IRAN WMD Watch Movin Up The List

[TheBramble]

Good points Dave, but I'm just as worried by my own government and its allies as I am the latest near-to-middle-east 'threat'. Actually, probably more so.

The superpowers have shown for over 50 years that having nuclear attack capability is one thing; having the will to deploy it quite something else.

The only real currency these smaller nuclear or soon-to-be-nuclear nations have is their apparent willingness to use it. And the crazier and more ideologically frenzied they seem, the less likely they are to be messed around with by those who would wish to change their way of life (or steal their natural resources).

Gadaffi utilised this 'madman in a tent' approach successfully for many years until we got the message and decided to trade sensibly with him - initially under cover and nowadays more overtly.

If I was Iranian or whatever, I'd likely be supporting the stance of my government in its attempts to prevent preemptive action. After all, that's precisely what GB (and US) have done in the past in the name of peace and democracy. Except we've tended to take the other route rather than simply threaten.

I'm long plutonium.

 

[fxmarkets]

hmm but what about Hamas and their key thoughts...

"Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it."

"The Islamic Resistance Movement believes that the land of Palestine is an Islamic Waqf consecrated for future Moslem generations until Judgement Day. It, or any part of it, should not be squandered: it, or any part of it, should not be given up. "

"There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors."

"After Palestine, the Zionists aspire to expand from the Nile to the Euphrates. When they will have digested the region they overtook, they will aspire to further expansion, and so on. Their plan is embodied in the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion", and their present conduct is the best proof of what we are saying."

Ami Isseroff

Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia fund them to the tune in excess of $100 million anually to maintain their interests so it could all get a bit tricky.

 

[charliechan]

looking back at the gulf conflict, I think Israel will be backed to the hilt by the US, for the "Owe Me" expected by Israel from refraining from escalation on their part when the scuds were dropping on their doorstep.

Thing is who will likely back Iran, when action or force is used against them if it gets to that and what capacity do any Iranian allies have at their disposal?

iran + china + n korea + maybe russia = good bye usa.

i dont think anyone has a clue as to how many bombs n korea has - or china for that matter.

 

[DaveJB]

The key point I think is the 'willingness to use them'.
I can't agree with the idea that

I'm just as worried by my own government and its allies as I am the latest near-to-middle-east 'threat'

although I can empathise with the underlying tone of despair at our own politicos... in truth I trust Tony Blair more than somebody yelling about Jihad, simply because I trust one not to blow us all to kingdom come more than the other...

It's quite fashionable to question UK/US motives in removing Sadam, especially now it looks very much like 'spin' was applid with great force - it should perhaps be borne in mind that at the time, and not seeking to downplay the 'evil' of spin wrt WMD, Saddam himself was apparently deliberately preventing verification of nuclear status.... not because he enjoyed brinkmanship, but allegedly because he feared western intervention caused by not 'fessing up' less than he feared Iran invading the moment Iran was sure he didn't have the warheads....

It's ALL a complete furball of cross-interests, power politics, and ethical conundra.... in the end it's a survival issue - the human animal is driven to survive, and to procreate - the latter (in some creatures) is overemphasised to the point that the former goal is suppressed (eg Mantis, some spiders, and so forth). It's kind of interesting where morality actually comes on the evolutionary scale - it's not a survival trait generally speaking, but it is probably a requirement that populations deliberately develop and apply ethical frameworks before they can progress. Humans obviously are a long way from having the 'survival v ethics' balance sorted. It strikes me that a major issue is that different groups of people are at different points on the scale - I think the west is generally disposed more towards the ethical, (although our political institutions don't always reflect this) - I cannot accept that any constitutional government advocating wholesale slaughter purely because "the other guy is different " is equally developed.

However, this is obviously one of those threads where a variety of positions are taken and vehemently defended, and nobody is persuaded to alter the opinions they arrived with, so hey ho... I'm off for a beer or three <g>

Dave

 

[charliechan]

hmm but what about Hamas and their key thoughts...

"Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it."

"The Islamic Resistance Movement believes that the land of Palestine is an Islamic Waqf consecrated for future Moslem generations until Judgement Day. It, or any part of it, should not be squandered: it, or any part of it, should not be given up. "

"There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors."

"After Palestine, the Zionists aspire to expand from the Nile to the Euphrates. When they will have digested the region they overtook, they will aspire to further expansion, and so on. Their plan is embodied in the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion", and their present conduct is the best proof of what we are saying."

Ami Isseroff

Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia fund them to the tune in excess of $100 million anually to maintain their interests so it could all get a bit tricky.

if my next door neighbour built a wall round my house, cut off my water supply, squashed my house with a tank, and beat my girlfriend up for being 'different', i imagine i would feel the same way about them.

the least i would do is report them to my local council or the fuzz for being 'noisy neighbours'. but what do i do when i find that my neighbours are the good friends of the fuzz and have too much sympathy from the overly pc local council because of their 'race' and their past? im screwed. id have to take things into my own hands.

i could either call trisha or jerry springer and haul them on tv, but my neighbours also happen to own the media stations.

theres only one thing for it.......


anyway, god works in mysterious ways - like putting all that american oil under iraqi desert!

 

[charliechan]

f**ck it.


i say we just nuke the whole of the middle east - israel, iran, iraq, saudi - the lot.

no middle east. no problem.

 

[Splitlink]

iran + china + n korea + maybe russia = good bye usa.

i dont think anyone has a clue as to how many bombs n korea has - or china for that matter.

Goodbye everybody, I should imagine. Probably that is what will happen, one day, it's just a question of delaying the inevitable as long as possible.

Split

 

[millsy500]

Lets not forget that our mad mullah iranian friend Mahmoud is readying the world for the return of the 12th imam. Who returns to save the world after Armageddon or should i say after the world has descended into chaos. Even Charlie Chan in all his wisdom can work out where this is going!

 

[trendie]

some incredibly good posts over past couple of days on this.

DaveJB pointed out that the west have preserved peace for a few decades,a nd west wouldnt use them.
However, this overlooks Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The point to be learned from this, is that going nuclear IS an option if the other side cannot retaliate in kind. So maybe knowing the other guy can inflict similar losses to you imposes clarity of mind.

I prefer charliechans option, lets get rid of all our nuclear weapons by dumping them ( with firing pins out ) into the middle east.
problem solved.

 

[kako]

apart from history issues, i agree with charliechan considering the right for arabs&iran to defend their homeland agaist a threatening attitude as israel has. politics has no regard to ppl's rights, and ppl are victims as always. we're victims of media's biased propaganda. i tell u, all of us iranian ppl do respect to all other cultures, ppl, religions, etc. politics was rotten and corropted part of our history and it is the same for our current life(all of the world's true peace seeking ppl). imho we have no way out of wicked politicians because of mind bombing media which been choosed to alter our minds rather than the facts which are happening.

what happening in middle east, is not truely broadcasted to u, neither to us(while liveing in it!). this is where we all cheated every day and day. newspapers, TV, radios, music bands, poets, books, college papers, internet news services, etc... i believe they're all dirty tools in hands of some mind washing machines named politicians.

pls don't get me wrong, i don't encourage terrorism, islamic fascism, torture, public executions, religious discrimination, etc. but i believe it's a countrie's ppls who should decide abt their destination. we know ahmadi nejad wasn't elected, he've been "selected" from several months ago, but it's the only way ppl will know if they don't pay attention to whom their allowing to be "selected", there could be war, sanctions, etc. as a result of that! please let our ppl experience for themselves, this is every countrie's right, right?

iran or any other country(except israel imo) won't take this label to start a atomic war. west knows this.

"Nothing is as it seems"

 

[WINDY MILLER]

A friend (Dr. Mopp) told me of an Iranian government idea to set the stage for a euro denominated oil bourse which would miff Nymex and Lpe? I think this came from V.HEADLINE.COM. This is a Venuzualan news service.

 

[Fulcanelli]

A friend (Dr. Mopp) told me of an Iranian government idea to set the stage for a euro denominated oil bourse which would miff Nymex and Lpe? I think this came from V.HEADLINE.COM. This is a Venuzualan news service.

Hmm...check out this:

http://www.turkishpress.com/news.asp?id=105626

 

[TWI]

Walker's World: Iran's really big weapon By MARTIN WALKER UPI Editor http://www.upi.com/InternationalIntelligence/view.php?StoryID=20060118-052333-1392r

If you want to see wht really goes on rather than CIANN or corporate media sponsor b/s watch this.
http://www.ripplescross.com/

We are all in the process of having the wool pulled over our eyes yet again.
We are all going to be dragged into this war whether we like it or not. I study closely many global news feeds and have numerous links which clearly point to what is coming.
Here are two clear messages
Russia confirms missile defence contract with Iran
Moscow: Amid the escalating crisis around Iran's nuclear programme, Russia said Thursday that it will still arm Tehran with missiles that can secure nuclear facilities from attacks.
http://www.newkerala.com/news2.php?action=fullnews&id=6679

Putin to Invite Hamas Leaders to Moscow
By Scott Wilson
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, February 9, 2006; 3:39 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/09/AR2006020901329.html

Putin is without doubt one of the smartest World leaders we have today. He is playing this very well and the recent War games with China and the Gas issues with Europe sent a clear message to the West.

 

[Fulcanelli]

and there's more..........

The brown stuff is soon to hit the fan methinks.

Syria switches to euro amid confrontation with US

Petrodollars and Nuclear Weapons Proliferation: Understanding the Planned Assault on Iran

 

[SOCRATES]

If you wish to upset the law that all crows are black....it is enough if you prove one single crow to be white.

What a marvellous quotation ~ it has a quality of hauntingly stark realism that stimulates me to admire the concept immensely.

