Which I understand has little impact on the Napoleonic war you were talking about.

Again, which buffer states were you talking about?

You are mistaken regarding the timeline. When Germany attacked Russia, Poland was already gone. To claim that Poland was a buffer state the Germans had to march through and that such a march slowed Germany down is to deny that Russia had already by that time annexed half of Poland and bordered Germany when Barbarossa started.

In general your knowledge of history seems to be a bit detached. You remember buffer states between Napoleon's army and Russia and between Hitler's army and Russia when in reality the invading armies crossed the border directly and were slowed down not in buffer states but in Russia itself.

Prussia bordered Russia directly after the third partition of Poland in the late 18th century and before Napoleon's invasion of Russia. There was no buffer state between the two, not even one. And Nazi Germany also bordered Russia directly when Hitler attacked the Soviet-Union (Belarus was a tiny Soviet republic, not a border state).

While Poland and some of the other East-European countries were indeed set up as buffer states, they didn't act as such thanks to appeasement. They certainly didn't slow down anybody and no invasion army was crippled in any way because it had to march through them.

If you think it took 50 years of containment you never studied history. Containment did not work and the change in strategy is what did it. Under containment we reduced our military just as we are doing now, we played chess with nations, we played publicity games and gotcha games. None of it worked. What worked was rebuilding the military, standing up to the USSR and getting in their face at times. The Soviet Union could not keep up with the spending on all fronts and fell apart. That did not happen until Mr. Reagan changed the game and within 10 years they were gone.

I am so sorry you think that 50K dead Americans was just a small tactical loss.

Okay you really don’t know history. Iran had been our ally since before WWII, Europe begged us to join NATO to threaten the USSR. Turkey had been an ally at least since the end of WWII. Pakistan became an ally after 9/11 when Mr. Bush told them pick a side ours or theirs. Pakistan abandoned the Taliban a group set up and funded by Pakistan to be our friend. Because of that Pakistan is on the verge of being taken over by the Taliban now that the liberals withdrew their support. You are correct to say that Mr. Nixon started the ball rolling but that was not 50 years ago. Mr. Carter took office and withdrew support for the Shah of Iran allowing the islamoterrorists to take over. They were so grateful to the USA that they started Hezbollah, and five other terror organizations as well as taking our embassy. Iran and Egypt were our allies until Mr. Carter took office we have lost them both during his time in office. Those two countries were keeping the peace in the Middle East and had signed peace agreements with Israel. Mr. Carter brokered the deal with Egypt after he stabbed Iran in the back. The islamofacist then murdered the president of Egypt paid for by Iran. Mr. Carter has always hated Israel and left them without and ally in the region. So even if your theory that we had this great master strategy starting with Mr. Nixon it was undone by the next president and had to be started from scratch with Mr. Reagan and undone by Mr. Clinton. Lucky for us the USSR had fallen apart by then and our biggest worry was Iran and the terrorists they spread around the world.

No, I am saying it out right. I even pointed it out in my forthcoming book, (Silent Thunder) You did not know that Mr. Carter forced the fall of the Shah of Iran allowing the radical fundamentalist to take power. Now our president is doing the same things Mr. Carter was doing how much more damage do you think he will do before he is booted from office.

All missiles travel in a nice straight line, well a ballistic arc. This is why we are able to pick up the launch within 12 seconds of launch and know its destination 60 seconds into the 30 minute flight. We have trouble with sub launched missiles on a low arc because it only takes 6 minutes from launch to impact. For that to work they need nuclear submarines to do that at less than 500 miles from our shore.

Oh, please tell me which missile this is, the SS-20, SS-6 the SS-4, SS-18. which ICBM is it that has this magical power. Now if you are talking about cruise missiles, that is not new they have limited range of about 1200 miles from launch. The trade off is that they travel slowly, under 500 miles an hour and can easily spotted by our fighter jet radar. That is the reason we use them against countries that have lousy air forces’ You know the ones that have Russian fighters.

