Does anyone here feel the threat posed by terrorists with Nukes or for that matter Chemial weapons to be underplayed?
We all know that Al Queda would love nothing more other than to sneak a Nuke into the US or Britain and place it in a van parked outside Downing Street or outside the Whitehouse lawn.
Question is could they do it? Are the respective nations security forces doing their best to make sure it doesn’t happen?
I feel that its a question of “When” rather than “If”. Sadly, the US will be the target as it would send a greater signal to the West. I can see it happening in my lifetime without doubt.
By: Krishna - 22nd June 2003 at 07:59
Even if pakistan doesn’t supply nukes / nuclear material to al-qaida directly, who can say some of the elements of paki army / ISI haven’t already provided enough resources, to al-qaida, to be able to make a dirty bomb.
By: SabreAce - 20th June 2003 at 21:29
If they are fighting India and the IAF you can bet it will be
Well duh PhantomII, do you think they’ll be fighting Kazakhstan? Yes, pakistan will be terrible shape if things like war occur.Today, they are’nt anywhere close to the training and quality of their indian counterparts either so it won’t be favourable for them at any stage of the conflict. My question is on the probability of nuclear material or even warheads getting “exported” or smuggled out as a result. If pakistan can supply nuclear tech to N.Korea (not that I totally beleive that but there are credible reports), imagine the case with nukes lying around for anyone’s taking!!!! 😮 😮
By: mongu - 20th June 2003 at 19:41
Come on, that isn’t the case at all now is it.
By: Arabella-Cox - 20th June 2003 at 10:04
Ricin is nice. There is no cure. It is the poison used in the umbrella attacks on Bulgarian dissidents by the Hungarian secret service. (The tools were provided by the KGB of course).
A jab in the leg with an umbrella and three days later you are dead.
Of course if you really wanted to kill a lot of people you’d go for Ebola or Marburg fever, which is very similar. It breaks down the cell walls of humans over a period of a few weeks. It is also highly contagious and is an airborne virus.
Did you see the first X-Men movie when the politician who was opposed to mutants sort of turned into water. It is very similar to that except the end is not so fast and of course instead of coughing up water and “leaking” water from every pore… it would be blood. Basically you die when your major organs disolve and you hemmorage blood from every part of your body… including skin.
…not nice.
By: mongu - 19th June 2003 at 19:23
Don’t forget there were a lot of arrests in the UK 6 months ago to do with a terrorist group which had obtained something called Ricin. You may remember, a policeman who sometimes guarded Blair was killed in a raid.
By: Arthur - 19th June 2003 at 11:16
Sarin is a nerve gas, which blocks the transfer of certain neurotransmitters between nerve cells. While neurotransmitters giving a nerve the order to act will still function, the neurotransmitter giving the ´off´ signal will be blocked. Effectively this means that nerves constantly stimulate glands and muscles without relaxation. Your limbs will be cramped, but also your heart and lungs so you’ll suffocate and suffer a heart attack as well. And since the glands will be running overtime, you’ll be drooling, sweating like a pig and throwing up too. It’s not one unpleasant way to die, it’s several. Other nerve agents (VX, Tabun) work in a similair way but Sarin is nice and volatile so it spreads out quite fast, and it also dissolves in water if you want to poison the local well of Washington DC (i guess this is about the time the anti-terror-webcrawlers start beeping alert. NSA guys, sorry for waking you up!). It doesn’t just work when inhaled, skin contact is enough.
But the effectiveness of Sarin shouldn’t be overestimated. It’s vapour is heavier than air, so either you’ll have to spread a lot of the stuff around otherwise people in decent boots won’t be affected. The stuff will evaporate quite fast to a non-clinical level too, so the threat doesn’t take too long. Even in a nice closed system (which would appear perfect for a chemical attack) like the Tokyo metro the fatality percentage wasn’t all too high.
Even more so, since Sarin is so volatile it is extremely dangerous to prepare the stuff for an attack.
So is the stuff a threat? Definately. Should we overestimate it? Nope. If I were a terrorist, i would hire myself a nice and big SUV at Hertz and started running over people in a crowded city. It’s a much easier way of making a lot of victims.
By: PhantomII - 19th June 2003 at 04:23
Just out of curiosity what all does Serin (or Sarin….however you spell it) do to you?
