It's finally done-The Three Gorges Dam

vesicles said:

No, I think it would be worse than a nuclear attack considering the size of the affected area and number of people affected.

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Not if the authorities acted upon prior warning of an eminent attack on the dam and emptied the dam, If they chose not to, upon whose shoulders would you place the greater burden of guilt, if hundreds of thousands or millions of civilians were to die from the resulting damage?

Finn McCool said:

Well, it's finally done. It took a long time.

Undoubtedly the dam is a massive enginnering feat. Most people do not think of building a dam, even one this size, as a technological achivement but it is.

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Well, since no one has posted any pictures, let me do so. The largest hydro-electric power plant in the world deserves to have pictures of it on the thread that is about it here on SD:

First, a few construction pics:







And then some pictures of the finished product:
















There...that's much better. Always better to have pictures to be able to gauge what we are talking about by.

bladerunner said:

Not if the authorities acted upon prior warning of an eminent attack on the dam and emptied the dam, If they chose not to, upon whose shoulders would you place the greater burden of guilt, if hundreds of thousands or millions of civilians were to die from the resulting damage?

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This is, IMO, a shift of blame. You simply can't blame the attacked more than the attacker. Like traffic laws, when one driving a car without insurance is involved in a car accident, no matter who's fault it is, it is the guy without insurance who will be blamed. Why? He/she shouldn't be on the road in the first place. The same should be said in the dam attack case. You simply cannot blame the Chinese govn't for failing to inform the people more than the attackers because of the attackers start the whole thing...

Plus, this is not the question of how much actual damage can be done, but what the attacker intends to achieve. Obviously, when one decides to attack such an important target, they are fully aware of the potential consequences. Of course, when one plans an attack, he would definitely hope for the most effective outcome and also hope the attacked is not prepared. In other words, they are hoping for the biggest casualty and most devastating outcome possible. So that's why I said in my last post that they must have a malicious intent. It is this intent that China should and must responds to. Even if little actual damage is done to the dam because of various reasons, be it China is fully prepared or the attacker is incompetent, China will still be very pissed because someone is trying to inflict A LOT of damage to China and China as a nation should let the world know that this kind of thinking should not even come up and if it does, it will be punished severely.

Attacking a civilian infrastructure is a war crime.

nemo said:

Attacking a civilian infrastructure is a war crime.

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yea it is. also if the enemies are that persistent to going through everything in order to attack the dam, they must've known the damage.

my guesses are that the resulting damage of the dam can cause hundreds of millions of deaths, especially in the major cities like shanghai etc.

i also don't think china cares as much about the infrastructure as much as compared to the loss of human lives in that scenario. fighting a war is one thing, but attacking the dam is personal.

vesicles said:

This is, IMO, a shift of blame. You simply can't blame the attacked more than the attacker. Like traffic laws, when one driving a car without insurance is involved in a car accident, no matter who's fault it is, it is the guy without insurance who will be blamed. Why? He/she shouldn't be on the road in the first place. The same should be said in the dam attack case. You simply cannot blame the Chinese govn't for failing to inform the people more than the attackers because of the attackers start the whole thing...

Plus, this is not the question of how much actual damage can be done, but what the attacker intends to achieve. Obviously, when one decides to attack such an important target, they are fully aware of the potential consequences. Of course, when one plans an attack, he would definitely hope for the most effective outcome and also hope the attacked is not prepared. In other words, they are hoping for the biggest casualty and most devastating outcome possible. So that's why I said in my last post that they must have a malicious intent. It is this intent that China should and must responds to. Even if little actual damage is done to the dam because of various reasons, be it China is fully prepared or the attacker is incompetent, China will still be very pissed because someone is trying to inflict A LOT of damage to China and China as a nation should let the world know that this kind of thinking should not even come up and if it does, it will be punished severely.

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i agree. if the first attack failed, the enemy nation will never get a second chance. actually either it failed or not, the enemy will literally be wiped lol.

