Proliferation in the Age of Technology

A recent and potentially critical example of the proliferation of not only the usual WMD’s (nuclear weapon technology and components, chemical and biological weapons) but of today’s cutting edge cyber warfare and killing technology is seen in the Russian involvement in Syria and Iran, the US involvement in Afghanistan, Pakistan and now, Iran.



Advanced Weaponry

It has been reported that a recent and large shipment of advanced cruise missiles was sent to Syria by the Russians. These will be very effective for attacking US, Israeli or Turkish ships off the coast of Lebanon. Hizballah will be quite pleased to cooperate with Syria and Iran just to get their hands on the means to increase the threat to Israel.

Syria has an advanced military with massive stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons (some thanks to Saddam Hussein’s demise). They don’t have the technological superiority to design the high end delivery systems but they don’t need it. The training they need to handle the weapons has long been supplied in Moscow and the advanced technology with some of it’s handlers is a “gift” of the Russian government. Syria is Russia’s toe-hold in the Middle East and Russia doesn’t intend to let it go down with (or without) Assad at the helm.

This last week has seen the capture of the stealth drone the RQ-170 Sentinal. This extremely advanced and secret intelligence tool is now being examined very minutely by at the very least Iran and Russia, with China most likely participating. If it is successfully reverse engineered, they will be flying over every area of the world any hour of the day or night. In addition, the cyber warfare likely used to down the UAV will soon be available to all. Does this mean we won’t be killing soldiers and civilians any longer, but ‘killing’ and disabling robots?? Would that this would be the case.

Hi-Tech Intelligence and Killer “Robots”

If one takes the example of the increased use of the UAV’s by the US and Israel, the effort to take out targeted leaders, weaponry or other targets very often incurs what is nicely called ‘collateral damage’. That damage could be my family and yours, just as those families living near terrorists in Pakistan and Gaza have found themselves in the bull’s eye. If these UAV’s were limited to intelligence-only or defensive use, perhaps the collateral damage could be argued as the cost of stopping attacks with an even greater loss of life -like the Hiroshima, Nagasaki unending now-philosophical disagreement. But the argument is once again not just philosophical. More critically, the increased spread of this machine that can be used for intelligence or as a robotic killer, will also now allow use by rogue dictators and evil regimes bent on conquering others.

It’s a moot point if the US was at fault (or maybe it was a deliberate way to deliver ‘something’ to Iran??) for the loss of the drone. What’s critical is that one super-aggressive power and two potentially very aggressive powers now will have this same technology within their means. Israel can find and strike a terrorist in the midst of sending out his killing team in a street in a high population center. What’s to stop Iran (who has already planned an attack in the US) from deciding to take out the President or the Secretary of Defense at the Pentagon or the CIA director? What’s to stop Syrian Shiites or Hizbollah from bombing Israel’s Defense Minister or other high official?

There is no end to the likely outcomes of the spread of technology meant for use in war. Nuclear and chemical warheads are now more than equaled in their threat to the whole world. Without the new delivery technology they would be even limited comparatively. They too rely on the cyber war capabilities.

Now, think about the anti-personal bombs and even more critical to survival, the electronic warfare that will knock out all communications systems, electrical grids, and infrastructure subsystems over whole countries. Hacking into the Pentagon is a child’s game beside what is hidden in today’s headlines – a secret technology drone was stolen by Iran. So few words……such unimaginable outcome.

UPDATE: Iran barters examination of US drone RQ-170 for Russian & Chinese weapons and assistance.

Just in case you think that arms dealers are all shady characters hunted by Interpol, meeting in darkened corners, murdering the competition and bribing 3rd world countries to buy their wares, think again. National and International Intelligence agencies, diplomats, and legal arms manufactures lead the rush to arm every country on earth with weapons that can end life as we know it.

Mostly, we commoners never hear even about the official deals, let alone the machinations of the underworld, but once in a while a headline hits the news: US threatens to withhold technology from Israel if Israel sells xxxx planes or yyyy arms to India. Same news media, two months later: US signs large contract for xxxx planes or yyyy arms with India. You figure it out!

Now Iran has the latest and greatest arms prize and is brazenly auctioning it off to the highest bidders, likely to be the Russians and Chinese since they built much of the existing infrastructure in Iran. Some experts wonder if and, if so, who helped Iran ‘break the tether’ and land the drone in working order. It’s the perfect setup: If the drone had come down in Russia or China (or any other country, for that matter), US pressure would have forced them to return it. Few places would be currently rogue enough and immune to US pressure than Iran.

Iran is driving a hard bargain for granting Russian and Chinese teams access to the US stealth drone RQ-170 it captured undamaged last week. DEBKAfile reports: The price, they were told, includes advanced nuclear and missile technology, especially systems using solid fuel, the last word on centrifuges for enriching uranium and the S-300PMU-1 air defense system, which Moscow has consistently refused to sell Tehran. Israel’s prime minister sent foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman to Moscow to try and stop the deal. [Debka.com]

[more to come…]