| Author | Message | | Alpha | |  | | Alpha | | Posted: Tue Aug 16, 2005 6:05 am Post subject: An Attack on Iran Will Usher in World War III |
| An Attack on Iran Will
Usher in World War III
By Mike Whitney 8-9-05
The facts about Iran's "alleged" nuclear weapons program have never been in dispute. There is no such program and no one has ever produced a shred of credible evidence to the contrary. That hasn't stopped the Bush administration from making spurious accusations and threats; nor has it deterred America's "imbedded" media from implying that Iran is hiding a nuclear weapons program from the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency). In fact, the media routinely features the unconfirmed claims of members of terrorist organizations, like the Mujahedin Klaq, (which is on the State Depts. list of terrorist organizations) to make it appear that Iran is secretively developing nuclear arms. These claims have proved to be entirely baseless and should be dismissed as just another part of Washington's propaganda war. Sound familiar?
Iran has no nuclear weapons program. This is the conclusion of Mohammed el-Baradei the respected chief of the IAEA. The agency has conducted a thorough and nearly-continuous investigation on all suspected sites for the last two years and has come up with the very same result every time; nothing. If we can't trust the findings of these comprehensive investigations by nuclear experts than the agency should be shut down and the NPT (Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty) should be abandoned. It is just that simple.
That, of course, is exactly what the US and Israel would prefer since they have no intention of complying with international standards or treaties and are entirely committed to a military confrontation with Iran. It now looks as though they may have the pretext for carrying out such an attack. Two days ago, Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman formally rejected a plan submitted by the EU members that would have barred Iran from "enrichment-related activities". Foreign Minister Hamid Reza Asefi said, "The Europeans' submitted proposals regarding the nuclear case are not acceptable for Iran."
Asefi did the right thing; the offer was conspicuously hypocritical. The United States doesn't allow any intrusive inspections on its nuclear weapons sites even though it is the only nation that has ever used nukes in battle and even though it is developing a whole new regime of tactical "bunker-buster" bombs for destroying heavily-fortified weapons sites buried beneath the ground.
The US is also the only nation that claims the right to use nukes in a "first-strike" capacity if it feels that its national security interests are at stake. The NPT is entirely designed to harass the countries that have not yet developed nuclear weapons and force them to observe rules designed by the more powerful states. It was intended to maintain the existing power-structure not to keep the peace. Even so, Iran is not "violating" the treaty by moving ahead with a program for "enriching uranium". They don't even have the centrifuges for conducting such a process. The re-opening of their facility at Isfahan signals that they will continue the "conversion" process to produce the nuclear fuel that is required in nuclear power plants.
This is all permitted under the terms of the NPT. They temporarily suspended that right, and accepted other confidence-building measures, to show the EU their willingness to find a reasonable solution to mutual concerns. But, now, under pressure from the Bush administration, the EU is trying to renege on its part of the deal and change the terms of the treaty itself. No way. So far, Iran has played entirely by the rules and deserves the same considerations as the other signatories of the treaty. The EU members (England, Germany, and France) are simply back-pedaling in a futile effort to mollify Washington and Tel Aviv. Besides, when Iran re-opens its plant and begins work, the UN "watchdog" agency (IAEA) will be present to set up the necessary surveillance cameras and will resume monitoring everything that goes on during the sensitive fuel-cycle process. Iran has shown an unwillingness to be bullied by Washington.
The Bush administration has co-opted the EU to enforce its double-standards by threatening military action, but that doesn't' conceal the duplicity of their demands. Why should Iran forgo the processing of nuclear fuel for peaceful purposes if it is written right into the treaty? Would Israel or Pakistan accept a similar proposal? Of course, not. Both countries ignored the treaty altogether and built their own nuclear weapons behind the back of the international community. Only Iran has been singled out and punished for COMPLYING with the treaty. This demonstrates the power of Washington to dictate the international agenda. Iran's refusal puts the EU in a position to refer the case to the IAEA, where the board members will make their determination and decide whether the case should be sent to the UN Security Council.
Whether the IAEA passes the case along or not makes little difference. Bush, Sharon and the western media will exploit the details in a way that condemns Iran and paves the way for a preemptive attack. The drive to war will not be derailed by mere facts. Iran has weathered the media criticism and the specious claims of the Bush administration admirably. They have responded with caution and discipline seeking reasonable solutions to thorny issues. Never the less, they have been unwavering in defending their rights under the NPT. This consistency in behavior suggests that they will be equally unswerving if they are the targets of an unprovoked attack. We should expect that they will respond with full force; ignoring the threats of nuclear retaliation. And, so they should. One only has to look at Iraq to see what happens if one does not defend oneself. Nothing is worth that.
