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Barack Obama is fond of insisting that he "has Israel's back." Maybe he should mention that to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. In remarks to journalists in London quoted by the Guardian, General Martin Dempsey warned that any Israeli attack on Iran would "clearly delay but probably not destroy Iran's nuclear programs." He also said economic sanctions on Iran were having an effect and needed more time to work, but that the good they were doing "could be undone if [Iran] was attacked prematurely." And to underscore the firmness of his opposition to an Israeli strike, the Chairman added...

Dateline: Tel Aviv, sometime in the next six weeks From this moment the State of Israel declares a state of war exists between the State of Israel and the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Because Israel views the threats by the government of the IRI in conjunction with its efforts to develop nuclear weapons and means of delivery as existential threats, Israel will take all actions necessary, specifically including unilateral and preemptive military action, to protect its citizens from the threats posed by representatives of the government of the IRI and to assure Israel's continued survival. To minimize...

Moscow - Iran's first atomic power plant, a symbol of what the Islamic Republic says is its peaceful nuclear ambition, is now operating at full capacity, Russia's state nuclear corporation Rosatom said on Friday. The Russian-built 1,000-megawatt reactor near the Gulf city of Bushehr, was plugged into Iran's national grid last September, ending years of delays and suspicions that Moscow was using the project as a diplomatic lever. Oil-rich Iran says electricity generation is the main motivation for nuclear work that its adversaries say is really aimed at getting atomic weapons capability.

‘If you’re not going to act against the reactor, then we are,’ PM told president, says advisor Elliot Abrams. Then, as now on Iran, the US favored Ehud Olmert ordered the 2007 strike on a Syrian nuclear reactor immediately after former US president George W. Bush informed him that the Americans would not attack the facility, according to a Channel 10 report aired on Sunday evening. Bush’s deputy national security adviser Elliot Abrams was present when the president called Olmert on September 6, 2007 and made clear that the US would not take action, and that then-secretary of state Condoleezza...

Heya Freepers, I have a problem. I started writing a book, and I am getting in over my head, here. I am at a point in the notes for the book where the Middle East is broke because oil is pretty much worthless.Will the Mid East population roll over Europe? Will they get control of European nukes? Will they immediately use those nukes on Israel and the US? What would our reaction be? Would we defend ourselves or try to appease them with more Muslim outreach programs a la NASA? Would Russia and China help us?Believe it or not, this...

North Korea will have been able to build as many as 48 nuclear weapons by 2015 unless the international community is able to make sanctions already imposed on the regime work. The stark warning about Pyongyang's nuclear stockpile was issued by The Institute for Science and International Security, which projected three scenarios for North Korea's atomic weapons programme. In the best-case scenario for the next four years outlined by the researchers, North Korea will have been able to use the centrifuges at its Yongbyon nuclear plant to produce sufficient low enriched uranium for a maximum of 25 nuclear weapons. That...

It wasn't a movie poster for a monster or disaster film. It was an illustration of America's worst nightmare - that an atomic bomb would strike a major U.S. metropolis. The harrowing image of the New York City skyline marred by a giant mushroom cloud splashed the cover of Collier's magazine on August 5, 1950 - at a time of heightened American anxiety. The Collier's issue was spotlighted recently on Smithsonianmag.com, which ran the same pictures that appeared in the same 1950 issue of the magazine. While recent films like The Avengers, Independence Day and Cloverfield touched on a fictional...

PORTLAND, Maine — The U.S. Navy intends to repair a nuclear-powered attack submarine that was severely damaged by a fire while in dry dock and then return it to the fleet, Navy officials Friday. While engineering assessments are ongoing, the Navy has decided to repair the USS Miami and is committed to doing so, Navy spokeswoman Lt. Courtney Hillson told The Associated Press. “Our goal is to return the Miami to the fleet because this makes sense operationally and fiscally,” Hillson said. There had been lingering questions over whether it would make financial sense to repair the 22-year-old submarine, which...

Pentagon denied on Thursday media reports that a Russian nuclear powered submarine cruised unnoticed for several weeks in the Gulf of Mexico near the shores of the United States. “I don't know what that information was based on, but it was not correct,” Wendy Snyder, a spokeswoman for the Pentagon, said. The Washington Free Beacon reported earlier that Russia’s Akula class nuclear powered submarine (Project 971) freely traveled in June and July in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico undetected by the U.S. Navy.

Gunmen have attacked and entered a Pakistan air force base, according to Reuters. The target is the Minhas Air Base in the town of Kamra, located around 40 miles outside Islamabad. The attacked is believed to be conducted by the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) — reports in the Pakistan press have suggested they were planning attacks in retaliation for upcoming military action. A three hour gun battle is reportedly raging between security guards and attackers.

