I'm not sure there was ever a nuke permitting board deciding which countries are allowed nukes. I mean Russia and N Korea having them isn't ideal. It's just some countries got hold of them and some the west tries to stop getting them for strategic reasons.
I'd actually feel safer if Iran just got it over with and developed/tested their own nuclear weapons. Then SA would get theirs, along with Egypt and Turkey, and all this low-grade (and brutal, primarily to civilians) nonstop warfare in the middle east would come grinding to a halt as everyone is forced to treat their neighbors with respect.
That’s a strange take. Pakistan and India are both nukes and continue to have border wars. Israel has nukes and has had a perpetual war. The UK and Egypt had conflict when UK has had nukes.
China had battles with Vietnam, Laos, and the Soviet Union. It’s amazing the restraint these nations have shown. Adding more nations to the pot adds more risk, especially when in the hands of unstable, immature, and emotionally irrational leaders. Russia and NK are threatening nuclear attacks annually. Let’s pray it never comes to that
Of all the conflicts you listed, only India and Pakistan are at nuclear parity, and their body count in all their conflicts is a rounding error compared to the others.
You’re forgetting that the US and Soviets /Russians fought multiple proxy wars with high body counts, even most recently in Syria. It doesn’t have to be direct confrontation
You actually want a theocracy whose religion considers non-muslims to go sub-humam to have nukes and would even feel safer?
The only thing that would make this constant war stop would be to cut all nations participating in these wars entirely off from the modern world. Revoke any travel permits, and stop any and all goods traveling to/from their borders, including to any nations ignoring such a ban.
The only reason why that's not am option is because of the vested interests of billionaires which procure oil from that area
But if we did, that would actually stop the wars, within a very short period of time.
It just can't be done passively like with NK, because China likes to ignore such initiatives
> theocracy whose religion considers non-muslims to go sub-humam to have nukes and would even feel safer?
we already sanction and BACK a theocracy, that considers (palestinian) non jews to be subhuman , to have nukes. You can argue all you want about Israel being a theocracy but their constitution mandates a jewish state. Your religion is on your passport and strongly impacts your quality of life when you're in the regime.
While it's generally estimated that Israel has nukes, there's actually no evidence that they do. They've never tested one and you're never going to hold something in your pocket for defense that's untested.
1998 India/Pakistan was a rough year; but every nuclear power has tested their bombs to make sure they work.
There are detection systems that were able to detect sub kiloton explosions in NK from across the world; with triangulation that's quite precise. We would know if Israel has tested.
If they havent tested, they really dont have anything.
Now lets assume they do in fact have some; perhaps smuggled or sourced plans from some other nuclear power.
Why are they allowed to? Well what are you going to do about it? They'll nuke you to keep them.
> While it's generally estimated that Israel has nukes, there's actually no evidence that they do. They've never tested one and you're never going to hold something in your pocket for defense that's untested.
That's one take.
It's really hard to say what the US has allowed as regards Israel. Locals near a particular nuclear facility can recall an Israeli "team of scientists" mysteriously visiting the facility, a year or so before Israel declared themselves a nuclear power. The assumption is that they "snuck" material out, while US officials were "distracted" - by prior agreement.
>It's really hard to say what the US has allowed as regards Israel. Locals near a particular nuclear facility can recall an Israeli "team of scientists" mysteriously visiting the facility, a year or so before Israel declared themselves a nuclear power. The assumption is that they "snuck" material out, while US officials were "distracted" - by prior agreement.
Israel has never declared themselves a nuclear power. They literally have a hebrew word for their refusal to answer questions on the matter.
That's also a very very suspicious story that anonymous locals near an anonymous nuclear facility that supposedly knew about a top secret team of israel scientists...
I don't know what the point of nukes are anymore. They will never be used. You'd figure giving Ukraine long range missiles would provoke Russia into using theirs, but they haven't. What would it take other than another nuclear strike to cause Russia or anyone with nukes to actually use them?
Separately, if Israel nukes Iran, will we be OK with it? Is there anything Israel can do that would make us say "Stop"?
> According to our elected leaders, we should be very scared of the possibility that Iran could get a nuclear bomb. But Israel already has them, and ...
For the past 80 years, it's been all-but-guaranteed that you won't win an American election if you seem insufficiently pro-Israel.
Yes, there are plenty of objective arguments for America's foreign policy being far less pro-Israel than it has been for 8+ decades. US Sec. of State (and former US Army General) George Marshall made those arguments to US President Harry Truman back in 1948 - and was overruled. Truman had staked out a pro-Israel position before his previous election (which he had won), then won another election 6 months after overruling Marshall.
