The European parliment is making a bid to shut down its early warning systems for nuclear attack over Y2K. Think about this. Europe is saying that Y2K is a more important game than the "we are paranoid and can blow up the world game" or that it could significantly impact that game. In one sense it is not paramount whether they are correct or not. Just take a minute to realize that Europe is saying this is more important that defending their countries from unsuspected nuclear launch. While I don't have the link handy, John Hamre, assistant secretary of defense had previously stated that bad data was more a threat then screens going blank. Europe is taking a beautiful if risky stance here. They are saying, lets admit we have "blinders" on and just not blow each other up for one day. To rearrange Sen Bennet's wording they are more concerned with 'Y2K's effects causing a potential profound misunderstanding of ballistic missile systems' then having "a profound misunderstanding of Y2K's potential effects on ballistic missile systems." They are proposing the risk of leaving the early warning system operable is greater than shutting it down. Wow. I applaud their faith in humanity and will prey that it not be disappointed.

Europe Y2K nuclear weapon shutdown blasted By Reuters Special to CNET News.com November 19, 1999, 8:35 a.m. PT WASHINGTON--The chairman of a special Senate panel on the Year 2000 blasted as ill-informed a European Parliament call yesterday to shut down nuclear weapon alert systems over the New Year to avoid accidental launches.

"This vote is particularly troubling in that it demonstrates an overall lack of awareness with regard to Y2K's potential effects on a country's infrastructure," Sen. Robert Bennett, R-Utah, said in a statement.

He said the European move also showed "a profound misunderstanding of Y2K's potential effects on ballistic missile systems."

Deputies in Strasbourg voted to appeal to the United States and Russia in particular to guard against possible errors in computer systems that may not recognize the date change to 2000.

U.S. and Russian military officials are to spend New Year's Eve together in a special command center in Colorado Springs, Colo., to monitor launch data across the century date change.

Bennett--who was involved in setting up the U.S.-Russian Center for Year 2000 Strategic Stability--said shutting down missile warning systems would be "far more dangerous than any problem that may arise from Y2K."

"What the European Parliament is asking countries to do is wear blindfolds during the crucial date rollover," he said.

The so-called Y2K glitch could cause some computers and the systems they control to crash or malfunction when their internal clocks encounter "00" in areas that track dates.

Bennett said there was no danger of missiles being launched by a computer glitch because a person always is part of the command process.

"International cooperation and awareness are the keys to avoiding a Y2K catastrophe, not pulling the plug and hoping for the best," he said.

The European Parliament also voted to ask countries with nuclear power stations to shut them down over New Year's Eve unless they had been shown to be millennium compliant.

Deputies said their appeal would be aimed specifically at countries in central and Eastern Europe, Turkey, Russia and members of the former Soviet Union.

Story Copyright ) 1999 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.

-- PD (PaulDMaher@att.worldnet.com), November 20, 1999

Answers

I prefer to be less beautiful. I'll just be in the audience of this beauty pageant and marvel over the beauty of the UK, but it just isn't "Me" to be on that stage and compete.

-- Paula (chowbabe@pacbell.net), November 20, 1999.

---the europaeans, having real-time awareness of what the results of war are up close and personal have always been more concerned with the potentialities of war, either nuclear or otherwise. We don't have that as a society here, just in combat vet's memories from overseas.

