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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend
Sweden
9688 Posts |
 Posted - 03/21/2008 : 14:38:31 [Permalink]
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bngbuck, can we agree on this scenario?
One, or even ten 100ton yield home made terrorist nukes, would not disable USA's ability to launch a nuclear counter strike against a nuclear pre-emptive strike launched from either Russia or China? |
Dr. Mabuse - "When the going gets tough, the tough get Duct-tape..."
Dr. Mabuse whisper.mp3
"Equivocation is not just a job, for a creationist it's a way of life..." Dr. Mabuse
Support American Troops in Iraq:
Send them unarmed civilians for target practice..
Collateralmurder. |
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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 03/21/2008 : 19:06:46 [Permalink]
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Dr. Mabuse.....
bngbuck, can we agree on this scenario?
One, or even ten 100ton yield home made terrorist nukes, would not disable USA's ability to launch a nuclear counter strike against a nuclear pre-emptive strike launched from either Russia or China? |
Well, Dr. Mabuse, I first stated on March 17....| 3/17/08 00:25:21 If ten such 100 megaton explosions were triggered within minutes of each other - the ability of the United States to effectively function for some time would be very seriously damaged! We would be able to unleash nuclear hell times 1000 on ......whom? And......why? Because with stealth entry of the terrorists into the U.S., and total vaporization of themselves along with their targets, how could we blame a particular nation as the originator of the attack and proceed to vaporize them? |
Again...3/17/08 23:27;22 I have no doubt that we would have and use our nuclear ability to respond to this kind of secondary attack from another nation!
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Again...3/21/08 00:53:00 All I can say here is that one would hope that Russian and Chinese leaders would understand that disabling Washington would not disable our retaliatory ability - as I acknowledged on 3/17 here:
any nation not associated with the terrorists but mistakenly thinking that the US was too crippled to retaliate, thus engaging in a nuclear attack on the U.S.! I said...We would be able to unleash nuclear hell times 1000 on ......whom? And......why? |
Again...| 3/21/08 00:53:00 But the military is decentralised with a very structured chain of command. A nuke in D.C. would not prevent USA from launching a nuclear counter-attack. There is no doubt in my mind concerning this, and I have expressed that several times in this thread! |
Again....
| 3/21/08 12:05;36 If everything within the Beltway in Washington was totally vaporised in a single instant of nuclear explosion, the U.S. military would still be completely capable of sending a barrage of fusion bombs to any place on the surface of the earth! And there would be many demanding that we do just that! |
Dr. Mabuse, that's five times in four days that I have clearly stated that "One, or even ten 100ton yield home made terrorist nukes, would not disable USA's ability to launch a nuclear counter strike against a nuclear pre-emptive strike launched from either Russia or China"
I do not know how I could make the point more clear!!
Is there some problem with the "inertia" of my mind, or my disabling senility here, Dr. Mabuse?
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Chippewa
SFN Regular
USA
1496 Posts |
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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 03/22/2008 : 03:01:30 [Permalink]
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Dude.....
Well, I now have been fully informed by you that I am a stupid, intolerably boorish and absurd ass of invincible ignorance who is grasping for straws, falsely representing you and inventing things that I pretend you say; that I am full of shit and that my old ass is in danger of being blown up by a nuclear bomb!
You are going to stop speaking to me if I continue to act like Marfknox; and actually I could be Marfknox as I have so successfully adopted her style!
However, you are barely irritated and certainly not angry; even though you are done arguing with me and..... you want to know why you still are arguing!
Hmmnnnn!
Considering everything, I think it would be best if you rested a bit while I await replies from Frank Barnaby and Robert Serber, both of whom I have written tonight!
When I have additional reference information on the topics we have been so civilly discussing, I will resume posting in this thread.
Thank you for the respectful and gentlemanly discourse we have had so far! I appreciate your courtesy!
| You probably think its clever or amusing, but it is actually intolerably boorish. And stupid. |
| I'm going to stop speaking to you if you continue to behave like marfknox. |
| you could BE marfknox in this thread, since you have adopted her inane style of argument so thoroughly. |
| Ok, you will irritate me if you continue to mischaracterize what I am saying. |
| Angry? I'm barely irritated by you. Certainly not angry. |
| I'm done arguing with you. |
Just you being a deliberate ass.
