Fundamentalist Fanatics revolt in the US

[Lord MJ]

The recent Stargate episode gave me this idea.

Suppose a group of rabid fundies under thier leader who thinks he is the Messiah start an uprising in the US, and manage to take over several US cities.

They intend to cleanse the world of non-believers.

They manage to breach security of a US nuclear base.

Would the Russians then be justified in launching a full scale nuclear attack against the US nuclear bases. They say "This attack is against your nuclear bases, if you don't wish full scale war, do not retalliate."

And the would US gov't (who is still in control) be justified in retaliating against the Russians?

[DPDarkPrimus]

They wouldn't be justified in attacking every singel base.

They wouldn't even be justified in attacking the occupied ones, unless we allowed them to.

[Lord MJ]

They wouldn't be justified in attacking every singel base.

They wouldn't even be justified in attacking the occupied ones, unless we allowed them to.

How would they not be justified. Religious fanatics with the goal of exterminating all non believers are in control of nukes. A grave threat to Russias security and it's survival.

If it is clear that American military forces can't stop the fundamentalists, wouldn't Russia have the right to preempt a nuclear attack, by destroying the US entire land based nuclear arsenal?

[Darth Wong]

They would have every right, provided you take the "pre-emptive defense" argument to its logical conclusion.

[MKSheppard]

They manage to breach security of a US nuclear base.

Have fun trying to break the PAL locks.

[BlkbrryTheGreat]

They manage to breach security of a US nuclear base.

Have fun trying to break the PAL locks.

000-000-000 <enter>. Oh damn, they changed it!

[MKSheppard]

000-000-000 <enter>. Oh damn, they changed it!

Seriously, their chances of actually getting their hands onto a US nuke is zero, due to US Law § 1047.7, which authorizes the use of lethal force
to keep control of Special Nuclear Materials.

[BlkbrryTheGreat]

000-000-000 <enter>. Oh damn, they changed it!

Seriously, their chances of actually getting their hands onto a US nuke is zero, due to US Law § 1047.7, which authorizes the use of lethal force
to keep control of Special Nuclear Materials.

Keep in mind that the US military has fundies in it too. The chances that they are large proportion of the soliders stationed at some random silo command center is not insignifigant.

[DPDarkPrimus]

How would they not be justified. Religious fanatics with the goal of exterminating all non believers are in control of nukes. A grave threat to Russias security and it's survival.

If it is clear that American military forces can't stop the fundamentalists, wouldn't Russia have the right to preempt a nuclear attack, by destroying the US entire land based nuclear arsenal?[/quote]

Oh, the military has no way whatsoever of preventing them from taking over entirely?

I suppose it would be "justified", then, but I certainly don't agree with it. Are non-nuclear strikes not powerful enough?

[MKSheppard]

Oh, the military has no way whatsoever of preventing them from taking over entirely?

If they by some magical chance managed to take a missile LCC over,
the US would probably deploy a B-61, since those damn things are
hard to breach, it takes several DAYS to even dent the damn doors,
(current hardening standard)

[Veramocor]

Seems like the plot for Crimson Tide except the US was going to nuke a Russian base controlled by separatists

[DPDarkPrimus]

Wouldn't the US be able take out the site(s) itself? This would be effective not only because they would be eliiminating the threat not only of the occupied bases, but also emptying unoccupied bases of a potential hijacked missle.

[lukexcom]

Yeah, if worst comes to worst we could sacrifice a nuke or two to take out that LCC. Would be a nice opportunity to test out any of those new earth-penetrator nuke concepts, provided that we coincidentally fielded a testable prototype right before the incident started.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Wouldn't the US be able take out the site(s) itself? This would be effective not only because they would be eliiminating the threat not only of the occupied bases, but also emptying unoccupied bases of a potential hijacked missle.

This was my thought. Tell the Russians we'll take care of it, then frag the site.

[Sarevok]

I was thinking the same thing. There is no need for Russian intervention unless the US forces could not take care of the situation.

[Zed Snardbody]

I was under the impresion that you could control the silo and do whatever the hell you please, but without the code from the president, and the all the verifications and what not that goes with it, all you control is a hole in the ground and the biggest target in the country.

