Posted on 01/15/2006 10:04:04 AM PST by weef
Was Mecca moved to Iran?
Before you make predictions about how America would react to a nuking, consider what happened after pearl harbor. Then contemplate Hamburg, Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki.
Probably, some Senator would get up and say "Arabia Delenda Est".
Good article but it failed to identify how this will be President Bush's fault.
Yes but fight who, from all reports most of the opposition is coming from young men unemployed who are fed up with the present system and want changes.
It is easy to harness the energy of youth if you sell your self as something new and fresh.
The Iranian revolution is old seen as decaying. It has not provided the paradise it promised, like Communism it can only maintain power through the use of force.
Many of Iraninas best and brightest are fleeing the country
I like what if scenarios as much as the next man, but lets not weight the dice to prove a point.
What is not factual is if Iran launched a nuclear weapon at Israel, Iran would be utterly destroyed by Israel. There would be no 'side' for China to join. Would Iraqi Shia storm US bases in Iran if a wider Iranian-Israeli nuclear war broke out? Unknown. I would be curious to read a wider description of what would happen in such a war. A '2007-2011' implies a far reaching Middle Eastern War. Who would be fighting a nuclear waq for 4 years?
Israel can be flown over by strike aircraft border to border in 4 minutes.
Israel cannot sacrifice territory nor can they afford to lose a war.
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/israel/doctrine/
The creation of the State of Israel in 1948 was preceded by more than 50 years of efforts by Zionist leaders to establish a sovereign nation as a homeland for Jews. The desire of Jews to return to what they consider their rightful homeland was first expressed during the Babylonian exile and became a universal Jewish theme after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 A.D. and the dispersal that followed. After the end of World War II, and the near-extermination of European Jewry by the Nazis, international support for Jews seeking to settle in Palestine overcame British efforts to restrict immigration, and laid the foundation for establishing a Jewish state. On 14 May 1948 the State of Israel was proclaimed. The following day, armies from neighboring Arab nations entered the former Mandate of Palestine to engage Israeli military forces.
The State of Israel has always had a single defense goal - to ensure the existence of Israel and the security of its citizens. Israel is tiny (smaller than New Jersey) when compared to its Arab neighbors. More pointedly, it lacks strategic depth. A hostile fighter could fly across all of Israel (40 nautical miles wide from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea) within four minutes, while traveling at "only" subsonic speed. Israel is unable to field a large standing force compared with those it faces and must rely on its reserves. Israel's small population also increases its sensitivity to civilian and military losses. To make up for quantitative disadvantages, Israel maintains as large a qualitative lead as possible. The IDF makes up for its lack of size by superior maneuverability and firepower, and by relying on intelligence.
Israeli national security strategy is founded on the premise that Israel cannot afford to lose a single war. Because the best way to avoid losing a war is to not fight it in the first place, Israeli strategy begins with the maintenance of a credible deterrent posture, which includes the willingness to carry out preemptive strikes. Should deterrence fail, Israel would seek to prevent escalation, and determine the outcome of war quickly and decisively. Since it lacks strategic depth, Israel must prevent the enemy from entering its territory, and must try to quickly transfer the battle to enemy territory.
Israel applies its nuclear weapons to all levels of this formula. The total Israeli nuclear stockpile consists of several hundred weapons of various types, including boosted fission and enhanced radiation weapons ("neutron bombs"), as well as nuclear artillery shells. Strategically, Israel uses its long-range missiles and nuclear-capable aircraft (and, some say, submarines with nuclear-armed cruise missiles) to deter both conventional and unconventional attacks, or to launch "the Samson Option", an all-out attack against an adversary should defenses fail and population centers be threatened. In addition, despite Israel's insistence that it "will not be the first to introduce nuclear weapons into the Middle East," these systems represent an effective preemptive strike force. At the same time, Israel deploys tactical systems designed to rapidly reduce an invading force. Following the 1973 war, Israel fielded at least three batteries of atomic-capable self-propelled 175mm cannons equipped with a total of no less than 108 warheads, and placed atomic land mines in the Golan Heights during the early 1980s.
Nuclear weapons need not be detonated to be used as weapons. Early in the 1973 war, Israel went on a nuclear alert, partly in the knowledge that it would be detected by the United States and the Soviet Union. The Soviets, Israel assumed, would restrain their Arab allies while the Americans would speed up resupply efforts. While the USSR did inform Egypt that Israel had armed three nuclear weapons, the extent to which Israel's nuclear alert affected the timing of Washington's subsequent decision to rearm Israel is not clear.
Israel does not have an overt nuclear doctrine beyond its insistence that it will not introduce nuclear weapons into the region. Instead, it follows a policy of what Avner Cohen calls "nuclear opacity" - visibly possessing nuclear weapons while denying their existence. This has allowed Israel to enjoy the benefits of being a nuclear weapons state in terms of deterrence without having to suffer the international repercussions of acknowledging their arsenal. Israel also has a strong commitment to preventing its potential adversaries in the region from becoming declared nuclear weapon states, as evidenced by Israel's 1981 raid on Iraq's Osirak nuclear installation.
Given the very long range of the Jericho-2 missile, some analysts have speculated that this system was developed to deter Soviet intervention in the region. The USSR has always been one of the primary targets of Israel's nuclear force, as Israeli assumptions hold that no Arab nation would attack Israel without Soviet support. The purchase of fifty F-4 fighters from the US in 1968 provided Israel with a platform capable of delivering a nuclear payload as far as Moscow, and it has actively pursued imagery and other information necessary for targeting weapons against the USSR. In 1979, the US agreed to provide Israel with access to high-resolution images of its neighbors taken by the KH-11 satellite. