Posted on 12/12/2004 11:32:29 AM PST by Paul Ross
Iranian Missile Could Reach Eastern U.S. The latest generation of missile technology currently being engineered by Iranian scientists will be able to reach the continental United States, former Israeli ambassador to the U.N. Dore Gold said Saturday. Gold called Iran's capacity to launch a nuclear attack on most of the Western world a "global problem in which European governments, the United States and Israel have to come up with a solution."Reprinted from NewsMax.com
Sunday, Dec. 12, 2004 9:41 a.m. EST
Asked what Israel would do if Tehran began producing nuclear weapons, Gold told the Fox News Channel's Cal Thomas, "This is not just an Israeli problem. The missiles being developed in Iran have a range that goes well beyond Israel. "Certainly they have the Shihab-3 missile, with a range of 1,300 kilometers, that can strike Israel," he said. "But they're developing the Shihab-4 for hitting Europe and a Shihab-5, with Russian missile technology, that can strike the Eastern Seaboard of the United States."
Volume 2 Issue 24 (December 10, 2002)
CHINA OPENS PANDORA'S NUCLEAR BOX
By Thomas Woodrow
The transfer and sale of Chinese-origin nuclear weapons and missile technologies has started a spiraling cycle of proliferation with grave consequences for security in South and East Asia. Beijing has made nuclear and missile transfers directly and indirectly through proxy states such as Pakistan and North Korea, disseminating through them to other nations including Syria, Iran and Libya. This Chinese-led proliferation has kick-started a nuclear arms race involving India, Pakistan and North Korea. Japan, South Korea and Taiwan will soon join in, to be inevitably followed by Iran, Syria and others. China's direct and indirect assistance to North Korea is especially worrying, as Pyongyang is designing an intercontinental-range ballistic missile with a nuclear mission to target the United States.
In October 2002, North Korea revealed that it was continuing to secretly develop nuclear weapons despite promising not to do so as part of its 1994 agreement with the United States. The nuclear weapons technology involved--including large numbers of centrifuge machines to produce weapons-grade uranium--has its origins in Chinese assistance to Pakistan's nuclear programs. It seems most unlikely that Islamabad would have passed on Chinese-origin nuclear technology in such quantities to North Korea without Beijing's knowledge and consent. Chinese technicians working in Pakistan's nuclear and missile facilities would have notified Beijing in any event.
China has long historical links with North Korea's missile programs. The Chinese themselves have typified their relationship with North Korea as "closer than gums and teeth." In the 1970s, North Korea received Chinese missile technology of Soviet design. This assistance was furthered by the joint development of the Chinese DF-61, a 1,000 km-range nuclear missile that was to be turned over to Pyongyang. Although this program ended in 1978 when its Chinese sponsor fell from favor, by that time North Korea had acquired valuable design assistance from the Chinese. This assistance helped Pyongyang reverse-engineer a version of the Scud missile it had purchased from Egypt in 1976. North Korea arranged for Iranian funding of its indigenous Scud B missile program in the mid-1980s; these links with Tehran have continued to the present day. North Korea also served as a conduit for Chinese transfers of Silkworm anti-ship missiles to Iran in the late 1980s to avoid U.S. censure of Beijing. One 1988 transfer reportedly included eighty Chinese Silkworms and forty North Korean Scud-Bs as part of the same shipment.
Although Beijing has stepped up its political and economic relations with South Korea, there is evidence of ongoing military cooperation with North Korean missile and nuclear programs. In 1997, a "joint team" of Chinese and North Korean technicians was reportedly sent to Iran to assist in Tehran's ballistic missile efforts. The Iranian Shahab-3 and Shahab-4 missiles are direct beneficiaries of North Korean and Chinese missile programs. North Korea likely has used the Iranian missile tests for its own missile program development to circumvent Pyongyang's "promise" not to conduct missile launches (the Shahab-3 is the No Dong; the planned Shahab-5 is the Taepodong-2).
There is other evidence of Chinese assistance to North Korean missile programs. A 1993 test launch of the 1,000-km range No Dong missile from North Korea evidently involved no telemetry, reportedly a signature of some Chinese missile tests. In 1994, a missile mockup of the long-range Taepodong-2 appeared to resemble the Chinese CSS-2 intermediate-range ballistic missile. A 1995 press report claimed that some U.S. intelligence officials believed China was both assisting North Korea to develop a family of long-range ballistic missiles and training some 200 Korean missile engineers in China. That family of long-range missiles is, of course, the Taepodong, which Pyongyang successfully launched in August 1998--ten years before the CIA believed possible--on a trajectory that carried it over Japan to impact near the Hawaiian Islands. The miniaturization of a nuclear package, advanced guidance components and stage separation mechanisms are critical to North Korea's efforts to develop a nuclear-capable Taepodong-class missile with a range to target the United States. These are the areas where Chinese assistance is likely occurring, possibly under the guise of satellite-launch assistance.
