| Saturday,
October 14, 2006
Subject: Iraq and isolation
The president says
that if we cut and run they will follow us home. Is it defeatism to take
that statement seriously and address that possibility? Is it defeatism
to look into means to assure it can't happen? I would think that
building border fences, cancelling visas, and building up the Navy would
manage to keep them from following us home, and would be cheaper than
continuing the war. Indeed, I would think that closing the borders,
paying a lot more attention to visas, building up the Navy to 600 ships,
investing in genuine X Programs that build up our space access
capabilities, providing substantial (billions) prizes for certain
technological developments such as mobile energy storage and reusable
orbital launcher systems, building nuclear power plants, and developing
our domestic oil resources would not cost substantially more than
continuing the war. Is it defeatism to at least study that possibility?
I admit I find the idea of isolationism appealing on
my down days. Screw 'em all. But you know, at some point while I sit in
Vortex USA while the Brutals batter themselves to death on whatever
incredible barrier we have to erect to keep even a vial of smallpox out, I'm
going to start missing things like bananas.
The current war is one price we're paying for not
finishing the Gulf War, and for not using the tactics in this war that gave
us victory in every other war we've ever won. I often hear from the anti-war
crowd that we won WWII in less time than this. I point out that if we were
using the tactics and weapons we used on Germany and Japan, we would have
won this one a hell of a lot sooner.
If we leave Iraq in defeat, our enemies will see this
as an immense victory. If you think the war is recruiting al Qaeda members
now, wait until al Qaeda has sent the U.S. packing.
They will come after us. After digesting the rest of
the Middle East and probably parts of Europe and Asia first. And eventually,
we will have to resort to real war. The anti-war protesters don't know what
a real war looks like. There are still some older people who do.
Maybe real war would have been inevitable no matter
what we did. I find it hard to believe that Saddam, if he were still in
power, would be sitting quietly right now while Iran built atomic bombs.
Tom Brosz
Winning in Iraq may take 'real war', warre,
rationing and conscription and two million under arms, a million
constabulary in Iraq backed up by the Army and Marines. Is this a price we
will pay? What is the likely outcome of "staying the course"? Does "staying
the course" mean feeding troops into a 100 men a month meat grinder? Or are
there measures short of warre that will win?
==
The cost of victory
Jerry P:
You started off well, and I agree. But defining
success by stationing 2 million troops in Iraq is conquest, not victory, at
least in the minds of those of us who don't want empire. Of the 2 million
troops, how many are we willing to lose? Success may be defining the what
the coalition troops can accomplish and what the Iraqi people must supply;
recognizing the limits to what we can do without totally occupying the
country. We need to recognize the difference between what we can do and what
we cannot do. I would suggest that we cannot dictate peace to parties who do
not recognize the legitimate political rights of others who are also
citizens. From the status of Sunni vs Shia in other countries, one sect or
the other seems to feel the necessity for domination. This seems largely to
be the result of the Muslim encompassing of secular authority by clerical
authority. So in Muslim countries one or the other clerical group must
dominate. I can not see any way that the coalition forces can prevent this
from happening. And if it does happen, there will be turmoil until there is
some stability. This may be with the Shia being supported by Iran, and the
Sunni by the Saudis and maybe the Syrians.
Where the Kurds will end up is the problem, in
particularly for Turkey whose Kurdish population will take heart and want
autonomy. But without a solution provided by those local powers, the
coalition forces probably cannot accomplish much except to lose troops and
delay the inevitable.
Charles Simkins
How is
invading a foreign nation, removing its President, occupying the country,
etc., etc, anything other than conquest? Conquest is a matter of intent and
outcome, is it not? How was anything you say not obvious before we went in?
And how will we accomplish whatever it is you want without going to warre?
==
Subject: Canada troops battle 10-foot Afghan marijuana
plants
Not a headline I ever expected to see: "Canada troops
battle 10-foot Afghan marijuana plants"
http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/americas/
10/12/canada.troops.marijuana.reut/index.html
"Have you ever really looked at your rifle, man? It's
sooooo cool!"
I thought the use of indigenous camouflage materials
was very appropriate, but they didn't say whether they were using whole
plants or just the buds, and whether the plants were in bundles or bales.
