Bomb Iran?

drew64 said:
surely the idea of them possibly having nukes doesnt change much.
how would it be that much different to the current state of things?
IF they were to launch one, they'd get it back 10 fold.

i know the idea of the initial casualty's is bad, but what country is really going to commit an act that is A. going to cause irreversible damage and B. bring about their own annihilation.

i understand that some of the middle eastern countries want others wiped off the planet, but at the cost of their own existence?
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The leadership of North Korea are mad enough to do it.

I don't think Iran is, but it's far from a stable country at the moment with a lot of political unrest. They have protests to a level not seen since the Islamic Revolution. Outwardly they are blaming other countries for this unrest, with the UK getting particular mention.

If they were to succeed with getting a viable nuclear weapon and the current 'government' was over thrown would they use the weapon? Would the weapons fall into the wrong hands aftewards?

Nuclear weapons for stable sane countries isn't a problem; for example I have no problem with the French being a nuclear power or them having significantly more than us.
 
drew64 said:
IF they were to launch one, they'd get it back 10 fold.
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would they though?

It would be incredibly diplomatically damaging to a nuclear power to launch a nuclear attack on them if they where not directly attacked themselves.

There would probably be sanctions aid sent to the victim but America, Russia Britain and France would not want to retaliate with nuclear attacks.

If only because the amount of time spent assuming and confirming with the other nuclear powers that he attack was not aimed at them would make the decision totally cold and vengeful, and they would be unable to attribute it to an emergency action as it would have taken weeks of planning.

The only country i can see nuking them without being attacked first would be Isreal.
 
Whilst I can agree that the current Permanent Security Council Members probably wouldn't retaliate with nukes themselves they would probably bring to bear savage conventional retaliation.

With 30% unemployment, high inflation and an extremely young demographic Iran teeters on the brink to my mind. The old theocracy might hold the power now but how long will that last?
 
After all the money, military trade invested in Israel for decades by the US I would say they are more then easily prepared to deal with a threat from Iran on their own.
 
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Iran has to be prevented from acquiring nuclear weapons, that I know for sure. The very idea of a nuclear armed Iran fills me with trepidation.

It is quite clear that diplomacy will not work, we can offer Iran all sorts of carrots, but they don't want them, they want nuclear weapons, and who can blame them, they are a damn good way of insuring your place in the world.

But, that is counter to our national security, Iran is not a friend to us or our friends and alies, they are a very real potential threat. For our own protection that threat must be removed. By any means necessary.

They have declared themselves an enemy of the west and all that we stand for, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said that he wants to wipe Israel off the face of the planet. This lunatic and his followers must not be allowed to posses weapons of mass destruction, full stop.

However, the political situation and voting demographic in Iran is changing, new ideas and desires are coming to the fore, for now, I think we can afford to bide our time and see what happens. But we should not leave it too long, lest we be made to regret it.

And it is in a world with countries like Iran that our illustrious leaders want to 'reduce' our own nuclear capability, madness, utter, utter madness. We should build a dozen more ballistic missile subs, not reduce our number from 4 to 3.
 
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Demtwok said:
After all the money, military trade invested in Israel for decades by the US I would say they are more then easily prepared to deal with a threat from Iran on their own.
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In a convential conflict I would expect Israel to win and that's why Iran is trying to get nuclear weapons. They see it as a way to redress the balance.
 
Moeks said:
And it is in a world with countries like Iran that our illustrious leaders want to 'reduce' our own nuclear capability, madness, utter, utter madness. We should build a dozen more ballistic missile subs, not reduce our number from 4 to 3.
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We only need enough to do the job. The job would be to murder the majority of a nations population, destroy their infrastructure, industry and render the entire area unfit for human habitation.

If we can do that with 3 subs then why do we need a dozen?
 
The Halk said:
We only need enough to do the job. The job would be to murder the majority of a nations population, destroy their infrastructure, industry and render the entire area unfit for human habitation.

If we can do that with 3 subs then why do we need a dozen?
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If you believe Labour we can do it with one!
 
^^Gord^^ said:
If you believe Labour we can do it with one!
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Did they say that? They're cutting it down from 4 to 3. As I understand only one is on service at a time. It seems perfectly reasonable that one of the others is being cleaned, and getting the oil changed so to speak, while the other is having more serious maintenance.

I won't be voting labour of course, I don't like em. They've lied and decieved us, and their policy is entirely based on what they think will get them votes. But there's no need to just make stuff up about them.
 
The Halk said:
Did they say that? They're cutting it down from 4 to 3. As I understand only one is on service at a time. It seems perfectly reasonable that one of the others is being cleaned, and getting the oil changed so to speak, while the other is having more serious maintenance.

I won't be voting labour of course, I don't like em. They've lied and decieved us, and their policy is entirely based on what they think will get them votes. But there's no need to just make stuff up about them.
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As you say, one is at sea at any one time. The fouth one is our insurance policy in case anything goes wrong with that active sub. Take away that 'extra' sub and we would need 100% servicability on that active sub.

If that is true then it's the first bit of military kit in history to achieve it since the sword was invented.

Military kit is complex and it goes wrong on a regular basis.

Hence my comment about only needing one sub, as Labour seems to have found this magical item that never goes wrong.

I also hate Labour, but judging by the Conservatives recent comments our armed forces will still be getting sold short after the next election. :(

But I digress, lets stay on topic.
 
sr4470 said:
Iraqi forces failed to make it more than 20 miles into Iran in 6 years. Apart from some random air assaults and ballistic missile launches, the action was concentrated on the southern border. The regular Iranian military didn't join the counterattack in the other direction, it was mostly partisans and other irregulars like the Basij launching human wave attacks during 1986-88 with virtually zero support.
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I'd say a war that degenerates into a WWI style stalemate is a pretty good indication that both sides were evenly matched, and we know how good the Iraqi military was.

Obviously that was a long time ago, and the Iranians haven't just purged their professional military in a bloody revolution, but they still treat their professional military as the poor relation with the Revolutionary Guards getting the best equipment. Echos of the Iraqi Republican Guard there and we know how that worked out.

At any rate, the Iranian airforce is no better equipment wise than the Iraqi airforce was in 1991 so its not hard to imagine how its going to work out.

The only "hard" part for the US military would be occupying the country but who says they *have* to do that ?
 
^^Gord^^ said:
In a convential conflict I would expect Israel to win and that's why Iran is trying to get nuclear weapons. They see it as a way to redress the balance.
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Against Israel ? Huh ?

These are two militaries who have no way of getting to each other. There is no way they can fight a conventional war, they don't share a border, they don't have blue water navies and their air forces lack the range to reach each others countries.
 
I'm going into this 'ignorant' as I admit I'm not really up to speed on world affairs.

But a question has bugged me on things like this.

The UK, America, Russia, Japan and a few other countries have nuclear capabilities that are widely known about and we've had them for over half a centuary and never used as an act of aggression (since the end of World War 2 anyway).

Why can't Iran have their own nuclear capabilties? Is it that the president is a bit of a dictator, a 'poor mans Saddam' who will use them against I'd imagine Israel? Or does the rest of the world just not want anyone else to have them?
 
We have to forget "collateral damage" for just one day and carpet bomb the area around this guy, a 10 mile radius should do it, then he will be dead along with most of his cronies, yes some innocent people will be killed but far fewer than if we let him develop and use nuclear weapons.
 
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