Israel strikes Iran

[Ken]

Iran has been developing a nuclear bomb for quite a while. 48 hours is plenty of notice to evacuate sites doing things like enriching fissile material.

I simply do not see valid excuses why Iran’s regime needs to develop nuclear weapons. We need less proliferation, not more.

When a nuclear power attacks a non-nuclear power is simply reinforces to them and the rest of the world why nuclear weapons are desirable. If nuclear powers oppose nuclear proliferation they should behave better and seek international defense agreements that make them unnecessary for smaller countries to have.

Iraq (second gulf war) was premised the lie that Iraq was pursuing nuclear weapons

Russian invasion of Ukraine. Would not have happened if Ukraine had kept its nukes. And I would be shocked if Ukraine isn't secretly exploring nuclear weapons. Ukraine has lots of nuclear scientists and plenty of uranium.

Israeli/US bombing of Iran. Will likely just accelerate Iran's nuclear program. I think it is naive to think we can bomb it out of existence in a country that large and technologically advanced.

Taiwan. If they feel less than confident in the US security umbrella they will no doubt seek nukes to deter China. And they certainly have the technology to develop nuclear weapons at light speed.

Every one of these current or potential hot spots are a message to the world as to why nuclear weapons are desirable and necessary.

[JohnH]

So, you’re arguing Iran should develop a nuclear weapons and that would lead to a more stable world?

[Ken]

So, you’re arguing Iran should develop a nuclear weapons and that would lead to a more stable world?

No, I'm arguing that might doesn't make right.

And that bombing Iran is both (1) likely to be ineffective, and (2) send message to smaller states around the world that great powers can't be trusted and the only meaningful deterrence is to acquire your own nuclear weapons. The US has shown itself to be a completely untrustworthy player in this entire episode.

I would suggest you have way too much faith in tactical air strikes to accomplish military objectives on their own. Strategic bombing campaigns of the type we did during WW2 were effective as part of an overall war strategy. But tactical surgical air strikes rarely are if you are aiming at hardened military objectives as opposed to soft targets like people. Look at the tactical bombing of Iwo Jima during WW2, for example. How many bombs and artillery were dropped on that few square miles of rock and how effective were they?

[JohnH]

So, you’re arguing Iran should develop a nuclear weapons and that would lead to a more stable world?

No, I'm arguing that might doesn't make right.

And that bombing Iran is both (1) likely to be ineffective, and (2) send message to smaller states around the world that great powers can't be trusted and the only meaningful deterrence is to acquire your own nuclear weapons.

I would suggest you have way too much faith in tactical air strikes to accomplish military objectives on their own. Strategic bombing campaigns of the type we did during WW2 were effective as part of an overall war strategy. But tactical surgical air strikes rarely are if you are aiming at hardened military objectives as opposed to soft targets like people.

An obvious exception to this is the kind of facilities for building nuclear weapons, which certainly can be destroyed in tactical strikes.

I simply don’t think proliferation to rogue states like the Iran regime is a good thing. North Korea had carte Blanche to develop them because of the threat of shelling Seoul. Iran has done the same brinksmanship with sponsoring every tinpot terrorist group they can find, including material support for the Oct 7 attacks. At some point, if a country wants to be left alone, they have to choose to stop attacking their neighbors.

[Ken]

So, you’re arguing Iran should develop a nuclear weapons and that would lead to a more stable world?

No, I'm arguing that might doesn't make right.

And that bombing Iran is both (1) likely to be ineffective, and (2) send message to smaller states around the world that great powers can't be trusted and the only meaningful deterrence is to acquire your own nuclear weapons.

I would suggest you have way too much faith in tactical air strikes to accomplish military objectives on their own. Strategic bombing campaigns of the type we did during WW2 were effective as part of an overall war strategy. But tactical surgical air strikes rarely are if you are aiming at hardened military objectives as opposed to soft targets like people.

An obvious exception to this is the kind of facilities for building nuclear weapons, which certainly can be destroyed in tactical strikes.

