Bush says nuclear strike against Iran is "on the table"

This is the first time in memory that I can ever recall a President threatening a nuclear strike publicly.
Scary!

What's scary is your inability to comprehend this thread, beside the title that is. The title of this thread and the title of that article are misleading and they are not Bush’s words. He said “all options are on the table”, which means even the military option. He said nothing about nuclear strikes, so please don't be duped by false headlines.


[edit on 19-4-2006 by WestPoint23]

Theres not going to be a nulcear strike. No matter how stupid Bush is, he coulnd possibly be dumb enough to strike the atomic spark... could he?

If there were to be a nuclear strike on Iran, I can guarantee it would come from the US and not vice versa. Iran does not have nuclear weapons capability... yet... it would probably go down as such :

The news would broadcast that cruise missiles had been fired at the United States (Which would be bogus, but to cover it up, they may use fakes, or simply fire at the open sky with the coastal defence grid saying it was a nuke)
Somehow, even though the missiles travel at near mach speed and sometimes above, the news would know that they are in fact nuclear... you would ask yourself how they could know that... just as you probably asked yourself how they knew who the hijackers were in 2001 on the same day.

With the media relaying to the world that Iran attacked first, the US will in turn launch their weapons. Only once Bush is out of office will information come out that Iran had not in fact launched a single weapon... but the media will play that down by simply not talking about it, or not bringing attention to it.

Thats IF the US wanted a nuclear strike.

If "all options are on the table" wouldn't a nuclear strike be one of those options?

And if that was not what Bush stated then why has the admin. not made it clear that he was misquoted?

Originally posted by WestPoint23

The title of this thread and the title of that article are misleading and they are not Bush’s words. He said “all options are on the table”,


which means even the military option. He said nothing about nuclear strikes, so please don't be duped by false headlines.


[edit on 19-4-2006 by WestPoint23]

you're right. but the title of the thread was direct from the seattle times newspaper and was posted just as such. (it no longer is posted that way)

but none the less when asked about the nuclear option he stated that "it is on the table"

now in this game of who's bluffing more.. we are not bluffing because we are in fact prepared to have our bluff called

Newspapers sell stories - one of the most famous was "Freddie Starr ate my hampster" - now i dont expect you all to know who Fredia Starr is - but please let me assuse you - he ate no hampster.

Of course all options are on the table according to PTUS - as they are for Tony Blair et all any other World Leader you might care to name. However drama sells - so its the nuclear option on the table to the Editors pen - evr heard of wagging the dog ?

If you are seriously concerned about nuclear capability - please consider something - simple geography and logistics -

IE

The US -
B2 Spirit Bombers
B52 Bombers
Bases in the UK and Europe
An ICBM deployment system in place since the cold war
A huge Fleet of Nuclear Equiped Submarines
A huge fleet of Tomahawk Equiped Naval Vessels

oh and a bunch of people in NATO, The UN and AWEA


Iran
mmm well

.... we made some depleted uranium last month


In the UK we call this a no win bet - no Idea what those of you in the States call it.

Then again a chap in Iraq called bluff and erm well i dont think 7 to life covers where hes off to.

Originally posted by deltaboy

Originally posted by ThePieMaN

He didn't deny it either tho Deltaboy. Still scary.

No he doesn't deny it either, but he is trying to be ambiguous which is a good strategy to make the Iranians think about their plans. Think of America's policy with Taiwan against China. China doesn't know if the U.S. is willing to defend or not.

I think China is waiting for the US to crumble like the former CCCP. Im pretty sure it doesnt want to waste resources unneccessarily, but Im also sure it wont allow the US to dominate further and further, limiting its own (China's) resources.

Its like a good game of starcraft. Now thats an awsome game.

A second news source is identifying the President's comments as specifically in answer to a question about the nuclear option.

Asked if options included planning for a nuclear strike, Bush replied: "All options are on the table. We want to solve this issue diplomatically and we're working hard to do so."

So I think this is a thinly veiled nuclear threat to Iran.
Whether the option is really being seriously considered or not is another story, however.

[edit on 4/19/06 by xmotex]

The nuclear option is a perfectly legitimate tool for diplomatic negotiation, particularly when the other party is threatening to wipe Israel "off the map"... I don't care who the president is, when diplomats walk into the talks, they place ALL of their options on the table...

You say, "Look here, we have a lovely banana split with lots of fudge syrup and whipped cream and a nice cherry on top on THIS end of the table; and we have a tankard of bubbling hot battery acid with broken glass and razor blades on THAT end of the table. You choose."

And that's how diplomacy works.

I am shure that they have a new version of the neutron bomb,
small area ,quick disdispersion..Never see a Nuc type explosion .

That's a scary thought. Nuclear should never ever be a real option, unless you are using the threat to try and get the other side to budge. Then that might backfire. A push of a button can screw up the environment and harm or kill many people. I don't like talk of nuclear, there are no winners in such a battle.

Bush is not well mentally if he is even considering the notion of a nuclear attack.

Troy

How many times have I read about Bush resorting to nukes when he depletes his army resources?
Lots.

They could be small bunker buster nukes, most likely they would be the ones used.
But what happens when a country reopens that pandora's box? Well, the US and the Russians aren't the only ones any more and they will want to pre-empt as well if threatened.
That would be pretty screwed up

[edit on 19-4-2006 by Toadmund]

There is nothing wrong with Bush indicating that a nuclear strike is "an option on the table"

Say your neigbor yells at you from his yard saying he is going to get a gun and shoot you and your family.....would you:

A) Throw out all your guns cause defending your family is not an option
B) Ignore the threats
C) Or lay out all your options to defend your family whatever it takes.

Diplomacy is still in the works with Iran, however their crazed regime continues to threaten other countries. I don't think the US or any other country would deny any defensive options knowing that Iran may damn well be serious about their threats.

Im sorry, but when you are talking about peoples lives you don't sit around and play threats as if they were bogus and not worth thinking about. You prepare for it, incase it comes around to bite you in the ass. Nuclear option or not,...if you have to bite, pull hair or kick someone in the junk to save your life.....then that is what you have to do. I don't think it will be necessary for the US to defend itself with nukes nor do i think it to be a high priority option to the administration or combination of allies,....however it can't just be written off as an option in the small event that it may be necessary to save heavy US or other Allied casualties.

Carburetor

Originally posted by cybertroy
Bush is not well mentally if he is even considering the notion of a nuclear attack.

Then you've just diagnosed every president in U.S. history since 1945, because they have all had to consider the nuclear option. Every one. Once the nuclear genie was out of the bottle, it became the responsibility of every U.S. president to consider its use. And I mean seriously consider it.

You may not be old enough to remember the Cold War, but that was a span of decades during which the West was just waiting for a Soviet first strike. Every American president, whether Democrat or Republican, was on constant alert during those years, with his finger hovering over "the button"...

Thankfully, we don't even know how many times we were just a hair's breadth from nuclear annihilation, because there were certainly a number of false alarms. Some were publicized, some were never leaked to the public.

The point being this: If an American president never considered the nuclear option, in the face of nuclear proliferation worldwide, then that American president would be a pinheaded moron with a deathwish for his country. It is the duty and responsibility of the President to always consider our nuclear capability, and particularly so with a belligerent adversary who is hell-bent on developing and deploying his own nuclear arsenal.

Which is a rather long-winded way of saying that I respectfully disagree with your position.

New urgency" to curb Iran - U.S. official

By Christian Lowe
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia said on Wednesday it wanted no action against Iran before an April 28 U.N. deadline set for it to halt uranium enrichment, but a top U.S. official said other countries were inching towards sanctions.

Tensions remained high, with oil prices hitting a high above $73, partly driven by fears the dispute could disrupt shipments from the world's fourth-largest oil exporter.

"What I heard in the room last night was not agreement on the specifics but to the general notion that Iran has to feel isolation and that there is a cost to what they are doing," U.S. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns told reporters.

"Now we need to go beyond that and agree on the specifics of what measures we need to put that into operation," he said.

He said Iran's shock announcement last week that it had enriched uranium to a low level and planned to produce it on an industrial scale had focused the minds of the international community.

The United States and its European allies say Tehran could divert highly enriched uranium to make bombs.

"What is new is a greater sense of urgency given what the Iranians did last week ... Nearly every country is considering some sort of sanctions and that is a new development. We heard last night and again today that all of those that spoke are looking at sanctions," Burns said.

In a surprise development, an Iranian delegation appeared later in the day in Moscow for talks with officials from the so-called EU3 -- Britain, France and Germany -- although a spokesman for the British Embassy in Moscow said there were no major breakthroughs.

"The Iranians set out their position and we listened carefully but there were no significant breakthroughs," the embassy spokesman said.

