Replies

No I disagree.

If a terrorist group detonates low yeield nuclear weapons in, say, NYC, DC, and Los Angeles, just as an example. The entire cities would not be destroyed, most likely - initial blast crater would be a few blocks, and fires would rage for a few blocks more radiating outward.

The cities would be terribly damagaed, and the impact would be felt citywide - gas pipes exploding, fire racing down subway tunnels, and not enough police and firemen to control the disaster.

Say 50,000+ dead in each city, several hundred thousand more burned or injured in each city.

OK, Einstein, who do you nuke in response? A major muslim city? A holy site? So kill millions of innocent people over the murder of our innocent people? Ruin one of their holy sites over what an admittedly small minority of their culture did? What does that accomplish?

The correct response is attack those directly responsible - using a nuke is like using a dozen grenades when a 9mm gun is better suited.

Nobody in the US leadership will kill 100,000s of innocent people, even after a terrorist WMD attack stateside.

"And you know it," patronizing subtext notwithstanding.

If a terrorist group detonates low yeield nuclear weapons in, say, NYC, DC, and Los Angeles, just as an example. The entire cities would not be destroyed, most likely - initial blast crater would be a few blocks, and fires would rage for a few blocks more radiating outward. True, the entire city would not be destroyed, but your estimation of a the effect of a 'low yeild' nuclear blast is off. The heat, blast and radiation would immediately kill immediately everyone within 3/4 a mile in every direction, even people in reinforced buildings. Nearly everyone exposed out of doors out to 3 miles would be killed or terribly burned within 10-15 seconds after the blast(people make fun of the 'Duck and Cover' films, but lowering your exposure immediately after a blast increases your chances for survival exponentially). 5 - 8 miles out, most buildings would be severly damaged. Flying glass and other objects would injure a large number. Radiation from fallout would start to effect people down wind within the hour.

Well, a more effective response to a domestic detonation of a nuke than our own nuclear retalliation would be to expell %100 percent of muslims here in the US and tightly (can we borrow your wall Israel?) seal our borders.

After a domestic nuclear detonation, be it one at 1kt or 10 at 1mt, our response domestically will do more to either ensure our defeat or champion our victory.

Again I fall back on the Medieval analogies.

When clans of old were warring, say for example the Boar vs. the Horse, you would not find "Boar communities" within the walls of the Horse kingdom.
Their walls would be up and any people with affiliations to the opposing clan would be persona non grata (if not straight out killed).

Now granted those wars of old were (mostly) land/nobiity based. This war however, like it or not politicos(dems, and reps), IS about religion. The agressor dictates the terms. Since Islam and those who would kill without discretion have time and again stated in so many words that their actions are just as much based in Islam as in any policies the "west" has, it by default has become a holy war.

Muslims present in America are akin to Boars in the streets among the Horse kingdom.

People decry what happened to the Japanese during WWII, but we ended up winning that one didn't we. Also, comparing radical Islam to Japanese imperialism is a huge mistake with it's own consequenses. If the Japanese were not interned during WWII we may have had some sabotage or lost some agents/assets to spys and sleepers.
If we do not shore up our internal terrorist potential we could glow with nuclear after-effects, and loose thousands to epidemics never before seen.

Have we forgotton history?
Sometimes I wonder about the leaders...

"If a terrorist group detonates low yeield nuclear weapons in, say, NYC, DC, and Los Angeles, just as an example. The entire cities would not be destroyed, most likely - initial blast crater would be a few blocks, and fires would rage for a few blocks more radiating outward.
"The cities would be terribly damagaed, and the impact would be felt citywide - gas pipes exploding, fire racing down subway tunnels, and not enough police and firemen to control the disaster.
"Say 50,000+ dead in each city, several hundred thousand more burned or injured in each city.
"OK, Einstein, who do you nuke in response? A major muslim city? A holy site? So kill millions of innocent people over the murder of our innocent people? Ruin one of their holy sites over what an admittedly small minority of their culture did? What does that accomplish?

"The correct response is attack those directly responsible - using a nuke is like using a dozen grenades when a 9mm gun is better suited."

The attack on 9/11/2001 was an act of war WORSE than Pearl Harbor. It occurred on our soil, against innocents, including women and children. At least Pearl was against a military installation not on American soil.

The event of 9/11 was ample justification for a formal declaration of war against Islam--and for any form of retaliation we had the capacity to inflict.

Had I been President on 9/12/2001, you could still see the glowing patches that once were capital cities of terror supporting states, and Mecca and Medina would have been reduced to their component atoms.

No mercy. No quarter. This is war, and we are in denial. Specifically, you are in denial.

One lesson: the death of one American is worth the deaths of (say) 100,000 Arabs. They understand only violence, overwhelming force and superiority--and we should have administered it long ago. To do otherwise shows only weakness and invites more attacks.

--Boris

Yeah, you sound just like John alQerry: What alQerry and you both embrace is to treat the war on terrorism as a law enforcement issue; i.e., just bring to justice those who actually committed the act of terror. By your logic, suicide bombers are "brought to justice" when they blow themselves up (and countless innocents along with them). Thus, you would advocate abandoning Bush's WOT right now, because the 19 terrorists who carried out 9/11 died in the attacks, so they "were brought to justice." Suicide bombers are bred quite easily in the Islamist world, so we'd be facing acts of terrorism against us from now until ddomsday if we were to follow your line of thinking. I subsribe to the concept of total war when we are fighting for our national and cultural survival (yes, survival, because th eIslamists will not stop until they are either destroyed or they turn America into an Islamic republic: You know that, and that is not a patronizing comment). My comment about nuking them was in response to them nuking us first. And in reality, if they do get a nuke, they will use it, and you cannot dispute that. And yes, I'd turn their holy sites into green glass.

The correct response is attack those directly responsible - using a nuke is like using a dozen grenades when a 9mm gun is better suited.

Using the nuke does 2 things. First it is the offical public policy of the US to use nukes if we are hit by WMD. The second reason and the better reason is the history of islam. Islam seems to go through militant stages and only stops its militancy when it has been horrified into a quiet phase.

Having said that I still doubt we would do it overtly when terrorist are the perps, a nuke or WMD will fall into the hands of some new anti-islamic terror organization (btw it does not have to be US sponsered, the Russians have an islamic problem also and they have a much looser control of their weapons).