They have always had more protesting, more public debate, and frankly, they are a lot more socialistic and appeasement oriented than I think the collective "we" are. "We" aren't as concerned. "We're" americans, bad stuff only happens to those weird foreign countries, remember? It sez so on the tv. And to their credit, I think they have a much clearer understanding of the big bears "launch on blindness" policy. We don't here, and it's my bet that 98 out of 100 US citizens do NOT know that it's our country's policy to accept the megatonnage impacts of a nuclear first strike before launching a single missile in retaliation. Now, it will most likely happen. That one single presedential directive convinced me beyond any doubt that the king is bought and paid for lock stock and barrel by the globalists. Before that, I just thought he was a greedy, meglomaniacal lying rapist. He has purposefully done every single thing possible to sabotage our country's defenses, give aid and comfort to the enemy, use his public position for personal gain, arranged for some of his biggest campaign contributors to transfer sensitive military secrets and hardware to china and russia, and allowed the money and commodities markets manipulators free reign in the long term goal of the stealing and transfer of masses of wealth to the same globalist/ international Konzerns. Frankly, the europeans are scared. They couldn't believe all of our fascination with oral sex and monica, and ignoring all the other scandals. And the threats. They want a little more realistic approach to some of the major possible impacts of y2k, and frankly, the bear launching because he's blind and xenophobic is certainly a valid threat. Don't blame them one bit. zog the warner

-- zog (zzoggy@yahoo.com), November 20, 1999.

PD, I got a little different take on it myself. Call my cynical but if you don't see a launch from Russia targeted at the U.S. you aint obligated to respond by no stinking treaty. If you don't respond maybe the Kremlin lets you keep running the show as a puppet government for a while. Instead of blowing your sorry ass to hell along with the Americans.

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), November 20, 1999.

Well crap, I aint stopping there. The level of sheer ignorance displayed here on this forum reguarding this subject is inexcuseable after we have covered it so many times. Zog has a clear understanding of what the situation really is. So do most Europeans. Unlike us they live right next door to this voracious psychopathic regime, they have a much better understanding of what world war really means when it is brought to you front door, not your television. So one more time kiddies, fingers out of ears, heads out of asses, this is the current situation.

Our current total nuclear deterrent consist of what? Well lets go down the list and have a look.

Land based ICBM minuteman missiles. Well no we can scratch those off, the impacts we will be verifying before retaliating will be on the silos that house them and Cheyenne mountain which coordinates them. Thanks Bill.

The Strategic Air commands B-52 B-1 and B2 bombers on 24 hour alert. Well no we did away with those too. the current number of strategic bombers armed with nuclear weapons on the flight line is ...ta da 0.0000000000000000000000000000 as in zero. It takes over 24 hours just to change out the bombracks to go from conventional weapons to the MK-5 gravity's or to load up the ta da, less than 50 nuclear cruise missiles we have left. (Those are really small warheads too ) Thanks Bill.

Well then our Nuclear sub fleet. How big you think this fleet is? Oh I don't know, 50 or 60 anyway. Nope, think smaller, much smaller. We have eighteen Trident class subs. At least four or five are down for refitt, refuel, etc at any given time. Four or five more are in the process of training crews and restocking provisions tied up in their ports. The eight or nine that are in operable condition are rotating duty on station. That means half of them are out and half of them are in port. So we got four tridents max at any given time at sea. That aint counting the ones that are scheduled to go out and develop problems. Half of the missiles have been removed from these subs and the MRV warheads have been cut down to one per missile by Uncle Bill in accordance with the Salt II treaty, which the Russians are totally ignoring by the way and we should be too as it has never been ratified. So we got four Tridents out there with the combined firepower of less than one fully loaded Trident. Russia has over 70 akula class hunter killer subs whose only mission in life is to keep track of these Tridents and take them out when ordered. The last current numbers I saw on their deployment was between 30 and 35 at sea. That's pretty near ten to one odds against our subs getting a single missile off. Then you got to take into account that Uncle Bill God love him, has removed the launch codes from the subs and the only way they can get them is via ELF radio broadcast after Bill waits and sees all our ICBM's, Strategic bombers,nuclear stockpiles, the pentagon, cheyenne mountain, the other Tridents, most of our aircraft carriers, most of our fighters, damn near all our tanks, and the 1000 or so largest cities go up in mushroom clouds along with----ta da, the 2 ELF antenna arrays which can relay those launch codes and authorization to fire. They won't be bored while they wait though, or maybe they will be, by an Akula nuclear tipped torpedo which will take out about fifteen square miles of ocean and everything in it. Did I mention that the new generation Russian subs are quieter than ours too?