That was called Poland, by joint agreement Poland was attacked by the USSR and Germany. Germany turned around and attacked the USSR going through Poland and several hundred miles into they USSR the first two days. So much for a buffer. At the time the nation of Poland did not exist because it had been split up between Germany and they USSR.

Actually my good man it is none of the above. It is the SS-27 (ground) and SS-NX-30 (submarine)

This is a missile that is able to accelerate much faster than most ICBM's, has a flatter balistic trajectory than most and is designed to maneuver evasively on re-entry.... meaning that in the terminal phase, which most interceptors are geared towards, the re-entry vehicle or multiple re-entry vehicles DO NOT travel in the nice straight line that can be easily plotted.

There has NEVER been a succesful interceptor test of a missile that was deviating from a linear trajectory, and even then the interceptor can only hit the missile some of the time.

The latest generation of SS-27's are going to have multiple independent re-entry vehicles for between 4 to 6 warheads, all of which will have evasive capability -and- there will probably also be a couple of decoys thrown in there as well.

The beauty of it? The Soviets had this missile back in the mid-90's, we knew about it and BILLIONS of dollars have been spent on a platform which isn't even close to being able to take down something like the SS-27.

The U.S missile shield program is a prime example of a multi-billion dollar waste of a boondoggle. Just like the B-2 bomber, of which only 21 were ever built because each one has a price tag of 1.5 billion and can't land in most theatres because they can't handle inclement weather, need special bunkers to protect them on the ground, and need something on the order of 30 hours of maintenance for one hour of flight time.

Is this a joke? israel, georgia, the entirety of europe with the whole "missile defense is antagonizing the russians", and lets not forget the friendly pro democracy iraqies and other arabs in the region. To name a few.

Are you in all honesty claiming that the COLD WAR was an act of the USA APPEASING the russians to victory? what kind of fantasy world do you live in.

Addressing Arty (a slightly more reasonable Canadian liberal )

Your statement just addressed the entire problem...it's not for use against Russian ICBMs. They know it too.

The ABM system is in its infancy (might be why they need 10) and is still developing, so is the Iranian missile program.  If Russia or most any other country with missiles in the northern hemisphere fire missiles they go over the Arctic Ice cap. Placing ABMs in Poland...would only benefit Europe at this stage.

Not according to some Canadian (would be) economic professors (see post 17). They propose we "just out spend" the Russians aka Cold War style.

Since your a man of figures, maybe you could explain what the cost of one moderate to large nuked European city would cost? Will it happen? Probably not.

BTW Your Iraq war cost is over inflated (LINK , still expensive though, do you thing the Iraqi appreciate it?). You must be thinking UHC.

What is up with Canadians supporting "elbow room" for Russia... with no regard for the rights of those sovereign nations? Guess it's easier to "do as I say not as I do".

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/story.html?id=a3dcc991-8df0-40c7-9732-8ed5641953c7

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2007/08/mil-070809-rferl04.htm

http://www.robertamsterdam.com/2007/08/the_arctic_claim.htm

It is so easy to give up someone else's rights, isn't it? Not so nice when it your own. Yet somehow I get the feeling there are some in Canada that would welcome their Soviet Russian liberators with open arms.

Iran became a world power in the creation and funding of international terror organizations. All because we looked weak enough for them to get away with it. Soviet invasion of Afghanistan because we looked feckless enough for them to get away with it and our response was to not send our athletes to the 1980 Olympics in the USSR. now the spin offs of this was the Taliban created by Pakistan, Al Qaeda a spin off of the Afghan war. Libya started to attack America because we looked weak. Wow it seems that the loss of two wars did hurt us, it was not quick and immediate because it takes time to see if America is a paper tiger and then to see what weaknesses we have and how to exploit them. Just as Mr. Clinton did not jump on Bin Laden when he had the chance allowed 9/11. We look weak bad people will exploit it. Most of the world knows that if you attack America with an army we will crush them. What the soviets figured out was if they grew terrorists organizations that were not openly sponsored by any nation state we would have no way to defend or fight them. That is the new war we are fighting it started when the USSR funded Black September and a host of other groups. using them to weaken the nation then makes it easier for other attacks on us until we can be attacked by a nation state and lose. it is an old strategy, death by a thousand cuts. One little cut is nothing but if you are cut at different places some serious and some minor it will wear down the person until a 6 year old can kick your ass.

