Man, this thread has gone ALL OVER the place!
As for the "BushorChimp.com" website, I saw it too and I thought it was hilarious. He really
does look like a chimp.
As for the Bush-ring pic, that was really funny too.
Now to the real topic:
Ok, about Bush and Co. considering using "small" nuclear weapons in Afganistan: This is a BAD IDEA. There's the "small" fact that we went into Afganistan to liberate it from the Taliban and free the Afganis from tyranny. Yeah, yeah, I know, we didn't go in to liberate the Afganis
per se, but it was a nice happenstance that occurred once we kicked the Taliban's and al-Queda's asses. I'd just as soon NOT leave behind a bunch of lethal radioactivity for the Afganis to deal with on their own. Yeah, killing off the remaining terrorists in Afganistan is important, but you don't use a bulldozer to kill off a couple of flies. (There IS such a thing as overkill, after all.)
There's also the fact that America has signed QUITE A FEW nuclear non-proliferation treaties where we said to the rest of the world that
we would not use these nuclear weapons in a conventional manner. Once we break this word, we'll have made ourselves fair targets for our enemies to use these weapons on us.
Here's a possible situation of what might occur if and when we decide to use "small" nukes on the battlefield: Unfriendly nations, that is, nations who hate the USA with a passion (and this includes "nominal" allies like Saudi Arabia) will see that when it comes to honoring treaties that we signed, we're full of ****. Then they'll try even harder to get the same kinds of weapons, without regard of where they will come from. The worst case scenario will be Russia watching us violate every non-nuclear treaty we ever signed and will then decide that they won't be bound by those treaties either. Once THAT happens, the Russians (thinking that the Cold War has restarted) might very well decide to sell whatever nukes they can to any rogue state that makes the highest bid. (Remember, the Russians are sorely strapped for cash right now; selling nukes would be pretty profitable...) We've got enough problems with just Iran, Iraq and North Korea trying to develop nukes. What happens when every rogue state in the world manages to get their grubby mitts on them?
I don't know about you guys, but I'm not ready for a new Dark Age.
Some people might say "Well, in WWII we nuked Japan. We're in another war now, so what's the difference between nuking Japan and nuking Afganistan?"
Here's the difference: In WWII, we were at war with the Empire of Japan. It was a declared war between two nation-states and both sides understood that it was no holds barred, meaning that civillian casualties were to be expected. The only alternative to dropping Fat Man and Little Boy on Japan was an invasion that would have cost litterally hundreds of thousands of American casualties. We are NOT facing that sort of situation in Afganistan (yet, if ever), so dropping a nuke on Afganistan would NOT be justified on this argument.
Furthermore, in Afganistan, we are NOT at war with the state of Afganistan or its people; President Bush has stated time and again that we are at war with the al-Queda terrorists (I'll leave out the "axis of evil" countries for now.) We are NOT trying to kill Afgan civillians; in fact we've bent over backwards to minimize civillian casualties as much as possible. We've said over and over again that we're trying to help these people. Dropping a nuke on Afganistan and leaving the Afganis to deal with the fallout (literally AND figuratively) would make us treaty-breaking liars in the eyes of the whole world. To say nothing of the fact that the Afganis would feel completely betrayed by the US. We said that we would help them rebuild; dropping a nuke is NOT going to be condusive to reconstructing a war-torn nation. Anyone with half a brain knows this. Nukes are NOT constructive devices; that's completely contrary to their purpose. You drop nukes to blow **** up big-time, not build stuff. (Duh....)
I'd *****-slap "Shrub" myself for even considering this crap if it wasn't a federal offense. I support Bush on his handling of the war (but not much else), but THIS is fundamentally stupid.
If you guys want a second opinion, you can find it here:
http://www.msnbc.com/news/722383.asp?0dm=N14POI'm sure (in fact I'm positive) I'm not alone in thinking this "small nuke" stuff is fundamentally wrong.
