Osiris

I suppose you are referring to their leader's suggestion to "wipe Israel off the map." That is simply rhetoric, not necessarily a declaration of intent. Remember, Israel has nuclear weapons and arguably the best military in the region, as well as the support of the US. It would be suicidal for Iran to launch nuclear strikes when they would face severe retaliation from the rest of the world. I don't think we've come to the point (and hope we never will) where nuclear weapons are intended for tactical use. Even when we dropped bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the intent was not to destroy Japan's military capability, but to force them into unconditional surrender. In other words, it was a bargaining tool.

The US does not have the military capability to invade Iran, so we'll just have to see how the sanctions work out.

Parihaka

You seem to be assuming a rationality which they are not known for.

Commando

This issue is a chance for the United Nation's to redeem itself after the Iraq war. What should be done is not only against Iran. The Un should send in a force and occupy and regime change Iran and Syria. We all know whats gonna happen though. Its gonna be Israel then USA, Britains and Australia's mess to clean it up.

The US has the potential to launch a full invasion of Iran at any time. Go back to WW1 and WW2 and Vietnam, the US has the best production rates, and can nationalise and efficiently use industries better then any other country.

In times of war, no country is managed better then the USA.

Confed999

Just curious, why do you not believe a person's intent, when they tell you what their intent is? Personally, if someone says they're going to kick my ***, I believe them, and act appropriately.
Suicide is what they preach. It's not like they haven't risked a severe retaliation before, either.
Nagasaki was a regional capital, an Imperial Navy base, an industrial area, and a port. Hioshima had long been a major junction in the supplies that fed their military, and was also a regional capital. It may have been a bargining tool in hindsight, but they were taken out for a real reason... Invasion...
I agree, no occupation option, without major assistance. Sanctions are useless, they just get innocents killed. I'm on the "support anti-government groups" side, and when they're ready to make a stand, blow hell out of everything political or military.

__________________
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I agree completely with this Administration’s goal of a regime change in Iraq-John Kerry
even if that enforcement is mostly at the hands of the United States, a right we retain even if the Security Council fails to act-John Kerry
He may even miscalculate and slide these weapons off to terrorist groups to invite them to be a surrogate to use them against the United States. It’s the miscalculation that poses the greatest threat-John Kerry

Bluesman

Osiris, respectfully but forcefully, I must point out that you simply do not understand the nature of this regime. If you think that there is any deterrent effect in our power or the Israelis', you do not have the measure of the man we're dealing with. If you believe that he doesn't mean what he says, vis-a-vis Israel, you are the exact same kind of dupe as Chamberlain, when he simply could not fathom that Herr Hitler meant exactly what he said.

Furthermore, you have managed to mis-read my other posts, wherein I expressly rejected the invasion of the entire country. That is not a part of what I conceive is possible to do in response to the crisis.

As for sanctions, they can only be effective as part of a much more active and muscular package of tools that we could use. By themselves, they would be worse than useless, and seeing 'how the sanctions work out' is about as weak and defeatist an approach as one could imagine.

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Commando

Do u think Iran has nukes already since their programme has been progressing for 25 years now.

Bulgaroctonus

If Hassan Abbassi is so convinced that the U.S. will not send a million men to invade Iran, which we won't, I advise a nuclear option.

It will be the greatest political shock of the last half-century, but I think it is necessary.

The strategic goals of Iran should not be underestimated, and if we show weakness now, the Islamic world will revel in its victory.

Iran must be crushed militarily. A nuclear option is the most efficient way to do it.
It will also set a great example. If a nation wants to play 'Chicken' with the U.S., it should be prepared to be exterminated.

Maybe the Islamic Republic will respond to and American type of nuclear terror, and the threat of their own annihilation.

Officer of Engineers

1) We don't need the nuclear option. We have plenty of bombs that are big enough and nasty enough to do the job.

2) Would you like to give the PRC the excuse to nuke Taiwan? Or Pakistan to settle their internal problems?

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troung

Devils adovcate...

With who and what? The MKO lacks credibility in Iran and we are wonderfully linked with them (they lack popular support). Plus using terrorism on Iran could blow up in our face.

I don't like the line of reasoning of an Iranian nuclear umbrella for AQ. I know that is not what I qouted. If I where a Sunni extermist terrorist group I would just push Mush off and use Pakistan rather then the distant long shot that Iran would give me a nuclear umbrella. And looking at Iraq and what happened in Afghanistan it is not likely that Iran would protect AQ.

On another hand I doubt Iran would like to keep living with the risk of a nuclear armed Pakistan, Israel, Russia, America and India.

So we want to push sectarian voilence?

We might just be better sending money through expats to student groups in the hopes they get killed on camera...

lwarmonger

Concur. The current regime is far more entrenched than the Shah ever dreamt of being.