- If your real priority is sounding sophisticated, you can make fancy arguments about America being far too pro-Israel.
- If your real priority is understanding why America is so pro-Israel, then you need to shut up with the fancy arguments, and analyze the American electorate's strong preference for that.
- And if your real priority is winning American elections, then you need to present as "obviously" pro-Israel. And ignore the idiots making fancy arguments.
If you read the article you find out that it's against American law to provide weapons if Israel evaded treaties to get nukes. So America is knowingly breaking its own law every time it sends more bombs to Isreal.
The MIC loves expensive constant un-winnable wars and Israel is the devil that provides them. I’m very glad the youth oppose Israel so this nightmare can end in a few generations, hopefully before a million more people die.
They’re dispensationalists, though. Actual biblical literalists would probably have a hard time reconciling St. Paul with this idea that the modern nation-state of Israel has anything at all to do with the Israel of either the Old or New Testaments.
It is literally impossible to state objectively what "actual biblical literalists" would believe, as the document is massive, self-contradictory, and written with heavy use of allegory and metaphor.
That might be and while the government certainly takes advantage of that sentiment to preserve its Israel policies, but the real reason the US government supports israel has more to do with the general region being oil rich and having a reliable and strong nuclear secular ally in the region.
> I do know my dad said we should nuke and glass the whole middle east, them included. It'd be the only way the middle east would stop fighting. (He was deployed there, desert storm)
> Edit: and -1's poured in less than 1 minute.
Re: downvotes, these lines imply immaturity. You should either be explicit about your degree of agreement with your father, or remove the anecdote entirely. And complaining about downvotes is always pointlessly distracting.
Archived version: https://web.archive.org/web/20250621153024/https://www.curre...
Related: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_affair
I'm not sure there was ever a nuke permitting board deciding which countries are allowed nukes. I mean Russia and N Korea having them isn't ideal. It's just some countries got hold of them and some the west tries to stop getting them for strategic reasons.
I'd actually feel safer if Iran just got it over with and developed/tested their own nuclear weapons. Then SA would get theirs, along with Egypt and Turkey, and all this low-grade (and brutal, primarily to civilians) nonstop warfare in the middle east would come grinding to a halt as everyone is forced to treat their neighbors with respect.
That’s a strange take. Pakistan and India are both nukes and continue to have border wars. Israel has nukes and has had a perpetual war. The UK and Egypt had conflict when UK has had nukes. China had battles with Vietnam, Laos, and the Soviet Union. It’s amazing the restraint these nations have shown. Adding more nations to the pot adds more risk, especially when in the hands of unstable, immature, and emotionally irrational leaders. Russia and NK are threatening nuclear attacks annually. Let’s pray it never comes to that
You’re illustrating my point.
Of all the conflicts you listed, only India and Pakistan are at nuclear parity, and their body count in all their conflicts is a rounding error compared to the others.
You’re forgetting that the US and Soviets /Russians fought multiple proxy wars with high body counts, even most recently in Syria. It doesn’t have to be direct confrontation
You actually want a theocracy whose religion considers non-muslims to go sub-humam to have nukes and would even feel safer?
The only thing that would make this constant war stop would be to cut all nations participating in these wars entirely off from the modern world. Revoke any travel permits, and stop any and all goods traveling to/from their borders, including to any nations ignoring such a ban.
The only reason why that's not am option is because of the vested interests of billionaires which procure oil from that area
But if we did, that would actually stop the wars, within a very short period of time. It just can't be done passively like with NK, because China likes to ignore such initiatives
> theocracy whose religion considers non-muslims to go sub-humam to have nukes and would even feel safer?
we already sanction and BACK a theocracy, that considers (palestinian) non jews to be subhuman , to have nukes. You can argue all you want about Israel being a theocracy but their constitution mandates a jewish state. Your religion is on your passport and strongly impacts your quality of life when you're in the regime.
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The elephants in the room are always hard to spot.
AIPAC
While it's generally estimated that Israel has nukes, there's actually no evidence that they do. They've never tested one and you're never going to hold something in your pocket for defense that's untested.
1998 India/Pakistan was a rough year; but every nuclear power has tested their bombs to make sure they work.
There are detection systems that were able to detect sub kiloton explosions in NK from across the world; with triangulation that's quite precise. We would know if Israel has tested.
If they havent tested, they really dont have anything.
Now lets assume they do in fact have some; perhaps smuggled or sourced plans from some other nuclear power.
Why are they allowed to? Well what are you going to do about it? They'll nuke you to keep them.
> They've never tested one and you're never going to hold something in your pocket for defense that's untested.
Vela Incident: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vela_incident
> While it's generally estimated that Israel has nukes, there's actually no evidence that they do. They've never tested one and you're never going to hold something in your pocket for defense that's untested.
That's one take.
It's really hard to say what the US has allowed as regards Israel. Locals near a particular nuclear facility can recall an Israeli "team of scientists" mysteriously visiting the facility, a year or so before Israel declared themselves a nuclear power. The assumption is that they "snuck" material out, while US officials were "distracted" - by prior agreement.
I believe the US nuclear-armed Israel directly.
>It's really hard to say what the US has allowed as regards Israel. Locals near a particular nuclear facility can recall an Israeli "team of scientists" mysteriously visiting the facility, a year or so before Israel declared themselves a nuclear power. The assumption is that they "snuck" material out, while US officials were "distracted" - by prior agreement.
Israel has never declared themselves a nuclear power. They literally have a hebrew word for their refusal to answer questions on the matter.
That's also a very very suspicious story that anonymous locals near an anonymous nuclear facility that supposedly knew about a top secret team of israel scientists...
>I believe the US nuclear-armed Israel directly.
I doubt.
I guess it's the same reason why the genocide is allowed.
Why is North Korea?
I don't know what the point of nukes are anymore. They will never be used. You'd figure giving Ukraine long range missiles would provoke Russia into using theirs, but they haven't. What would it take other than another nuclear strike to cause Russia or anyone with nukes to actually use them?
Separately, if Israel nukes Iran, will we be OK with it? Is there anything Israel can do that would make us say "Stop"?
"Never" is a ridiculous thing to say.
Answered in the first 5 words of the subtitle:
> According to our elected leaders, we should be very scared of the possibility that Iran could get a nuclear bomb. But Israel already has them, and ...
For the past 80 years, it's been all-but-guaranteed that you won't win an American election if you seem insufficiently pro-Israel.
Yes, there are plenty of objective arguments for America's foreign policy being far less pro-Israel than it has been for 8+ decades. US Sec. of State (and former US Army General) George Marshall made those arguments to US President Harry Truman back in 1948 - and was overruled. Truman had staked out a pro-Israel position before his previous election (which he had won), then won another election 6 months after overruling Marshall.
- If your real priority is sounding sophisticated, you can make fancy arguments about America being far too pro-Israel.
- If your real priority is understanding why America is so pro-Israel, then you need to shut up with the fancy arguments, and analyze the American electorate's strong preference for that.
- And if your real priority is winning American elections, then you need to present as "obviously" pro-Israel. And ignore the idiots making fancy arguments.
Because they are allies... at least, that's probably their justification.
Iran was also an ally... until 1979. Saddam was another ally... until 1990, et cetera.
Not saying you're wrong, but were the reasons for those alliances failing, because of nukes?
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If you read the article you find out that it's against American law to provide weapons if Israel evaded treaties to get nukes. So America is knowingly breaking its own law every time it sends more bombs to Isreal.
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Way too many Americans are Biblical literalists and think there's some kind of cosmic destiny that requires the US to defend Israel.
The MIC loves expensive constant un-winnable wars and Israel is the devil that provides them. I’m very glad the youth oppose Israel so this nightmare can end in a few generations, hopefully before a million more people die.
They’re dispensationalists, though. Actual biblical literalists would probably have a hard time reconciling St. Paul with this idea that the modern nation-state of Israel has anything at all to do with the Israel of either the Old or New Testaments.
It is literally impossible to state objectively what "actual biblical literalists" would believe, as the document is massive, self-contradictory, and written with heavy use of allegory and metaphor.
It's not Kearney & Ritchie.
That might be and while the government certainly takes advantage of that sentiment to preserve its Israel policies, but the real reason the US government supports israel has more to do with the general region being oil rich and having a reliable and strong nuclear secular ally in the region.
> I do know my dad said we should nuke and glass the whole middle east, them included. It'd be the only way the middle east would stop fighting. (He was deployed there, desert storm)
> Edit: and -1's poured in less than 1 minute.
Re: downvotes, these lines imply immaturity. You should either be explicit about your degree of agreement with your father, or remove the anecdote entirely. And complaining about downvotes is always pointlessly distracting.
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