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How important is it to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons?

How important is Preventing Iran from acquiring Nuclear Weapons?

  • Most important crisis humankind has ever faced.

    Votes: 1 2.4%
  • Extremely Important.

    Votes: 23 54.8%
  • Good to stop them, but not super important.

    Votes: 5 11.9%
  • Who cares... It really doesn't matter.

    Votes: 12 28.6%
  • It would be a good thing if they got nuclear weapons.

    Votes: 1 2.4%

  • Total voters
    42

Painter

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Personally, I believe it to be a much more serious situation than mainstream opinion.
I believe that Iran acquiring nuclear weapons is as large as any crisis humankind has ever faced during its existence.
I will explain why:

#1 The immediate threat to our allies - "Mutual Assured Destruction" (MAD) is why we made it through the Cold War and are alive today. MAD worked great for us, and continues to work great for many nuclear armed Nations around the world. So far, all Nations who have nuclear weapons have a primary common desire which is "Self Preservation".
The "Supreme Leader" and those around him who actually control Iran are motivated more by religious ideology than by anything else. For the first time, those in control of nuclear weapons would be motivated more by religion than by self preservation or by ideologies that are historically compatible with MAD.
I would compare this to placing all of our nuclear weapons under the control of the Westboro Baptist Church, or even a less fanatical group, so long as it cares more about Religion than Life.
There is a fair chance that Iran's leaders would not seek to martyr Iran by destroying Israel. But there is also a fair chance they would.

#2 Immunity - Once Iran moves past the beginner stages and has multiple bombs with a good delivery system, they become impervious from us or any other Nation that would seek to keep them in check. For example: Iran could attack another Arab Country that is not our strong ally. We would no sooner interfere than we did when Russia attacked Georgia. We would not be willing to place our troops or our Nation in harms way to protect a Nation that is not our strong ally.

#3 Immunity stage 2 - Once Iran has a nuclear deterrent, we will not attempt to stop them or invade them for any reasons short of attacking a NATO nation or Israel. There would be nothing to stop Iran from continuing its nuclear program and entering an arms race. Who can say for certain that they will not end up with hundreds, or even thousands of nuclear weapons?
Thousands is doubtful, but what about 50 or 150 over the next 40 years? What would possibly prevent this once they get started?

#4 Eventual Direct Threat - At some point Iran will have a delivery system capable of delivering a direct nuclear payload to the United States. Regardless of how you view the issue in it's entirety, a new Cold War with Iran is just simply not a good thing. Once they have a couple of bombs, we will not be able to stop them from eventually reaching this point.

#5 Iran's ability to control their nuclear weapons - Every single County that poses nuclear weapons is at constant risk that they could fall into the wrong hands. Even our own country. Iran has very deep and very strong under currents of extremism. Even if their Supreme Leader wants them to remain secure and under lock and key, (which is debatable in itself), can he guarantee that 1 bomb or even some bomb material would never slip into the wrong hands?

#6 Iran's possible desire to deliberately allow them into extremist hands - Can we be sure that the Supreme Leader would not allow enough material for a bomb to slip into the hands of an extremist faction and wind up detonating in Israel, The Unites States, or another ally? I know some of you will say, "No, because we can trace its signature and know it came from Iran and we'd destroy them". However, only nuclear material that is already documented can be traced. And assuming it is traceable, you are depending on a variation of MAD. Iran may or may not believe that we would destroy them if they were attempting to say the loss of nuclear material was an accident. Especially after watching the chaos surrounding our claims of chemical weapons in Syria. Misinformation is a powerful thing. But the real issue is not whether it would work, but whether Iran might think it would work.

#7 I want one too! When Iran has nuclear weapons, everyone in the Middle East will want nuclear weapons. Israel will want more. All Arab and Muslim Nations will want the deterrent as well as the power of having nuclear weapons. Once Iran has nuclear weapons, it is only a matter of time before more Nations have them too. Eventually, someone will use them. Eventually, someone will lose control of them to extremists.