The difficulty is....there are many instances in life in which the temptation to do so is curbed by self imposed prudent silence because the consequences far outweigh the benefits.

In parallel, these boards are remarkably like the capitalist system with all its percieved inequalties, one in fact could reason they are the quintessence of capitlaism in microcosm.

 

[TheBramble]

The difficulty is....there are many instances in life in which the temptation to do so is curbed by self imposed prudent silence because the consequences far outweigh the benefits.

To do what Bertie? The temptation to do what? To prove a single crow is white?

Are you hinting that you know something about Iran's intended use of warrior-crows: beaks hardened with depleted Uranium and each flock able to carry a 1MT war-head? Is that what you're saying?

Don't forget what happened when they started playing around with the intellectual abstraction of attempting to establish a theoretical basis for proving that not all swans are white - it led to the discovery of cygnus atratus by quite 'separate' means.

Be careful what it is you put you attention on unless you're really keen to have it occur.

 

[jimbo57]

Putin to Invite Hamas Leaders to Moscow
By Scott Wilson
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, February 9, 2006; 3:39 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/09/AR2006020901329.html

Putin is without doubt one of the smartest World leaders we have today. He is playing this very well and the recent War games with China and the Gas issues with Europe sent a clear message to the West.

I agree re Putin's smartness, but I think there is a subtely here, with the Hamas invitation, that is lost on the Washington Post, unsurprisingly.

Putin wants to be seen a s a man of calm and reason in the Middle East and he had his nose more than a little put out by the Iranians apparant discarding of his offer to talk on February 16th regarding uranium processing on Russian soil. The offer to Hamas to visit then appeared, and whilst Israel predictably complained that such an invitation was a "knife in the back", the French equally predictably called the move "sensible". Putin agin is seen as a man of reason, and the Iranians are forced into another U-turn and will now send a negotiating delegation to Moscow for talks next Monday.

Iran has a legal right to develop nuclear power for peaceful purposes as a signatory to the Non Proliferation Treaty. The fact they have vast oil reserves is irrelevant to this negotiation from a legal argument, but of course is everything to the US.
Thein lies the dilemma. But I doubt that we will have the wool pulled over our eyes as it was in 2002/03.

This one will run for many many months yet I suspect

 

[starspacer]

Quote:Originally Posted by charliechan: iran + china + n korea + maybe russia = good bye usa.i dont think anyone has a clue as to how many bombs n korea has - or china for that matter.

Goodbye everybody, I should imagine. Probably that is what will happen, one day, it's just a question of delaying the inevitable as long as possible.Split

What is needed is a new Age of Enlightenment à la Voltaire and Rousseau. Unlikely judging by the moral qualities of most people and therefore a new Dark Age appears inevitable.

 

[fxmarkets]

Written by LEAP/E2020
Saturday, 25 February 2006
March 20 to 26, 2006: Iran-USA, beginning of a major world crisis, or «the End of the Western World we have known since 1945».

The Laboratoire européen d’Anticipation Politique Europe 2020, LEAP/E2020, now estimates to over 80% the probability that the week of March 20-26, 2006 will be the beginning of the most significant political crisis the world has known since the Fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, together with an economic and financial crisis of a scope comparable with that of 1929. This last week of March 2006 will be the turning-point of a number of critical developments, resulting in an acceleration of all the factors leading to a major crisis, disregard any American or Israeli military intervention against Iran. In case such an intervention is conducted, the probability of a major crisis to start rises up to 100%, according to LEAP/E2020.


An Alarm based on 2 verifiable events
The announcement of this crisis results from the analysis of decisions taken by the two key-actors of the main on-going international crisis, i.e. the United States and Iran:



- on the one hand there is the Iranian decision of opening the first oil bourse priced in Euros on March 20th, 2006 in Teheran, available to all oil producers of the region ;


- on the other hand, there is the decision of the American Federal Reserve to stop publishing M3 figures (the most reliable indicator on the amount of dollars circulating in the world) from March 23, 2006 onward[1].


These two decisions constitute altogether the indicators, the causes and the consequences of the historical transition in progress between the order created after World War II and the new international equilibrium in gestation since the collapse of the USSR. Their magnitude as much as their simultaneity will catalyse all the tensions, weaknesses and imbalances accumulated since more than a decade throughout the international system.

full article, link below

http://www.newropeans-magazine.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3463&Itemid=85



We'll see, how will this impact on the dollar? is it up for a battering.... ? People talking of a flight to dollar, but hmmm, dont know.... something sneaky is afoot.....

 

[fxmarkets]

what happening in middle east, is not truely broadcasted to u, neither to us(while liveing in it!). this is where we all cheated every day and day. newspapers, TV, radios, music bands, poets, books, college papers, internet news services, etc... i believe they're all dirty tools in hands of some mind washing machines named politicians.

Kako, any info on Irans Oil bourse plans ?

Cheers

Fx.