This is a foolish myth, if you bother to read up on it you will find out what I am about to write. The Shah of Iran took power during WWII from his father. He ruled continuously until the fundamentalist pushed him out, President Carter withdrew support of him and that was that the end of an unbroken 5000 year rule. If it was unbroken as history books say, then how did the CIA put the Shah back in power. The answer was that it did not happen like that. The Prime Minister was taken out of power by the Brits and the CIA at the request of the Shah because the Prime Minister was trying to oust the Shah who was still in power at the time. The Shah has the power to fire the prime minister at will, he did but the man would not leave and was planning a coup d'état. The longest unbroken monarchy in the world was broken by President Carter. We looked weak in not supporting our allies in the region and the rest is bloody history. See how our current president is doing the same thing. Poland refused to take our Secretary of State’s phone calls. They feel abandoned by us. Once again the liberals have laid the ground work for an attack against us because the first move it to tell the world that well will not help or support anyone we don’t like today even if you were a great friend and help yesterday. What country or leader is going to help us when we need help if we always stab them in the back? Pakistan had been our enemy for decades, we made friends with them and now they are our enemy again or at least feeing abandoned by us in their time of need.

One of the reasons it does not land outside the US is because we don’t want people knowing how it works. That is why they are stationed in the middle of the country. Unlike liberal thinking giving away our military secrets is not really a good idea. This weapon has the ability to fly into and out of enemy airspace and not be detected. That makes it a closely guarded secret. Also keep in mind that a maintenance hour is one man per hour. I seriously think that they have one man doing all the maintenance on the aircraft. You have the plane captain who is in change of the maintenance of the aircraft he has a team of people that work with him. If ten men work on the aircraft for one hour that is ten maintenance hours If they work on the aircraft for ten hours that is one hundred maintenance hours. It takes 16 hours to change the tires of the plane. Four men working four hours. While at that same time another team is working on the skin of the aircraft that takes eight to ten hours. Another team is working on the avionics, while another team is working on the propulsion systems, a team working on the bombing systems. So your 120 hours of maintenance is usually done in 8 hours what does that tell you besides that you don’t understand maintenance cycles? A bombing run over Iraq takes about 24 to 30 flight hours. According to you the plane would be taken out of service for 2,880 hours or 120 days, with so few planes I find it hard to believe that we waited 120 days per flight during the initial bombing during desert storm. I worked for a few airlines when I was younger and I know how the cycles work. Now after so many flight hours the plane goes in for a “D” check where the plane is literally taken apart checked and rebuilt that takes a good month on commercial aircraft the “A” checks that is done about every 500 flight hours takes about 2 hours per plane before it can fly again. On civilian air craft there are normally two to four mechanics doing an “A” check.

That's nice. If you actually do just a smidge of research however, you'll find that actually, no, the B-2 bomber actually needs a special air-conditioned building to be housed in.

The reason is that during routine flight, a lot of the top secret stuff that keeps the plane so radar invisible actually gets damaged or starts coming off. To keep the plane radar invisible it needs to have this stuff repaired or replaced. While this is happening, the plane must be in a precise environment so that everything can cure properly, which can take upwards of a day or more.

Therefore, during this maintenance and while everything is curing, a specialized hangar is required that can keep the environment (temperature, humidity, pressure, blah blah blah) at the precise required levels.

Now, this is not just a plain jane hangar, it is a specialized hangar built only for the B-2, it is very expensive and very permanent. Meaning it cannot be setup quickly or temporarily in a forward location.

