You could probably catch most containers by monitoring the baker's dozen biggest transshipment hubs for each of the major carriers.

But detection is not the biggest problem with using commercial container shipping as deployment mode for an atomic first strike. The biggest problem is that commercial container shipping needs to still be serving your country by the time you decide that you would like New York to go away.

Which means you can only really use this deployment mode if you make your first strike completely out of the blue.

This is not what most people want to use nukes for. Most people who would like to have nukes want them in order to use them as back-stop of their conventional power plays - to provide an ultimate step on the escalation ladder that cannot be challenged.

And the kind of people who would use atomic weapons for out-of-the-blue first strikes are not the kind of people who can afford to buy atomic weapons. Nevermind setting up and maintaining the advanced industrial engineering infrastructure required to produce them.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.