The Iranian people should be confident that their government will do whatever is their power to defend their borders, their national sovereignty and their right to live in peace without the threat of foreign intervention.
That, of course, will entail attacking both Israel and US forces in Iraq. Whether or not the US actually takes part in the initial air raids is immaterial; by Mr. Bush's own standards, the allies of "those who would do us harm" are just as culpable as those who conduct the attacks. In this case, the US has provided the long-range aircraft as well as the "bunker-busting" munitions for the planned assault. The administration's responsibility is not in doubt. We should anticipate that the Iranian government has a long-range strategy for "asymmetrical" warfare that will disrupt the flow of oil and challenge American interests around the world. Certainly, if one is facing an implacable enemy that is committed to "regime change" there is no reason to hold back on doing what is necessary to defeat
that adversary. So far, none of the terrorist bombings in London, Spain, Turkey, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia or the US have implicated even one Iranian national.
That will certainly change. Iranian Intelligence has probably already planned covert operations that will be carried out in the event of an unprovoked attack on their facilities. Iran is also likely to become an active supporter of international terrorist groups; enlisting more recruits in the war against American interests. After all, any attack on Iran can only be construed as a declaration of all-out war. Isn't that so?
If Iran retaliates against Israel or the US in Iraq, then both nations will proceed with a plan that is already in place to destroy all of Iran's biological, chemical and conventional weapons sites. In fact, this is the ultimate US strategy anyway; not the elimination of the "imaginary" nuclear weapons facilities. Both the US and Israel want to "de-fang" the Mullah-regime so that they can control critical resources and eliminate the possibility of a regional rival in the future. In the short term, however, the plan is fraught with difficulties. At present, there is no wiggle room in the world's oil supply for massive disruptions and most experts are predicting shortages in the 4th quarter of this year. If the administration's war on Iran goes forward we will see a shock to the world's oil supplies and economies that could be catastrophic. T
hat being the case, a report that was leaked last week that Dick Cheney had STRATCOM (Strategic Command) draw up "contingency plans for a tactical nuclear war against Iran", is probably a bit of brinksmanship intended to dissuade Iran from striking back and escalating the conflict. It makes no difference. If Iran is attacked they will retaliate; that much is certain. It is always the mistake of extremists to misjudge the behavior of reasonable men; just as it is always the mistake of reasonable men to mistake the behavior of extremists. We should not expect the Bush administration to make a rational choice; that would be a dramatic departure from every preceding decision of consequence. The President of the United States always has the option of unleashing Armageddon if he so chooses. Normally, however, sanity prevails. When the bombs hit the bunkers in Iran; World War 3 will be underway.
Mike Whitney lives in Washington state. He can be reached at:
fergiewhitney@msn.com
http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/wake-up-america-your-government-is-hijacked-by-zionism/2005/08/09/on-the-road-to-world-war-3-for-israel-and-oil.php | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Wed Sep 14, 2005 3:30 am Post subject: The Iran trap |
| The Iran trap
by Scott Ritter
Sunday 11 September 2005 3:06 PM GMT
In the complicated world of international diplomacy surrounding the issue of Iran's nuclear programme, there is but one thing that the United States, the International Atomic Energy Agency, the so-called EU-3 (Germany, France and Great Britain) and Iran can all agree upon.
And that is: Iran has resumed operations of facilities designed to convert uranium into a product usable in enrichment processes. From that point forward consensus on just about anything begins to fall apart.
Iran's resumption of its uranium conversion programme seems to have brought to an end a negotiating process begun in November 2004 between the EU-3 and Iran, at which time Iran agreed to freeze its uranium enrichment-related activities in exchange for the EU-3's agreement to broker a deal that would provide inducements for Iran to give up its nuclear enrichment program.
With the EU-3 initiative now dead in the water, it appears that the next logical step in the diplomatic process is for the IAEA to refer the matter to the Security Council, where the US, backed by the EU-3, have threatened to push for economic sanctions. The IAEA board meets in Vienna, Austria on 19 September to discuss this matter.
The EU-3 countries are uniform in their criticism of Iran's diplomatic slap in the face, but in fact neither the EU-3 nor the IAEA have a legal leg to stand on.
Iran, as a signatory to the non-proliferation treaty (NPT), asserts its "inalienable right" under Article IV of the NPT to "develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes".
Such rights are conditional, however, but Iran strongly believes that it has complied with Articles I and II of the NPT, where it agrees not to manufacture or acquire nuclear weapons, and Article III, where it accepts full safeguards, including on-site inspections.
The only chance the world has of avoiding a second disastrous US military adventure in the Middle East is for the EU-3 to step back from its policy of doing the bidding of the US
Iran has yet to be declared to be in formal breach of any of these obligations, which raises the basic question: What is it the EU-3 wish to accomplish vis-a-vis their diplomatic intervention?
