Should Japan Go Nuclear? [Archive]

mack

10-24-06, 12:41 AM

This post/thread might be able to be modded into the Party Politics aside: WTH? thread, but Im not sure so I leave to the mod?
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So, I was reading the paper today, and a political columnist seems to believe that we should allow Japan to go nuclear to meet the rising threat of Korea.

My only concern, albeit uninformed: I understand that we are political allies with Japan, and that Japan has the similar geopolitical agenda as the US: stabilizing their region - however, I ask: why did we ignore the fact that Korea was building a nuclear weapon in the first place?

We knew they were, and we all but ignored it to go after Bin Laden's supposed WMDs instead - which we still have no proof existed!

Well. You know what they say: a bird in the hand beats 2 in the bush - a theory that was NOT applied by GWB in this case.

So the columnist believes that rather than getting all up in arms about letting Japan go nuclear (because they might just, anyway), we should agree, and "sanction" it.

Any thoughts on this?

Piddzilla

10-24-06, 08:03 AM

Well. You know what they say: a bird in the hand beats 2 in the bush - a theory that was NOT applied by GWB in this case.

Isn't that supposed to be: a dove in the hand beats two hawks and a Bush? :D

So the columnist believes that rather than getting all up in arms about letting Japan go nuclear (because they might just, anyway), we should agree, and "sanction" it.

Any thoughts on this?

More countries having nukes? A good thing? Don't think so. The Chinese have nukes as well so Japan should've had them too a long time ago if hostile nuke neighbours was the only valid argument. And who knows, maybe they do.

I really think that aggressive "non-diplomacy" is a contributing factor to North Korea having nuclear weapons today, as people like Jimmy Carter also have claimed. To allow Japan to develop their own nuclear arsenal would not only be a terrible political mistake, it would be downright stupid and to unnecessarily challenge fate, quite frankly. There are people that seriously argues for this? Amazing.

Golgot

10-24-06, 08:37 AM

So the columnist believes that rather than getting all up in arms about letting Japan go nuclear (because they might just, anyway), we should agree, and "sanction" it.

Any thoughts on this?

There's a broader problem already in turns of 'sanctioning' or opposing new nuclear states - in that most big signatories to the non-proliferation act don't really stick to it anyway (and the US leads the way in totally ignoring it ;)). So we've got no moral grounds for objecting in any case - and that kind of double-standard really doesn't help any attempts at 'diplomatic' resolution or implementing 'communal' sanctions etc.

Plus...

More countries having nukes? A good thing? Don't think so. The Chinese have nukes as well so Japan should've had them too a long time ago if hostile nuke neighbours was the only valid argument. And who knows, maybe they do.

I reckon this is the reason for potential US endorsement right here. China is currently the biggest player when it comes to restraining N Korea. Japan is still a much more traditional ally of the US tho - and could be expected to fall in line with any US-favoured policy - if things stay sweet between them. (Japan do seem to be striking out on their own much more these days - in terms of re-militarising - but economic ties will still bind them together, i'd guess. Well, that and a shared distrust of China ;))

I really think that aggressive "non-diplomacy" is a contributing factor to North Korea having nuclear weapons today, as people like Jimmy Carter also have claimed.

Mmmm, taste the flavour of the decade :rolleyes:;)

spudracer

10-24-06, 07:41 PM

Nah, we'll run with it (the thread that is).

Having been in Japan for three years, I can tell you that they are very nervous when it comes to anything nuclear. They were arguing with the Navy the entire time I was there about bringing a nuclear carrier into Japan. They (the nuke carriers) have been in and out before, but not stationed in Japan.

Also, nuke subs visited the port I was stationed at on a regular basis and the Japanese Coast Guard constantly had a small boat monitoring the water for radiation.

Would Japan benefit from having nuclear power? Hard to say. Their major down-fall is the limited space they have in order to build a fully-functional Nuclear Plant. When you start building up rather than out, you know you're running out of space.

Do they have the technology, oh yes! Could they have something up and running in no time, without a doubt!