#8 Nuclear close calls and accidents - Even if Iran proves to be compatible with MAD, the more nuclear armed nations we have in the world equals the higher chance of having an accident occur that leads to full out Nuclear War and the end of life as we know it.
Read these links to see how the world almost ended multiple times:
Close Calls
Key Issues: Nuclear Weapons: Issues: Accidents: 20 Mishaps that Might Have Caused Nuclear War

The nuclear weapons of today dwarf the atomic bombs we dropped on Japan. Just 1 detonation in the right place with the right weather conditions could be catastrophic for the environment and the food chain. It would only take 1 detonation to collapse our own economy. Would only take a dozen to send us back to the stone age with town sized skirmishes over food and resources.
Yet we have thousands.
Take a look at just the documented arsenals of the world:
List of states with nuclear weapons - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Pakistan has up to an estimated 120 nuclear bombs. This is why we give them so much money. They are on the verge of losing control and we must make sure they stay in control.
Do we want to be giving Iran billions each year too?

Currently Pakistan, India, North Korea, and Israel do not have long distance delivery systems. This will change in time. Just as it will change for Iran, whether it gets the bomb or not.
 
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I would have to say that while I dislike the Iranian regime immensely, there is no conclusive evidence (or rather, it has yet to be presented) that Iran is attempting to attain nuclear weapons.
 
There's no option for, "They already have them...Now what?"
 
IMO preventing Iran from getting a deliverable nuclear weapon - short range or long range - is paramount to the U.S. Whether that happens by negotiation, sabotage, military action - it doesn't matter. Something should have been done about this in a permanent way, years ago. It's not so much about the weapon, but the crazy mullah's running Iran that would be willing to use them against Israel or Europe or whoever. The world doesn't need another uncontrollable fanatical nation with nuclear weapons.
 
There's no option for, "They already have them...Now what?"

Without a dependable long range delivery system, the bomb itself is irrelevant unless they want to blow themselves up.
 
Without a dependable long range delivery system, the bomb itself is irrelevant unless they want to blow themselves up.

Why wouldn't they have that technology? NK and Pakistan have both shared with them.
 
Without a dependable long range delivery system, the bomb itself is irrelevant unless they want to blow themselves up.

Irrelevant in the hands of an extremist or terrorist?
What about encased in lead or other compounds that might prevent it's radiation signature from showing up?
Reference #6
 
Why wouldn't they have that technology? NK and Pakistan have both shared with them.

To my knowledge Iran has not yet tested nuclear armed missiles. Iran's Ghadr and Shabab missiles are modified NK designs are short range at 2km or less. I know they're working on something like NK's Taepdong (sp?) which is NK's biggest missile I think does 5k or 6k and can barely reach Alaska from NK. Iran can reach today, Israel with their missile technology but with a 6km missile they'll be able to reach all of Europe, all of Africa, Russia, China and even Tazmania and West to Greenland.

I doubt NK is sharing the good stuff with Iran.
 
Suicide bomber = long range delivery system.

Not unless the suicide bomber is the size of Godzilla. To miniaturize a nuke it takes a very advanced technology and high skill - something neither NK nor Iran has the ability to make. Perhaps they could purchase one but Russia is the only country that is allied with Iran that would be willing to provide it and even then, those mini nukes are the size of small garbage cans. A dirty bomb or chemical / biological suicide bomber would be much more likely.
 
Irrelevant in the hands of an extremist or terrorist?
What about encased in lead or other compounds that might prevent it's radiation signature from showing up?
Reference #6

See my posts after - sorry didn't see your post until I responded to the other posts.
 
Not unless the suicide bomber is the size of Godzilla. To miniaturize a nuke it takes a very advanced technology and high skill - something neither NK nor Iran has the ability to make. Perhaps they could purchase one but Russia is the only country that is allied with Iran that would be willing to provide it and even then, those mini nukes are the size of small garbage cans. A dirty bomb or chemical / biological suicide bomber would be much more likely.