The real purpose of the EU-3 intervention - to prevent the United States from using Iran's nuclear ambition as an excuse for military intervention - is never discussed in public.
The EU-3 would rather continue to participate in fraudulent diplomacy rather than confront the hard truth - that it is the US, and not Iran, that is operating outside international law when it comes to the issue of Iran's nuclear programme.
In doing so, the EU-3, and to a lesser extent the IAEA, have fallen into a trap deliberately set by the Bush administration designed to use the EU-3 diplomatic initiative as a springboard for war with Iran.
The heart of the EU-3's position regarding Iran's nuclear programme is the matter of nuclear enrichment, which the EU-3 outright oppose. This, of course, is an extension of the American position (as well as that of America's shadow ally, Israel).
Legally, this is an unsupportable position under the NPT, but one which has been pursued based upon two fundamental points.
The first is Iran's history of deception regarding its nuclear programme, in which Iran hid critical aspects of this effort from the international community.
Iran now claims to have come into compliance with its NPT obligations, by having declared the totality of its efforts, something neither the EU-3 and the IAEA, nor the US and Israel can refute factually.
As with Iraq earlier, the United States has embraced a position which requires Iran to prove the negative
Indeed, the recent disclosure by the IAEA that the hard 'evidence' it possessed to sustain the charge that Iran was pursuing a covert nuclear weapons programme (the existence of traces of highly enriched uranium on Iranian centrifuges) was flawed.
The fact that the uranium came from Pakistan, not Iran, has undercut any case the EU-3 might have had in pursuing its confrontational stance with Iran.
In the face of this development, the EU-3 - Britain, Germany and France - need to ask themselves a very fundamental question: What is their true policy objective being pursued vis-a-vis Iran?
The answer appears to be little more than serving as a front for American complaints against the Iranian nuclear programme.
Given this, the EU-3 must next confront the real policy of the US when it comes to Iran - regime change. As was the case with Iraq, Europe has failed to confront the Bush administration's policy of regime change.
Instead, the EU-3 has allowed their seemingly unified European foreign-policy position regarding Iran to be hijacked by a neoconservative cabal in Washington, DC, as a stepping stone to war.
Europe would like to believe that the diplomatic initiative undertaken by the EU-3 last November represents a nominal Plan A, which avoids direct confrontation between the US and Iran through use of the European intermediary.
It is completely irrelevant that Iran has yet to be shown to have a nuclear weapons program (in fact the overwhelming amount of data available points to the exact opposite conclusion)
The EU-3 comfort themselves with the knowledge that any failure of their initiative pushes the world not to the brink of war, but rather toward a Plan B, intervention by the Security Council of the United Nations, which would seek to compel Iran back into line with the threat of economic sanctions.
A failure by the Security Council to achieve change on the part of Iran would then, and only then, pave the way for Plan C, American military intervention.
European diplomats concede that there is little likelihood that the Security Council will impose sanctions on Iran, given the intransigence on the part of Russia and China.
However, they have lulled themselves into a false sense of complacency by noting that given the situation in Iraq, and now in the US in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the US military is so overstretched that any talk of the Bush administration implementing a Plan C is out of the question.
What the Europeans - and the member nations of the EU-3 in particular - fail to recognise is that the Bush administration's plan for Iran does not consist of three separate plans, but rather one plan composed of three phases leading to the inevitability of armed conflict with Iran and the termination of the theocratic regime of the mullahs currently residing in Tehran.
These three phases - the collapse of the EU-3 intervention leading to a referral of the Iran matter to the Security Council, the inability of the Security Council to agree upon the imposition of economic sanctions against Iran, and the US confronting the Security Council over its alleged inability to protect American national security interests - lead inevitably toward military confrontation.
A failure by the Security Council to achieve change on the part of Iran would then, and only then, pave the way for Plan C, American military intervention
As with Iraq earlier, the US has embraced a position which requires Iran to prove the negative (ie, demonstrate that it does not have a nuclear weapons program) as opposed to the US and the IAEA proving that one does in fact exist.
The criteria put forward by the Bush administration for Iran to comply - no-notice inspections of any site at any time - are an affront to a sovereign nation that has yet to be shown to be in violation of any of its legal obligations.
The fact that the US used a similar programme of no-notice weapons inspections as a front for espionage against Iraq in support of its regime-change policy against Saddam Hussein has not escaped the attention of the Iranians, who have flat-out rejected any such extra-legal requirements on its part.
The US, and to a lesser extent the IAEA and the EU-3, have taken Iran's intransigence as a clear sign that Iran has something to hide.