I don't think they should do it, but they would do it well if they were to.

Officer 663

10-31-06, 02:36 AM

A nuclear Japan would be problematic. An arms race in NE Asia would be a major roadblock to the global economy.

And, I don't know about you, but I don't really trust the Japanese not to revert to a cultural tradition centuries old. The last time they got frisky, it wasn't really a good thing.

unpredictable

11-03-06, 01:21 PM

Should anyone go nuclear, really?

Naisy

11-07-06, 08:03 AM

Should anyone go nuclear, really?

I hate you, that was going to be my post word for word, thief! but that is the point. Should anyone go nuclear? for any reason? There is still solar and wind farming for power. Oh but they cost too much money, yep when the polar ice caps melt in ten years and we are all f***ed. Cost is the main thing.

As for W.M.D's (nukes) noone SHOULD have them at all, but it all comes down to countries having big balls and flexing their muscles all in the name of "protection" against other countries. I can deal with a country having them, but using them that I can't really deal with that.

Officer 663

11-07-06, 01:42 PM

Personally, I think nuclear weapons have been one of the most fantastically successful inventions in human history. There hasn't been a shooting war between major powers in 61 years, and at the bottom, that's because of nukes. They have proven to be the best guarantor of peace the world has ever known.

The problem is that with nukes, the peace only has to break down once...

Sedai

11-07-06, 02:03 PM

I hate you, that was going to be my post word for word, thief! but that is the point. Should anyone go nuclear? for any reason? There is still solar and wind farming for power. Oh but they cost too much money, yep when the polar ice caps melt in ten years and we are all f***ed. Cost is the main thing.

Solar and Wind power? Great...unless it's cloudy and still out, which it is, a lot. Not that I don't support exploring alternate power sources, but the two you mention have big problems with reliability...

John McClane

11-07-06, 03:12 PM

Solar and Wind power? Great...unless it's cloudy and still out, which it is, a lot. Not that I don't support exploring alternate power sources, but the two you mention have big problems with reliability...I totally agree. Major problems exist with both of those. However, nuclear waste is a big problem in it's self. Sure, it's not nearly as much as the waste coal puts out, but we still need to have a reliable method of disposing of nuclear waste before we go hog wild with it.

Naisy

11-13-06, 06:35 AM

I admit I dont know everything on the clean technologies, but I do know that both solar and wind farming, stores the power in a large battery (type thingy ;)). Even with shortage of light and wind energies being available.

I have seen the technology to run cars off of lawn clippings, which lawn is atleast a renewable resource which doesnt have any dangerous harvesting qualities. Why not adapt these principles to running a motor to turn the turbines like a wind farm? Im no scientist but I know that there are cleaner ways then oil for cars (but hey wait arent there some billionares that would be worse off), alternatives to nuclear energies. Even if there is no possible way to run the worlds energy needs with clean options (which im sure is B.S.) there is certainly plenty of ways to limit/minimise the use of the damaging nuclear waste's or just as bad Australia's burning of fossil fuels (coal in particular).

John McClane

11-13-06, 05:43 PM

there is certainly plenty of ways to limit/minimise the use of the damaging nuclear waste's or just as bad Australia's burning of fossil fuels (coal in particular).There is certainly ways to minimize the effects, but will the entire world agree? And I really wouldn't point a finger at Australia when China is set to become the next world power, and they are certainly showing it. China, right NOW, accounts for 1/3 of the steel in the world and over one half of the world's concrete. And not only that, but they burn a large portion of the world's oil and coal. China is an emerging superpower with more construction projects then any other nation in the world. It is also said that in 30 years, we will need a new Earth to meet the demands of China's economy. We really have to face facts that no matter how clean Europe and America get, China will be there to burn what we don't.

Othelo

11-13-06, 07:11 PM

I think the real question is why? Why should they after all they have been the sole recipient of the "gift" of nuclear war. Why should Japan have or for that matter want to inflict the horror of Nagasaki and Hiroshima on anyone else? And why would they want to possess such a destructive tool when two of their nearest neighbors already have the capacity to "blow the t*** of the earth" as Robin Williams once so eloquently put it?

There is certainly a saturation point, in my opinion it happened sometime near the cold war. If the standoff in Cuba wasn't enough to dissuade humans from possessing such a destructive force then we are all doomed to eternal stupidity.

7thson

11-13-06, 07:40 PM

I think the real question is why?

There is certainly a saturation point, in my opinion it happened sometime near the cold war. ... we are all doomed to eternal stupidity.

If only most thought this way.....I agree with you but Bush-haters do not. Most of the time anyway. Why? Because to hate Bush is "in".

Othelo

11-13-06, 08:18 PM

If only most thought this way.....I agree with you but Bush-haters do not. Most of the time anyway. Why? Because to hate Bush is "in".

I think the issue there is that we keep promoting a sanitized version of our culture abroad, which naturally includes nuclear weaponry and power. After all, emulating the greatest democracy on the planet comes with all the trimmings.

Being one of those on the opposing side of the political fence (or complementing depending upon how you see it) I can tell you that I don't think that stalling nuclear proliferation by intimidation is a good plan. Many of us to the left feel this is counterproductive, like intimidating a child and having that child become a rebellious teenager. What we have in these "rouge states" are a bunch of rebellious teenagers.

With the Arab states in particular you have what amounts to street gangs, looking for cred from the rest of the world. They feel rightfully oppressed and denigrated, often by their own leaders and by the fact that we have steadfastly supplied weapons to Israel for the entirety of its existence. Weapons which have gone from being necessarily defensive to unneccesarily offensive.

I always have believed that nuclear proliferation was a losing game, the US has always (regardless of administration) been rightfully accused of a "do as I say, not as I do" mentality. Clinton tried to balance this with a steady hand in Israel and through police actions in countries who had serious humanitarian issues, unfortunately he failed.

Ten years down the road I wonder if the deaths in Somalia will seem nearly comparable to the lives lost in Iraq. Both, I fear, will be in the same sad shape.

having nukes is like playing with the big boys. I remember watching a documentary about the India/Pakistan nuclear build up. one thing the Pakistanis kept saying was that with nukes comes respect. The simple fact that they could kill every man woman and child in both countries 10 times over was apparently lost on them. Like I said...bloods and crips...

Piddzilla

11-14-06, 06:23 AM

There is certainly ways to minimize the effects, but will the entire world agree? And I really wouldn't point a finger at Australia when China is set to become the next world power, and they are certainly showing it. China, right NOW, accounts for 1/3 of the steel in the world and over one half of the world's concrete. And not only that, but they burn a large portion of the world's oil and coal. China is an emerging superpower with more construction projects then any other nation in the world. It is also said that in 30 years, we will need a new Earth to meet the demands of China's economy. We really have to face facts that no matter how clean Europe and America get, China will be there to burn what we don't.

This is an argument I hear from both left and right, environmentalists and rock hard capitalists.

If USA don't sign the Kyoto agreement, then why should China? USA is the world's leading carbon dioxide discharger, not China. For years different groups have been trying to make the Industrial World change their ways and attitude towards the environment but the corporations and shortranged profit thinking have always prevailed. Now, when China is becoming what capitalists always have been wanting them to be (capitalists), the problem with the green house effect and so on is being formulated as a problem connected to China. It's a case of classic protectionism. The big markets are afraid of China's increasing power as a capitalist nation. "They can't have what we have because then the Earth will die". That's hypocrisy. The Earth has been dying because of the Westworld's torture of it for long now and the ruling powers to be have never cared. So how come now when China's economy is exploding that the environment is all of a sudden so important to people who not long ago didn't give a damn. It's not the fear of the Chinese polluting the world as much as the rest of us. It's the fear of the Chinese being as rich as the rest of us. Imagine the average Chinese being as rich as the average American. The Americans are about 300 million. The Chinese are between 1 and 1.5 billion. The Chinese would own the world like USA own it now. So, when American corporations are desperate to get a piece of the action in China I don't think the environment is very far up on the agenda. It's about securing the American financial and cultural empire, an empire that, as I said, is the world's largest discharger of carbon dioxide. Good Night. And Good Luck.

