I raised a family of four kids on moose and elk, their diet was supplemented from a Peace River garden and a pig or two every year with milk and cream from half wild range cows. My children all enjoyed the lifestyle; however, they now all live a comfortable life in the city. They want me to retire in the mountains, so that I can expose my grandchildren to the same childhood they enjoyed as my ‘bush bunnies’. Of course a lot depends on what Mr. Obama does with the economy and indirectly with my retirement investments. I had hoped to be retired by now; those dreams have been washed away like Obama’s campaign confetti and lies.
None the less, my son has asked me to write this story. He remembers it quite well, for when your dad comes home one night visibly shaken, it makes a strong impression on an impressionable wee lad who thought of his dad as a typical character portrayed by John Wayne in a movie.
Although, he once rode the big jumpers in North America and Europe, he now says that he will never ride a horse again unless it is with his dad in the mountains with big saddles and big hats: it is nice to be a hero to someone in this life, even if it is only your son.
It was nearly dark, I had finished work early and grabbed my 8mm X 06 rifle to head out to one of the two moose licks on my ranch. A moose lick is actually an artesian spring that flows up through mineral enriched mud that animals crave. I have watched moose eat twenty to thirty pounds of colored mud that is washed out of the springs as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
I had a little tree stand, about 20 feet high, built between two poplars that were three feet apart. Constructed out of 2 x 4’s, the first rung of the ladder was six foot off the ground, just in case kids ever wandered by and wanted to climb up the ladder, that wasn’t likely; but you should always be careful. At the top there was a plywood seat across two boards, it was just the bare minimum; however, I loved to watch the moose come in during the rut and fight for the rights to breed.
Like humans, there were several different personalities, most just fought head to head in desperate battles, others would lurk in the trees until two bulls were tied up in desperate battle and charge out of the trees to gore one of the bulls in the ribs, inflicting serious damage. It was great fun to watch in the evening if the moon and stars were out to provide enough light to see.
I had about a mile and a half run to get to the lick before dark, for on this night, I wouldn’t be there to watch: I was going to secure meat for the freezer, meat that would feed my family for the next year.
When I was within 200 meters, I slowed to a slow walk; yet, I was still trying to make time to get to my stand before dark and I was fast losing my daylight. I was within 60 meters of my stand, when I heard a moose leaving the lick at a leisurely pace. I cursed my clumsiness for spooking the moose and quickly called out with the challenge grunt of a 2 or 3 year old moose. Seconds later, I heard the answer to my challenge: it had the noise and intensity of a gravel truck rolling over on the highway. I have never been to Africa, but I have been to the zoo and when the Lions begin to roar at feeding time, you can feel your heart vibrating in your chest, that is what I was feeling as the enraged bull continued to roar and started his return trip towards me. I looked out in front and a six foot swath of twenty foot poplars were being mowed down as if there was some powerful machine out there in front of me and it was getting closer by the second, this was the length of his antlers, he had his head down and was on a desperate charge for murder and mayhem. I eased back the bolt to make sure I had a live round in the chamber, I’ve made that mistake before; but I didn’t want to make the same mistake again, not when one of us is about to die in the next few seconds.
Yes, there was a round in the chamber, primed and ready to leave the barrel at 2200 feet per second. I brought the stock to my shoulder and waited for this giant to break cover about 30 meters in front of me as he continued to roar. Then he started to veer to my left, my rifle followed the sound and suddenly, I realized I was aiming into a stand of Jack Pine with its characteristic black bark and I couldn’t even see my front sight, my light was gone and to survive this charge I would need to make a killing shot in less than a second on an animal weighing over a ton traveling towards me at over 40 miles an hour, in the dark with iron sights.
I decided to head to my tree stand, I covered that ground in nothing flat and made it to the top one handed (with my rifle in my right hand); wondering how I made the climb, only after I was seated on my plywood. The bull broke cover and was down below venting his rage at the human who challenged him as a young bull, he was mad and was beating up on trees down below. It would have been an easy shot, but the night sky offered no light and I sat in total blackness awaiting either a little light or for my macho friend to go somewhere else with his machismo.
Eventually, things quieted down or at least my new friend had quieted down and I wondered if I might climb down and go home for dinner, I certainly wouldn’t want to leave before my friend and end up crushed while the moose greased that massive rack of antlers with me against a tree. So I sat there fighting the numb butt syndrome, suddenly a spruce tree next to me began to move back and forth, I had felt an earth quake once before that had originated in Alaska and I figured that we had one happening now. I grabbed hold of the poplar tree to my right and watched as the spruce tree was uprooted and fell in front of me.