If you think those Europeans are a little paranoid it's your mistake. If you think Russia is some backwater shithole that can't possibly be a threat to us from 3000 miles away yu are even more mistaken. With the invention of nuclear missiles fronts and rears and invasions and oceans all became obsolete. Distance is measured in seconds to impact, not miles. If you think the Russians couldn't do such a horrible thing, well I hope you're right. I damned sure aint betting on it though. The history of socialist and communist holocaust in this century should give you at least a little insight into the mindset of these regimes. I was watching some Russian soldiers being interviewed in Chechnyya a couple of days ago and one of them is laughing and stroking a twelve inch gleaming bowie knife across a wetrock. He pointed it at the camera and said "We're going to kill every one of them." Russias soldiers are just like that bowie knife, they have been honed for total warfare for over ten years now and they are going to go through Eastern Europe like a knife through hot butter. And those Eastern Europeans know it. The tiger is loose and he smells blood. Thanks Bill.

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), November 20, 1999.

The Europeans are often more humanistic in some cases. It disappoints me that the U.S. has not agreed to outlaw land mines or child soldiers.

-- Mara (MaraWayne@aol.com), November 20, 1999.

Who knows the political reasonings involved. The fact of its proposal takes Y2K out of the non-event, VCR problem arena into one of gravest concern for national ... defense, well-being, etc.

-- PD (PaulDMaher@att.worldnet.com), November 21, 1999.

Let me try that again, as I am still digesting this. How can Y2K be a "non-event" if it leads to the prosposal to shut down all of Europe's nuclear early warning systems? It doesn't matter whether they are technologically correct here or not. Nothing has ever led to the proposal to shut off all nuclear warning systems for Europe. What an insult to the party line of no major problems.

-- PD (PaulDMaher@att.worldnet.com), November 21, 1999.

How do they figure that turning them off is any less risky? They still have to turn them on again, and they could go off then.

Nikoli,

The Russians have a serious beef with the terrorists in Chechnya, they blew up some apartments killing hundreds of innocent Russian civilians. No matter how much you personally are afraid of the big bad Russsians, the fact remains that the United States has a VERY good relationship with them. I don't get it, I think you watched "Red Dawn" too many times or something.

Also, you said: "Russias soldiers are just like that bowie knife, they have been honed for total warfare for over ten years now and they are going to go through Eastern Europe like a knife through hot butter. And those Eastern Europeans know it. The tiger is loose and he smells blood. Thanks Bill."

Are you trying to say that the European Parliament is intentionally turning off their nuke systems, even though they know that they are going to get slaughtered, or that Clinton had something to do with this? I'm confused, please explain.

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), November 21, 1999.

Landmine treaty. Oh yes those great compassionate Europeans can afford to be so caring for humanity. They are not the ones with their kids facing 100's of thousands of troops of the psychotic leadership of North Korea. They are not the ones who would even take a stand on the slaughters occuring in their own back yard. Hell it was the peace loving Germans who sold Saddam the equipment to produce chemical weapons. It was those peace loving Swedes who sold the Russians the equipment that made their submarines quieter and more a risk to OUR boys under and over the ocean. Been there done that.

Lets give a group hug to those lovely Europeans. Hell they would probably sell the US down the river if there was a profit in it. Now during a period of potential instability the world has ever seen they drop their gaurd. Who gets to bail them out if there are problems?

This is the same crowd that brought us "peace in our time." Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy. Let's wish the world a nice place, then we can wish y2k as a BITR.

The Europeans will ask the former Soviet Union to shutdown their nuc plants. Some of these countries receive up to 80% of their electricity from these plants. Do you think they will shut them down in the cold of winter.

I am beginning to feel the US is being set-up, big time. The world has lost its collective mind!!!!

I am wishing so hard for nice. But let's send all of our Tridents to sea for the turn-over.