John McClane

11-14-06, 09:03 AM

This is an argument I hear from both left and right, environmentalists and rock hard capitalists.Quite frankly, I think global warming is a crock, but there's no harm in reducing our emissions. You're probably right about us being afraid of them becoming rich, but that doesn't stop the fact that they'll be burning more resources.

Othelo

11-14-06, 09:27 AM

Quite frankly, I think global warming is a crock, but there's no harm in reducing our emissions. You're probably right about us being afraid of them becoming rich, but that doesn't stop the fact that they'll be burning more resources.

There is so much evidence to the contrary though. Yes the earth has naturally warmed and cooled over cycles I agree with that, but never so fast and to such a degree. There is no doubt in my mind that we have had a significant effect on climate change as human beings. Just think logically for a second about all the S*** we have pumped into our atmosphere and our water since the industrial revolution.

People usually think of global warming as a result of emissions and deforestation. They often forget that the oceans we are over harvesting, and dumping so much crap into as well as the relational effect of this dumping on the ability of human beings to survive is a major factor in global warming. Oceans help the balance by both Osmotic effects and as serving as a ready storehouse of oxygen, nitrogen and hydrogen.

There was an article that I read recently that stated that overfishing will eventually make it impossible for us to harvest fish from the oceans, that frightens me. We have already had a hand in the premature extinction of so many species, is man next?

Piddzilla

11-14-06, 09:33 AM

Quite frankly, I think global warming is a crock, but there's no harm in reducing our emissions. You're probably right about us being afraid of them becoming rich, but that doesn't stop the fact that they'll be burning more resources.

No of course they'll be burning more resources. And so will America. Why are the Chinese the ones that have to stop? Especially now when global warming is a crock.

John McClane

11-14-06, 01:48 PM

Othelo

11-14-06, 06:28 PM

Othelo: Alright, let's say that global warming is actually being affected by humans; to a degree that is dangerous. If we were to stop all emissions TODAY, what would be the effects on the environment?

Piddzilla: I never said they were the ones that had to stop, I said that if we [USA] were to stop China would be there burning all the resources we wouldn't be using. Basically, just because America stops does not mean the world stops.

I would turn that around and ask what would happen if we didn't stop, or at least slow down? I honestly cannot say if its too late, but I can say with certainty that controlling emissions and other pollutants, curbing rapid deforestation and looking in earnest for sources of renewable power will certainly give us more time. time to possibly come up with a more permanent solution.

Naisy

11-14-06, 07:00 PM

Othelo: Alright, let's say that global warming is actually being affected by humans;:rolleyes: As opposed to the cows, with all their burning of coal.

to a degree that is dangerous. If we were to stop all emissions TODAY, what would be the effects on the environment?

hmmm cleaner oxygen, possibly (close to fact) less caner, a drop in acidic rain level's which would stop melting the earth. Im no greeny, Im still going to drive my car to work, but the fact remains the green house gases dont really do anything positive to the environment.

There is certainly ways to minimize the effects, but will the entire world agree? And I really wouldn't point a finger at Australia when China is set to become the next world power, and they are certainly showing it. China, right NOW, accounts for 1/3 of the steel in the world and over one half of the world's concrete. And not only that, but they burn a large portion of the world's oil and coal. China is an emerging superpower with more construction projects then any other nation in the world. It is also said that in 30 years, we will need a new Earth to meet the demands of China's economy. We really have to face facts that no matter how clean Europe and America get, China will be there to burn what we don't..

So its a case of we should all, burn the resources while we can before those other nations burn it for us?...wtf? how is this in any way got to do with reducing our emissions? No it doesnt mean everywhere WILL, but they SHOULD. Didn't your parent teach you, just because so-and-so is doing it doesnt mean you should to? Two wrongs dont make a right? any of this ringing any bells?

