Visit My WebsiteU.N.: Bomb Iran and face Mideast 'ball of fire'


UN atom watchdog chief says to quit if Iran attacked


DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - The U.N. nuclear watchdog chief warned in comments aired Saturday that any military strike on Iran could turn the Mideast to a "ball of fire" and lead Iran to a more-aggressive stance on its controversial nuclear program.

The comments by Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, came in an interview with an Arab television station aired Saturday, a day after U.S. officials said they believed recent large Israeli military exercises may have been meant to show Israel's ability to hit Iran's nuclear sites.

"In my opinion, a military strike will be the worst... it will turn the Middle East to a ball of fire," ElBaradei said on Al-Arabiya television. It also could prompt Iran to press even harder to seek a nuclear program, and force him to resign, he said.

Iran on Saturday also criticized the Israeli exercises. The official IRNA news agency quoted a government spokesman as saying that the exercises demonstrate Israel "jeopardizes global peace and security."

Israel sent warplanes and other aircraft on a major exercise in the Eastern Mediterranean earlier this month, U.S. military officials said Friday.



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That's exactly what will happen.

We have to come down hard on our "congress critters" (I love that) about this and slap a very short leash on Israel. Israel is the aggressor in this case and their judgment, as usual, is poor and their intellect, as usual, severely flawed.

We cannot allow any more innocent people to die because of Israeli paranoia.

They KNOW they can't because I'm certain they already tried.

All this Iran saber rattling is to make up for the very fact that we are toothless.

You have heard "Talk soft and carry a big stick", right? Well when you hear all this loud talk, it's because we have no sticks left. This Iran beligerance policy is a front. A loud mouthed punk-policy that makes of our nation a silly bully who will certainly cry when the taunts provoke an actual reaction. This is republican foreign policy - reducing our proud standing in the world to that of " Scut Farkus"

If Israel attacks Iran, it will be the beginning of the end of Israel.

It would serve them right. They need to back off and stop copying the Right Wing pigs in the US.

No, it would serve no one right. Millions of people will die. The end of Israel will come as the Samson Option. They will go nuclear.

You're right. I stand corrected.

I'm just sick of our tax dollars being spent to help protect Israel while the Israelis and the US neocons are sharpening their swords against Iran when they haven't attacked anyone, but only talked trash. Let them be Holocaust deniers. so what!

Well here's so what.

Iran has threatened Israel and taken adventurous policies against it. It has armed and encouraged Hizb's and Hamas aggressive military activities toward Israel and has financed and planned attacks against Jews in other parts of the world, most notably in Argentina. It has hosted gatherings of neo-nazis and people who want to align themselves with nazis because they feel they have mutual interests.

So, if Iran needs nuclear power, and you feel nuclear power is fine everywhere in the world, ok. But keep nuclear weapons technology from them.

By the way, there are Iranians who question Ahmadinjad's insane obsession with Israel and the Jews. International Herald Tribune - Authorities have shut down a Tehran newspaper ,the official IRNA news agency reported Sunday, after the paper published a story critical of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's stance on Israel.

And then there is the brutal repression of the Bahai in Iran. Let's not sit quitely for that either.

Not sure why you'd support a theocratic, repressive, militaristic regime there when you seem to oppose those tendancies in the US.

Heed Iran's dissidents.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/20...17/comment.iran

Heed Iran's dissidents
An attack would fortify Tehran's nuclear hawks, and we would all suffer the consequences

[snip]

The last thing outside powers should be contemplating is any action that makes the most desirable internal resolution less possible. And we should be taking public note of what Iranian dissidents are repeatedly saying, which is that they "categorically reject a military attack on Iran". Whatever happens, America and its supporters need to consider, reconsider and then consider again their long view. Would it be absolutely disastrous if Iran acquired a few nuclear weapons a few years earlier than would be the case if its facilities were bombed now? For that is what the issue comes down to - a delay, and maybe a pretty short one.

[snip]

Iran could change from within, but will not as long as U.S. and Israeli policy belligerence helps the hardliners to reinforce their positions.

Here's the problem, and its much like one we face in the US, when a country/society feels its under attack/threatened it tends to unify against outsiders. Ahmadinjad knows that and is promoting conflict for this reason (sound familiar?).

But that doesn't mean that Iran isn't also acting aggressively and that it would be dangerous for them (like many other unstable and adventurous parties) to have nuclear weapons technology. There is a reason the world seems to be generally united on the problem, though not the solution.

