Posted on 06/15/2008 9:55:46 AM PDT by neverdem
WASHINGTON — American and international investigators say that they have found the electronic blueprints for an advanced nuclear weapon on computers that belonged to the nuclear smuggling network run by Abdul Qadeer Khan, the rogue Pakistani nuclear scientist, but that they have not been able to determine whether they were sold to Iran or the smuggling...
--snip--
It was not until 2005 that officials of the I.A.E.A., which is based in Vienna, finally cracked the hard drives on the Khan computers recovered around the world. And as they sifted through files and images on the hard drives, investigators found tons of material — orders for equipment, names and places where the Khan network operated, even old love letters. In all, they found several terabytes of data, a huge amount to sift through.
“There was stuff about dealing with Iranians in 2003, about how to avoid intelligence agents,” said one official who had reviewed it. But the most important document was a digitized design for a nuclear bomb, one that investigators quickly recognized as Pakistani. “It was plain where this came from,” one senior official of the I.A.E.A. said. “But the Pakistanis want to argue that the Khan case is closed, and so they have said very little.”
In public statements, Pakistani officials have insisted that the Khan “incident,” as the call it, is now history, and they publicly declared nearly two years ago that their investigations are over.
A senior Pakistani official, interviewed in Islamabad in April, said that the information provided by the I.A.E.A. was “vague and incomplete,” and he insisted that because Dr. Khan’s laboratories specialized in the manufacture of the equipment needed to enrich uranium, “he was not involved in weapons designs.”
But investigators have no doubt that he was the source of the digitized bomb design...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I have stopped worrying about this. If they bomb us, then we will bomb them. By the time everyone has had their turn bombing each other, a truce will be called because no one will be left.
These peoples’ capabilities will be underestimated at everyone’s peril.
This is not possible, my “liberal” friends and relatives told me so.
They don’t have the technology, the centifuges, the wherewithall, etc. to build and deliver a nuke to NYC, DC and other American cities, so I’m not worried, depressed or paranoid about it at all. OK, sarcasm off.
We have nothing to worry abou,......BOOM!!!
If you think that 9/11 was bad (and of course, the dim Dhims DON’T) just wait til the nuclear 9/11 to come.
A nuclear exchange will not determine "who is right", but rather "who is left"! I have no doubt we will prevail, I just don't know if it would be that much better than loosing?
Regards,
GtG
PS That reminds me of an old political cartoon in which a "hollow-eyed" grunt stood alone on a blasted hilltop, smoking wreckage and bomb craters as far as the eye could see. He said "We won, I think"...
Is this the third thread? When it gets to eight it might have some modality.
Where's the first and second? I want to decide which one to link. Maybe I'll link all three.
I have zero faith in the I.A.E.A.
Does anyone believe the people in the UN can keep this information secure?
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2031438/posts
But who knows if this is the first or the tenth?
Thanks for the link.
tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-kaboom
I would not call it a certainty, but the odds are not at all in our favor. Given the mindset of a Jehadist terrorist and his eagerness to die for his share of the virgins, we have lost our ability to depend on MAD to deter an attack. MAD requires a rational opponent and they don't qualify.
They don't have anything to lose except their life and they are prepared to throw that away too. We are certainly at a disadvantage unless we can locate the source of the problem geographically and disinfect the entire region. The Arabs recognize and respect brutal strength if we have the "stones" to use it.
Regards,
GtG
:)
One Trident submarine can lay waste to all of Iran. We do not have the balls to use it.
Pakistan and Iran will never have the nuclear capability to destroy the USA. The USSR did, but they had 15,000+ nukes, some of them truly giant in size.
It will be years before the Islamic nuclear powers have even 100 bombs, much less the capability to deliver them in a militarily effective way.
IOW, Pakistan and Iran in five years might be able to hurt us. We’d lose a few cities. What they will probably never be able to do is defeat us militarily, punish us to the point where we can fight no more. OTOH, about one hour after they launch an attack, their countries will be radioactive ash. Those of their leaders who are not insane are fully aware of this fact.
The nuclear threat by posed by Islamic nuclear powers is quite literally at least two and possibly three orders of magnitude less than that posed by the USSR in its heyday.
Let’s try to keep some sense of proportion to our panic.
“I have zero faith in the I.A.E.A.”
The IAEA was set up to police nations that wanted to be policed. They have no power over “rogue” nations or groups.
I hear the same thing from liberals. “Oh, that can’t happen because it just can’t... blah blah blah.” These are the same people who will blame Bush when, not if, it does.
Thanks, NY Times, for offering up a little information to our enemies on how long their secrets are safe.
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