Little Green Footballs - egypt wants to join the club

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-♻Retweetegypt wants to join the club

Sat, Jun 22, 2002 at 1:03:03 pm PDT

According to Ha'aretz, German daily Die Welt is reporting that Egypt is trying to obtain nuclear weapons.

Western intelligence agencies have reached the conclusion that Egypt is taking steps to obtain nuclear weapons, the German daily Die Welt reported Saturday. According to the report, Egypt intends to mine natural uranium in the Sinai Peninsula and enrich it to weapons' grade material with the help of Chinese technology. The material would then be used on long-range missiles.

The paper also said that Egypt had in the past few years considered obtaining enriched uranium from several African countries.

Die Welt stressed that Egypt has denied the existence of any military nuclear project, and that the International Atomic Energy Agency, located in Vienna, confirmed that it has no information on nuclear developments in Egypt. The paper claimed that despite the denial, there have been increased hints that Cairo was stepping up its attempts to attain and enrich uranium, so as to be able to produce nuclear weapons in the future.

UPDATE: And where Egypt is, can Saudi Arabia be far behind?

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13 comments

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Stefan Sharkansky Sat, Jun 22, 2002 2:37:34pm

I especially like the part about mining uranium in the Sinai. Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "land for peace".

An adjacent story in Die Welt talks about other aspects of Egypt's comprehensive rearmament program. It mentions the curious factoid that Egypt is the second largest purchaser of weapons in the world today, after... Saudi Arabia.

J. Finney Sat, Jun 22, 2002 2:52:07pm

aarrggghhh!!!

I can't help but wonder if the "Foreign Aid" the U.S. gives to Egypt is being re-directed to this. Are we going to let every Arab nation become a nuclear power before we realize that these weapons in the hands of these governments is suicidal?

Imagine for a second what would inevitably happen if all the nations surrounding Israel became nuclear powers. Not to mention who would be next.

Do we even perform any accounting for the money we give to these nations?

Bossman Sat, Jun 22, 2002 3:11:20pm

Let's see... we need a few more hundred earthquakes in Iran, Iraq, Saudia Arabia, Syria and Eygpt can join the Richter Club.

Praise be to Mother Nature. May she make us
proud.

Moira Sat, Jun 22, 2002 5:01:44pm

"Are we going to let every Arab nation become a nuclear power before we realize that these weapons in the hands of these governments is suicidal?"

Nah. We'll just label it "unhelpful" and stick our heads further up our butts.

Robert Crawford Sat, Jun 22, 2002 5:58:08pm

I have to wonder if the Saudis and Egyptians have decided to throw their lot in with Iraq when the time comes? Egypt can't be building long-range nukes to take on the Israelis -- I'm betting their targets will be in Europe.

Charles Sat, Jun 22, 2002 6:08:35pm

We need to stop fooling ourselves and realize that the Arab world is in an all-out race to get the bomb.

Joseph Hertzlinger Sat, Jun 22, 2002 6:51:06pm

Egypt can be taken out with one bomb at Aswan. It would take several to eliminate Israel.

Bossman Sat, Jun 22, 2002 7:02:04pm

Why don't we get all one billion Chinese to fart at the same time and blow all the arabs off the face of the earth?

Whaddya mean there aren't enough beans!!!

JamesW Sun, Jun 23, 2002 2:59:12am

They ought to test their nuke on a hard target. May I suggest the Aswan High Dam, AKA Nasser's Hubris?

(It can't be Nasser's Folly as it is reserved for the 6 Day War.)

Maine's Michael Sun, Jun 23, 2002 9:16:47am

Great. Egypt under mubarak develops the bomb. Mubarak is with certainty eventually overthrown, likely by the military operating under the control of Islamist elements.

At that point, 20 years of american aid (40 billion dollars) spent on weaponry falls into their hands, along with a nuclear capability.

The state department launches an investigation into 'who lost egypt?', a few people get rotated to new desks, and the US moves on, leaving Israel to deal with the real and immediate threat, nuclear blackmail by egypt

Israel is counselled to 'show restraint' (no green light to pre-empt) and deal with the new reality.

Charles Sun, Jun 23, 2002 11:23:04am

Testing something.

Yehudit Sun, Jun 23, 2002 3:43:44pm

VERY interesting article...

[Link: www.haaretzdaily.com...]

"... the United States launched an attack on the strongholds of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. Thus began the war scenario in the simulation game conducted by the School of Government and Policy at Tel Aviv University, headed by Prof. Zeev Maoz. But from that point on, the game branched out into surprising directions that left even the experienced players gaping. ... as pawns in the hands of the simulation management that devised the scenario, the participants expressed the government of Israel's ineffectiveness and paralysis, its predictable moves and lack of imagination and creativity. Israel's decision-makers were caught in the grip of the concept.

amr Sat, Sep 21, 2002 12:56:59pm

why are you hating the arabs i am one of them and i have no relation with politics but i want to say that the arabs in general hates israel because all of us as we know that the father of king hussien sold palestine to the jewish people and they came not as a friends but they came to own the land and kill the arabs and to occupy it all the arabs knows that the two lines in the israels flag means from the nile to furat even the shikle the israel's currency are released with the map of the jewesh dream how can the arabs live in peace and the israel's are looking to occupy these countries to acheive their targets and acheive big economical capabilities, all of us know as well that the arabs have no weopons to fight and all of the weoponbs they take thgey took it from the developed countries the arabs doesn't hate americans and not uncivilised, close minded people but arabs are like any americans or europeans or asians are looking for freedom and they are hating to be occupied from a people just want to have some economical benefits americans, israel's (not all of them) doesn't want peace but they want potrol, land, and fortuns and they are using some sweet words to make it legal to them to kill and occupy (the arabs are asking for peace every day and no one respond to this like there are donkey's screaming) as a person who lived there i would like to say that these people are extreemly poor and they deserve help not to be killed. if you want to listen to my comment about what bin laden have done in america i totaly dis agree with it. and i want to say to americans to be fair if it is playing the game of the judge who give the orders to kill or not. kill the arabs if they make something wrong and kill the israeli's if they make something wrong as well (i want to be a freind to americans jewish christians muslims europeans) "peace are better than economical benefits and some sand" sorry for my stupid analysis and bad english