India, Pakistan exchange border fire - nuclear deterrence doesn't work

[bananas]

Pro-nukes told us Fukushima couldn't possibly happen - they were wrong.
Pro-nukes said nuclear deterrence couldn't possibly fail - they said no country would attack a country that had nuclear weapons - they were wrong.
Professor Martin Hellman estimates a 1% per year catastrophic failure rate of nuclear deterrence: www.nuclearrisk.org
There is a 1% probability that this will escalate to a nuclear exchange this year,
and a 10% probability it will happen this decade.
We have to eliminate nuclear weapons: www.globalzero.org

From LBN:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4851761

India, Pakistan exchange border fire
Source: Reuters

(Reuters) - Indian and Pakistani troops exchanged sustained cross-border fire on Sunday, security officials said, a day after an Indian soldier was killed by Pakistani troops while patrolling one of the world's most heavily guarded borders.

The two sides exchanged small arms fire for 30 minutes early on Sunday at a border post 30 km (18 miles) from Jammu, the winter capital of the disputed Kashmir region in north India.

"Pakistani soldiers opened unprovoked firing on our Umra Wali post," said a spokesman for the paramilitary Indian Border Security Force. "We responded to their fire effectively."

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/15/us-india-pakistan-shooting-idUSTRE74E11F20110515

[RandomThoughts]

1. Yadda Yadda Yadda.

Expected that after posting a previous post.

Note that post was out of sequence, was a flashback post.

sigh, how ridiculous.


('that' being a post, not something that happened.)


And the mother ship, is the concept of security state, not wood craft. LOL, just gets funnier and funnier.

[bananas]

2. I hope they show us a live feed from the ISS

The astronauts will get to watch nuclear war from space.
They'll see the mushroom clouds from above.
If NASA gives us a live feed, we can watch it on HDTV at home.
People at work could stream it on their work computer.

[bananas]

3. It's escalating - Pakistan is threatening NATO now

Pakistan threatens to cut NATO supply lines: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1105452

[RandomThoughts]

4. And how exactly will that effect the beer and travel money that is due?

[txlibdem]

5. May I remind you that only one nation in the world has ever actually used nuclear weapons

... Welcome to the Good Ole US of A.

Second, a 30 minute exchange of small arms fire does not equate to tanks rolling across borders. Small arms fire is regularly exchanged along the border between North and South Korea, and has been happening for the past 40 years.

Your premise that nuclear deterrence does not work is flawed and easily disproven using facts and history books (except those written in Texas, I suppose).

[bananas]

6. Only one so far - just as there was only one level 7 nuclear disaster until this year.

Pro-nukes kept saying that 20+ years without a disaster proved how safe they were.
I kept pointing out that Fukushima was statistically expected: http://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Ademocraticunderground.com+bananas+chernobyl+tick+tick+tick
The next Fukushima will happen even faster - the old reactors are in the wear-out phase of the bathtub curve, and the new reactors are in the high infant mortality phase - and scientists in China have been raising questions about their quality control: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bathtub_curve


There's a 1% annual deterrence failure rate ... tick tick tick ...
Pro-nukes are using the same faulty reasoning with nuclear deterrence that they used with nuclear reactors.
Intelligent people learn from their mistakes.
You're an intelligent person, you'll learn - it'll sink in eventually.
I'm not saying anything controversial - it's basic statistics and basic engineering.

[txlibdem]

7. You are always confused between nuclear weapons and peaceful nuclear power

You keep trying to use bubble gum, duct tape and super glue to stick them together. It's not working. Everyone with a brain knows that there are far more nations that have nuclear power plants than those that have nuclear weapons. Ever hear of wikipedia or google? Just a hint for you...

Second, you state that a failure in the oldest nuclear power plants is inevitable. So why are you against building new zero-carbon energy plants? To be logically consistent you should be screaming at the top of your lungs that we need to build many new nuclear power plants so these older plants can be closed down. Instead, you (meaning the collective of anti-nukers out there) scream at the top of your lungs that there should be NO new zero-carbon energy plants built.

If you are so against an "inevitable" failure of these old nuclear power plants then why are you against replacing them? Methinks you and your collective have been secretly hoping for a disaster at a nuclear power plant so you can further your anti-nuke agenda. It took about a minute and a half after the earthquake and tsunami in Japan for the anti-nuke posts to ramp up and have been going strong ever since.

As for nuclear deterrence, and your continued refusal to learn the actual history of the world, I offer you some of your own advice: you are an intelligent person and you can learn from your mistakes. Please provide proof of one nation that has nuclear weapons ever having another nation openly attack them militarily. Even the mere hint that Israel has the bomb has kept them safe from another military attack from their antagonistic Arab neighbors. Israel has even openly denied that they have the bomb... but then other rumors surface. Do you think that their neighbors have held back their tanks for some other reason?

[Someguyinjapan]

12. Speaking of someone who doesn't know history

"Israel has even openly denied that they have the bomb... but then other rumors surface"

It's no rumor; it was verified in 1987 by whistle-blower Mordechai Vanunu.

"Please provide proof of one nation that has nuclear weapons ever having another nation openly attack them militarily"

Iraq, 1991, First Gulf War. Attacked Israel with Scud missles.

Stop embarrassing yourself.

[txlibdem]

19. Speaking of someone who also doesn't know history

Please tell me the exact number of Saddam's tanks and infantry units rolled across Israel's borders? I must not know history because I think that number is ZERO!

There is a difference between harassing someone with small weapons fire or lobbing ineffective missile volleys versus a full-scale military attack. Your post shows your ignorance of the differences between chest pounding and forced regime change.

