[Cog]

Cid for being a Republican, you don't know jack about trade deals. The business of America is business. You completely avoid the issue that someone is going to sell the nuclear reactors to Saudi. If not us the Chinese or Russians. You going to trust them with oversight? I thought your side hated Russia nowadays. There wasn't anything covert about Trump's administration efforts to deal with Saudis for reactors. In the article I linked the administration official spoke openly about the desire. Just because your new Democrat controlled House committee is having a case of the vapors about it doesn't mean squat.

What you fail to understand about Trump is he is about American companies and American jobs. Even when he failed to reach a deal with North Korea to get rid of their nuclear weapons, he was signing a $20 billion dollar deal with Vietnam to buy Boeing planes. Your fake news media didn't mention that one.

[Cid_Yama]

Recent press accounts indicate that the effort to provide Saudi Arabia with sensitive U.S.
nuclear technology has shifted to Secretary Rick Perry at the Department of Energy, although the
White House—and Mr. Kushner—allegedly remain directly involved. In fact, the President is
reported to be directly engaged in the effort, maintaining contact with IP3 about the plans and
expressing his support for the transfer of nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia. These reports also
indicate that Saudi Arabia is refusing to agree to prohibitions on enriching uranium and
processing plutonium similar to those agreed to by other countries in the region.

In February 2018, it was reported: “The administration is considering permitting Saudi
Arabia to enrich and reprocess uranium as part of a deal that would allow Westinghouse
Electric Co. and other American companies to build nuclear reactors in the Middle East
kingdom.”28

There is now serious, bipartisan concern with the Trump Administration’s efforts to
transfer sensitive U.S. nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia.

For example, on October 31, 2018, Republican Senators Marco Rubio, Todd Young,
Cory Gardner, Rand Paul, and Dean Heller sent a letter to President Trump urging him to
“suspend talks related to a potential civil nuclear cooperation agreement between the United
States and Saudi Arabia” due to “serious concerns about the transparency, accountability, and
judgment of current decision makers in Saudi Arabia.” They explained:

We remain concerned that the Saudi Government has refused, for many years, to
consider any agreement that includes so-called “Gold Standard” requirements against
pursuing technologies to enrich uranium and reprocess plutonium-laden spent nuclear
fuel.47

Executive Summary of the Interim Report


What you Banana Republicans don't seem to understand, is that the Rule of Law and Common Sense MUST override 'Business is Business'. Otherwise you end up with a corrupt cesspool that is a danger to everyone.

Real Republicans know better. Corruption and Criminal Enterprises destroy the business environment where transactions take place. If Trade is harmed, you don't have business. Just the strong feeding on the weak, where there is no point in producing anything.

[Cog]

Elijah Cummings(D) I thought I smelled the partisan stench of that report. The man is as dumb as a bag of hammers. He proved that with the Cohen hearings. What are the names of the whistleblowers? I want to know if they are stay behind Obama people like what still infest the FBI and CIA.

This is just more partisan fluff intended to stir up the uninformed. The Trump administration isn't trying to circumvent the law here. This so called report is like reading a Buzzfeed news report. But it does point out something important. The Democrats are so filled with Trump hate they will destroy American business at the cost of American jobs to defeat his agenda.

[dissident]

Hysteria over North Korean nukes but zero care about terrorist central from getting even the precursor tech. Compartmentalized, propaganda-generated thinking at its most brazen. The US always "worries" about dual use supplies (recall the ban on chlorine supplies to Iraq which resulted in lack of water treatment and widespread disease). But in the case of its protectorate, terrorist central, it does not care.

Only US politicians think that they create reality. They can behave like they are doing this, but they are only jumping around like retarded chimps.

[evilgenius]

Is it too dangerous to exploit nuclear power in order to electrify the world? It seems like there is a two fold danger; that of weapons, and that of old plants that fall into a failed state of maintenance. Maybe the newer kinds of reactors would mitigate both of those worries? What kind of tech do the Saudis want? I think they have wanted, on and off, a nuclear program in the past. When it didn't come easy they seemed to give up on it. I don't know if that was because they were easily bribed off of that plan by cagey Western politicians, or if their own scientists put the stall on their plans, or if it was for some other reason. If this story is true, it looks like they are in the market for another round at an easy path to it. I wonder what it would take to bribe them off of it again? The last thing you want introduced into the Arab/Israeli conflict, to cite a worst case scenario coming from easy to buy nuclear weapons technology in the region, would be something vastly destructive that doesn't need to cross any checkpoints because of the range of its destructiveness, say in East Jerusalem.

