Nuclear War Scenarios ...who will start it?

[brainless 0]

I know, some time ago someone else started a debate on the same topic but somehow (I suppose it was not intentionally) twisted the facts so that the message was "China threatened the USA". This statement is _not_ true but the issue is interesting even without a current threat. So what happened that makes me bring this topic onto the agenda? According to the Financial Times, the chinese General Zhu Chenghu told a group of forein journalists that China might start a nuclear war if the USA decide to attack China in order to protect Taiwan, which is considered chinese territory by the chinese government.

We Chinese will prepare ourselves for the destruction of all cities east of Xian [in central China], he said. Of course the Americans will have to be prepared that hundreds of cities will be destroyed by the Chinese.

As you might see yourself, Gen Zhu's war threat is harmless unless the USA decide to attack China and devastate one third of the country first (-> Map of China in the CIA World Factbook). As this is currently very unlikely to happen, the chinese response to this is just as unlikely. And, one more quote to comfort the US citizens (and all others who might feel threatend by China now) among us:

 

Chinese government officials emphasised that Gen Zhu's remarks were seen as a minority opinion and being the first to use nuclear weapons would contradict Beijing's military strategy.

 

Sources (both Financial Times):  

 

(1) "Top chinese general warns US over attack"

(2) "Beijing plays down general's threats"

 

so much about the story, let's start the debate: As the FT quoted the chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, China does not intend to be the first to use nuclear weapons against an enemy but does not object to strike back. So where's the real threat now? I'd say it's the US since the Pentagon has plans to develop "Mini nukes" which shall be used to destroy bunkers and similar targets without harming the surroundings (which is, physically, nearly impossible). These nuclear weapons might be ready to use when the US government decides to intervene in the China-Taiwan-dispute and will probably be used since US military officials strongly deny that mini nukes might affect the area around a bunker. Only when this happens, the chinese government has a reason to strike back with their own nukes. by the way: China has "only" about 20 nukes without "first strike"-option while the USA have several thousands and do have plans for doing a nuclear first strike...

[steven 0]

I know, some time ago someone else started a debate on the same topic but somehow (I suppose it was not intentionally) twisted the facts so that the message was "China threatened the USA". This statement is _not_ true but the issue is interesting even without a current threat.

 

So what happened that makes me bring this topic onto the agenda?

 

According to the Financial Times, the chinese General Zhu Chenghu told a group of forein journalists that China might start a nuclear war if the USA decide to attack China in order to protect Taiwan, which is considered chinese territory by the chinese government.

Sources (both Financial Times):

(1) "Top chinese general warns US over attack" http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

 

(2) "Beijing plays down general's threats" http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

 

-----

 

so much about the story, let's start the debate:

 

As the FT quoted the chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, China does not intend to be the first to use nuclear weapons against an enemy but does not object to strike back.

 

So where's the real threat now? I'd say it's the US since the Pentagon has plans to develop "Mini nukes" which shall be used to destroy bunkers and similar targets without harming the surroundings (which is, physically, nearly impossible). These nuclear weapons might be ready to use when the US government decides to intervene in the China-Taiwan-dispute and will probably be used since US military officials strongly deny that mini nukes might affect the area around a bunker.

Only when this happens, the chinese government has a reason to strike back with their own nukes.

 

by the way: China has "only" about 20 nukes without "first strike"-option while the USA have several thousands and do have plans for doing a nuclear first strike...

162478[/snapback]

"I know, some time ago someone else started a debate on the same topic but somehow (I suppose it was not intentionally) twisted the facts so that the message was "China threatened the USA"."

 

Yeah, I think that might be me. However, I think that China can harm USA in a much better way than US can to China. The reason is because in a way, China "owns" most of the goods that are transported to North Ameria. Today, it is not surprising to see most of the stuff we see, on the Label it says: "Made in China" Therefore, in a war, not only will US experience a decrease in the transported essential goods, but they will also experience heavy military attacks from China. The reason is because China has a lot of army and, my point of view is that, because China has over-population, it won't even hurt them if a lot of Chinese die. Anyways, I think that there should not be any war, as it will affect all the countries surrounding US and China.

 

 

That's it from me.

[ManOfSTEEL 0]

I think china is strong enough to start war, but do you think war can solve the problem? somehow, maybe yes, but if that happen you might not even hear or see the result of the war. all of us would be all victim of nuclear war. China and US are both great country, strong and very powerful, when talking to massive distruction, well, they're both good, they can destroy the city or even the whole country, but what is the point? To proved that your country has own massive distruction? what about those who don't own that kind of weapon? victim is it?In war there are no winner, they're both losser maybe they can survive but in return they're still losser, real fight didn't come with nuclear or missile or what. If you want to fight china against US then do it in a manner way, one-on-one like boxing without using gloves that was more great and can be called a supreme war:) what do you think?Real fight for me didn't come with what weapon you have, or how many soldiers you have. Real fight comes is the one who fight without affecting the audience... like us we're just and audience of war. B)What do you think? can I open this topic to those fighter and start fighting withou handing a weapon? I hate war you know, there a many civilians died of that fxxx war...like what happen in some other country... war is an evil act... real war is what I am looking for...