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| But hey, I said I wasn't arguing this with you any more, so whay am I? I recognize invincible ignorance when I encounter it, |
| Yet another false representation by you. Good job. |
| I know you aren't stupid, yet, for some reason, you appear to be suffering from that condition in this thread. |
| Now, in addition to grasping at straws, you are full of shit. |
| You are inventing things to pretend I said them. |
| The absurdity of this statement doesn't deserve a response. |
| So yes, you can say there is a posibility of a terrorist getting a nuke and blowing your old ass up with it, |
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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend
Sweden
9688 Posts |
Posted - 03/22/2008 : 06:16:17 [Permalink]
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During the last 50+ years, the nuclear super powers has managed to no blow ourselves up, thanks to the doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction.
USA, Russia (Soviet Union), and China has managed to stay their hand simply because each nation knows that initiating a nuclear strike means the end of the world as we know it. Tension between these three nations have lessened considerably since the Cold War, and the threat is lower than ever.
50+ years of not blowing the world to hell with nukes is a pretty good record, and from todays political climate, there is no reason to think there wouldn't continue to be "nuclear" peace.
Now that there is no doubt, bngbuck, that you agree that a terrorist nuke will not affect USA's launch-capability, can't you see that a terrorist nuke is irrelevant to a MAD-scenario?
Everyone knows that a terrorist nuke won't stop USA from retaliating. So launching a preemptive strike will cause mutual destruction, regardless of a terrorist nuke or not. Therefore, China or Russia will not initiate a nuclear attack on USA. It's as simple as that.
That is why I claim that a terrorist nuke is irrelevant to any MAD scenario. And that is also why I continue say that your scenario with a "shadow preemptive" strike against USA is ludicrous.
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Dr. Mabuse - "When the going gets tough, the tough get Duct-tape..."
Dr. Mabuse whisper.mp3
"Equivocation is not just a job, for a creationist it's a way of life..." Dr. Mabuse
Support American Troops in Iraq:
Send them unarmed civilians for target practice..
Collateralmurder. |
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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend
Sweden
9688 Posts |
Posted - 03/22/2008 : 06:30:03 [Permalink]
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| When I wrote "Everyone knows" I meant everyone with a rudimentary understanding on history and military power (and use thereof). Your basic high-school graduate should qualify for "everyone", for the purpose of this discussion. |
Dr. Mabuse - "When the going gets tough, the tough get Duct-tape..."
Dr. Mabuse whisper.mp3
"Equivocation is not just a job, for a creationist it's a way of life..." Dr. Mabuse
Support American Troops in Iraq:
Send them unarmed civilians for target practice..
Collateralmurder. |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 03/22/2008 : 06:55:38 [Permalink]
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bng said:
| Thank you for the respectful and gentlemanly discourse we have had so far! I appreciate your courtesy! |
Yeah, fail to make a lucid point, then initiate a giant red-herring to distract the thread away from your failure. Whatever.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 03/22/2008 : 16:21:51 [Permalink]
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Dude].....
In your last post that referred to the subject matter of this thread, you stated:| I cite a nuclear physicist on the simplicity of making a nuclear bomb (if you had access to the uranium), then you shift the context away from that point (without acknowledging that my point is correct) and claim that his opinion on the probability of a nuclear terror attack means that he doesn't support my position? Uh huh. Obviously he doesn't have the same opinion as I do (at the time he wrote the book anyway) of how likely a nuclear attack on the US would be, but that is entirely irrelevant to my other point. |
I then replied (relevant to the subject):| Considering everything, I think it would be best if you rested a bit while I await replies from Frank Barnaby and Robert Serber, both of whom I have written tonight! When I have additional reference information on the topics we have been so civilly discussing, I will resume posting in this thread. |
to which you replied:| Yeah, fail to make a lucid point, then initiate a giant red-herring to distract the thread away from your failure. Whatever. |
I have yet to make any point in reference to your specific citation of Frank Barnaby's paragraph in his book, How to Build a Nuclear Bomb. I wrote him yesterday and I don't expect an answer until sometime next week. I also wrote Robert Serber, author of The Los Alamos Primer. I received an e-mail from his publisher (he had written numerous books on the subject of nuclear weapons) stating that Serber was deceased, but that I should direct my inquiries to Richard Rhodes, whom I have mentioned here earlier as the quintessential nuclear weapons historian.
I have done that, and I expect a significant amount of clarification on the issues we have been discussing in this thread when I receive replies from both these gentlemen! I will resume posting in this thread when I have received responses from both Barnaby and Rhodes!
