President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad appears to have rejected Washington’s offer of direct talks as well as the “freeze-for-freeze” proposals put forward by the International Community aimed at getting Iran to stop developing nuclear weapons. “The nuclear issue is a finished issue for us,” Ahmadinejad was quoted by the Washington Post as saying, adding he had his own ideas about how to proceed. He challenged Obama to a debate in the United Nations. The Obama administration had offered to hold direct talks with Teheran and Western diplomats offered
a so-called “freeze-for-freeze” proposal first put forward last year under which Iran would freeze expansion of its nuclear program in return for the U.N. Security Council halting further sanctions against Tehran. … Western diplomats say the proposal remains on the table. Ahmadinejad last month said Iran had prepared its own package of proposals to end the stalemate. … Asked about North Korea’s nuclear test on Monday, Ahmadinejad said: “In principle we oppose the production, expansion and the use of weapons of mass destruction.” He said Iran had no missile or nuclear cooperation with North Korea.
In other developments, the Israeli Defense Minister was heading to Washington to discuss “Iran’s nuclear ambitions”.
The defence minister was also planning to meet Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Obama’s National Security Adviser James Jones and special Middle East envoy George Mitchell, the official told AFP on condition of anonymity. Barak’s visit comes on the heels of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s White House meeting with President Barack Obama last week, which revealed discord between the two close allies on the stagnant Middle East peace process.
However, Obama eased Israeli concerns over his efforts to persuade Iran to halt its nuclear programme in direct negotiations, with the president saying the success of the dialogue would be assessed by the year’s end.
“This dialogue ought to be short and should have milestones to check whether it is serious or not,” Barak told army radio. “I believe the chances that talks will halt Iran’s nuclear programme are very low.”
The former chief of staff reiterated that the Jewish state would not rule out military action against nuclear sites in the Islamic republic.
Saul Alinsky taught his disciples that authority figures could survive anything except public ridicule. Once people began to laugh at you, things were heading downhill. The recent actions and rhetoric from North Korea and Iran openly mock the Obama administration. Ahmadinejad was dismissive of Obama’s offer of direct negotiations and has challenged the US President to appear in a freakshow debate of his own device before the UN. If the news reports of Ehud Barak’s remarks are accurate, then even the Israeli Defense Minister, who would ordinarily be diplomatically correct and deferential towards an American President is practically characterizing his trip to Washington as a waste of time. Is President Obama, the sweep of whose hands it was once believed could silence the world, in danger of becoming an object of derision? He is in any event, in the middle of the challenge which Joe Biden predicted he would face.
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wretchard,
For what it’s worth, my opinion is that there is no limit to Obama’s ability to portray himself as having done, doing, or being about to do the “right” thing, about Iran or anything else. Nor is there a limit to the news media’s abilities to successfully back him up. We simply do not have an opposition (apart from the remarkable Dick Cheney, who really is no longer a political figure) capable of challenging him.
Jamie Irons
Ahmadinejad was dismissive of Obama’s offer of direct negotiations and has challenged the US President to appear in a freakshow debate of his own device before the UN.
Will be interesting to observe the conflicts in Obama following this challenge – provided the MSM doesn’t just bury it. Had Ahmadinejad so challenged GWB to a debate, it would be headlines for a week.
But regardless of the MSM, the challenge will pique the colossal ego of Obama, whose constant yapping about ‘diplomacy’ has really set him up for a fall. He’ll yearn to enter the arena and show his super-powers of wordslinging, but without the teleprompter and his own staging (or even with them), this is a debate he can’t win. All Ahmadinejad has to do for checkmate is say ‘no’.
I think Iran just tested it’s weapon in their Nork facility. For the second time…
It was hard for them to threaten with a fizzle. But now they got proof. They are now a punk with a gun.
What will Obumble do?
Nothing.
aaron/3
Agreed, see my post #29 on the previous thread (NKor nuke test).
Ahmmadjihadi is not a good poker player though, he’s displaying a “tell”. There is still a plausible deniability, but he just can’t help himself, his ego just got a boost and he is compelled to show it.
It’ll get worse before it gets better.
“America’s chickens are coming home to roost.” – just not like Rev. Wright imagined.
Jamie Irons, in regard to Obama’s coming trials and tribulations, I do believe there is a limit to the news media’s ability to successfully back him up. Irrespective of Chris Mathews’ contention that it is “his job” to ensure Obama’s success, I don’t see how as a practical matter that is possible. Events, and the reaction to events, will alone determine success–either Obama’s or Ahmadinejad’s, (or by extension, on the part of the U.S. or Iran,) not even to mention Israel or N. Korea, or however many other players might like to enter the fray. It may well be that the majority of Americans, the larger portion of the news media, and even Obama himself do not yet quite understand this reality, but I venture to say at some point it will become rather obvious.
Two options — either the nuke tested in North Korea was a domestic product, or it came from Iran.
If it came from Iran, time’s up.
If it came from North Korea, anyone who wants a nuke and has large amounts of ready cash now has a willing supplier. Eg, Iran.
Either way, time’s up. Diplomacy is over. We may be in a period similar to 1939′s “Phoney War” for a little while, but the die has been cast.
[MILES]
I am my ideal!
I, Miles Gloriosus,
I, slaughterer of thousands,
I, oppressor of the meek,
Subduer of the weak,
Degrader of the Greek,
Destroyer of the Turk,
Must hurry back to work.
[MILES & ROMANS:]
I/he, Miles Gloriosus,
[SOLDIERS]
A man among men!
[MILES & ROMANS:]
I/he, paragon of virtue,
[SOLDIERS]
With sword and with pen!
[MILES]
I, in war the most admired,
In wit the most inspired,
In love the most desired,
In dress the best displayed–
I am a parade!
[SOLDIERS]
Look at those eyes, cunning and keen,
Look at the size of those thighs, like a mighty machine!
[PSEUDOLUS]
Those are the mightiest thighs that I ever have theen!
I mean…
Just a few small changes and it works, slaughterer=deceiver, oppressor=betrayer and Miles=Obama.
Jamie,
“For what it’s worth, my opinion is that there is no limit to Obama’s ability to portray himself[...]”
I rarely disagree with you Jamie, but here goes. I think Obama is already dangerously overstretched – domestically, internationally, personally.
Appearances are he’s way out of his league, and no amount of Axelrod-ian imaginings can change that impression. Fiat’s sniffing at their Chrysler deal a lot more closely, select states’ pensions are gearing up to sue the Feds, the EU is suing Intel for, get this, “anti-trust violations,” and Iran and the Norks are getting all trigger happy all of a sudden.
One well-aimed tomato will topple what’s left of the Obama cult. Just one is all it’ll take. And, whether it is found in the daily fluctuations of the Dow, or in the serial teasings of nuclear-tipped autocracies, that tomato is ripe and ready to fly.
I for one have absolutely no confidence in the willingness or ability of Hussein Pasha to defend the United States against an attack. On the previous thread it was posited that he would back off from dismantling our missile defenses. That ain’t gonna happen.
#8 Kinuadrach is correct. The clock is ticking. Right now, our future as a nation is no longer in our hands. We will do nothing before, and maybe after, we are attacked strategically. The hope of the United States rests with the State of Israel as their defending their own survival simultaneously protects us, and on the hope that Japan and possibly Taiwan and South Korea will go nuclear now that they understand that they no longer can depend on us to stand with them if they are attacked.