Jeff Head said:

Well, since no one has posted any pictures, let me do so. The largest hydro-electric power plant in the world deserves to have pictures of it on the thread that is about it here on SD:

First, a few construction pics:

[qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorgesbuild-01.jpg[/qimg] [qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorgesbuild-02.jpg[/qimg]

[qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorgesbuild-03.jpg[/qimg] [qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorgesbuild-04.jpg[/qimg]

[qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorgesbuild-05.jpg[/qimg] [qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorgesbuild-06.jpg[/qimg]

And then some pictures of the finished product:

[qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-01.jpg[/qimg] [qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-02.jpg[/qimg]


[qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-03.jpg[/qimg] [qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-04.jpg[/qimg]

[qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-05.jpg[/qimg] [qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-06.jpg[/qimg]

[qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-07.jpg[/qimg] [qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-08.jpg[/qimg]

[qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-09.jpg[/qimg] [qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-10.jpg[/qimg]

[qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-11.jpg[/qimg] [qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-12.jpg[/qimg]

[qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-13.jpg[/qimg] [qimg]http://www.jeffhead.com/3gorges/3gorges-14.jpg[/qimg]

There...that's much better. Always better to have pictures to be able to gauge what we are talking about by.

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nice photos!! very grand, but the tanned water looks gross.
are there reserviors to purify downstream?

bladerunner said:

Not if the authorities acted upon prior warning of an eminent attack on the dam and emptied the dam, If they chose not to, upon whose shoulders would you place the greater burden of guilt, if hundreds of thousands or millions of civilians were to die from the resulting damage?

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china wont be notified of an imminent attack. plus it's not a legitimate target because thats killing civilians. also i think the damage the dam does will be worse than MULTIPLE strategic nukes combined. no fallout, but the damages are worse. u can explain away a tactical nuke on a regiment, but the message of a dam is you want to kill people, lots of them, millions of them.

destroying the 3 gorges is perhaps nearing in conducting genocide. it's a surefire way of becoming the top enemy of an entire civilization.

btw i have a question. sounds weird, but does anyone know any technical aspects/data of the dam about its durability? in terms of against threats during wartime and earthquakes? for example, how well does the dam fare in times of a quake? do u think the dam can withstand richter 9? (tahts wt i think the minimum/maximum threshold it should be able to withstand. if it can withstand that strong of seismic activity, then everyone living downstream of the dam will never have to worry about the dam failing on them in terms of earthquake. plus, while the odds of richter 9 is odd, it's also the highest and most realistic it can get. a richter 10 is godspeed.)

and the strange part of this question will be in terms of wartime, do you guys think aside from defense protecting the dam, are there armor or fortifications on the dam itself?

We live in an age where the definition of words change according to who sees fit. If the definition of words can change on a whim, how hard is it for rules? I can point to many examples of note. If you look at what's been happening in the world you can see human rights crimes of the highest order happening where if China were committing them, the world would be on the brink of nuclear war... seriously. Rules are to trick people into believing that those that make them are fair. Crimes today are solely determined by who commits it and who's the victim. By that I'm sure the Three Gorges Dam is considered a "legitimate" target. All you need is the media to spell it out that the dam does something like supply power to a bomb factory and voila... it becomes a legitimate legal target regardless of what you think.

AssassinsMace said:

We live in an age where the definition of words change according to who sees fit. If the definition of words can change on a whim, how hard is it for rules? I can point to many examples of note. If you look at what's been happening in the world you can see human rights crimes of the highest order happening where if China were committing them, the world would be on the brink of nuclear war... seriously. Rules are to trick people into believing that those that make them are fair. Crimes today are solely determined by who commits it and who's the victim. By that I'm sure the Three Gorges Dam is considered a "legitimate" target. All you need is the media to spell it out that the dam does something like supply power to a bomb factory and voila... it becomes a legitimate legal target regardless of what you think.

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Yes, your view might be pessimistic but I have to agree with you on some part of it. But supplying power to a bomb factory? Why not just hit the factory? It would be the most direct way and most obvious choice.

Anyway, one thing we do know is that China's response will be very predictable. Gloves will be coming off and fingernails, claws, fists, palms and whatever else that used to be hiding in the gloves will be out. And I would imagine that would also justify nuclear attacks too. I think some US generals mentioned that attacking a US Carrier would be enough to justify the use of nuclear weapons. If that's the case, attacking the dam would most definitely qualify the use of the nukes.

And China will also play the casualty card. I mean China will continue broadcasting images of those affected by the breached dam and issuing stats of the casualties. The matter will be made at least controversial.