The U.N. Security Council on March 29 gave Iran a month to halt enrichment and answer questions from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on its nuclear programme.

VETO POWER

Russia and China, which both have veto power in the council, say they are not convinced sanctions would work. U.S. officials had hoped to use the talks to persuade them to take a tougher line on Iran, which it suspects of seeking nuclear weapons.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said some countries, including Russia, wanted to wait until the U.N. nuclear watchdog reports on Iranian compliance on April 28 before acting.

"We are convinced of the need to wait for the IAEA report due at the end of the month," Lavrov told reporters.

An Iranian delegation headed to Moscow for talks on the dispute, Foreign Minister Manoucher Mottaki told state radio.

He said officials from the Foreign Ministry and the Supreme National Security Council would "discuss possible solutions which could pave the way to reach a comprehensive understanding based on a recognition of Iran's right to nuclear technology".

Iran says it only wants nuclear power for civilian use, but Russia said Tehran was not responding to international demands.

Several diplomats said that when IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei was in Iran last week he had hoped to persuade Iran to accept at least a brief "technical pause" of its enrichment programme, which could have provided the basis for a renewal of negotiations between the EU3 and Iran.

One diplomat close to the IAEA said such a pause "could open the door, provide a new space for negotiations", but a senior EU3 diplomat said the Iranians had given no indication they were would accept that.

Burns said Washington was opposed to allowing Iran any kind of pause, calling some of Iran's negotiating positions "a ruse".

"One of the core points that I made, supported by a great number of people in the room is, we are not going to agree to any pause by Iran," Burns said.

Speaking to the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the international community agreed Iran could not have a nuclear weapon and was mobilised to respond.

"In order to turn the Iranians back from what has been behavior that is contrary to all the wishes of the international community, we are prepared to use measures at our disposal -- political, economic, others, to dissuade Iran," Rice said.

Tuesday's meeting of deputy foreign ministers from Russia, China, the United States, Germany, France and Britain underlined international differences over punitive action against Iran.

All the powers have said they are determined to solve the problem through diplomatic means, but the United States is alone among them in not ruling out military action.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said Tuesday's meeting had been "totally fruitless".

U.S. President George W. Bush was planning to raise the issue with his visiting Chinese counterpart, Hu Jintao.

(Additional reporting by Simon Webb and Madeline Chambers in London, Anna Willard in Paris, Louis Charbonneau in Berlin, Meg Clothier in Moscow and Edmund Blair in Tehran)




Copyright © 2005 Reuters

Based on the newz report..

it seem that d Bush Goverment is really to lobby all their 'frenz' to agree with their action eventhough 2 vetos power -Russia n China wanna wait for UN report. Could u see that...Bush cabinet people is seem always act beyond d border..wat they think they re 'world police' or 'super government'!

Originally posted by legolas
Based on the newz report.. it seem that d Bush Goverment is really to lobby all their 'frenz' to agree with their action eventhough 2 vetos power -Russia n China wanna wait for UN report. Could u see that...Bush cabinet people is seem always act beyond d border..wat they think they re 'world police' or 'super government'!

First of all, we ARE the World Police. No other nation has a fully functional nuclear arsenal and delivery system to compare with ours, no other nation has the surveillance capabilities that we have, and no other nation controls the Internet and world economy as we do. Disregard all the petulent anti-American propaganda, and take assurance in this fact: We are the last, big bad-asses on the block, and shame on anyone who crosses us.

Russia and China may have veto power (and they'll probably use it); but, ultimately, we can override and/or ignore any decision of the U.N. Security Council---in case you don't remember, even Bill Clinton launched missile strikes against Iraq and elewhere without even consulting the U.N. Security Council.

Our recent actions against Iraq only came after years of the U.N. Security Council issuing ineffectual resolutions and ultimatums to Saddam Hussein; the USA finally and simply exercised our sovereign right to ENFORCE the ultimatums. Yes, the U.N. Security Council repeatedly warned of military action against Hussein's regime, yet never made good on its promises. But what good are ultimatums without at least a token show of force? Hussein essentially thumbed his nose at the U.N., booted out weapons inspectors, continued taking potshots at surveillance planes, and boasted of renewed weapons programs. Face it, Saddam had it coming, and the U.N. enabled him.