[Cog]

Saudi Arabia has signed the Non-proliferation treaty and are entitled to the use of nuclear power generation. Now if you prefer, the Chinese, Russians, or France can sell them the technology without the safeguards the USA would put in place. But I prefer that money and technology originates from US companies.

The Democrats are just upset that Trump is doing this instead of Hillary, and will stop at nothing to wreck the US economy to make him look bad.

[Ibon]

It would be positive to see some announcements regarding new generation nuclear plants being started as a foundation for a secure energy grid in North America.

[KaiserJeep]

In fact there ARE what are called 4th generation prototype nuclear plants being built by American companies. However they are all located in China.

Understand that the regulatory agency requirements are not the issue. The issue is the anti-nuclear stance of many US citizens. The legal costs of litigating both permits and ongoing operations is what makes nuclear so expensive here. Fracked natural gas is replacing many nuclear plants because the cost per kwhr is cheaper. Thus low carbon power plants are being replaced with medium carbon plants in the USA.

[eclipse]

A fascinating question is how long it would take for civilisation to rebuild after a nuclear war.

Isaac Arthur (physicist and futurist) predicts industrial society would have mostly rebuilt within a few generations of a nuclear war.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWmEgu1iP_E

In some ways it would be much faster than the first industrial revolution, as we have already learned the laws of physics and chemistry and biology that make the modern world possible. All survivors would have to do is dig through buried libraries and dig up the engineering information to start rebuilding things. In other ways it would be slower and more dependent on local renewable energy sources as we've already burned up all the easy to get fossil fuels. But they'd get things up and running eventually, even if the local workshop had to stop working on cloudy days. Smart survivalists might have seen the war coming and downloaded and printed out this "Civilisation starter kit" to have some knowledge to trade. https://www.opensourceecology.org/gvcs/ ... ine-index/
But if not, other places will have their technical people dig up and study old manuals (by candlelight?) in the evenings as they're will be no TV for a while. What else are you going to do but research that next component to salvage for your workshop needs?

Bit by bit society would build up again, but in a more walkable, human based city plan. Energy would be more valuable and prioritised for the most important survival and salvaging efforts. That is, until finally someone gets the nukes started again. Once they get the breeder reactors up and running, any nuclear waste in that country becomes an incredible asset that could power the nation for centuries to come.

[Zarquon]

It's not exactly hot news anymore, but just because I just stumbled across it:

https://www.wagingpeace.org/general-lee-butler/

The former commander of all US nuclear forces ('91-'94), after retiring, went very public, calling for the abolition of all nukes everywhere. Calls the theory of nuclear "deterrence" basically a bunch of nonsense. Says that the fact that mankind made it through the cold war is, if you like, more due to divine intervention than just dumb luck and certainly not due to skill. That Hiroshima wasn't about "saving lives". That nuclear weapons have no strategic value. That nukes are, as usual with the military-industrial complex, a racket.

He knows this stuff better than pretty much anyone. If you've commented in this long thread before, repeating the old, official cold war arguments, please read the interview.

[Newfie]

IMHO, and that’s all it is, the greatest deterrent we have is the global economy. At this point China and the West are so economically intertwined that we are symbiotic, we feed off one another.

Where I perceive the danger is that down the road to collapse, after a financial market meltdown, there may come a time when one of the big powers decides its going to “go it alone”. Either to take over the world or retreat into isolation, but it needs to reduce the threat on its borders first.

But these events are pretty far out in time. Not really predictable, or controllable.

[vtsnowedin]

But these events are pretty far out in time. Not really predictable, or controllable.

I hope you are right in that but I worry that someone, Perhaps China, will make a mistake that sets catastrophe in motion. Crushing dissent in Hong Kong or invading Taiwan are possibilities and elsewhere Iran might try to strike Israel which I think would be a quickly fatal mistake on their part but might then escalate.

[Tanada]

It's not exactly hot news anymore, but just because I just stumbled across it:

https://www.wagingpeace.org/general-lee-butler/

The former commander of all US nuclear forces ('91-'94), after retiring, went very public, calling for the abolition of all nukes everywhere. Calls the theory of nuclear "deterrence" basically a bunch of nonsense. Says that the fact that mankind made it through the cold war is, if you like, more due to divine intervention than just dumb luck and certainly not due to skill. That Hiroshima wasn't about "saving lives". That nuclear weapons have no strategic value. That nukes are, as usual with the military-industrial complex, a racket.

He knows this stuff better than pretty much anyone. If you've commented in this long thread before, repeating the old, official cold war arguments, please read the interview.