I don't see that waiting to receive elaboration from the author of the reference you cited is in any way failing to make a lucid point, nor is it a "red herring". Wiki defines "red herring" as:| A red herring is a metaphor for a diversion or distraction from an original objective. In other words, this means it diverts you from your goal. |
I am in no way diverted from my goal. Quite the reverse, I am assiduously pursuing additional information from the same source you cited as authoritative in this field. This will certainly provide you with additional evidence of my stupidity and ignorance, so you can satisfactorily conclude the defense of your assertions and complete your presentation of me as an ass. |
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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 03/22/2008 : 22:06:07 [Permalink]
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Dr. Mabuse.....
I will not be able to respond to your last post until sometime next week. My wife and I are going to Vegas for Easter, sort of Rejoice the Resurrection with Roulette! Kind of came up in a hurry, her boss has a plane and asked if we wanted to go -- so see you next week! |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 03/22/2008 : 22:47:41 [Permalink]
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bng said:
| This will certainly provide you with additional evidence of my stupidity and ignorance, so you can satisfactorily conclude the defense of your assertions and complete your presentation of me as an ass. |
You are presenting yourself as an ass in this thread, I see no need to help you!
Make sure you get some specific answers to these questions from the authors:
1. How, and from whom, can a terrorist aquire enough uranium or plutonium to build a crude nuclear bomb?
2. How, and from whom, would a terrorist aquire an already functional nuclear bomb?
3. What is the specific probability of either of those events happening and what data do you use and how do you calculate it?
Answers to those three questions, in detail, could help your argument.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 03/26/2008 : 01:07:43 [Permalink]
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Dr. Mabuse......
You stated on 3/22:| During the last 50+ years, the nuclear super powers has managed to no blow ourselves up, thanks to the doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction. there is no reason to think there wouldn't continue to be "nuclear" peace. |
Also, | So launching a preemptive strike will cause mutual destruction, regardless of a terrorist nuke or not. |
I must assume that your repeated references to a "shadow" terrorist nuclear attack refer to a prelude to, or possibly even an planned initial stage of a major first strike of a missle-equipped entity upon the United States.
My original statement on 3/17 was:| I do not believe that these terror events alone would constitute a threat to end civilization as we know it; but what might follow could be such a threat if eventually major nuclear war broke out with massive nuclear exchanges between nations - because of opportunism on the part of Russia, China, or even a consortium of nuclear armed Arab states,to take advantage of the United States weakened posture after such an enormous terrorist attack. That might well be a threat to "the very things that make civilization possible". |
My thought, as clearly stated in the above paragraph, was that after a highly destructive terrorist attack on D.C. and perhaps other critical targets, the U.S. would be in a state of shock, to say the least. Of course our military capability would only be slightly compromised, and we would be fully capable of launching any number of nuclear strikes to anywhere in the world! With the destruction of the commander in chief and all or most of his successors, we would undoubtedly be in a state of emergency and of martial law!
The war, retaliation, and nuclear policies of the country would presumably be in the hands of some civilian, but the foreign policy of the country would undoubtedly be focused overwhelmingly on finding the perpetuator of the terrorist attacks and destroying them, and the conclusions of the largely intact military establishment would most probably dominate!!
Depending upon the reasoning power and mental stability of the leaders of the political entities that possessed nuclear missles, the danger of a pre-emptive strike would at least be heightened at this unfortunate point in history. MAD, as a deterrent, might certainly be considered by such leaders, but if their balance of terror calculations were distorted by faulty intelligence (such as we {the US} certainly have been shown to possess!), and powerful political motives, such a strike most certainly might be considered (see below, critics of the MAD doctrine)!
Perhaps the scenario of a nation such as Russia or China daring to attack the U.S.A. is unthinkable to you; but the possibility - some time in the future - of an Arab nation or consortioum of Arab nations or political organizations, financed by Arab - possibly Saudi - oil money, possessing nuclear warheads and, if not of ICBM, at least of Into-Israel range, is certainly not unthinkable to me. I firmly believe that an Arab-based nuclear attack on Israel would be instantaneously met by a 10X return by the Israelis - irrespective of where it came from!
If such an attack was directed toward the U.S.,and the geographical source could be identified, I am reasonable sure there would be nuclear retaliation! Particularly if Mr. McCain becomes our next president!