Our government media will protect and cover “Teh One” regardless of the cost to the country. This will continue until heads start appearing on pikes or the classic formulation of “rope, journalist, lamp post; some assembly required” becomes commonplace. At which point they will all claim to have been patriots just following orders.
I offer what is the first overt attempt to control the media.
http://reason.com/blog/show/133659.html
Note that the Department of Justice is filing against the newspaper because of editorial content.
The media WILL fall in line until they are consumed in either a mushroom cloud or a lynch mob.
Subotai Bahadur
Oh, I forgot that California’s tax-payers tossed a big booger in Obama’s stew of tax policies last week, too.
I think he’s teetering.
But it’s not too late. If he’d pull back from his “God Damn America” position to one of “God Bless America,” he’ll save his presidency from certain satirical limbo and spare his party prolonged embarrassment.
Of course, that’ll mean governing like a republican, but, signs from his flips on Gitmo and renditions indicate that Obama’s got it in him.
steveaz, or maybe all it will take is for someone to suggest that the Mussolini-like jut of Obama’s chin betrays a defining characteristic–not to say similar self-aggrandizing, if not megalamaniacal, character flaw.
steveaz (#10 and #12) and sirius_sir (#7):
Thanks. Of course, I hope you’re right and I’m wrong!
Jamie Irons
Wrichard writes: “He is in any event, in the middle of the challenge which Joe Biden predicted he would face.”
Jamie Irons writes: “For what it’s worth, my opinion is that there is no limit to Obama’s ability to portray himself as having done, doing, or being about to do the ‘right’ thing, about Iran or anything else.”
We might not see the middle of the challenge very clearly. Perhaps the middle will occur a la Chamberlain in Munich, were one sees the fork in the road only in hindsight. The beginning of the middle will be an Iranian nuclear test, which may have already occured if Aaron is correct.
As I reflect on Obama, I see his behavior mimicking what used to reside in the realm of theology. He adopts, or accepts, the mantle of ‘hope,’ which is a looking forward with confidence towards a fulfillment. But what is the fulfillment or end? In political terms it can only be some general concept of progress leading towads a perfecting of liberal democracy in time, i.e socialism. The only way to preserve this kind of hope is to invoke universal ideals. In this kind of invocation, the risk will be that the ideal becomes the enemy of the real, the best the enemy of the good.
Even in recent times, a few decades ago, people would not expect resolution of all injustice in the sublunary realm. Justice was an eschatological concept, completed and perfected in the final days. John Wintrop (and later Ronald Reagan), to be sure, invoked the ideal of the shining city on a hill, but this ideal derives from the Sermon on the Mount, and applies ultimately to individual behavior. Nevertheless, in post-modern opinion, Reagan’s kind of idealism was sheer nationalistic, triumphalist arrogance.
In the post-theology age of Obama, the hopes of a majority of people align with the image of the leader. People have placed their confidence in the candidate of hope and change, so well iconicized by Shepard Fairey, regardless of the nebulousness of the goal. To meet the theological or philosophical needs of his followers, the leader must, increasingly, play the idea of the best against the idea of the good, the ideal against the real (e.g., hope for universal peace via rational diplomacy vs. policy recognizing ongoing contests of national interests). Deluded by ideals, we are likely to see how we are raising the stakes in a way that will bring us more surely to a point of crisis, both at home and abroad.
At the point of crisis, what does the idealist do?
As I visit the graves of relatives today, and say prayers before the tombstones of veterans marked by crosses, I know I will be thinking of about forebears willing to die to preserve our flawed freedoms. I’ll also be wondering whether, at this time in our history, we may be observing a majority of fellow citizens more willing to flirt with the idea that it is more noble to chip away at the foundations of American exceptionalism and live as hostages to some ideal notion of justice and freedom that surely does not exist on this side of the Kingdom.
Hans Brix! What you doing here?!
“Of course, that’ll mean governing like a republican, but, signs from his flips on Gitmo and renditions indicate that Obama’s got it in him.”
Maybe so, but Lord Zero is rapidly painting himself into a corner when it comes to his Nut Roots base. Not a few of them are now muttering, “If I’d known that ‘Hope & Change’ basically meant Bush’s Third Term, I wouldn’t have sent in all those fraudulent credit card contributions to Obama’s campaign.” Obama has yet to learn that there’s a point where triangulation and equivocation simply don’t work anymore.
Indeed, The One has always struck me as, deep down, the kind of college kid who thinks he’s the smartest and wittiest dude in the room at parties, yet who is so insecure he slips $20 bills to frat presidents to ensure he gets invited to all the right keggers.
There are two kinds of countries in the world today. Those with nukes and those without them.
The nuke is the ultimate veto, the dead man’s switch, provided a nation’s leaders or military have the will to use them.
Those without them are dependent on the nuclear umbrellas of those who do. Those with the ability to develop their own nukes are satisfied with this arrangement as long as they are secure in their faith in their nuclear patrons.
Nevil’s Shute’s 1957 novel “On the Beach”, was set in a world where damn near everyone had nukes and once thing led to another, resulting in everyone reflexively using them when the first domino fell. (Based on current knowledge, I don’t think his scenario of everyone dying from radiation after a global nuclear exchange is possible, just as nuclear winter doesn’t seem to pencil out, but his book was meant more as a polemic than as science.)
Intelligence involves assessment of both capabilities and intentions. If the nuclear status quo is disturbed, those with capabilities will acquire nuclear weapons one way or another. Today, that’s a pretty long list.
Interesting tmes.
I think ridiculing President Obama is the wrong approach. He is not a pacifist and he is not a patsy and he takes that sort of thing personal. Assuming the Iranians want to acquire nukes, and need more time to do so, they should be stringing him along and use flattery to prey on his weakness. Then allow him to blame Israel (and, if possible, Bush) for the ultimate failure.
By publicly treating the President as a fool, they also show his followers to be foolish — and in a way that is tough to ignore. And they ain’t pacifists, either (though they may be patsies). Besides, you have to give the Democrats more time to wreck ruin on the nation — and not provide the excuse for a military crisis they can use to divert attention from the result. What could save left leaning newspapers? Why, a war they could actually support.
Iran should present the illusion of success for Obama while allowing the Democrats more time to get on with their work. Frankly, I thought they would be better at this stuff.
But perhaps Ahmadinejad, facing an “election” where the fraud happens in advance, needs to puff himself up to keep his job. But if there is any dope getting roped it is likely Ahmadinejad and he is doing it to himself.
hdgreene:
I thought much the same thing — that our various antagonists and enemies abroad wouldn’t make the mistake of humiliating or embarrassing Obama, because they’d seen what followed in the wake of voter disgust over Jimmy Carter’s serial foreign policy blunders. They’d flatter Obama’s ego and participate in media adulation of him because they’d end up getting much of what they wanted from him in exchange. The longer he stayed in office, the better.
The first months of his administration seemed to bear this out, as he returned from both Europe and Latin America empty handed to the applause of obsequious lapdogs in the media and chattering classes.