Okay I read the whole thing as you asked. Not only does he not say "Hiroshima wasn't about saving lives" what he actually said was alternative targets could have been chosen to cause fewer civilian casualties.

He does say that Deterrence is a very bad reason to use for building up unlimited numbers of nuclear weapons, but the idea that in our current world situation that every country will willingly not only give up nuclear weapons but allow the kind of invasive inspections that would be necessary to prevent their secret stockpiling is purest fantasy.

The world as always is a dangerous place. Pulling the covers over your head and saying nobody will be allowed nuclear weapons from date X is not a rational response to the existence of nuclear weapons. I hope we never find ourselves in a situation where those weapons are used, but pretending we never will is at best a fantasy and at worst deadly denialist wish fulfillment.

I also find it very troubling that despite the fact that the US Military had created four war plan options the only option he ever offered in a simulation was total war. How ridiculous is that? He then justifies this stance by saying the USSR had planned a total force response to any American counter attack. That is patently nuts because it presumes that if the USSR had initiated a limited nuclear attack their real goal was total attack when the retaliation was launched. That in his mind justified the USA launching a total response no matter what size the USSR attack was in the "first strike". That is not rational thinking and I really truly wish that our political leadership would participate in these simulations. Any politician might fall for the "I recommend MAO-4" answer once or twice in a simulation, but once they went through it a time or three the rational part of the mind would be asking "Why does this general always call for a total response no matter what size the Soviet attack is?" The fact that the other person on the line during these simulations was probably a military officer with the same mindset means they never said "No general, I want MAO-1 as closely matched to the attack as you can manage" instead of acceding to what the head of NORAD recommended. In that case the simulation would have had to continue a bit further and whomever was playing "Team Red" would have had to try and make a rational response to the USA counter strike instead of reflexively responding with a full out attack in the face of a full out attack.

The whole purpose of simulations the way NASA does it for example, seems how I am familiar with their method, is to stress the participants as much as possible so that if a real situation occurs they can respond rationally rather than reflexively. From everything in that interview the US military planning was rote reflexive response, you could leave the leadership completely out of the picture because you knew going in what the answer is always going to be. I find that far more terrifying than the idea that the world has nuclear weapons, a situation that is not about to change any time soon.

[sparky]

.
" A population of 1BIL with people consuming around 1900 levels seems to be the best estimate of a longer-term carrying capacity."

that's about the best one could expect if population is controlled at this level ,
the 20th century failed in this in spite of two horrendous wars , a multitude of absolutely huge civil wars , several famines with millions of dead
also the mother of all pan epidemics with some other erupting at regular interval .

not too good a solution if it would only last for a few decades only , I would think a reduction to 100 millions is more sustainable

[vtsnowedin]

.
" A population of 1BIL with people consuming around 1900 levels seems to be the best estimate of a longer-term carrying capacity."

that's about the best one could expect if population is controlled at this level ,
the 20th century failed in this in spite of two horrendous wars , a multitude of absolutely huge civil wars , several famines with millions of dead
also the mother of all pan epidemics with some other erupting at regular interval .

not too good a solution if it would only last for a few decades only , I would think a reduction to 100 millions is more sustainable

I wonder what you base that on but more importantly how would you propose to get the current seven billion down to less then one? A world covered with radioactive glass craters post nuclear war might not support 100 people much less half a billion. Like New England back roads in Mud season "You can't get there from here."

[sparky]

.
@vtsnowedin
"A world covered with radioactive glass craters post nuclear war might not support 100 people much less half a billion"

the concept of a dead world following a total nuclear exchange is a meme with no reality
Hiroshima and Nagasaki are thriving city since the mid 1950ies ,Chernobyl is a nature haven

the myth of nuclear dead zone lasting decades or centuries was created by anti-nuclear campaigners and specifically targeted to mothers to scare the bejesus out of them and suspend they critical thinking
this was so successful it was kept in spite of zero evidence for it and plenty of evidence against it

as for my numbers it took less than one hundred years to go from a bit more than one billion people to seven
so I would think as a long term solution one billion population is not going to make much difference

The first principle of population growth is that it will expand to use all the food available
wars , pandemics and asteroids will not make any difference long term only food restriction will

[vtsnowedin]

A meme you say? Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 to 20 Kilotons. Today's active weapons range form 100 KT to 1.2 Megatons (1200kt) and a single SLBM can have eight 475kt independently targeted warheads on a single missile. A single Trident submarine can have 24 SLBMs each with 8 MIRVed warheads. The football that follows the president has access to something on the order of 500 MT of throw weight at any time. The Russians and Chinese can match us warhead for warhead.
And Chernobyl was not a nuclear explosion but a steam explosion that released radiation. If it had gone critical and detonated there would be no reactor there that needed to be covered by the sarcophagus of concrete they have put over it.
There is plenty of evidence that a full blown nuclear war would almost certainly wipe out all life forms on the planet higher then a cockroach.

