It’s the same scary neocon leitmotiv of 'WMD, woe and war' that we saw a led-by-his-nose George Bush applied to poor Iraq, a country that is now a quagmire of destruction, devastation and daily deaths, thanks to his 'regime change' claim after the original WMD lie was discredited.
Only that now Bush's new target is another country, Iran, even preposterously accused by him of having the inclination or potential to initiate a WWIII.
Over the last couple of days, we have read in various international press of the report by the US intelligence community that said Iran had halted a drive for atomic weapons in 2003.
Despite the availability of such intelligence, as was in the case of Iraq, the US under George Bush has for years accused Tehran of actively seeking a nuclear bomb. Fuelled by the same set of lies that Iraq suffered from, Bush no doubt wants to start with his standard economic sanctions (including much needed medical supplies for children) to be followed by indiscriminate bombings, but perhaps for Iran, avoiding the invasion and a US humiliating defeat a la Vietnam and Iraq.
The slap in Bush’s face by his own National Intelligence Estimates (NIE) for his war-mongering lies and misinformation somehow didn't faze the discredited US President. Bush continues to be thick-skinned defiant, warning that Iran remains a threat.
OK, he is low-brow stupid, even moronic, but why is Bush so insistent that Iran is a 'threat' to be dealt with in the way that Iraq had been?
Well, the Star Online reported that: “Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak suggested that American spies had suffered a ‘disconnect’.”
'Disconnect'? Hey, the NIE mirrored the estimates of the IAEA.
While idling in a library recently I also came across an article in Aviation Week magazine (November 19, 2007 issue) which said:
“Israeli officials want Washington to understand that Cold War deterrence doctrine doesn’t work in their neck of the woods … An Iranian bomb test could energize every Islamic extremist from Malaysia to Europe. … the official says, but the real threat to this country comes from Iran with the combination of weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missile delivery systems.”
Well, at least Malaysia rated a mention about our being ‘energized’ by a Shiite Iranian bomb test, though I am disappointed that Sunni Pakistan with a number of bomb tests, bombs, long range missiles, the nesting of al Qaeda within its borders and its proliferative entrepreneurial Dr AQ Khan weren’t.
But then, Israel does have a thing about Iran!
Scott Thompson tells us that “there were significant signals as early as late 2005 that Iran had already done what Saddam Hussein had done in Iraq several years before the false war of Bush administration propaganda started grinding up its war scenarios for that country, namely to purposively slow down, if not close, the military nuclear programme.”
“Yet what have we been subjected to in the meantime? Ah, the Prince of Darkness, Vice-President Dick Cheney, telling us that Iran ‘would not be allowed’ to develop nuclear weapons, as if the intelligence community was denying access to the fruits of its analysis to America’s most powerful person. The boy president meantime was telling us that if we wanted to avoid World War III (and who was he suggesting had the power to start that?) we must prevent an Iranian bomb. And so forth.”
Ignoring the Aviation Week article, I would say Scott Thompson has been kind to Israel in stating that “In all fairness to Israel, Jerusalem was always more measured in its assessment of the ‘threat’ from Iran, but at least they might have to face a real threat in due course, especially if Washington were determined to create its own self-fulfilling prophecy.”
Well, I am less generous ;-). I recall that Dick Cheney was on the Board of Advisors for JINSA, the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs.
Please see my post The 'O' in SWOT regarding the 3 'I'-s in the ME to have a feel of why kaytee thinks the US has been bamboozled into taking such an idiotic stand against Iran in the same way it has foolishly expended over 3500 young American lives in attacking and occupying Iraq based on blatant lies. The fact has been there was no Iraqi threat to the neo-colonialist USA.
However, I don't think Iran is completely safe yet from George Bush, though the danger from a crazy American strike has now lessened somewhat. So long as Israel is frantically egging an imbecilic Bush on to bomb the Iranian nuclear facilities, the possibility continues to exist.
Related:
(1) George Bush's farewell gift to Israel?
(2) Will Bush parcel out Iran toward the four winds of heaven?
(3) Lies & power behind US invasion of Iraq
(4) Anything for dear old Israel
(5) Why President Bush is so against Iran
Hanukkah Begins Friday Night
ReplyDeleteAn Arab money changer in eastern Jerusalem admitted Wednesday to paying former Israeli Knesset Member Azmi Bishara $390,000 for information on behalf of Hizbullah during the Second Lebanon War. As part of a plea bargain, Firas Asilah, a business owner in northeastern Jerusalem's Beit Hanina neighborhood, is being charged with money laundering.
ReplyDeleteThe money was transferred from an undisclosed Muslim country, via Jordan. Despite his perpetual denial of receiving funds other than his Israeli government salary, Bishara fled from Israel following the war in order not to be tried for treason.
Investigators state that Bishara's contacts say Bishara recommended Hizbullah attack Haifa, and use long-range rocket attacks as a tactic against Israel. Bishara is also thought to have recommended other strategic locations for terrorists targets inside Israel.
The United Arab Emirates has impounded the cargo of a vessel bound for Iran after discovering that "hazardous materials" aboard contravened UN sanctions placed on the Islamic republic to curtail its nuclear development programme.
ReplyDeleteIn a further ratcheting up of the UAE's determination to curb misuse of its ports, an official there confirmed that the cargo, detained for testing last month, contained materials banned by UN Security Council resolutions 1737 and 1747, while the purchaser of the materials had also been barred by the same resolutions.
But he declined to identify the contents of the cargo or the Iranian company that had ordered the materials.
The UAE's move comes amid a broader tightening of control over Iranian business interests that have for decades existed in the emirates, mainly Dubai.
"The UAE wants to be seen to take action as they haven't been so proactive in the past on, for example, dual-use materials," says Neil Patrick, analyst for the International Crisis Group, a non-governmental organisation....
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2ff6fdf4-a2d4-11dc-81c4-0000779fd2ac,Authorised=false.html?_i_location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ft.com%2Fcms%2Fs%2F0%2F2ff6fdf4-a2d4-11dc-81c4-0000779fd2ac.html%3Fnclick_check%3D1&_i_referer=http%3A%2F%2Fjihadwatch.org%2F&nclick_check=1
I don't know about intelligence estimates, but if I put together all the publically available information on Iran's nuclear program, it spells A-T-O-M-I-C-B-O-M-B. They may well have temporarily stopped active bomb development for a few years, but that's basically a tactical move.
ReplyDeleteI'm no warmonger, the answer doesn't have to be military action, but don't let hatred for Bush blind us all into inaction.
Or we'll very well be faced with a nuclear armed Iran in 2015 or 2020, mainly aimed at Israel, with Israel no doubt aiming dozens of their well-known nukes at Teheran and other Iranian cities.
That's going to be fun.
Despite the surprising conclusion of the American intelligence committee that Iran suspended its push for nuclear weapons, both France and Germany insisted that Iran represents a real threat. Nicolas Sarkozy still wants to impose harsher sanctions, although Angela Merkel would not commit to supporting another round at the moment. The two EU powers want Iran to end its uranium enrichment:
ReplyDelete"Iran continues to represent a threat," Mrs Merkel said during a joint news conference with Mr Sarkozy in Paris.
She did not specifically express support for a new UN sanctions resolution against Iran, which the US is calling for. ....
Mr Sarkozy said he agreed with his German counterpart that Iran still posed a danger, and that he supported the push for more sanctions.
"Notwithstanding the latest elements, everyone is fully conscious of the fact that there is a will of the Iranian leaders to obtain nuclear weapons.
"What made Iran move up to now, it was sanctions and firmness," he said.
The statements show that the NIE has made little difference in the international evaluation of Iranian nuclear research. No one feels that the mullahs will simply give up their desire to wield nuclear power and shift the balance of power in the Middle East sharply in their favor. France, Germany, and Britain spent years attempting to convince Iran to allow verification of the shutdown of the program, offering a wide range of economic concessions. If Iran had nothing to hide, why not take advantage of the offers in 2003, 2004, or 2005?
If pressure and sanctions convinced the Iranians to shelve the nuclear-weapons research temporarily, then it would be madness to back away now. Iran has not acknowledged its previous work on nuclear weapons, much as they hid it for years until a dissident group exposed the program in 2003. No one trusts them now when they claim they have only pursued peaceful nuclear power, and so France and Germany -- two nations that rely on trade with Iran -- still want to keep Iran isolated.
It provides a helpful reminder that the danger has not passed. As long as Iran enriches uranium and builds ever-larger centrifuge cascades, they can build a weapon fairly quickly. They bought the knowledge from the AQ Khan network, and they already have the missile platform for delivery. The issue may not be as acute as first thought, but the danger remains real -- and even if some Americans don't take it seriously, Iran's European trading partners still do.
;-) good to see your support for Bush in the face of the NIE
ReplyDeleteThis NIE was written by the National Intelligence Council whose chairman, Thomas Fingar had in July 2007, testified before the U.S. Congress that Iran was working on nuclear weapons. Others who participated in the NIE include Kenneth Brill, the director of the National Counterproliferation Center, Vann H. Van Diepen, the National Intelligence officer for Weapons of Mass Destruction and Proliferation, and Christian Westermann.
ReplyDeleteThe Wall Street Journal reported, “the NIE’s main authors include three former State Department officials with previous reputations as ‘hyper-partisan anti-Bush officials,’ according to an intelligence source.”
The New York Times quotes an unnamed IAEA official as saying that “we are more skeptical. We don’t buy the American analysis 100 percent. We are not that generous with Iran”. (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/05/world/middleeast/05iran.html?_r=1&oref=slogin)
This is consistent with recent statements by the IAEA that Iran had blueprints “showing how to mold uranium metal into the shape of warheads”. (http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1683709,00.html?xid=rss-topstories)
It was only in mid November Director General, Mohamed ElBaradei was complaining that the IAEA was “unable to provide credible assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities” in Iran. (http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5hilXSrV7bb8KJVip7ULVpQ_zRKhw)
So who do you believe ?
Bush will invade Iran using the same reason that Hitler invaded Poland in 1939, that is, "might is right"
ReplyDeleteIran should be given the nukes. The world is very dull. Russia and China can liven things up.
ReplyDeleteMore Bush lies:
ReplyDelete(This post was updated and bumped.)
"The story you are reading in the news is NOT true... CF assessment: Wildly inflated, irresponsibly exaggerated claims-no 600 families displaced, no 200 terrorists, no evidence of civilian KIA."
MAJ Peggy Kageleiry
Task Force Iron PAO
On the "Dwelah Massacre" reports
The "Dwelah Massacre" made international headlines on December 2, 2007.
http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2007/12/mnf-i-responds-another-bogus-report-no.html
A British intelligence official said that Iran had deceived the CIA over its nuclear plans and expressed doubt that Iran had indeed frozen its atomic weapons program.
ReplyDeleteThe official said British analysts believed that the Iranians, knowing their phone conversations were being listened to, deliberately gave misinformation. "We are skeptical. We want to know what the basis of it is, where did it come from? Was it on the basis of the defector? Was it on the basis of the intercepted material? They say things on the phone because they know we are up on the phones. They say black is white. They will say anything to throw us off," the official told the Telegraph.
On Sunday, a Security Cabinet panel is set to meet to discuss the new US intelligence report.