Othelo

11-14-06, 08:06 PM

Easy killer...keep it civil :D

John McClane

11-14-06, 09:55 PM

:rolleyes: As opposed to the cows, with all their burning of coal."Global warming" happens. It happened without us. It happens with us.

hmmm cleaner oxygen, possibly (close to fact) less caner, a drop in acidic rain level's which would stop melting the earth. Im no greeny, Im still going to drive my car to work, but the fact remains the green house gases dont really do anything positive to the environment.So basically, it'll be like flushing a toilet? No more poopy air. All clean!!

Didn't your parent teach you, just because so-and-so is doing it doesnt mean you should to?Exactly, do as America says. Not like we do. :rolleyes:

Golgot

11-14-06, 10:40 PM

Erm, wasn't this thread about nukes?

Anyhoo, i'll happily join in with any discussion about global warming stuff and sufferage in a more appropriate thread (http://www.movieforums.com/community/showthread.php?t=11433&page=1&pp=20) ;)

But just off the cuff:

JM: You should really check out how robust the 'hockey stick' theory has become, when it comes to human influence on global warming. Check out the 'menace or myth' article in my sig for a pretty balanced overview on fairly-recent thinking n'all ;)

As for time frame, worst case scenarios say we've got around 10 years before we trigger a more profound long-term change. I suspect we've got more time than that. But that doesn't make the challenges involved any less tricky.

If someone can get some real 'market leadership' going on this front, that's probably where behavioural change will take place. China's as up for being energy-efficient, sustainable and green as anyone else. But others are better placed to dictate the pace. At the moment. (Yes, i mean y'all - in conjunction with rest of us industry-worshippers n'all ;))

Othelo

11-15-06, 06:02 AM

Naisy

11-17-06, 08:06 AM

"Global warming" happens. It happened without us. It happens with us.

I fail to see any point in that statement at all. Just because it happens naturally doesnt mean we should be adding fuel to the fire. Fact: Global Warming is bad, Fact: we are making it worse, Fact: We can help slow the disaster, possibly buy time to prevent a disaster of global proportions. It seems crazy to me to have the attitude of not giving a ****?

So basically, it'll be like flushing a toilet? No more poopy air. All clean!!

Basically, it gives a chance for things to stop declining at such a rapid rate and thats worst case scenario. Im not saying a complete remission, but if there is any possible way to say keep the earth from dying when my grandchildren grow up, then THATS the direction EVERYONE should be taking and yes when I say everyone I do mean the places outside America as well.

By slowing (or if by miracle somehow stopping) we can not only buy some time for future generations, help start laying a path for future generations to develope even cleaner, smarter and cleaner technologies. God only knows we may even be able to reverse the negative effects. I'd like to know how my logic flawed? I can't see a losing side to doing what we can. Either things do start to get better, we develope some way to create clean renewable resources, etc, etc or we buy the earth 50 - 100 years before its completely screwed...

Exactly, do as America says. Not like we do. :rolleyes:

That made no sense to me. So Im not going to be able to respond to that one.

Piddzilla

11-17-06, 11:10 AM

I fail to see any point in that statement at all. Just because it happens naturally doesnt mean we should be adding fuel to the fire. Fact: Global Warming is bad, Fact: we are making it worse, Fact: We can help slow the disaster, possibly buy time to prevent a disaster of global proportions. It seems crazy to me to have the attitude of not giving a ****?

Basically, it gives a chance for things to stop declining at such a rapid rate and thats worst case scenario. Im not saying a complete remission, but if there is any possible way to say keep the earth from dying when my grandchildren grow up, then THATS the direction EVERYONE should be taking and yes when I say everyone I do mean the places outside America as well.

By slowing (or if by miracle somehow stopping) we can not only buy some time for future generations, help start laying a path for future generations to develope even cleaner, smarter and cleaner technologies. God only knows we may even be able to reverse the negative effects. I'd like to know how my logic flawed? I can't see a losing side to doing what we can. Either things do start to get better, we develope some way to create clean renewable resources, etc, etc or we buy the earth 50 - 100 years before its completely screwed...

:yup: