How many nations could conceivably destroy america, if so inclined?

[CalGun]

Saddam and Quadaffi were military men from a very young age, and never had much in the way of formal education. They had the capacity to pull it off (money, men, even international connections). They though their militaries were sufficient to protect them.

A man like Assad is not that stupid. He knows the US military could take him out in a heartbeat if wanted. He knows his military can't protect him, and the only way (push come to shove) he could stay is to distract America with such a conflict. He also commands the resources, capacities and abilities to make such a move.

No its never been done.

Planes never destroyed a fleet of Battle Ships before either - Pearl Harbor,
Bombs like those dropped on Japan to end a ware were never used either,
And planes were never flown into sky scrapers before in an act of war - either.

While anything canhappen, the scenario you described has never happened at the scale you describe,as far as I know.Saddam,Khadaffi,and even Bin Laden didn't (or couldn't) launch an attack against us of that scale.

 

[CalGun]

And what happens if the US power grid is assaulted - its wide open and even a small military force could severely impact it? What happens to that wonderful world of commerce / consumerism from the USA?

Add to this any form of panic regarding oil / fuel prices and it'd be devastating.

I'm more afraid of a collapse of the world's financial system as a cause of the collapse of the $US. The resulting chaos including military action is a frightening idea.

As long as the $US is up and well, I'm not terribly concerned.

 

[Verthaine]

Saddam and Quadaffi were military men from a very young age, and never had much in the way of formal education. They had the capacity to pull it off (money, men, even international connections). They though their militaries were sufficient to protect them.

A man like Assad is not that stupid. He knows the US military could take him out in a heartbeat if wanted. He knows his military can't protect him, and the only way (push come to shove) he could stay is to distract America with such a conflict. He also commands the resources, capacities and abilities to make such a move.

No its never been done.

Planes never destroyed a fleet of Battle Ships before either - Pearl Harbor,
Bombs like those dropped on Japan to end a ware were never used either,
And planes were never flown into sky scrapers before in an act of war - either.

I'm not disputing any of that.
I've already stated that anything can happen.

Is there some diabolical "Dr Evil" out not only planning some heinous act of mass ,but has the ability,resources ,and man power that our Government doesn't know about but you do?
So what do you want us to do about it if this "Dr.Evil" is actually out there in the real world?


What is it that you want,Calgun?
How much is it going to cost,and who is going to pay for it?

 

[Verthaine]

And what happens if the US power grid is assaulted - its wide open and even a small military force could severely impact it? What happens to that wonderful world of commerce / consumerism from the USA?

Add to this any form of panic regarding oil / fuel prices and it'd be devastating.

What do you propose we do about it? How much is it going to cost,and who is going to pay for it?

 

[Oozlefinch]

Saddam and Quadaffi were military men from a very young age, and never had much in the way of formal education.

Actually, Saddam was never a "military man". He came from a modest but influential family, and actually had a fair amount of education (3 years of college, worked as a teacher). He simply was an early joiner of the Ba'ath Party when they began their rise to power, and was not afraid to get his hands dirty in the early days and rose higher because of that.

So Saddam actually has some pretty good education, and was never in the military.

Momar Gaddafi came from an even more modest family (actually impoverished). He was born and lived most of his youth in a tent, and worked his way through 2 years of college before joining the military. He was then selected to attend the Benghazi Military Academy for another 2 years, earning a degree in Engineering. His high grades entitled him to attend a special 1 year training program in England.

So no, neither of them had money, both had extensive education for the region, and neither of them was in any way "military men from a very young age". Momar was 21 before he had any kind of training at all, Saddam never had any military experience.

Research my friend, research.

Planes never destroyed a fleet of Battle Ships before either - Pearl Harbor,
Bombs like those dropped on Japan to end a ware were never used either,
And planes were never flown into sky scrapers before in an act of war - either.

No fleet was "destroyed" at Pearl Harbor. Out of over 90 ships in port at the time, only 9 ships were sunk. And of those 9, 7 were able to return to duty (only the USS Arizona and USS Utah were scrapped or left in place as a memorial). So no, the Japanese did not even come close to "destroying a fleet".

And the Emperor and some cabinet members were already trying to agree on ending the war, but the cabinet was to deadlocked to agree on doing so. The bombs merely gave the Emperor enough clout to make the other members see that ending the war was the only solution other then total destruction. And the effect of the bombs themselves has long been exaggerated. A great many conventional bombing raids had done more death and damage then those 2 bombs combined.

In one single air raid, over 16 square miles of Tokyo was destroyed, with over 100,000 killed (that was just 1 of over half a dozen such attacks). The atomic bomb ended the war because it was the only argument that Emperor Showa was able to give to his cabinet that would make accepting peace possible. And as evidenced by 2 atomic bombs and an attempted coup, even that was almost not enough.

