← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Angeleyes
Thread ID: 19200 | Posts: 3 | Started: 2005-07-18
2005-07-18 22:23 | User Profile
The tactic is called re-attack. Last year, Congress zero funded the "new tactical nuke that will solve bunkers as a problem" dream of the Silver Bullet crowd. So, re-attack is underway by DoD. Tactical nukes, once pulled from the US inventory, are being advocated again.
From the article at the bottom of this post: [QUOTE] At a congressional hearing this year, Linton Brooks, head of the National Nuclear Security Administration, which oversees nuclear weapons programs, acknowledged that there was no way to avoid significant fallout of radioactive debris from use of a bunker-buster warhead.***
He said the administration never intended to suggest "that it was possible to have a bomb that penetrated far enough to trap all fallout. I don't believe the laws of physics will ever let that be true."
Nevertheless, Brooks and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld have argued that a nuclear weapon that can destroy hardened, deeply buried targets is needed in the U.S. arsenal [/QUOTE] *** This approach is self defeating at the political level. The entire nuclear non proliferation movement, some 40 years or so old, is a political movement. It relies on message, trust, and credibility to convince each other to back away from the edge of the nuclear cliff. It relies on making a deal.
After a generation of playing chicken, some hard working folks slowly but surely got the Two Big Powers to reduce the size of nuclear arsenals. China never played in that match, though they had their first nuke in 1965. It's been a multi polar game for a long time.
The multi-decade political and information war against nuclear proliferation is at best losing ground slowly, evidence India and Pakistan, Iran and North Korea, not to mention Israel's officially-undeclared-but-most-likely-robust capability. This after both Russia and US reduced their arsenals in a modest display of leadership.
At worst, non proliferation is an abject failure.
If Washington wants to put the nail in the political coffin of nuclear non proliferation, Congress will fund this program. At that point, US credibility in the political, information, and progaganda campaign against Nukes will be rendered irrelevant, and only Europe and Russia will emerge as bona fide leaders in that regard. China is, as always, looking out for China.
That prospect fills my heart with neither joy nor hope.
Please write your Congressmen and Senators. Please tell them in the strongest terms to vote No to resurrecting the Tactical Nuke. The more people who sound off, the better chance we have of seeing this nonsense ended. Tactical nukes have no deterrent value, unless in the hands of a terrorist, but hold heavy risk of escalation by their use . . . and perhaps by their contemplated use. (Note: Hard to know exactly what an enemy is really thinking, really considering . . . in a close society . . . like . . . oooh, Saddam's Iraq? We knew WHAT about what was going on in there???)
For scientific background on the topic, I suggest the Scientific American article from early last year (August 2004.) I read it in paper copy. It discusses the physics and practicalities of kinetic versus nuclear weapons against bunkers, specifically the limitations of physics and materials for kinetic weapons. The SA piece of course ignores conventional tactics, precisoin guidance and operational technique. Simple things like re attack.
Los Angeles Times July 2, 2005 [size=5][u][size=3]Senate Approves Money For New Nuclear Weapon [/size][/u] [/size][size=4][size=3]The House has so far resisted funding development of the 'bunker-buster.[/size]' [/size]By Associated Press
WASHINGTON ââ¬â The Bush administration may get another chance to try to develop a ground-penetrating nuclear warhead. The Senate agreed Friday to revive the "bunker-buster" program that Congress last year decided to kill.
Administration officials have maintained that the country needs to develop a nuclear warhead that would be capable of destroying deeply buried targets, including bunkers tunneled into solid rock.
But opponents say its benefits are questionable and that such a warhead would cause extensive radiation fallout above ground, killing thousands of people. And they say it may make it easier for a future president to decide to use a nuclear weapon instead of a conventional one.
[u]The Senate voted 53 to 43 early Friday to include $4 million for research into the feasibility of a bunker-buster nuclear warhead. The House had refused this year to provide the money, so a final decision would have to be worked out between the two chambers.[/u]
The money is included in a $31.2 billion spending measure for the [u]Energy Department and other programs.[/u] Last year, Congress killed the program, but the Bush administration asked that it be revived.
Supporters of the program said the $4 million did not signal development of any new warheads. They contend that the money would be used to see whether a sufficiently hardened casing could be developed for an existing warhead so that it could penetrate the ground before exploding and destroy reinforced underground bunkers.
But Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), one of Congress' most vocal opponents of the bunker-buster, disagreed.
The program "sends the wrong signals to the rest of the world by reopening the nuclear door and beginning the testing and development of a new generation of nuclear weapons," Feinstein said. "A bunker-buster cannot penetrate into the Earth deeply enough to avoid massive casualties and the spewing of millions of cubic feet of radioactive materials into the atmosphere."
In April, a panel of the National Academy of Sciences concluded that a ground-penetrating nuclear device would likely cause the same casualties as a surface burst if the weapons were of the same size.
Such a bomb could cause from several thousand to 1 million casualties, depending on its yield and location, according to the report requested by Congress.
At a congressional hearing this year, Linton Brooks, head of the National Nuclear Security Administration, which oversees nuclear weapons programs, acknowledged that there was no way to avoid significant fallout of radioactive debris from use of a bunker-buster warhead.
He said the administration never intended to suggest "that it was possible to have a bomb that penetrated far enough to trap all fallout. I don't believe the laws of physics will ever let that be true."
Nevertheless, Brooks and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld have argued that a nuclear weapon that can destroy hardened, deeply buried targets is needed in the U.S. arsenal.
2005-07-18 22:41 | User Profile
If the US were to develop nuclear bunker busters then I say that they have China on their sights because China has 85% if all their military factories and other instruments of war below ground, according to The Black House, and not reported or seen by many. :evil:
2005-07-18 23:02 | User Profile
Good point, Ponce. Closer to the current political rhetoric, North Korea went underground in about 1951, and they have been digging ever since. :censored:
[QUOTE=Ponce]If the US were to develop nuclear bunker busters then I say that they have China on their sights because China has 85% if all their military factories and other instruments of war below ground, according to The Black House, and not reported or seen by many. :evil:[/QUOTE]