US considers use of nuclear weapons against Iran http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060408/wl_mideast_afp/usirannuclearmilitary Sat Apr 8, 2:24 AM ET The administration of President George W. Bush is planning a massive bombing campaign against Iran, including use of bunker-buster nuclear bombs to destroy a key Iranian suspected nuclear weapons facility, The New Yorker magazine has reported in its April 17 issue. The article by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh said that Bush and others in the White House have come to view Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as a potential Adolf Hitler. "That's the name they're using," the report quoted a former senior intelligence official as saying. A senior unnamed Pentagon adviser is quoted in the article as saying that "this White House believes that the only way to solve the problem is to change the power structure in Iran, and that means war." The former intelligence officials depicts planning as "enormous," "hectic" and "operational," Hersh writes. One former defense official said the military planning was premised on a belief that "a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government," The New Yorker pointed out. In recent weeks, the president has quietly initiated a series of talks on plans for Iran with a few key senators and members of the House of Representatives, including at least one Democrat, the report said. One of the options under consideration involves the possible use of a bunker-buster tactical nuclear weapon, such as the B61-11, to insure the destruction of Iran's main centrifuge plant at Natanz, Hersh writes. But the former senior intelligence official said the attention given to the nuclear option has created serious misgivings inside the military, and some officers have talked about resigning after an attempt to remove the nuclear option from the evolving war plans in Iran failed, according to the report. "There are very strong sentiments within the military against brandishing nuclear weapons against other countries," the magazine quotes the Pentagon adviser as saying. The adviser warned that bombing Iran could provoke "a chain reaction" of attacks on American facilities and citizens throughout the world and might also reignite Hezbollah. "If we go, the southern half of Iraq will light up like a candle," the adviser is quoted as telling The New Yorker.
"a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government" _______________ If this is truly what they are planning no one will tolerate it for a second. I mean this same plan has worked so well in Iraq.
sounds like the plan Bin Laden had Take out two towers and Americans will be so frighten they would run out of the middle east Americans would rise and bag their leaders to leave and if they didn't over through the leaders It was not an overly bright plan . . .. and this one doesn't seem so either Rocket Riverr
How I hope this is the product of Hersh's fervid imagination. Please make that be the case. We simply cannot use atomics without WMD's being used against the United States first. We simply can't. I don't want to live in a country that would do such a thing. If Bush does this, he is a certifiable madman. If we must take out Iran's atomics program, we have to use conventional weapons, and it is far too soon to be considering an attack on their program. Unfortunately, Hersh is not some chump writing for the National Enquirer. There may actually be something to this, god help us. I would think it was a ploy to frighten the theocrats in Iran to negotiate an end to their atomic weapons program, except that I thought the run-up to the Iraq war was an effort to make Saddam do what we wanted him to do, and make some serious changes in how he did things. He was desperate to make a deal, and Bush invaded anyway, as he had intended all along. Had he wrung out the concessions Saddam was willing to give, and not invaded, I would have sung his praises. I said so at the time here. That makes me think this is not a ploy, assuming this is going on as Hersh describes, but deadly serious. Bush has completely lost it, if that is the case. I hope someone credible resigns and makes this public, if it is true, before this lunatic can do something so insane, inhuman, disastrous, and ultimately horrific for our own country. Keep D&D Civil.
basso, that was 60 years ago. Don't be a fool. There is no comparison, whatsoever. If we use atomics, unprovoked, we open a pandora's box for the rest of the world. We will be telling them that the use of atomics, without WMDs being used on you first, is fine, if you think it serves your interests. You don't seriously believe that is what we should do, do you, basso? Keep D&D Civil.
Makes me think that Bush really is trying to hasten Armageddon...may be there's something to that if he's at peace with being as reckless and 'faith-driven' in his policies as the article seems to suggest (by faith, I don't mean religion, I mean the blind faith that just as the Iraqis jumped in jubilation at the sight of our invading troops, the Iranians will; it's truly frightening if they're still stuck with that naive idealism in retrospect with what we're facing in Iraq now).
I don't know anything really but I will tell you that the Pentegon and National War College run war games 24/7/365 to try and determine the ramifications of every possible scenario of world politics. I would be shocked if they hadn't considered using nuclear weapons on Iran....but not even close to as shock as I would be if this insanity ever came to pass.
You are right Deckard, and it would legitimise the use of WMD against the US in the eyes of many, and it would start a whole new arms race. Some countries would conclude that only the mutually assured destruction concept of the cold war could keep the US from using its nuclear weapons on others, and they would start or accelerate programs to build their own. Or maybe some county or group will take Bush’s lead in another area and engage in a preemptive strike. If they set off a dirty bomb or released some nerve gas in, say the middle of downtown Manhattan, or St. Louis or Dallas for that matter, would that be warning enough to keep Bush from using nuclear weapons? Again, Bush himself has legitimized this type of action by legitimizing preemptive strikes, (and by doing so he has jeopardised the safety of all the people of the US in order to pursue personal and political gains for himself and his party.) Is this administration just so morally corrupt at this point that only force will get them to pay attention? An equally important question, however, is how many governments and groups around he world with enough power to do something about it believe this?
By the looks of how the Iraq war has gone the might as well shut 'er down and go fishing for all the good they’re doing. I suspect, however, that the process has been corrupted by politics and that key decisions have been made by unqualified politicians with the intent of advancing the position of the Republican Party, and not made with the intent of doing what's best for the American public.
Well they considered using nukes in Iraq too. The military considers everything...except idiot politicians.
How can anyone believe it is a good idea under any circumstance to use nuke as a preemptive strike option? This administration is absolutely crazy.