And a decade prior to that nobody had ever placed a giant car bomb in the basement of a skyscraper with the intent of toppling the building either. SO I really don't get where you are trying to go with that at all.

 

[ChezC3]

The largest existential threat to America, the single greatest danger we face as Americans, is Americans.

 

[German guy]

And what happens if the US power grid is assaulted - its wide open and even a small military force could severely impact it? What happens to that wonderful world of commerce / consumerism from the USA?

Add to this any form of panic regarding oil / fuel prices and it'd be devastating.

Yes, I think a large-scale terrorist attack could cause such a collapse (think of a single nuke detonated in the center of NY or something).

At any rate, I think asymmetric threats are much more probable possibility at the moment than a conventional attack on America, with or without nukes. Without a major collapse, no other nation even comes close to successfully invading America.

 

[joko104]

An army of 900 well trained men, smuggled across our wide open borders, and armed inside the United States would bring our society to collapse in a weekend. It doesn't take a military confrontation or a weapon of mass destruction.

1) They attack shopping malls / centers and kill thousands forcing America to shut down,
2) They destroy the grid by simply taking down massive transmission lines,
3) They hit key choke points and diesel fueling stations so that our commerce is toast, food shipments end,

America would implode in 10-20 days.

I don't think American would implode. Rather, I think the actions of Department of Homeland Security would make the German Gestapo look a bunch of ******s by comparison - and Americans are such scaredy-cats the overwhelming majority would approve of it too.

 

[CalGun]

The answer is not to create an enemy state that would do so such a thing. We keep toppling off dictators like "its our job" and one day one of them is going to bite us in the back side with a large number of dedicated men - and we are vulnerable. We could secure our border, we could increase our intelligence gathering, OR we could just stop meddling in the affairs of other nations when we don't like how they run things.

(and no Ron Paul fans that does not mean close down all foreign installations and run from the world - it just means leave other nations be)

What do you propose we do about it? How much is it going to cost,and who is going to pay for it?

 

[Verthaine]

The answer is not to create an enemy state that would do so such a thing. We keep toppling off dictators like "its our job" and one day one of them is going to bite us in the back side with a large number of dedicated men - and we are vulnerable. We could secure our border, we could increase our intelligence gathering, OR we could just stop meddling in the affairs of other nations when we don't like how they run things.

(and no Ron Paul fans that does not mean close down all foreign installations and run from the world - it just means leave other nations be)

Good luck with that.We can't get people in this country to stop giving a crap about gays marrying,or whats going in some woman's womb IN THIS COUNTRY.If we are not meddling in some other countries affairs,then we are meddling in the affairs of our own citizens.
We're Americans,that's what we do.

I agree that we are vulnerable,but reversing that isn't something that doesn't come without a price.Somebody has to pay something somewhere for our security.
And it doesn't come cheap.
And somebody (or somebodies) is making lot of money off us sticking our noses into other countries affairs.
These people seem to be very very powerful,and if you want to stop these people from making tons of money off having us meddle in other countries affairs,be my guest.Good luck with that.
I for one know I'm not bulletproof,and ideologies make a poor substitute for kevlar body armor.
I've met some very wealthy and powerful people in my time,and they scare me more than terrorists do.
These people can make whole families disappear.
And some of them work for our own government.

Very powerful people have a bad habit of doing very nasty things to people who get in the way of their power and wealth.
I have no plans on being one of those people.I have a family to think about.

We as a nation may be vulnerable,but we are not a weak nation.If we as a nation is about to go down,we as a nation have no problem dragging the rest of the planet down with us.


Now personally,I agree we shouldn't be meddling in other countries affairs.

 

[Morrigi]

The only nation capable of taking down America is America itself, most likely due to a combination of political unrest and open rebellion by a small minority.

Thing is, a few dozen somewhat simultaneous attacks across America against government assets would probably cripple the country for days, if not weeks.

This would give time for a theoretical revolutionary faction to recruit additional manpower after showing the the great pillars of the government could in fact be harmed. At that point, public support may well go off the deep end depending on the revolutionaries' stated goals. A vow for a return to Constitutional policy would probably get the most on board. This nation's biggest vulnerability is the people themselves, as it should be. This is why the government is doing its best to ensure that the people will accept policies reducing or eliminating our power and force us to do so if we do not without fear of armed retaliation.

No conventional military could invade the United States without taking horrific losses from both our military and the inevitable involvement of civilian irregulars. There is simply too much land to cover and too many armed civilians to allow any kind of occupation. To capitalize on that, it has been estimated that there are over 100 million rifles and over 80 million shotguns owned by American civilians. This would make engagements by enemy infantry in all terrain problematic, probably more so than in the Middle East because I'd bet your average American gun owner is a better shot than their Afghan or Iraqi counterparts.

