SS-N-22 Sunburn - Cruising in the ramjet

Springing the Trap

"At the battle of Cannae in 216 BC the great Carthaginian general, Hannibal, tempted a much larger Roman army into a fateful advance, and then enveloped and annihilated it with a smaller force. Out of a Roman army of 70,000 men, no more than a few thousand escaped. It was said that after many hours of dispatching the Romans Hannibal’s soldiers grew so tired that the fight went out of them. In their weariness they granted the last broken and bedraggled Romans their lives…

Let us pray that the US sailors who are unlucky enough to be on duty in the Persian Gulf when the shooting starts can escape the fate of the Roman army at Cannae. The odds will be heavily against them, however, because they will face the same type of danger, tantamount to envelopment. The US ships in the Gulf will already have come within range of the Sunburn missiles and the even more-advanced SS-NX-26 Yakhonts missiles, also Russian-made (speed: Mach 2.9; range: 180 miles) deployed by the Iranians along the Gulf’s northern shore. Every US ship will be exposed and vulnerable. When the Iranians spring the trap, the entire lake will become a killing field." - Mark Gaffney

The Might of the U.S fleet on a leash, neutered, even the Argies have some. An impenetrable array of conventional warheads that ONLY long-range ICBM nukes can destroy - finally calling the bluff on the M.A.D. doctrine. I want one!

["It appears that he’s just an irresponsible contrarian as a matter of temperament." - Bruce]

Conspiracy theories from the tree-house #1:

A few years from now . . .

• We start a nuclear Waste Complex in South Australia.
• We allow Imported waste for a big, fat fee.
• South Australia starts a second, bigger, safer repository and begins importing Yucca Mountain, Nevada.
• P.M. Beazley smells a tax and designs a "fixture".
• South Australian Govt reject Labor's intervention and secedes from the Commonwealth.
• P.M. Beazely orders Peter Garret strap on a cardboard cutout of Alex Downer and spread fixture in a tuneful way.
• South Australia immediately invites US intervention - becomes 52nd State of the USA.
• SA, USA declares 200-mile security zone and fences-in WA and NT as Protectorate Territories (Renamed West Texas).
• Queensland calls itself South Florida and introduces "cock-sucking" to secondary qualifications.
• Beazley sells South Florida to Singapore Airlines for $29.00 (and an alligator purse).
• Spanish becomes the second language of NSW and Victoria.
• NSW and Victoria align themselves with the US and become known as "Little Nevada" due to the fallout, the gambling and the amazing number of retards living there.
• Tasmania is sold to an unnamed penal/correctional corporate operating out of Cuba.
• Hippies become cereal pests, drug-tolerant and feral, they infest the badlands, happily enjoying their peace, love and mungnuts - the bastards, they are laughing at us!

Bloody Labor Thunderbox

Leave it to Beazer - Labor's Nuclear Blimp!

I am utterly and profoundly appalled (!) by the Australian "Intellectual Class" trotting out bucketsful of the most myopic, childish pigswill - you reckon Hippies are out of touch? Have no clue at all about the hard realities? Are so obsessed by dreamy utopias that mere pragmatism escapes our pot-furrowed brows? Well have a look around you!

Labor-endorsing Genii are now seriously trying to sell a nuclear solution . . . (wait for it) . . . to solve the greenhouse nightmare! The parents of these intellectual giants were, 100 years earlier, insisting on a coal-powered future as a safe solution to the industrial energy crisis.

My grasp of mathematics fits happily on a Tally-Ho, so feel free:
Of all the energy consumed by humans, electricity provides only a small fraction. Less than 17% of that electricity already comes via fission. For nuclear-generated electricity to replace our dependence on fossil fuel as a source of energy the sheer number of nuclear power stations and its attendant cabling is nothing compared to the logistics that Governments and theMarket would face when trying to safely move the fissionables around. Too little, too late? Swallowed a spider to capture the fly?

Yep, my math is lousy, but I can see only greenhouse forever, you won't cure asthma with lung cancer, you're wasting your time.

Not satisfied with mutual masturbation, these folks further suggest that Australia should "get involved" in the nuclear process and take responsibility for the waste, ensuring all spent fuel rods are returned to our mining industry for safe keeping (minus the 600 tonnes so far oxidized as Depleted Uranium projectiles in Yugoslavia, Falklands, Afghanistan Iraq, etc.)

Pragmatism will require millions of fuel rods (proudly painted in green and gold) being transported around the planet to and from our proverbial "arsehole of democracy and common sense". Is your blind faith in the market so rusted on that you can't see the immediate and palpable danger of transporting this stuff in a world full of terrorists? Will the market never be tempted to create a single-desk uranium exporter? (You would have to, anyway, for quasi-security reasons) You could call it the Australian Uranium Board (AUB) and you know where I'm going with this.

This is right up there with Royal Prinny Di's brainfully inspired suggestion that manufacturers of land mines take responsibility for their products immediately the war is over. The cost of digging them up is covered in the purchase price. Yep, that worked.

Bangladeshi recyclers would benefit from the decommissioned "hot" ships (or do we sink them in the Nullabore, too).

"the market" will ensure the security of our gene pool forever, amen! (At least while there's a buck in it.)

Clever people should be indulged, yeah, but Lefty intellectuals need to have their noses firmly rubbed in pigshit because all this competitive cleverness is simply greasing Darwin's guillotine. theHippies were right forty years ago - and still (demonstrably) are.

We need a virus that will sterilize 90% of all human males, worldwide, for at least three generations. Every sperm will be sacred. (Sorry, I was just trying to be clever.)