[wariorpk 0]

I think that China would start the war because it seems they have a few rouge leaders who are not at all interested in peace. However, there is not a doubt in my mind that the United States would retaliate. I do not think anyone would win the war. I think that if this happens the Earth would cease to exist.

[saga 0]

In a scenario of a world war 3, history will repeat itself. The first weapon of mass destruction (nuclear weapon) that will ever be drop is by USA. It has all intention and capabilities.United States Government is a rouge state. It does not respect anything exept its own agenda. China wont dare to attack first with nuclear becuase USA could easily wipe out chinese with its thousands of nuclear. But if they are attack they will strike too for it is the natural reaction and the only one.Not even North Korea will attack with nuclear if it has one. To get respected by USA you must have a nuclear capability.By the way, why do USA keeps a thousand nuclear weapons and yet it is stopping other countries to have one. Have we forgotten that only the USA have the stomach to use a weapon of mass destruction and they already did. Their first victim was Japan. I wonder who will be next.

[brainless 0]

and once again, the USA are about to move another step to a third nuclear strike ... As the Washington Post reports, a new nuclear strike plan has been worked out by the Pentagon but hasn't been approved by Donald Rumsfeld yet. This draft plan contains so many situations in which military commanders may ask the president for permission to use nuclear weapons that it would be possible to use nukes against about anyone...

 

[...]

 

1  (1) Geographic combatant commanders may request Presidential approval for

2  use of nuclear weapons for a variety of conditions. Examples include:

3 

4  (a) An adversary using or intending to use WMD against US, multinational,

5  or alliance forces or civilian populations.

6 

7  ( Imminent attack from adversary biological weapons that only effects

8  from nuclear weapons can safely destroy.

9 

10  © Attacks on adversary installations including WMD, deep, hardened

11  bunkers containing chemical or biological weapons or the C2 infrastructure required for

12  the adversary to execute a WMD attack against the United States or its friends and allies.

13 

14  (d) To counter potentially overwhelming adversary conventional forces,

15  including

16  mobile and area targets (troop concentration).

17 

18  (e) For rapid and favorable war termination on US terms.

19 

20  (f) To ensure success of US and multinational operations.

21 

22  (g) To demonstrate US intent and capability to use nuclear weapons to deter

23  adversary use of WMD.

24 

25  (h) To respond to adversary-supplied WMD use by surrogates against US

26  and multinational forces or civilian populations.

 

[...]

As everyone except for conspiracy theorists knows now, there were no WMD stockpiles in the Iraq since a couple of years -- but until late 2004, George W. and his comrades stuck to their lies which were not even backed by false intelligence reports (contrary, publicly available CIA reports stated that there was nothing but rumors)...

...and if this doctrine would have been in use 3 years ago, Kabul and Baghdad would look like Hiroshima and Nagasaki now

 

-> Washington Post Article: http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

 

-> "Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations" [i had to create a mirror on rapidshare since I didn't want to steal the guy I got it from's bandwidth]: http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

[wild20 0]

I think it is dumb. No one should have nuclear power. We have enough to destroy the world two times over! Do you see a problem with that?! There are too many people out there that are NOT responsible. Lets say a nuclear war broke out. We would have to destroy everything that5 shot at us. There would be countries destroyed left and right. Food would be scarse, almost nothing would be okay to eat or drink because the aftermath would be the world filled with radiation from the nuclear bombs.If China does destroy tons of cities, I know that we will destroy cities at twice the rate, and we will also be left vonurable if we use too many. Russia, iran, most likely iraq, and china have a good ammount of nuclear power. We underestimate their power. Even if we have more than they, the US can only hold so much nuclear blasts before it is one big whole in the ground. I say, end the nuclear programs. It will ease a lot of strain between countries. That is my two cents worth. I just think its a BAD idea.

[Milovoriel 0]

I think any unstable country, which also has nuclear capabilities could potentially instigate an attack .... so the USSR and Pakistan could fall into this category .... more worrying is the potential attack from countries who are suspected of having nuclear capabilities, but deny same .... so Israel, Iran and the Ukraine ....

 

However, the USA is paranoid and neurotic enough to instigate a nuclear attack .... and they have a history of it! ....