This was no earth quake, my antlered friend down below, took advantage of the spruce tree’s low branches and hooked his antlers under them and pulled the tree out of the ground in the hope of having a serious discussion with me. Thank goodness poplars don’t have that type branches; of course, he could have rammed the trees and thrown me out easier than a squirrel; but that didn’t enter into his thought processes and I wasn‘t planning on enticing him.
Several hours later, I climbed down and moved as silently as possible through the black night towards home and dinner, a much more humble man. My wife was disgusted that I was so late without any tasty morsels for a quick meal, my kids were shocked to see my hands weren’t steady. They still recall that night when I finally came home.
The next day I was listening to Paul Harvey’s show on my truck radio. In the Big Horn Mountains, up above Big Horn, Wyoming. A man’s remains had been found the previous day after being missing for 20 years. He was beneath the skeleton of a bull moose and he had a spent cartridge in his rifle.
It is one thing to be brave and foolhardy with your own life; however, those kids needed me at that time. I should have carried a good light with me and I should have headed for the tree stand as soon as I challenged the bull. Challenging a bull moose in thick brush is a stupid thing to do, unless you have an edge: I was lucky to be alive.
Although, I had worked as a hunting guide for many elk, moose and Grizzly, I was overconfident in my ability as a hunter. It is the nature of hubris, that it will catch up with you; if you are lucky, it will be a learning experience: if you are unlucky, you will be dead.
President Obama is now playing with our lives as carelessly as I played with my children’s future. Instead of facing up to a rampaging moose, he is tempting a far more dangerous animal, the human fanatic. By declaring that America wont respond to a chemical or biological attack with a nuclear response, he has given the green light for a rogue nation, of which there are several, to attack with nuclear or biological weapons and to attack with impunity, especially if our military is occupied on the other side of the world.
The threat of nuclear attack kept the Soviet Union and China at arm’s reach during events like the Cuban missile crisis when the nitwit Castro volunteered to Khrushev to start a nuclear war. Like it or not, our weapons have been a deterrent and now our president has decided that we no longer need our nuclear arsenal and seems to be intent on disarming our country incrementally.
This not a lone man standing up to an enraged moose, this time it is an entire nation that is being stood up against enraged nations, North Korea and the soon to be nuclear Iran are the first two that come to mind. Now we have become the insignificant pawns in Obama’s efforts to change the world, if our enemies see Obama’s entreaties as a foolish weakness that serves only to embolden them and weaken our allies, we will be the ones who pay for his hubris, incompetence, and braggadocio. Surely, even a Progressive Socialist Congress will see the sacrificial nature of Obama’s latest disastrous adventure into the realm of foreign policy. The Malignant Narcissus should only be given enough power to destroy himself and the Democrat Party, to be allowed to destroy the entire country because of his arrogance, insecurities, and personality disorders is going beyond the public’s indulgence of an incompetent.
Obama’s propensity for being a pathological liar and Malignant Narcissist are not only obvious to us; but to the community of nations as well. Dismissing his minimal intellect and accomplishments with the ‘I Won’ syndrome and attacking detractors as partisans who are plagued with ignorance and racism, he pushes forward with his sophomoric demeanor that fools only those who want to be fooled and certainly not our enemies. The inability to feel empathy with the American voter is a symptom of the Malignant Narcissist and is partially responsible for his ‘cool’ demeanor while his presidency is losing its mandate among the frustration and anger of a disenfranchised voting public. Rather than empathy, Obama becomes angry at the public’s impudence at failing to recognize his superior position in life, another symptom of the Pathological Narcissist. If he loses his ability to control those around him, he strikes out, using the race card as a last resort, he fights to maintain his control. Narcissistic control of a population is much easier for a president who maintains control with either love or fear; but when it comes to nations who have the personality of an enraged moose, the Narcissist loses his ability to intimidate and control.
A professional horseman for over 50 years, Skook continues to work with horses. Skook has finished an historical novel, Fifty Thousand Years, that traces a mitochondrial line of DNA from 50,000 years ago to the present. The story follows a line of courageous women, from the Ice Ages to the present, as they meet the challenges of survival with grit and creativity. These are not women who whimper of being victims, they meet the challenges of survival as women who use their abilities without excuses or remorse, these women are winners, they are our ancestors.
