On: How Close Is Iran to a Nuclear Weapon?

[lightedman]

Do you just go up to a Texas Holdem poker table and tell everyone you've got two kings before the first part of the river is even dealt?

It's called playing your cards to your chest.

[nexuist → lightedman]

There is no point in keeping nuclear warheads secret. Not a single nation with nuclear capability has ever been invaded since the bomb was invented. It is geopolitically infeasible.

North Korea knows this well. If Iran got the nuke and told us, their general would be alive today and the chance of war would be near 0. Nobody would touch a nuclear Iran.

[lightedman → nexuist]

"There is no point in keeping nuclear warheads secret."

Keeping bigger countries off your ass is one reason. Future surprise attacks are another reason. An emergency defensive show of force right before an impending invasion would be another.

There're plenty of reasons to keep almost anything a secret.

[ramphastidae → lightedman]

This is absurd. You keep "bigger countries off your ass" specifically by informing them you have nuclear warheads. The whole point is to inform them. How exactly would you deter them otherwise? This has been established for decades: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deterrence_theory#Rational_det...

And if Iran has secret nukes, how do you possibly explain Stuxnet?

[lightedman → ramphastidae]

"You keep "bigger countries off your ass" specifically by informing them you have nuclear warheads."

Not if you don't want tons of spies all up in your shit, you don't.

"And if Iran has secret nukes, how do you possibly explain Stuxnet?"

As if that stops them from secretly importing refined material.