Can they? Iran has one of the largest mining industries in the world with tens of thousands of mines scattered across the country. How do we know they don't have facilities for enriching uranium aren't buried secretly underground in places we don't know about? Do you think our intelligence is really that good?

I simply don’t think proliferation to rogue states like the Iran regime is a good thing. North Korea had carte Blanche to develop them because of the threat of shelling Seoul. Iran has done the same brinksmanship with sponsoring every tinpot terrorist group they can find, including material support for the Oct 7 attacks. At some point, if a country wants to be left alone, they have to choose to stop attacking their neighbors.

I don't think nuclear proliferation is a good idea either. That is why I supported the JCPOA between the US (and other members of the security council) and Iran. And was horrified when Trump inexplicitly torpedoed the agreement at the beginning of his first term. And also his inexplicable reversal of sanctions on North Korea because he “likes” Kim Jong-un .

All of this follows from those decisions.

[Ken]

Looks like we are speed-running through the Iraq War now. Anyone remember Donald Rumsfeld on the location of Iraq's WMD? "The area in the south and the west and the north that coalition forces control is substantial. It happens not to be the area where weapons of mass destruction were dispersed. We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat."



This is today: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/22/us/p ... =url-share

Officials Concede They Don’t Know the Fate of Iran’s Uranium Stockpile

Both Vice President JD Vance and Rafael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, acknowledged questions about the whereabouts of Iran’s stockpile of near-bomb-grade nuclear material.


June 22, 2025
A day after President Trump declared that Iran’s nuclear program had been “completely and totally obliterated” by American bunker-busting bombs and a barrage of missiles, the actual state of the program seemed far more murky, with senior officials conceding they did not know the fate of Iran’s stockpile of near-bomb-grade uranium.

“We are going to work in the coming weeks to ensure that we do something with that fuel and that’s one of the things that we’re going to have conversations with the Iranians about,” Vice President JD Vance told ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday, referring to a batch of uranium sufficient to make nine or 10 atomic weapons. Nonetheless, he contended that the country’s potential to weaponize that fuel had been set back substantially because it no longer had the equipment to turn that fuel into operative weapons.

The Iranians have made it clear they are not interested in having conversations with the United States, accusing Washington of deceiving Tehran during the last set of negotiations while planning the air attack. Moreover, that stockpile of fuel is now one of the few nuclear bargaining chips in Iranian hands.

In a briefing for reporters on Sunday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Dan Caine, avoided Mr. Trump’s maximalist claims of success. They said an initial battle-damage assessment of all three sites struck by Air Force B-2 bombers and Navy Tomahawk missiles showed “severe damage and destruction.”

Satellite photographs of the primary target, the Fordo uranium enrichment plant that Iran built under a mountain, showed several holes where a dozen 30,000-pound Massive Ordnance Penetrators — one of the largest conventional bombs in the U.S. arsenal — punched deep holes in the rock. The Israeli military’s initial analysis concluded that the site, the target of American and Israeli military planners for more than 26 years, sustained serious damage from the strike but had not been completely destroyed.

But there was also evidence, according to two Israeli officials with knowledge of the intelligence, that Iran had moved equipment and uranium from the site in recent days. And there was growing evidence that the Iranians, attuned to Mr. Trump’s repeated threats to take military action, had removed 400 kilograms, or roughly 880 pounds, of uranium enriched to 60 percent purity. That is just below the 90 percent that is usually used in nuclear weapons.

The 60-percent enriched fuel had been stored deep inside another nuclear complex, near the ancient capital of Isfahan. Rafael Mariano Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said by text that the fuel had last been seen by his teams of United Nations inspectors about a week before Israel began its attacks on Iran. In an interview on CNN on Sunday he added that “Iran has made no secret that they have protected this material.”

[JohnH]

No, I'm arguing that might doesn't make right.

And that bombing Iran is both (1) likely to be ineffective, and (2) send message to smaller states around the world that great powers can't be trusted and the only meaningful deterrence is to acquire your own nuclear weapons.

I would suggest you have way too much faith in tactical air strikes to accomplish military objectives on their own. Strategic bombing campaigns of the type we did during WW2 were effective as part of an overall war strategy. But tactical surgical air strikes rarely are if you are aiming at hardened military objectives as opposed to soft targets like people.