 

[ashiezai 0]

hmmm ... china is strong now ... but not that strong to start a war with USA ... that is why China threaten to use nuclear weapon because they are no opponent to the USA ... nuclear weapon is just the last resort and last defence ... I do not think that any country will use nuclear weapon nowadays ... may be Iraq and North Korea ... because those countries are unstable in the form of economy and business .. and it's still undeveloped yet ... moreover SOME COUNTRIES in the world just keep pressuring them and to control them ... as i said ... the nuclear weapons are just the last resort ... If a nuclear war really starts ... i do think that it's those attacker countries that deserves it ... it's *BLEEP* to say that they were there to release the people ... hell no ... the people there doesnt welcome those intruders too !! it's just an excuss to start a war !!

[brainless 0]

One question: How in the world are the iraqi people supposed to use nuclear weapons? There aren't any WMDs in Iraq [except for those imported and used by the USA but that's use of chemical weapons by the USA, not Iraq] and definitely less nukes. When President Bush, that person who started a war <strike>over links between Saddam Hussein</strike <strike>over WMDs in Husseins possession</strike> <strike>"Oil for Food"-Program abuse backed by the USA</strike> <ins>an evil dictator</ins> admits that President Hussein did not possess any WMDs, I dare say that this was already true when many people tried to raise their voice against this unjust, imperialist war.

wild20, ashiezai: There is currently no nuclear weapons program running in Iraq nor was there one during the last few years. Right now, the Iraqi people have better things to do than developing WMDs, things like ... struggling to get their freedom back...

milo: AFAIK Israel does not even deny having nuclear weapons (but does not have plans to use them except for last resort-defence). I'm ashamed that I have to admit that the german government decided that it's ok to sell some submarines to Israel for a symbolic fee even though it's known that they will be upgraded to be able to launch nuclear missiles once they've arrived there :/ Peaceful protest did not help...

As to the Iranian nuclear program: This quite an interesting story:
Mr. Bush threatened Iran with war for the case they don't stop their program for the <strike>production of nuclear weapons</strike> <ins>civil use of nuclear energy</ins> (which, by the way, is completely legal according to the Non-Proliferation Treaty).
As everyone who followed the propaganda should know, muslims are dumb people who blindly have to follow their religious leader who issues a Fatwa every now and then on a current or not-that-current issue which this leader's followers are bound to.
well, here's the catch:
a) yes, muslims are bound to fatwas issued by their chosen leader - but: they're free to choose to be led by someone else if they think their leader's stupid.

Iran Daily reports[1] that

[...]The Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, has issued the fatwa that the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons are forbidden under Islam and that Iran shall never acquire these weapons, [...]

So where's the problem?

anyway, the CIA stated earlier this year that the Iran will definitely not be a threat in terms of nuclear weapons within the next 10 years ... acusing the Iran of developing or even possessing nuclear weapons is unfair.

North Korea, however, does possess nuclear weapons (the last reports I've read talk about at least 6 [China is reported to have 10, just as little hint so you've got something to compare that to]) and is, according to an article on globalsecurity.org, going to test missiles which are supposed to be able to carry a nuke to the USA's west coast and Kim Jong Il said that he would not hesitate to use these options if the USA were to attack North Korea. If you ask me, this is a way bigger threat to the world than Iraq was in the last 14 years. That this would happens was already known before the War for Oil began but for some reason, Mr Bush decided to go after President Hussein...

[1] http://www.iran-daily.com/1384/2347/html/

[brainless 0]

it's me again ... I found an article on ABC News online [1] about what Colin Powell does now and in which he talks about his infamous PowerPoint presentation to the UN:

 

[...]

Making False Case for Iraq War a 'Blot' on Record

 

When Powell left the Bush administration in January 2005, he was widely seen as having been at odds with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President *BLEEP* Cheney over foreign policy choices.

 

It was Powell who told the United Nations and the world that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and posed an imminent threat. He told Walters that he feels "terrible" about the claims he made in that now-infamous address assertions that later proved to be false.

 

When asked if he feels it has tarnished his reputation, he said, "Of course it will. It's a blot. I'm the one who presented it on behalf of the United States to the world, and [it] will always be a part of my record. It was painful. It's painful now."

 

He doesn't blame former CIA Director George Tenet for the misleading information he says he pored over for days before delivering his speech; he faults the intelligence system.

 

"George Tenet did not sit there for five days with me misleading me. He believed what he was giving to me was accurate. The intelligence system did not work well," he said.

 

Nonetheless, Powell said, some lower-level personnel in the intelligence community failed him and the country. "There were some people in the intelligence community who knew at that time that some of these sources were not good, and shouldn't be relied upon, and they didn't speak up. That devastated me," he said.

 

While Powell ultimately supported the president's decision to invade Iraq, he acknowledges that he was hesitant about waging war. "I'm always a reluctant warrior. And I don't resent the term, I admire the term, but when the president decided that it was not tolerable for this regime to remain in violation of all these U.N. resolutions, I'm right there with him with the use of force," he said.