Beijing's willingness to sell and transfer critical components of WMD technology makes China directly or indirectly a key component of the global proliferation of nuclear and missile technology. While Beijing may have had its political reasons for assisting Pakistan and North Korea, in doing so it has opened the Pandora's box of a regional nuclear arms race. The Indian Defense Ministry has publicly stated it sees China as India's primary strategic threat; New Delhi is designing its longer-range Agni missiles specifically for nuclear deterrence of China. Faced with ongoing North Korean and Chinese nuclear and missile efforts, Japan will undoubtedly activate its own nascent nuclear weapons program and start to devote some of its launches from Kagashima for military purposes. South Korea already has a half-hidden missile program underway. Taiwan developed medium-range missiles in the 1980s and was well on its way towards a nuclear capability when the United States pressured it to stop some twenty years ago. Taipei, too, likely will rethink its need for a nuclear deterrent. The nuclear race is also spreading to Iran, Syria, Libya and Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia may be funding much of Pakistan's missile and nuclear efforts and could become a nuclear power literally overnight through an airlift of missiles.
Why has China continued to proliferate in the face of such obviously negative consequences? By spreading WMD technology throughout Asia, Beijing is only helping to create the regional instability it claims it wants to avoid, and is fulfilling its own paranoia of encirclement as Asia becomes increasingly wary of Beijing's willingness to throw its economic and military weight around. China's mistakes can be partly attributed to simple Han hubris, especially in its relations with India, which Beijing regards as an inferior culture. Mostly, however, it is political blundering, spurred on by shortsighted greed, which has led China to start an arms race it did not want. China armed Pakistan to the nuclear teeth without considering the Indian response. It assisted North Korea, either directly or indirectly, seemingly without concern that this might cause Japan to rethink its nuclear option and more fully embrace the U.S. NMD initiative. Perhaps Beijing plans to use Pyongyang as a lever against Washington in the event of a decision to launch an attack against Taipei. In any event, China's rampant proliferation of WMD has created an arms race that cannot now be stopped. Beijing will soon reap the rewards of its ill-considered policies as India, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan accelerate or reactivate indigenous missile and nuclear weapons programs.
Mr. Woodrow was a senior China analyst at the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Bingo. If the US put conventional bombs on the top of our ICBM's we'd bankrupt ourselves to use them. Only use for an ICBM is either decapitation strikes and non-conventional use.
"But they're developing the Shihab-4 for hitting Europe and a Shihab-5, with Russian missile technology, that can strike the Eastern Seaboard of the United States."
So is there a downside to this?
Please scrap the tagline.
Thanks for the info
Hey, I'm a red voter in a blue state....NY
So am I. I live in the socialist state of Illinois where the dead vote early and often.
You really think we would give a full nuclear response? I think we would do a lot of hand wringing and issue some arrest warrants. Congress does not want to give this president a declaration of war, would give him too much power and castrate the ACLU.
The only way an Iranian missile can reach the US is by boat.
Nevertheless, it is time for a preemptive strike against Iran to end this charade once and for all.
The world's most powerful country says Islam cannot have a nuclear missile.Anyone have a problem with that?
Well, gee, it's not like we've had any dire events warning us about Iran to necessitate something other than a diplomatic response, right? < /sarcasm >
I am almost positive that we have several missles that can reach anywhere in Iran.
Thanks for the ping!
Bravo, while we waste time grand standing with words before it happens, preemption is the only way to prevent this inevitable threat from reaching US soil.
I can only hope Moscow is targeted, considering their stupidity in selling this tech to insane murder cultists.
Alright, all you Freepers out of the north east. Then we won't have to worry about it.
BMEWS Thule and/or Fylingsdale would detect the missile in-flight, sure. Inceptors launched from Greely AFB near Fairbanks would travel at 12,000 meters per second in a [desparate yet successful] attempt to kill them.
Don't blame W., it would be nearly impossible to locate interceptors in a blue state or Canada, whence interception geometries are more favorable.
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