-- squid (Itsdarker@down.here), November 21, 1999.

Hawk, I thought Zog and I had made it pretty clear why Europe would want to shut off those warning systems. I'll try again though. Europe is not stupid. They know what the current US nuclear response policy and force deployment is. They realize full well just as I do, and anyone else would if they would bother to read the post that Russia has got us by the nuts if they decide to launch. They know we are going to be exterminated as a warmaking power on any level above small arms. They know their own piddling little nuclear weapons stockpiles aren't going to do any more than piss the Russians off if they try to defend an already decimated sugar daddy. What they are in effect doing is telling the Russians that they are staying out of the nuclear exchange and will accept Russian rule in the aftermath as client states, hoping those terms are acceptable to the Russians. There is no way in hell they can hold out against the 25,000 tanks and thousands of jet fighters the Russians will be able to mass against them for more than a few bloody days without our backup and they full well know it. Better to surrender now in the face of hopeless odds than have their populations go through what awaits us. Poke in the fork, we're done. After reading that article I raised my personal level of strike probability to over 50-50.

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), November 21, 1999.

Deactivating early warning systems reminds me of the "Hear no evil/See no evil/Speak no evil" monkeys. It provides no benefit and it actually increases the risk (origin of incoming can't be determined, therefore no shooter at risk of reply.)

-- Tom Carey (tomcarey@mindspring.com), November 21, 1999.

Wow. And I thought I had a vivid imagination! Jeeeesh, you think 17 NATO nations are going to simply let Russia walk in and take over? Wheeeeeew!! I don't know what to say, except that it must be terrible to live with that kind of fear.

How do you think Russia is going to explain it to their military officials that will be sitting in Cheyenne Mountain that they are going to have to nuke them? You think maybe they will just ask them to volunteer to commit suicide?

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), November 21, 1999.

Sure Hawk, we have a great relationship with Russia. Why they feel so close to us that they just stole $15 or $20 billion in aid money from us and laundered it through the Bank of NY. You are totally clueless about Russia, but hey, you are entitled to your opinion.

-- Nabi (nabi7@yahoo.com), November 21, 1999.

Uh, is the military in the habit of explaining orders when it gives them? Are you saying it isn't common practice to sacrafice a small band of soldiers to gain an advantage over an enemy? We based the entire Vietnam war on that principle. Do you really think they would tell this group that they were going to be killed in a nuclear attack so they could rat it out to us in advance to save their skins? If we're going to continue this conversation you're going to have to have to contribute a little more thought and lot less bluster.

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), November 21, 1999.

Exactly Tom. There is absolutely no logic which can justify such a proposal. They are sending a message, plain and simple, just like Uncle Bill did a couple of weeks ago when he announced we were removing all our remaining nuclear weapons from those same countries. Where is he now? Over there trying to figure out who's in and who's out. Andy said it best a couple of months ago. "Pay attention folks, cards are being played here." You know there is not a doubt in my mind any more that Bill Clinton and Hillary have been Russian agents all along, and have played the American people and the New world order against each other while setting us up.

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), November 21, 1999.

Oh, here comes good old Nabi of course, does your nose smell the word "nuclear" or what?

Well, since you went and started the name calling, I think I can safely say that you just demonstrated how much more infinitely "clueless" YOU are than I. If you really knew anything about what is going on in the World, you would have been able to put 2 and 2 together when you encountered "I.M.F." and "Bank of New York" involved in the same scandal. Also the actual figure I believe was closer to $10 billion. Nabi, I'd like to introduce you to the NEW WORLD ORDER, and I bet even Nikoli can confirm that. Why do you think the chief of the I.M.F. just resigned?

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), November 21, 1999.

Nikoli,

So you're saying that Russia is going to fry some of their highest ranking nuke commanders while they sit in Cheyenne Mountain? Excuse me, but I'm not buying it. I'm also having a hard time believing that 17 of the wealthiest, most developed, Nato member nations in the world are simply going to let the Russians take over. This is becoming increasingly more far-fetched as we go along.