<grin>
--Gary Pavek
============
Fighting back.
http://www.cnn.com/2006/EDUCATION/10/
13/defending.the.classroom.ap/index.html
- Roland Dobbins
===========
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts
/articles/2006/10/14/hospital_former_rep_studds_dies_at_69/
Studds, 1st openly gay congressman, dies
By Jay Lindsay, Associated Press Writer |
October 14, 2006
BOSTON --Former U.S. Rep. Gerry Studds, the
first openly gay person elected to Congress, died early Saturday at
Boston Medical Center, several days after he collapsed while walking his
dog, his husband said. He was 69.
<snip>
Studds was first elected in 1972 and
represented Cape Cod and the Islands, New Bedford, and the South Shore
for 12 Congressional terms. He retired from Congress in 1997.
In 1983, Studds acknowledged his
homosexuality after the page revealed he'd had a relationship with
Studds a decade earlier, when the page was 17. Studds was censured for
sexual misconduct by the House, then went home to his constituents to
answer questions in a series of public meetings and interviews with the
press.
Studds defended the relationship as a
consensual relationship with a young adult. The page later appeared
publicly with Studds in support of him. The scandal recently resurfaced
when former Republican Rep. Mark Foley resigned after exchanging
sexually explicit instant messages with a page. Republicans accused
Democrats of hypocrisy for savaging Foley, but saying little about
Studds at that time.
Hara said Studds was never ashamed of the
relationship with the page.
"This young man knew what he was doing,"
Hara said. "He was at (Studds') side."
Studds left Congress and became a lobbyist
for the fishing industry and environmental causes.
In 1996, Congress named the 842-square mile
Gerry E. Studds Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary after him in
recognition of his work protecting the marine environment.
But of course he only did it with the page. He
didn't talk about it on the Internet. Quite different cases, actually. And
Studds stayed in the closet until the page outed him. Clearly this means
that Hastert must resign.
========
Jerry
Some guys and a car and some snow. Heh heh.
http://lerman.biz/pics/Gallery42.html
And some people think blondes are dumb.
Ed
=========
Subject: Groupthink in the
sciences,
Jerry
I am looking at the inside or the back cover of
Science News, October 7, 2006. There are two books that complain about
string theory, and for the same reason. The title of one book - Not Even
Wrong - says it all in three words. Both books complain that string theory
is not even a theory; "it is unsupported by experiment, unfalsifiable and
unconfirmable." The writer of the second book speaks of "groupthink" that
has "hijacked theoretical physics."
Taken with the hysterics surrounding Climatism, it
seems that we may be entering a time when official Science is becoming less
scientific and more religious in its characteristics. And as proof, there
have been recent calls by "green" advocates for an Inquisition to try
"Global Warming deniers" and execute them.
Robert predicted all of this, of course.
Ed
The October issue of Physics Today has a biting
editorial on "Theory in particle physics: Theological speculation versus
practical knowledge," aka String Theory. There is about a 2 month delay on
letters to the editor, so the December issue should make for some mighty
interesting reading.
http://www.physicstoday.org/vol-59/iss-10/p8.html
is listed as a free download.
Alan
BuScience anyone? Doesn't "peer review" =
"Groupthink"?
==
Jerry,
I have to think about this more, but one comment that seems immediately
obvious:
Peer review is NOT "groupthink" in concept, though it can easily tend
that way in execution. A properly constructed peer review should evaluate a
proposal or a paper on its technical merits and the coherence of its
arguments, even if the results are contrary to the prejudices of the
reviewer.
Scientists being human, however, their prejudices can impact their
decisions, and when those prejudices concern controversial issues (e.g.
global warming) groupthink can develop.
Jim
Oh, I agree. I don't have a solution to
the problem. But we have come to a pretty pass when we spend billions/year
on AIDS and won't give the discoverer of retroviruses a couple of million to
do research contrary to the groupthink. There needs to be a way to fund
contrarian research by people like Duesberg and some of the global warming
doubters. Insurance against being wrong isn't all that expensive, and
sometimes results in massive savings -- and sometimes results in finding
things you wouldn't have found had you not been looking for an experimentum
crucis.
========
Subject: User education is pointless,
Jerry
Says here, "Security expert: User education is
pointless:"
http://news.com.com/Security+expert+User+
education+is+pointless/2100-7350_3-6125213.html
?tag=nefd.lede
This reminds me of Pournelle's Reminder: 50% of the
population is below average.
If half - or even a third - of the people online are
below average, then perhaps this guy is right: we shouldn't depend on users
to protect themselves. By expecting them to do so, we end up with ZombieNets.
Something to chaw on in your pitifully few idle
moments.