Fifty Thousand Years is available in paperback and e-book, it is getting great reviews. You can purchase a copy here; Visit me on Facebook.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Dylantheauthor
Love that last paragraph!
Great story with a message, Skookum. Thanks.
Thanks guys, I forgot a line that puts things in perspective, (I always forget something). If you talk to one of the old bush apes, a person like myself with slightly loner arms, he will invariably tell you he would rather face a charging Grizzly than a charging bull moose in the rut. The killing shot doesn’t work so well when the moose has blood in their eye (literally) and they are ready to kill. In other words they continue to charge even if they have a round through the heart. Sounds impossible, but that is an awesome animal. They stand 6 foot 6 at the withers or the top of the shoulder and weigh over a ton, they can run as fast as a race horse (45 mph) over uneven ground and fallen timber with a stride as smooth as a sewing machine. It is a different feeling when they are headed right at you and your target is the size of a large grapefruit.
I like your story. But as an analogy, it would work better if we were, say, Finland circa 1939, with Soviet Russia as the bull moose.
As regards deterrence, I don’t agree at all. Our nuclear weapons are necessary to deter attacks from opponents who could destroy or cripple us or our allies, meaning nuclear powers and/or the old Soviet Union’s conventional arms in Europe. Deterring attacks that are horrifying, but too small in scale to have any impact on our own ability to make war, only requires making it clear that we can’t be influenced by that kind of intimidation (preferably, too, that we will kill the responsible parties, but that is actually less necessary than making the attacks useless).
And I think we’ve done a pretty good job of that over the past two hundred years; no one who looks are our response to the Alamo, or Pearl Harbor, or 9/11 would conclude that we’re going to fold up like a paper cup in response to some deed of terror. Which is one of the reasons we don’t actually get messed with much (our border security being the other, though I believe they are mostly effective against amateur fanatics and stateless actors). It probably wouldn’t be technically that difficult for Iran or for that matter China to smuggle in some chemical or biological weapons, and kill American civilians with a terrorist attack, but unless their goal was to start a war they couldn’t win, what would be the point? They know we wouldn’t accede to anything.
So I don’t think we give up much by taking the use of nuclear weapons in response to non-nuclear attacks off the table. It’s fair to ask whether we gain anything of value (is there such a thing as international goodwill? Does it even exist?), but we haven’t given up anything of value either.
As regard the reduction of arsenals, I can’t see that as a big deal either. We still have enough; seems like a cost savings. I regard the idea of complete nuclear disarmament as stupid and unrealistic, but various presidents since at least Carter (including Reagan) have paid lip service to the idea of a world without nuclear weapons; I’m not going to fault Obama if he wants to just run his mouth about that, so long as he doesn’t start talking about unilateral moves.
@bbartlog, I am glad you liked the story. I have many outdoor stories; but it is difficult to portray them as a contemporary political analogy. I appreciate your comment. There are others on this blog with a far greater understanding of our potential threats than me; however, I have read and appreciate the fact that nuclear, biological, and chemical attacks can be launched off our shores by ‘benign looking’ cargo ships, in other words, a freighter from a foreign power can have more destructive power than a foreign warship. That was the reason I used the missile picture from a fairly simple deck, so there is the potential for a much larger attack.
How would we respond from such an attack? Blow an unmarked ship out of the water after a series of nuclear warheads are unleashed, perhaps a simultaneous attack from several ships and be left wondering who is responsible for the attacks?
Strength is a deterrent: weakness has never been a deterrent. We have several rogue nations and Iran is about to become a nuclear power, Iran has flaunted their willingness to unleash their nuclear capability against Israel and I doubt that they will have inhibitions about turning their arsenal against the US. In either case, I must ask, is this a time to be scaling back and adopting a defensive posture of less is good enough? We are not dealing with rational people in many of these countries, Soviet Leaders wanted to avoid nuclear war at all cost, I don’t believe that our current group of madmen are all that anxious to avoid confrontation, especially with the apparent spinelessness of our current administration.
I am sure that some of former and present military people can explain the potential threat and options available to the enemy with more authority than me; hopefully, one of them will apprise us of the enemy’s potential.
From Reuters today @ drudge
MILITARY WARNING
While dismissing the sanctions threat, Iran has also warned against any military steps against its nuclear program.
After several warnings that it would hit back at Israel if attacked from there, Iran’s military chief said Thursday he would target U.S. forces stationed in the Middle East if Washington attacked.