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), November 21, 1999.

The New World Order is about 4 weeks from being extinct.

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), November 21, 1999.

I wish that were true, but you're not even close.

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), November 21, 1999.

Nikoli,

Let's try putting on our Russian thinking caps for a moment and pretend we are the big bad evil Russians. Now, you say that Europe is going to surrender to the Russians on New Year's Eve. Russian knows that if they nuke the United States to oblivion as you say that they are going to, it would render the continent worthless toast, they would get smothered in the fallout, and risk the chance that we will be able to counter them with enough nukes to at least hurt them pretty bad. So why wouldn't they just march into Europe and take over instead without having to use any nukes? They would hold the wealth and resources of the richest nations in the world, and they could economically starve the U.S. into dire straits. So what would be their motivation to attack the U.S. first, and risk killing themselves?

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), November 21, 1999.

I have been wanting to ask someone a question about nukes. Are y'all game? How accurate are the nuclear missiles that would be aimed at us? I live about 60 miles from an Air Force Base (B-1 Bomber base). I know this sounds bad but...I sure do hope that they can hit what they are aiming at and not accidentally land in my back yard. Of course, I guess that would have its advantages too. :-/ Thanks. I am having an insomniac moment and this is at least giving my brain something to do!

-- Sharon (Sking@drought-ridden.com), November 21, 1999.

I honestly don't know Sharon, but I'd guess they're pretty damn accurate. Nikoli seems to know exactly what is going to happen, so he can probably tell you where it will land to the nearest square meter. IMO this is all really just a case of bad science fiction.

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), November 21, 1999.

Good points Hawk.

PD,

Maybe the US and Eurpoean Parliament should have hired those genius Russian programmers and engineers for help in fixing the Y2K problems. From your scenario, the Wealthy Russians will be 100% while everyone else on earth is groping around in the dark.

In reality, isn't this backwards? Isn't it the U.S. who has Russians coming HERE because WE are "Good To Go" and they are NOT?

As long as nuclear weapons exist, we are in danger of being impacted by them. We're probably more vulnerable to being struck (by accident) by our OWN nuclear weapons stored here in the U.S. than any foreign nuclear weapons. Wouldn't that be a pisser? We erroneously bomb ourself then launch an all out exchange with everyone else.

Stranger things have happened.

-- GoldReal (GoldReal@aol.com), November 21, 1999.

Have any of you guys heard that the Russians are planning to fire missles into space and produce a fireworks display for the world's population? And that they were going to shower small gifts down upon the world is a show of generosity and brotherhood?

Have any of you guys heard af a Trojan horse? What a perfect way to fire missles w/o retaliation.

I read about this Russian plan of celebration only once about a week ago. Has anyone else

-- Bill Solorzano (notaclue@webtv.net), November 21, 1999.

Sharon, sorry it took so long to get back to you but I had to get some sleep. I would GUESS that the accuracy of our weapons and theirs is going to be pretty good on the whole. I know ours have a self destruct feature if they go wildly off course. Any engineer would have designed the missiles so that if they malfuntioned during boost phase the warheads would come back down inert, as a certain percentage are bound to do. You wouldn't want live warheads from your own missiles showering down all over your country, and a random explosion in the booster isn't going to set them off. Nuclear detonation requires a controlled precise implosion of the fissionable material to achieve critical mass and if it isn't perfect you get a fizz not a bang.

