"Nuclear Umbrella?"

[Wagner]

Change you can believe in



http://www.foxnews.com/politics/elec...umbrella-iran/

Crap like this, is what started WWI...blanket alliances.

[ekaz]

The world is going to end in 2012, need to get the ball rolling somewhere.

[FSETH]

Haaretz, quoting an unnamed source, said the Obama administration would pledge under the proposed "nuclear umbrella" to respond to any Iranian strike on Israel with a "devastating U.S. nuclear response."

Is there anyone here who thinks this is a good idea? and if so, can you please explain why?

I wonder what the rest of the world (who thought Obama was the best thing since sliced bread) thinks about him throwing out nuclear threats before he even takes office?

[ylwjacket]

I don't believe for 10 seconds that Obama would lob nukes at anyone, no matter what they did to one of our allies.

this is cover for actually confronting the iranians before they actually develop a wepaon.

[B-Line]

Don't quote me on this but I remember reading somewhere that Israel had a retaliation policy that included language in the effect of:

If Israel were to under ANY nuclear attack, they would respond by launching a simultaneous nuclear attack on ALL of their enemies.

I believe the point of the language is to also serve as a deterrent to keep Israelis enemies from launching an attack from unknown origins. It also passes the responsibility of keeping the Middle East nuclear attack free from some countries to every country.

[Eric5273]

Being as Obama is not even president yet, I somehow doubt he is in treaty negotiations with the Israelis. That said, if this were to be true, I can take a guess at what he is thinking.

Up until now, whenever the nuclear issue has come up in regional negotiations, the Arab states have always been more than willing to agree to a "nuclear free Middle East". Iran has also said as much. But there lies the problem -- Israel has nuclear weapons. In fact, Israel is one of only 4 countries that is not a signature to the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty. That makes it difficult for any negotiations to go anywhere. The old "we can do it, and so can they, but you're not allowed to" strategy -- it's not very convincing and certainly not a good tool for negotiations.

Perhaps Obama feels that he can convince Israel to give up their nuclear weapons in exchange for such a treaty by the US. If he can convince them of such a thing, then he has a good chance at working out such a treaty with Iran.

Beyond that thought, I cannot imagine any such treaty as it would not make any sense nor serve any purpose. If the Iranians are not affraid of an Israeli nuclear response, then they would not be afraid of an American nuclear response. Last time I checked, nuclear weapons do a ton of damage regardless of which country they are launched from.