As to the 119 hours of maintenance for 1 hour of flight time, of course, yes, that is a standard that was calcaluted out cumulatively over time. No, after every single flight the plane doesn't need several days of maintenance, but stretched out over a year of routine operation and several flights, it adds up.

But I really don't need to go on about this, because there are documents online, released by the U.S General Accounting Office and even some Pentagon papers back in the mid-90's (I believe 1997) that detail all of this.

If you go out and look for them, you'll find em in short order. But if you would like, I can post the links for you.

Your argument assume that Iran only "hates" the US. In reality, Iran could very well be facing NATO (which includes Europe) if hostilities would occur. What is the best way to make Europe cry uncle? Give it a bloody nose where it hurts - their backyard. Additionally, US military staging points are in Europe.

But lets be real for one moment. Iran doesn't have to fire a nuke at Europe... all it needs is a credible capability to change the EU's policy toward Iran. The whole game changes for negotiations.

I do agree with you, chance for a launch to Europe would be low. It's the thought that counts. If someone is hovering over you with a club you might feel intimidated. If that same person was behind bars, you might be more inclined to speak your mind.

I feel that Iran would be more inclined to use a device against Israel. And probably covertly via proxies (hamas, hezbolah). They know a first use against the US would be the end for them.

BTW Iran is the last group that wants oil shut off. They export so much oil to buy commodities, that they need to import gasoline for domestic use. Imagine an oil producing country that is itself energy poor.

Russia was never threatened by the interceptor missiles. In reality they could probably care less. Anyway a Russian nuclear attack on Europe would initiate a US response. They know that they can get support by crying foul. It's a no lose proposition for them with potential gains.

US ABM technology is by far the best in the world and (at least prior to Obama) improving everyday. Last years destruction of a defunct US spy satellite, traveling over 7000 miles an hour, is clear proof (the Chinese shot down a static weather sat. the previous year). To disparage it as a "fraudulent magic bullet" is not very fair. While it probably wouldn't hamper the latest Russian (or other space capable nations), it would certainly defeat Iranian technology. On top of that these systems are constantly improved to meet new threats. Just as the same Patriot missile system that was so successful in the first gulf was has been repeatedly improved since then. In that respect we owe Saddam a great deal of thanks.

I always get a kick out of it when someone calls out the cost of such things. The fact is if it weren't for the US military spending, we wouldn't have these capabilities. Imagine if like minded people thought the same way about ARPANET in the late 60's. One, they or their descendants wouldn't be here bitching on the Internet for one. What about GPS? Digital cameras? Simple truth is US military spending benefits the world. What has Russia's military given the world? China's?

Come now Arty, these missiles are almost twenty years old. Do you really believe the US has not developed a counter measure? If they were so wonderful why is Russia selling them to China and Iran? No country sells their best when it could find its way into unfriendly hands. BTW this missile uses active radar homing, which can be easily defeated. The moment Iran lights up the radars that control these missiles to paint our ships, those radars will be destroyed, then the missiles are useless. They have to acquire targets in the crowded Persian Gulf, which would take much more time than this missiles flight time. Funny, your flawed argument does not support Obama's plan for a ship based missile defense. You listen too much to the enemy propaganda. Read about this old missile here LINK.

If you actually did some thinking to go along with your research you would have to conclude that the F-117 stealth bomber uses the same materiel as the B-2 yet is has been stationed outside the US, goes through the same type of maintenance cycles and needs the same air-conditioned hangers. The B-2 is safer in the air than on the ground. The only way for an enemy to know they are on the way is to sit at the airfield and watch them take off because once in the air you can’t see them with radar. They launce from the US you don’t know where they are headed. They launch from other countries you have an advantage, not much of one but some advantage.