Ed
I am not sure it follows. People seldom need
educating but they often need reminding. I point out that the American
People have done pretty well taking care of themselves with self government
for 200 years. Alas, we now have the tendency for government to take care of
everyone, and in doing so make it impossible for people to take care of
themselves -- and discourage them for trying.
It could be that the quality of citizen is
declining, but it could also be that by relieving people of responsibility
we also discourage them from trying to be self governing and self
controlling.
But we certainly have ZombieNets...
===========
Subject: RE: Can the West defeat the Islamist threat?
The biggest failure I see with how the ‘War on Terror’
has been fought is the way the US reacted initially.
Within a week of the attack on 9/11 the President
should have gone to Congress and asked for a formal declaration of war on
Afghanistan. No pussyfooting around with police actions and UN mandates.
This should have been followed by a speech to the
people in which the President asked all men to do their duty, report to the
nearest recruitment station and prepared for a general mobilization of all
forces.
This could have and should have been done. Rationing
and other effects would soon follow.
Instead of this everyone decided that what would be
best for the country would be to return to normalcy. Frederick the Great’s
comment about the Burghers in the towns, and the Farmer’s in the fields
should not care that the state is at war comes to mind.
The problem is the state is not at war. The President
has never declared war on Iraq or Afghanistan. Unless you are at war, people
will not treat it with the same urgency.
I feel that this will all change when someone finally
nukes something. As Kosh said to the Centauri Emperor, it will all end in
fire.
Dave M.
We had plenty of reserves for the Afghan
operation; had we sent to Afghanistan what we sent to Iraq, we would have
had entire success. It's the Iraqi war that lacks resources.
===========
Subject: "The Lights of Freedom"
Jerry, it just occurred to me that "The Lights of
Freedom" is a pretty appropriate title for that satellite recon mosaic
image, that shows night lights everywhere on the planet.
I don't have the URL for the complete world image, but
http://www.deskpicture.com/DPs/Astronomy/zByNight_2.jpg
is the one you just mentioned. --John
=========
The following is long
and somewhat technical and worth your attention. Most of the letter is on
North Korea and nukes and proliferation; you can skip through the Foley
section if you like.
Subject: Korean Nukes and Foley
Jerry"
I couldn't resist the temptation to check in to see
how you and the other Paleocons are reacting to the North Korean's alleged
nuclear test.
In perusing your comments on Korea, I couldn't help
but notice your comments on the Foley mess. After our arguments about Martha
Stewart, you'll probably be amazed to find that I totally agree with your
commentary on Foley. As distasteful as his behavior is to moral
traditionalists such as myself, it is my understanding that the cultural
liberals have succeeded in legalizing consensual, homosexual relationships
between adult men and teenage boys in certain jurisdictions, including DC.
I'm also unaware of any FCC or other regs that would make it illegal for
consenting adults to engage in less than graphic, electronic communications
about their actual or potential sexual liazons. If it were, about 99.999% of
the adult population would have to be arrested. The simple fact is that if
the GOP leadership had punished Foley for his deviant and predatory sexual
behavior, the liberals who are now calling for Hastert's head would be
screaming "Homophobia." My own personal opinion is that the parents of the
Pages involved had a very real and reasonable expectation that their son's
and or daughters were going to Washington to further their educations, not
to become the sexual toys of Congresscritters. Those parents now have a
perfect right to excise certain portions of Foley's anatomy using a dull
knife and no anesthetic.
As to North Korea. There has been considerable
uncertainty regarding the authenticity of NK's nuclear test. While I was
attending New Mexico Tech, the DoE conducting an above ground simulation of
a kiloton nuke using about 700 tons of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil. Since
the test was non nuclear, it was not a highly classified event. They had
hundreds of of DoE and DoD employees as well as academics from across the
country to witness the event. Many of those who lodged in Socorro the night
before the event partied hardy all night and I was told that several beer
trucks were even at the event. Although I wasn't invited to attend the
party, I was able to feel the ground shock as I was sitting in the Library.
This experience combined with the fact that the test
was announced in advance makes me wonder if the NK's might have just packed
a tunnel with a couple hundred tons of high explosives which they then
detonated to con the world into believing the that they'd joined the nuclear
club. The initial failure to detect any radiation seemed to confirm my
suspicions. Underground tests release many orders of magnitude less fallout
than above ground tests. However, many of the fission products are noble
gasses which can diffuse through solid rock. Also, the rock above the
chamber excavated by the explosion will eventually collapse. The fracturing
of the rock combined with the pressure from the rock falling into the
chamber (remember the dust clouds when the towers collapsed on 9-11-01) will
result in other fission products being ejected to the surface and into the
atmosphere. This is why underground nuclear tests are conducted under the
Nevada dessert rather than under Manhattan.
The latest news is that radioactive fallout has been
detected. This too could have been simulated by the North Korean's by
releasing some radioactive fission products recovered from spent fuel rods.
However; an analysis of the composition of the radioactive material and the
isotope ratios should determine the truth. If the event was for real, most
of the radioactivity will be from isotopes with half-lives measured in days.
While many people are dismissing the NK nuke test as a
dud and are now ridiculing their competence, I am forced to consider
another, far more alarming possibility. Among the issues that has lead to
this crisis is NKs insistence on reprocessing reactor fuel to extract
plutonium. I piss off a lot of liberals and environmentalist wackos by
pointing out that the Plutonium in spent fuel is not the same as bomb grade
Plutonium. Bomb grade Plutonium is mostly pure, Pu-239 which is the most
fissile isotope. Reactor waste grade Plutonium includes large portions of
other isotopes, most notably Pu-238 and Pu-240.
While the fast neutron fission cross section of Pu-239
is high enough that waste grade Plutonium can still sustain a nuclear
explosion, these impurities pose serious practical difficulties. First is
that the critical mass for waste grade Plutonium is over an order of
magnitude larger than for bomb grade plutonium. Secondly, the relatively
short lived Pu-238 isotope produces large amounts of thermal energy. While
this heat makes Pu-238 valuable as a power source for space probes, this
heat poses serious problems for a weapon designer. First and foremost any
bomb built out of waste grade Plutonium would include tens of kilograms of
Pu-238 which would produce hundreds of kilowatts of heat. Your bomb is going
to need to have a really big refrigeration system. Thirdly and most
seriously, the Pu-240 isotope in waste grade plutonium poses extremely
severe problems for a weapons designer. While the half-life of Pu-240 is
relatively long and therefore the radioactivity is low, Pu-240 undergoes
spontaneous fission to release neutrons. This means that such a device would
require several feet of shielding to protect the technicians. Even more
problematic is the large neutron flux from the Pu-240 will result in
relatively large amounts of fission energy being produced before the device
reaches critical mass. Unless your bomb design includes a very sophisticated
and very, very large mass of high explosive to trigger the explosion, the
device will blow itself apart before critical mass is achieved.
The preceding discussion is not intended to suggest
that building a nuke out of reactor waste grade Plutonium is impossible.
However; it is extremely difficult. Former President Carter's ill-considered
decision to cancel the breeder reactor and order that reactor wastes be
disposed of rather than recycled was in part a reaction to the success of US
weapons labs building a device out of waste grade Plutonium. Unfortunately,
Carter ignored the fact that the resulting device was about the size and
weight of a railroad locomotive and the explosives that were needed to
trigger the explosion accounted for a significant fraction of the total
energy of the subkiloton explosion.
I suspect that the North Korean's just tested a bomb
that was fueled with waste grade Plutonium. The low yield and minimal
fallout would be consistent with that. Also, given the fact that North Korea
is not known to possess a weapons production reactor to produce bomb grade
plutonium and the isotope separation capacity to produce bomb grade Uranium
is also thought to be limited, they might be reluctant to expend their
limited supply of high grade fissile material on a nuke test. North Korea is
known to have large quantities of spent fuel rods and an active reprocessing
plant. The Korean's might have decided to conduct a test using a device that
employs reactor waste grade Plutonium. If so, the device in question is not
militarily usable. However; the ability to build such a device demonstrates
a level of technological competence that is very impressive and should be
sobering.
Unfortunately, your jaded response to the potential
North Korean nuclear test is about what I would expect from a
neoisolationist. I'm not a nuclear weapons alarmist, but I'm not sanguine
about nukes either. Even a single, moderately powerful fission bomb can
inflict a tremendous amount of carnage. If detonated in the middle of
Manhattan Island during the middle of a work day, the prompt death toll
would be in the millions. If such a bomb were delivered by terrorists rather
than by missile or bomber, it would be a surface burst that would result in
radioactive fallout orders of magnitude more lethal than the minimal fallout
that resulted from the air bursts that the US employed at Hiroshima and
Nagasaki. It is logical to presume that as horrendous as such an attack
would be, the nation as a whole should survive it. However, the stock market
collapse that followed 0-11-01 forces me to wonder if the economy might
collapse. As much as the prospect of all of the bureaucrats in DC being
nuked (or better yet, the Four Whores of the Apocalypse who rule Multnomah
county) appeals to my libertarian instincts, I'm realistic enough to
understand that anarchy would be a plausible result and that anarchy can be
even more lethal than tyranny.
We also have to consider the possibility of North
Korea exporting to a nuclear black market the way A Q Kahn of Pakistan did
before his activities were revealed as an unexpected result of Bush's Iraq
invasion. One obvious customer is Iran which is still struggling to work the
bugs out of their gas centrifuges. While NK is too impoverished to
manufacture many nukes, the Iranians have enough oil revenue to finance a
very robust nuclear infrastructure. If no action is taken in response to the
NK test, we could see them proliferate to a number of countries that can
afford to build significant arsenals and use the revenue to buildup their
own production capabilities to build far more than just a token arsenal.
You seem to content to believe that isolationism can
insulate us from attack if North Korea and Iran have nukes. What if the
precedent results in other countries going nuclear. Will isolationism save
us if Brazil, Argentina and Chile have nukes. What about Venezuela or even
Mexico having the bomb. There is a political movement in Mexico that feels
that the US should return the occupied territories of Texas, New Mexico,
Arizona and California. While this movement isn't taken seriously now, even
in Mexico, their views could become far more credible to a Mexico that is
armed with nuclear weapons.
Once again, I must emphasize that I'm not a nuclear
alarmist. You would have been amazed and amused by the reaction I got from a
local newspaper editor when I wrote an op-ed piece some years ago in
response to the local "Shadow Project" in which I conclusively proved that
while thousands of people received horrific burns at Hiroshima and Nagasaki,
no one was actually vaporized. I also pissed off one of my professors at New
Mexico Tech when I insisted that he actually do the math to prove his
assertion that SDI was futile because the nukes detonating when they are
intercepted over the pole (it would take some horrendously sensitive salvage
fusing that would probably make the warheads far vulnerable to interception)
would melt the ice caps and flood coastal cities. He was amazed and enraged
when the calculations revealed that the energy of 10,000 megatons (then the
total of the US and Soviet strategic arsenals) would melt enough ice to
raise ocean levels by only a trivial amount (about 1/3 of a millimeter if I
recall correctly). I then pointed out that since floating ice displaces its
own mass in water, the melting of the ice wouldn't raise ocean levels at
all.
However; while I'm not a nuclear alarmist, I'm amazed
at how easily you dismiss the threat that nuclear proliferation could pose
to human civilization. Perhaps you should reread the passage in "The Mote in
God's Eye" in which you describe how Earth grown coffee is a rare delicacy
because most of the planet is still radioactive from the war that ended the
CoDominium. To be blunt, I always thought that while it was reasonable for
you and Niven to indulge in artistic license, this was just another example
of the gross hyperbole about nuclear weapons effects that add credibility to
the appeasement and unilateral disarmament lobby. To be blunt, by the time
the Second Empire discovered the Moties, the radioactivity of the fallout
would have decayed to the point where it would have been an interesting
thesis for some archeology grad student to prove that a nuclear war had even
occurred. It is exceedingly unlikely that there would have been any area's
where the radioactivity levels would have remained dangerous. If you doubt
me, check out the fallout decay tables in "The Effects of Nuclear Weapons."
However; your allusion to a large scale nuclear war ending civilization on
Earth, causing the collapse of the CoDominium, and leaving Earth's infant
colonies to fend for themselves is very reasonable. The problem is, we don't
have any colonies.
While I dismiss the claimed, global environmental
effects of nuclear war such as the infamous "Nuclear Winter" theory, I
believe that even a limited nuclear war could have devastating effects on
the industrial ecology that supports human civilization. Supporting modern,
technological civilization requires a very large and complex industrial
ecology. You and Niven touched on this concept in "Oath of Fealty." Although
the residents of your Arcology were technologically competent, they were
utterly dependant on daily trade with the City of Los Angeles to sustain
themselves. Building their Arcology or the nuclear power plant that provided
the hydrogen that fueled their city in a building would have required human
and material resources from all over the globe. While I enjoyed your Prince
of Sparta series, I thought you and S & M Steriling were off your rockers
when you suggested that Sparta was capable of building starships when they
were still having to import all of their machine tools and other
technologically sophisticated products, mostly from earth. Perhaps this was
one of the factors that contributed to Lysander's decision to build an
empire? Aggregate a population base and industrial ecology large enough to
sustain their civilization before it collapsed. You were far more realistic
in your War World Series in which you made it clear that Haven's
technological civilization wouldn't survive being cut off from the rest of
the first empire. You were also right on when you made it clear that the
loss of their technology would inevitably result in their population
collapsing below the critical threshold needed to rebuild technological
civilization. In spite of all of their genetic enhancements, I can't imagine
the Saurons being able to rebuild technological civilization either. One
possibility is suggested by the genetic mutation that allowed that horse to
give birth out side of the Shangri La valley. If the same adaptation were to
occur in humans, then Haven's enhanced carrying capacity might allow the
population to grow large enough to rebuild technological civilization.
All of these seeming digressions inevitably lead to my
main point that because we do live in a global economy in which the
factories and people that are required to make the most sophisticated
products are scattered across the globe, even a limited nuclear war might
disrupt the industrial ecology so severely that it would collapse. I
remember one study of the vulnerability of the US refining capacity to
nuclear attack. Because all of the US Refineries are concentrated so
severely, a few dozen nukes would take out most of our refining capacity.
This reduced refining capacity is going to bring the entire economy to its
knees. Ironically, such a disruption of the global economy would probably be
more devastating to the third world populations that weren't directly
targeted than to the industrialized nations that were attacked. Even the
third world countries that are reasonably successful are highly dependant on
imports of critical machinery, fuels, chemicals and manufactured goods to
sustain their predominantly agrarian economies. These countries are also
dependant on food imports to offset seasonal variations in production and in
times of famine. The inevitable chaos that would result from a limited
nuclear war is going to ensure that the only countries that will be
importing food or anything else will be the technologically, militarily
competent countries who can and will take what they need to sustain
themselves in the aftermath of a limited, nuclear war.
Your solution to the North Korean problem is to rely
on a combination of deterrence, missile defense (probably augmented by a
rational civil defense policy), and isolationism. I agree with you whole
heartedly about the need for a robust deterrent and missile defenses, and
I'm probably a more active advocate of civil defense (if you thought about
civil defense, you wouldn't live in LA), However; I'm also realistic enough
to know that deterrence can and will fail eventually, while missile defenses
can dramatically reduce the carnage and the devastation of a nuclear attack,
some of the missiles could and would reach their targets, and civil defense
can only limit, not eliminate the casualties from the nukes that get
through. We need to continue our efforts to build and maintain a global
community that discourages irrational countries from acquiring the
technology to destroy us.
James Crawford
When my friend Mel Tappan moved to the Rogue
River and urged me to do so -- back in the days when I was an editor of
Survive Magazine and considered a journeyman survivalist and colonel of my
own survival company -- I told him the best way to survive a nuclear war is
not to have one; and I could do a lot more about that by staying on Los
Angeles, where I could chair the Council that worked with Graham and Reagan
on SDI. I don't regret the decision. Mel, alas, died when separated from
modern medicine and UCLA hospital.
I suspect I have thought at least as much
as you have about the requirements of a modern civilization.
Thanks for explaining some of the
technical aspects. I never know how much I can or should say on such
matters.
I don't do topical news. My
current thought is that NK had a squib, a partial detonation, but they had
good decoupling and isolation; but that is a mere guess. I am sure they did
not have the technology to build a sub-kiloton weapon. I am also sure that
NK or any other country with a few hundred million dollars can manage to
acquire fissionables and given fissionables can build a 15 KT device.
There is speculation that NK is trying to
develop a suitcase weapon. They certainly have every reason to want one, but
it's a hard thing to do.
==========
========
The Rights of Englishmen, Part XLVI.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,,1889311,00.html
- Roland Dobbins
==
The Rights of Englishmen, Part XLIX.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;
jsessionid=DN4MHOV25IIFTQFIQMGSFGGA
VCBQWIV0?xml=/news/2006/10/14/nlunch14.xml
-- Roland Dobbins
At Runnymede, at
Runnymede,
What say the reeds at Runnymede?
The lissom reeds that give and take,
That bend so far, but never break,
They keep the sleepy Thames awake
With tales of John at Runnymede.
========
Global warming: the chilling
effect on free speech.
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/article/1782/
- Roland Dobbins
TOP
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