Wiki's opinion follows:
| Critics of the MAD doctrine note the similarity between the acronym and the common word for mental illness. The d |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 03/26/2008 : 04:32:50 [Permalink]
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bng said:
| see it as an "absurd" scenario! |
That nuclear weapons will be used in anger, at some point in the future, is not absurd. Its probably inevitable.
The idea that the US's response to being nuked, the nuking of whomever we discover to be responsible, would set off some catastrophic MAD scenario with another nuclear state.... now THAT is absurd.
All the arguments against MAD fall apart (or are seriously challenged) because of one basic human desire, to stay alive. We already have a huge nuclear superpower run by a religious fanatic.... and he hasn't launched a pre-emptive strike on the nations who will be in major competition with us for oil (though he did launch a war to take physical control of a big oil field).
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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bngbuck
SFN Addict
USA
2437 Posts |
Posted - 03/26/2008 : 21:18:42 [Permalink]
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Dude.....
On 3/22 you stated:| I cite a nuclear physicist on the simplicity of making a nuclear bomb (if you had access to the uranium), then you shift the context away from that point (without acknowledging that my point is correct) and claim that his opinion on the probability of a nuclear terror attack means that he doesn't support my position? Uh huh. Obviously he doesn't have the same opinion as I do |
Then again on 3/22.....| You are presenting yourself as an ass in this thread, I see no need to help you! |
and.....Make sure you get some specific answers to these questions from the authors:
1. How, and from whom, can a terrorist aquire enough uranium or plutonium to build a crude nuclear bomb?
|
In order to fully complete my presentation of myself as a total ass I would simply like to quote further from Dr. Barnaby's book, How to Build a Nuclear Bomb, pp 112-117. There is no need to ask him the question you pose above, he fully answers it in the same book from which you quoted! Perhaps if you read the entire book instead of picking out sentences that you agree with? Although highly enriched uranium may be the ideal material for constructing a terrorist nuclear explosive, a terrorist group may find it easier to to acquire civil plutonium originally produced in nuclear-power reactors used to generate electricity. Because of reprocessing, civil plutonium is becoming more available and it is increasingly possible for a terrorist group to steal or otherwise illegally acquire some.
Of particular concern, is the growing trade in civil mixed-oxide (MOX) nuclear fuel. Mixing plutonium oxide with uranium oxide produces MOX. The plutonium oxide is that separated in reprocessing plants from spent nuclear-power reactor fuel elements. MOX is produced in Belgium, France, and the UK. It is used to fuel nuclear –power reactors in France, Germany, Sweden, and Switzerland. Japan plans to to use MOX fuel in its nuclear-power reactors. MOX is therefore, transported to from France and the UK to Germany, Sweden, and Switzerland and will be transported from France and the UK to Japan.
If terrorists acquire MOX fuel, they could easily remove the plutonium oxide from it chemically, and use it to fabricate a nuclear weapon. The storage and fabrication of MOX fuel assemblies, their transportation and storage at nuclear-power stations on a scale envisaged by the nuclear industry will be extremely difficult to protect. The risk of diversion or theft of fuel pellets or whole fuel assemblies by personnel within the industry or by armed and organized terrorist groups is a terrifying possibility.
The operators of the nuclear-power reactors that use MOX fuel may want to send their spent MOX fuel elements for reprocessing. They therefore demand that the spent MOX fuel can be dissolved in nitric acid for ease of reprocessing. This requirement makes it much easierfor terrorists to separate chemically the plutonium from uranium in MOX.
None of the concepts involved in understanding how to separate the plutonium are difficult; a second-year undergraduate might be able to devise a suitable procedure by reading standard reference works, consulting the open literature in scientific journals, and by searching the World Wide Web. The progress of the separation can be estimated easily at different stages by measuring the concentrations of uranium and plutonium, by, for example, ultraviolet spectophotrometry, using cheap and readily available equipment.
A primitive nuclear explosive constructed fro plutonium oxide may have an explosive yield smaller and less predictable than a device constructed from plutonium metal. The terrorists, therefore, may decide to prepare plutonium metal from the plutonium oxide they may have separated from MOX nuclear fuel. This can be done by using standard chemical techniques.
(The author proceeds to give details)
The sheer amount of plutonium in the world is itself an incitement to nuclear terrorism. Plutonium was first discovered in 1940 and, as we have seen, first produced in significant amounts as part of the Manhattan Project, set up by the Americans in the Second World War to manufacture nuclear weapons. Since 1945, the world has produced a huge amount of plutonium – a total of about 1500 tons. About 250 tons of this plutonium was produced for use in nuclear weapons. The other 1250 tons are civilian plutonium produced as an inevitable by-product by civilian nuclear-power reactors while they are generating electricity.
