The proliferation of the technology and actual availability of completed systems has led to several smaller states (Israel, Pakistan, India, North Korea and now Iran etc etc) having such weaponry.

The question therefore is: Do these states view usage of such lethality in the same way as the original ‘big powers’? If we assume that is unlikely, then the probability of ‘limited’ nuclear war increases.

Further, my guess is that Mutually Assured Destruction is less of a consideration for those who aspire to ‘martyrdom’, than it might be for those in the West. It’s also less likely that the major powers would step into a ‘local’ nuclear war - recognising the potential for further escalation.

On that basis, if (for example) the Israelis decided to nuke Tehran or Baghdad there would be widespread condemnation but little escalation. And the world would have had a graphic demonstration of a) what such a bomb does and b) how utterly impotent the UN actually is.

I suspect that the 5:1 rule still applies - that is, for every 1 nuke that we target at our enemy we send 5 to China. This is because the analysts worked out early in the Cold War that the only winner in a nuclear conflict is China - their huge population would have many more survivors than the main protagonists.

Couldn’t you just SMELL the glee in the air though when Mr. Ahmadinejad opened his mouth?!

"YES!!! The perfect excuse!!! We could almost drop the lies about their nuclear plans…"

Tony got so excited he had to change his pants, the poor love…

Something else to consider though. Whilst we know this insanity will continue as long as we have a (frankly laughable) "War President" incumbent in the White House, I think we tend to overlook the fact that the Russians are consummate geopolitical operators too. I wouldn’t discount the possibility that Mr. Ahmadinejad’s remarks were deliberate; calculated to gauge response, perhaps, now that International eyes are concentrating a little more closely on Syria.

I was making 2 points: that Blair seems hell bent on getting the Yanks into a confrontation - remember Serbia and the way he leaned on Cliton? - and secondly, that the nuclear balance of disaster - MAD - and the generally understood strategies which flow from nuclear weapons, do not apply in the Insanian case. This latter point being the more interesting to me. A while back it was, for instance, reported that the Yanks had supplied the Israelis with 500 bunker buster bombs… It seems that Bush, Blair and Sharon would each like to do the busines (mass killing of non-believer, believers to end the medievalist theocracy) but each one wants to goad the other into starting it.

http://monabaker.com/quotes.htm

:o>