What role do nuclear weapons play in 21st-century military policy?

[multi]

President Bush is trying to persuade other nations—especially "rogue regimes"—to forgo their nuclear ambitions. Yet he is shoveling money to U.S. nuclear weapons laboratories as if the Soviet Union still existed and the Cold War still raged. more..

[schmooky007]

rogue nations with nuclear weapons are always dangerous because they tend to sell the technology to the highest bidder in order to sustain themselves. north korea is one example. pakistan is another. people (generally terrorists or nations who are aspiring to have nuclear capability) are willing to pay big money on the black market for nukes, especially portable warheads. in my opinion, nuclear weapons are an effective deterrent as long as they lay in the hands of responsible nations. while i think the US is a responsible nation, russia is certainly isn't. russia's stockpile on nuclear warheads is probably bigger than america's. yet in russia, scientists from the soviet era are selling the technology and materials on the black market for millions while the russian government sits back and do nothing. in fact, bush recently committed to putin $10 billion to get this problem under control. as for rogue nations like north korea, they sold nuclear technology to iran and syria. pakistan is widely believed to have been libya's largest supplier for parts and manuals on how to build nuclear bombs.

[miss_silver]

Originally posted by schmooky007
rogue nations with nuclear weapons are always dangerous because they tend to sell the technology to the highest bidder in order to sustain themselves. north korea is one example.pakistan is another.

Oh please!

Pakistan acquired the nuke bomb to protect against India, likewise, India has a nuke bomd to protect themselves form pakistan! to my knowledge, pakistan is the only muslum nation to have a nuke so far.

About North Korea, citizen there are so antagonised by "communists" thinking by their leader, even though he rides in luxury cars.

people (generally terrorists or nations who are aspiring to have nuclear capability) are willing to pay big money on the black market for nukes, especially portable warheads.

True

in my opinion, nuclear weapons are an effective deterrent as long as they lay in the hands of responsible nations. while i think the US is a responsible nation, russia is certainly isn't. russia's stockpile on nuclear warheads is probably bigger than america's.

Fuzzy math

Do you truly believe that anyone holding nuke warheads are truly responsible? No nation is responsible enough to be entrusted with the care of such a deadly weapon or just to yank the chain WMD. Just the fact to have a nuke, only one nuke is provocation enough Either it's US or Russia or North Korea or pakistan, it's still a weapon that will do damage if launched. No Country should have such a capibility!

yet in russia, scientists from the soviet era are selling the technology and materials on the black market for millions while the russian government sits back and do nothing.

It happens everywhere, anyone who has enough knowledge about uranium will know which type of uranium to buy to make a bomb, Hell, even the blueprints are on the net!

in fact, bush recently committed to putin $10 billion to get this problem under control. as for rogue nations like north korea, they sold nuclear technology to iran and syria. pakistan is widely believed to have been libya's largest supplier for parts and manuals on how to build nuclear bombs.

Then again, why is Bush spending much more money in the creation of new nukes? Is the US safer because it's armed to the teeth?

Armed peace was/is not a solution. to me the real terrorists are the one claiming to go to war for WMD when they have some of their own!

Just so you know, with the right connections and the right information access, anybody could build a nuke.

Just a thought

[JackSpratts]

Just so you know, with the right connections and the right information access, anybody could build a nuke.

Just a thought

that's a fact.

"John Aristotle Phillips is no stranger to the spotlight. As an undergraduate at Princeton University in the late 1970S, he demonstrated how to design an atomic bomb using information available in public documents. That drew the attention of the CIA, FBI, foreign governments and Hollywood."

he gave a speech i attended in connecticut in '79, and he was trailed by spooks and corporate types from the likes of the big nuclear divisions of westinghouse and abb etc.

he claimed, and it was generally agreed to by experts who read his paper on how to do it that almost anybody could design an effective bomb using information commonly held in larger libraries (this was pre-web). he was a smart guy but he was only a sophomore at the time, no post-doc he, not even a phd. in the following 30 years it hasn't gotten any more difficult to achieve. my guess is that cad/cam has made it a lot easier.

there are no safe nuclear bombs nor safe countries with them, not even ours.

- js.

[schmooky007]

Originally posted by miss_silver
Pakistan acquired the nuke bomb to protect against India, likewise, India has a nuke bomd to protect themselves form pakistan! to my knowledge, pakistan is the only muslum nation to have a nuke so far.

reality check: pakistan is hardly a stable nation. pervez musharraf is not a democratically-elected leader, and pakistani scientists have openly sold nuclear technology to rogue nations such as libya. these scientists could not have done such dealings without the knowledge of top people in musharraf's inner circle.

just because the bush administration choose to look the other way for a time because musharraf is helping them, to some extent, to capture al-kaida militants doesn't mean that pakistan is in any way a responsible nation. and india has much to be concerned about. pakistan is too unstable. pakistan continues to finance islamic terrorists that kill indian civilians on a regular basis. the global war on terror created a surge of radical islam in pakistan. can you imagine what will happen should islamic fundamentalists come to power in pakistan? the way these two countries publically taunt each other with nukes is stupid. imo neither of them should have such weapons because neither countries are responsible enough to have such power.

Fuzzy math

Do you truly believe that anyone holding nuke warheads are truly responsible?

yes. maybe the US is not the perfect example, but yes, i believe there are responsible nations who have nuclear weapons and don't sell the technology to any other country, let alone terrorists.

No nation is responsible enough to be entrusted with the care of such a deadly weapon or just to yank the chain WMD. Just the fact to have a nuke, only one nuke is provocation enough Either it's US or Russia or North Korea or pakistan, it's still a weapon that will do damage if launched. No Country should have such a capibility!

well, now with the end of the cold war and europe reconciliation and unifying, nukes are becoming less of a necessity. nonetheless if you want to maintain the title of "superpower" i guess some countries think "they have theirs, i have mine" though no one is probably gonna use their nukes against another country.

It happens everywhere, anyone who has enough knowledge about uranium will know which type of uranium to buy to make a bomb, Hell, even the blueprints are on the net!

you're right but it's not that simple. you still need an engineer to weaponize the uranium and this is something that not every person can do. there's definitely no shortage of such people.

Then again, why is Bush spending much more money in the creation of new nukes?

he's spending more money trying to eliminate nukes from getting into the hands of terrorists. i think bush is acute to the threat of scientists in former soviet blocs selling their knowledge and technology to terrorists or rogue nations to create compact nuclear weapons. the money america spends on its own nukes probably has to with upgrading and maintaining as well as eliminating some of its unconventional arsenal.

Is the US safer because it's armed to the teeth?

yes, it is, in a conventional way. but with raging global terrorism it isn't safe at all. terrorists like bin ladin already proved they don't care what weapons you have. they certainly don't see nukes as a deterrent not to launch terrorism on american soil.

[Nicobie]

Originally posted by schmooky007
reality check: pakistan is hardly a stable nation.

And Israel IS?

Schmook, you have just expressed the best rational for the US invading Israel I've ever read.

Talk about WMD stolen from the US...............