Ever actually seen one? They can be extremely small. Shoe box...

I agree about the dirty bomb though.
 
I do not think it really matters.The US has the largest stockpile in the world so we really have absolutely no business telling other countries if they can or can't have nukes.
 
If the Iranian regime gets nukes, it will turn into another North Korea - darkness for generations of Iranians.
 
I do not think it really matters.The US has the largest stockpile in the world so we really have absolutely no business telling other countries if they can or can't have nukes.

Just because America has nukes we can't tell nutty Iran they can't have them. You'd be okay then selling them a few of our old Titan II's for cash then.
 
Just because America has nukes we can't tell nutty Iran they can't have them. You'd be okay then selling them a few of our old Titan II's for cash then.

Well, look who has nuclear weapons now....

"We are a rudderless country. No regard for God, no moral core, no leadership or regard for the rule of law. Our elected officials are a disgrace and our cesspool pop culture society is even worse." - Anonymous Internet Posting (2013)
 
Not unless the suicide bomber is the size of Godzilla. To miniaturize a nuke it takes a very advanced technology and high skill - something neither NK nor Iran has the ability to make. Perhaps they could purchase one but Russia is the only country that is allied with Iran that would be willing to provide it and even then, those mini nukes are the size of small garbage cans. A dirty bomb or chemical / biological suicide bomber would be much more likely.

See my posts after - sorry didn't see your post until I responded to the other posts.

I was aware of these things.
I am not at all convinced that a high end terrorist network could not get one in the country via a shipping container.
Even less convinced that they could not pull right up into the border checkpoint to be searched in Israel and detonate right there.

We need to focus on keeping the technology away from extremist. And not just Muslim extremists either. There are government hating whackadoos within our own country that would love to get a hold of one.
I'd rather secure and work on eliminating the weapons, rather than simply try to keep them from detonating.

Another "godzilla" sized point that you are missing is that while you are right today in that Iran does not have the technology to make a small nuke. Once they have nukes we can not or will no longer be in a position to impede their progress. Eventually they will have the technology to miniaturize them. And eventually they will have many of them.
They only place where we can stop it is to stop the first one.
 
I do not think it really matters.The US has the largest stockpile in the world so we really have absolutely no business telling other countries if they can or can't have nukes.

Not to mention being the only nation on Earth to have actually used nuclear weapons on a civilian population. There's a strange, greenish glow emanating from somewhere atop that moral high ground.
 
How important is it to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons?

It's important enough that Saudi Arabia should perform its duty as regional power. For once.
 
It's important enough that Saudi Arabia should perform its duty as regional power. For once.

They would need Israel as an ally, and I don't see that happening...
 
Another "godzilla" sized point that you are missing is that while you are right today in that Iran does not have the technology to make a small nuke. Once they have nukes we can not or will no longer be in a position to impede their progress. Eventually they will have the technology to miniaturize them. And eventually they will have many of them.
They only place where we can stop it is to stop the first one.

So either we act or don't and face the consequences. Jamesrage seems to think that because we have them we give up the right to say anything about anyone else having them, therefore, we should give them out like candy to everyone and hasten our extinction. Love that logic.
 
It's important enough that Saudi Arabia should perform its duty as regional power. For once.

Wouldn't that be something.
 
Just because America has nukes we can't tell nutty Iran they can't have them. You'd be okay then selling them a few of our old Titan II's for cash then.

The U.S. isn't the only country with with grave concerns. Iran makes a lot of threats.
 
They would need Israel as an ally, and I don't see that happening...

we keep our alliance with Israel, and SA handles its own problems.

right now, SA abdicates its responsibility, we are its pro bono military, and it makes out like a bandit every time we act.

and the kicker? you're paying for it.
 
we keep our alliance with Israel, and SA handles its own problems.

right now, SA abdicates its responsibility, we are its pro bono military, and it makes out like a bandit every time we act.

and the kicker? you're paying for it.

SA has no army to speak of. They do have some credible defense capabilities though...
 
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