A Novel Idea: Wild Fire

Leave it to novelists to stimulate reality -- or does reality sometimes follow novelists? It was Dan Brown and Tom Clancy who first wrote of using large commercial aircraft as "flying bombs" applied to American targets. And now another novelist, Nelson DeMille, has revealed a "novel" idea which, in my opinion, should be reality.

And that idea is "Wild Fire."

This post isn't about the book; you can read it or not. It's about the idea and the fact that something like this should exist. If it does not, this nation needs to draw up and enable the implementation of this plan immediately, ready to activate, should appropriate conditions come to term.

But first, a review of one bit of Cold War history. When tensions existed between the United States and the USSR there was a seldom-mentioned but, militarily, well known theory acknowledged by both sides called MAD or "Mutually Assured Destruction." In this concept, MAD ensured the phrase "whoever shoots first dies second." That is, the theory was based upon the assumption that it would be illogical for one nation to launch a nuclear first strike if it was known that such a launch would result in an automatic and even larger "fail deadly" strike towards the aggressor, which would effectively obliterate both sides.

Plan Wild Fire is MAD taken to a 21st century Islamic degree, and that is: should a nuke ever detonate on US soil, it would be assured that US nuclear-tipped missiles would rain down upon every Islamic stronghold across the globe and not simply one country.

Nelson DeMille writes:

Wild Fire is a pro-active response. It is a gun to the heads of Islamic countries - a gun that will go off if they fail to keep their terrorist friends from going nuclear," DeMille writes.

"This is a great deterrent because nobody wants to end the world as we know it," he told me. "In 'Wild Fire,' I pose that we have something very similar to MAD. Meaning, that if a nuclear bomb went off in America, the presumption of guilt against Islamic terrorists would be very strong; we wouldn't need the proof, we'd never have the proof.

"We would automatically launch against the nation of Islam, specifically against the cities of Mecca and Medina, and other places like Damascus where we don't care for the government, and this would be a deterrent against a nuclear bomb going off in America."

Mr. DeMille makes much sense. Further, he writes:

As a citizen of this country and the world, we are trying to keep it from happening, and the only way is to say, 'If it happens, we will retaliate in a nuclear way.' What else can we do, say we will launch an investigation and find out who blew up midtown Manhattan?

"That is a game we have played for too long. We never played that with the Russians, why play the same silly game with Islamic terrorists? Some say they don't have a country, but that is not true, they know where their homeland is and so do we."

For many, perhaps over 50% of my fellow Americans, this concept would go "over the top." But for me, it is the perfect Sword of Damocles and may actually engender some fear in Militant Islam for the following reasons:

• It is simple and it is clear; if Action A occurs, then Reaction B shall occur;
• It does not target one nation or one spot of earth; it would target many nations and:
• More importantly, it would specifically target Islamic religious locations around the planet

Islamists do not quake in fear at the thought of an FBI investigation with harsh language, warrants and possible arrests; they know we are the quintessential Paper Tiger nation. For Wild Fire to work we would first have to approve and create the program and then, via special envoys or messengers let it be known, sub strata and unofficially, that Wild Fire would be enabled under certain nuclear conditions.

With a plan such as this in place we could perhaps begin to relax our presence in the Middle East and more lives could be saved. Absent this I fear, I know, that it is only a matter of time before we do witness a mushroom cloud, ala "24," over a city or feature on American soil.

BZ