[Tanada]

A meme you say? Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 to 20 Kilotons. Today's active weapons range form 100 KT to 1.2 Megatons (1200kt) and a single SLBM can have eight 475kt independently targeted warheads on a single missile. A single Trident submarine can have 24 SLBMs each with 8 MIRVed warheads. The football that follows the president has access to something on the order of 500 MT of throw weight at any time. The Russians and Chinese can match us warhead for warhead.
And Chernobyl was not a nuclear explosion but a steam explosion that released radiation. If it had gone critical and detonated there would be no reactor there that needed to be covered by the sarcophagus of concrete they have put over it.
There is plenty of evidence that a full blown nuclear war would almost certainly wipe out all life forms on the planet higher then a cockroach.

Quite the contrary if you actually use science rather than propaganda. Even at the very height of the cold war in 1988 when the world had about 5 times the current nuclear weapon yield we never came close to the number needed to eliminate "everything above a cockroach". Today though the threat of war remains real the level of potential damage to the ecosystem is vastly reduced from 1989 levels.

Chernobyl, where the radioactive materials released were not "fresh" from a nuclear detonation actually released a much higher fall out than any nuclear weapon. Any nuclear bomb detonating releases just a few kilograms of fission fragments, that is inherent in how they function. Those fragments only become fall out when they stick to dust or other bits of matter which causes them to settle on the ground. The vast majority of modern weapons are intended to detonate at moderate altitudes like those over Hiroshima and Nagasaki which in turn means the fallout is very low compared to a ground burst. Hiroshima and Nagasaki started rebuilding in weeks after the bombs, not years or decades, because their was very little residual radiation after 14 days.

The whole point of a "fall out shelter" is to allow people to avoid the fallout during that 14 day period when it is decaying away. To an extent the same thing happens with a nuclear power plant, the decay products are extremely intense at shutdown and the core needs strong cooling for the first week after shut down to deal with the energy released. What destroyed the cores at Three Mile Island and Fukushima was lack of adequate cooling during that first two weeks after shut down. It isn't magic, it is physics.

[sparky]

.
The number of nuclear warheads has decreased by seven fold
their power also is much less ( because it is not needed ) the W88 used for MIRVed has a yield of 500 kilotons
China arsenal is very small ,
https://fas.org/issues/nuclear-weapons/ ... ar-forces/

nuclear weapons use fusion as their main explosive force this produce isotopes at the light end of the element table ,
all of them decay in a matter of seconds , hours or a few days
https://roadtrippers.com/magazine/trini ... ew-mexico/

nuclear reactor use Uranium and produce isotopes at the heavy end of the table , while some are short lived ,
there is some with half live longer than a human life span ,
keeping the spent fuel in a cooling pond for a couple of years see the total radioactivity drop substantially
the residual radiation is best to be left in peace for a couple of decade then reprocessed

Nuclear power both civilian and military is powerful stuff and is no joking matter
but the meme of demonic nuclear is just that , a made up propaganda exaggeration

[vtsnowedin]

.......

Chernobyl, where the radioactive materials released were not "fresh" from a nuclear detonation actually released a much higher fall out than any nuclear weapon. Any nuclear bomb detonating releases just a few kilograms of fission fragments, that is inherent in how they function. Those fragments only become fall out when they stick to dust or other bits of matter which causes them to settle on the ground. The vast majority of modern weapons are intended to detonate at moderate altitudes like those over Hiroshima and Nagasaki which in turn means the fallout is very low compared to a ground burst. Hiroshima and Nagasaki started rebuilding in weeks after the bombs, not years or decades, because their was very little residual radiation after 14 days.

The whole point of a "fall out shelter" is to allow people to avoid the fallout during that 14 day period when it is decaying away. To an extent the same thing happens with a nuclear power plant, the decay products are extremely intense at shutdown and the core needs strong cooling for the first week after shut down to deal with the energy released. What destroyed the cores at Three Mile Island and Fukushima was lack of adequate cooling during that first two weeks after shut down. It isn't magic, it is physics.

I find it hard to imagine that you can not see the difference between a radiation leak from a failed fission nuclear power station and the devastation from a 1.2 megaton hydrogen bomb that will vaporize everything within five miles of it's ground zero.
Do you really believe the crap you just posted?