“If America presents Iran with a serious threat and undertakes any measure against Iran, none of the American soldiers who are currently in the region would go back to America alive,” Major General Hassan Firouzabadi, was quoted as saying by the semi-official Fars news agency.
U.S. troops are engaged in Iraq and Afghanistan, both of which border Iran.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of a military ceremony, Firouzabadi said a strike on Iran would also put oil supplies at risk.
“If America wants to have the region’s oil and its markets then the region’s markets would be taken away from America and the Muslims’ control over oil would increase,” he said, according to state broadcaster IRIB.
Iran has flaunted their willingness to unleash their nuclear capability against Israel
They (meaning mostly the blowhard Ahmadinejad) have talked all sorts of sh*t. Back in the day, both Stalin and Mao claimed to be willing to absorb a nuclear strike (Stalin: ‘nuclear weapons are something to frighten those people with weak minds’. Mao, concerning a nuclear attack: ‘all it is, is a big pile of corpses’.). Unsurprisingly, they didn’t follow through.
is this a time to be scaling back and adopting a defensive posture of less is good enough
Well, it depends – *is* less good enough? I always thought the Chinese were pretty sensible about nukes: they built enough so that we wouldn’t be willing to undertake a nuclear war with them, and called that enough. We ended up needing more so that the Soviets couldn’t dream of crippling us with a first strike, but do we still need them?
We are not dealing with rational people in many of these countries[…] I don’t believe that our current group of madmen are all that anxious to avoid confrontation
There’s a whole range of rationality, from Spock to the gibbering homeless schizophrenic guy. My problem with this line of argument is that it assumes a peculiarly specific kind of crazy, where enemies who have so far been careful not to push things too far are assumed to now be scheming to start an apocalyptic war. Iran, for example: if they were really so heedless of their own destruction, they could start something anytime they wanted, either by sending troops openly into Iraq or blasting ships in the strait of Hormuz. But they don’t; even though they have engaged in provocations they’re quite careful not to push it too far. They want nukes in order to change the balance of power in the Middle East, not so that they can achieve martyrdom by vaporization (they already have that opportunity and seem to be taking a pass).
Kim Jong Il may be crazier (though again I notice he hasn’t actually started a war). But then we have to ask ourselves, if he’s *that* crazy, will our nuclear threat actually deter him? If we’re discussing people who absolutely can’t be deterred, then we should talk about monitoring, security, and preemptive strikes(*), not nuclear threats that will fall on deaf ears.
I am sure that some of former and present military people can explain the potential threat and options available to the enemy with more authority than me
There are a lot of things that enemies could do, in theory. But the nature of their WMD is not that important to the deterrence argument; we assume they can do something awful, but that they can’t simply destroy us and our ability to strike back. There’s a good quote from Reagan in the other thread on this topic, about making the cost to our enemies greater than any potential gains. I think it’s important to focus on the second part of that equation: make it crystal clear that no one, anywhere, can gain any concession by striking us. Then you don’t need to threaten to destroy whole cities to stop people from attacking.
(*) – to be clear, I don’t favor preemptive strikes in our current situation – but in the context of a genuine madman they would make more sense than futile deterrence.
If you’re still a hero to your children at your age, Skookum, you’re a real hero! I’m hoping my son someday thinks I’m something other than a Republican (which I’m not). 😉
By openly stating the circumstances under which the United States would resort to a preemptive nuclear first-stike, the Bush administration essentially announced to terrorists what button they needed to push to precipitate nuclear warfare.
I recall exactly what I thought at the time: We’ve got to be out of our freaking minds.
WOW SKOOKUM that was scary i was in a hurry to see the end ,,vrey good analogy of the way the country is going with obama ,,bye 🙄
@Patter
I will respond to the other comments after a little thought; but to my friend Patter, I’d like to say, thank you, for the kind words. I talked to my son on the phone the other day and he asked me to write this story so that he could show his friends. I had no idea of how to use it until the nuclear disarmament and deployment policy came up; consequently, I tried to squeeze a semblance of a relationship between the two.
I also find it hard to believe that I can be a hero to a young man who is almost thirty: I am certainly not a hero to myself. I think it has something to do with reading them stories, telling them bedtime stories, showing them tracks and animal signs, living up to the principles you expect of them, never raising your voice in anger and never using your hand in punishment. I was pretty effective with a cold stare and the pointing finger.
