Chris and Kris' Nuke Inventory Conversation Cont'd

Hello All,

Kris and I met and spoke about various world issues and one of the topics was nuclear proliferation and such.....well, I was not aware that certain countries had achieved such power: China, Israeal, India, and especially North Korea.....I have known that they all want nukes, but I had no idea until Kris informed me......

Then I stumbled upon this article on MSN (of all places).....Below is the gist of it:

"According to information compiled by the Nuclear Threat Initiative, an organization devoted to monitoring the status of the nuclear threat worldwide, nine countries had nukes by April 2004. The nine countries are listed below. Each figure includes the approximate number of both tactical and strategic bombs (nuclear and thermonuclear, or "big" and "really humongous").

Country                                  Warheads

United States                         10,455
Russia                                      8,400
China                                        400
France                                     350
Israel*                                     250
United Kingdom                     200
India**                                    65
Pakistan**                              40
North Korea***                      8
TOTAL                                    20,168

Asterisks explained
* Israel has a policy called "nuclear opacity" or "nuclear ambiguity," which consists of refusing to confirm or deny that it has nuclear weapons at all. In 1986, however, whistle-blower Mordechai Vanunu, an Israeli nuclear weapons worker, published pictures of nuclear weapons facilities in Israel. Today, experts agree that Israel has between 100 and 300 warheads (and Israel doesn't deny it).

** India and Pakistan both admit (boast?) that they have weapons, but are cagey about how many. Estimates for India run from 40 to 90 and for Pakistan from 30 to 50.

*** North Korea is anybody's guess. At the end of 2003, U.S. intelligence experts were surmising it had three bombs, but four months later they tentatively raised their estimate to eight. They also said North Korea is geared up to build about six bombs a year from here on out.

In short, there are now some 20,000 fully operational nukes pointed at someone in this world."

Freakin' nuts I tell yas.......Freakin' nuts!

Peace,

The Chris Man