1. No high end hardware is being tied down (B2s, Aegis ships, F22s, etc).
So no carriers are on station? Those carriers are operating without escorts?
And it is not just frontline assets that I was talking about. Significant back-end support, such as AWACS, tankers, C&C equipment and personnel etc are all tied down supporting the operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Have a good look at the map and see just how far those F22s will get without massive tanker support, or how long those B2s will last in Chinese airspace when the PLA's air defense capabilities are fully operational.
2. More and more responsibilities (particularly the fron end duties) are being handed over to local forces and military contractors (Blackwater and the like).
They are taking over the kind of operations and that have zero bearing on this discussion, unless Blackwater (who changed their name to Xe btw) started operating carriers now.
And the US Pacific Fleet is not active in the area at any given time? And US Pacific Air Force and Marine Corp is sitting in Hawaii only? Do you even know how many US warships are in South China Sea, East China Sea and Sea of Japan at any 1 time? Not to mention the sizeable US military assets based in RoK, Japan and Guam. There's a reason why the USN is known as the only global navy on this planet.
Maybe you would care to look on a map and then figure out how useful military bases in South Korea or the vast majority of bases in Japan will be in a Taiwan scenario. Not to mention the very likely case that South Korea at the very least will not allow bases on their soil to be used in hostilities against China for fear that that would re-start the Korean War.
The USN have a global presence, but if those few picket ships tried to starting something against the likes of China without proper support, then the only thing that will happen is they will get sunk.
The USN is not stupid and knows is. That is why they will not start shooting until they feel they have gathered enough strength to have at least a fighting chance. Harder to do if half their fleet was occupied fighting a war against Iran in the Gulf.
The Israelis asked for the US bunker busting bomb that can take out the hardened nuclear facility. The US rejected the request. Otherwise, the strike would have taken place already.
And did you not bother to stop for a minute and think why exactly the US vetoed the strike by refusing those weapons? Or did you think that was some new budget cut?
As for back-up facilities, I'd think Mossad would have figured it out already and factored it into their plan. There's plenty of allegations as it is about Mossad's assassination of the people involved in the Iran nuclear program.
You'd 'think'? So just how sure is that? 70%? 80%? What's the risk assessment here? How much would you be willing to bet on Mossad having found every single last site? Are you willing to bet your life on it? The lives of your loved ones?
You need to be pretty absolutely damn sure if you are going to green light such a strike, because you are literally betting with thousands, maybe even millions of lives that you are 100% right.
If you cannot be 100% certain, your only options are to go in all out on the ground to make sure you got everything, or don't even start anything in the first place.
And there is no loose nuclear material from the collapse of the USSR? From discarded medical equipment that uses radioactive sources?
Do you have any idea at how much effort has been put into tracking down and safely disposing of those materials?
And you obviously need to read up firstly on just how little radioactive materials there is in most 'radioactive' medical equipment, and secondly on how much monitoring and safety checks there are to make sure all of those materials are properly accounted for and safely disposed of.
What more, there is a world of difference between how hard it would be for terrorists to try and find and secure a suitable source of radioactive material, having the equipment and expertise to extract, purify and weaponize it, compared to a state agent knocking on their door with a briefcase bomb ready to go.
Terrorist organisations are very good are recruiting and training up bombers, it is finding, processing and weaponizing the suitable materials that is their current bottleneck. One that could be quickly removed if a certain government is hacked off enough and don't think they have much else to loose.
In more developed countries, there are nuclear waste dumps:
These are public knowledge and provide enough radioactive material for dangerous purposes. In less developed countries, these are dumped as common trash. A person with a Geiger counter can actually locate and collect it. Much easier to obtain and at much lower cost compared to loose Iranian sources.
Oh wow, just how stupid do you think the world's best counter-intelligence agencies are if it really is that easy to make a dirty bomb?
Talking tough on the interwebs is easy. If you actually thought about the logistics or even have the most basic knowledge about how things worked, you would realize how silly what you are suggesting is.
First of all, as I mentioned earlier, 'radioactive' parts in the overwhelming majority of medical equipment only contain extremely weak radioactive sources. If you made a dirty bomb out of that stuff, the worst you will do is make it unsafe for people exposed to the particles to have x-rays for a few years. Maybe a mildly increased risk of cancer in their later life. Not pleasant, but certainly not what anyone has in mind when they talk of 'dirty bombs'.
For the tiny number of specialist equipment that does have mildly strong radioactive parts, those machines and parts are strictly monitored. What more, these machines tend to be the size of cars and weigh in the tons. They are not the kind of thing that can easily go missing or be misplaced. And there are people who's jobs are all about making sure all those those machines and their critical parts never go missing (and tracking those down if they do go walkies).
And lastly, just basic engineering. When you need to use a strong radioactive material, you need to properly shield it so it is safe to use. Most safes are easier to get into. And unless that shielding was breached, your Geigor Counter would tell you nothing even if you were standing right on top of the most powerful radioactive material known to man.
All of this is pure common sense. And there are lots more measures that I will not bother to get into here since it is off topic and also since I believe I have already made my point.