Sure, there would be a lot of American casualties, but it has been shown time and time again that an invaded country is often able to soak up far more casualties than its invading foe. This is to say nothing of the capabilities of the American military which is optimized to fight against a large conventional army and would likely wipe any invading force off the map barring the disabling of equipment that a large EMP would bring. Even if that was the case, you'd still have tens of millions of armed civilians to deal with, more and more of whom would join the cause as their friends and families are killed by occupying forces.

 

[beerftw]

Any one of Russia, UK and France, could get up with a bad hangover and fire 200 nukes stateside.
Russia could probably send 2000 nukes stateside.

Is there anyone else out there that could get up tomorrow and end your world, if they decided to?[/QUO

some people apparently are unaware of the mad or mutual assured destruction doctrine.

it started after the cuban missle crisis,when icbm's werent a major factor yet,and russia was sending nukes to cuba,close enought to hit america.after all the fear and turmoil,the solution was to send nukes to turkey,close enough to hit moscow,this started the mad doctrine,or in lamens if you destroy us we destroy you as well.

since icbm's became common,the mad doctrine applied to every nuclear nation,in that if russia attacked america,it would us its missles hidden in shelters resistant of nuclear blasts to fire back and destroy russia.if america attacked russia,russia had multiple bunkers and mobile icbm lauchers ready to retaliate and destroy america.


in the end the mad doctrine proved to be highly effective,as no single country could ever win a nuclear war,deterring anyone from trying it.

 

[Sherman123]

Any one of Russia, UK and France, could get up with a bad hangover and fire 200 nukes stateside.
Russia could probably send 2000 nukes stateside.

Is there anyone else out there that could get up tomorrow and end your world, if they decided to?[/QUO

some people apparently are unaware of the mad or mutual assured destruction doctrine.

it started after the cuban missle crisis,when icbm's werent a major factor yet,and russia was sending nukes to cuba,close enought to hit america.after all the fear and turmoil,the solution was to send nukes to turkey,close enough to hit moscow,this started the mad doctrine,or in lamens if you destroy us we destroy you as well.

since icbm's became common,the mad doctrine applied to every nuclear nation,in that if russia attacked america,it would us its missles hidden in shelters resistant of nuclear blasts to fire back and destroy russia.if america attacked russia,russia had multiple bunkers and mobile icbm lauchers ready to retaliate and destroy america.


in the end the mad doctrine proved to be highly effective,as no single country could ever win a nuclear war,deterring anyone from trying it.

I mean that isn't expressly true. MAD applied to the Soviet Union and the United States, and it probably holds true to the United States and the Russian Federation (though its possible that in the future this would no longer be the case. Does MAD apply between the United States and China though? That is much less clear, and many would argue that with a very carefully planned first strike the United States could initiate a nuclear conflict with China with a high probability of negating an attack in return, certainly of preventing anything approaching mutual destruction. Likewise does MAD exist between the US and Pakistan? In that instance the answer is rather clearly not at all.

 

[beerftw]

I mean that isn't expressly true. MAD applied to the Soviet Union and the United States, and it probably holds true to the United States and the Russian Federation (though its possible that in the future this would no longer be the case. Does MAD apply between the United States and China though? That is much less clear, and many would argue that with a very carefully planned first strike the United States could initiate a nuclear conflict with China with a high probability of negating an attack in return, certainly of preventing anything approaching mutual destruction. Likewise does MAD exist between the US and Pakistan? In that instance the answer is rather clearly not at all.

both the us and russia have enough nukes to pretty much destrtoy the civilized world,ie most major cities,while the radiation clouds would kill everyone else not in bunkers or in select regions more immune to the clouds like deep valleys.

basically mad doesnt just mean you destroy me i destroy you,it can also be used as you destroy me i destroy everyone.

 

[Oozlefinch]

Does MAD apply between the United States and China though?

MAD pretty much works against all nations, for the same reason.

Any nation that launches first is going to instantly become an international pariah nation, period. And likely be attacked by a great many other nations, if nothing else then because of fear they might get attacked next, or because their country will fall into the range of fallout. The consequences will be much less for the responder nation(s), but remember that they are already getting nuked.

This is pretty much what keeps any nation from talking about nukes as a first strike weapon. It does not work quite the way it did during the Cold War, but the principal remains.

 

[American]

The biggest threats to America right now are non-State actors, like private financial institutions, globalists and terrorists.

Soft powers like China are already chipping away at us, via trade deficits.

No one has to attack us to take us down. We are rotting from the inside out, thanks to our own people betraying us.

Like Congress?

