Re: The Terrorists are coming!
In message <Pine.3.87.9408011942.A12890-0100000@raven.csrv.uidaho.edu> CatAshleigh writes:
first of all the only "muslim" (NOT ARAB, NO ARABS HAVE NUKES, the only
How do you know?
country with nukes in the middle east is Israel) country with a nuclear program is pakistan, and they're years away from anything that could be stolen.
Ahem. Uzbekistan is Muslim, and is also the third or fourth largest nuclear power, and also is in a part of the world where there is a long tradition of ... how do I say it gently ... greasing the palm. I spent quite a while next door in Afghanistan and am familiar with the culture. A large part of the former USSR was Muslim and there were strategic and tactical nuclear weapons scattered all over the place (tactical weapons are used as mines, fired from artillery pieces, carried by short range missiles, and dropped from fighter bombers). If none of these is unaccounted for, it is a genuine miracle. Also, there has been quite a lot of press coverage here in the UK of the defector from Saudi Arabia who claims that (a) the Saudis backed both the Iraqi and the Pakistani nuclear programs and (b) the Saudis at least have some nuclear materials.
second of all there are more deaths caused by lighting on golf courses, ask any insurance agency.
Also not true. The total number killed directly and indirectly in Japan alone by atomic bombs is certainly over 100,000. I can't believe that that many people have been killed by lightning on golf courses! Then again, we are talking about elementary arithmetic. Yes, the probability of someone being killed by lightning on a golf course tomorrow is much much higher than that of the detonation of a nuclear weapon in a populated area. But when that nuclear weapon goes off, it's not going to be just one golfer that gets scorched.
some call it pork barrel, I call it consperasy theory to protray muslims as terroists.
Pork barrel? -- Jim Dixon
On Aug 1, 10:07pm, Jim Dixon wrote:
A large part of the former USSR was Muslim and there were strategic and tactical nuclear weapons scattered all over the place (tactical weapons are used as mines, fired from artillery pieces, carried by short range missiles, and dropped from fighter bombers). If none of these is unaccounted for, it is a genuine miracle.
Out of curiousity, is anyone aware of whether the USSR employed PAL's (Permissive Activation Links) in their strategic nuclear weaponary? If so, is anyone aware of how secure the PAL's the Soviets actually used were? There was a rumor on USENET some time back that the Soviets were using RSA in their PAL's, but it sounded too much like an urban myth to me. Ian.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Out of curiousity, is anyone aware of whether the USSR employed PAL's (Permissive Activation Links) in their strategic nuclear weaponary? If so, is anyone aware of how secure the PAL's the Soviets actually used were? There was a rumor on USENET some time back that the Soviets were using RSA in their PAL's, but it sounded too much like an urban myth to me.
I suspect they must have had a PAL-like mechanism, although at least some of their weapons rely on interlocks which can only be triggered by a KGB-controlled activator. I remember the USENET rumor as being that the _US_ was using RSA as a component of the comm systems used to transmit Emergency War Orders (EWOs) to US forces. No one has confirmed that, but it certainly seems plausible. Come to think of it, the PALs on US weapons are primarily electromechanical in nature. You get the EWO, you punch in the supplied code into the PAL, and off you go. I'm not sure that RSA would a whole lot of use as part of the PAL mechanism itself (except for signature verification, which is certainly important.) - -Paul - -- Paul Robichaux, KD4JZG | "Information is the currency of democracy." perobich@ingr.com | - some old guy named Thomas Jefferson Of course I don't speak for Intergraph. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6 iQCVAgUBLj+d86fb4pLe9tolAQEllwQAmrjDgCgTwdER8RfyUKybdY9IyVtahYdz OfrdFi813sHZqKCw+ONzCL5sPlIAtLeZzNsqUL8MarM66EbSGzdSilMxVc32eAKe p1j7SXvIVj9gWKM2AS+i0AcEv9HIla417zovTGtowi2stlp34KmhHK7WWGuWqxD+ iWLFcWh9mcg= =BONM -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
participants (3)
-
Ian Farquhar -
jdd@aiki.demon.co.uk -
paul@poboy.b17c.ingr.com