the issue with the Sunburn is close to being true. their problem is that it has a very short range. 180 miles. A carrier group has 250 mile control of the sea, that is air, surface and subsurface so to launch the launch platform is already within detection range. the 800 pound warhead will damage a carrier but you will need more than one to sink it. The SM-2's might not be able to get it on such a low trajetery and high speed of mach 2.4 if it is sublaunched but the guns have a real good chance. Air launched we have a better than even shot of taking it out. let me put it this way, to launch it undetected they have to launch more than 250 miles away, the range of the weapon is 160 to 180 miles. in a sneak attack they have a good shot but once the systems are fully on line thier chances of success diminish quickly. The exerocet used to be the big bad anti-ship missile, not any more. Oh, and just for the record we stopped building carriers of one class the next class of carriers is already in the works and has been since the 80's. The ones we have now are rated for the next 50 years so there is no hurry for the next class of carrier. I think you give Iran too much credit. Out of the 25 ships in a carrier group against the 25 ships in the Iranian navy. We have more groups.

With the current administration I know Russia will not side with us. They want to be on the winning side and this administration is not interested in winning.

Then you missed the mark if that is your point. We have no defenses in the middle east. The few small bases we have out there are not designed for doing anyting other than play with terrorists. Think of Germany during the cold war, we had a million troops sitting in Europe. The missile interception data you have is from the 80 with the SDI program. You have not seen the new data because it has never been released. Don't you ever wonder why all the information that is out there on our technical abilities dates back to the 70's. Nothing after that has been released because we made some advances that make the 70's stuff worthless. All you see is rehashed junk nothing that is good has been released to the public, even the B-2 stuff is prior to 70's technology. The flying wing or the YB-47 was cancelled in the 40's and no one talked about it. All of a suddedn we had the Sealth fighter that can't fight but is a great small bomber and the B-2 those were the Have-blue projects of the 60's. The idea is to stay at least three full generations ahead of what is released for public knowledge. The amazing things you can do with your cell phone is 70's technology. Notice how all the innovations that have come out have not bombed. Where are the Edsles, and the like? By the time a product hits the market is is obsolete. LCD monitors have been around for decades but are just coming out now? What makes you think that the weapons of Russia are a problem to us? The second latest generation of weapons systems that Russia had were used in desert storm. They lasted 30 minutes against our 1970's equipment. The M-1 tank is still 70's stuff. No other country can come close so that is all we use. Like when an aircraft breaks the speed record. every time they do we pull the SR-71 out fuel it and break the record then put it back in the museum that was 1960's tech. If we are deploying it it is because we need it to upgrade the systems to take the next three generations. I worked with a guy and his wife a few years ago he designed a missile that you can launch 1000 miles away from the target. it will go through a specific window in the building without any additional help once launched. One more point, the laptop and desk top computers were designed by the US Marine Corps in 1964 contracted to IBM to build. IBM stopped making desk top computers because?

Nirro, thanks I have a good idea what you do so I will say this. I rode on a habu from Kadena to Andrews in the 80's , I have been inside the B-2 and sat in the cockpit of an f-117. I also used to work for Lockheed Martin, you know how smelly that can be,         just before I moved to DHS.

Bravo. The U.S has been able to take out satellites with missiles launched from F-15's since the 80's. Shooting down a reconassaince satellite is hardly proof that U.S ABM technology is "the best in the world"

And, there you go with your assumptions that I'm automatically against all things expensive. A program like the ARPAnet vs today's missile shield is like comparing apples and oranges.

Some programs are practical, have long-reaching consequences and yield fruit. Other programs are collosal wastes of time and money and yield little else.

For example, let's look at ground-attack aircraft for close support. The current premier ground attack aircraft in use by U.S Forces is the A-10.

Now, the A-10 is truly an amazing piece of work. It can deliver massive amounts of ordnance accurately on target in support of ground forces, it can take a hell of a beating and can be easily maintaned and repaired in a field tent in the middle of the boonies.

It's also from the 1970's, and from the time of the program's inception to the time that planes were rolling of the assembly line was only a few short years -AND- the per unit cost is relatively cheap compared to other aircraft.