But realistically, I don't think the dam will ever be attacked even in time of war. Like I said before, the dam must be well protected and attacking it will cost HUGE amount of resources that can hardly be justified. Plus, the dam is in central China. Attacking it would mean you have to defeat all the defensive mechanisms that China has in place along the coast and in North, East and South part of China. If that's successful, that means the invading force has pretty much taken over China since the east coast of China is its political and economical center. In that case, destroying the dam becomes meaningless since China would already be in enemy hands... But most likely, anything that tries to approach China will be stopped way before it has a chance to get close to the dam.

ravenshield936 said:

china wont be notified of an imminent attack. plus it's not a legitimate target because thats killing civilians. also i think the damage the dam does will be worse than MULTIPLE strategic nukes combined. no fallout, but the damages are worse. u can explain away a tactical nuke on a regiment, but the message of a dam is you want to kill people, lots of them, millions of them.

destroying the 3 gorges is perhaps nearing in conducting genocide. it's a surefire way of becoming the top enemy of an entire civilization.

?

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Theres a precedence of taking out a country's infrastructure even if it has civilian uses.

eg RAF taking out the German Dams during WW2
USA Bombing raids/strikes in Vietnam
The attacking of the Merchant marine/ during 1st and 2nd WW was considered permissable
Nato bombing in the Balkans taking out bridges etc

THe 3 Gorges dam would be undoubtedly supplying power to the armaments factories or powering other military uses eg radar etc,therefore in a total war situation it does become a legitimate target.

If the forces opposing China was to consider the dam a legit target Im sure it would be well signalled before the actual outbreak of hostilities

To prevent a large scale loss of life downstream, all the authorities in China have to do, is to empty the dam. The ball is in their court so to speak


(All you have to do is go back and read about all the possible targets published prior to the IRAQ wars 1&2 and all possible targets againts Iran by the warmongerers, armchair generals, wanabe military strategists, military forum posters, in fact the whole fkn. kabodle ), and what measures will be taken if IRAN was to play silly buggers in the gulf.

Similarly targets in China would be discussed by the free press in the West as well as examples from above , with comments supporting or dismissive from the military.etc etc

vesicles said:

But supplying power to a bomb factory? Why not just hit the factory? It would be the most direct way and most obvious choice.

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If you want to hide the fact that the primary objective is to destroy the dam and have it be a massive problem for China skirting by all the death and destruction, all you need is to show why the dam had to be destroyed. A bomb factory is an excuse for destroying the dam not the reason. That's all it takes to legitimize it in the public eye. I can give an example with the debate about torture. The argument "for" is that "terrorists" are not a part of any country's army so they aren't protected by the Geneva Convention and have no rights at all. Really... no rights? First of all, someone who says that doesn't know the definition of the term and what it means in the first place. They're talking about privileges not rights. They equate rights as the same importance as getting a license to drive a car. But anyway... does that logic apply to those behind and particpated in the Tibetan and Uighur riots where innocent civilians were killed? By their definition of who has rights or not, the people who participated in those riots don't have or deserve rights because they weren't a part of any country's army. And thus, what is the all the complaining about China mistreating and not giving fair trials to these people when by their own logic and their own actions don't have the rights that protect them? And that's why the Three Gorges Dam wil be considered a legitimate target while targeting the other side's dams will be considered a nuclear retaliatoriable offense because of all the death and destruction that will lay waste in the aftermath.

bladerunner said:

If the forces opposing China was to consider the dam a legit target Im sure it would be well signalled before the actual outbreak of hostilities

To prevent a large scale loss of life downstream, all the authorities in China have to do, is to empty the dam. The ball is in their court so to speak


(All you have to do is go back and read about all the possible targets published prior to the IRAQ wars 1&2 and all possible targets againts Iran by the warmongerers, armchair generals, wanabe military strategists, military forum posters, in fact the whole fkn. kabodle ), and what measures will be taken if IRAN was to play silly buggers in the gulf.

Similarly targets in China would be discussed by the free press in the West as well as examples from above , with comments supporting or dismissive from the military.etc etc

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I think you're being extremely unrealistic here.

First of all, by your logic, any terrorist would be justified in bombing a building provided that he warns the people inside to evacuate first.

Secondly, when was the last time you saw an attack being announced first? Announcing your target means your enemy can set up an ambush for you. If the US didn't even warn Iraq about its intended targets (so that Iraqi civilians can flee), what makes you think any nation can afford to warn China before attacking her?