Exactly. It takes courage to go this route, since to some people it feels like inaction. There are active things to be done in supporting internal moderates also, so not necessarily inaction. But that is how the choice is usually presented by the advocates for violence: "Shall we just sit or our thumbs, or take action and attack?".

Further, people get it in their heads that violence will succeed, even though there are plenty of examples of the opposite. Even when our experience is as immediate as Iraq.

If we look at this question strategically, without fear, laying out all the various branching alternatives, we'd likely see that there aren't any good strategic options, anymore, mostly because of mistakes made in the past. but there is always a best one, even if it's bad; and there are no guarantees in life. My strategic intuition is similar to that on attacking Iraq (I thought that was a very bad idea); attacking Iran is a horrifically bad idea. This conflict will jump from "Iran" to "Muslim", spreading to the far east and Africa. It will go nuclear, IMO. The only reason I can be sanguine about it is because I have already accepted the notion that the stupidity, pride, greed, belligerence of a few "leaders" will likely set the earth on a course of self-destruction, and there's very little I can do about it. It's more about coming to terms, than preventing, for me now.

It's not a matter of supporting Iran or supporting a war against Iran. We don't live in a paper universe.

You think bombs would fix that place? You think that would set the hardliners straight?

Who are we to dictate who can and cannot have nuclear weapons?

I am not persuaded that Iran is a threat. They do not have a history of invading other nations.

The more bellicose the U.S. and Israel are, the more Iran and other countries will be convinced they are under threat. Our invasion and occupation of Iraq has served notice to all that no nation is safe from American aggression, especially those included in Bush's lame-brained "Axis of Evil". Neither is it constructive for people like Hillary Clinton to threaten to "obliterate Iran". Who can blame Iran for wishing to arm themselves?

They are a right wing theocracy, that's always dangerous...

However the issue of nuclear weapons is moot here. I say we conceed: Why spend all this effort on conjecture that we know goes off into outer space? Let's just wait until we have something actionable before flying off the handle. International forces can attack Iran just as soon as we see a nuclear test. Why then? Because it takes time to go from a single successful test to an actionable weapon system.

There's no 'surprise we are a fully formed nuclear power' capability.

This is a bunch of hot air and hog wash.

Are your suggesting that ther world simply not worry abouit nuclear proliferation until it happens? Are you thinking that Israel (or anyone else in a similar situation, ie many of Irans neighbors) will sit quietly while another nation threatening their distruction acquire the tools to do that.

Even if you think it's a good approach, I can tell you, it just won't happen.

Shall we just sit or our thumbs, or take action and attack?

It seems to me that many in the U.S. and Israel are determined to provoke an unnecessary confrontation with Iran, which is not in the best interests of the American people.

Cheney and Bush are warmongers who are agitating for confrontation with Iran, as part of their mad agenda of world domination at worst or coercive democraticization at best. They are maniacal and dangerous. They are also perpetually dishonest.

It simply does not follow that a military confrontation must result from provacative threats from an adversary. When Krushchev threatened to bury the U.S., Kennedy did not make plans to bomb the USSR. Neither did subsequent presidents. The Soviets represented an actual threat to our lives and security. But through a measured and mature approach, catastrophe was avoided. By no stretch of the imagination does Iran represent an equally significant threat to the United States.

The warmongers in the U.S. and Israel have a habit of posing as the victims and portraying perceived enemies as fiends endangering our security, regardless of the real threat. They do this to frighten the people into backing their aggressive actions, because Americans and Israelis are fundamentally just, peace-loving people and will only go along with pre-emptive attacks if they feel threatened. To jump to the conclusion that a confrontation is inevitable and unavoidable is to succumb yet again to the Neocons' schemes of deception.

Pre-emptive attacks against real of perceived enemies, which do not pose a real, imminent threat to us, are immoral and illegal. Aggessive acts of war without justification are WAR CRIMES.

I'm kind of hoping that there is some effective point between those two. I'm not any more comfortable with the former than the latter.

Opinion understood (as it relates to the topic at hand). However, as a matter of correction, Pre-emptive attacks are, by definition, a response to a real threat. And they are (at least often) legal.

Yes.

Iran cannot be bombed without express written permission from China. Just yesterday, China announced more restrictions on oil consumption. Read this as "You toucha my Iranian oil, I breaka you economy."

