What would you do, or propose doing, if tomorrow, Al Qaeda announced that it had obtained posession of a suitcase-sized nuclear weapon? Imagine that the accouncement is seen as credible, and that they say that they will use it at a time in place of their own choosing.
The long terms of something like that going off would be much worse than an ICBM air burst. It would be a fallout nightmare as would any ground burst. At least with a warhead it is over quick for a lot of them and the fallout is minimal if any. A ground burst would mean years of invisible death.
Not much you CAN do. Continue to work your intelligence sources, make sure your transportation security and ports are doing what they're supposed to be doing, and continue to work diplomatically and through financial institutions to make it hard for al Qaeda. Oh, and bomb Iran.
Announce in no uncertain terms that if Al Qaeda explode a nuclear bomb in one of our cities, we will respond by flattening with thermonuclear fire the one place on earth dear to their Islamist hearts.
Which is definitely the last place said suitcase nuke would be. Well thought out. The goal here is to stop the suitcase nuke, not to kill everyone who doesn't have it.
If the announcement is seen as credible then our intelligence agencies would have to agree that they have it and know how it was achieved. I'd be asking how on earth they let it happen
The best way to stop them using it would be by using the intelligence services and special forces. In order for them to do that it would be nice to find out why they are so useless
The best option here would be to threaten Mecca with nuclear destruction. You wouldn't announce it to the world of course. You would use other channels to make sure the news got to the leaders of Al Queda. Many Islamist soldiers already see the futility of another 9/11 attack. After all, if your enemy can kill 50,000 of you for every 3,000 of them, it makes no sense to continue escalating things. Also, offer, on public TV, a very substantial reward for anyone with any information leading to the recovery of said nuke. And immediate heightened security and searches of any boat coming into the most populated ports.
This sort of thing is always particularly useless. People wanting to sneak stuff in don't go through "the most populated ports". They're more likely to sneak a barge or sailboat up a minor river somewhere and unload the stuff away from prying eyes.
OK. Two choices then, tell me which one is ok: 1. Someone's passport that would work. 2. Someone's passport that wouldn't work.
You're a hypocrite Dan. When a nuclear war is at risk, who gives a fuck what country uses stolen passports to find that nuke and disable it?
In the middle of a crisis, the first thing he does is point the finger and figure out who to blame instead of taking steps to avert a nuclear holocaust. Dan, you would make an EXCELLENT politician.
I wouldn't be TOO concerned because they're largely a bunch of fuck-ups and would screw something up. Damn thing would never go off.
You do know how truly small nuclear explosion wise a "suitcase nuke" is don't you? Subkiloton range. Something like equivalent to 100 to 500 tons of TNT at most. The result would be a Sept. 11th scale attack with some level of radiation. A lot of damage, but nothing that would bring a major nation to its knees.
There are many places that our intelligence services can't effectively reach, primarily because of twits like yourself.
No it didn't. It destroyed a few buildings in NYC and got a lot of people worried. World War II brought Germany to its knees.
You're on crack. The most likely "suitcase nuke" they'd obtains would have a yield of AT LEAST 15 kilotons...
