To: Sully- who wrote (4755 ) 3/8/2004 1:19:33 PM From: KLP Read Replies (1) | Respond to More Kerry flip-flops from the June 2000 remarks by Kerry...the ones AS should have/could have reported if he/she/it wanted to be totally accurate.........Also, since this was during Clinton's watch, wouldn't you have thought that Kerry would have hand carried his remarks over to the White House so that Clinton could be sure to know what to do?clw.org North Korea, Iran and Iraq are all believed to have programs capable of weaponizing chemical and biological weapons, which are cheaper and easier to acquire than the most rudimentary nuclear warhead. The most effective means of delivering CBW on a ballistic missile is not to deploy one large warhead filled with agent, but to divide it up into as many as 100 submunitions or "bomblets." There are few technical barriers to weaponizing CBW this way, and it allows the agents to be dispersed over a large area, inflicting maximum casualties. Because the limited NMD system will not be able to intercept a missile before the bomblets are dispersed, it could quickly be overpowered by just three incoming missiles armed with bomblets and that is assuming every interceptor hit its target. Just one missile carrying 100 targets would pose a formidable challenge to the system, with possibly devastating effects. <<<<<<<<<<<<<Even as we have made progress with Russia on reducing our Cold War arsenals, ballistic missile technology has spread and the threat to the United States from rogue powers has grown. The July 1998 Rumsfeld Report found that the threat from developing ballistic missile programs in nations hostile to the United States, especially North Korea, Iran and Iraq, is developing faster than expected and could pose an imminent threat to the U.S. homeland in the next 5 years. <<<<<<<<< Clearly, North Korea, Iran and Iraq are hostile to us, and our ability to use diplomacy to reduce the threat they pose will be limited. But having the capacity to reach us and an animosity towards us does not automatically translate into an intention to use weapons of mass destruction against us. In the 40 years that we faced our Soviet adversary with the raw capability to destroy one another, neither side resorted to using its arsenal of missiles. Why not? Because even in periods of intense animosity and tension, under the most unpredictable and isolated of regimes, political and military deterrence have a powerful, determining affect on a nation's decision to use force. We are already seeing this at work in our efforts to contain North Korea's nuclear and missile programs. And we saw it at work in the Gulf War, when Saddam Hussein was deterred from using his weapons of mass destruction by the sure promise of a devastating response from the United States. <<<<<<<<<<<<