But, as others have noted, bullies are impatient and reckless, whereas bespoke, silver-tongued European diplomats and gangsters masquerading as statesment in the Kremlin and Zhongnianhai are shrewder poker players by comparison.
hey
here in the uae the french are showing that as President Pantywaist sings kum by yah, Sarko the magnificent is playing rough guy. the french will man a naval/coastal battle station that will provide heavy securtiy to a region where all power generation (incluidng nuke) will be planned.
Sarko is also claiming his intentions to defend the UAE, with a french run naval station planned along the ”power gen. beach strip”, outsde of abu dhabi. the french are pumping a retro fit of existing Mirages 2000 fleet and purchase of new upgraded models-all whistles and bells…just sign here Sheikh !!!
Obama is arrogant and has an enormous ego. He just does not show it all the time. But his actions do. His acceptance speech at his nomination with the columns. Wrapping him in Lincolnesque trappings. His insistance of the Constitution as the background to face down Cheney’s speech of Thursday His intense focus on presidential trappings and his inauguration/ symbols are every real to him. He is the ultimate narcissist.
However he is very focused on domestic political enemies not other leaders. He would faster take out a perceived political threat than a real threat. So I’m not sure when Obama would get angry at Ahmahdinejad ranting and insults.
He was fast to attack Palin or had his toadies to do it. He reacted against Rush Limbaugh and Cheney. But he was mild to Chavez and Ahmadinejad. He seems to be mean to friends but nice to foreign enemies. That is why I still don’t think he has absorbed that he is President and not a candidate. He is the symbol of America and his actions reflect America. But he does not know that.
He is thin skinned but what foreign action will get him angry on behalf of America. I just do not know.
DTD,
UAE already has a brace of newest-model F-16s, probably the most capable all-role fighters not on a US carrier in the region. What it needs is a shore-mounted version of the AEGIS system loaded with VLS cell after VLS cell of SM-2s and SM-3s. Launch what you want, we’ll launch more.
RAH,
I agree with your read on Obama. The question is how long his own defenses can deflect criticism of the US as criticism of the past administration without being direct criticisms of him. I would imagine that his interpretation of Ahemdinejad’s statement is, “Well, of course he can’t trust the US, after all, he’s still thinking about that Bush idiot being in that office. He hasn’t met ME yet…”, or “I’d react defensively to Hillary Clinton, too. Maybe Ahmendinejad is not so unreasonable.” After a while he has to realize, like most of the rest of the country will realize, that no, it’s not just America, they really don’t like him personally. At that realization, things will become interesting. Does his political understanding of the world (It’s America’s Fault) override his personal injury? There is no telling.
Once Obama gets rejected face-to-face, like Kennedy in Vienna, lots of other things become possible, but even then he seems to have confidence in everything but the use of actual kinetic force. He replaces McKiernan after McKiernan questions the number of troops he’s being sent. He continues programs of the Bush era (Predator strikes, etc.) in Afghanistan but shows little concern for the perilous supply situation our troops in Afghanistan are in if Pakistan collapses. I’m not sure he knows what to do when it comes time to pull a trigger, liberals have never been particularly good at the use of force against anything other than domestic enemies, and then usually at arm’s length.
Obama knows political war but not the real thing. Yet he is the CIC. Shame.
I think that Obama’s realization of insult will not come due to the language barrier. He can be pushed by accustions in the US of cowardice. Leftists will react just to show they are tough enough. Usually it is a poor action without thought.
The impetus has to come from a domestic source to get Obama to react.
We need to find the blueprints for the Pershing and deploy some to Saudi Arabia and Iraq. It’s the same issue Europe faced in the 70s and 80s.
Make the Iranians think about what they’re doing.
The challenges are coming faster now, yet only this week was an FAA Administrator confirmed and there are no Assistant Secretaries for Treasury. “Hit the ground running” is not an expression that will be used about this administration. Maybe “Never hit the ground at all”?
And the increasing tempo of challenges gives every sign of meaning our enemies are smelling weakness. Not good, folks. Not good. F
So the President of the US is willing to meet without preconditions, but the President of Iran is not.
Now what? This situation has the look of bad, wealthy poker players who show up at the high-stakes table acting like they’re ready to win because they listened to the audio version of “Poker for Dummies” while riding the train in from Connecticut. But sunglasses do not a great card player make.
Sheesh.
L3
“Saul Alinsky taught his disciples that authority figures could survive anything except public ridicule. Once people began to laugh at you, things were heading downhill.”—Wretchard
It looks like Saul Alinsky was correct.
Kim Jong-il and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have successfully double-teamed Obama and have stripped him of the ball.
They are probably laughing at how easy it was to fool the Hippy Preppie President who has zero ability to fight his way out of a wet paper bag.
Kim Jong-il set-off a nuclear device to coincide with Memorial Day. That is quite disturbing – but a good time to catch Obama off guard while he makes hollow speeches to the world.
Next, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gives Obama a direct “F-you” and proceeds to bait the adolescent Obama into a public debate where Obama will made a fool in front of the World.
Obama’s Toy “reset buttons” and a world “apology tour” indicate extreme weakness when the exact opposite is needed. Obama has gotten everything assbackward.
He has weakened the economy of the USA and shown himself to be Ponzi President only focused on inflating his own ego and further his partisan agenda.
Ahmadinejad probably has the ability to get a crude nuke into Iraq’s Green zone and vanquish the Americans and the most of the Iraqi government.
Further, Iran with a little help form Syria can probably deliver a gun style nuke to some parts of Israel.
These problems will keep Obama and Hillary hog tied for the remainder of their term.
I would not doubt that the Mullahs will have some other unpleasant surprise for American’s on their own soil.
This is terrible news on Memorial Day.
There is of course, the other side of the looking glass:
“Have We Already Lost Iran?” by Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett, Op-Ed Contributors, in the NYTimes on May 24, 2009:
President Obama’s Iran policy has, in all likelihood, already failed. … In his greeting to “the people and leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran” on the Persian New Year in March, Mr. Obama included language meant to assuage Iranian skepticism about America’s willingness to end efforts to topple the regime and pursue comprehensive diplomacy.
Iranian diplomats have told us that the president’s professed willingness to deal with Iran on the “basis of mutual interest” in an atmosphere of “mutual respect” was particularly well received in Tehran. They say that the quick response of the nation’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei — which included the unprecedented statement that “should you change, our behavior will change, too” — was a sincere signal of Iran’s openness to substantive diplomatic proposals from the new American administration.
… the real reason Iranian leaders have not responded to the new president more enthusiastically: the Obama administration has done nothing to cancel or repudiate an ostensibly covert but well-publicized program, begun in President George W. Bush’s second term, to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to destabilize the Islamic Republic. Under these circumstances, the Iranian government — regardless of who wins the presidential elections on June 12 — will continue to suspect that American intentions toward the Islamic Republic remain, ultimately, hostile.
More broadly, President Obama has made several policy and personnel decisions that have undermined the promise of his encouraging rhetoric about Iran. On the personnel front, the problem begins at the top, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. As a presidential candidate, then-Senator Clinton ran well to the right of Mr. Obama on Iran … Even more disturbing is President Obama’s willingness to have Dennis Ross* become the point person for Iran policy at the State Department.