For you young people out there, this is probably the best advice I have, I hope you can use it with your own children. It worked well enough for me, I am expected to educate my grandchildren with the same techniques, a chore I look forward to and hope to take on in the next year or so, that is if the creeks of debt don’t overflow their banks
Bees, from my perspective, the walk home in the pitch dark was the worst part. I lost the trail and I was making way too much noise trying to get through the brush; at any moment, I fully expected to have a ton of enraged muscle and bone slamming into me and destroying my body. With no stars or moon visible, I was traveling by dead reckoning, a process that sometimes works and sometimes doesn’t. The animals can see in the dark and they can move like ghosts. It was a humbling experience and a long slow walk home. The helplessness that you feel is indescribable; you are totally at the mercy of nature, whether you live or die is out of your hands.
Greg & bbartlog: I think we all agree that the nuclear arsenal prevented a confrontation with China or Russia during the Cold War: whether it would have been a conventional war or a nuclear war, in retrospect, it didn’t happen.
We now face an enemy in Iran who is hoping a guy will crawl out of a well and bring eternal Islamic Bliss to mankind; that is the nature of their religion and we are a people who like the idea of religious freedom, except this guy is supposed to arise during an Armageddon. Frankly, there are many of us who believe Iran’s Leader is more than anxious to start the dance as soon as he has an arsenal.
Will we stop or intimidate him with a huge arsenal, probably not, this just causes a greater potential for the fulfillment of the radical Muslim prophecy. The famous ‘Is’ word comes up, is it better to have the arsenal and never use it or is it better to need the power and not have the arsenal?
We all assume chemical or biological attacks are of limited capacity like the few that have been triggered thus far, yet launching missiles from ships can increase the threat exponentially to the point that 9/11 might look like a minor incident. If the damage sustained b such an attack were a hundred or a thousand times greater, at what point would you or President Obama consider a nuclear response? Suppose the damage was ten thousand times worse?
UN sanctions become laughable at a certain point, before 9/11 we would have considered it impossible to sustain the damage that happened on that day. We are not invincible, I argue that reducing our arsenal makes us more vulnerable. We should all give thanks that these homicidal maniacs, who just happen to all be Muslim, are not as well trained as our military and especially our special forces or the Hell that could be unleashed on our country in a matter of minutes with unconventional weapons would be unimaginable.
By openly stating the circumstances under which the United States would resort to a preemptive nuclear first-stike, the Bush administration essentially announced to terrorists what button they needed to push to precipitate nuclear warfare.
When did this happen? Got a quote? I’m pretty sure that from Nixon ’til now (when we’ve clarified things a little by backing away from a nuclear response to chemical and bio weapons), the strategy has been one of deliberate ambiguity as to exactly what circumstances might cause us to drop a nuclear weapon on someone. I might add that even if someone did (stupidly) draft a US policy saying ‘under exactly these conditions, we will use nuclear weapons’, the functional reality would be far more complicated. There are plenty of things to slam Bush about without just making stuff up.
yet launching missiles from ships can increase the threat exponentially to the point that 9/11 might look like a minor incident.
This frankly strikes me as sufficiently unrealistic that I would as soon worry about the North Koreans developing previously-unknown energy weapons. The Iranian navy does not patrol the globe. They have a few ships over a thousand tons displacement, which we could follow closely if they decided to ply the Atlantic Ocean. On top of them somehow evading our defenses, you envision successful deployment, from a smallish warship or three, of chemical-weapon warheads that would then kill a hundred or a thousand times as many Americans as died on 9/11. All to accomplish nothing, strategically (unless you count starting a war of with the US, which as noted they can already do right close to home). Bioweapons *could* be more dangerous, if something contagious like smallpox were used, but as far as is known the Iranians have no such program. And again, strategically useless except as a deterrent, and for that you have to tell people you have it.
The military warning from the Iranians, that you post above, does nothing to suggest that they’re crazy; it’s basically a declaration that they will retaliate if bombed, which is not very bellicose and is about what you’d expect from anyone.
there are many of us who believe Iran’s Leader is more than anxious to start the dance as soon as he has an arsenal
But why would they *just* be after some nukes, if they were preparing for Armaggedon? They spend 2.5% of their GDP on their military. That isn’t the hallmark of a country that’s militarily gearing up for the end of the world. It makes a lot more sense to assume that they’re trying to get nukes to improve their bargaining position in the Middle East.
