The US and Israelis are currently engaged in this high-stakes "game" (not to trivialize the human misery which is its result) whose logic, if carried far enough, leads to the use of nuclear weapons as the only means of shattering the resistance forces and terrorizing the population. The vicious conventional bombing currently being conducted by the Israelis is militarily ineffectual and politically counter-productive in that it strengthens rather than weakens the resistance forces and further destablizes the region rather than bringing it under control.
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I agree.
This is a new moment.
Even the most devastating conventional arms fail to provide Washington and Tel Aviv with a decisive edge over their non-state competitors. The wide gap separating tough pronouncements from bitter reality - "we will destroy...", "we will capture or kill...", "we will prevail..." - leads to embarrassment, frustration, confusion and rage.
The militarists are trapped in one-dimensional thinking; ironically, their well-stocked arsenals seem to limit tactical choices (hammers, hammers everywhere but no ideas to be found). Force and more force is their only response to obstacles.
As fighter-bombers, tanks and other advanced weapons systems are increasingly seen as ineffective (destructive, yes - but not effective at producing the desired effects) nuclear weapons will appear more attractive.
Unless American and Israeli populations are able to reign in their militarist elites or, more likely, an internecine struggle at the elite level between militarist and 'internationalist' camps ends with cooler heads firmly in command, I'm convinced we can look forward in the years (months?) to come to waking one morning to news of a "tactical" nuclear strike against "terrorists".
Such an event would mark a dividing line between the era of hope in gradual change and a new dark age that will beggar description.
Hopefully, I'm all wrong about this and we'll just keep murderously muddling through until political action produces positive outcomes.
.d.
The most important isotope of plutonium is 239Pu, with a half-life of 24,110 years.
...................... http://monroelab.net/blog/