* * *
To fix our Iran policy, the president would have to commit not to use force to change the borders or the form of government of the Islamic Republic. He would also have to accept that Iran will continue enriching uranium, and that the only realistic potential resolution to the nuclear issue would leave Iran in effect like Japan — a nation with an increasingly sophisticated nuclear fuel-cycle program that is carefully safeguarded to manage proliferation risks. Additionally, the president would have to accept that Iran’s relationships with Hamas and Hezbollah will continue, and be willing to work with Tehran to integrate these groups into lasting settlements of the Middle East’s core political conflicts.
======================
You need to understand how demented this type of thinking is. At its root it sees Iran as an ordinary country engaged in ordinary pursuits. The Leveretts compare it to Japan “the only realistic potential resolution to the nuclear issue would leave Iran in effect like Japan — a nation with an increasingly sophisticated nuclear fuel-cycle program that is carefully safeguarded to manage proliferation risks.”
This is completely delusional. The Iranian regime is revolutionary, and committed to using violence to summon the “Mahdi” (the Islamic Messiah) who will create an Islamic Kingdom of God on earth — from which Hell will be a welcome escape.
The regime has, since its birth in 1979, committed repeated acts of war against the United States, starting with the kidnapping of the US Embassy staff, and including the Beirut embassy bombing by Hezbollah (which even the delusional Leveretts acknowledge is an Iranian tool), the Kohbar towers bombing, and numerous acts of terrorism and sabotage against the US and its allies in Iraq.
The truly astounding thing is that no American official has, at any time during the last 30 years, been willing to acknowledge this state of war publicly and explicitly.
The posture the Leveretts urge would be a suit for peace on whatever terms the Iranians deign to give. The results would be a disaster, for the US, for our Arab allies in the Mid-East, and for Israel.
What I would urge is a recognition of reality, and demands on Iran that would be backed by an obvious show of armed might.
hdgreene said:
“I think ridiculing President Obama is the wrong approach. … Assuming the Iranians want to acquire nukes, and need more time to do so, they should be stringing him along and use flattery to prey on his weakness. Then allow him to blame Israel (and, if possible, Bush) for the ultimate failure.”
Don’t ignore the Middle-Eastern/Arab/Persian mindset:
They despise weakness.
The Iranians contempt for Obama’s weakness supercedes the advantages of duplicity through false respect.
People like Nasser, Assad and Saddam Hussein were politically successful because they were perceived as strong. Obama’s obvious willingness to negotiate with the Iranians when all previous attempts have failed can only be seen as weakness.
Obama is leading us to nuclear war in the Middle East.
Fat Man, the question should be: “Have We Already Lost the Iranian People?”
I hope not, but to take Leverett’s path would certainly mean losing forever all the Iranians who dream of a Democratic Republic of Iran. I fully realize the neo-con label is commonly used as an epithet anymore, but if anyone has a better option to war (or, as in Leverett’s example, all out appeasement) than internal revolution by the people of Iran, I haven’t yet heard it.
The combination of pretty words and destabilizing actions does suggest a sophisticated rope-a-dope, or at least an attempted one. Were Obama a different person than I believe him to be, this would be a great example of the classic definition of diplomacy, “Saying ‘nice doggie’ while you reach for a big rock.” Make everyone else believe you’re truly committed to talking this one out until you are “forced” to act, an action you had planned all along. When criticized, point to your long record of engagement and sincere committment to diplomatic resolution, all of which was rebuffed.
There are at least a few problem with this approach, at least in this case.
First, if Obama has an iron fist under the velvet glove he has yet to show it to anyone except Chrysler bondholders.
Second, this concedes first blow to your opponent, which is fine until you consider that your opponent has been spinning centrifuges for the better part of the last five years or so.
Third, this requires the creation of an extensive and public record of engagement, and having so throughly trashed Bush’s talking without military action for the past several years the current President has to spend time making a diplomatic paper trail. This only makes the second drawback that much more dangerous, and given that none of our European allies has shown inclination to do anything other than talk, it may not matter in the first place.
Fourth, I still don’t see a good way for the US to intervene without igniting Iranian nationalism and only strengthening the Khameni regime. Ideally, the response to the first blow ends the fight, but I see no scenario of kinetic action by the Israelis or the US that doesn’t end in a regional war. This is particularly so given the constraints we have on our military, with preexisting committments. About the only thing we can handle is an enforced embargo, the Air Force and Navy can probably make that happen and absolutely destroy the Iranian economy without attacking Iran directly.
Fifth, nobody is accusing the Iranians of being stupid, so the provocation is unlikely to come, meaning that they will mind their ps and qs and rush their nuclear program to fruition without giving our President the opportunity to act surprised when attacked. Rope-a-dope doesn’t work when your opponent refuses to take a swing at your unguarded chin.
As it is, what will probably happen is that there is nothing but a damp, limp hand within our velvet glove, the Iranians will announce a successful test within the next couple of years, and our President with shrug his shoulders and encourage us to accept the New World Order as it is. When Turkey and Egypt and Saudi Arabia go nuclear in response, they will have been shown the way by the Iranians.
The Saudis don’t need Pershings, they already have Chinese CSS-2s, and I’m reasonably sure the Paks can modify them back to nuclear capability if needed.
The only thing I got wrong about Obama was the speed at which it would become clear that electing him was a catastrophe. In just a few months he’s managed to destroy us domestically and internationally. No “Manchurian candidate” could have done a better job than he has.
Darren, supposing the Iranians themselves intervened to bring down the Khamenei regime, could we live with a nuclear Democratic Republic of Iran? Could Israel? Could Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt?
I confess my ignorance here, but guess we wouldn’t know unless and until it were to happen. But as you point out, the one thing we do know is that a revolutionary Islamic Republic of Iran in the position of nukes will undoubtedly be an unmitigated disaster.
Obama is an arrogant posturing clown and a fool. He knows nothing certainly less than Palin about the world and real dangers that America faces.
At least Israel had an election that put in a more realistic leader and Sarkozy and Berlusconi also know better. When France and Italy is more conservative than an American leader you know we picked badly.
My worries about Iran have been pacified since I am assured that Israel recognizes the danger and will not rely on the US to save them. They have the ability to save themselves.
Plus Israeli intelligence is good most places. I expect our air cover will let them slip by as needed wily nilly.
NK can’t get their missiles to our shore and we have limited missile defense.
The only worry is a good planned attack on our land by a terrorist. Not a minor store bombing.
All the good people that inspect shipments far away from our shores are still on duty and will do so despite our President.
Our domestic security forces are still alert. I doubt the next attack will be by plane. It has to be original and spectacular.
A Bombay attack will not work with our police and armed populace. If police are not there a citizen will be and attack back. That is our nature.
So if we can abide and get our economy back on track and wait out this idiot in office, we will survive to live and fight another day.
Make that “possession of nukes” not “position of nukes”–slightly more sensible that way.
@36- Sometimes, however, the first punch puts you down for the count. More so with nukes. consider:
1) EMP Bomb. Iranians have already demonstrated ballistic missile capability sufficient for EMP attack:
http://www.defensetech.org/archives/004673.html
2) North Korea test could be Iranian $$/Uranium/plans assembled in situ
3) EMP attack would be catastrophic;
http://www.empcommission.org/docs/A2473-EMP_Commission-7MB.pdf
4) If you want a fictional but believable look at the aftereffects of EMP attack:
http://www.onesecondafter.com/ (book also available on Amazon)
http://www.amazon.com/One-Second-After-William-Forstchen/dp/0765317583/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232080074&sr=1-1
@Subotai Bahadur- any predictions?
Hope that you enjoy your reading
Cheers
InlandEmpire
21. downtowndubai:
hey
here in the uae the french are showing that as President Pantywaist sings kum by yah, Sarko the magnificent is playing rough guy. the french will man a naval/coastal battle station that will provide heavy securtiy to a region where all power generation (incluidng nuke) will be planned.
Sarko is also claiming his intentions to defend the UAE, with a french run naval station planned along the ”power gen. beach strip”, outsde of abu dhabi. the french are pumping a retro fit of existing Mirages 2000 fleet and purchase of new upgraded models-all whistles and bells…just sign here Sheikh !!!
uh oh, my iranian friend is back
hey, not happy ???
http://www.iran-resist.org/article5393.html
A truly democratic Iran I believe we can live with. A truly democratic Iran might bite at the rather hefty carrots we have to offer in terms of trade, diplomatic recognition and technology transfer.
India was not our friend when it detonated its first nuclear weapon, or while it built out its arsenal. The Persian-Israeli “conflict” has never come to blows the way the Indo-Pak conflict has, and there are not nearly so many bodies on both sides in the Iran-Israel contretemps. Despite this racial/religious animosity, history of direct and bloody warfare as well as an active border dispute neither India nor Pakistan has managed to nuke each other in the 35 years that India has been a nuclear power.
A small nation like Israel can be covered by fewer megatons than Iran, but Iran will have to work for years to achieve an annihilation threat to Israel. Iran could see a 70% population loss and utter collapse as a state at the hand of Israel in an afternoon. A democratic Iran would understand this, I think. A democratic Iran might be less interested in getting the Mahdi out of the well.
And RAH, I agree, it’s disturbing when our country is moving to the left of the French.
The Bombay thing might not work, but two guys, a Bushmaster AR-15 and an old Impala sure did paralyze the Washington, DC area for about 10 days. A better-financed operation with more teams of shooters and multiple vehicles would be far worse, and still cheaper than the plane tickets for 9/11.
I read an article several years ago about Beslan, and the potential for application in the United States. The author pointed out that SWAT training in the US was oriented around contain-and-negotiate, which was useless for the Beslan situation where terror and death were the ends, not the means to other ends. The author pointed out that there are only a few units in the US trained for the specific mission of breaching and killing terrorists in a short period of time. I think there has been some upgrading of training since then, but several teams pulling off the same thing on the same day would stretch our resources to the limits. Particularly if it’s not New York and LA, but Bakersfield and Rochester and other cities in “flyover country”.
The attacks themselves wouldn’t be the worst of it. They are the hapten, the molecule that accompanies the antigen to produce a more vigorous immune response. Our ideological opponents do not have to kill us all, they just have to fire up an autoimmune reaction, get us to attack ourselves, and in the process weaken our response to their actions elsewhere. A mutli-Beslan attack would generate incredible finger-pointing and mutual blame sessions. Given the polarization of politics that has been building for years, that seems to be the best pressure point for terrorists to attack.
It’s arguable that this has already happened. Our last President just put his head down, ignored the noise and did what he felt needed doing. This one may not be so stubborn. or resistant to polling.
Neither Ahmadinejad nor Bibi pay the slightest attention to the President of the United States, demand or cajole as he will. The Norks detonate a nuke, the Iranians continue to build nukes, and Israel refuses to commit national suicide when asked nicely to do so, even though the President promised Bibi the famous Obama smile was enough to deflect incoming.
What’s that you say, you wish we’d stop?
Whatever do you mean?
You used to be the biggest cop
But now you’re truly seen
For what you are, a toothless boy
Come begging for to please
Your cringing manner brings us joy
And puts us at our ease
We’ve told you many times before
Our nukes are not for hold
We’ll go ahead and build our store
If we may be so bold
We know you try to do your best
To look so rough and tough
But we know you won’t pass the test
Big smiles just aint enough
But Bibi now’s, a different guy
He’s told you where to go
He’s knows what’s up, he isn’t shy
He’s gonna strike a blow
But we think we are ready for
Whatever Bibi does
We think that we can win this war
In partly just becuz
We know whose side that you are on
We know just where you stand
We know Barack is no Sharon
We know he’ll lend no hand
To either side, that’s who he is
He’s just above all that
Where once US made soda fizz
Today the soda’s flat
Remembering
As recently as the late 1950s, in a small town on Long lsland near New York City, young people in school learned certain poems:
Joyce Kilmer’s “Prayer of a Soldier in France,”
Alan Seeger’s “ I Have a Rendezvous With Death”
and John MacRae’s “In Flanders Field.”
Does anyone still remember the fallen this way in classrooms?
Joyce Kilmer’s “Prayer of a Soldier in France,”
Alan Seeger’s “ I Have a Rendezvous With Death”
John MacRae’s “In Flanders Field.”
for the memorial day
“Le dormeur du val” Arthur Rimbaud
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XV_BToE8gD0&translated=1
Le dormeur du val
C’est un trou de verdure où chante une rivière
Accrochant follement aux herbes des haillons
D’argent ; où le soleil, de la montagne fière,
Luit: c’est un petit val qui mousse de rayons.
Un soldat jeune, bouche ouverte, tête nue,
Et la nuque baignant dans le frais cresson bleu,
Dort ; il est étendu dans l’herbe, sous la nue,
Pâle dans son lit vert ou la lumière pleut.
Les pieds dans les glaëuls, il dort. Souriant comme
Sourirait un enfant malade, il fait un somme :
Nature, berce-le chaudement : il a froid.
Les parfums ne font pas frissonner sa narine ;
Il dort dans le soleil, la main sur sa poitrine
Tranquille. Il a deux trous rouge au côté droit
Octobre 1870.
Arthur Rimbaud
Is Obama weak, and do Alinsky’s rules apply?
No.
Women LOVE Obama. Love is probably too weak a word, they worship him as the combination of the Beatles, Elvis, American Idol, Oprah, the View, and pretty much ever tweener idol ever created. He’s all that. And women will NEVER abandon him.
Women don’t care (except for married women, and then only older, married women with kids, in their mid 40′s or older, concerned about the future of their kids) about North Korea or Iran nuking us. They really don’t. Why would they? As long as they’re not nuked, all for the better. Because the feature of modern warfare since 1945 for Western Women is that they don’t take it on the chin. It’s a “pretend war” that never impacts their lives. Most women would GLADY surrender to Iran or any other nation, all for the better because it ends holidays like Memorial Day (honoring dead soldiers almost none of whom were female) and gives power to them.
Women won’t ever abandon Obama and his dream of Vichy America, constantly apologizing and surrendering. Heck women put huge emphasis on popularity and being loved, if America were nuked again, well it’s Munchausen Syndrome, with America getting “sympathy” and being “the victim” which is the staple of Lifetime TV and most women’s magazines.
MEN, however, are starting to really get angry at Obama, for a whole host of reasons. This makes him look weak and pathetic. The feminized media will cover for him of course, and women don’t mind him being weak, in fact that’s the whole point. To be the victim. Where everyone feels sorry for you, and you can wallow in emotion.
Overlaying the gender divide is the class divide, with Media/Entertainment/Law/Finance people allied alongside Obama wanting a weak, submissive, begging America, and the middle-middling classes in real estate, construction, resource extraction, trades, entrepreneurs, and so on wanting a strong, aggressive, forceful America.
Obama WANTS an American defeat. Not the least of which is his backers (women, gays, Blacks, Hispanics, SWPL Yuppies, Media, Entertainment, Law, Finance, folks) all want the same thing too. Defeat. Humbling. The last thing your typical NPR listener wants is an American victory. Since that would sweep in the Palin types for a decade or more.
I lived in the area with the 2 guy assassination team with a Bushmaster. I was in the field and my visits were to Fitzgerald Auto Mall on Rockville Pike where the man got killed on the lawn mower then to Georgia Ave where another person was shot at a gas station where I got gas also, so I lived that terror scene.
It was weird, the killings were random and we all watched out carefully and realized that there was nothing I could do to avoid a sniper hiding out and planning to shoot me if he wanted. I am a person who believes in self-defense but a gun would not have helped me if taken my surprise by a bullet to the head.
However once the police released the info it was truck drivers that found them and blocked their escape until police came. Once authorities cooperated and communicated to the public, the public responded and found the killers and was willing to prevent their escape personally.
So even though that was a strange couple of weeks it did not stop us from our daily activities. So while destructive to those they killed it was not spectacular which is the terrorists trademark.
My fear is that someone with better knowledge of our society will convince them to abandon their “spectacular” requirement and set about to serious and destructive monkeywrenching. The WTC and Pentagon attacks were bad, but symbolic attacks don’t get most people where they live. Maybe it’s my perspective as a small town person, but the 9/11 attacks are just a part of the joys of living in a dense urban area. Certainly not that anyone deserves to be attacked by a terrorist, but random crime, etc., is more common there than it is here. I have friends is large cities and wish no urban dwellers ill, but that’s just one of many things you have to consider when you move to a large urban area, and one of the things you don’t worry so much about in a town of 85,000.
Many people believe in security through obscurity, that it “won’t happen here”. The majority of funds spent on “Homeland Defense” have been dumped into urban areas. What better way to make that “investment” useless than to attack nonurban areas? In terms of sowing dissent in the political sphere, that seems to be the best target available. Apparently we are still enjoying the benefit of having enemies of limited competence.
What I want to know is whether the latest NK bomb was an enriched uranium or a plutonium bomb. A workable uranium bomb is a lot easier to make than one based on plutonium, but enriching uranium to bomb grade quality is an expensive and time consuming process. And uranium bombs are messier to store and are larger than plutonium bombs of equivalent power. But if you do have the know how to build plutonium bombs then your ability to produce X number of bombs per unit of time is greatly enhanced.
I don’t think the Dear Leader in NK would even think of selling everything he has–he’ll first want to build up a personal arsenal before he starts selling excess production to his customer base.
If it was just a uranium bomb we have a little more time before the other members of the Legion of Psychopaths get their hands on a nuke courtesy of NK.
@36 RAH- sometimes the first punch puts you down for the count.
consider EMP: Iran could launch high altitude nuclear device and essentially shut down anything electronic in USA not hardened or protected by Faraday cage:
http://www.defensetech.org/archives/004673.html
For a fictional look:
http://www.onesecondafter.com
@ Subotai- What does your crystal ball say? Time to pack up the VW (no electronics except for radio) and head for Idaho?
Cheers-
InlandEmpire
Tcobb,
That is about the most astute observation and comment in this whole sob story. A plutonium bomb would also be a lot easier to mount on a ballistic missile. The uranium bomb might be just too darn big and heavy to go on a missile.
It would also be a clue as to how much Iran and NK were actually co-operating. Iran has the centrifuges running to build up the enriched plutonium (or uranium), but one wonders how much and who would be making plutonium for this? They might also be able to get the technology from Europe or elsewhere buy or to make the precise timers for plutonium bomb implosion.
Our mission, then, is to ferret out the truth in this world wide hanky – fest and find out whether it was a uranium gun type test or a plutonium implosion test.
Stay tuned.
“He is in any event, in the middle of the challenge which Joe Biden predicted he would face.”
“The nuclear issue is a finished issue for us,” Ahmadinejad was quoted by the Washington Post as saying,
With these two quotes you now have a good idea that we have known that the Iranians were a LOT closer to having fissile material than was reported. They may have gotten that material from a bordering country…
And by him gloating to the press. We can be assured that it was his test bomb. All conjecture on my part of course. But what does YOUR gut tell you…
We are coming to the realization that talk alone does not stop nuclear weapons development. This should have been evident but incredibly, no. So what now? Only two choices, accept any and all future members to the nuclear club or stop it with force. No other choices. The facts are in people- now what do we do with them?
1) Obama HATES America.
He, like most of the Left, firmly believed that if they could defeat America (in Iraq), they could defeat George W. Bush in the US.
You go to the BBC “Have your say” boards and you will find plenty of people that think it is great that NK has nukes. No doubt Obama and many on his White House staff think the same. Unfortunately for them, they can’t express it openly; they have to do the “we support the troops” dance.
2) Obama and the EU would love to see Israel get nuked. To them Israelis are worse than Nazis. Good old Marxist oppressor/victim analysis. If the oppressor (Israel) got there’s, all the better.
Plus, if the Arabs cause a 2nd Holocaust, Europe would morally be off the hook for the 1st Holocaust. “See, it wasn’t our fault. No one can live with those Jews.”
A recent survey asked who thought “The Jews” were responsible for the current economic crisis. The Democrats weighted in at 32%. Given the fact that Jews tend to identify as Democrats, the portion of non-Jewish Democrats that said “Yes” must have been higher than 32%. Republicans came in at 18%.
3) But finally, I am tired of all this foreplay. I am ready for someone to nuke someone else and find out where the chips will finally fall.
Of course, I have always been pessimistic and have no hope that we’ll go the Obama 8 years without someone getting nuked.
I have already moved a chunk of my meager retirement holdings to China.
#50 E.Nigma
As far as I know, the devices are U-235 based. Plutonium would have to be made in reactors, which are pretty easy to detect. Centrifuges are used to cascade-separate U-235 isotope from inert U-238. They may have some difficulty in mounting a warhead on a missile, the implosion method used with plutonium being far less forgiving of real small errors than U-235. However, while not discounting their ability to eventually mount a nuke on a missile for a counterforce strike; there are other options.
A U-235 gun device is as simple as chopsticks [I'm Chinese, I can say things like that!]. It is the equivalent of banging two fabricated rocks together real hard.
For a long time, it has been a truism that a 1st year college physics student could design a nuclear device that could fit in a minivan. How many standard cargo containers move around the world, both by ship and by truck? How many SUV’s are capable of crossing borders without benefit of roads and such details as customs inspections? How many aircraft are moving around the world with the capability to move cargo of the appropriate size and weight [and it ain't gonna be that heavy]? If you want to be scared gormless, read Ted Taylor’s [he designed many of our nuclear weapons] The Curve of Binding Energy.
If we are hit, it probably is not going to be directly by a nation state we can hold responsible. There will be a tremendous amount of doubt as to who to blame. Iran, Pakistan, and North Korea all use U-235. They are the interconnected proprietors of the “Anti-American Arms Bazaar”. And the equivalent of the Apple Computer SuperBowl commercial has just aired. What do you want to bet that after we are hit, the government will be paralysed into inaction due to uncertainties as to who is to blame?
And in 10 years, after it is accepted as a fact of life that there is no American defense umbrella and has not been one for a long time; the growth in the number of nuclear states will increase any such uncertainty exponentially.
Oh Lord, for that which we are about to recieve, may we be truly grateful! … Morbid Royal Navy saying during the Napoleonic Wars, as they awaited the first French broadsides.
Subotai Bahadur
Jamie Irons @ 1: “…Dick Cheney, who really is no longer a political figure…”
I beg to differ. He is stepping forward at a time when he perceives he is needed. But, he served 2 terms as VPOTUS and can still serve as POTUS. Cheney is able to serve in any way his wishes at this point.
F @ 26: “The challenges are coming faster now, … And the increasing tempo of challenges gives every sign of meaning our enemies are smelling weakness. Not good, folks. Not good.”
And The 0bamanation votes present by saying he will have the UNSC create a strongly worded letter or some such? As L3 says @ 27: “So the President of the US is willing to meet without preconditions, but the President of Iran is not.” Because the strong horses smell the weak horse. They will come faster and faster now.
Several points for RAH @ 36: “NK can’t get their missiles to our shore and we have limited missile defense.” & “The only worry is a good planned attack on our land by a terrorist. Not a minor store bombing.”
Read this: “December 7, 2007″ @: http://www.newmediajournal.us/staff/kraft/2006/10242006.htm It will explain why they can get here and how. This is just one scenario out of many I could think of. And the Nork’s can hit Hawaii with one of their long range missiles they just tested.
“All the good people that inspect shipments far away from our shores are still on duty and will do so despite our President.”
The holes in this system are so big I cannot believe that you think they are effective. Containers of people get through into our ports daily.
“Our domestic security forces are still alert. I doubt the next attack will be by plane. It has to be original and spectacular.”
The same thing. TSA is so spectacularly ineffective as to be a laughingstock in the security world. Here is a good place to start: http://www.schneier.com/blog/
“A Bombay attack will not work with our police and armed populace. If police are not there a citizen will be and attack back. That is our nature.”
Yes, it will. Pick a gun free zone and they are off and running. California comes to mind. Any state that has made open carry of a firearm illegal is prime victim hunting ground.
RAH – We have too many ways we can be attacked. I expect there will be one soon. Probably in conjunction with some other event abroad similar to the NoKo nuke test. Go to Gates of Vienna and search their site for Jamaat ul-Fuqra. They have covered these guys quite well. JaF is an Islamic group who has several sites in the US.
We now know what the test would be. The Nork’s detonating the test nuke for Iran or themselves, it does not matter. They can now sell or barter the product to whoever wants one.
The question now is, when and where does the attack on Israel and/or the US come? In what form will it be?
“Obama and the EU would love to see Israel get nuked.”
don’t speak for EU, may-be only the ultra-left part would, – 5%
I read on Wired that the NK use plutonium and the it was 4kt explosion which also can be done with conventional explosives. Current theory is the NK has enough for 8-12 warheads A 4 kt is warhead size .Considering they shot off another couple of missiles. This is testing both components.
I really do not beleive their missiles are good enough to get to the west coast, since technically it is difficult to acheive consistency such as we have. But any new launches should be shot down to prevent them learning from their mistakes.
They want the ability to threaten the west not that they intend to atack us. But from our viewpoint there is little difference.
Darren #33,
Good round-up, D.
You wrote:
“Third, this requires the creation of an extensive and public record of engagement, and having so throughly trashed Bush’s [...]”
One example of where O! and his media have boxed themselves in is the topic of Yellowcake uranium. Notice how the words “yellow” and “cake” don’t appear in the pages of the NYT anymore (outside of a possible front-page interest-piece about “greedy bankers’” cake-decorating skills).
But…imagine the headline: “Iranian Dirty Bomb Uses Niger Yellowcake.” It’ll sure put the lie to “Sixteen Words in the SOTU,” the “Plame-Wilson Affair,” “Merry Fitzmas and the corrupted Italian dossier on Saddam’s armaments. Heck, applied broadly, it could even force a revisit of DeVillepin’s “reasoned” veto-threats against OIF at the UN.
So, I’m just a concerned American, not an expert, but if Iran were importing Yellowcake from Africa, I sincerely doubt that the Legacy media could bring themselves to report that fact. They’re way too vested in protecting the anti-Bush touchstones that their client politicians, like Durban, Pelosi, the CBC and Franks, rely on to stay in office.
When the fact that African yellowcake uranium is making its way into Palestinian dirty-bombs and Iranian “factories” becomes unavoidable, look for a new, “chartreuse-cake Uranium” to show in NYT reports about the discovered Somali bills=of-laden. This, new “off-yellow-cake uranium,” our media better’s will swallow whole and regurgitate ad nauseum along with predigested “Bush did too lie” left overs added for bulk.
Call it the “Shepherd’s Pie” approach to ass-covering.
From Mish Shedlock: Japan to enter global arms race. http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/
Maybe someday soon after the Bama has got us nuked and nearly destroyed, we can be covered under the Japanese Nuclear/ Missile Defense umbrella.
#60 RAH
I stand corrected. I was thinking of the early centrifuge plants in NE North Korea. The Norks are using plutonium from Yongbyon. That in inself is not a comforting thought. We have had two tests. While the first one may have been somewhat of a fizzle, this last one did satisfactorally go bang. [Although it is becoming a new meme on the Left that this was faked by the North Koreans with a huge amount of conventional explosives, because the Norks would not really set off a nuke. If we have sufficient monitoring stations, the difference might be theoretically seismically detectable.] This implies that with plutonium and an implosion type device that they have mastered that part. The difficulty is in the critical timing and tolerances required. Such a device would be smaller and lighter, but the “ruggedization” process would be more critical to make a warhead. A missile and warhead undergoes some rather high g-force/delta v stress and since very small fractions of a second and very tight tolerances are necessary, you have to learn to build it just right.
It nets out though, that the nuclear physics part has been mastered. The engineering part is where they are now. If they get it figured out, their missiles will have somewhat longer effective ranges, because the warheads will be lighter. Smaller packages also make for easier smuggling as I noted in #56 above. The difference in warhead type, however, would be detectable, far after the fact differentiating a North Korean from a Pakistani or an Iranian source for the nuke. However, if a device is detonated in the West [US, Europe, or Israel] by Hamas, Hezbollah, Al Quada, Jamaat Al Fuqra, et. al.; who would the return strike be against? Actually, if the Israeli NCA survives along with its strategic forces, I assume that they have a retaliatory plan already in place. However, Europe or the US would be in full dither mode, and I suspect it would take multiple strikes and possibly a field expedient change of government to get them past worrying about “root causes”.
