Promoting fear of (choose one: biological, nuclear, terrorist, conventional weapons) attack - it's good for business

a friend sent me this article with the following question...

the question...

What's your read on this having spent time near the country mentioned?

the article...

The United States can expect a terrorist attack using nuclear or more likely biological weapons before 2013, reports a bipartisan commission in a study being briefed Tuesday to Vice President-elect Joe Biden. It suggests the Obama administration bolster efforts to counter and prepare for germ warfare by terrorists.

[...]

Al-Qaida remains the only terrorist group judged to be actively intent on conducting a nuclear attack against the United States, the report notes. It is not yet capable of building such a weapon and has yet to obtain one. But that could change if a nuclear weapons engineer or scientist were recruited to al-Qaida's cause, the report warns.

The report says the potential nexus of terrorism, nuclear and biological weapons is especially acute in Pakistan.

"Were one to map terrorism and weapons of mass destruction today, all roads would intersect in Pakistan," the report states.

my response...

i think 90+ percent of these stories are designed as fear-mongering, pure and simple... a population living in fear is, by definition, easier to control...

however, if sophisticated biological attacks become part of the arsenal of ANY group, it will because the technology and skill required for their development became available in some manner, intended or otherwise, through the incessant research on same being done by countries like the u.s., in precisely the same way that nuclear weapons technology became available to pakistan and, now, india...

don't think for a moment that a new weapons race such as that announced today by russia in response to the u.s. plans to position missiles in poland and the czech republic isn't planned as a means to increase defense research and weapons systems spending... likewise, nuclear and biological weapons systems proliferation is equally good for business... as always, follow the money...

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Condi tips her hand about where her head is REALLY at

for a united states secretary of state who also happens to be ranked as the most powerful woman in the world by forbes magazine in 2004 and 2005 and number two in 2006 to make such an obvious and damaging gaffe and then to not catch herself, tells me as much as i want to know about condoleezza rice...

"The idea that somehow 10 interceptors and a few radars in Eastern Europe are going to threaten the Soviet strategic deterrent is purely ludicrous and everybody knows it," she told reporters ahead of the Oslo meeting. "The Russians have thousands of warheads. The idea that you can somehow stop the Russian strategic nuclear deterrent with a few interceptors just doesn't make sense."

perhaps she's just pining for the days when her expertise was actually relevant...

From 1989 through March 1991 (the period of the fall of Berlin Wall and the final days of the Soviet Union), she served in President George H.W. Bush's administration as Director, and then Senior Director, of Soviet and East European Affairs in the National Security Council, and a Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. In this position, Rice helped develop Bush's and Secretary of State James Baker's policies in favor of German reunification. She impressed Bush, who later introduced her to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev as the one who "tells me everything I know about the Soviet Union."

or maybe she was distracted thinking about going shopping for some new ferragamos later in the day...



Condoleezza Rice...........Ferragamo shoe

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As long as we're on the subject of Condi

Condoleezza Rice...........Ferragamo shoe

she's back in europe, lying her ass off...

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Thursday dismissed as "ludicrous" Russian concerns that Washington's plans to deploy anti-missile defenses in Europe would endanger Moscow's nuclear arsenal.

A flurry of high-level talks in recent weeks has failed to soften Russia's public opposition to the U.S. plan to install radar scanners in the Czech Republic and 10 interceptor missiles in Poland.

Washington says the deployment is aimed at protecting Europe and North America from a growing threat of missile strike by North Korea, Iran or others in the Middle East. Moscow says those countries do not pose an immediate threat, and claims the U.S. plan aims to target Russia's strategic missile arsenal.

understandably, putin's pissed...

Putin ... warned that Moscow could halt compliance with the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty, a landmark 1990 agreement between NATO and former Warsaw Pact countries.

"I propose we declare a moratorium on fulfillment by Russia of the CFE treaty," Putin said.

The Russian leader complained that Western powers have failed to ratify the agreement. However, the threat appeared to be linked to growing tensions over security, especially the US military's plan to deploy anti-missile defences in eastern Europe.

let's just imagine that russia wanted to put missiles in cuba... i know that's "ludicrous" and would never, ever happen, but let's just suppose for a moment that it did... what do you think would be the u.s. reaction...

The "Cuban Missile Crisis" was a confrontation during the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States in Cuba. The missiles were ostensibly placed to protect Cuba from further planned attacks by the United States after the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion, and were rationalized by the Soviets as equivalent to the U.S. placing deployable nuclear warheads in the United Kingdom, Italy, Greece, and most significantly, Turkey

The crisis began on October 14, 1962 when U.S. reconnaissance imagery revealing Soviet nuclear missile installations on the island were shown to U.S. President John F. Kennedy and ended fourteen days later on October 28, 1962, when Soviet premier Nikita Krushchev announced that the installations would be dismantled. The Crisis is often regarded as the moment when the Cold War came closest to escalating into a nuclear war. Russians refer to the event as the "Caribbean Crisis," while Cubans refer to it as the "October Crisis."

oops... i had an emily litella moment... never mind...

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Well, duh, Vladimir

vlado isn't my favorite world political figure, but that doesn't mean he can't occasionally hit the nail on the head...

- QUOTATION OF THE DAY -

"Today we are witnessing an almost uncontained hyper use of force in international relations - military force."

- VLADIMIR V. PUTIN, President of Russia, on the U.S.

here's the details...

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia accused the United States on Saturday of provoking a new nuclear arms race by developing ballistic missile defenses, undermining international institutions and making the Middle East more unstable through its clumsy handling of the Iraq war.

In an address to an international security conference, Mr. Putin dropped all diplomatic gloss to recite a long list of complaints about American domination of global affairs, including many of the themes that have strained relations between the Kremlin and the United States during his seven-year administration.

Among them were the expansion of NATO into the Baltics and the perception in Russia that the West has supported groups that have toppled other governments in Moscow’s former sphere of influence.

“The process of NATO expansion has nothing to do with modernization of the alliance,” Mr. Putin said. “We have the right to ask, ‘Against whom is this expansion directed?’ ”

He said the United States had turned the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which sends monitors to elections in the former Soviet sphere, “into a vulgar instrument of ensuring the foreign policy interests of one country.”

you can be sure that, given the source, even liberals and progressives will be tempted to dismiss such criticism as merely global political posturing... however, it's worth looking at the nuggets of truth in putin's statements... while all of the above ring true in many ways, the most disturbing one is this...

He expressed alarm that an effective antimissile shield over the United States would upset a system of mutual fear that kept the nuclear peace throughout the cold war. “That means the balance will be upset, completely upset,” he said.

with the u.s. resuming nuclear weapons research and development and considering the resumption of underground nuclear testing, the prospect of re-igniting a nuclear arms race is a chilling prospect, particularly given our sharing of nuclear technology with india, pakistan's instability, iran's bid to join the nuclear club, israel's nuclear stockpile, and the ticking middle east time bomb...

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