Thibaud

Of course France is an unlikely target. I was just pointing out that it and England have nuclear deterrent.

If Iran arranges from bombs to go off in the US, they will be dirty simply from being ground bursts. If they added cobalt or other dirtyingg elements, it would be even worse.

Which is why we need to defang them, and have a doctrine of destroying any untrustworthy nuclear power after we are his with an anonymous nuke.

My concern is that proliferation destroys deterrence. I note that the government just started a program to identify the origins of a nuke after it has gone off. Obviously they share my concern.

If one looks down the road a few years, Iran ends up with ICBM’s, and which case they have a direct deterrent against us (unless we make more progress on ABMs). In such a situation, a plan by us to topple the regime could result in nuclear launches as a dead-mans strategy. We have the same problem with North Korea, except their ICBM may be just around the corner, and out ABM system is (barely) operational.