| Author | Message | | Alpha | | Posted: Wed Feb 15, 2006 12:10 pm Post subject: Forget Iran, Americans Should be Hysterical About This |
| http://counterpunch.org/roberts02112006.html
Forget Iran, Americans Should be Hysterical About This
Nuking the Economy
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
Last week the Bureau of Labor Statistics re-benchmarked the payroll jobs data back to 2000. Thanks to Charles McMillion of MBG Information Services, I have the adjusted data from January 2001 through January 2006. If you are worried about terrorists, you don't know what worry is.
Job growth over the last five years is the weakest on record. The US economy came up more than 7 million jobs short of keeping up with population growth. That's one good reason for controlling immigration. An economy that cannot keep up with population growth should not be boosting population with heavy rates of legal and illegal immigration.
Over the past five years the US economy experienced a net job loss in goods producing activities. The entire job growth was in service-providing activities--primarily credit intermediation, health care and social assistance, waiters, waitresses and bartenders, and state and local government.
US manufacturing lost 2.9 million jobs, almost 17% of the manufacturing work force. The wipeout is across the board. Not a single manufacturing payroll classification created a single new job.
The declines in some manufacturing sectors have more in common with a country undergoing saturation bombing during war than with a super-economy that is “the envy of the world.” Communications equipment lost 43% of its workforce. Semiconductors and electronic components lost 37% of its workforce. The workforce in computers and electronic products declined 30%. Electrical equipment and appliances lost 25% of its employees. The workforce in motor vehicles and parts declined 12%. Furniture and related products lost 17% of its jobs. Apparel manufacturers lost almost half of the work force. Employment in textile mills declined 43%. Paper and paper products lost one-fifth of its jobs. The work force in plastics and rubber products declined by 15%. Even manufacturers of beverages and tobacco products experienced a 7% shrinkage in jobs.
The knowledge jobs that were supposed to take the place of lost manufacturing jobs in the globalized “new economy” never appeared. The information sector lost 17% of its jobs, with the telecommunications work force declining by 25%. Even wholesale and retail trade lost jobs. Despite massive new accounting burdens imposed by Sarbanes-Oxley, accounting and bookkeeping employment shrank by 4%. Computer systems design and related lost 9% of its jobs. Today there are 209,000 fewer managerial and supervisory jobs than 5 years ago.
In five years the US economy only created 70,000 jobs in architecture and engineering, many of which are clerical. Little wonder engineering enrollments are shrinking. There are no jobs for graduates. The talk about engineering shortages is absolute ignorance. There are several hundred thousand American engineers who are unemployed and have been for years. No student wants a degree that is nothing but a ticket to a soup line. Many engineers have written to me that they cannot even get Wal-Mart jobs because their education makes them over-qualified.
Offshore outsourcing and offshore production have left the US awash with unemployment among the highly educated. The low measured rate of unemployment does not include discouraged workers. Labor arbitrage has made the unemployment rate less and less a meaningful indicator. In the past unemployment resulted mainly from turnover in the labor force and recession. Recoveries pulled people back into jobs.
Unemployment benefits were intended to help people over the down time in the cycle when workers were laid off. Today the unemployment is permanent as entire occupations and industries are wiped out by labor arbitrage as corporations replace their American employees with foreign ones.
Economists who look beyond political press releases estimate the US unemployment rate to be between 7% and 8.5%. There are now hundreds of thousands of Americans who will never recover their investment in their university education.
Unless the BLS is falsifying the data or businesses are reporting the opposite of the facts, the US is experiencing a job depression. Most economists refuse to acknowledge the facts, because they endorsed globalization. It was a win-win situation, they said.
They were wrong.
At a time when America desperately needs the voices of educated people as a counterweight to the disinformation that emanates from the Bush administration and its supporters, economists have discredited themselves. This is especially true for “free market economists” who foolishly assumed that international labor arbitrage was an example of free trade that was benefitting Americans. Where is the benefit when employment in US export industries and import-competitive industries is shrinking? After decades of struggle to regain credibility, free market economics is on the verge of another wipeout.
No sane economist can possibly maintain that a deplorable record of merely 1,054,000 net new private sector jobs over five years is an indication of a healthy economy. The total number of private sector jobs created over the five year period is 500,000 jobs less than one year's legal and illegal immigration! (In a December 2005 Center for Immigration Studies report based on the Census Bureau's March 2005 Current Population Survey, Steven Camarota writes that there were 7,9 million new immigrants between January 2000 and March 2005.)
The economics profession has failed America. It touts a meaningless number while joblessness soars. Lazy journalists at the New York Times simply rewrite the Bush administration's press releases.
On February 10 the Commerce Department released a record US trade deficit in goods and services for 2005--$726 billion. The US deficit in Advanced Technology Products reached a new high. Offshore production for home markets and jobs outsourcing has made the US highly dependent on foreign provided goods and services, while simultaneously reducing the export capability of the US economy. It is possible that there might be no exchange rate at which the US can balance its trade.
Polls indicate that the Bush administration is succeeding in whipping up fear and hysteria about Iran. The secretary of defense is promising Americans decades-long war. Is death in battle Bush's solution to the job depression? Will Asians finance a decades-long war for a bankrupt country?
Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions.He can be reached at: paulcraigroberts@yahoo.com | |  | | Alpha | | Posted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:54 pm Post subject: Russia Warns U.S. Against Striking Iran |
| Russia Warns U.S. Against Striking Iran
By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV, Associated Press Writer
2 hours, 4 minutes ago
Russia's top military chief on Thursday warned the United States against launching a military strike against Iran and a top diplomat voiced hope that close cooperation with China could help resolve the Tehran nuclear crisis.
With tension mounting over Iran's nuclear programs, Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky, the chief of Russia's general staff, warned the United States against attacking Iran.
"A military scenario can't be ruled out," Baluyevsky was quoted as saying by Russian news agencies.
He said that while Iran's military potential cannot compare to the United States', "it is hard to predict how the Muslim world will respond to the use of force against Iran."
"This may stir the whole world, and it is crucial to prevent anything like that," Baluyevsky was quoted as saying.
Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Alekseyev, meanwhile, said that cooperation with China could help push Iran toward accepting Moscow's offer to host Iran's uranium enrichment program.
The Russian proposal has become a centerpiece of international efforts to defuse tensions over Tehran's nuclear ambitions.
"We are counting on the continuation of close contacts with our Chinese colleagues and other interested countries," Alekseyev was quoted as saying by the Interfax news agency. He added, however, that the Iranian nuclear issue recently had become "sharper," and "it is too early to assess the effectiveness of our joint steps to resolve it."
Iran's ambassador to Moscow said Thursday that Tehran hoped Russia would be able to help resolve the international crisis surrounding the Iranian nuclear program.
"Taking into account the good relations between Russia and Iran, I hope that together we can overcome this crisis which has arisen recently," Gholamreza Ansari said at a meeting with Russian lawmakers.
Ansari confirmed that a delegation is expected to travel to Moscow on Monday to discuss the proposal. He would not say who will lead it, but the Interfax news agency quoted Vyacheslav Moshkalo, a spokesman for the Russian embassy in Tehran, as saying that the team will be headed by Javad Vaeidi, Iran's deputy nuclear negotiator.
Konstantin Kosachev, the head of Russian parliament's foreign affairs committee, said after his discussions with the ambassador that he was satisfied that the Iranians would be coming in good faith.
"Iran understands the seriousness of the situation and is ready to continue discussions between experts to reach a compromise on the Russian proposal," he said. He said he had received assurances that "the delegation is getting ready for talks and will have all the necessary authority for conducting negotiations."
Kosachev also sharply criticized Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's remarks in which he called for Israel's destruction and questioned whether the Holocaust occurred.
"Such statements don't help strengthen Iran's international prestige," he said with Ansari standing at his side.
A Western diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the strong international consensus developed so far, including Russia, "is probably the strongest instrument we have going right now in trying to influence Iranian behavior."
Moscow is deeply concerned about the current Iranian regime's prospects for acquiring nuclear weapons, not only because Russia is geographically located close to Iran, but also because of the impact that could have on other Middle East players' nuclear aspirations, including Saudi Arabia's, the diplomat said.
The diplomat also noted that by aspiring to a central role in resolving the Iran crisis, Russia wanted to show that it could use the contacts it has built up over the years — including direct communications with the Iranians — to advance the concerns of the international community.
http://www.nowarforisrael.com
http://nogw.com/warforisrael.html
htto://nomorewarforisrael.blogspot.com | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Mon Feb 20, 2006 7:14 am Post subject: IRAN IN NEO-CON CROSSHAIRS |
| http://americanfreepress.net/html/iran_in_neo-con_.html
IRAN IN NEO-CON CROSSHAIRS
AIR STRIKES BY ISRAEL WOULD DRAW U.S. INTO ANOTHER WAR
What would happen if Israeli warhawks launched an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities? This week, American Free Press takes a look at a new study by an international terrorism expert, which warns that bombing the Persian country would likely drag the United States into a drawnout
and bloody clash of civilizations. AFP predicted it almost a year ago, but are neo-cons that crazy?
By Richard Walker
A new study by an international terrorism expert warns that a military attack launched by the Israelis on Iran’s nuclear facilities would certainly escalate to involve the United States, Iraq and Lebanon, as well as Persian Gulf states.
In its early stages, it would result in many thousands of civilian and military casualties.
In an in-depth report for the Oxford Research Group, titled “Iran: Consequences of a War,” Prof. Paul Rodgers writes that Israel has bought [or has been given—Ed.] all the necessary weapons from the United States for such an attack, including long-range fighters and a large supply of so-called “bunker-buster bombs,” capable of penetrating hardened underground bunkers.
The targets of such an attack would initially be the Tehran nuclear reactor, as well as a radioisotope facility and a range of laboratories and other facilities, all of them in heavily populated areas.
If the newest reactor at Bushehr were to be targeted after it comes on line later this year, such an attack could lead to a Chernobyl-type disaster with radioactive clouds rising over most gulf countries.
According to Rodgers, if the United States is drawn into such an attack with the aim of setting back Iran’s nuclear program, the British could also find themselves dragged into the affair by being asked to provide bases for the refueling of U.S. aircraft as happened when F-111s were used to bomb the Libyan capital of Tripoli in 1986.
If bombings were launched this year against Iran they would, claims the Oxford report, be launched simultaneously in order to kill as many of the technical staff as possible at the various nuclear sites. Iran would be unable to prevent such an air assault because of its lack of a functioning anti-missile and anti-aircraft arsenal.
Some experts dispute this aspect of the report, however, due to recent high-tech weapons purchases Iran has made from North Korea, China and Russia.
In the past decade, it is known that Iran has acquired hundreds of medium-range missiles from China and North Korea and an unknown number of long-range Sunburst cruise missiles from Ukraine, which, it is believed, could be used to sink U.S. ships in the Persian Gulf.
Israeli hawks in Tel Aviv and their allies in Washington want Americans to believe that Iran is a major threat to U.S. and Israeli interests in the Middle East.
The Israelis and their neo-con backers had hoped a successful invasion of Iraq and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein would undermine the clerical leadership in Iran and lead to its overthrow by an emerging democratic movement led by the youth of the country. To the dismay of Washington and Tel Aviv, however, the war in Iraq has failed to achieve that goal, and the power of the religious leadership in Iran has grown significantly.
The prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran stands in the way of Israeli hegemony in the Middle East. Israeli hardliners have convinced many Americans that they should be the only Middle East country with nuclear weapons. It is estimated that the Israeli nuclear arsenal contains as many as
400 nukes.
In order to plan for an attack on Iran, recent reports indicate Israel has been buying long-range versions of American-made F-15 and F-16 aircraft. Beginning in 2003, the Israeli air force purchased 102 F-16s and 500 bunkerbuster bombs.
Efforts are also under way to equip Israeli submarines, including ones given to Israel by Germany, and naval surface vessels with cruise missiles that could reach Iran.
The Oxford Report points to an alarming trend: in the past two years, there has been the appearance of a strengthening of the relationship between the Israeli defense forces and the U.S. Army’s Training and Doctrine Command.
The report warns: “Although not commonly covered in the western
media, this relationship is well known in the Middle East and would contribute to an assumption that any Israeli attack on Iran would be undertaken with the knowledge, approval and assistance of the United States. It is certainly the case that an Israeli air attack on Iran would involve flights through airspace currently dominated by the United States.”
Rodgers also makes the point in his report that close links between Israel and the United States are far more widely recognized in the Middle East than in the United States and in Europe. Therefore, any Israeli action would
be seen as a joint operation with “Israel acting as surrogate and doing so with direct U.S. support.”
He speculates that this would mean that Iranian retaliation would be directed at U.S. interests in the gulf and at U.S. forces in Iraq. Hezbollah, regarded as the most formidable terrorist organization on the planet, would be encouraged by Tehran to launch attacks on Israel from Lebanon and to coordinate strikes against U.S. targets across the Persian Gulf, in Iraq and in the continental U.S. While Israel would enjoy a short-term advantage over Hezbollah forces in Lebanon, there would be long-term consequences for both Israeli and U.S. interests.
It would be costly in terms of lives, money and influence. Perhaps the most troubling outcome, says Rodgers, would be the likelihood of a prolonged military confrontation, which would probably spread to other gulf nations.
Any attack on Iran by Israel, he says, no matter how small, would surely escalate to involve the United States and its bogged-down forces in Iraq.
(Issue #9, February 27, 2006)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
More war for Israel coming with the bombing of Iran:
http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/wake-up-america-your-government-is-hijacked-by-zionism/2006/01/14/more-war-for-israel-coming-with-bombing-of-iran.php | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Mon Feb 20, 2006 7:19 am Post subject: What Bush Is Up To |
| February 18, 2006
What Bush Is Up To
by Charley Reese
I'm going to tell you what the real Bush administration policy is. I have no take-it-to-court proof. No one does, because the administration doesn't tell the truth and is very secretive.
But from conversations I've had with people from the Middle East and from extensive reading, I infer that the Bush administration's policy encompasses three goals:
One of the goals is to replace the present Syrian government with one the administration hopes will be more pliable in its policy toward Israel. Another is to construct four permanent bases in Iraq, and that means the administration has no intention of ever withdrawing all U.S. forces. The third goal is to attack Iran's nuclear facilities from the air. The propaganda campaign to justify this attack is already under way.
The U.S. government has lied a lot about Syria. It has implied that Syria was helping jihadists slip into Iraq. Some of the neoconservatives have claimed that Iraq hid its infamous nonexistent weapons of mass destruction in Syria. Now they have joined in accusing the Syrian government of assassinating a Lebanese politician. They've even picked out a successor to the current president of Syria. More recently, they accused Syria of inciting mobs to burn a foreign embassy in Damascus during a riot related to the prophet cartoons.
In fact, Syria's government is Ba'athist – that is to say, it is secular, socialist and nationalistic. It highly disapproves of religious extremists, whether Shi'ites or Sunni. There is no evidence whatsoever that Syria incited the mobs to burn the foreign embassy in Damascus. Professor Juan Cole searched the databases of Arab newspapers and radio broadcasts, which are monitored and translated by the U.S. government and the BBC. Not a peep from the Syrian government in the way of incitement.
The Syrian ambassador to the U.S. told me of another instance of U.S. lying. Our government asked the Syrian government to help it catch an Iraqi who was hiding in a tribal area that extended across the border, partly in Iraq and partly in Syria. The Syrian government agreed and indeed captured the man and 32 of his followers, all of whom were handed over to the U.S. Syria asked the U.S. for only one thing in return: just tell the world we cooperated with you.
Did the U.S. do that? No, it lied and said that the Syrians had harbored the fugitive. As for Saddam Hussein hiding his weapons in Syria, it so happens that the Syrian Ba'ath Party and the Iraqi Ba'ath Party have famously been at odds for years. People spreading that nonsense seem to have forgotten that Syrian troops fought alongside Americans in Gulf War I against Iraq. You can be sure Saddam did not forget that. He would have no more turned over his nonexistent weapons to Syria than he would have to Israel.
The large American military bases in Iraq already exist and are being improved. These are billion-dollar-plus facilities, and you can bet nobody in the Bush administration intends to hand them over to the Iraqis. Watch carefully the language used when the Bush people, in or out of uniform, talk about "withdrawal." It is always surrounded by conditions. They don't intend to leave Iraq. Now, that doesn't mean that the new Iraqi government might not force them to leave. That remains to be seen.
As for bombing Iran's nuclear facilities, we have that capability. There's not much the Iranians could do to stop us. And, yes, it would be a stupid and foolish thing to do, since at present there is no evidence that Iran intends to build a bomb. As we know from the Iraq invasion, this administration is capable of doing stupid and foolish things.
Just because Iran can't stop us from bombing it doesn't mean the Iranians can't retaliate. They very likely have the capability of setting the entire Middle East on fire with a general war that could disrupt the world's oil supply and wreck much of the world's economy. Unfortunately, history shows that those who bet on wise political leadership avoiding war end up losing their shirts and often their lives and their fortunes.
Find this article at:
http://www.antiwar.com/reese/?articleid=8567 | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Mon Feb 20, 2006 7:29 pm Post subject: Silence the War Drums |
| Silence the War Drums
by Ron Paul
Before the US House of Representatives, February 16, 2006
Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to this very dangerous legislation. My colleagues would do well to understand that this legislation is leading us toward war against Iran.
Those reading this bill may find themselves feeling a sense of déjà vu. In many cases one can just substitute "Iraq" for "Iran" in this bill and we could be back in the pre-2003 run up to war with Iraq. And the logic of this current push for war is much the same as was the logic used in the argument for war on Iraq. As earlier with Iraq, this resolution demands that Iran perform the impossible task of proving a negative – in this case that Iran does not have plans to build a nuclear weapon.
There are a few things we need to remember when thinking about Iran and this legislation. First, Iran has never been ruled in violation of its international nuclear non-proliferation obligations.
Second, Iran concluded a Safeguards Agreement more than 30 years ago that provides for the verification of Iran's fulfillment of its obligation to not divert nuclear energy programs to nuclear weapons development. Since this agreement was reached, the International Atomic Energy Agency has never found any indication that Iran has diverted or attempted to divert source or special nuclear materials from a peaceful purpose to a military purpose.
But, this does not stop those eager for conflict with Iran from stating otherwise. As the Washington Post reported last year, "U.S. officials, eager to move the Iran issue to the U.N. Security Council – which has the authority to impose sanctions – have begun a new round of briefings for allies designed to convince them that Iran's real intention is to use its energy program as a cover for bomb building. The briefings will focus on the White House's belief that a country with as much oil as Iran would not need an energy program on the scale it is planning, according to two officials."
This reminds us of the quick move to justify the invasion of Iraq by citing Iraq's "intentions" when actual weapons of mass destruction could not be found.
The resolution's second resolved clause is a real misrepresentation of the Iran/EU3 talks. The "efforts of France, Germany, and the United Kingdom" were not "to seek...suspension of enrichment and reprocessing related activities..." As the EU3-Iran Paris Agreement makes very clear, the suspension of enrichment is a purely voluntary measure taken by Iran and is "not a legal obligation."
This is similar to the situation with Iran's voluntarily observation of the Additional Protocols (allowing unannounced inspections) without legally being bound to do so. Suspending voluntary observance of the Additional Protocols is not a violation of the NPT. But, those seeking to push us toward war with Iran are purposely trying to connect the two – to confuse voluntary "confidence building" measures taken by Iran with the legally-binding Treaty itself.
Resolved clause four of this legislation is the most inflammatory and objectionable part of the legislation. It lowers the bar to initiating war on Iran. This clause anticipates that the US may not be successful in getting the Security Council to pass a Resolution because of the potential of a Russian or Chinese veto, so it "calls upon" Russia and China to "take action" in response to "any report" of "Iran's noncompliance. That is right: any report.
Mr. Speaker, this resolution is a drumbeat for war with Iran. Its logic is faulty, its premises are flawed, and its conclusions are dangerous. I urge my colleagues to stop for a moment and ponder the wisdom of starting yet another war in the Middle East.
February 20, 2006
Dr. Ron Paul is a Republican member of Congress from Texas.
Ron Paul Archives
Find this article at:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul304.html | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2006 10:34 am Post subject: Iran spurns Russian demand for enrichment freeze |
| Iran spurns Russian demand for enrichment freeze
By Oleg Shchedrov
5 minutes ago
Iran showed few signs on Tuesday that it was ready to strike a deal with Russia that could allay fears it wants nuclear arms and avert possible U.N. sanctions.
After two days of talks in Moscow, Russian and Iranian negotiators said they planned more discussions this week on a Russian proposal to enrich uranium for Iran, seen as a way to ensure Tehran cannot divert nuclear fuel into bomb-making.
But the two sides appeared far apart, with Iran's foreign minister ruling out any return to a moratorium on uranium enrichment, which Russia has repeatedly demanded.
"We discussed a joint formula and we will continue talks," said Ali Hosseinitash, deputy secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security, who led his country's delegation in Moscow.
"Our assessment of this offer is positive," he added.
The Russians were more circumspect, with Foreign Ministry spokesman Mikhail Kamynin saying only that Moscow's proposal had been examined in detail and that more talks were planned.
Sergei Kiriyenko, head of Russia's atomic energy agency Roastom, is due to travel to Iran on Thursday.
Kamynin, quoted by Itar-Tass news agency, said Moscow had again stressed that Iran must restore the enrichment moratorium.
However, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said this was out of the question and Tehran would press ahead with its nuclear work with or without the Russian plan.
"Returning to the suspension of our nuclear activities is not on our agenda," Mottaki said on his return to Tehran after talks on the nuclear issue with EU officials in Brussels.
U.S. officials suggest Iran is discussing the Russian plan merely to gain time, a view shared by many Russian commentators.
"Their aim is to haggle, to put off as long as possible the hour when sanctions from the international community become unavoidable," wrote the daily Izvestia.
Tehran has said it will consider a joint venture with Russia and possibly others to enrich uranium for power stations, but reserves the right to pursue enrichment at home as well. It says it wants nuclear fuel only to produce electricity, not bombs.
POSSIBLE SANCTIONS
Iran may face action by the U.N. Security Council after Mohamed ElBaradei, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, formally reports on Tehran's nuclear program at a March 6 meeting of the U.N. watchdog's governing board.
He is expected to circulate his report to members of the 35-nation board on February 27 so they can digest its conclusions.
Diplomats say they doubt the Security Council will rush into sanctions, which Russia, China and other countries oppose.
It may first reiterate IAEA demands for Iran to answer questions still outstanding after three years of investigations and then consider expanding the agency's inspection powers.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier urged Iran to change tack to stave off punitive measures. "We do not rule out the possibility of economic sanctions completely," he said.
Germany and other European countries have hardened their stance on the Iran nuclear issue after repeated calls by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for the destruction of Israel.
Russia and China, which could veto any move by the United States and its European allies to impose sanctions on Tehran, share concern about Iran's nuclear ambitions, but do not want to sacrifice their commercial interests in the Islamic Republic.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman again urged Iran to restore a freeze on uranium enrichment activities to create the conditions for a negotiated solution.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said it might be hard for Moscow to resist calls for U.N. sanctions unless Iran resumes the moratorium it abandoned in January.
Analysts and European diplomats in Tehran said Iran's tough line was a ploy to draw Washington into the nuclear talks.
"They know that the only way to address the issues they really want addressed, such as security concerns, is to talk to the Americans," said a European diplomat who said he had been told of the gambit by a senior Iranian official.
Iran's leaders, who want guarantees against any U.S. attack on a country listed by President George W. Bush as part of an "axis of evil," may believe the time to force the issue is now.
"They know that the Americans were not going to give up until they had sent Iran to the Security Council," said an Iranian political analyst, who asked not to be named.
"So they figured it was better to go to the council now, with America still struggling in Iraq and oil prices high, than say in two years when America may be in a stronger position."
(Additional reporting by Chris Buckley in Beijing, Teruaki Ueno in Tokyo, Meg Clothier in Moscow, Parisa Hafezi and Paul Huges in Tehran and Mark Heinrich in Vienna) | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2006 9:44 am Post subject: Ex-U.N. Inspector: Decision Already Made To Attack Iran |
| Ex-U.N. Inspector: Decision Already Made To Attack Iran
http://www.bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=10282
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11812.htm
Ex-U.N. Inspector: Decision Already Made To Attack Iran
Ex-U.N. inspector: Iran's next: Ritter warns that another U.S. invasion in Mideast is imminent
By Brandon Garcia
02/06/06 (Santa Fe New Mexican, The (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) The former U.N. weapons inspector who said Iraq disarmed long before the U.S. invasion in 2003 is warning Americans to prepare for a war with Iran.
"We just don't know when, but it's going to happen," Scott Ritter said to a crowd of about 150 at the James A. Little Theater on Sunday night.
Ritter described how the U.S. government might justify war with Iran in a scenario similar to the buildup to the Iraq invasion. He also argued that Iran wants a nuclear energy program, and not nuclear weapons. But the Bush administration, he said, refuses to believe Iran is telling the truth.
He predicted the matter will wind up before the U.N. Security Council, which will determine there is no evidence of a weapons program. Then, he said, John Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, "will deliver a speech that has already been written. It says America cannot allow Iran to threaten the United States and we must unilaterally defend ourselves."
"How do I know this? I've talked to Bolton's speechwriter," Ritter said.
Ritter also predicted the military strategy for war with Iran. First, American forces will bomb Iran. If Iranians don't overthrow the current government, as Bush hopes they will, Iran will probably attack Israel. Then, Ritter said, the United States will drop a nuclear bomb on Iran.
The only way to prevent a war with Iran is to elect a Democratically controlled Congress in November, said Ritter, a lifelong Republican. He later said he wasn't worried his advice would be seen as partisan because, "It's a partisan issue." He said the problem is one party government and if Democrats controlled the presidency and Congress, he would advise people to elect Republicans.
Most of Ritter's hour-long speech focused on Iraqi weapons programs from shortly before the Persian Gulf War in 1991 to 2003, when the U.S. invaded Iraq. He also discussed the weapons-inspections process during that time.
Ritter was in charge of U.N. weapons inspections until he resigned in 1998. Before the Iraq invasion, Ritter said, he told Congress that inspections needed to continue.
He also said he was a Marine in the Persian Gulf War and was part of an assassination attempt on Saddam Hussein in the early 1990s.
Throughout the 1990s, Ritter said, America's real policy for Iraq was regime change -- not forcing Iraq to disarm and destroy chemical-, biological- and nuclear-weapons programs. The U.S. insisted on regime change, he said, because it believes transforming the Middle East countries into democracies will help ensure American access to oil.
The policy, he said, was borne from a political problem, not a threat to national security.
Ritter said the CIA knew Iraq had no ballistic, nuclear, chemical and biological weapons by 1995. "We knew there were no WMDs in Iraq," he said.
Ritter blamed Americans' apathy for allowing Bush to claim there was an intelligence failure. Presidents can lie to the public too easily about national security issues because Americans aren't paying attention, he said.
"It's a damn shame there's so many more people interested in the Seattle Seahawks and the Pittsburgh Steelers," he said in reference to the two teams that played in Sunday's Super Bowl.
After his speech, Ritter took questions from the audience. The first questioner wondered whether the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks were faked. Ritter, a fiery speaker, seemed irritated by the question and said the attacks were real.
Someone else asked if he was interested in running for Congress. While the question drew applause, Ritter responded, "I hate politics."
Ritter, 44, was promoting his book Iraq Confidential: The Untold Story of the Intelligence Conspiracy to Undermine the UN and Overthrow Saddam Hussein. The speech was sponsored by Peace Action New Mexico.
Contact Brandon Garcia at 995-3826 or at bgarcia@sfnewmexican.com. | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Sat Mar 11, 2006 11:31 pm Post subject: Israelis Demand U.S. Attack Iran Now |
| Israelis Demand U.S. Attack Iran Now
Saturday March 11th 2006, 2:26 pm
Once again, the disgusting Straussian neocon owned Jerusalem Post has complained that “United States has until now not done enough to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons,” in other words the United States has yet to bomb the heck out of Iran, as the Jabotinsky maniacs in Israel demand. “America needs to get its act together,” brayed a senior Defense (Offense) Ministry official. “Until now the US administration has just been talking tough but the time has come for the Americans to begin to take tough action,” that is to say begin mass murdering Iranians.
According to this nameless official, as paraphrased by Yaakov Katz of the Post, the “only real way to stop Teheran’s race to obtain the bomb apart from military action was through tough economic sanctions that [would cause] the Iranian people to suffer” the same way a million and a half Iraqis suffered and died under medieval sanctions. “Once the people understand that their government is bringing upon them a disaster will they realize that the [Iranian President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad’s regime needs to be replaced,” the official continued.
If the Israelis sincerely believe this, they should invade Iran on their own and leave the United States out of it. But then the genocidal Jabotinskyite Israelis own America, or at minimum its foreign policy, and direct it from the offices of the treasonous AIPAC, the Project for a New American Century, the American Enterprise Institute, the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs. Radical Jabotinskyites and Straussian neocons—Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, Edward Luttwak, Henry Kissinger, Dov Zakheim, Kenneth Adelman, Scooter Libby, Robert Satloff, Elliott Abrams, Marc Grossman, Richard Haass, Robert Zoellick, Ari Fleischer, David Frum, Joshua Bolten, John Bolton, David Wurmser, Eliot Cohen, Michael Chertoff, and others—have labored over the past few years to turn the Pentagon and the White House into an Israel-First encampment at the behest of Jabotinsky Mafia dons in Israel.
Of course, the Israelis understand they cannot shock awe Iran on their own—and in due course, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and even mega-populated Egypt—and that is why they have spent years infiltrating the United States government, particularly the Pentagon.
Israel must be prepared “take military action” on its own, the Post summarized the nameless official as stating. But this option is not only undoable, it is impossible, and it was only mentioned as a way to get the attention of the United States and keep the war drums reverberating in the corporate media. “Israel has many drawers containing everything it needs to defend its citizens,” Defense (Offense) Minister Shaul Mofaz said mid-week. “We do not plan to turn a blind eye to these threats and we will do everything possible to make sure they do not materialize.” In other words, they will lean ever more on the United States.
One day, after the smoke and radiation clouds have subsided, the United States will lay in economic ruins, picked clean by the Jabotinsky maniacs in Israel. Like the people of Germany after the fall of Hitler and the Nazis, Americans will be considered the scourge of the world, a nation of people untrustworthy. Naturally, after the fall of America—a lot closer than many think—the tiny outlaw state of Israel will go by the wayside and become another small country in the Middle East. As the United States rebuilds itself, if indeed there will be anything left to rebuild, the people must make damn sure they get rid of all the Israel-Firsters, a partial list enumerated above, and make sure they never get back into power.
After arrest, trial, and conviction, these people need to be put on a ship and sent to a small island in the Pacific, an island situated in shark-infested waters, a sort of penal colony for Straussian neocons and their fellow travelers. In that way we can only hope they will never hijack our government again, a government based on the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, as initially proposed, but subverted over the years by sociopaths, power-mongers, miscreants, sleazeballs, and mountebank snake oil salesmen.
http://kurtnimmo.com/?p=284 | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 6:21 pm Post subject: UN Council faces Iran impasse |
| UN Council faces Iran impasse
By Evelyn Leopold 16 minutes ago
The United States, Britain and France on Tuesday will move the Iran crisis to the full U.N. Security Council after failing to get support from Russia and China for proposals to rein in Tehran's nuclear ambitions.
At issue is a British-French draft of a council statement that would call on Iran to suspend uranium enrichment efforts, which the West believes are a cover for bomb making, and obtain a progress report from the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency in a short period of time.
The talks on Tuesday among the 15-nation Security Council at France's mission to the United Nations are scheduled several hours after the five veto-holding permanent council members meet again in an effort to find a compromise on the text.
"We're trying to hold the perm five together," U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said on Monday, after the third session among the five ended without agreement.
"But reality is reality and time is an important factor given the Iranians continue to progress toward overcoming their technological difficulties" in enriching uranium, Bolton told reporters.
If the split continues, the Western powers may decide to drop the idea of a Security Council statement, which requires the consent of all 15 members. Instead they are considering putting a resolution to a vote and force Russia and China to abstain or veto, thereby breaking any semblance of unity.
IAEA ROLE
Russia and China have been uneasy about involving the Security Council, which has the authority to impose sanctions, and want the IAEA to retain control.
The United States wants Mohamed ElBaradei, the director-general of the IAEA, to report to the council within 14 days on Iran's compliance. Russia and China prefer a six-week deadline and want the report to go to the IAEA rather than to the Security Council, the envoys said.
But Bolton said the case was now before the Security council, not just the IAEA, the U.N. nuclear watchdog.
"There's no reason why a specialized or technical agency of the United Nations can't report to the Security Council on a matter within the Security Council's jurisdiction. That's certainly our view," Bolton told reporters.
Iran, which denies it is trying to make a nuclear weapon, had rejected an offer from Russia to enrich Iranian uranium on Russian soil. But it then wanted to reopen the talks, which Moscow's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said would happen soon.
But Lavrov expressed impatience with mixed messages from Iran, saying he was "extremely disappointed with the way Iran in the course of these talks."
"Iran is absolutely no help to those who want to find peaceful ways to solve this problem," he said on Monday.
ElBaradei's report to the council a week ago said Iran had disregarded a February resolution from the 35-nation IAEA board urging it to suspend all enrichment-related work and answer inquiries on its nuclear program.
Instead, Iran is testing a cascade of 20 centrifuges -- machines that convert uranium UF6 gas into fuel for atomic power reactors or, if purified to high levels, weapons.
http://nomorewarforisrael.blogspot.com | | | | Alpha | | | | | ©2002-2009 WarWithoutEnd.co.uk |