About 300 tons have been produced from spent nuclear-power reactor fuel elements in reprocessing plants, about 550 tons will be separated by the year 2010. About 20,000 nuclear weapons could be fabricated from the 300 or so tons of separated civil plutonium in the world today.
About 80 tons are in France, about 60 tons in the UK, about 50 tons in Japan, and about 40 tons in each of Germany and Russia. Amounts less than 8 tons are in each of Belgium, India< Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland, and the USA. |
Your second question is answered on pp 138-144If a terrorist group wants to fabricate nuclear weapons, it would have to have plutonium or highly enriched uranium. Clearly, action to prevent the acquisition by terrorists of WMD should focus on the physical protection of the key materials, which must take into account the relatively small amounts of the materials needed to make a WMD.
Counterterrorist agencies are particularly concerned that terrorists will acquire fissile materials, plutonium and highly enriched uranium, from nuclear smugglers and use them to fabricate a nuclear explosive. These materials are ideal for smuggling. A kilogram of weapons-grade plutonium would be worth at least 2 million US dollars on the black market. About the size of a golf ball, it could be smuggled across borders very easily. More than 100 scientific and industrial institutions and facilities in Russia and some other ex-Soviet republics keep nuclear fissile materials. Many of these establishments are in cities controlled by the Russian Mafia. Estimates suggest that there are about 6000 Mafia gangs in Russia with a membership of more than 100,000 criminals. It is hardly surprising that many fear that nuclear material is in the hands of the Mafia or soon will be acquired by it.
There are fears that some ex-Soviet complete nuclear weapons are missing. After the former Soviet Union collapsed, there were about 30,000 nuclear weapons on Soviet soil. The risk that a few of them will be illegally acquired is significant. The smaller tactical nuclear weapons such as artillery shells or nuclear land mines are the most vulnerable to theft. The trunk of a car would be sufficient transport for one or two of these.
It is very doubtful that a complete inventory of the ex-Soviet nuclear weapons exists. The Soviet bureaucies were so confident that their nuclear weapons were safe, being so closely guarded by the KGB and the military, that they probably did not bother to record them at all!
(The author goes on to document in detail intercepted smugglings of bomb materials in the mid-to-late '90's) |
Finally, you ask:
| 3. What is the specific probability of either of those events happening and what data do you use and how do you calculate it? |
Being neither a statistician nor a probability theorist, Dr. Barnaby will likely be unable to calculate the specific probability of an event for which there is no relevant past data of similar or related events. Even though I am stupid and ignorant, I studied probability theory and sampling statistics extensively at the graduate level many years ago. I know of no statistical, mathematical, or Boolean algebraic process that can deal with stochastic variables such as those implicit in the problem you pose, and come up with "specific probabilities"
Dr. Barnaby's statements are opinions, nothing more or less. So are your statements and mine. Presumably, the more informed an opinion is, the more persuasive it becomes. My opinions on these subjects are nowhere near as informed as Frank Barnaby's or Richard Rhodes. It is for that reason that I have written to both of these experts as to their specific views on the matters we have been discussing here. I am sure that I will get a much better view of this subject when I hear from both of them.
However, opinions as to the answer of least two of the questions you have posed - How acquire nuclear bomb fuel and from where such fuel can be obtained; and - How and from whom obtain a functional weapon - have been substantially provided by Dr. Barnaby in his book which you cited.
Now, I understand that your expertise is in agreement with certain of Dr. Barnaby's statements and strongly in disagreement with others. I suspect you will not agree with the opinions of his I have quoted verbatim above.
All I can say, is that he certainly is more of an informed expert than I; and if he provides elaboration on his comment regarding the ease with which a crude fission bomb can be fabricated which confirms the "child's play" characterization presented by you and Dr. Mabuse, and that view is confirmed by Richard Rhodes, who is a lecturing, consulting, Pulitzer Prize winning expert on nuclear weapons - I will most certainly change my appraisal of the difficulty of such a fabrication. I cannot in any way substantiate a position that my opinion is superior to anyone's whose education, training, and experience has been focused on this subject for most of their lives! I will leave it to you to decide for yourself as to whether or not to agree with the highly informed opinions of Dr. Barnaby and Rhodes!
