IRAN: NUCLEAR SUICIDE BOMBERS?

New York Post ^ | 3/11/03 | MICHAEL LEDEEN

[kattracks]

March 11, 2003 -- THE story of Iran's mad dash to develop nuclear weapons is finally attracting attention. The most recent alarm is in Time magazine, quoting various experts to the effect that Iran is far more advanced than previously believed.

[MigrantOkie]

The most important points:

"Why are we doing nothing to support the Iranian people's efforts to rid themselves of their monstrous regime? How can it be that Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage publicly claims that Iran is a "democracy"? Why are we making deals with Iranian-sponsored Shi'ites regarding the future government of Iraq?"

[EternalVigilance]

The Iranian regime is the most dangerous regime on earth.

IMO, Iraq is nothing more than a flanking maneuver.

That is, if our leadership is smart.

[wretchard]

Every road, once paved, becomes a two-street. When Islamic suicide bombers truck their deniable weapons into America, they should be on the lookout for a van headed the other way.

By any conservative reckoning, there should be upwards of a 100,000 Americans who are financially and technically capable of building a biological, chemical and even a nuclear weapon. As for the Israelis, the list of Jewish Nobel prizewinners would run to several typewritten pages: the Arabs for all their number have but three entries. There is no shortage of Jews who can effortlessly achieve what Bin Laden is painstakingly groping to accomplish.

A biological weapon released in Mecca by an unidentified private person would spread a vector of disease to every Islamic nation on earth. It would be regrettable, yet identifying the exact perpetrator would be difficult. Perhaps the United Nations can help identify the culprits; perhaps not. And it may be followed, in short order, by a second, third, fourth ...

An Islamic suicide bomb may be planted in New York, but it will detonate in every Muslim city, town and village. Count on it. If they start it, someone else will finish it.

[EternalVigilance]

Yeah, and it's alot easier for us to get over there, than it is for them to get over here.

After all, our civilization knows how to build airplanes. ;-)

[goldstategop]

After Iraq we will have to deal with the next member of the Axis Of Evil next door to it. Which also harbors Bin Laden's boys.

[Yaron]

Actually there are eight Arab winners of the nobel prize. However, using that as a measure is flawed. One of those winners is Yasser Arafat don't forget, so I don't think that it means anything. As a Jew of Israeli descent, I don't mind saying that we are undeservedly over represented in what is a rather occidentocentric award. It annoys me greatly that so few Indians have won the nobel, when the sheer volume of scientific reasearch and scientific endeavor far outstrips the rest of the world.

What I do find distastful is the fact you are going rather close to using it as vindication of some kind of racial theory.

[observer5]

"Former President (and actual strongman) Hashemi Rafsanjani gave a speech many months ago in which he said that the moment Iran obtained nuclear bombs, they would be used to destroy Israel. He added that even if Israel responded in kind, and wiped out Iran in its entirety, it would still be an enormous net gain for Islam: Nearly half the Jews in the world would be killed, but only a small percentage of the world's Muslims would die in a nuclear exchange."

[chilepepper]

Hogwash! You must have never met any Iranis. My roommate was Irani, and an Irani heart surgeon saved my father's life. The Irani middle class is sophisticated, highly cultured, and nearly western in their outlook.

They are starting to reassert themselves and will, IMHO, prevail. The radical Iranis support terrorism because its "the thing to do" if you are Moslem. When we wipe out Saddam, it will no longer be "the thing to do if you are Moslem". Just watch. The next six months are going to be really interesting...

[Free the USA]

http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/bump-list

[ought-six]

The Iranis, as you well know, are Persians, not Arabs. They do have a very well-educated and disciplined middle class. Iran could be a positive force in the region (and the world) if it throws off the yoke of the religious fanatics now running the country and rejoins the family of nations. From everything I've heard lately, the Iranis want to do just that. I jus hope hope they do it soon.

[wretchard]

"Actually there are eight Arab winners of the nobel prize. However, using that as a measure is flawed.

What I do find distastful is the fact you are going rather close to using it as vindication of some kind of racial theory. "

I stand corrected about the 8. If it is any comfort to you my own ethnicity does not benefit from any racial theory which I am supposed to be advancing.

However, I will plead guilty to suggesting that cultural values determine scientific success. Because the Jews were forced into a ghetto existence and denied access to regular schoolng in Europe, they developed a life of the mind in compensation.

Please don't confine your annoyance of the the lack of Nobel prizewinning to Indians. The Japanese and Chinese are in a similar case. Remember also that the Indians, the Japanese and Chinese achievements all followed the abandonment of their traditional scientific cultures. Similar results for the Arabs may also follow on the day the Saudis decide to let schoolgirls out of burning schools without their burkas.

Culture and outlook, not race, is the primary determinant of scientific achievement. I am acutely aware that both the Arabs and the Jews are a Semitic people. And if they have 8, rather than a hundred scientific Nobels, then we must look to culture for the differential. What I do find interesting is that you saw a racial theory in the inkblot instead of the obvious.