With a successful coup now, Pakistan would most likely descend into even more chaos than it is in already. Not a reliable nuclear umbrella, even if the extremists form the strongest group.

Would they rather get nuked by one of the aforementioned nations?

A divided and warring Iran is an Iran that isn't going to be focusing on developing nuclear weapons.

Also a workeable plan.... although I'm not sure we can really get much more support than we have already. Nations like Russia and China, who oppose doing anything against Iran (at least that is the way they are acting), are unlikely to be concerned about a few dead protestors, even if they do die on camera.

Commando

The US or UN is going to have to act soon and decisively because if Israel acts alone and then Iran retaliates. It is highly likely Israel will use nukes.

By the way just a curious question. Will my caltex shares rise due to the rising price of oil???

troung

Only if it sticks and doesn't get smashed bringing more support to the Mullahs. Plus we would need to actually get the ball rolling which would not be easy by any stretch of the mind.

A lot more likely then AQ hiding under Iran...

Just throwing an idea against the wall seeing if it sticks.

Swift Sword

Hi Bulgaroctonus,

OOE is correct in his assesment that the use of nuclear weapons would be an unsavory prospect at best.

I would like to point out that 120 kt yield is a pretty big bang.

One problem to consider about using nuclear weapons in Iran is the prevailing winds.

AFAIK, the contingency plan for subterranean, hardened targets has until recently been to deploy a B53 weapon in a laydown, delay mode. Even though there is a so called "clean" variant of the B53, one would think that a at the stated yield range a ground burst would create a significant amount of fallout.

The problem is that the communications, emergency prepardness and civil defense capabilities of Iran and neighboring countries are distinctly lacking in robustness (lets use the problems associated with earthquakes in the region as a benchmark). This would significantly exasperate the collateral damage caused by radioactive fallout to citizens in Iran and neighboring countries, some of which are considered friendly.

The B53 was being phased out towards the end of the last decade in favor of the earth penetrating variant of the B61 known as the Mod 11. The B61-11 is a dial a yield weapon with a yield range on the order of the 1 to 350 kt (not exactly sure, but this figure is representative of the B61 family in general).

The B61-11 is certainly a much more realistic option than your idea for using megaton yield weapons but I am still skeptical that secondary effects may not be an issue. However, the B61-11 may not be fully developed and deployed just yet which brings us back to conventional earth penetrating weapons.

The existing US earth penetrating weapons are combat proven and have a CEP that would make the power of nuclear explosvies unneccessary for the proposed targets but the essential problem still remains: what targets to strike and when. Without this information firmly in hand, striking directly at the Iranian nuclear program is a haphazard proposition at best.

I have an alternative idea that might be more suitable for a forcible preemption of the Iranian nuclear program.

The business of refining nuclear fuel and some of the associated operations is a particularly electricity intensive affair. It strikes me that the thing to do in an Iranian scenario is to strike at grid elements that are proximal to suspected nuclear facilities.

The advantages of such an strategy are many. For example:

First of all, those targets are likely to be less well defended than the nuclear facilities themselves.

Secondly, there is a wide lattitude of options to strike them. They could be hit clandestinely by cyberattack or old fashinoned sabotage, possibly using dissident groups or other proxies for an element of deniability early in the crisis.

Grid elements could be targetted at low risk with standoff weapons such as the TLAM from submarines in the Arabian Gulf or Indian Ocean with little warning or defense. If the conflict escelates to a bigger exchange, widespread air attacks against Iranian electricity production could be perpetrated.

Third, the Iranian government would be under pressure from its own people to get the lights back on and keep them on. It is amazing how much government legitmacy has historically been shown to be dependent on the ability to supply electricity ! This would reduce the political and physical resources of the regime to pursue its weapons efforts.

Finally, the US has some neato keeno goodies specifically designed to target and damage power generation capacity and associated grid elements and they are the shiznet.

The problem with nuclear weapons in general is that they are too powerful to be of any meaningful military utility under most circumstances. IMO, the US should dismantle some of its weapons and redeploy the fuel in something along the lines of the old Mk54.

With an itty bitty implosion core, the Mk54 as deployed as the M388 system weighed around 75 pounds and had two yield selections of 10 t and 20 t (about 1/50 th of a kt max). Update with GPS guidance, cram as many as will fit into a B52 and just have the thing circle high above theatre dispensing as neccessary to make things cease to exist on the demand of spotting authority. I digressed...

Probably the best case against deploying nuclear weapons against the Iranians is what history showed us happened after the last combat deployment of these systems: it percipitated an arms race which lead us to exactly the proliferation mess we are currently in. If the US used nuclear weapons against Iran, it would doubtlessly spur others to obtain some sort of detterent capability and the whole concept of squaring off with the Iranians in the first place is counterproliferation.

Well, that is my case against using nuclear weapons against the Iranians. I will defer to the knowledgable, proffessional WAB military contingent for correction or reinforcement on the matter.

