Hersh: The Iran Plans | 24 comments (24 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: Hersh: The Iran Plans (4.00 / 3)

Yes, Bush is crazy enough to use nukes, because for a man who feels - and is - a nobody, it would be the ultimate power trip.

There are no good strategic reasons for using nukes, and plenty of good strategic reasons not to use them:

A 1kT yield is militarily useless against bunkers. Larger yields would do the job, but being ground bursts, would potentially spread fall-out all the way into Russia, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Israel, depending on which way the wind was blowing. Some parts of Wales are still dealing with the fallout from Chernobyl, so ignoring fall-out is really not a good idea.
1kT is bad enough. Using anything as a tactical bunker buster more could really, really, really piss off the rest of the world.
The bunker buster idea is nonsense. All you get is a conventional nuke going off under the minimal cover of 10-20ft of rock. In terms of cratering and fall out, the difference between this and a ground burst are minimal.
The Pentagon apparently believes it can keep the Strait of Hormuz open. This is fantasy. It can't.

...And so on. You can make a long list proving that the idea is suicidally stupid. But Bush is suicidally stupid. So reality is not the issue here.

The bigger question is how the rest of the world, especially Russia, China, India, and the Saudis, responds. So far, no one is saying anything, which makes it very hard to tell.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Sun Apr 9th, 2006 at 09:18:06 AM EST

Re: Hersh: The Iran Plans (none / 0)

One big question you would have to ask is how the use of nuclear weapons would play with the populations of current members of the coalition.

If the US starts using Nuclear weapons in a confrontation, many of the undecided in the UK will get pushed over into the anti war camp very quickly. This could be to the extent of forcing the UK government to withdraw from Iraq. at one stroke the US will have increased the area of battle, and reduced the forces available to fight.

Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.

by ceebs (ceebs (at) eurotrib (dot) com) on Sun Apr 9th, 2006 at 10:05:09 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Hersh: The Iran Plans (none / 0)

The Pentagon apparently believes it can keep the Strait of Hormuz open. This is fantasy. It can't.

The person quoted as saying that is a civilian consultant. Hersh presents the uniformed military as vehemently against any use of nukes - to the point of a formal, categorical statement by Joint Chiefs and threats of mass protest resignations. The military is also presented as a lot more pessimistic about the blowback from even a conventional strike. The US officer corps is a pretty right wing, conservative group, but they aren't insane.

by MarekNYC on Sun Apr 9th, 2006 at 10:47:42 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Hersh: The Iran Plans (none / 0)

1 Kt useless?

1 Kt is one thousand tonnes of high explosive!

The biggest bunker buster of WW2 was the British Grand Slam which carried 4 tonnes of high explosive and could blow through 40 meters of ground or 4-7 meters of reinforced concrete.

The weapon the Americans are probably going to use is the B61 Mod 11. The weapon has variable yields starting at 10 Kt (or maybe as low* as 0,3 Kt) and up to 340 Kt.

* Wow! Only 300 hundred tonnes of TNT equivalent! That's only 25 times as much as a MOAB! What a mini-nuke!

Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.

by Starvid on Sun Apr 9th, 2006 at 12:02:32 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Hersh: The Iran Plans (none / 1)

The bunkers are - so we're told - 30m thick, and maybe 50ft undergroud.

So yes - a 1kt nuke is useless against them. The Iranians always knew a stand-off was likely and seem to have planned accordingly.

I also think there's a psychological threshold around 1kt. Under that you can argue - no matter how uconvincingly - that the bombing is tactical and not strategic. And some people will nod their heads and believe you, because for a semi-buried detonation, the radius of 1psi of overpressure - which means broken windows and not much more - will be localised to half a mile or so. (Fall-out remains a big problem. But they probably won't be thinking that far ahead.)

The higher the yield, the less believable that argument becomes. Once you get over 15kt you're into Hiroshima territory, way on the wrong side of the red line.

Anything over 100kt would be horrendous. I don't even want to think about the reaction to that.

My point was that any nuke-based plan has a fundamental flaw. If the US wants to say 'Look - tactical!' the bombing won't work. If it increases the yield, any pretense at 'tactical' soon disappears and it turns into a much more dangerous game.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Sun Apr 9th, 2006 at 12:49:50 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Hersh: The Iran Plans (none / 0)

Maybe you are right about 1 Kt being useless. But it still is one hell of a blast.

The idea that they could get away with nuclear weapons as long as they are tactical is delusional.

The big weapon=strategic/small weapon=tactical is flawed anyway.

Any nuclear strike on Iran, no matter how small, will by definition be a strategic attack.

While a 300 Kt strike on the advancing red hordes in the Fulda gap (thank god those days are gone) might very well be tactical as long as it is not a first-use attack.

Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.

by Starvid on Sun Apr 9th, 2006 at 01:08:45 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Hersh: The Iran Plans (none / 0)

Well, sure. But it's about PR and spin as well as body count.

Legally the doctrine of pre-emption is already insane.

And from where I am all war is delusional. The fact that we're even discussing this reminds me - again - that we're all living on Planet Crazy.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Sun Apr 9th, 2006 at 01:28:02 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Hersh: The Iran Plans (none / 0)

I thought a "tactical" nuclear weapon was one that went off in Germany?

Sorry, bad cold war joke.

Seriously, I can't see the citizens of major nations whose governments support the "war on terror" stomaching cooperation with a state which actively uses nuclear weapons, even "small" ones. Those governments would be under intense pressure to withdraw support and leave the Americans to fight their battle alone.

Idiot/Savant

by IdiotSavant on Sun Apr 9th, 2006 at 08:28:44 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Hersh: The Iran Plans (none / 1)

Excellent post.

One potential fallout recipient you omitted is Iraq.

There are over 100,000 Americans there, and a lot of citizens of 'friendly' countries (to use the fairly abhorrent 'us-and-them' categories). How much risk would these people be at directly from nuclear fallout if the worst happens?

by GreatGame2 (fishy_logic_at_yahoo.co.uk) on Sun Apr 9th, 2006 at 01:17:03 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Hersh: The Iran Plans | 24 comments (24 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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