Originally Posted by gekkogecko

Hm, yes, consider the source. Seymour Hersh, the same journalist who eventually blew the lid on the massacre of Vietanmese villagers in My Lai 4 in 1968.

Thing is, the US military probably does have plans to use deep-penetration bombs on Iran, both of the nuclear and non-nuclear variety. *NOT* because there's necessarily any actual intent to do so, but because it's part of the planning departments job to make plans to be ready for contingencies dictated by the political leaders of the US. In that sense, it can be realistically said that the US has plans to invade and take over Canada.

What matters is not wheter or not these plans exist-they, in fact, do. What matters is how willing Bush & Co are to implements what are always contingency plans.

The following facts are relevant:
1. The US is the one country which has used nuclear weapons in the context of a military conflict.
2. The US was the country which has continuously refused, through the history of the possession of nuclear weapons, to renounce the doctrine of "first use".
3. The US has, as most powerful nations throughout history have, a policy of playing the "little guys" off against each other. The use of this type of politicking by the Byzantine empire became so famous, that it is in fact known as Byzantine politics. This is shown today by the support of the US for such theocracies as those in Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Pakistan, often directed against the theocracies in neighboring countries, like Iran or Syria.
4. The current Administration has shown that it is willing to ignore the military doctrines against overextension in order to launch pre-emptive strikes against threats that are so nascent (militarily) as to be worthy of ignorance.
5. Nuclear weapons are unfortunately, fairly cheap in terms of what they can accomplish militarily. Hence, the attraction for a lot of different nations.

In light of all of these taken together, I find the possession of nuclear weapons by the current administration of the US far more alarming than the potential possession of nuclear weapons by the theocracy in Iran.