It really was fear of WMD's

Today I had a private conversation with Douglas Feith and Frank Gaffney Jr. It came about due to a conference call that was arranged by the Center for Security Policy of which the latter is the President.

The subject of the call was Feith's recent book War and Decision: Inside the Pentagon at the Dawn of the War on Terrorism. Feith as you may recall was the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy on 911. As such he was in the thick of things.

That aside, there were technical difficulties that left me as virtually the only person on the call.

Feith explained that the first thing that the administration had to decide after 911 was what to do about it. It could seek revenge against al Qaeda who they believed perpetrated it or it could seek to act to prevent future attacks. It chose the latter. CONTINUE

Something the public needs explained to it are the major steps that a nation needs to take, alone or with other nations, to develop Weapons of Mass Destruction.

To start with, explain that there are three kinds of WMDs, an expression invented by the Soviet Union. Chemical weapons, biological weapons, and nuclear weapons.

The public needs to know that any developed country in the world has toxic chemicals that could be used as weapons. And any developed country in the world that has a hospital could create biological weapons. But that neither of these two are effective against a modern military. Their only use is against unprotected civilians, and most likely in a terrorist attack.

This leaves nuclear weapons. First of all, for all the talk about “radiation bombs”, which are essentially nuclear matter tied to high explosive which blows it up into the air as dust; such weapons are impractical and pretty ineffective, unless they are created by real experts, and blow up in just the right place at just the right time. So they are not much of a threat.

So what everybody is concerned about are nuclear bombs, that explode with a nuclear reaction. The most important part of such bombs are the weapons grade uranium or plutonium in them.

Most of the nuclear reactors in the world produce at least some weapons grade uranium or plutonium, so it is not entirely hard to get.

This means that there are only two obstacles left. Actually making a nuclear weapon, and having some way to deliver it, most likely a missile. The missile has to be able to carry about 900 pounds of bomb, which is about the smallest that most countries can make a nuclear weapon.

When you add it all up, there is actually very little that even the US can do to tell if somebody is making a bomb. To a great extent, we are reliant on what they say to make our judgment.

If they say they are making a bomb, we would be foolish to not believe them. If they say they aren’t making a bomb, but are doing the things they have to do to make a bomb, then the US also has to assume that they are making a bomb.

And more than anything else, this is what the experts have to tell the public. Say there are 10 things that we can detect, that tell us someone is making a bomb. How many do we have to detect of that 10, until we are pretty certain they are trying to make a bomb? When it would be very unlikely that they are doing things for peaceful purposes?

By doing so, it gives the experts the authority to draw a line in the sand, and say, “If this country crosses that line, we will know they are making nuclear weapons, so we will stop them.”

And even if it later turns out that they were just faking it, then it is not the experts that are at fault. It is that country for trying to bluff the experts into thinking it was making a bomb.

It is not a wise idea to practice your quick draws on armed gunmen. Sure, you might be faking it, but if you get shot it is your own fault.

Yes and no. The Russians, especially have a knack for creating “false positive” non-nuclear detonations.

For example, they stored too much high grade nuclear waste in a salt mine in the Urals, then sealed it up with a concrete plug. About a month later, the internal temperature of that mountain was about the same as the surface of the Sun. When the top of the mountain blew up, from space, it looked like a nuclear detonation. Turned about 40 square miles of forest into desert for say, 30,000 years.

Another time, at the Baltic port of Riga, they were loading missiles with a crane, when the crane head broke. The Russians don’t store their munitions well, and keep them too close together. The resultant crater was impressive, and it, too, looked like a nuclear detonation from space. It also effectively neutered the Russian North Sea fleet, which was ordered to go into port at the slowest speed, and if they had a breakdown, it was nice knowing you.

Russians have no disasters but the very worst.

As far as geosynchronous satellite accuracy, it is probably around a few inches. However, most satellites have dynamic orbits, so their accuracy would be somewhat less. Even civilian satellites give reasonably good imagery.

http://maps.google.com/

Center your State, then zoom in and center your city. Select satellite view, then zoom in to see the roof of where you live.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.