Originally posted by Stryke 9
2. SADDAM IS NOT A THREAT. This is really, really lame-brained. We're sitting here, nation with enough nukes to blow up the world a thousand times over, and enough standard munitions to do it again a couple times, military technology that belongs in a sci-fi movie, millions of soldiers, global reach, trillions of dollars in defence spending, nearly the best intel system in the world, and most of the world's governments (formerly) willing to collectively suck off the President for a little attention, and we're crapping our pants because the tinpot dictator of an impoverished desert nation may, at some point far in the future, have access to a single nuke, or may right now have enough poison gas to make everyone in a small city badly ill. Never mind that he'll never have a delivery system. Never mind that it in no way would serve his interests to USE said weapons against any other nation. Never mind that we could get together and use just the tiniest portion of the world's collective intelligence, financial, and technological resources to ensure that if Saddam had a wet fart, we'd know about it a week in advance. Nooo, he's a THREAT, and he's going to KILL US ALL unless we go in there and depopulate a few cities with mortars. How pathetic- the world cowering before an imaginary, non-functional nuke in the hands of a man who doesn't plan on using it. Clearly, the solution is to go out there and kill a lot of foreigners.
Have you seen/read The Sum of All Fears? Allow me to quote... or perhaps it's a paraphrase: "I don't fear the nation with a thousand nukes. I fear the madman with one."
Originally posted by Mr. Vega
Kill one terrorist and four more come out of hatred. They'll stop hating you if you stop returning hate.
Actually, you're wrong. Ever since Israel's operation in Jenin and the other Palestinian towns, we've seen a significant drop in terror attacks. It hasn't stopped by any means, but its gone down - way down.
And the hatred thing - forget it. They hate you. Period. The reasons for it very - perhaps it's because their uncle was a "Glorious Freedom Fighter" who was shot and killed before he was able to set off the bomb he had strapped to him, or perhaps they simply, like all Palestinian children today, went to schools where hate propoganda waas taught and suicide bombings were encouraged. Yes, you heard me - IN THE SCHOOLS!! I've seen freaking 7-year-olds chanting about their dreams of someday becoming a martyr (successful suicide bomber)...
Originally posted by Stryke 9
Uh-huh. Iraq has invaded Israel? That's news to me. He's going to? He's a dead man, then. Israel's got some bad-assed military tech, one of the best armies in the world. Just ask Sandwich, they've got some damn cool gear and a nation of soldiers. Saddam has about enough to defend his country against invasion, and that's about it.
No, he hasn't - all he's done so far is tossed a few dozen scuds our way. Directly killed one whole person from the explosion, a few others, mainly elderly people, died from heart attacks caused by the explosions, or from suffocating because they forgot to remove the cap on the gas filter.
But anyways...
Here's how I see things rolling: Saddam attacks Israel in some way that is significantly more threatening than the Gulf War. Say he invades Israel via Syria, perhaps even with Syria joining in - doesn't really matter for the purposes of this discussion. Israel is such a small nation, physically/geographically, that we cannot afford to lose one bit of ground. We would undoubtably make use of tactical nukes to wipe out certral portions of Saddam's army, finishing the rest off with our air force (since we do have air superiority of the whole region - I thank God for that). But wait! Saddam may have been defeated, but look at this, world (*ahem* EU *ahem* UN *ahem* all our other wonderful friends *ahem*)! Spunky little Israel used nukes on foreign soil! Spunky little Israel needs to be taught a lesson.
Originally posted by Stryke 9
So, say Saddam for some reason decides to nuke the US. He sends a smallish freighter (still big enough to be easy as all hell to pick up, and obvious from miles away- the whole idea of an effective "suitcase nuke" is best described as a combination joke and big-gun fantasy) into the Potomac, up goes part of DC. Boom. Nice fireworks- too bad, he probably didn't even take out most of the city, never mind the US's military power. So American troops get sent over to Iraq. Boom boom boom blammo kazow boom. Saddam's dead, the Republican Guard's dead, most of the populace is dead, Iraq is either a radioactive sheet of glass or a new Texas. I'm sure that's high on the list of Saddam's goals. Giving a nuke to terrorists or using chemical weapons would have much the same effect- it's hurt his target, but not nearly so much as it'd hurt him. So now, your turn. why the hell WOULD he use a nuke?
Again, I refer to Sum of All Fears.