The one comforting thought is that while conventional terrorist attacks probably will fall in the heartland, these generally would not threaten national survival and can be fought back against. A nuclear WMD attack, with few exceptions, will more likely fall on Hussein Pasha’s own base.
No, I am not a nice person. I try to be a realistic one.
Subotai Bahadur
Israel can easily mount a targeted EMP attack on Iran. The underground bunkers where the centrifuges are would survive, but the government of Iran would be crippled. If we had any balls we would simultaneously hit the NORK’s with an EMP attack to deprive the Dear Leader of his VCR and porno tapes.
Unfortunately – as should be blindingly obvious – this not a North Korean or Iranian problem, this is a Russia/China problem, and nothing will be “resolved” in Tehran or Pyongyang except to the satisfaction of those two Powers until the West learns to unite and deliver b/tch- and other slaps when and where appropriate.
Of course it will not. Not since the election of Leon Blum has the West decided to more extravagantly display its weakness and lotus-eating to the world’s predatory powers. At this point, it appears we have much more to hope from the incompetence or bad luck of our enemies rather than any positive achievement of our own leaders. Pathetic.
#50 TCobb:
Almost certainly Plutonium. I spoke to someone a few weeks ago who is familiar with our “negotiation” paper trail with N. Korea, and how we let them keep their Plutonium stockpile when they “promised” to “stop” their bomb program.
In my conversation (FWIW) I also pointed out that N. Korea is a long way from an effective and reliable delivery system. Their “ICBM” is too small, and they likely have no reentry vehicle capability. That could change with Iranian help, however, because the Iranian IRBM-equivalent could deliver a 500 lbs. payload as far away as Japan. 500 lbs. is probably the smallest size the Norks could possibly make a nuke for some time.
any small ship or boat that can carry the weapon is a quite effective delivery sytem as well as any cargo plane of the right size even a passenger aircraft can carry and suicide detonate over it’s target the NorKs nor the others really need a missile size delivery weapon.
A Container ship maybe but a fishing trawler would do.
Phoney war is over may be the best remark from here on out it’s just a matter of time it’s the real thing now.
Obama will allow a first strike against us in order to obtain the moral high ground to go to war.
It’s the only way his and the Democrats political career will survive.
#66
Having plutonium and being able to build a bomb with it are two different things. That,as I said, is what I would like to know. Not only does the type of bomb (uranium vs. plutonium) determine how fast you can manufacture them it also determines the minimum weight of the bomb. And when it comes to ICBM’s, every gram counts. My information is dated, but is used to be that the minimum amount of U-235 needed to create “critical mass” was about 45kg, whereas with plutonium it was about 5kg.
It could easly be shipped via ship/air to say Venezuala and from there either floated by boat, ship or even semi submersible dope subs along the gulf coast. By land it could travel along the drug highways via truck or rail.
“These are the guys who used a $1.99 box cutter to drop the WTC on 9/11″ they do this stuff on the cheap.
Missiles are not needed more nukes are needed so Pakistan starts production with two new reactors, NorKs build the weapons and Iranian or other ‘s will pilot the suicide crafts to targets, ya cannot stop them all.
#71
Why bother with that? The UN headquarters are in New York. Just send the nuke in with the diplomatic luggage. It can’t be searched. The sanctity of International Law and all that. It makes a whole things easier, don’t you think?
We are in a time where everything that the elites of washington and finance believe turns out not only wrong but disastrous.
You know what is perverse about this situation. Every day that passes will be taken as proof of the wisdom of the elites.
Until disaster strikes and the utter foolishness will be evident. To those who survive.
Another perversity. The US now has more to fear from it’s friends than it’s enemies. North Korea is a failed state. Iran is dangerous, but watched very closely. But what about those threatened by these developments? The ones that have counted on the protection of the US? What deals will they make? What forces of madness will the danger arouse within their midst? If a nuclear Iran is frightening, what about a nuclear Saudi Arabia, or Egypt, or Jordan? Or Japan, South Korea, Taiwan? Or Singapore. Or Thailand. Turkey.
If I’m seeing these things, others are also. Isn’t right now the only opportunity to neutralize potentially dangerous neighbors before they are nuclear? Wouldn’t it be foolish for say China to wait for it’s small neighbors to go nuclear in response to North Korea rather than annex them now to remove the potential threat? Same with the middle east.
Oh, I forgot. They will receive the full condemnation of the international community.
Derek
Iranian objectives should be at the core of this discussion. These objectives actually explain why Ahmadinejad is acting the way he is. And, please before anyone jumps up and screams, consider this carefully.
It is widely assumed that the Iranians are simply seeking nukes so they can come out and destroy everyone. I am not sure were the notion that nuclear holocaust was a necessary prelude for Al-Mahdi. As the Shiites explain it, they await him in a similar fashion to our awaiting the Messiah. No collective destruction is necessary.
The Iranians know that an attack would be the end of them. No matter how much damage they do, they will still be wiped off the face of the earth. Even if you believe the Al-Mahdi story, it will not help them. They will not be there to see him.
What the Iranian government aims for two things.
First, the Iranian Government needs foreign adversity, including the threats of nuclear attacks by Israel to remain in power. Like all radicals and fanatics, they can only survive through conflict. But, only low intensity conflict that does not kill them. The constant threat and resultant fear they can feed into their people allow them to retain their grip on power.
It is very hard to rally people into frenzy when they are living comfortably and safely.
This explains why Ahmadinijad has responded as he did. Antagonism of the West and Israel’s threats are desperately needed for him to keep the moderate voices in check. The radicals may still control Government, but have long lost the hearts and minds of the people. The opposition has been growing below the radar, but the Mullahs know it.
Second, they want to be among the big boys. They want the world to consider them important and not just a third rate country. They want to placate the opposition voices by looking like they brought Iran into the forefront of the world scene through all this technological development. Suicidal attacks do not achieve that.
No amount of talk will stop them from developing missile or nuclear technology. It has not stopped others and the nuclear club has been growing rapidly.
The comparisons to 9/11, misses the actual intent of 9/11. Bin Laden was not trying to destroy the US with his attack, as anyone knows that it would take much more to do this. Bin Laden was instigating our counterattack into the region. He wanted us to go their and fight on his turf. He hoped that a war in Moslem country will allow him to radicalize more people. He hoped he could get people to turn on any Government that worked with us, and pave the way for his take over.
Bin Laden managed to radicalize some on account of the war, but most people as in any other place would rather not die mindlessly. Even if they have differences with their Governments or the war they do not go blow themselves up. This is particularly true in rich oil producing countries were people are enjoying the good life.
Ahmadinejad has so far managed to incur our ire and threats with ease. Why would he risk large scale war? He can continue to tick us off through minor incidents here and there and continue to build his arsenal.
His support for Hizbullah in Lebanon alone is enough to keep all this coming. And, only the Lebanese suffer, while marches on.
In the mean time he is negotiating hard with the Arabs across the pond for mutual security agreements, etc. designed to remove western militaries from the Gulf. All the threats of war are making his job much easier, as the people in the region are all in the kill zone, and would rather not be nuked.
The most dangerous thing we can do is underestimate our adversaries.
The Iranians are playing a very shrewd Chess game.
Unfortunately, we have yet to find a match for them on this side. Obama is not it.
Cadmus