Hawk. NATO's deterrence against a Russian invasion of Europe has always relied on the nuke option to be sucessful. There was never even any assumption that they could be stopped with conventional weapons. The Europeans have little in the way of tactical nuclear weaponry such as artillery rounds and small gravity bombs to use in defence while the Russians have thousands of these. In a surprise attack the Russians would fire on the NATO bases in E.Europe at the same time they fire on us, along with the capital cities. That is what the Europeans are desperately afraid of. Not all NATO nations are nuclear powers either. If you paid attention during the recent Serbian conflict you would see who furnished 95% of the firepower, and it wasn't those 17 NATO nations, it was us. The Europeans have become so heavily socialized that they do not have the money to maintain their military's at anywhere near a capable level. In a nutshell their situation is hopeless without the threat of American ICBM's guarding them. Clinton's recent decision to remove our remaining nukes from Europe has taken their last safeguard.

Nuclear winter is a disproven theory, cooked up by a bunch of half ass scientist who were vehemently anti nuke. The reality is that most of the weapons will be airburst leaving little residual raiation and fallout. The Russians will have little concern over the destruction of our cities having much effect on them, and they can grow everything they need in France, Germany, and England. Moreover since the european nations have become so socialized it is a closer step politically for them to move into pure communism than it would be to return to pure capitalism. And Bill isn't the only one castrating defenses around here. Tony Blair removed the launch codes from Britains Two Tridents also. I hope if we get through this that the american people will finally wake up and realize the dangers of electing a Socialist President.

Bill, I have heard that rumor also, and I would guess it is just that. The Russians know full well that launching those missiles is going to light off the alert screens at Cheyenne Mountain like a Las Vegas Casino. If this were the case the current president of the United States would be obligated to tell them we would have no option but to fire on them if they proceeded. So if they in fact do have a plan to do this, and Bill Clinton doesn't take his obligatory action, you have absolute confirmation that he is in fact working hand in hand with the Russians and Chinese to destroy this country.

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), November 21, 1999.

Couldn't we be less paranoid about this and just assume for a moment that perhaps Europe is making a "peace offering" of sorts to Russia on this? that perhaps they are coming out and announcing that they will be shutting down their system and will not be launching any attacks, and why not do the same? that we all have too much else to worry about than misinterpreting bad info that leads us to belive there are incoming missles when there aren't any? That perhaps we can call a truce for a day? What if this is all there is to it??

-- farmer (hillsidefarm@drbs.com), November 21, 1999.

I believe there is also a biblical reference to this European surrender too. From Revalations. "A measure of wheat for a penny, and two measure's of barley for a penny. See you hurt not the oil and the wine." Loosley translated, don't cut off our juice and don't nuke France and we'll keep you fed.

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), November 21, 1999.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that the Russians ARE planning an attack, but it is also clear that our two countries are not the best of buddies. Their espionage is way up. They have LASEd our ships right off our own coast with impunity, inflicting blindiness on a sailor. Their rhetoric has become far more icy since the NATO Kosovo bombing and they are extremely paranoid about NATOs "post" Cold War role and their exclusion from it. They are warming up to China and agreeing in principle that the power of America and the West must be checked to reconfigure geopolitics from a uni-polar to a "multipolar" world order.

Many of their politicians and most of their military blame all of their current problems on the West...Which is of course ironic because what they asked for was a massive amount of money to do with as they pleased in the early 1990s. We offered to give it to them with stipulations. They refused. They still got smaller amounts but nonetheless can't see fit to blame their problems on their own kleptocracy instead of on the West. If you ask me, i suspect there is vast amounts of political power quietly changing hands there in Russia, with Yeltsin playing the idiot fool with senility (but, like the Roman emperor Claudius, is far far more crafty and mentally capable than people realize) in order to survive. The stage is set for what people have called the "Weimar Russia" scenario. Not good.

-- coprolith (coprolith@fakemail.com), November 21, 1999.

I've always believed that eventually man will play with his fire, no matter what, and that many many would be launched.

What if y2k halts or limits the ability for us or them to strike? If so, 100 years from now they will be rusted solid in the silos.

At this point in history, all groups are in damage-control. Russia or us for that matter, can barely control our own complex system of infrastructure. Would they really want to attempt control of the entire world and it's population? It's the ultimate catch-22 for all parties. Maybe y2k is the hope.