Russia isn't justified because the missle isn't going anywhere.

[Sea Skimmer]

Such an action wouldn't be remotely justifiable given that such fundamentalists couldn't even open a silo door let alone launch an armed missile without totally rewiring the missiles, warheads and the entire fire control system of the base. That is something, which would take the people who built the things years. A bunch of crazed fundies would stand no hope of doing it. The way the system is currently setup it also possibul to isolate compromised launch control bunker from its missiles and the other launch control bunkers in case of just such a scenario.

[CJvR]

Only if the US was unable or unwilling to remove the threat to Russia, and even then the targeting of the remaining arsenal would be questionable unless the US goverment was about to fall appart completly.

Nuking ICBMs mean big groundbursts, the fallout would be unbelivable.

[Talon Karrde]

They would have every right, provided you take the "pre-emptive defense" argument to its logical conclusion.

I agree. If terrorists took over a nuclear base that threatened our security, we obviously would take action, and another nation has that same right.

[Shroom Man 777]

Why should the Ruskies have the right when the US can handle it by itself.

The Ruskies, when they tell the Americans that they're gonna nuke the fundies, are gonna sound like this: "This attack is against your nuclear bases which are controlled by the fundies and which you can destroy by yourself. If you don't wish full scale war, do not retalliate in fear that we are actually trying to blow you to hell, no matter how dumb our justifications of attacking your bases are."

[Talon Karrde]

Why should the Ruskies have the right when the US can handle it by itself.

The Ruskies, when they tell the Americans that they're gonna nuke the fundies, are gonna sound like this: "This attack is against your nuclear bases which are controlled by the fundies and which you can destroy by yourself. If you don't wish full scale war, do not retalliate in fear that we are actually trying to blow you to hell, no matter how dumb our justifications of attacking your bases are."

If terrorists took control of a base in Russia and it threatened the US, you can bet we would take action. We would be foolish not too. Most likely we would try to work in accordance with the Russian government, but I think it's a certainty we would take action to ensure our safety, and they would have that same right.

While we may be able to "handle it by" ourselves, it's still everyone else's business if it threatens world security.

[Beowulf]

As told to me by someone who was a missile maintainer before he got retrained: It takes hours just to jackhammer the concrete over the lock mechanism open. This being required when they lose the combo for the lock. This several hour period is enough time to get a large number of heavily armed SFs that have orders to shoot on sight, to get to pretty much any silo.

[irishmick79]

What I would see would be something more like a "Sum of All Fears" scenario (the movie version, not the book) where a bunch of radicals in the US military smuggle nuclear material out of the country to a fundie group abroad. The said fundie group makes some threats, and backs them up with some sort of attack. The US Government thinks that somebody else supplied the fundies, and goes kill-crazy on some poor dictator who doesn't know what the hell is going on.

I guess the whole idea would be that the Homeland Security department probably won't be looking for nukes going out of the country, especially if the box they're in is stamped "US Military".

[sketerpot]

Suppose that the Rabid Fundie Liberation Army had miraculously managed to get control of a nuclear base and actually launch a missile. Don't ask me how they did that. Couldn't the US army just camp out with some missile defenses near the base and shoot down the missile while it's still coming out of the silo at a relatively slow speed? Hell, a bazooka ought to do. Or maybe a land mine at the top of the silo. I'm sure they could think of something.

[The Last Rebel]

Do you even have any idea what kind of security they have on those bases? Any group trying to force its way in would encounter very stiff resistance. The base security is equipped with automatic weapons galore. And, if it happens to be an airbase, they could scramble fighters (A number of SAC bases nowadays have tactical fighter wings) for close air support.

Not to metion help from the local police, and eventually army reinforcements. (Most towns have a Army National Guard armory/depot).

Any army of whackos that tried to takeover a military base by force would fail. And even if they did, how would they even manage to arm a bomb. You honestly think an airforce officer is just gonna tell them? HELL NO!

MEanwhile, while they're dicking around, they find themselves dying as our counter-terrorist teams infiltrate the base and swiftly take them out.