The West and Iran—Global Dominance and Possible Consequences of Current Fictions
Current tensions between the West and Iran are slipping into a state of degeneration. With fictions competing for dominance on a global scale, the West and Iran, and its partners, are defining the global discourse. Two fictions are competing—the West's notion of Iran as a dangerous nation intent on developing nuclear weapons and Iran's notion of being bullied, insisting on peaceful ambitions. By narrowing the scope of their respective fictions, the West and Iran, and its partners, are restricting the means of resolving the current tensions.
If situations play out poorly, we could witness conflicts unlike the West's recent forays into Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya. As the game for dominance continues to spill into public view, the fictions are solidifying, possibly laying the groundwork for conflicts far more catastrophic than recent situations in the Middle East and in Southeast Asia.
Just glance at the situation. Remove the rhetoric and nationalism, forget assessing possible blame for the current situation; simply observe it as it is now and you'll glimpse pieces of a distinct structure: the Western World is attempting to cripple Iran financially; Iran is threatening to close the Straits of Hormuz, a move that could spike global oil prices, thus inflicting damage on an already shaky global economy.
Israel and the West, specifically the United States, are ratcheting up rhetoric aimed at condemning Iran in the eyes of the world, including implied military action; subterfuge—explosions at testing facilities, assassinations of scientists—is spilling outside of Iran now, with recent violence against Israeli diplomats in Thailand and India.
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http://www.obsense.org/2012/02/west-and-iranglobal-dominance-and.html#!/2012/02/west-and-iranglobal-dominance-and.html
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Ooops! Left out the US & Russia. But in fairness, it's hard for the arsenals of other countries to even show up on the same graph with the top two:
And if you throw in the extra nukes we and the Russians have in mothballs:
Here's a couple of videos that add some real world perspective on those numbers
It’s worth noting that Israel has some nuclear missile submarines too, so if any of their neighbors nuke them, no matter how successfully, Israel could give them a very bad day.
Every world leader knows that not only do we have enough nukes to destroy the whole world several times over, we are the only country who has ever used them. They know that it would be suicidal to nuke us or give a nuke to terrorists to nuke us. That's why the Soviets never attacked us even when they had roughly as many or slightly more nukes than us.
Someone will say the threat of even one nuke going off here is too great. However, the leaders of countries are like chess players. They got into power by being able to accurately predict how their opponents would react to their actions. That's why there are few any examples in history of numerically, technologically, and economically inferior countries launching attacks on a superior country's home turf.
A nuclear attack on us even if successful in itself, would have zero chance of having positive political or economic results for the country that launched it.