The A-10, in terms of what it can do is amazing, but it has an interesting backstory. And that is, that the fellow responsible for pushing it, a Colonel Avery Kay, had to fight not just the defence contractors but also his superiors at the Pentagon. As a former combat veteran and fighter pilot, Kay knew exactly what the plane DID need and what it didn't need, politics be damned. Because he stuck to his guns and chose to get actually get something done vs. making the popular choice with his bosses and defence contractors.

The result was a weapons program that was cheap, practical, and bang on for what was needed in the field.

And in all that time, the A-10 has yet to be replaced.

Now the A-10 was a success but what happens to a weapons program that has too many defence contractors with their fingers in the pie, wanting to milk it for as much as they can get?

Well, you get things like the F-35, the F-22, the Comanche and the B-2

The Comanche program was cancelled. The F-22 is as good as cancelled as they're not going to make anymore, the B-2 they only ever made 21 of the things because they're so god-damned expensive, and the F-35 is being hyped us the ultimate fighter of the future yet former defence officials including folks that were involved with the F-16 and F-18 programs are calling the F-35 an abysmal failure that's going to see massive cost overruns and will be massivley overweight, underpowered, and ridiculously complicated thus ensuring ridiculous amounts of maintenance.

As to the maintenance issues with the B2:

"from 1993-2000, America’s B-2 fleet has historically had availability rates below 50% for a number of reasons. In practice, what this meant was that even with moderate usage, an average of only 6-10 stealth bombers were actually available for missions at any given time. "

http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/usas-b2-bombers-leading-the-way-in-contracting-for-availability-02950/

And in regards to the special hangars, this is a quote from a report of your own General Accounting Office:

"The Air Force has concluded it could not effectively deploy B-2s to
forward operating locations without sheltering the aircraft to
preserve and maintain its low-observable features.  Accordingly, if
permanent or temporary shelters must be developed and built at
selected forward operation locations or additional support equipment
must be acquired to meet deployment and maintenance requirements,
additional costs will be incurred. "

and

"While the B-2's performance met
requirements for initial operations, the aircraft are unable to meet
intended deployment requirements because some low-observable features
require substantial maintenance and the aircraft are more sensitive
to climate and moisture than expected. "

http://www.fas.org/man/gao/nsiad97181.htm

Again, the low-observable features are all the cool stuff that keep the plane radar invisible, which really isn't a priority at the airshows you were talking about Nitro. And, by the way, isn't it kinda sad that at a price tag of 1.5 billion per, these puppies best use right now IS an airshow?

OK, with that (and the  first gulf war scud interceptions) why don't you enlighten me who does it better?

Ir's all about you right? LOL While my comment was directed to liberals in general, since you felt guilty enough to bite, I'll respond. The left loves to spend, that's no secret, except like to spend on things that mostly have no chance of offering a tangible return for every American, as military spending does.

Funny you mention the  A-10 which some in government wanted canceled... until the 1st gulf war. Anyway, this aircraft, while IMO is good, needs to operate in an environment with control of airspace assured (with planes like the F-22). During the first gulf war, the A-10 was the the type most shot down (4) with the AV-8 Harrier sharing top spot with it. The A-10 flew 14.8% (8032) of total coalition sorties flown and had the 3rd highest number of AC (132) by type. The F-16 flew 24.2% (13,087) of total coalition sorties and was the largest AC type used (244). Both aircraft first flew in the early 70's (A-10 1972, F-16 1973). Both the F-16 and the F-18 (second highest amount of AC (175), second in sorties (17.3% / 9388) had less casualties