Dear Bloggers;
I am not a specialist on nuclear weapons, I am, however, a nuclear engineer. My specialty was in the commercial and military use of nuclear power for propulsion of submarines and for electric power. My feelings on this aspect of Obama’s policy is . . . about 50/50 . . . I think he may have made a strategic error in his decision to announce to our adversaries that the US would no longer agressively use the policy of nuclear deterrence . . . to me that is the same as a poker player not using his “bluff” tactics . . . for certainly nuclear deterrence is just that . . . bluff, nothing but absolutely a blank face, un-readable, and non-agressive. So basically, Obama took off the sunglasses . . . and said look in my eyes . . . what you see is what you get. The fear, and a credible one, is that the US may now have our bluff called. There is a price to pay if our bluff is called . . . but I will also say . . . if such happened the horror is something none can appreciate.
In 1973, Yom Kippur . . . I was aboard the USS Daniel Boone SSBN-629 (Blue) . . . we were raised to condition 1SQ . . . that is “All Missles Spun-Up and ready for Launch” . . . this IS NOT A DRILL, the “Red Pistol” grips were in-hand and all we waited for was the “Final Launch” order. Yes, we would have done our duty . . . in so doing . . . I would have cooperated, willingly, in killing millions of people . . . including . . . my wife and children . . . the retalitory strike would have most certainly been to take out Charleston, SC . . . home of many of the nuclear boats on the US East Coast.
Obviously, no nuclear weapons were launched . . . we are all here to talk about it today. The most significant thing about this whole senario is that . . . what most people think . . . it just ain’t true. Nuclear weapons are the Aces in the Flopping of you hand . . . Flopping the Aces . . . is the “Sucide Jack” and the Jacks win . . . the only time the Jack will trump the Ace.
So whay is my feeling only 50/50 . . . there is a technology issue. The last US “actual” nuclear testing occurred in 1992 . . . so first the weapons we have are maybe getting old . . . considerations of getting old have much more implication than just with “technology” . . . there are nuclear physics aspects of the current weapons inventory that figure very much into these considerations. Nuclear half-lifes of the materials are very significant . . . sure we have a weapon . . . but now it might not be an Ace . . . only a King . . . or at worst a total dude. The next generation of replacement weapons, improvements in technology, the re-engineering and construction of production facilities . . . the cost . . . not in BILLIONS . . . but TRILLIONS of dollars. Maybe this reason alone is sufficient to try to cool the situation . . .
So the posture of our stratigists, although, to revealing for my comfort . . . was indeed only posturing . . . the poker face . . . but the result may belie the actual.
So take your choice . . . Lets be a bunch of poker players . . . or . . . by God Flop the Aces!!!
I edited out a word . . . that felt inappropriate . . . for the stress of realizing that you are on-board a weapons platform that carries more fire-power than all the explosives of World War II . . . does have a tendency to make a person a little . . . different (LOL).
TALLGRASS i have a problem understanding ,,,why aiming CHARLESTON,,,,was it because of RUSSIA IN CUBA?
Admittedly the document linked below references that policy of deliberate ambiguity very specifically on page viii. It also lists what I interpret as implied first-use scenarios, and repeats a number of times that the use of nukes isn’t unlawful.
Perhaps my interpretation of what it all actually means involves some extrapolation, based on how I understood the so-called “Bush doctrine”.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/policy/dod/jp3_12fc2.pdf
Tallgrass, your input is a very sobering influence.
Perhaps you can tell us if a cargo ship or an oil freighter could be transformed to covertly carry nuclear weapons. bbartlog thought I was in reference to naval war ships; actually, I was considering a much cheaper alternative, one that doesn’t include a Navy or submarines.
Thank you for your input, I was on the edge of my seat for a few seconds. I think you had better straighten things out with Bees.
Bees;
Charleston, SC “was” one of the homeports out of which nuclear powered submarines were stationed. Submarine Flotilla Six headquarters were there until the mid-1980’s when a new base at Kings Bay, GA was built and the boats were moved there. Originally, all the missle boats that were homeported on the eastern US coast were forward based out of Holy Loch, Scotland or Rota, Spain. This forward base concept was required for two reasons, the long distances the boats had to travel to get from their homeports to patrol locations in the Med or Arctic Oceans (lots of hours at high power operation on the reactor plants) and due to the range of the missiles being to short to hit the required targets in the Soviet Bloc countries. In the late 1970’s a missile capable of hitting the targets was produced, so having the boats foward based no longer was required as the range was sufficient to hit any location on earth from homeports in the US. So all the boats were brought back to the US. Charleston was also a major US Military Base, there was two naval bases and an air force base there, so it was a principal target for any counter strike. So if any US nuclear strike had been initiated the Soviet counter strike would have been to take out the bases in the US. My family was in Charleston.
