"THEY" are going to attack...........

[c1ue]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

What's the difference between a 100Megaton plutonium weapon and a thermobaric bomb.

Well, one is a nuclear weapon that produces radiation. The other is just a jumped up Molotov cocktail.

They're both a chemical mechanism for killing people.

Uh, no. One is atomic. The other one is chemical.

And they're both quite effective at exterminating people in an area indiscriminately. I guess it's just it cost less to use plutonium say to wipe out half a million people.

Do you have numbers behind this comment, or is this yet another erroneous belief? Producing an atomic bomb isn't that cheap at all - creation of the plutonium is a damned expensive endeavor.

Jokes aside, I think the main difference between gas and thermobaric is that gas is easier to conceal and for terrorists to use. A 5kg sarin gas canister can definitely kill more people than a 5kg thermobaric.

Theoretically this is true - in reality you're comparing apples and oranges.

Sarin can be administered via rocket, artillery, or airplane. Thermobaric is pretty much only deliverable via large, heavy plane.

One primary reason why the US dislikes chemical weapons is that it makes ground combat far more dangerous for everyone - which is a big no no when talking about zero American casualties. Also, the US is generally the only combatant with the technical means and economic reach to be able to deploy thermobaric bombs, the WTC being a notable exception.

Its like a bully saying that only brute strength is fair in a fight. Sure, and why wouldn't he/she say so, since this puts all the advantages on one side?

[vt]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

Iran, Russia advise Assad to transfer chemical stockpile to Tehran - to avert US attack
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report September 2, 2013, 9:59 AM (IDT)

The Iranian parliamentary delegation visiting Damascus Sunday, Sept. 1, advised Bashar Assad to move his chemical stockpile out of Syria and deposit it in Tehran under Iranian and Russian military supervision, to save himself from an American military strike, debkafile’s exclusive military and Iranian sources reveal.

Chairman of the Majlis Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ala-Eddin Borujerdi, who headed the delegation, explained that Presidents Hassan Rouhani and Vladimir Putin had discussed the stockpile’s removal ad hoc, as the basis of a Iranian-Russian plan for presenting to US President Barack Obama at the G-20 summit meeting in St. Petersburg later this week.
After the Americans accept the plan and the crisis blows over, the stockpile could be quietly returned to Syria, the Iranian lawmaker explained.

Another option was for Iranian and Russian teams to destroy the stockpile in return for US-Arab League guarantees that the Syrian rebels would not use this process for strategic war gains. The chemical agents would be destroyed in stages in accordance with rebel compliance with such guarantees.
debkafile’s military sources explain Tehran’s quest for a deal on two grounds: One - Iran supplied Syria with most of the formulae and substances for the manufacture of the poison agents and fears exposure if they fall into American hands.

Another is anxiety lest an American military strike on Syria’s chemical stores – if it is allowed to go through – would serve as a precedent or prequel for a similar attack on Iran’s nuclear assets.
Tehran is therefore willing to put on an amenable face and meet the United States half way on the disposal of Syria’s chemical arsenal. The offer would be presented as good for President Obama and let him give the American people the glad tidings that he had managed to defuse the Syrian chemical crisis by procuring a joint Iranian-Russian guarantee to eliminate Syria’s chemical arsenal. He could then call off an attack Syria with honor, or postpone it indefinitely to avoid disrupting the process of Syria’s chemical disarmament.
Both the Russians and the Iranians saw an opening for their plan in a phrase President Obama used in his surprise announcement Saturday night, Aug. 31 that he would ask Congress to authorize a military attack on Syria before going ahead. It was this: “…the Chairman [of the Joint US Chiefs of Staff] has indicated to me that our capacity to execute this mission is not time-sensitive; it will be effective tomorrow, or next week, or a month from now.”

The Russian-Iranian plan would turn those words back on the US president by offering him guarantees that if he was not satisfied that Syria’s chemical stocks were gone - either by transfer to Iran or destroyed - he had left himself with time to play with for reverting to his military option.

The Iranian lawmakers told Assad that Tehran is not fully in the picture of the secret Russian-US dialogue on Syria, but Tehran had reason to believe that the Russians had put out feelers to the Americans on the proposition and were not initially turned down.

Russian and Iranian intelligence experts on US politics expect Obama’s limited offensive plan for Syria to run into major obstacles in Congress. They hope the opposition will find added support for its counter-arguments in the Iranian-Russian proposition. And even if it is eventually turned down, the deliberations on its pros and cons would buy time for the Syrian ruler's war effort.
The Iranian parliamentary delegation also included Javad Karimi Qodusi and Fath-o-Allah Hosseini, two other prominent members of the Majlis foreign affairs panel.

[Southernguy]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

While very wary about Debka files information this one in particular seems quite reasonable.
After all chemical weapons seem to be something absolutely useless in modern warfare arsenals. For Syria it would be a good thing to get rid of them.
It's limited potencial uses are not worth the international bad press they get.
The provocative aspect of the information supplied is the one referred as to not only Iran holding chemical weapons but being the supplier of the ones Syria holds.
Do Iranians really have chemical weapons?
My bet is that they don't.

[touchring]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

While very wary about Debka files information this one in particular seems quite reasonable.
After all chemical weapons seem to be something absolutely useless in modern warfare arsenals. For Syria it would be a good thing to get rid of them.
It's limited potencial uses are not worth the international bad press they get.
The provocative aspect of the information supplied is the one referred as to not only Iran holding chemical weapons but being the supplier of the ones Syria holds.
Do Iranians really have chemical weapons?
My bet is that they don't.

