Iran's space program.

[Satanic Mechanic]

mms://od-msn.msn.com/3/mbr/Hi_3052_msn.wmv

[SCEtoAUX]

Wow, THAT was racist and offensive.

Worse yet, it wasn't even funny....

[DonPMitchell]

Here is what Iran is up to with regard to missiles, mostly derived from North Korean technology:

http://fas.org/nuke/guide/iran/missile/index.html

Their ISIS missile is intended to loft satellites at some point -- the time-honored way of demonstrating you have an ICBM.  However, their chief rocket scientist died mysteriously a few years ago.  Can't imagine how that happened.

[Satanic Mechanic]

Can't imagine how that happened.

My guess is the goat did it.

SM

[DonPMitchell]

Bahahaha...

Well they still have yet to really build a working orbital launcher.  Of course the next shoe to drop will be the test of a nuclear warhead.  It's just painful to watch the ineffectual EU negotiations with Iran about uranium enrichment.  The Neville Chamberlain school of diplomacy.  What's with that?

[Satanic Mechanic]

If Iran builds it, they will test it underground and we will pickup with siesmic sensors.  Iran will want to rattle the nuclear saber.

SM

[sparkmaster]

Bah. Iran can have nukes for all I care. Just as long as they don't use them.

[Johno]

I don't know if this sounds prejudiced, but I am nervous about ANY country having nuclear weapons when it is a matter of recorded foreign policy that a neighbouring country should be turned into a slightly radioactive car park.  Maybe that's just me.

As it happens, I see nuclear weapons as a dangerous and outmoded white elephant, useful only to terrorists now.  Soldiers don't generally like 'em (not just because of moral arguments either, which traditionally have never prevented a soldier from using a weapon - they don't like being ordered to march into a radioactive wasteland 20 minutes later! ), politicians wouldn't use 'em unless they went bonkers, they're difficult to store and finicky to maintain, and they're environmentally dreadful.

About the only plus is that they're cost effective, and that's only if you think a nuclear deterrent really works.  As far as I can see, I'd be less scared of nuclear bombs (which my opponent was unlikely to use) than a larger conventional military (which he'd be all too likely to use).  It's kind of the same philosophy that says that a fine applied liberally is a better deterrent than capital punishment of one captured criminal in a million!

[jdbenner]

I can think of few weapons more lethal and destructive than Fire.  The chef difficulties with using nuclear weapons are the large size of the explosion, and the radiation.  For those who have never considered the strategic implications of nuclear weapons.  Radiation is hard to control, and the motive for war is usually for one side  to take something from the other side.  If you destroy every thing what is there to take?  At least napalm can be used on small targets as well as large. 

[DonPMitchell]

If you've never seen it, look at the film Trinity and Beyond by Peter Kuran.  We won an Academy Award for the film restoration used.  It's awesome and also highly educational.

Here's a section I found on-line (3.3 MB):

www.MentalLandscape.com/nukecannon.wmv

Whoever did it got a kind of flawed capture off video tape.  The DVD of the film doesn't have any of the pops in the soundtrack and such.

[Johno]

That is one scary concept . . I'm glad I'm not one of the soldiers involved!

[DonPMitchell]

That's just a tactical nuke, probably only about 1 kiloton.  This little wmv has been edited out of the full movie, and is somewhat misleading.  The images of the bus and forest being destroyed are from another larger detonation.

H-bombs (thermonukes) are more difficult to build by far, but are about 1000 times as powerful as an A-bomb.  Thermonuclear weapons take out a whole city.

It was bad enough having the USA and USSR in a nuclear stand-off, although some would argue that the existance of atomic weapons is what prevented an all-out world war over communism.  We were lucky that the situation was handled by game-theory and careful strategizing.

Now with countries like Iran involved, you have the prospect of religious zealots with suitcase nukes.  Not an idea I would dismiss.  With China thinking about themselves, and Europe's lack or resolve, it certainly makes for interesting times.

[Johno]

Yes, I am well aware of all of the above.  But 1 KT or 1MT, I'd still not want to be anywhere near the minimum "safe" range.  I know enough about the gamma involved, for example, to know that there's no effective shielding possible, and that there's going to be enough alpha and beta laced dust that you wouldn't want to be hanging out in the area.

Yes, I agree that strategic nukes kept the peace (probably, in my opinion, accidentally!), and I know that a suitcase bomb wouldn't kill a full city, but I still don't like either.  I would rather even responsible powers like the USA and the UK dice their nukes, and the idea of other countries beginning programs is bad.

[DonPMitchell]

Oh I agree, nukes are bad news.  Richard Feynmann once said that uranium should have just been left in the Earth.  But the geni is out of the bottle now.  The biggest danger now is unstable, rogue states acquiring and distributing nuclear weapons now.