 

[...]

Actually, those people in the "intelligence community" did speak up, under the protection of anonymity, but were not believed.

One more thing which is interesting to notice: Mr Powell is ashamed of the "blot on his record" but does not explicitely mention the many thousands of lifes he helped to erase. Does this mean he's more concerned about his record than about other people's lifes?

 

[1] http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Politics/story?id=1105979&page=1

[kasm 0]

----

As the FT quoted the chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, China does not intend to be the first to use nuclear weapons against an enemy but does not object to strike back.

 

 

by the way: China has "only" about 20 nukes without "first strike"-option while the USA have several thousands and do have plans for doing a nuclear first strike...

162478[/snapback]

We have to not rely on reports from CIA or any other intelligence after the lesson of Iraq.

 

We have to use the commonsense and our minds.

 

China is building successfuly the welfare of its citizens AND HAS NO REASON to destroy that by using Nuclear weapons without be attacked since the enemy will respond with the same.

 

The lessons of past world wars, make anyone think before attacking.

 

China is huge country and has huge population but this one factor in winning but not sufficient to win. The weapons and weapon of mass destruction is more in US than in China who build and test these weapon many years after US.

 

China will not intervene in another countries affair.

 

China will not start war . Only China want return Taiwan and that is its right.

 

If China starts to return its territory and US will intervene to defend Taiwan [which is wrong but is expected from US], then it will conflict with US .

 

If US attack China by nuclear weapon, then why China don't respond with the same weapon.

 

I expect both of them will be with clasic weaponsbut not with nuclear one. US used nuclear bomb when Japan hadn't it. US didn't use it against the Soviet Union because it will be hurt her with the same.

 

But anyhow for the tiny possipility China has to prepare to any scenario.

 

To whom said Israel will use Nuke as last resort, I say every one will say that. And the question where Israel will use it. If it use it against surroundings countries, then it will affect its population too. History shows that Israel has survived 3 times wars and won on all and has occupied parts from 5 countries with normal weapons. My opinion is Israel don't want nuke for the Arabs. It want it to be recognized as important country..

[mendezgarcia 0]

China has 20 nukes only? You are... brainless! China has more than 400 nukes. OK, the US have 10,000 nukes, but name400 cities worth nuking. And as you know, nuking a city will affect a big area near it; if China can successfully deploy the nukes and half of them hit the US, US will be destroyed and the air, soil and water become radioactive!For countries like US and China , nukes serve a single purpose: ensure mutual destruction. If China is losing a war against the US, I don't think they will hesitate to nuke the US.

[LocalSeer 0]

I don't see why everyone focuses on China and USA when talking about nuclear weapons. Both countries are way more civilized then 99% of third world countries. In addition, using nrdc tables, USA has droped from 30k nukes in 1965 to only 10k in 2002 estimate. In fact, China, Russia, UK and France all have less nukes then they did a few years back. I'm more worried about small wars. Maybe Pakistan starts a war with India and launches its estimated 15-25 nuclear weapons and India retaliates with its estimated 25-125 nuclear weapons. China might panic having nuclear weapons flying below it's throat and launch some more leading to a chain reaction. We'll probobly see the best fireworks ever, however you'd probobly need filters so you don't go blind.Just to throw it in Canada produces most of the world's uranium.

[mrbaseball_cpr 0]

so nice to see a subject of such understated urgency being actively discussed in an open forum. while i do believe that china poses a much bigger threat than might be seen at first, i also am VERY concerned by the new proposed guidelines for forward deployed US field commanders in the use of battlefield and intratheatre nukes. very disturbing; basically, they will be able to request authorization for release of nuclear weapons in most any situation they feel isn't going quite as planned. also, part of these guidelines would practically make it a guarantee that at some point in a conflict, if biologicals are used on ground troops, that the US could nuke its own soldiers in order to prevent spread of a virulent or contagious pathogen. the justification would be for the greater good of all involved, "to protect citizens from this horrible disease".....i can see it now. the wording, after all, did say specifically that authorization might be given to prevent the spread of or eliminate the confirmed (or implied, as the case might as easily be) presence of contagious and/or incapacitating pathogens. in a war scenario involving nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons, the use of any one of the three can and most likely will trigger the release of the other two. long story short, any scenario involving NBC's is a bad, bad one.also, i am very concerned about china's seeming willingness to sacrifice a large percentage of its civilian population in a nuclear exchange. my feeling about that is simply this: the chinese gov't would welcome the loss of millions of its own people as a blessing. more food and resources to go around. sounds sick, but in a nuclear war, this thinking makes all the sense in the world. with an infrastructure all but completely destroyed, industrial capacity extremely limited and arable land all but lost in the impending fallout and subsequent decades-long radioactive decay, the fewer people you have to feed and house, perhaps, the better.