Once again, as was the case with Iraq, the US has put process over substance, and unless the EU-3 bloc, the American effort to have the Iranian case transferred to the Security Council, the end result will be war.
The Iran trap has been well baited by the Bush administration, so much so that a Europe already burned once by American duplicity regarding Iraq, and a war-weary American public, fail to recognise what is actually transpiring.
The bait for this trap is, of course, diplomacy, first in the form of the EU-3 intervention, and that having failed, in the form of Security Council actions.
Polls taken in April 2005 showed that most Americans (63% to 37%) believed the Bush administration should take military action to stop Iran from developing or trying to develop a nuclear weapons programme.
It is completely irrelevant that Iran has yet to be shown to have a nuclear weapons programme (in fact the overwhelming amount of data available points to the exact opposite conclusion).
Today, in September 2005, many Americans might be loath to immediately embrace a direct path towards war with Iran. However, according to recent polls, most Americans support referring the matter of Iran to the Security Council for the purpose of imposing sanctions.
The EU-3, and to a lesser extent the IAEA, have fallen into a trap deliberately set by the Bush administration designed to use the EU-3 diplomatic initiative as a springboard for war with Iran
If the Security Council, because of Russian and Chinese opposition, refuses to support sanctions, the American people will be confronted by the Bush administration with the choice to either appear weak before the UN, or to take matters into our own hands (ie, unilateral military action) in the name of national defence.
The outcome in this case is certain - war.
Since the result of any referral of the Iran issue to the Security Council is all but guaranteed, the push by the EU-3 to have the IAEA refer Iran to the Security Council, while rooted in the language of diplomacy, is really nothing less than an act of war.
The only chance the world has of avoiding a second disastrous US military adventure in the Middle East is for the EU-3 to step back from its policy of doing the bidding of the US, and to confront not only Iran on the matter of its nuclear programme, but also the larger issue of American policies of regional transformation that represent the greatest threat to Middle East security and stability today.
Scott Ritter is former UN weapons inspector in Iraq, 1991-1998 Author of Iraq Confidential: The Untold Story of America's Intelligence Conspiracy, published by IB Tauris (London) and Nation Books (USA) in October 2005.
The opinions expressed here are the author's and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position or have the endorsement of Aljazeera.
Aljazeera
By Scott Ritter
You can find this article at:
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/1A678E7E-2612-4B21-8D21-04E6D5FC5D54.htm | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Wed Sep 14, 2005 7:55 pm Post subject: U.S. Deploys Slide Show to Press Case Against Iran |
| washingtonpost.com
U.S. Deploys Slide Show to Press Case Against Iran
By Dafna Linzer
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, September 14, 2005; A07
UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 13 -- With an hour-long slide show that blends satellite imagery with disquieting assumptions about Iran's nuclear energy program, Bush administration officials have been trying to convince allies that Tehran is on a fast track toward nuclear weapons.
The PowerPoint briefing, titled "A History of Concealment and Deception," has been presented to diplomats from more than a dozen countries. Several diplomats said the presentation, intended to win allies for increasing pressure on the Iranian government, dismisses ambiguities in the evidence about Iran's intentions and omits alternative explanations under debate among intelligence analysts.
The presenters argue that the evidence leads solidly to a conclusion that Iran's nuclear program is aimed at producing weapons, according to diplomats who have attended the briefings and U.S. officials who helped to assemble the slide show. But even U.S. intelligence estimates acknowledge that other possibilities are plausible, though unverified.
The problem, acknowledged one U.S. official, is that the evidence is not definitive. Briefers "say you can't draw any other conclusion, and of course you can draw other conclusions," said the official, who would discuss the closed-door sessions only on condition of anonymity.
The briefings were conducted in Vienna over the past month in advance of a gathering of world leaders this week at the United Nations. President Bush, who is to address the annual General Assembly gathering Wednesday, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, plan to use the meeting to press for agreement to threaten international sanctions against Iran.
The president's direct involvement marks an escalation of a two-year effort to bring Iran before the U.N. Security Council, which has the power to impose sanctions, unless Tehran gives up technology capable of enriching uranium for a bomb. U.S. officials have acknowledged that it has been an uphill campaign, with opposition from key allies who fear a prelude to a military campaign.
Several diplomats said the slide show reminded them of the flawed presentation on Iraq's weapons programs made by then-secretary of state Colin L. Powell to the U.N. Security Council in February 2003. "I don't think they'll lose any support, but it isn't going to win anyone either," said one European diplomat who attended the recent briefing and whose country backs the U.S. position on Iran.
Robert G. Joseph, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, acknowledged last week that despite European support, the Bush administration has traveled a tough road in persuading others that Iran should face consequences for a nuclear program it built in secret.
"There's a great deal of resistance . . . on the part of many governments who don't seem to place, quite frankly, nonproliferation and Iran, a nuclear-armed Iran, at the top of their priority list," he told a congressional panel last week.
Several influential nations such as India, Russia, China, South Africa and Brazil share U.S. suspicions about Iran's intentions. But they maintain profound differences with the Bush administration over how to respond, and are apprehensive about the goals of a U.S. president who has said "all options are on the table," in dealing with Tehran.
Three years ago, the White House used the same annual gathering to put both Iraq, and the world community on notice. In a toughly-worded speech, delivered six months before the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Bush warned that the United States would deal alone, if necessary, with a dictator bent on launching nuclear weapons.
The U.S. intelligence community no longer believes Iraq was trying to reconstitute a nuclear program, as the president said. Those and other U.S. intelligence failures have remained fresh in the minds of international decision-makers now being asked to weigh the case of Iran.
The Iraq experience has had a "sobering effect" on Iran discussions, said President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan, a close ally of the Bush administration. In an interview, he refused to speculate on whether Iran, whose program was secretly aided by Pakistan's top nuclear scientist, had been designed for weapons production. But he said he feels confident Iran's aims are now peaceful and there was no need for Security Council action.
Iran's new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is also attending the U.N. summit, has his own meetings scheduled in New York, and Iranian officials said he would use the gathering to mount forceful counterarguments. Iranian diplomats have been in close contact with countries such as Japan, which relies heavily on Iranian oil.
The outcome of both sides' efforts will be tested on Sept. 19, when diplomats from 35 countries meet at the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna to decide whether to report Iran's case to the Security Council.
Undersecretary of State R. Nicholas Burns last night suggested the administration may not be able to press for a successful vote and was exploring other options. He said the administration was working "with lots of other governments to devise an international coalition that will call upon Iran to return to the talks," it walked away from this summer with European negotiators. "There is a consensus that Iran has got to return to the talks."
Iran insists its nuclear efforts are aimed at producing nuclear energy, not bombs. The Bush administration contends that the energy program, built in secret and exposed in 2002, is just a cover. "They cannot be allowed to develop nuclear weapons under the guise of a civilian nuclear program, which is what they're trying to do," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said earlier this month.
A recent U.S. intelligence estimate found that Iran, mostly through its energy program, is acquiring and mastering technologies that could also be used for bomb-making. But there is no proof that such diversion has occurred, the estimate said, and the intelligence community is uncertain as to whether Iran's ruling clerics have made a decision to go forward with a nuclear weapons program.
The estimate judged Iran to be as much as a decade away from being able to manufacture the fissile material necessary for a nuclear explosion. A report issued last week by the International Institute for Security Studies, a London-based research group, found Iran was 10 to 15 years from the technical know-how to build a bomb.
Both reports are based in large part on the findings of U.N. nuclear inspectors, now in their third year of investigating Iran's program. While no proof of a weapons program has been found, serious questions about Tehran's past work on centrifuge designs and experiments with plutonium -- a key ingredient for a nuclear weapon -- have yet to be adequately addressed and have furthered suspicions that the country is hiding information.
With little new information from the probe, the Bush administration put together its own presentation of Iran's program for diplomats in Vienna who are weighing whether to report Iran to the Security Council.
The presentation has not been vetted through standard U.S. intelligence channels because it does not include secret material. One U.S. official involved in the briefing said the intelligence community had nothing to do with the presentation and "probably would have disavowed some of it because it draws conclusions that aren't strictly supported by the facts."
The presentation, conducted in a conference room at the U.S. mission in Vienna, includes a pictorial comparison of Iranian facilities and missiles with photos of similar-looking items in North Korea and Pakistan, according to a copy of the slides handed out to diplomats. Pakistan largely supplied Iran with its nuclear infrastructure but, as a key U.S. ally, it is identified in the presentation only as "another country."
Corey Hinderstein, a nuclear analyst with the Institute for Science and International Security, said the presence of a weapons program could not be established through such comparisons. She noted that North Korea's missile wasn't designed for nuclear weapons so comparing it to an Iranian missile that also wasn't designed to carry a nuclear payload "doesn't make sense." | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Sun Oct 16, 2005 4:24 pm Post subject: Russians gave aid with nukes: report |
| Russians gave aid with nukes: report
17oct05
FORMER members of the Russian military have been accused of secretly helping Iran produce missiles capable of striking in the heart of Europe.
Britain's Sunday Telegraph has reported the Russians have been acting as go-betweens with North Korea.
Their help has enabled Tehran to receive regular clandestine shipments of top-secret missile technology, believed to be channelled through Russia.
