So what do we do about Iran?
- Thread starter MeekAndMild
- Start date
HAHAHAHAHAHAH!!! Or, once he opens his mouth to speak, they'll be like: "OK! OK! We'll take the !@#$%^ thing apart!
Seriously...I think the Israelis will tkae action on their own...When it comes to security threats in their back yeard, they DEAL with them decisively and expediently...And you never hear whining about it from within their own camp...Oh wait...There's no democrats there
.
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Not quite that simple....
Anyone who thinks that the Iran leadership can be negotiated with probably believe that Saddam had nothing to do with terrorism, Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro are champions of the people, and Kim Jong Il is a paragon of lucidity.
Actually, the Ayatollah purged the Army when he took over, and destroyed what was arguably the most powerful and professional army in the region. When Saddam invaded, he pulled a Hitler-at-Moscow - he inexplicably stopped when he had the Iranians beaten and on the run. This gave Iran enough time to regroup and draft a million boys, who were thrown into the battle as not much more than raw cannon fodder. The war dragged on for years, with Saddam (who never had WMD) using WMD at the front. Over a million Muslims were killed in that war, which kind of points to the disregard that elite have for their own citizens.
Anyone who thinks that the Iran leadership can be negotiated with probably believe that Saddam had nothing to do with terrorism, Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro are champions of the people, and Kim Jong Il is a paragon of lucidity.
Harley Quinn
Moderator
Shorthair I have to say your post is well put.
I just hope we are not going to get into a problem but...It will definitly go bad if something is not done and the UN does not take a good stance on this one.
I saw another thread on this with a poster showing the UN telling the US as in us to back off and let them handle it...
Yea right, UN is taking some heat on there stance on PLO. You remember David and Goliath? Goliath was a Philistine.
Folks that is the same people as the PLO and Israel is still the same people. We are going for the story by 'Daniel' it appears, and we have no ability to stop it I guess?
Idiots
I am going to finish that hole I started in 1954 when we were talking bomb shelters. My own personal grave site I think
HQ
I just hope we are not going to get into a problem but...It will definitly go bad if something is not done and the UN does not take a good stance on this one.
I saw another thread on this with a poster showing the UN telling the US as in us to back off and let them handle it...
Yea right, UN is taking some heat on there stance on PLO. You remember David and Goliath? Goliath was a Philistine.
Folks that is the same people as the PLO and Israel is still the same people. We are going for the story by 'Daniel' it appears, and we have no ability to stop it I guess?
Idiots
I am going to finish that hole I started in 1954 when we were talking bomb shelters. My own personal grave site I think HQ
Yep. Dead on.
Iran's leadership may be using N Korea's scam of blackmailing Western countries. This is how Jimmy Carter got his Nobel Prize; Clinton sent Carter to N Korea with 7 billion dollars to buy off N Korea the first time they hinted at becoming nuclear. Unfortunately N Korea spent the 7 billion on nuclear plants........................oops!
fluwoebers
Inactive
Isreal can't reach Iran without going through Iraq (our air space), so we would have to be complicit. If our goal in sitting this one out is to not piss off the middle east, it won't work. It will be ugly for us regardless. Iran claims it has 300 well protected sites. Isreal can't handle it alone and shouldn't have to. If it comes down to military action, the US should and probably will lead.
As useless as the UN is, it is actually a good idea this time to start out there. Not only is Europe much more willing to cooperate this time, but the longer we can wait, the better chance of Iran fixing itself. Ahmadinejad certainly won't cooperate, but the Iranians will some day take control of their country. Maybe it will be sooner rather than later.
As useless as the UN is, it is actually a good idea this time to start out there. Not only is Europe much more willing to cooperate this time, but the longer we can wait, the better chance of Iran fixing itself. Ahmadinejad certainly won't cooperate, but the Iranians will some day take control of their country. Maybe it will be sooner rather than later.
The Radioactive Republic of Iran
By MICHAEL RUBIN
January 16, 2006
On Friday, George Bush and German Chancellor Angela Merkel stood together in the White House to condemn Iran. "Iran, armed with a nuclear weapon, poses a grave threat to the security of the world," Mr. Bush said. "We will not be intimidated," Ms. Merkel added. The press conference marks a turning point in a decade-long saga. Europe's engagement with Iran has failed. While Iranian diplomats met with their British, French and German counterparts in Vienna and Geneva, Iranian technicians toiled to ready Iran's uranium enrichment capability. European officials discussed a China model for Iran, in which they could use trade to catalyze political liberalization. Between 2000 and 2005, EU trade with the Islamic Republic almost tripled. But rather than moderate, Iranian authorities used the hard currency to enhance their military. They built secret nuclear facilities and blocked inspections. They failed to explain why there were traces of weapons-grade uranium on Iranian centrifuges, and refused to detail what assistance Tehran received from Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan. On Sept. 24, 2005, the International Atomic Energy Agency declared Iran to be in non-compliance with the Non-Proliferation Treaty's Safeguards Agreement.
Still, diplomats and doves hold out hope. After a Jan. 12 phone conversation with Ali Larijani, Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, Kofi Annan assured reporters that Tehran was interested in "serious and constructive negotiations." As Mr. Bush met Ms. Merkel, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw told the BBC that military action was "not on the agenda" and insisted that the crisis "can only be resolved by peaceful means." But while Mr. Bush and his European allies may agree to refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council, traditional diplomacy will not work for a simple reason: Iran's quest for nuclear weapons has nothing to do with the U.S. or Europe. The crisis with Tehran is ideological, not political.
* * *
Destruction of Israel is a pillar of the Islamic Republic's ideology. Soon after leading the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini declared, "Every Muslim has a duty to prepare himself for battle against Israel." President Ahmadinejad's recent Holocaust-denial and call for Israel to be "wiped off the map," may have shocked Europe, but his statements mark only a change in rhetorical style, not ideological substance. When it comes to Israel, there is no difference between hard-liners and reformers. While Mr. Annan honored Mohammad Khatami for his Dialogue of Civilizations, the reformist president's instructions to the Iranian people were less high-minded. "We should mobilize the whole Islamic World for a sharp confrontation with the Zionist regime," he told Iranian TV on Oct. 24, 2000. "If we abide by the Qur'an, all of us should mobilize to kill." In a Dec. 14, 2001 sermon, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, perhaps the second most powerful man in Iran and one often described as a pragmatist by Western officials and journalists alike, declared, "The use of even one nuclear bomb inside Israel will destroy everything… It is not irrational to contemplate such an eventuality." During a Sept. 22, 2003 military parade, authorities displayed a Shihab-3 missile draped with a banner reading, "Israel must be uprooted and erased from history."
The ideological venom of their leaders carries little weight among the people. While the Iran-Iraq War killed hundreds of thousands, Iran and Israel have never exchanged a single shot. Many Iranians express pride that Israeli president Moshe Katsav was born in Iran. Indeed, the real ire of ordinary Iranians is expressed toward their government, not the outside world. In a 2002 labor protest, workers demanding back pay marched through Tehran, chanting, "Forget about Palestine and think about us."
Iran's youth want no more to live under theocracy than do Americans or Europeans. Iran Institute for Democracy telephone polls sampling opinion in every Tehran neighborhood suggest that 80% of the population have lost faith in the Islamic Republic. The Iranian people have little say in their leadership. The Supreme Leader wields autocratic power and reigns for life. The Guardian Council selects who can run for office. Before the 2005 elections, this clerical council disqualified more than 1,000 candidates, allowing the public to choose from only eight, all of whom endorsed theocracy and opposed far-reaching reform. Ordinary Iranians ignore the sham: While the Iranian government claims 50% voter turnout, Iranian pilgrims in Iraq say it was less than 20%. Contrast that with Iraq, where 70% of the population braves bombs and bullets to vote.
The Iranian religious leadership recognizes that demography is against them. Reform is a slippery slope, democracy a theocrat's hemlock. For the Ayatollahs, there can be no Orange, Rose, or Cedar Revolutions. Popular will is irrelevant. Legitimacy comes not from the people, but from God as channeled through a cabal of religious leaders. While Western analysts divide Iran's politicians into hard-liners and reformists, the difference is one of style, not belief. Take Mr. Khatami: Viewed by diplomats as a reformer, he nevertheless demonstrated disdain for popular sovereignty. "Knowledge of God's commandment must be the foundation of … life," he wrote in the state-run daily Kayhan. "People are not able to comprehend God's will through the explanations contained in the Quran and Sunna. Acquiring such comprehension requires several years of studies and much effort." Democracy is fine, but only clerics should be able to participate fully. Khomeini's successor and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called liberal democracy "the source of all human torment."
Such statements ring hollow among the Iranian people. This year marks the 100th anniversary of Iran's constitutional revolution. Many people wonder why they no longer have today rights they had a century ago. Since the 1999 student protests, they have taken to the streets with increasing frequency to demand real reform. Iranians are losing their fear of the Islamic authorities. State control is eroding. Televised confessions once broke dissidents, now they build them. A stint in Tehran's notorious Evin Prison has become a badge of honor. Last summer, dissident author Akbar Ganji shook the Islamic Republic with a two-month hunger strike that captivated his countrymen. "I have become the symbol of justice in the face of tyranny," he wrote from prison, "my emaciated body exposing the contradictions of a government which has reversed justice and tyranny."
The ideological guardians can suppress wildfires of dissent, but Iran remains a tinderbox. Demography pours fuel on the fire. The leadership is following a different China model: Only with a nuclear deterrent can the ayatollahs launch the Cultural Revolution that will ensure their survival without fear of outside interference. The Revolutionary Guards are preparing for not one, but dozens of Tiananmen Squares.
As they cleanse their home front, the theocrats may use their nuclear capability to act upon their ideological imperative to destroy Israel. The West once ignored Saddam Hussein's threats against Kuwait. But dictators often mean what they say. Even if Iran does not use its bomb, a nuclear deterrent will enable it to lash out conventionally without fear of consequence.
Diplomacy can only work when both sides are sincere. Like an abused spouse, Western policy makers blame themselves rather than understand the fault is not theirs. There is no magic formula waiting to be discovered. To Tehran, the West is naïve. More diplomacy will only give the Islamic Republic time to achieve its nuclear goal. The only solutions that can rectify the problem are those that deny the Islamic Republic its nuclear arsenal or those that enable Iranians to cast aside theocracy and its aggressive ideology and instead embrace freedom.
Mr. Rubin, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is co-author, with Patrick Clawson, of "Eternal Iran: Continuity and Chaos" (Palgrave, 2005).
URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB113736575780147145.html
By MICHAEL RUBIN
January 16, 2006
On Friday, George Bush and German Chancellor Angela Merkel stood together in the White House to condemn Iran. "Iran, armed with a nuclear weapon, poses a grave threat to the security of the world," Mr. Bush said. "We will not be intimidated," Ms. Merkel added. The press conference marks a turning point in a decade-long saga. Europe's engagement with Iran has failed. While Iranian diplomats met with their British, French and German counterparts in Vienna and Geneva, Iranian technicians toiled to ready Iran's uranium enrichment capability. European officials discussed a China model for Iran, in which they could use trade to catalyze political liberalization. Between 2000 and 2005, EU trade with the Islamic Republic almost tripled. But rather than moderate, Iranian authorities used the hard currency to enhance their military. They built secret nuclear facilities and blocked inspections. They failed to explain why there were traces of weapons-grade uranium on Iranian centrifuges, and refused to detail what assistance Tehran received from Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan. On Sept. 24, 2005, the International Atomic Energy Agency declared Iran to be in non-compliance with the Non-Proliferation Treaty's Safeguards Agreement.
Still, diplomats and doves hold out hope. After a Jan. 12 phone conversation with Ali Larijani, Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, Kofi Annan assured reporters that Tehran was interested in "serious and constructive negotiations." As Mr. Bush met Ms. Merkel, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw told the BBC that military action was "not on the agenda" and insisted that the crisis "can only be resolved by peaceful means." But while Mr. Bush and his European allies may agree to refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council, traditional diplomacy will not work for a simple reason: Iran's quest for nuclear weapons has nothing to do with the U.S. or Europe. The crisis with Tehran is ideological, not political.
* * *
Destruction of Israel is a pillar of the Islamic Republic's ideology. Soon after leading the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini declared, "Every Muslim has a duty to prepare himself for battle against Israel." President Ahmadinejad's recent Holocaust-denial and call for Israel to be "wiped off the map," may have shocked Europe, but his statements mark only a change in rhetorical style, not ideological substance. When it comes to Israel, there is no difference between hard-liners and reformers. While Mr. Annan honored Mohammad Khatami for his Dialogue of Civilizations, the reformist president's instructions to the Iranian people were less high-minded. "We should mobilize the whole Islamic World for a sharp confrontation with the Zionist regime," he told Iranian TV on Oct. 24, 2000. "If we abide by the Qur'an, all of us should mobilize to kill." In a Dec. 14, 2001 sermon, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, perhaps the second most powerful man in Iran and one often described as a pragmatist by Western officials and journalists alike, declared, "The use of even one nuclear bomb inside Israel will destroy everything… It is not irrational to contemplate such an eventuality." During a Sept. 22, 2003 military parade, authorities displayed a Shihab-3 missile draped with a banner reading, "Israel must be uprooted and erased from history."
The ideological venom of their leaders carries little weight among the people. While the Iran-Iraq War killed hundreds of thousands, Iran and Israel have never exchanged a single shot. Many Iranians express pride that Israeli president Moshe Katsav was born in Iran. Indeed, the real ire of ordinary Iranians is expressed toward their government, not the outside world. In a 2002 labor protest, workers demanding back pay marched through Tehran, chanting, "Forget about Palestine and think about us."
Iran's youth want no more to live under theocracy than do Americans or Europeans. Iran Institute for Democracy telephone polls sampling opinion in every Tehran neighborhood suggest that 80% of the population have lost faith in the Islamic Republic. The Iranian people have little say in their leadership. The Supreme Leader wields autocratic power and reigns for life. The Guardian Council selects who can run for office. Before the 2005 elections, this clerical council disqualified more than 1,000 candidates, allowing the public to choose from only eight, all of whom endorsed theocracy and opposed far-reaching reform. Ordinary Iranians ignore the sham: While the Iranian government claims 50% voter turnout, Iranian pilgrims in Iraq say it was less than 20%. Contrast that with Iraq, where 70% of the population braves bombs and bullets to vote.
The Iranian religious leadership recognizes that demography is against them. Reform is a slippery slope, democracy a theocrat's hemlock. For the Ayatollahs, there can be no Orange, Rose, or Cedar Revolutions. Popular will is irrelevant. Legitimacy comes not from the people, but from God as channeled through a cabal of religious leaders. While Western analysts divide Iran's politicians into hard-liners and reformists, the difference is one of style, not belief. Take Mr. Khatami: Viewed by diplomats as a reformer, he nevertheless demonstrated disdain for popular sovereignty. "Knowledge of God's commandment must be the foundation of … life," he wrote in the state-run daily Kayhan. "People are not able to comprehend God's will through the explanations contained in the Quran and Sunna. Acquiring such comprehension requires several years of studies and much effort." Democracy is fine, but only clerics should be able to participate fully. Khomeini's successor and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called liberal democracy "the source of all human torment."
Such statements ring hollow among the Iranian people. This year marks the 100th anniversary of Iran's constitutional revolution. Many people wonder why they no longer have today rights they had a century ago. Since the 1999 student protests, they have taken to the streets with increasing frequency to demand real reform. Iranians are losing their fear of the Islamic authorities. State control is eroding. Televised confessions once broke dissidents, now they build them. A stint in Tehran's notorious Evin Prison has become a badge of honor. Last summer, dissident author Akbar Ganji shook the Islamic Republic with a two-month hunger strike that captivated his countrymen. "I have become the symbol of justice in the face of tyranny," he wrote from prison, "my emaciated body exposing the contradictions of a government which has reversed justice and tyranny."
The ideological guardians can suppress wildfires of dissent, but Iran remains a tinderbox. Demography pours fuel on the fire. The leadership is following a different China model: Only with a nuclear deterrent can the ayatollahs launch the Cultural Revolution that will ensure their survival without fear of outside interference. The Revolutionary Guards are preparing for not one, but dozens of Tiananmen Squares.
As they cleanse their home front, the theocrats may use their nuclear capability to act upon their ideological imperative to destroy Israel. The West once ignored Saddam Hussein's threats against Kuwait. But dictators often mean what they say. Even if Iran does not use its bomb, a nuclear deterrent will enable it to lash out conventionally without fear of consequence.
Diplomacy can only work when both sides are sincere. Like an abused spouse, Western policy makers blame themselves rather than understand the fault is not theirs. There is no magic formula waiting to be discovered. To Tehran, the West is naïve. More diplomacy will only give the Islamic Republic time to achieve its nuclear goal. The only solutions that can rectify the problem are those that deny the Islamic Republic its nuclear arsenal or those that enable Iranians to cast aside theocracy and its aggressive ideology and instead embrace freedom.
Mr. Rubin, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is co-author, with Patrick Clawson, of "Eternal Iran: Continuity and Chaos" (Palgrave, 2005).
URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB113736575780147145.html
Just a simple point here, is Iran a growing enemy that will use it's power against the US and it's allies or not? If you wait and see you and your family will suffer if they are enemies. If they are not then they would submit to inspections to prove so.
Do you let deadly snakes crawl around your house knowingly?
25
Do you let deadly snakes crawl around your house knowingly?
25
MicroBalrog
New member
May I remind you that Ahmadinejad, who was more extreme that the Iranian government-approved candidate, won the election there?
My Take, Support Iranian western leaning resistance from Iraq (hey they are doing it to our troops in Iraq, paybacks) and if the Israeli want to fight, give them the OK. The US cannot get involved in a direct confrontation at this time because. A) we are not done in Iraq yet B) you think resistance the war in Iraq is bad now, you will not get enough popular support in the US to invade Iran. C) We got burnt invading Iraq with the WMD issue, the Iranians will destroy all the proof of WMD development if we invade and they will cry foul. D) can you handle $10 or $20 a gallon for gas, Iran is the 4th largest oil producer and a member of OPEC E) our military...and I hate to say it, is overstreached and could not pull off an invasion of a country the size of Iran with a people/army willing to fight. Unlike Iraq, the US would suffer heavy losses.
So my solution, let go of the leash around Israel, support Iranian government resistance, and maybe a little Black Ops moves here an there but that's it.
So my solution, let go of the leash around Israel, support Iranian government resistance, and maybe a little Black Ops moves here an there but that's it.
Gary Conner
New member
Let the elitists in the European Union handle it.
Well, we only have one choice if we are to not once again be referred to as the Great Satan amongst the European Union elitists.
Let the French handle it. After all. They have a good track record on handling such things.
Well, we only have one choice if we are to not once again be referred to as the Great Satan amongst the European Union elitists.
Let the French handle it. After all. They have a good track record on handling such things.
I imagine Dubyah is setting heavily on the Israelis right now. I wonder what goodies and promises they got in return? I imagine the folks that run Iran are replaying the Dubyah speech about Iraq having strategic nuclear weapons and terrorist ties so we are going to war with them and getting a pretty good laugh.
I was employed at Bell Helicopter durning the era when we sold Cobras to Iran, I was offered the opportunity to work there, declined. Many friends went and worked there and were handsomely paid. They said the Iranians were nice to them and made friends there. Before the Ayatolla overthrew the Shah's Government. After Khomeini took over they rubbed the US's face in the dirt and did horrible things to their own Citizens.
At this time while they have not nuked anybody I have faith in the younger Iranians somehow overthrowing the present Government and joining the human race. I suppose we have to wait and see and take serious measures if Iran gets too powerful . Radical Islam, not young thinking Iranians are the enemy.
At this time while they have not nuked anybody I have faith in the younger Iranians somehow overthrowing the present Government and joining the human race. I suppose we have to wait and see and take serious measures if Iran gets too powerful . Radical Islam, not young thinking Iranians are the enemy.
Israel would not exist without the US. That's what Israel "gets in return". That's why we are hated and called the Great Satan.
Iraq did have Terror ties and still does. All Muslim countries have Terror ties. Saddam's Iraq did have WMDs. What do you think he killed Kurds with?
Anybody who uses the derogatory term "Dubyah" is living in an "imagine" world. That's the reason John Kerry lost. The realists would not trust him with America's national security.