We just can't assume we'll spot 'em all...

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=68&e=20&u=/nyt/northkoreahidesnewnuclearsiteevidencesuggests

Ultimately this just goes to show that monitoring, inspections and intelligence will eventually fail us. The root of our problem isn't that countries are trying to obtain nuclear weapons. It's that the countries in question are unstable tyrannies with ties to terrorism and emnity towards the US. No one cares how many bombs France has.

The danger of containment and inspection is that we are only treating symptoms. Unless we cure the disease and change these regimes at their core, we will eventually miss something or fail to act, and we'll pay the price of our negligence with something that makes 9/11 seem like a pleasant memory.

Unless we cure the disease and change these regimes at their core

I''m not just picking one part here to disagree with and ignoring the point of your post. I''m not actually even disagreeing here precisely, but I''m curious if the ''disease'' is actually the regime. Is it even, ultimately, Muslim fundamentalism? I guess I''d ask people what the ''disease'' is? What is the root of the problem?

A bit off topic, I know.

The argument thus far has been that we can focus on national governments because they are the only organizations capable of bringing significant arms to the battlefield, but modern technology has made that assumption obsolete.

While I agree with the notion of a strict military policy regarding threatening nationstates, the presence of a Chirac in the government of a nation largely populated by militant muslim fundamentalists would not signal a cessation to terrorist activities originating in that nation.

Or would it? I think, Elysium, that one can and should still focus some attention on the stability of national governments. While the problem clearly has much to do with culture (when mothers hope and dream of the day they can strap bombs on their sons so that they can die punishing infidels, there seems little hope of any accord reached through fancy speeches), we can not hope to be the police responsible for every corner of the world. Even if that were what we wished, the rest of the world would not allow it. Therefore it must be the responsibility of each government to prevent terrorist organizations from operating within their borders, and to deliver swift, forceful, and decisive punitive measures when such activities do occur.

The world police force must be a hierarchy.

Simply put, the US has to be able to rely on local authorities to effectively combat this distributed threat.

"Elysium" wrote:

Is it even, ultimately, Muslim fundamentalism?

What? Lil'' Kim Jong Il is Muslim? I must have missed that part.

Hmm...go after WOMD where we WANT them to be, or where we KNOW them to be...decisions, decisions...

Right. To use an analogy:

I know Jimmy Hoffa''s not dead. They''ve looked for him for 30 years and haven''t found him.

"Rat Boy" wrote:
"Elysium" wrote:

Is it even, ultimately, Muslim fundamentalism?

What? Lil'' Kim Jong Il is Muslim? I must have missed that part.

Fundamentalist are willing to blow them selves up. Lil'' Kim is willing to sell them things that help fundamentalist blow more stuff up.

I think the problem is that people are turning away from Liberalism. We need to export Liberalism at every chance we can.

No, we shouldn''t allow those damn liberals to get a foothold anywhere!!