Posted on 07/31/2005 7:28:58 PM PDT by Hillary'sMoralVoid
We hear the chilling news about the possibility of suitcase nukes inside our borders, we hear that 10, maybe even 20 of our cities may be at risk.
The risk we face is nothing compared to what the Islamic World faces if terrorists choose to escalate the war on terror.
We currently have Poseiden Nuclear Submarines on patrol in the Indian Ocean. No terrorist could ever find them, much less destroy them. A single sub can unleash 50 missiles with pinpoint accuracy, each with a warhead bigger than the sum of even 20 suitcase nukes.
If the terrorists want to ensure that there would be no retaliation, they would have to destroy not only our major cities, but also our bombers, our land-based missile systems, our complete command and control network, and our nuclear submarines.
They cannot do this, and escalation brings with it such huge risks of anihilation of the Islamic world that it would seem incomprehensible that they would try to raise the stakes. Let's hope it doesn't come to that.
The fact that the victims of retaliation would only be loosely related to the perpetrators makes retaliation very difficult, and morally shaky. It would, however, be satisfying, and I am personally in favor of prompt retaliation for any strike inside the US.
OTOH, internment of muslims, expulsion of all non-citizens, and a finding from the attorney general that islam is more a political entity than a religion, and therefore not subject to constitutional protection, might be a better form of retaliation for non-nuclear attacks.
Bah. People said the same thing when Israel rose for the third time.
My question is, will its destruction make them stronger or weaker?
You may as well ask whether their attacking us with nukes is going to make us stronger or weaker. That's the real question.
Congressman Curt Weldon was told by a War Secretary in Russia that they did have over 100 suitcase nukes that had gone missing. It is not an urban myth.
"Ok, a suitcase nuke has just vaporized lower Manhatten, whom do you propose to retaliate against?"
Start with France.
Do people seriously think if Mecca was destroyed Muslims would shrug and become Presbyterians or something?
The Mecca-retaliation thing doesn't sound so bad...but then they'd (terrorists) probably go after the Crystal Cathedral, or any number of shrines.
If the enemy is counting on that, they may have misread him when he stood on the pile of rubble in NYC the day after.
ya know, something about the this thread made me think that the Chinese and the terrorists have something in common....
Mutually Assured Destruction wouldn't have turned any Soviet comrade into a capitalist either. And lo...it worked just fine.
I'm sorry. If they did this, America would probably not retaliate in any significant way. They will declare Islam a "religion of peace" and say that terrorists are not countries and spare the Muslim side anything beyond a few "surgical strikes".
It might be nice to think we would nuke Mecca or Teheran in retaliation but America and their leaders won't have the will to do it.
The logical argument against this is that we won't know who to retalliate against.
What is left out is that after even one US city is hit by a nuke logic will not be part of the equation.
The entire islamic world will be toast.
Every mosque.
Every Muslim.
Everywhere.
There will be a bloodbath not seen since the days of the Mongol hordes.
The holocaust, horrific and mechanistic as it was, will be seen as rational compared to the complete elimination of all vestiges of Islam and Arab culture.
The side effects will be horrific and very long lasting.
Sort of like what they did with 5th century Buddhist statues, the Church of the Nativity and the Tomb of Joseph, right?
Sorry to wake you up to reality, but they've ALREADY STARTED.
I wasn't exactly sleeping...I was thinking of places on U.S. soil.
And lo...they've already attacked us...on U.S. soil.
The fears you bear have already been realized. Time to stop living in fear. It's much too late for that.
I believe that the Constitution allows letters of amrque that are authorized by Congress. How much is a cruise missle anyway? MOABs? C130 time?
In short, the US does not have the political will.
What I would propose is to tell every Islamic government precisely what the consequences to them would be if a nuclear device was ever exploded in the US. Part of in would be that their holy sites would be totally destroyed, that they would be replaced with persons of our choosing, and that the would cease to exist as an independent political unit.
All Islamic controlled countries must know that we are deadly serious.
Seadevil, You are correct about Trident, that is the current SLBM, with the MIRVed weapons they can attack at least 50 independent targets, perhaps more than 100.
I think that we'll eventually develop a target list (if not already), just like we had with the Soviets. If war is waged in the name of Islam, we will retaliate against Islam, through a prioritized list of targets.
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