I’m not really up to speed on all these chemical and biological agents and their effects.
By: Arabella-Cox - 19th June 2003 at 02:29
“I reckon a chemical type attack would be probably the first to materialize and it is just a matter of time before it happens and it most surely will. Where and when, well that is the question that nobody yet knows.”
Why don’t you include the Sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway? It wasn’t done in war time… and certainly erpetrated by terrs.
By: PhantomII - 18th June 2003 at 21:50
“assuming the state in bad shape after a war….”
If they are fighting India and the IAF you can bet it will be.
By: mongu - 18th June 2003 at 18:36
The director of MI5 said last night it was a case of “when, not if” a major Western city would be attacked by a CBRN weapon.
By: SabreAce - 18th June 2003 at 17:16
Will an indo-pak war
a) Allow the easy access/distribution of nukes in pakistan to terrorists? (Assuming the state is in a bad shape after war)
or
b) Allow for a US presence to find and disarm or remove the remaining/existing ones?
By: LightningMk6 - 18th June 2003 at 15:48
In my opinion, there is a threat and of course enough nutters in this world who could carry out such an attack.
I reckon a chemical type attack would be probably the first to materialize and it is just a matter of time before it happens and it most surely will. Where and when, well that is the question that nobody yet knows.
If the worlds most powerful and rich nations took a bit more interest in the poorer countries and gave help where needed then I don’t think they would feel so left out and isolated.
There that’s my view.
By: Arabella-Cox - 18th June 2003 at 08:36
“Their harboring people like the Taliban initially (heck they recognized the Taliban as a legitimate government!) is part of what makes me cautious of them.”
Hahahahaha… US tax payers money was used by Pakistan to Create the Taleban. Of course they are going to support “their” side… who else was there? The pro Communist party and the pro Iranian party… hmmm where do you think the US wants its money to go?
Amuzing that the result is that the US has actually put what was the commies back in power. The justification that the Taleban were cruel leaders and had no respect for womens right is very true… just as true as it was when the Soviets were in there and the Commies were trying to give women equal rights…
By: PhantomII - 18th June 2003 at 06:27
Either way I’m not going to concern myself with this type of threat. There’s not much I can do as one person to stop it so I see no point in worrying about it.
As far as Pakistan’s treatment by the United States, I’m still on the fence about Pakistan’s motives in any case. To put it bluntly, I don’t really trust them all the way just yet….
Their harboring people like the Taliban initially (heck they recognized the Taliban as a legitimate government!) is part of what makes me cautious of them.
Sorry if that offends anyone, but that’s my opinion.
By: Arabella-Cox - 18th June 2003 at 04:01
“I’d say a “dirty bomb” attack is quite likely, but not a full blown A-bomb.”
I’d agree with that… a large supply of HE and some nuclear waste would suffice.
I am disappointed that the US is planning to start work on mini nukes for deeply dug bunkers and control facilities.
I am pretty sure that violates a few START treaties and the result will be a type of nuclear weapon that is relatively small and by far more likely to be used than even a tactical nuke.
The arms race it will create in mininukes would almost be the ideal type of nuke for a terrorist organisation. (Much like the back pack nukes of the cold war…)
By: mongu - 17th June 2003 at 19:20
I’d say a “dirty bomb” attack is quite likely, but not a full blown A-bomb.
Perhaps countries like the US, Russia and China should reduce their own stockpiles first. Being able to end the world once is one thing, but why the hell do you need enough nukes to destory the world 5 or 6 times over?!
Iran is probably the biggest threat, followed by Pakistan. North Korea comes third and Israel fourth. In the case of Pakistan, the US could only disarm them if they also disarmed the Indians. In the case of Iran, they need to disarm Israel at the same time.
By: mixtec - 17th June 2003 at 16:50
It really amazes me that the people of the US treat Pakistan like undeserving crap considering all they have done to aid the US. The US has been a very bad ally to Pakistan and it says alot that they have stayed on the side of the US with their very large islamic fundamentalist population. It would be very easy for Pakistan to provide terrorists with an A-bomb if indeed they wanted to support terrorism.
By: Hand87_5 - 17th June 2003 at 12:27
I’m affraid that the threat is real.
However nuke are not easy to handle nor biological weapons.
I guess that chemicals are the real threat.
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June 17, 2003 at 12:11 pm