It's no good for modern warfare. But it's very good for genocide.

[Woodsman]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

If Wikileaks is such a target, then why not Debka? Has anyone ever confirmed any info coming out of that place? There's plenty of heat and smoke, but not much fire and light, IMHO.

[GRG55]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

If Wikileaks is such a target, then why not Debka? Has anyone ever confirmed any info coming out of that place? There's plenty of heat and smoke, but not much fire and light, IMHO.

Isn't Debka based in Israel...and therefore politically "untouchable"?

[c1ue]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

It's no good for modern warfare. But it's very good for genocide.

Perhaps you can define what modern warfare is.

All the effort and money put into defense - even in the US - isn't all going towards fancy planes, satellites, and what not - much of it is going towards counterinsurgency.

The era of industrial nations pitting their war machines against each other seems to have passed away.

[Woodsman]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

The era of industrial nations pitting their war machines against each other seems to have passed away.

From your lips to God's ears. But who in the dog days of 1913 would have predicted a world war with 39 million dead, wounded or missing?

[flintlock]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

Anyone who wants a glimpse at how ugly warfare is can now simply pull up videos on youtube. Some really amazing and horrific stuff. The rebels in particular seem to have a sort of amateurish style of taking potshots at SAA tanks, with the inevitable results. But some rather daring anti tank efforts as well. Syria is using a llot of armor in cities, and paying a heavy price for it.

[flintlock]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

Yes, I'm not ready to pronounce that the days of wars between major powers are over either. Just less likely.

[verdo]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

China is too smart to engage America in a direct military confrontation. Today, the attacks would come in the form of cyberwarfare, derivatives, market crashing, economic isolation, and other such methods. You don't attack someone where they are strong, you attack them where they are weak, and the U.S. in particular is weakest when you hit them a blow in the financial markets

[GRG55]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

China is too smart to engage America in a direct military confrontation. Today, the attacks would come in the form of cyberwarfare, derivatives, market crashing, economic isolation, and other such methods. You don't attack someone where they are strong, you attack them where they are weak, and the U.S. in particular is weakest when you hit them a blow in the financial markets

I continue to be amazed at how widespread this nonsensical meme has become...

[verdo]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

Surely attacking them financially has a much better chance of hurting them than going the military route. I'm talking in relative terms here. I don't really see how the U.S. is less vulnerable militarily.

I mean, if they aren't weaker financially, then why does China and other countries continue to geopolitically isolate the U.S. through financial means and not through militaristic confrontations within the playground that is the middle east?

[GRG55]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

Surely attacking them financially has a much better chance of hurting them than going the military route. I'm talking in relative terms here. I don't really see how the U.S. is less vulnerable militarily.

I mean, if they aren't weaker financially, then why does China and other countries continue to geopolitically isolate the U.S. through financial means and not through militaristic confrontations within the playground that is the middle east?

You and I disagree in the belief that "China and other countries continue to geopolitically isolate the U.S. through financial means". I don't think you can actually make a real case that has or is happening without venturing into some pretty weird logic. At this point it looks to me that Bernanke has 'won" and it is the USA that is whacking much of the upstart rest of the world financially right now. The US Dollar and assets in secure jurisdictions denominated in US Dollars (gold, oil and real estate in Hong Kong, Singapore, Canada and parts of the USA) seem particularly prized by the Chinese mainlanders who were noted quite some time back on a post on another iTulip thread as having reversed the capital flows through the Hong Kong banking system as they started to get their money OUT of China before Beijing is forced to close the door on them as the Chinese bubble blows up.

[verdo]

Re: "THEY" are going to attack...........

You and I disagree in the belief that "China and other countries continue to geopolitically isolate the U.S. through financial means". I don't think you can actually make a real case that has or is happening without venturing into some pretty weird logic. At this point it looks to me that Bernanke has 'won" and it is the USA that is whacking much of the upstart rest of the world financially right now. The US Dollar and assets in secure jurisdictions denominated in US Dollars (gold, oil and real estate in Hong Kong, Singapore, Canada and parts of the USA) seem particularly prized by the Chinese mainlanders who were noted quite some time back on a post on another iTulip thread as having reversed the capital flows through the Hong Kong banking system as they started to get their money OUT of China before Beijing is forced to close the door on them as the Chinese bubble blows up.

So if you weren't favorable to the American way of doing things, you would rather stand up to them militarily in the middle east? And I would argue that China's constant gold purchases and bilateral trade deals bypassing the U.S. dollar is proof enough that this is the preferred path. All the euphoria will change once the stock market gets its 2014 correction, when the myth of U.S. oil production dissipates, and if/when Obama makes the fatal mistake of actually putting a guy like Larry Summers as head of the Fed. China having a credit crunch that they themselves are facilitating doesn't mean they aren't trying to isolate the U.S., and when I say China I'm talking about the government, not about what individual investors choose to do.

Just because Bernanke is "winning" in the short term, it doesn't mean that certain countries aren't trying to isolate it. The U.S. is a powerful beast, and even though attacking the U.S. in this way is easier than attacking it militarily, it doesn't mean that it all of a sudden becomes easy to do. So I don't see that as negating the idea that its easier to go through this path than engage the U.S. directly on the battlefield in the middle east and Africa