At its present rate of enrichment, Iran will have 250 kilograms of 20-percent grade uranium, exactly enough to build its first nuclear bomb, in roughly six weeks, and two-to- four bombs by early 2013, debkafile’s military and intelligence sources report. Hence the leak by an unnamed Israeli security source Sunday, Aug. 12, disclosing Iran’s progress in developing the detonator and fuses for a nuclear warhead which can be fitted onto Shehab-3 ballistic missiles capable of reaching Israel. Since 20 percent refined uranium is a short jump to weapons grade fuel, Iran will have the capability and materials for building an...

‘There are no civilians in Japan.” This was the judgment of a US Air Force intelligence report produced before the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during August 1945. The meaning was clear. The global conflict that had raged since 1939 had become a total war. London, Coventry, Berlin, Dresden, Tokyo and many other cities had all suffered “strategic bombing”. The leading participants in the Second World War did not view civilian population as pure collateral. By 1945 they were the principal targets. The bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and 9 respectively were the...

20 cannons were manufactured from 1951 to 1953. The cannon fired a W9 or W19 nuclear artillery shell with a maximum range of 24-29 miles. 5 Field Artillery Battalions were deployed to the 7th Army in West Germany between October 1953 and April 1954. The units were hosted by the 42nd Field Artillery Group. Each battalion had 3 280mm guns, 30 officers, 7 warrant officers and 401 enlisted men. All of the cannons were retired in December 1963.

Dr. Ephraim Asculai, senior research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies, said on Thursday that he doubts the sanctions being imposed on Iran will lead its leaders to give up the country's nuclear weapons program. He predicted that Iran could have nuclear weapons within a year. Dr. Asculai told Arutz Sheva that the sanctions imposed so far on Iran, whether by the UN Security Council or by the United States and other Western countries, have yet to have a real effect. “We still do not see that the Iranians are willing to be flexible on critical matters, even...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. government's only facility for handling, processing and storing weapons-grade uranium was temporarily shut this week after anti-nuclear activists, including an 82-year-old nun, breached security fences, government officials said on Thursday. WSI Oak Ridge, the contractor responsible for protecting the facility at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, is owned by the international security firm G4S, which was at the center of a dispute over security at the London Olympic Games. Officials said that the facility was shut down on Wednesday at least until next week after three activists cut through perimeter fences to reach the outer wall of...

SNIPPET: "I. When considering the matter of jihadis online, remember that most of what we think we know is based on analyses of the comments made by an handful of vocal activists. The vast majority of jihadis online, be they on forums or social networking sites[i], say nothing. Skillful translations and insightful analyses by definition tell us little about this potentially lethal yet silent majority."

(Reuters) - President Vladimir Putin oversaw the start of construction of one of Russia's newest generation submarines on Monday and vowed to boost nuclear naval forces to safeguard the country's position as a leading sea power. Warning that its navy would protect top energy producer Russia's interests in the oil-rich Arctic, Putin led the ceremony to begin building the submarine Prince Vladimir, named after the ruler who founded a precursor state to modern Russia. The vessel is the fourth Borei class submarine, designed to carry one of the country's newest and most powerful intercontinental nuclear missiles, the Bulava, or Mace....

Russian President Vladimir Putin participated on Monday in a ceremony to launch construction of Russia’s fourth Borei-class (Project 955A) ballistic missile submarine. “By 2020, we should have eight Borei-class submarines,” he said. “Two of them - the Alexander Nevsky and one other - are in trials. I am sure the entire project will be implemented.” The ceremony for the boat, the Knyaz Vladimir, was held at Sevmash, Russia’s largest shipyard and sole nuclear submarine maker located in the port city of Severodvinsk on the White Sea. More new-generation warships - both surface ships and submarines - should be built for...

US Republican Presidential nominee Mitt Romney and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agree Israel's greatest danger comes from Iran. The Republican presidential candidate's trip to the region is part of a three-nation foreign tour that has already taken in a somewhat unsuccessful stint in the UK and will finish in Poland, as the Romney campaign team hope to boost their man's foreign policy credentials. Meeting in Mr Netanyahu's office, the Israeli Prime Minister spoke to Mr Romney in front of assembled journalists and photographers. "I have to say that I heard some of your remarks and you said that the...

Tennessee’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory was such a well-kept secret during World War II that most Americans still don’t know that it sits off one of busiest highways in the South. Every year, streams of vacationers whiz by the complex that enriched uranium for America’s first atomic bomb project. It’s on the way to Great Smoky Mountains National Park — the most-visited U.S. national park. And every year, right about this time, the city of Oak Ridge, just west of Knoxville on Interstate 40, holds a Secret City Festival, crying out to potential tourists. “They don’t even know we’re here,”...