Western intelligence officials believe the technology will enable Iran to finish developing a missile with a range of more than 3500km.
It can carry a 1.2 tonne payload, enough for a basic nuclear device.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday failed to win Russia's support for referring Iran to the UN Security Council if the Islamic republic refuses to resume talks over suspected nuclear arms programs.
Dr Rice flew to Moscow on a surprise trip to press President Vladimir Putin to commit to backing the move, and the potential for international sanctions, if Iran continues to defy the West.
But with Russia wary of measures against a country it has strong commercial ties with, Mr Putin was unmoved.
He reaffirmed Russia's position that the United Nations' nuclear watchdog agency should deal with Iran.
A senior US official was quoted as saying Iran's program was "sophisticated and getting larger and more accurate".
"They've had very much in mind the payload needed to carry a nuclear weapon. I think Putin knows what the Iranians are doing," he told the Telegraph.
The US accuses Iran of hiding its weapons development behind its nuclear power program.
Iran has refused to suspend its uranium enrichment program or allow full UN inspections. – REUTERS | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Mon Oct 17, 2005 5:38 pm Post subject: Israel, Iran, and the US: Nuclear War, Here We Come |
| October 17, 2005
Israel, Iran, and the US: Nuclear War, Here We Come
by Jorge Hirsch
The stage is set for a chain of events that could lead to nuclear war over chemical weapons in the immediate future. If these events unfold, the trigger will be Israel, the target Iran, the nuclear aggressor the U.S. These are the reasons:
The U.S. State Department determined in August 2005 that "Iran is in violation of its CWC [Chemical Weapons Convention] obligations because Iran is acting to retain and modernize key elements of its CW infrastructure to include an offensive CW R&D capability and dispersed mobilization facilities."
According to the CIA, "Iran likely has already stockpiled blister, blood, choking, and probably nerve agents – and the bombs and artillery shells to deliver them – which it previously had manufactured."
According to (then undersecretary for arms control and international security, now U.S. ambassador to the UN) John Bolton's testimony to the House of Representatives (June 24, 2004), "We believe Iran has a covert program to develop and stockpile chemical weapons," and on Iran's ballistic missiles, "Iran continues its extensive efforts to develop the means to deliver weapons of mass destruction," and "The 1,300-km range Shahab-3 missile is a direct threat to Israel, Turkey, U.S. forces in the region, and U.S. friends and allies."
In the IAEA resolution of Sept. 24 [.pdf], Iran was found to be in "noncompliance" with its NPT safeguards agreements.
Members of the Israeli parliament from across the political spectrum are urging the United States to stop Iran's nuclear programs, or Israel will "act unilaterally." Statements of grave concern about Iran's nuclear program have been made by Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, and Mossad chief Meir Dagan (Iran poses an "existential threat" to Israel). Shin Bet chief Avi Dichter accuses Iran of plotting relentlessly to attack Israeli targets.
According to the head of the Russian Atomic Energy Organization, Alexander Rumyantsev, Russia will ship the first cargo of nuclear fuel for Iran's Bushehr's reactor at the end of 2005 or early 2006.
Israel bombed Iraq's Osirak nuclear reactor (which was under IAEA supervision) in 1981 just before nuclear fuel was loaded into it (to prevent nuclear fallout).
President Bush has said that "all options are on the table" if diplomacy fails to halt Iran's nuclear program.
The U.S. House of Representatives on May 6, 2004, by a vote of 376-3, called on the United States to use all appropriate means to deter, dissuade, and prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
In the recently released draft document "Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations" [.pdf], the Pentagon states that it will respond to the threat of WMD (which includes chemical and biological weapons) with nuclear weapons.
Conclusion: according to Israel, the U.S. administration, and 99.2 percent of the U.S. House of Representatives, Iran will not be allowed to have access to any nuclear technology. No diplomatic options to achieve that goal will remain when Russia and China veto Security Council sanctions, or if the IAEA refuses on Nov. 24 to refer Iran to the Security Council. Military action will occur before Russia ships uranium fuel to Iran, and will inevitably lead to the use of nuclear weapons by the U.S. against Iran.
How will it all get started? No matter how much Bush and Cheney want it, the U.S. Senate is unlikely to authorize the bombing of Iranian installations out of the blue. Unless there is some major disturbance in Iraq that can be blamed on Iran, Israel is likely to pull the trigger. It knows how to and has every motivation to do so.
Once Israel drops the first bomb on an Iranian nuclear facility, as it did with Iraq's Osirak reactor in 1981, 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:
"To demonstrate U.S. intent and capability to use nuclear weapons to deter adversary use of WMD."
