Latest War
Buildup on Iran news:
10/28/07 The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog
said Sunday he had no evidence Iran was working actively to
build nuclear
weapons and expressed concern that escalating rhetoric from the U.S. could bring disaster.
He
said: "I'm very much concerned about confrontation, building confrontation, because
that would lead
absolutely
to a disaster. I see no military solution. The only durable solution is through
negotiation and
inspection...My
fear is that if we continue to escalate from both sides that we will end up into a
precipice,
we
will end up into an abyss. As I said, the Middle East is in a total mess, to say the
least. And we cannot
add
fuel to the fire,"
See - http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071028/ap_on_re_us/us_iran
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On July 23rd this year, I opined
that it was Bush's decision to launch an
attack on Iran, or to take steps that made a war with Iran much more likley, that
was making Crude Oil rise so sharply. I wish it were not so. But it is.
http://tigersoft.com/Tiger-Blogs/7-23-2007/index.htm
CRUDE OIL $100 - Very
Soon!
Already, the deficits created
by Bush's Iraq war are sending the dollar into a steep dive.
Think how much faster the dollar will fall if Bush starts another war.
Elsewhere,
I have shown why I am convinced that Bush has evolved from being a
pedigreed sadist to a
war-mongering menace. Certainly, he is too dull to consider
nuances like "blow-back"
and too medicocre and verbally inept to find creative
diplomatic alternatives to war. I bet he does not know the name of a single peace
treaty from the 19th century. War is not necessary. It becomes necessary when
the gullible are led by dangerous ideologues like Bush. Peace has an honorable
history, but it must be worked for. Sadly, a lazy C- legacy at Yale would
never
have learned any of that.
They say if you think education is expensive, you should see how expensive
ignorance is. The only think more expensive is an expensive Yale education
wasted on a spolied, mediocre preppie turned into a President through the magic
of Amercian mass media and greedy corporate sponsorship.
Why Bush's Mad Rush To War with Iran?
As Conservative political columnist Thomas Sewell said,
"I'm not sure which is scarier, The gullibility of Americans or Iran with
nuclear weapons."
Why Would A Nuclear Iran Mean World War III? Run That By Me
Again, George?
or
If You Loved The War on Iraq, You'll Love The War on Iran.
 |
Poll shows global opposition to Iran - and U.S.
The survey, which polled 57,000 people from 52 countries,
showed
39 percent of respondents wanted to see the influence of Iran diminished,
compared with 37 percent for the United States.
Only 14 percent of people taking part in the poll wanted Iran to have more
power while 26 percent thought more U.S. influence would make the world a
better place.
( http://www.iranfocus.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=12918
) |
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“If Iran had a nuclear weapon, it’d be a dangerous threat to world peace,”
Mr. Bush said. “So I told people that if you’re interested in avoiding World War
III,
it seems like you ought to be interested in preventing them from having the
knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon.”
( http://209.157.64.200/focus/f-news/1912991/posts
)
Iran is surrounded by nuclear powers:
India, Aghanistan, USSR, Israel and
Nato and menaced by the US, which has already overthrown one Democratically
elected Iranian Premier, Moassadegh in 1953, It is only natural that it wants
nuclear weapons. If positions were reversed, wouldn't we want a nuclear
deterrent, too. It wouldn't mean we would want to use them. That would be
foolish. Well, that' was my first take on Bush's unliateral sanctions today on
Iran.
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Mohammad Mosaddeq (Mossadeq (help·info))
(Persian:
???? ????? Mo?ammad Mo?addeq, also Mosaddegh
or Mossadegh) (19 May
1882 – 5 March 1967) served as the Prime
Minister of Iran[1][2]
from 1951 to 1953. He was democratically elected to the parliament, and as leader of the
nationalists was twice appointed prime minister by Mohammad
Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran, after a positive vote of inclination by the
parliament.[3]
Mossadegh was a nationalist
and passionately opposed foreign intervention in Iran. He was also the architect of the
nationalization of the Iranian oil industry, which had been under British control through
the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, today known as British
Petroleum (BP).... He was eventually removed from power on August 19, 1953, by
military intervention. The coup d'état was supported and funded by the British and U.S.
governments and was led by General Fazlollah Zahedi [10].
The American operation to encourage it was run by CIA agent Kermit
Roosevelt, Jr.,[11][12]
the grandson of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, and came to be known as Operation Ajax,[11)
( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammed_Mossadegh
) |
US Certainly Seems To Be Preparing for
War with Iran.
"Tucked inside the White House's $196
billion emergency funding request for the wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan is an item that has some people wondering whether the administration is
preparing for
military action against Iran. The item: $88 million to modify B-2 stealth bombers so they
can carry a
newly developed 30,000-pound bomb called the massive ordnance penetrator, or, in
military-speak, the MOP.
The MOP is the the military's largest conventional bomb, a super "bunker-buster"
capable of destroying hardened
targets deep underground. The one-line explanation for the request said it is in response
to "an urgent
operational need from theater commanders." What urgent need? It
could potentially be used on Taliban
or al Qaeda hideouts in the caves along the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, but
there would
be no need to use a stealth bomber there.
"The most likely target for this bomb would be Iran's
flagship nuclear facility in Natanz, which is both heavily fortified and deeply
buried."
The MOP is a massive bomb -- 20 feet long and
encased in 3.5 inch thick high-performance steel. It is designed to
penetrate up to 200 feet underground before exploding...
( http://www.iranfocus.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=12923
)
Again, Why is a Nuclear Iran A Cause
for War, George?
"If Iran acquires nuclear weapons it seems very probable that there
will be other states in the
region that will decide for their own protection they will have to obtain nuclear weapons
as well,"
Gates said. "So you would very likely have a
nuclear arms race in the Middle East." As weapons
or nuclear material became more widely available "the
risk of an accident or a miscalculation, or those
weapons or materials falling into the hands of terrorists, would be
substantially increased," he said.
"Statements by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
that Israel ought to be "wiped
off the map" offer little confidence that Tehran would handle
possession of nuclear weapons responsibly.
( US Defense Secretary
Robert Gates )
Perhaps, the real reason this will be
so dangerous, is because Israel is very
likely
to launch its own attack on Iran to pre-emptively destroy its nukes, just as
it did in 1981 against Iraq.
" Once Israel drops the first bomb on an Iranian nuclear
facility... there is no return. Bushehr is
likely to be the first target; other installations will follow. Iran will respond
– how can it not? At a
minimum, it will shoot
missiles at Israel. It may or may not shoot at U.S. forces in Iraq initially,
but given the U.S.-Israel "special
relationship," there is no way the U.S. will stay out of the conflict.
Many of Iran's targeted
facilities are underground, and U.S. bombs will be needed to destroy them all.
Once the U.S. enters the conflict, 150,000 U.S. troops in Iraq will be at risk of Iranian
missiles with
chemical warheads, or of being overrun by Iran's conventional forces streaming into Iraq. According
to the Pentagon
planning [.pdf], nuclear weapons will be used:
(1) "To demonstrate U.S. intent and capability to use nuclear weapons to deter
adversary
use of WMD."
(2) Against an adversary using or intending to use WMD against U.S., multinational,
or alliance forces or civilian populations…"
(3) [O]n adversary installations including WMD, deep, hardened bunkers containing chemical
or biological weapons or the C2 infrastructure required for the adversary to execute a WMD
attack against the United States or its friends and allies"
(4) [T]o counter potentially overwhelming adversary conventional forces…"
(5) For rapid and favorable war termination on U.S. terms…"
(6) "To ensure success of U.S. and multinational operations..."
( http://www.antiwar.com/orig/hirsch.php?articleid=7649
)
Israel, Arabs and The Nuclear Menace
For nearly 50 years, Arab leaders were pretty certain
that Israel (which has never explicitly
acknowledged having nuclear weapons) would not drop the bomb except as a very last resort.
That is why Egypt and Syria were unafraid to attack Israel during the October 1973 Yom
Kippur
War. "Israel will not be the first country in
the region to use nuclear weapons. Nor will it
be the second." That seems now to have changed.
And there's another dimmension here. Many Sunni Arabs hate and dear Shiites.
They would be
more than a little nervous at the strength a nuclear Shiite Iran would mean. If Iran gets
nukes, will
Saudi Arabia and Jordon will want them for their own protection. And if they get
them, then the
Egyptians will demand them. Surely, there's
enough understanding of these dynamics for
Washington to try to build support for a Middle Eastern nuclear free zone instead of
goading Iran into nuclear weapons with threats instead of dialogue.
What Must Be Done
Given this awful scenario, now is surely the time to use
Diplomacy, not bluster!. Now is no
time to refuse to talk to Iran! Now is the time to restrain Israel and get it into
productive talks
about a viable Palestinean state. The US Congress must take steps in these
directions if
the Bush Administation will not. World Peace depends on it.
Surely, people will not let the Bush Admistration rush us into another war with lies
and deceptions. Americans must not let the pro-Israel lobby dictate Amercan foreign
policy. Israel must not be blindly supported. It must be led by the US!
Talks must start
at once. If they do not, it is only a matter of time before an anti-Israel terrorist
group
fires a nedium range rocket with a nuclear weaopon at Haifa or Tel Aviv.
Bush does not have the intellligence, wisdom or creativity to find solutions through
diplomacy. His unilateralism and rhetoric about a World War III demonstrate him
to be the most dangerous man on the planet.
Bush Disdains Diplomacy: Shoot first,
talk later
" It became apparent in the immediate postwar period that the U.S.
decision to use force had been
rash and senseless, ignoring the fundamental premise that military might should be the
last--not the
first--option. There was no near-term threat to the U.S. or its interests. Yet, the U.S.
made no attempt
to use diplomacy or build a coalition. Rather, it went at the problem assuming that, as
the world's
dominant power, it had no need to gain the cooperation of the global community that was
organized
to meet such international challenges. This unprecedented action reflects the approach
championed
by neoconservative groups for the past decade. Theirs is a doctrine of unilateral and
preemptive use
of force and disdain for diplomacy, collective security, and multilateral organizations.
"Until the Bush Administration,
diplomacy was not just another option, but the primary means by
which the U.S. worked with other slates to create collective security. Until recently,
military muscle
was used only when diplomacy failed. An important exception was the gradual slide into the
Vietnam
War in the 1960s, which also was marked by the misuse of intelligence information and the
failure
to gain international support and create a global coalition. Although the U.S. was not
involved directly,
there is no better example of the futility of war than in the Middle East, where conflicts
in 1948, 1956,
1967, 1973, and 1982 (and 2006) demonstrated the failure of diplomacy. More aggressive
international
diplomacy might have prevented the Arab attacks on Israel in 1948 and 1967, the
British-French-Israeli
coalition warfare in 1956, and the disastrous Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982.
"The use of
diplomacy seeks to prevent bilateral and regional antagonisms from descending into
violence
and create the means for building mutual advantage. Diplomats are trained to deal with
tense situations
and create peaceful solutions. Military action, however, often sparks unintended
consequences that worsen
geopolitical situations and leave behind desolation and bitterness, as in Afghanistan and
Iraq. From 1945 to
2000, U.S. policymakers relied primarily on diplomatic instruments and collective security
and, when they
did not, as in Vietnam, they created economic and social weakness at home."
(Source: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1272/is_2710_133/ai_n6114805/pg_1
)
See also: http://www.randomhouse.com/acmart/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9781400042609&view=excerpt
)
The Trouble with Incurious George Bush
"George W. Bush's biggest problem is
that he never knew much about the world around him, and he
still does not know much. All of his life, he has been known as a person who does not
read, who does not
travel unless forced to do so.Note part of a recent New York Times editorial describing Bush's manner
of informing himself: "As for newspapers, Mr. Bush said, 'I glance at
the headlines' but 'rarely read the
stories.' The people who brief him on current events encounter many of the newsmakers
personally, he said,
and in any case 'probably read the news themselves.' ... Bush isn't dumb, but he's staggeringly
incurious
and ill informed about history and politics."
( http://www.uncuriousgeorge.org/
)
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Bush Immediately Disengaged
from MidEast Diplomacy
in 2001. (Added 10/27/2007)
On coming into office in 2001, Bush
discontinued the
efforts of prior administrations to bring Arabs and Israelis
together in a form of peace settlement. Where Carter,
Bush I and Clinton engaged in shuttle diplomacy to
keet Palestineans and Israelis from fighting, Bush disengaged
and within 6 months hostilities reached a point of ignition.
Why did Bush disenage? Apparently, he lacked an
interest and understanding of the word diplomacy and,
though hard, it is a lot easier than ending active warfare.
Bush seemingly did not wish to offend the new right-wing
Israeli Prime Minister and said nothing in April 2001 when
Israeli soldiers for the first time reoccupied territory
in the Gaza Strip ceded to the PA under the 1993
Oslo peace accords. In July Bush was silent when
Israel Bulldozers leveled fourteen Palestinian homes
under construction in one of Israel’s
biggest demolition
operations in years, provoking tears and stone throwing
at a refugee camp on the northern edge of Jerusalem.
Details
of the modest Bush efforts to retrain Israel
in this period: 2001-2002.
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