They are a mostly united force, but not a sovereign nation. The question is: Is our love for freedom more powerful than their religious zeal?
I dont mean to be disrespectful but I think your ID says it all.
You give them (Al Quieda or any Muslim terrorist organization) too much credit.
As with most mindsets that are warped and prideful(in regards to reality) and they simply misjudged the situation.
Let's say for the sake of arguement that they did have 20 Nuclear suitcases...then why wait until the entire Arab population in this country gets put through a strainer?
Why use an airplane to attack the pentagon when you could've nuked it and been done with it?
No...if they were wanting to use them as bargaining chips then that would be stupid....once they used or produced one(required if the threat was going to be taken seriously)...then the whole country would be locked down, borders frozen and manned by the active military, Marshal law declared, DC emptied out (literally), shoot-on-site 24 hour curfew, and every single arab in this country regardless of descent would be rounded up and taken away until we found them or were comfortable that we could manage the threat and prevent a detonation...not to mention the military response everywhere overseas. The economy of the planet hinges on ours and when push comes to shove....Europe and the bulk of the rest of the planet would shake out their pockets too.
Obtaining and detonating a Nuclear device as a threat would guarantee the extinction of the Muslim terrorist.
The only way to appraoch this country from a nuclear standpoint is if you got em use em all at once.
Anything less is suicide. If they did want to use them as a bargaining chip then why wouldnt they have pulled that card to at least insure the survival of the lone country that they ran...Afghanistan?
This country has the Best and Brightest focused on the situation now...
There are no Suitcase Nukes inside of the United States that the US Military doesnt own and control.