-- readyaimdud (gottashutdown@some.day), November 21, 1999.

Some thoughts on this from a nucleaphobic....Just finished reading General Lee Butler (former head of SAC-now Stratcom)'s report (Sept.1999) on the likelihood of accidental nuclear war. Both the US and Russia have,combined, over 7000 thermonuclear bombs on hair trigger alert. Each side is paranoid about the intentions of the other side. Chances of an accidental launch seem pretty high. That's the ONLY reason I can imagine the US letting observers from the Russian Rocket forces into our monitoring center........ As for turning off the warning systems in Europe, this makes little sense. It seems that they are more afraid of false information than no information.....There have been numerous "close calls" in the past ten years, caused by misperception and a very limited decision to launch time.Here's my questions to all of you concerned with the possibility of thermonuclear war..1) how can we even consider annihilating millions of people for....what, part of Korea? Or Kosovo? .2) If N-war comes, when do you think most likely? 3)We and the Russians have a defense system that will destroy the defenders themselves.... 4)is missile defense a possibility?

-- Royalle (duckncover@nuked.com), November 21, 1999.

Here's my $0.02 for what it is worth:

1. The European move is a bilateral offering - I'll stand down if you stand down. Russia's Perimeter defense is the most susceptible to accidental launch - if telecom with central control is lost a launch becomes more possible.

2. Russia, China, etc will be beset by their own Y2K problems which they may have difficulty handling effectively in short time without outside help, expertise and finance. This does not seem like the most likely time to initiate WW III. The US has "topped off" our overseas stocks of humanitarian supplies - where do you think the greatest need will be?

-- Bill P (porterwn@one.net), November 21, 1999.

I think that some of you might have overlooked the possibility of nuclear blackmail. Is it necessary to launch, or is it just necessary to demonstrate we've got you by the short hairs? Nuclear blackmail is going to require the moving of various pieces on the chessboard - and this is already well underway.

It's nearly checkmate time, but that doesn't mean that a launch will actually occur. I think that it's all the more likely for either a limited launch or no launch - but capitualization by our resident agent provocuteur, Bill. Exactly how would this take place? I don't know, only play chess a little, but keep in mind that there is DEFINITELY and end game being played here and it ought not be ignored. Wishfully hoping that our neigbors in Russia, China or North Korea "will do the right thing" is myoptic at best. Destroying the United States need not be performed with bombs. Actually, Bill and company have done a very fine job of it already. Why not waltz in and spoil the goods without having to worry about radiation and fallout?

-- asdf (lifeofliberty@yahoo.com), November 21, 1999.

Have you ever had to deal with a person who had evil intentions and motives? I have. First, it is not 'rational'. Second, the lies are so thick that they themselves hardly know the truth. Third, they are often paranoid because of projection. They operate under the assumption that others have the same evil intentions and plans.

I am not saying that a 'Russian', in general, is evil. I am referring to an empire that places top priority on warfare and power. When I read the argument that Russia will not attack because it will have its hands full with Y2K, I have to apply the above. This means that Russia will view itself as VULNERABLE. If America was going to be in very bad shape, and they had the upper hand, do you think they would send money and food our way?

You can laugh now.

No, they would take full advantage of our vulnerability. Therefore, Russia will probably assume that we would do the same. The only 'rational' answer to Russia will be to prevent that with a crippling strike.

-- Mumsie (shezdremn@aol.com), November 21, 1999.

Lots of sound and fury, but still no link to the original story. Probably best to verify it before discussing it as though it's real.

-- Colin MacDonald (roborogerborg@yahoo.com), November 22, 1999.

Agreed, Colin. Here's the url:

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/19991118/tc/nuclear_usa_1.html

I've been link-impaired, but I'll try this.

-- harl (harlanquin@aol.hell), November 24, 1999.

This, instead. Sheesh.

-- harl (harlanquin@aol.hell), November 24, 1999.