Skook
As far as conversion of a cargo ship to a launch platform . . . why bother with a launch of a missile . . . hide the weapon on board the ship . . . bring it into port . . . all the major coastal cities in the US are vulnerable targets. A very low percentage chance that the weapon would be found and if hidden on the ship the chances of find it would be reduced even more. Most of the containerized cargo ships that come into the US are not inspected to a degree that would find a well hidden device, be it nuclear, chemical or biological.
Once the ship is docked or anchored initiation of the device would totally obliterate the ship with absolutely no influence on the damage caused the device. Would essentially be like setting off a stick of dynamite in a sardine can.
Keep in mind that the Strategic weapons the US builds will fit in a large suitcase and can be carried around by a person and not look to very conspicuous doing so. The delivery vehicle, the missile, is many, many times larger than the weapon it carries. Is anything of this size available to the third world? . . . probably not . . . first generation devices built by every nuclear capable country have always been large bulky devices based principally on the early US technology out of the WWII Manhattan Project.
A book, “Making of the Atomic Bomb” by Richard Rhodes . . . see this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Rhodes . . . provides a reasonably understandable description of the devices produced by the US during WWII. This book is readily available for 5 to 15 dollars on the used book market. This book is a Pulitzer Prize winner for Rhodes. This book contains the “Los Alamos Primer” a document used to train the new arrival scientists and engineers that were reporting to Los Alamos during the war.
TALLGRASS i see your point now,,i can understand the anxiety on your men on that moment time of decision,something so deep in your soul to never forget,while the civiliens where living on their unimportant every day routines making it the ultimate goal of life,,bye 🙄
In further consideration of adapting a merchant ship to carry a launchable weapon . . . I am sure that would be possible . . . even construction of a large container to house a launchable device is feasible. The chances of that modification being done clandestinly, without discovery is questionable . . . ships that are in major yards all over the world are monitorable by satelite and any activities carried out to make the modifications would probably be reported by some intelligence network somewhere, so the modification activies if conducted in a shipyard would most like be discovered. That is not to say that facilities do not exist somewhere that would allow the modifications to be made, just the likelyhood of discovery is very high. Considering the satelite technology of today . . . any ship carrying a visible weapon . .. would most certainly be discovered during transite to the US.
Consider that one of the current posibilities is to equip cargo ships and tankers that are moving through the middle east, especially those passing through the current areas of high pirate activity with “containerized protection” . . . a specially designed weapons module that would be manned by “contract” or “mercenarie” personnel. A “deterrent” consideration.
Strange as it may seem, I think that if there was a terriorist nation or organization that seriously wanted to attack the US with CHEMICAL OR BIOLOGICAL agents they would have already done so. Even strangeer is the consideration that they MIGHT of already done so, just “massive” effects were not achieved. Consider also that a truly diabolical war plan is not to “exterminate” the front line troops . . . only to cause sufficient damage that those in the support structure behind the lines can no longer accomplish the need support.
Thus in an “Economical War” or “Religious War” where no actual direct hostile actions occur, the damage is done by impacts on a broad basis and the desire may not be to kill the enemy as much as it is to disable them to the point that subversive invasion or take over is possible. So why kill the population, or excite a population to the point that they will come kill you, when it works better just to take over slowly through distruction of the enemies culture to the point that they can not maintain their cultural values and identity. Which is surely underway right NOW.
If the population under attack is sick and does not feel well they will have no resistance to invasion . . . and that invasion can be conducted on a very slow basis . . . the exact opposite of “blitzkrieg” we might call it . . . “klatternkrieg” (creeping war).
We grew up fearing “the look.” At my father’s funeral my aunt, his sister, sat behind my daughter. Later that afternoon she told me that when my grandson got a bit antsy, he got “the look” from my daughter and settled down immediately, she found it humorous, kind of a diversion at a sad, somber time. That look was the same she and my father grew up with and it’s success has lasted generations. My great-grandson is giving me “the look” right back, so far I find that humorous. He’s well on his way to become a very good boy, so I think I can let him get away with it for awhile.
