Into the Quagmire Important days ahead for Iran. (Iran to test Nuke in November)

Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei loudly proclaimed that the United States was entering an Iraqi quagmire (Vietnam metaphors are in great favor among the world's dwindling number of tyrants), but he and his regime seem rather deeper in the muck of late. It couldn't happen to a more worthy bunch, and it's especially gratifying to see Khamenei, Rafsanjani, and the other mullahcrats swinging in the wind, as world opinion turns against them.

It is particularly satisfying to see this crowd of old white men humiliated by intrepid women, one Shirin Ebadi — the unexpected recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, the other Zahra Kazemi, a Canadian journalist — murdered last summer in the infamous prisons of the Islamic Republic because she dared to photograph the regime's thugs beating up student demonstrators.

The Kazemi obscenity exposed the regime's basic characteristics, from its murderous attacks on those who try to tell the outside world the truth about the Islamic Republic, to its instant denial of any accusation or criticism, to its crafty routine of constantly-changing "explanations." As with earlier murders of its pro-democracy critics, the regime first denied that there was a murder at all ("she fell and bumped her head"), then admitted that something untoward had happened ("we are investigating"), then found someone to put on trial (most likely a convenient scapegoat). In the last two weeks, Iran has been sternly denounced by the European Union, and warned that if the mullahs' human-rights practices do not improve, the EU will invoke sanctions.

The Kazemi affair was very embarrassing to the Islamic Republic, and the Nobel award to Ms. Ebadi was a slap in Khamenei's face. Just when the democratic opposition was floundering — the result of savage beatings, thousands of arrests and torture, and near-total abandonment by the feckless leaders of the West — the Norwegian committee sent a message of hope and inspiration: Do not despair, we are with you. All of a sudden, the Iranians see again that there are people in the West who understand their plight, and support their struggle. Ms. Ebadi is no mere symbol of resistance to tyranny; she is the real deal, having survived nine months in the horrific Evin prison in Tehran, and 25 years of isolation and oppression from the regime (she was a judge under the Shah, fired by Khomenei after the revolution of 1979, denied the right to practice law, and forced to scratch for a living as a school instructor). There will be monster celebrations when Ms. Ebadi returns with her medal later this year, and the regime will be hardpressed to justify further repression. She will be a dagger aimed at the regime's heart, and the mullahs will feel the first pricks of the dagger's point right away, as she has agreed to represent the Kazemi family in legal action against the regime.

Meanwhile, back in Foggy Bottom, the State Department continues to try to arrange some kind of modus vivendi with the mullahs. The latest back-channel negotiations have revolved around Iran's nuclear program, both because there is serious concern in Washington and because it would be very difficult for Secretary Powell to sell the American people on a rapprochement with Iran if Tehran were known to have developed nuclear weapons (remember that Rafsanjani declared, in December, 2001, that if Iran had an atomic bomb it would be used against Israel). So, in addition to the formal talks between the International Atomic Energy Agency and the mullahs, the State Department dispatched a former Middle East correspondent of a leading American newspaper to talk to the Iranians. Today he will report near-total failure. The Iranians bluntly told him that the uranium-enrichment program will continue, that the United States is surrounded by enemies in Iraq, and if Washington increases the pressure on Iran there will be terrible consequences.

Some of this is bluster, but for the most part it is an honest statement of Iran's intentions. As reported here some weeks ago, the Iranians believe they now have all the necessary components for a nuclear bomb. The only question is how long it will take them to assemble and test it. Khamenei had hoped to be able to test an atomic bomb by the third week in October, but his scientific advisers recently told him they could not make that deadline. They are now aiming for November 4 or 5, the anniversary of the seizure of the American embassy in Tehran during the revolution.

There is another November date our leaders should take seriously: the 25th, the anniversary of the disappearance of the twelfth imam, and thus the most significant date in the Shiite calendar. Reports from Tehran suggest that the mullahs would like to celebrate that anniversary with a big-time terrorist attack against America.

2 posted on 10/14/2003 7:25:14 AM PDT by Pan_Yans Wife (You may forget the one with whom you have laughed, but never the one with whom you have wept.)

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"If they lob that thing at anyone it will be Isreal--The test will be there and the Iranians will blame someone else."

That will be a pretty good trick being able to "lob" and being able to deny it. It's hard to conceive a missile from Iran to Isreal not being detected from satellite surveillance and our anti-missile radar units for our Patriot-3 units and Isreali Arrow units in the neighborhood.

An attack by aircraft not being detected isn't likely.

Smuggling a crude nuclear bomb, which probably weighs at least hundreds of pounds if not a ton, over land or sea and evading the IDF, would be the only way to deny it.

6 posted on 10/14/2003 10:02:46 PM PDT by neverdem (Say a prayer for New York both for it's lefty statism and the probability the city will be hit again)

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