 

[American]

The biggest threats to America right now are non-State actors, like private financial institutions, globalists and terrorists.

Soft powers like China are already chipping away at us, via trade deficits.

No one has to attack us to take us down. We are rotting from the inside out, thanks to our own people betraying us.

Here's the problem with all the arguments about the US collapsing from the inside. It's always discussed in a vacuum. Understand that all other countries are also rotting from the inside. There is no perfect scenario where only the US has problems and no one else. Even the overrated Chinese are having major internal problems, only thing is we are an open society and all our dirty laundry is public. Totalitarian regimes put galactic efforts into hiding all their problems and projecting a phoney front. Trust me, the ChiComs are going to get stupid because they haven't invented some magic formula to take over the galaxy that no one else has ever thought of. They aren't smarter than we are, they are just finally developing. If you believe they have 1.5 billion rich people, you are delusional. The American people are far from finished, but what we have is a set of social justice politicians who want to change America into something it never was; and cannot be. And that is a country of lazy, unindustrious, me people.

 

[Morrigi]

The problem with the States is our currency, which only has a basis of oil money and pure, unadulterated faith. Once the oil runs out the faith will run out. Once that happens, the dollar will collapse into nothing overnight and we will be the first to fall, closely followed by others who trade primarily in the dollar. China will be hit very hard but is in the process of spreading their national currency, the yuan, into other countries. Australia has already accepted this offer and the deal is planned to go into effect in 2014.

It is no coincidence that Iraq, Libya, and Iran already have or have/had been planning dollar-independent currency in regards to their oil sales. For those wondering about our involvement in Iran, one word. Syria. Syria is Iran's closest ally and the two nations are also bound by a mutual defense agreement. Destabilizing Syria would have a profound effect on Iran and would thus be in the government's best interests. However Russia and China are not amused, and last year Russia warned us that any acts of war against Syria or Iran could escalate the regional conflict into something far larger, possibly resulting in the use of nuclear weapons by a vague and unspecified entity in the general region.

 

[Oozlefinch]

The problem with the States is our currency, which only has a basis of oil money and pure, unadulterated faith. Once the oil runs out the faith will run out. Once that happens, the dollar will collapse into nothing overnight and we will be the first to fall, closely followed by others who trade primarily in the dollar.

Actually, that has nothing to do with the value of our currency. The value of our currency is based upon the value of the nation, which is a staggering $280 trillion+.

In fact, International Petroleum is traded upon the US Dollar ("Petrodollar") simply because it is historically the most stable currency in the world.

We disassociated our currency from hard commodities decades ago simply because it makes a currency unstable and more prone to inflation-deflation. I never understood the desire to return to tying currency to something that would cause it to inflate in value by over 20% in a single year.

 

[American]

The problem with the States is our currency, which only has a basis of oil money and pure, unadulterated faith. Once the oil runs out the faith will run out. Once that happens, the dollar will collapse into nothing overnight and we will be the first to fall, closely followed by others who trade primarily in the dollar. China will be hit very hard but is in the process of spreading their national currency, the yuan, into other countries. Australia has already accepted this offer and the deal is planned to go into effect in 2014.

It is no coincidence that Iraq, Libya, and Iran already have or have/had been planning dollar-independent currency in regards to their oil sales. For those wondering about our involvement in Iran, one word. Syria. Syria is Iran's closest ally and the two nations are also bound by a mutual defense agreement. Destabilizing Syria would have a profound effect on Iran and would thus be in the government's best interests. However Russia and China are not amused, and last year Russia warned us that any acts of war against Syria or Iran could escalate the regional conflict into something far larger, possibly resulting in the use of nuclear weapons by a vague and unspecified entity in the general region.

You got sources?

 

[Oozlefinch]

You got sources?

Sure he does!

What silly questions you ask American!

 

[American]

Sure he does!

What silly questions you ask American!

Let's all drink, so we too can be delusional. :beer:

 

[Jango]

The largest existential threat to America, the single greatest danger we face as Americans, is Americans.

Besides cyberattacks and money problems, internal conflict is what I view as the only other credible threat to our nation.

 

[Thoreau72]

As far as destroying america goes, it seems the domestic enemies of the US Constitution have been far more successful at that effort than ANY of the foreign enemies of america.

By way of our elected representatives and appointed officials, america has been greatly weakened by the legislative and judicial processes, and of course the Unitary Executive.

Domestic enemies within government are daily succeeding in destroying america, with great help from Wall Street.

 

[Ad_Captandum]

The only countries that could wake up tomorrow and decide '**** the US' are Russia, France, the UK and China.

Give it a few years, and India, Pakistan, maybe Germany, Israel, and maaaaaybe Iran and North Korea if they get their ICBM programme together.