My fear is by announcing to the world that we will not be using a nuclear response to a chem or bio attack, what’s to stop Syria, with Iran’s backing, to quietly encourage an attack of some sort relieved that they will not be wiped off the face of the earth. They have a host of little terrorist buddies and possibly a pile of Saddam’s weapons. If it gets tracked back to them, they have Iran to back them up as well as Hezbollah and Hamas already spread all over. Israel better be on alert, they along with our diminishing troops in the ME will be the first to be attacked if and when Obama decides to respond.
Hopefully the 67 votes needed to ratify will take that off the table. We know that what Russia is negotiating away are aged weapons they probably would have dismantled anyway, and as Tallgrass mentioned, we need to upgrade ours. That should be done before we do away with anything. Tell Russia we will do away with the same quality of weapon that they are ridding themselves of.
There seems to be information for the public that is disseminated primarily for effect (Oh no! not Obama!) and the more likely scenario: that we have obsolete weapons that are past their date of reliability, it is expensive to replace them and rather than replacing them(especially in this economy, if Obama is capable of making rational decisions that curb spending), we are reducing our arsenal in a cost effective manner that maximizes the political effect. A move that is economically sound and politically expedient for placating the Pacifist Left.
Biological, chemical, and unconventional nuclear delivery will probably leave no evidence as to who initiated the attack: claiming a reluctance to respond with a nuclear attack is probably nothing more than political posturing, because of this simple reason; however, it is posturing that leaves Obama with an appearance of being weak or naive as Ahmadinnijad has already boasted.
The key phrase is ‘for political effect’, for while Obama is hoping to soothe the frustrations of the Far Left and make entreaties of Heroic Pacifism to the Muslim World, he inadvertently angers and further alienates a large portion of the US and appears to be a total nincompoop to the rest of the world, friend and foe alike. Essentially, it becomes even more apparent that the lies and corruption of small time politics like Chicago and Illinois don’t necessarily work on an international stage.
Will we feel safer by disposing of our nuclear arsenal as a gesture of good intentions? Will the rest of the world finally realize that we are just regular people that want to get along with everyone else? These questions seem to be a consideration or focal point of Obama’s Gandhi-like international policies.
Unfortunately, history has shown that international enemies seek signs of weakness to exploit, rather than gestures of goodwill and brotherhood, especially when they are offered up on a daily basis; thus far, Obama has not shown an ability or inclination to negotiate from a position of strength: his position has been that of an appeaser, always anxious to capitulate, except with our ally Israel.
Missy, as Tallgrass has illustrated so well, we are vulnerable to any crackpot in th world who has the ability and the inclination to unleash unspeakable horror upon our country; unfortunately, letting Iran build and experiment with nuclear weapons only decreases the odds of this happening.
While many are willing to pass off the little madman’s ranting as superficial ranting and gesticulation, the real chips on the table are the lives of Americans. Obama is more than willing to gamble our security and our very lives on his Narcissistic belief in his personal powers of persuasion and his open hand of friendship and capitulation. This is what Obama is willing to gamble away to secure a better world among freedom loving countries and the madmen and tyrants of the world.
On a more practical note, grandmothers are not the primary instruments of discipline; they are expected to just not undo discipline to a degree that does harm. We grandparents are in a unique position in life, we are meant to enjoy our grandchildren and we should; but there is alway an element of respect that a child must show to the grandparent. As long as the child maintains a certain level of respect, the sky is the limit.
I love teaching children and assuming their level for brief periods, in other words being a kid. Drawing with kids is an example, they don’t expect you to be a Rembrandt, but showing them how to draw a cat or a dog is a big thing n a child’s life. Finding a bird’s nest with eggs or hatchlings and watching with binoculars from a distance! or catching tadpoles and taking photos while they progress is worth a year of schooling for a child. Activities like this will bond a grandparent to a child, adult conversation is extremely boring for a child and doesn’t endear a child to a grandparent and no child looks forward to going to a grandparent’s house so that adults can drone on forever about the most boring subjects.
GREG i was re reading your comment and you always have a very important word or phrase that stand out ,,this one is specialy while the troups are waging a war and you’r right ,,he should not mention that weakenning decision at this time or any,it seems like a pattern ,,like other decisions also at the wrong timming on every one he pass bye 🙄 like you ask tax when people are down,it does’nt make sense that means to me he should get check by a medical expert on the problem he might suffer from bye 🙄