However, I must say that the entire thrust and content of Barnaby's book (which I have read in it's entireity) is very strongly that we (the United States) are indeed in very substantial danger of one or more nuclear terrorist attacks - as you might suspect from his statement that| "A group of two or three people with appropriate skills could design and fabricate a crude nuclear explosive. It is a sobering fact that the fabrication of a primitive nuclear explosive using plutonium or suitable uranium would require no greater skill than that required for the production and use of the nerve agent produced by the AUM group and released in the Tokyo underground" |
His entire book How to Build a Nuclear Bomb is dedicated to the proposition that the U.S. very likely will be subjected to a terrorist WMD attack of one sort or another!
That may be reason for you to discount his entire book except for the sentence that you like.
Being absurd, stupid, full of shit, a deliberate ass and grasping at straws; I intend to take Barnaby at face value on all his statements for now until I hear from him and Rhodes, at which time I feel I will be able to construct a somewhat more substantiated view of these matters than simply my current layman's opinion! |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 03/26/2008 : 23:30:40 [Permalink]
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bng said:
Being neither a statistician nor a probability theorist, Dr. Barnaby will likely be unable to calculate the specific probability of an event for which there is no relevant past data of similar or related events. Even though I am stupid and ignorant, I studied probability theory and sampling statistics extensively at the graduate level many years ago. I know of no statistical, mathematical, or Boolean algebraic process that can deal with stochastic variables such as those implicit in the problem you pose, and come up with "specific probabilities"
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Therein lies the rub, yes?
I'll grant you that there have been some suspected incidents of stolen weapons grade uranium, but only one confirmed report I could find (and the amount was less than 2% of what you'd need for a crude bomb). The material was recovered and the people responsible arrested.
Since the first nuclear bomb was tested, there has never been an instance of one being stolen from the people who made it.
Seems to me that whatever people are doing to protect these items is working well!
The argument that the breakup of the USSR resulted in nukes for sale is so ludicrous that the people who mention it should be ashamed. Its also provable that no terrorist intent on nuclear terrorism has ever obtained a bomb or even the materials to make a crude one... how you ask? Well, ABC news has (on multiple occasions) smuggled several kilograms of uranium (depleted, but it has the same radiation signature as the refined stuff) into the US from Islamic ports of origin!
If a terrorist had a nuke, and was determined to use it on the US.... all they'd have to do is mail it!
ABC News did this in 2002 and in 2003. They could probably do it again today, but don't want to end up in GITMO for pointing out security flaws to the Emperor.
So yes, it is impossible to calculate a probability for a terrorist nuke going off in the US. Given the apparent ease with wich such a device or material can be brought into the country, and the simplicity of crafting a crude bomb, and the ever diminishing chance of getting uranium from Eastern Europe(the past attempts to smuggle uranium have resulted in [i]increased[i] security and a great deal of international attention)(just not so much in the US, because our press is mostly retarded), it seems to me that if such an event were going to happen... it already would have happened.
When barnaby says:(re nuclear weapons)
| The risk that a few of them will be illegally acquired is significant. |
And fails to provide a definition of "significant", and fails to provide the data he used to calculate this risk(because he doesn't have any), and fails to enumerate (because, as you point out, he can't) the specific risk... I am left with the impression that he is overreacting.
Obviously we should be looking to increase the security of the world's nuclear weapons (Pakistan might be a good place to start!), and the US should indeed take the lead in an international effort in this area. It is not an impossible task to keep these destructive weapons out of the hands of those who would use them for anything other than MAD bargaining.
But to describe nuclear terrorism as some imminent threat, and remain credible, is going to require more than some anecdotes about "suspected" refined uranium smuggling.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend
Sweden
9688 Posts |
Posted - 03/27/2008 : 02:15:55 [Permalink]
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bngbuck, What type of nuclear bomb can you build with plutonium oxide extracted from MOX?
In all terrorist-scenarios we've discussed so far has relied on a bomb design simple enough for a mechanical engineer to put together: the Gun-barrel bomb. |
Dr. Mabuse - "When the going gets tough, the tough get Duct-tape..."
Dr. Mabuse whisper.mp3
"Equivocation is not just a job, for a creationist it's a way of life..." Dr. Mabuse
Support American Troops in Iraq:
Send them unarmed civilians for target practice..
Collateralmurder. |
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"Muslim jihadists"
