In Iran, Arming for Armageddon

Real Clear Politics ^ | December 16, 2005 | Charles Krauthammer

[kellynla]

WASHINGTON -- Lest you get carried away with today's good news from Iraq, consider what's happening next door in Iran. The wild pronouncements of the new Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have gotten sporadic press ever since he called for Israel to be wiped off the map. He subsequently amended himself to say that Israel should simply be extirpated from the Middle East map and moved to some German or Austrian province. Perhaps near the site of an old extermination camp?

Except that there were no such camps, indeed no Holocaust at all, says Ahmadinejad. Nothing but ``myth,'' a ``legend'' that was ``fabricated ... under the name `Massacre of the Jews.'''

This brought the usual reaction from European and American officials, who, with Churchillian rage and power, called these statements unacceptable. That something serious may accrue to Iran for this -- say, expulsion from the U.N. for violating its most basic principle by advocating the outright eradication of a member state -- is, of course, out of the question.

To be sure, Holocaust denial and calls for Israel's destruction are commonplace in the Middle East. They can be seen every day on Hezbollah TV, in Syrian media, in Egyptian editorials appearing in semiofficial newspapers. But none of these aspiring mass murderers are on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons that could do in one afternoon what it took Hitler six years to do -- destroy an entire Jewish civilization and extinguish 6 million souls.

[kellynla]

"Negotiations to deny this certifiable lunatic genocidal weapons have been going nowhere. Everyone knows they will go nowhere. And no one will do anything about it."

[johnny7]

“And no one will do anything about it."

That remains to be seen.

[.cnI redruM]

This man will ultimately be on the wrong end of regime change. He will do something so evil and so incomprehensible, that it can no longer be swept under the rug.

Like with Hitler's invasion of Poland, he'll do something that can't be wished away or ignored. Then, with a bevy of hypocrites in false dudgeon, the UN will act to take this man down.

[loreldan]

So a Holocaust-denying, virulently anti-Semitic, aspiring genocidist, on the verge of acquiring weapons of the apocalypse, believes that the end is not only near but nearer than the next American presidential election. (Pity the Democrats. They cannot catch a break.) This kind of man would have, to put it gently, less inhibition about starting Armageddon than a normal person. Indeed, with millennial bliss pending, he would have positive incentive to, as they say in Jewish eschatology, hasten the end.

Scary. Something tells me that we are nearer to the beginning of the War on Terror than the end.

[Rummyfan]

Well, to quote Churchill, we are not at the end, nor even the beginning of the end, but we are at the end of the beginning.

[TexasCajun]

Waiting on someone to ask the dim leaders if they think Israel is in eminent danger from Iran following the threats by it's islamoterrorist leader!

[Rummyfan]

Iran's the elephant in the room that everyone is ignoring. I'm sure plans are being made behind the scenes in Israel though. They cannot abide such a threatening madman and must take his statements at face value.

[GregoTX]

kellynla :"And no one will do anything about it."

"That remains to be seen."

I dunno. Look at all the big ta-doo because of the "preemptive" strike on Iraq. I fear there are those that will not allow us to use force against Iran until it is to late. I can see Israel acting first before us. Either way, I can see Iran and their Russin buddies pulling everyone in the world into a bloody mess. If something is done now we may be able to avoid that, but the lobger we wait, the worse it will be.

[redgolum]

Like with Hitler's invasion of Poland, he'll do something that can't be wished away or ignored.

Now a days, I suspect that would have to be a nuclear strike on Europe. Anything else and the UN will blame it on the Jews and the US.

[areafiftyone]

Like with Hitler's invasion of Poland, he'll do something that can't be wished away or ignored. Then, with a bevy of hypocrites in false dudgeon, the UN will act to take this man down. I think you are absolutely correct. And the UN will act AFTER THE FACT!

[johnny7]

That's one of my many, Churchill favorites. I believe he said this right after Dunkerque.

[RexBeach]

Right you are, Kelly!

The French(my God, the French!) could have kicked the Nazis out the Rhineland without a lot of trouble. A few years later, Hitler was touring a conquered Paris.

I hope we have the resolve to take care of Iran soon. Otherwise, they might turn the whole middle east into a piece of glass.

[.cnI redruM]

Well yes, it will be after the fact for the victims. We'll do what we always did before 9-11. We'll say an agnostic, nondenominational, prayer that someone else's people get the ax.

[theFIRMbss]

>To be sure, Holocaust denial and calls for Israel's destruction are commonplace in the Middle East

A German Holocaust denier who has regularly lavished praise on Adolf Hitler has gone on trial in Germany

---------------------------------------------------------------------
In many places,
it is a crime to say things
this Iran nut said.

The Europeans
should get some special forces
to kidnap the guy

and chief advisers
out of Iran, do a trial,
and then let them rot

in a jail somewhere
in Europe with soccer fans
and other skin heads . . .

[areafiftyone]

That guy scares me more than Kim Jong Il. Kim Jong Il is all talk and no action - he is soooo ronely! LOL But this guy is just plain evil.

[CaptRon]

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

I think we should all ask ourselves, "What would John Kerry do?".

[ZeitgeistSurfer]

I expect a regional nuclear war before the end of 2008.

[TheDon]

Agreed. It is pathetic that the world refuses to act and will once again force Israel's hand.

[Rummyfan]

I don't know, but I'm sure he 'has a plan' (imitating Kerry's drone here)!

He's probably also met with other world leaders in the cafes of NYC to solicit their advice!

[Paulus Invictus]

But wait, but wait! Won't the enormous power of the Security Council at the formidable UN come forward and mount an immediate, international preemptive military attack on Iran? Isn't that what the UN is all about? Gosh, the UN Charter says what to do when international peace and security are threatened, therefore the UN might be constrained to "take collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace, and for the suppression of acts of aggression." Will they do their job? Are you kidding, Paulus? The only time they move is when the US does and most of the time we are condemned for acting "without their approval" as in the case of Iraq.

Out of the UN and the UN out of the US!