Syria used to launch missile attacks into Israeli territory a few years back as well. Did their invasion force push through the Israeli defense lines? No.

You have so far brought up issues that prove my point for me. Please stop doing my job. Remember: your claim is that nuclear deterrence does NOT work. I'm the poster who's stating that nuclear deterrence DOES work.

PS, Saddam's scud missiles were a nuisance until the US set up a missile defense system which stopped the nuisance quite nicely.
PPS, the scud missile launches were a lame attempt to bring other Arab nations and/or Israel into the 1991 Gulf War. It failed. It was never an earnest attack against a nuclear power.

"Stop embarrassing yourself." Hey, that's some good advice. Why don't you heed it...

[Someguyinjapan]

20. Once again, you play the fool oh so well

"There is a difference between harassing someone with small weapons fire or lobbing ineffective missile volleys versus a full-scale military attack."

Is that so? Tell that to the Israelis, or better yet re-visit Moshe Aren's speech on Israeli TV after the Scuds started falling. They begged to differ.

"I'm the poster who's stating that nuclear deterrence DOES work."

Israel has nukes. That didn't deter Saddam from attacking them directly in a way that made the then-Defense Minister go on television and state they would use all means at their disposal to make them stop if something wasn't done about them. Israel also had nukes back in '73 and that didn't prevent the Yom Kippur War from happening either. Do some more reading.

"PS, Saddam's scud missiles were a nuisance until the US set up a missile defense system which stopped the nuisance quite nicely."

PS: The Patriot missle system was an abject failure in Israel. They didn't stop shit. Do some more reading.

"It was never an earnest attack against a nuclear power."

Right-which is why they issued chemical warfare kits to the entire population, because it wasn't a serious threat.

You have no idea what you are talking about. Again.

[txlibdem]

21. I'm not the fool, I just play one on TV

You seem to have taken it to the PHD level. Very impressive. :applause:

Patriot missiles were a failure in Israel? Wrong again. The Scud attacks were meant to tear a rift in the coalition against Saddam. That plan was 100% failure.

In your mind, sensible precautions (issuing gas masks) equals tanks and infantry units rolling across your borders? Where did you learn that? You forget that Saddam had gas-bombed the Khurds and killed untold thousands. The Israelis would have been idiots to NOT issue gas masks. But guess what? Those incompetent attacks were never more that a thorn in Israel's side. Some buildings were damaged, a few streets got holes in them.

With these past few posts you have proven to me that the four-pointed hat and jeweled baton belongs, now and forever, in your capable hands. I yield to your superior foolery.

PS, nuclear deterrence works. Period.

[Someguyinjapan]

22. Whatever

"Patriot missles where a failure in Israel? Wrong again. The Scud attacks were meant to tear a rift in the coalition against Saddam. That plan was a 100% failure."

The Patriots were deployed in Israel for military purposes-to intercept and destroy incoming Scuds. Based on their military performance, the Patriots failed:

"Official assessments of the number of Scuds destroyed by the Patriot missile system in the war have fallen from 100 percent during the war, to 96 percent in testimony to Congress after the war, to 80 percent, 70 percent and, currently, the Army believes that as many as 52 percent of the Scuds were destroyed overall but it only has high confidence that the Patriot destroyed 25 percent of the Scud warheads it targeted"
http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/library/congress/1992_r/patriot.htm

"In your mind, sensible precautions (issuing gas masks) equals tanks and infantry units rolling across your borders?"

In my mind, being attacked by missles potentially carrying biological or chemical weapons or being attacked by land-based military units are one in the same-they both present considerable threats to the security of the civilian population in a given country, just different types of threats. The Israelis obviously felt the same.

"PS: nuclear deterrence works. Period"

Didn't work in '73 during the Yom Kippur War now did it? Care to comment on that one, or is that fact a little too inconvenient for you to try and rationalize away?

By the way, care to comment on Arens' speech on ITV? The one where he said Israel would use all possible means to stop the Scud attacks? Or were the Israelis still viewing the Scuds as just a mere nuisance and not a real threat?

Better still, why don't you write the Israeli government and sell them on the idea of floating cities as a refuge from future missle attacks? Given your general level of ignorance, that would make perfect sense to you.

[kristopher]

8. I'll be happy when they get rid of unrecs.

[CJvR]

9. MAD only works...

...when both sides are sane.

[LAGC]

10. 1% catastrophic failure rate?

Considering how many nuclear armed countries there are, wouldn't that mean there would have been several nuclear exchanges by now?

[txlibdem]

11. 440 nuclear reactors, plus over 10,000 nuclear bombs, 1% catastrophic failure rate

That means 4 nuclear reactor meltdowns each year and a hundred nuclear bombs spontaneously exploding... each and every year.

I just don't remember hearing the news reports of all those terrible disasters. You'd think that some hungry reporter would want to break that story...

[kristopher]

13. Is that what you think it means?

[LAGC]

14. Enlighten us, kristopher.

What do you think it means?

[kristopher]

15. You posed the "question", is that what you think it means or not?

[LAGC]

16. Well, yeah. I thought I made myself pretty clear in post #10.

Apparently your interpretation differs? How so?

[kristopher]

17. From what pool of information did you form your interpretation?

[LAGC]

18. Well, first I considered that there are quite a few nations that have developed nuclear weapons...

Then I extrapolated that by figuring in that many of these countries have had these weapons for many decades now... and finally, I figured that if the catastrophic failure rate was really 1%, compounded by those X many years Y many nations... we would have seen one or two of these "catastrophic failures" by now.

But I'll admit, that is only guess-work on my part.