"Against an adversary using or intending to use WMD against U.S., multinational, or alliance forces or civilian populations…"
"[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"
"[T]o counter potentially overwhelming adversary conventional forces…"
"For rapid and favorable war termination on U.S. terms…"
"To ensure success of U.S. and multinational operations…"
That makes six independent reasons for nuking Iran.
The first nuclear bomb used in an act of war after "Little Boy" and "Fat Man" should be code-named "Demo" – for "demonstration" that we can do it, don't mess with us, for "democracy" on the rise in the Middle East, and for the "Democrats" in Congress who will go along with the program. As with Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we will be told it saved lives, ours and theirs. You know the script.
The upshot: a nuclear superpower will have nuked a non-nuclear state that is an NPT signatory and is cooperating with the IAEA, at the instigation of a state that is not an NPT signatory, that reportedly has over 100 nuclear bombs of its own, and that initiated hostilities with an unprovoked act of military aggression.
Given these prospects, the U.S. government should be doing its utmost to restrain Israel, yet it is doing exactly the opposite. It should be trying to achieve a diplomatic solution, but it refuses to even talk to Iran. The ongoing diplomatic effort by the EU is simply designed to provide cover for the planned military action, just as in the case of Iraq. How many times must Bush play the same game before the EU finally learns it is being used?
And how many times will it take for the U.S. citizenry to learn? The U.S. public and its representatives in Congress, preoccupied with the deception and subsequent disaster of the Iraq invasion, are blind to the enormously bigger deception and disaster unfolding just before their eyes. Do the majority of American citizens, from whom the authority of the administration is derived, really want to be drawn by Israel into a nuclear conflict? Is this really in the United States' best interest?
The sane world needs to tell the U.S. and Israeli governments to back off. And the United States needs to tell Israel, in no uncertain terms, that it will not allow (American-supplied) Israeli bombers carrying (American supplied) bunker-busting bombs over Iraqi airspace, and that it will not aid, abet, or condone such an attack. By not demanding this of the Bush administration, the U.S. Congress is complicit in what is about to happen and is betraying the trust of the people it represents.
There is a rational way to avoid this disaster.
Let Iran pursue a civilian nuclear program. Over 30 countries have civilian nuclear programs, while only nine have nuclear weapons. Let the Nobel-prize winning IAEA and Mohamed ElBaradei do their job!
The U.S. can guarantee Israel's safety by assuring Israel that any threat to its existence from a non-nuclear nation will be met with the full force of U.S. conventional forces, and any threat from a nuclear nation will be met with U.S. nuclear forces.
If Iran were to withdraw from the NPT and not allow international supervision of its programs, it would still take several years for it to acquire a nuclear weapon. There would still be plenty of time to act.
Otherwise? Welcome to the new world order, where the U.S. can nuke any non-nuclear country at will. Refrain from having a nuclear deterrent at your own risk. All nations that can will become nuclear, others on their way will be nuked, and all-out nuclear war will become an absolute certainty. Bye-bye, world.
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http://www.antiwar.com/orig/hirsch.php?articleid=7649 | | | | Alpha | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Tue Nov 01, 2005 6:46 pm Post subject: Why a nuclear attack is on the neocon agenda |
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Subject: Why a nuclear attack is on the neocon agenda
Date: Tue, 01 Nov 2005 16:18:44 +0000
Because Iran's intended underlying message to the U.S., which was ill-timed only in appearance, was: If you nuke us, the world will know that you did it because Iran supports the Palestinian cause.
The Real Reason for
Nuking Iran
Why a nuclear attack is on the neocon agenda
by Jorge Hirsch
The strategic decision by the United States to nuke Iran was probably made long ago. Tactics adjust to unpredictable events as they unfold.
There was such an event last week, when Iran's president declared that Israel must be "wiped off" the map. The surprise was not the statement, which was an often-repeated quote by the late Ayatollah Khomeini, directed at a domestic student audience. What was surprising was both the timing (amid discussions about whether Iran should be allowed to enrich uranium) and the relatively low-key U.S. response. Tony Blair expressed "revulsion," Chirac was "profoundly shocked," the European Union in a joint statement "condemned [it] in the strongest terms." Instead, Bush was quiet.
White House Spokesman Scott McClellan commented, "It underscores the concerns we have about Iran's nuclear intentions," and the usually vociferous U.S. ambassador to the UN John Bolton only said that Ahmadinejad's remarks about Israel were "pernicious and unacceptable." Those are uncharacteristically mild statements for this administration in the face of such a provocative statement by Iran against one of the U.S.' closest allies. Why?
Because Iran's intended underlying message to the U.S., which was ill-timed only in appearance, was: If you nuke us, the world will know that you did it because Iran supports the Palestinian cause.
