According to various news sources, Sarah Palin, vice presidential nominee for John McCain, has stated that she would not rule out going to war against Russia. According to The Australian News website: When asked if the US would have to go to war with Russia should Georgia join NATO and Russia invade the country, she said, "Perhaps so". Sarah, please allow me to enlighten you to some facts you perhaps may not have been entirely made aware of, seeing as how you have had quite a busy schedule in your life being a hockey mom and balancing the immense workload of managing Alaska.

Most importantly, Mrs. Palin, I would like to point out that Russia has nuclear weapons (Some in your party pronounce them 'nookular', in case that helps). There are many thousands of these weapons. These weapons can cause great destruction. According to www.fas.org, for example, here is one such missile that Russia has in its arsenal:

"R-36M / SS-18 SATAN

The R-36m / SS-18 intercontinental ballistic missile is a large, two-stage, tandem, storable liquid-propellant inertial guided missile developed to replace the SS-9 ICBM. Housed in hard silos, the highly accurate fourth generation SS-18 ICBM is larger than the Peacekeeper, the most modern deployed US ICBM. The SS-18 opened a "window of vulnerability" of Minuteman silos (at 300 psi) by 1975, so that some analysts aregued that few Minuteman could be expected to survive a Soviet attack by 1980. The "window of vulnerability" of U.S. land based strategic missiles opened on schedule, and became one of the major issues in U.S. strategic debates in the late 1970s and early 1980s"

"The Reagan and Bush administrations respected the SS-18 to such a degree that they made it the main focus of their arms control initiatives. The START II Treaty specifically banned land-based MIRV systems, in part, because of the threat the SS-18 posed to the balance of power. It was seen as a first-strike weapon and a very destabilizing presence in the bilateral relationship."

I do realize that perhaps that may be a bit on the technical side and not with keeping of the usual hockey jargon that you may be familiar with. Yet, it is very important to understand.

In other words, Sarah, should you go to war with Russia, chances are very high that some or all of these afore-mentioned weapons may end up being used against us in the United States. It brings little comfort that in a Mutually Assured Destruction scenario, Russia would be gone as well. The fact remains that most of us here would not survive.

Therefore, in the interest of this country and all of its people, I would kindly ask that, next time you have an interview and the conversation turns to foreign policy, think before you speak. I am almost certain Wasilla Alaska has at least one community college that offers geography courses, though I may be mistaken. It would benefit us all if you were to educate yourself and understand what repercussions for the world your actions would have.

Perhaps my post is a bit condescending. After all, how dare I question someone so patriotic, religious and with such a firm grasp of foreign policy?

It is only out of the interest and support for my country and its people that I do question. I do not want to see us in a war with Russia, no matter how many times God has told you this would be the honorable thing to do.