This time, however, I seriously doubt that the U.N. Security Council is going to let Iran get away with anything. The U.N.'s reputation is on the line---on the one hand, they can't afford to have ANOTHER Mideast nation ignoring their resolutions and thumbing its nose at them; and, on the other hand, they don't want the USA doing all their dirty work for them. I mean, without a demonstration of force, the U.N. is a useless body of chattering boobs.

Well he can't really say no we're not ever going to use nuclear weapons against Iran. That would serve to boost Irans confidence I suppose. I'd probably have said the same thing.

First of all, we ARE the World Police. No other nation has a fully functional nuclear arsenal and delivery system to compare with ours, no other nation has the surveillance capabilities that we have, and no other nation controls the Internet and world economy as we do. Disregard all the petulent anti-American propaganda, and take assurance in this fact: We are the last, big bad-asses on the block, and shame on anyone who crosses us. -written by saint michael

wat...u're d 'WORLD POLICE' coz u nominate urself to b d 'world police'..c'mon for god sake.
SHAME ON U!...


[edit on 20-4-2006 by legolas]

[edit on 20-4-2006 by legolas]

[edit on 20-4-2006 by legolas]

Originally posted by Saint Michael.

Russia and China may have veto power (and they'll probably use it); but, ultimately, we can override and/or ignore any decision of the U.N. Security Council---in case you don't remember, even Bill Clinton launched missile strikes against Iraq and elewhere without even consulting the U.N. Security Council.

comment by legolas

u seem so proud by talkin' abt US ACTION '# off'...arrogant people..i hope not all american thinkin' like you.

[edit on 20-4-2006 by legolas]

[edit on 20-4-2006 by legolas]

Originally posted by Silk

If you are seriously concerned about nuclear capability - please consider something - simple geography and logistics -

IE

The US -
B2 Spirit Bombers
B52 Bombers
Bases in the UK and Europe
An ICBM deployment system in place since the cold war
A huge Fleet of Nuclear Equiped Submarines
A huge fleet of Tomahawk Equiped Naval Vessels

oh and a bunch of people in NATO, The UN and AWEA


Iran
mmm well

.... we made some depleted uranium last month

you forgot about the very close base at Diego Garcia in the indian ocean.
where B52's and B2's operate out of. there are at least 4 hangers for B2's there




Diego Garcia is approximately 2,900 nautical miles from Baghdad which translates into a 5-6 hour flight time or 10-12 hours round trip










www.spaceimaging.com..." target='_blank' class='tabOff'/>

click on this for the satallite image. you will see the 4 B2 hangers along with 8 B1B's and 5 B52's.

base within striking range for heavy bombers

[edit on 25-4-2006 by bigx01]

Originally posted by pcxmac

Originally posted by deltaboy

Originally posted by ThePieMaN
He didn't deny it either tho Deltaboy. Still scary.

No he doesn't deny it either, but he is trying to be ambiguous which is a good strategy to make the Iranians think about their plans. Think of America's policy with Taiwan against China. China doesn't know if the U.S. is willing to defend or not.

I think China is waiting for the US to crumble like the former CCCP. Im pretty sure it doesnt want to waste resources unneccessarily, but Im also sure it wont allow the US to dominate further and further, limiting its own (China's) resources.
Its like a good game of starcraft. Now thats an awsome game.

Well, No matter why you drage our China in this thread, I have to tell you frankly, you only considered a half truth. Yes, Beijing want US to crumble like USSR, but you'd better know that Iran is the last ally with Beijing to against USA in this Asia except North Korea.
I am bursting to laugh how stupid White House officers are. They actually dare to say Iran need 3 or more years to complete nuke!? I have no doubt it contrarily as they have never been expecting something happened like this correctly, USSR, and Red China past time for example. They always be too late to make reponses.
The Iran leader Ahmadinejad looks like smart enough to know how to use threaten of jumping oil price to hurt USA's economy. Now Americans would already been feeling the pressure of oil price. In terms of jumping rate of oil price I will laugh at what oil price next year will be!?
Other side is that how late this nuuke crisis to be finished, how hard this crsis can be finished! Could u see what I mean?!
Yes, if you smart enough you will see that how long the nuclear station in IRAN to be destroyed to be delaied, how difficult the nuclear stations can be detroyed completely! Why? because, Iran will have much more time to add defense, to reinforce the nuclear station and to deploy the nuclear stations widely.
There are lots of abstruse theory to be continue, although officers in White House are fool enough, but I considered that you guys here are more intelligent than me, so I have to stop.