There is no indication that China has approved any sort of attack on Iran and no indication that they are about to.

My point in posting the question is that is the way the false choice is ususally given: attack or do nothing.
That dichotomy isn't the real one. The real choice is:
(1) Do nothing or do something?
(2) If something, attempt to resolve conflict (presumably) via violence, or non-violence?
By posing the false choice as attack or do nothing, the entire scenario of real, aggressive diplomacy is foreclosed. I'm not talking about diplomacy-by-the-numbers, either, rather about proactive bridge building, face to face discussions, looking for common ground. If both parties aren't meeting, this option isn't happening. Once we have set up the us-them frame, at least here in the world of GWB and the neocons, then diplomacy is 90% foreclosed also.

Yes, that is a real problem. But some people on this board seem to think that trying to do anything, including diplomatic and economic pressure is the same as violence. You can go back to discussion last week on the Con. Resoultion in the House and see that even though the term military was conspicuously left out, people we calling it a war resoution to attack Iran.

So, my belief is that there are too many people here willing to do nothing, and just sit and wait. I think that makes for bad policy and a worse end result. (you didn't see me call for military action against Iran, did you? But you wouldn't know it from the reaction to my concern about Iran and my feeling that ther current regime is a destructive force in the region, at this point.)

The US position is irrelevant. Any attack on Iran MUST bear the explicit approval from China and I don't see this happening.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2008...ent_6783932.htm
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2008...ent_6785724.htm
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2008...ent_6786501.htm

And don't think this won't be used when Iran's bank assets are "frozen"
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2008...ent_6781294.htm

I think this could be the best policy. Without us pushing them around, they were on the verge of removing the theocracy and restoring their place as an enlightened nation. Then along came a foreign menace to get them all riled up again.

So yeah, I think we should do exactly NOTHING about Iran.

Think that would keep Israel from first strike? With the US dragged in like Brer-Rabbit and the briar patch>?

I don't think we would jump in.

Did we jump into their latest skirmish?

We CAN'T jump in- China would punish ChimpenBush by cutting his Dick off.

Lebanon? No, but there was no discussion, nor promises, in that case. Iran is a different beast, has always been singled out by Israel. I think we've made it pretty clear that we're in it with them. So if China threatened our debt situation, do we have enough leverage on Israel to think they'd forgo military action if they thought survival was at stake? I think we'd jump in. At some point, there are simply no good options left for the US. Then it becomes a matter of every man / faction for him / itself. I don't believe this situation will be decided by rationality. I think it is overconstrained and will break in a way that hasn't been contemplated ... sort of like Catastrophe Theory.

(1) Netanyahu elected PM
(2) Israel attacks
(3) Iran retaliates against US
(4) Politically US must retaliate, debt notwithstanding
(5) Situation gets "out of hand"

Israel is definitely on its own; if only because China has less of a stranglehold on its economy. You'll know the day we "jump in." The Dow will drop 2,000 points and you will instantly be out of a job with no future prospects but to decide to work for a Chinese company that is recovering its debt via receivership.

The US would sooner default on those debts and declare war on China in that scenario, which is well over the "gone to Hell" threshhold.

"in it with them" is pretty nebulous. I don't see any reason to believe we would strike Iran. Ever.

The Chinese know the US is, as Mao once said, a "Paper Tiger." The Chinese are way too smart to be suckered into one of Chimpenfuhrer's wars. The Chinese can simply wait for Chimpy and Dickhead to drain the US treasury and pull the paper teeth out of the paper tiger. Our economy mostly belongs to China and they will allow the Republicans to damage it only enough to allow them to buy the remains at 10 cents on the dollar.

Remember the "adjustment" in the market in Feb 2007 caused by an unexplained "blip" in the far east? They were warning Bush and The Dick not to disturb the oil flow.

China has the ability to sink our economy in one hour. It seems to me that it is China that has mastered the strategy of talking softly and carrying a big stick.

China's oil supply determines the events in the Mideast- politics is irrelevant.

You know, Viewer, I think your problem is that you're trying to have a logical discussion with people who've got no concept of Iranian culture or history.

No concept of history period, actually, and no responsibility. If they say "we should do nothing" and we do something, they can say "see, we did the wrong thing." If we do nothing and something terrible happens, these people remain silent, and others in their group go "we didn't say you should do nothing, those were other people."

what are you proposing ?

I'm proposing that the conservatives and the liberals forget everything they think they know, read in a pamphlet or heard some talk radio host say about politics, get some good, hard facts, perspective and context and abandon the extremist left and right for some good old common sense.

That's what I'm proposing. A little less insanity, a little more "here are the problems, what tools do the right and the left have to solve them?"

You know, Jeff, you're right. Some people think we should do nothing. Some people think we should do something other than attack. And you're 100% right, that one group or the other will be unhappy if you things don't work out. So you got that part right. If course, that conclusion's pretty much a tautology, since you can't both do nothing, and something.

As for the rest of your content, you've conflated the two groups under some category of people, who have no concept of history, and no responsibility. Care to put a name on that category? Or is it just the 2 posters with whom Viewer is having a dispute?

Extremist liberals, extremist conservatives. Two groups, no brains.

Clear enough? There is no one doctrine that answers all the world's problems all the time. You can't Hitler everything, you can't Ghandi everything.

So just to be clear, the other poster is Hitler, and I am Ghandi? And you think I propose to Ghandi everything, all the time?

LOL It took awhile for an angry freeper to show up today

What's a freeper? And do you imagine that by labelling someone you take away their validity?

And no GCurry, I'm suggesting nothing about you personally, just the two camps and how they're represented here by many of the posters.

Typical Centrist chin flap.

It's that Spineless, Centrist "common sense" that has empowered BushCo for the past eight years.

[quote name='Jeff-Fletcher' date='Jun 23 2008, 06:33 PM' post='53086']
What's a freeper?

For what its worth, I didn't realize I was having a dispute.

That's the difference. You're just a guy with different views, we have no problem with that here.
You're a genuine, credible member of RRMB. You just see things differently than most of us.

It tools like this Fletcher/scottymac twerp that come here to lie and sow discord and insult people because they have no life, and suffer from some sort of mamma's boy syndrome, that cause "disputes".

We disagree on many things, Viewer. But be assured that I value your opinion and appreciate your challenging input.

I think this extremity of division among political ideas is a product of your own bias. I think you might be hung up on the much harped upon "liberal / conservative" poles - to the exclusion of deeper and more meaningful consideration that is happening right in front of you.

I see ideas here that don't plot easily on a left-right axis.

In fact, I don't see how the central discussion of intervention vs. non intervention plots as left right at all.

Also, for GCurry, I had to go look up Tautology. Lol. Great word.

Wow. Believe it or not, I really appreciate that and am honestly touched. In all honestly, I really didn't see that comment coming.

I do think that many of the people are willing to give the Iranian regime a pass when they don't deserve one.

The situation of Bahai's in Iran

This doesn't address anything at all of what I've said. All it is, is dogma. "The right is evil." Yeah well I'm not from the right. "Are you from the far far far far left?" No, I'm from the middle. "The middle is evil!"

Same thing. Centrist? Tell me what my dogma is? Predict my position. Let me guess yours. You're pro abortion, you're anti gun rights, you're anti semetic (i.e. you believe Jews don't have the right to have a country or defend themselves from aggression), you're anti war, you're pro terrorist, you're anti American.

How'd I do? Pretty much spot on huh? Now, tell me where I stand on those issues? What about drugs? What about immigration? What about our border? Do you know? Nope, you haven't a clue what "typical centrist chin flap" looks like. But you hate me nonetheless, don't you? Why? Because I'm not an extremist on your side. Because I think for myself, and don't let talk show hosts do it for me.

You're so consumed by hatred, you can't even listen to someone else before attacking them. You had 1 post in this thread that wasn't about me, and it was saying that Israeli paranoia is the problem. Really? How many times has Israel attacked a neighboring country? How many times has it been attacked? How much land has Israel taken from its neighbors? How much? Given that their airforce downed 82 planes in their last serious war, with zero losses of aircraft, and they could have marched all the way to Korea with their army, how much land did they take? Enough to create a buffer between them and the Arab Muslims that constantly attack them, that say they don't have a right to exist, that teach their children that Jews are dogs and have no right to a land that Jews have settled on since before history?

Oh yeah, you're real well informed.

It's funny, Randys just gave me an official warning because I insulted someone. I wonder how many official warnings are going to be handed out for all of your flagrant insults? Zero I'm betting.

There's your conspiracy theory.