Regards,

William

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Swift Sword

Bluesman and Osiris,

The problem I see with sanctions is that though they can be effective, Iran is a poor target.

Iran is already partially diplomatically and economically isolated and still recalitrant. It has no ties or trade with the United States which is the big piece of the global economy. This is why I feel the United States should unilaterally embargo/sanction those countries that do trade with Iran.

The UN can play catch up if it wants to but the United States needs to do something and do it now. We have no leverage on Iran because we have no ties but there are more than a few actors we do have ties to that do have ties to the Iranians as well.

I am going to operate under the core assumption that anybody who is trading with an enemy of the United States is not the friend of the United States. The industrial expertise, financial and political capital that the Iranians receive by trading with our friends and other actors is a direct threat to the Supreme Interests of the United States.

If the Japanese continue to do business with Tehran than I say the United States should not continue to do business with the Japanese or at least significantly penalize them via tariffs, asset freezing, denial of various privledges and permits or any other legal means at our disposal. Ditto for the Chinese, the Russians or anybody else.

US soft power is immense. What I am proposing is very hard application of that soft power and not standing around waiting as the UN fiddles while the Mullahs work on fission.

Such a course of action would be stiff medicine and not without consequences but the choice is clear: use a hard application of soft power now and lose some treasure or apply hard power later and lose blood and a lot more treasure.

Best Regards and have a nice weekend,

William

Bulgaroctonus

Greetings.

Nuclear weapons are an unsavory prospect. However, I'll concisely point out why I raised the possibility.

First, keep in mind that I do not have strategic or military training. Therefore, please excuse and correct me if I make any such errors.

In this post, I want to discuss the purely military strategy of nuclear weapons. Obviously the use of such weapons will have enormous international repercussions. It is very possible that such repercussions would completely overwhelm the military utility of nuclear weapons. However, those concerns deserve a second post.

The United States faces a shrinking list of options. Negotiations under the feckless Europeans will not work. In fact, such appeasement will probably increase the strategic stength of Iran. Even Security Council sanctions will ahrdly do anything.

A military invasion or action of some kind is necessary to deter the Iranians from their current course. The strategist Hassan Abbasi is determined to play 'chicken' with the United States. Iran is approaching this situation with pure game theory in mind.

The Iranians think if they can call the United States on its bluff of military force, they will be able to assure security for themselves, if not the status of a regional superpower. Iran is very shrewd by calculating that the West is averse to risks. It seems like the Europeans are already resigned to a nuclear Iran.

Therefore, the United States must demonstrate that it's threat is credible. However, the United States has certain limitations in this regard. From what I have read, it appears the United States has limited ground forces at its disposal. I think this is true because I have read that many American soldiers in Iraq are already on second or third tours of duty. That is, there is a large amount of troop recycling.

The United States could institute a draft, but President Bush is not willing to suffer the political costs attendant in that. Like Abbasi said, the United States is risk-averse. Therefore, the lack of political and civil will is paralyzing the U.S. military.

Looking at this situation, it appears that the U.S. cannot launch a satisfactory land assault. Instead, we would have to use an air assault. You and Officer of Engineers are correct that the U.S. has other bombs that can get the trick done.

However, I am concerned about another thing. The chief weakness of the U.S. is not its lack of infantry. Instead, the U.S. is very vulnerable to an Iranian embargo, and the far worse prospect of the Iranians closing the Straits of Hormuz. Any U.S. attack has to destroy the Iranian nuclear facilities, and destroy the Iranian ability to seal off the the Straits.

I fear that an non-nuclear aerial campaign might be unable to acheive both of these things efficiently. The area covered and speed necessary might be too much. However, this is probably not the case. Do you think that a non-nuclear aerial campaign could fully do the job?

Nuclear weapons are a nice thing because they can destroy large amounts of structures (i.e. the Iranian nuclear facilties) and large amounts of people (i.e. the Iranian army), in a short amount of time. A nuclear attack could crush a nation's will and exterminate most of its army.

In addition, a nuclear weapon could even be used against a civilian target. A nuclear weapon used against Tehran would probably kill Ahmadinejad and his government. The instantaneous death of about 14,000,000 people in the metropolitan Tehran area could break the Iranian will and force them to surrender. In addition, About 30% of Iran’s public-sector workforce and 45% of large industrial firms are located in Tehran and almost half of these workers work for the government.

Unfortunately, the world does not look favorably upon such strong action. Therefore, as I will discuss in a follow up post, a civilian nuclear strike may not lead to a net benefit for the United States.

You had mentioned destroying the Iranian power supply earlier. I do think this would be excellent for disrupting the Iranian defense capabilties. However, I imagine that most of the Iranian nuclear facilities are fully outfitted with generators so your strategy would not shut them down, at least not immediately.

As to the technical points that you raise, I do not have a reply. I am researching the different acronyms and weapons that you mentioned.