An obvious exception to this is the kind of facilities for building nuclear weapons, which certainly can be destroyed in tactical strikes.

Can they? Iran has one of the largest mining industries in the world with tens of thousands of mines scattered across the country. How do we know they don't have facilities for enriching uranium aren't buried secretly underground in places we don't know about? Do you think our intelligence is really that good?

I simply don’t think proliferation to rogue states like the Iran regime is a good thing. North Korea had carte Blanche to develop them because of the threat of shelling Seoul. Iran has done the same brinksmanship with sponsoring every tinpot terrorist group they can find, including material support for the Oct 7 attacks. At some point, if a country wants to be left alone, they have to choose to stop attacking their neighbors.

I don't think nuclear proliferation is a good idea either. That is why I supported the JCPOA between the US (and other members of the security council) and Iran. And was horrified when Trump inexplicitly torpedoed the agreement at the beginning of his first term. And also his inexplicable reversal of sanctions on North Korea because he “likes” Kim Jong-un .

All of this follows from those decisions.

NK developed nuclear weapons (mostly because they had the option to shell Seoul, so the west couldn’t realistically stop them). Pointless to try to sanction them now.

Israel has a massive intelligence network in Iran, since Israel has a large population of Farsi speakers who really do not like the Iranian regime - along with a large fraction of Iran’s population who don’t like the regime, either. Of course they aren’t going to expose details from such intelligence to your satisfaction in public.

But yes, I think rogue states can have nuclear proliferation stopped - provided they don’t have unreasonable leverage to prevent stopping them.

[Ken]

An obvious exception to this is the kind of facilities for building nuclear weapons, which certainly can be destroyed in tactical strikes.

Can they? Iran has one of the largest mining industries in the world with tens of thousands of mines scattered across the country. How do we know they don't have facilities for enriching uranium aren't buried secretly underground in places we don't know about? Do you think our intelligence is really that good?

I simply don’t think proliferation to rogue states like the Iran regime is a good thing. North Korea had carte Blanche to develop them because of the threat of shelling Seoul. Iran has done the same brinksmanship with sponsoring every tinpot terrorist group they can find, including material support for the Oct 7 attacks. At some point, if a country wants to be left alone, they have to choose to stop attacking their neighbors.

I don't think nuclear proliferation is a good idea either. That is why I supported the JCPOA between the US (and other members of the security council) and Iran. And was horrified when Trump inexplicitly torpedoed the agreement at the beginning of his first term. And also his inexplicable reversal of sanctions on North Korea because he “likes” Kim Jong-un .

All of this follows from those decisions.

NK developed nuclear weapons (mostly because they had the option to shell Seoul, so the west couldn’t realistically stop them). Pointless to try to sanction them now.

Israel has a massive intelligence network in Iran, since Israel has a large population of Farsi speakers who really do not like the Iranian regime - along with a large fraction of Iran’s population who don’t like the regime, either. Of course they aren’t going to expose details from such intelligence to your satisfaction in public.

But yes, I think rogue states can have nuclear proliferation stopped - provided they don’t have unreasonable leverage to prevent stopping them.

I think we were doing a better job containing Iran under the JPCOA and large numbers of retired generals and other military minds agreed.

[Soloist]

It’s interesting that only one country has ever used them militarily yet it’s all the other countries that are dangerous

[temporal1]

If the only measure is superficial quiet, then the world is all set. Sitting on a powder keg doesn’t matter.
Clearly, MANY world leaders live right there. They tend to shift with the winds for political expediency. Many love it!

Governments have secular responsibilities, some are better than others, most have periods that are better or worse.

From a Christian perspective, there is plentiful assurance life on earth will be tumultuous.
i’m grateful for the fair warnings. How much harder life would be if scriptures skipped over that part.

Luke 12:51
https://biblehub.com/luke/12-51.htm

50But I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is accomplished!

51Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth?
No, I tell you, but division.

52From now on, five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three.…

True, while simultaneously true that authentic faith and submission transcend earthly troubles in all circumstances.