Instead, it is in the U.S.' interests to de-emphasize any suggestion to that effect, hence its low-key response. Because nuking Iran for threatening Israel will inflame the Arab world and will not be acceptable to our European allies nor even to the American public. There are many other justifications that the Western world and the American public will find more acceptable, and these will be emphasized by the Bush administration at the right moment.
Iran "is determined to get nuclear weapons deliverable on ballistic missiles that it can then use to intimidate not only its own region but possibly to supply to terrorists." (John Bolton, Oct. 15, 2005)
"We cannot let Iran, a leading sponsor of international terrorism, acquire the most destructive weapons and the means to deliver them to Europe, most of central Asia and the Middle East, or beyond." (John Bolton, June 24, 2004)
"[S]yria and Iran … share the goal of hurting America. … State sponsors like Syria and Iran have a long history of collaboration with terrorists…." (George Bush, Oct. 6, 2005)
The 9/11 Commission determined that al-Qaeda had long-standing and strong ties to Iran, for example that "senior al-Qaeda operatives and trainers traveled to Iran to receive training in explosives." (By contrast, it found no ties between al-Qaeda and Iraq).
Iran was responsible for the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing, where 19 Americans were killed and 372 wounded, according to a June 2001 indictment by the U.S. attorney general. According to the 9/11 Commission, al-Qaeda may also have been involved.
Hezbollah, a terrorist group tied to Iran, carried out the suicide bombing in Beirut that killed 241 U.S. Marines in 1982. Iran was directly involved, according to a ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth in May 2003.
The real reason for nuking Iran, however, is none of the above. It was spelled out with surprising candor in the Pentagon draft document "Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations" [.pdf] as one of several possible reasons geographic combatant commanders may request presidential approval for use of nuclear weapons:
"To demonstrate U.S. intent and capability to use nuclear weapons to deter adversary use of WMD."
Yes, you read it right: The U.S. is prepared to break a 60-year-old taboo on the use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear countries – not because the survival of the country is at stake, not because the lives of many Americans or allies are at stake – just to demonstrate that it can do it.
The U.S. has maintained for some time now that it reserves the right to respond with nuclear weapons to attacks or intended attacks with WMD, and that it intends to use nuclear weapons to destroy underground enemy facilities. It is argued that such statements have deterrent value, and that maintaining ambiguity as to what might trigger a U.S. nuclear attack deters countries from pursuing military initiatives that are contrary to U.S. interests.
Nonsense. Those statements have no deterrent value because no one in his or her right mind would believe that the greatest democracy in the world would do such a thing.
Unless the U.S. demonstrates, by actually doing it once, that it is indeed prepared to do so.
How do you create the conditions to perform such a demonstration and avoid immediate universal condemnation?
You declare Iran to be the second member of the "axis of evil."
You start a "global war on terror."
You invade the first member of the axis (Iraq) and put 150,000 U.S. troops at the doorstep of the second member, in harm's way – not enough troops to invade Iran, nor to prevent an Iranian invasion of Iraq after Iran is attacked.
You strike Iran's facilities, using conventional and nuclear bombs, to deter Iran from retaliating with missiles with chemical warheads and from invading Iraq, thereby saving the lives of 150,000 American soldiers.
You argue that Iran's chemical and nuclear facilities had to be destroyed to prevent terrorists using weapons from those facilities to attack the U.S. (Never mind that the nuclear facilities were just nuclear reactors, not nuclear weapons).
You get Israel to pull the trigger, i.e., bomb some Iranian installations (as it did in Iraq at Osirak) to provoke an Iranian response.
Now enter the world after the U.S. "demo," according to U.S. planners:
There will be no doubt that U.S. statements on the use of nuclear weapons will have deterrent value.
The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty will be amended to prohibit uranium-enrichment for all countries that do not do it already; violators will be nuked.
North Korea will be forced to disarm under the now real and credible threat of massive U.S. nuclear attack.
Any country suspected of pursuing nuclear weapons or any other military capability that could threaten the U.S. or its allies will be nuked.
Russia, China, and all other nuclear countries will eventually be forced to disarm under the threat of massive U.S. nuclear attack.
However, the real world does not always follow the script envisioned by U.S. planners, as the Iraq experience illustrates. So here is a more likely "post-demo" scenario:
Many non-nuclear countries, including those currently friendly to the U.S., will rush to develop a nuclear deterrent, and many will succeed.
Terrorist groups sympathetic to Iran will do their utmost to retaliate in-kind against the U.S., and eventually will succeed.
With the taboo against the use of nuclear weapons broken, use of them by other countries will follow in various regional conflicts, and subsequent escalation will lead to global nuclear war.
Bye-bye world, including the United States of America.
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