I was on hand for a portion of test flights of the F-18 in 1979 (the project began years prior). This aircraft is still in use (with some improvements). Lets put it in perspective. This range of time is like taking a Curtis Jenny into battle in WWII. The B-2 has been operating with impunity since the Balkans conflict(s) and will be for decades to come. The price is high, theres no doubt. How much will the US learn from these aircraft to keep us on top? That's anyones guess, but I guarantee it will be more than any nation that doesn't spend the money (how many military aircraft has Canada built since WWII? Easy to criticize when you're not even a player). In fact lessons have been applied to the F-35 (with a substantially lower price tag). If these B-2s have a life half as long as long as the B-52, it will be a good investment. (B-52 were shot down in Vietnam, no B-2 has been lost in combat). I'm sure some liberals back in the 50's thought the money spent on B-52's was too expensive then and the money would have been better spent on some entitlement program. They probably never thought they were interfering with future liberals talking points for success stories as to why we shouldn't modernize. As hard as many liberals make it for defense-minded people to advance military science, they sure like to point back to it's past successes in order to derail its future. If liberals had their way the Army's best weapon would be the Mk1 Type III throwing rock.

Sure proper environmental controls must be present to apply the B-2's coatings. The same is true for you when you get your car painted. Your links are correct... most aircraft facilities outside the US are substandard, good job pointing that out. Good thing we have an aircraft that a tiny crew can fly to anywhere in the world to perform its mission. Who else can make that claim? Don't hate the player, hate the game.

Funny that you mention missiles. It has been my understanding that Iran's main treath to international oil shipping wouldn't be missiles, but mines.

While a strike of missiles could hurt quite a few ships, it is doubtful that the U.S. wouldn't be able to take out the missile installations (either ship- , plane- or truck-mounted). It would hurt the oil shipping and drive the speculations to a sky-high, but it would be a (relatively) short spike. You can know when there aren't any more missiles to be launch.

Is the Sunburn missiles man-portable, like Hizbulla's and Hamas'? If they are meant to aim at ships more than 50 km away, and hug the sea, I doubt it. So U.S.'s intelligence capacities and its air power would be able to take them out with (relative) ease. It would hurt, yhea, but it wouldn't hurt as much as mining the Gulf.

The problem with mines is that they can be deployed by any freaking boat, so the U.S. would have to take out even fishing boats and coastal patrol ships. You never know how many mines are left on the territory, and it takes large-scale effort to "clean" the area, without ever being 100% sure that everything is safe.

It's going to skyrocket insurance premium for oil tankers for YEARS. Even if only 1 ship will explode because of mines, they just stired much more problem on the world's economy than they could with a perfectly modern missile impliment.

And Russia will benefit of it all, and it's in nobody's interest/security to see scenario happen (except maybe Israel, as previously stated). But then again, I have just read very interesting analysis about Iran's defensive posture that rings right, especially when I read comments like "They just want to kill all americans and Jewish".

In short, Iran has a defensive interest in posturing as unpredictable, unstable and threatening.

Latest update by STRATFOR (please note that FSU = Former Soviet Union, Russia's desired sphere of influence needed to its defense)

Ergo, it's not a choice. You will play political chess with the Russians again, and you have to adopt the same winning tactics than in the cold war = forcing it to commit itself with regional support around the world to destabilise the U.S. They are already re-establishing military supplying of Cuba's leadership, done the same with Venezuella.

But I am not worried. As I said, I have trust in the U.S.'s capacities to win such games. In retrospective, Bush (or his team of advisor, depending on who you think called the shots) acted rationally on many topics, and Obama will act rationally too, and make sure the U.S. will prevail in the end.

Paladin77: Vietnam was did not make you look weak, except to yourselves. The only way the world might have been inclined to think the U.S. were weak was because of cultural osmosis. As far as I know, you haven't seen regimes actually changing allegiance because of Vietnam. (I am not talking of regime change, but of regime actually deciding to scuttle US's alliance).

Oh, and IF your analysis is true (which I think you are, again, deep in "wrong" territory), isn't that a good thing that Russia though you weak and attacked Afghanistan - and ruined itself on it? You provoked Russia to commit itself and spend ressources. They did the same. It was a number game as long as no one panicked (*cough* Cuba Missile Crisis *cough*)

Ohh.. the CMC. Yhea, Kennedy's appeasing Russia then sure was a bad move, eh? It would have been much better if he had kept strong, and never flinched on a single issue.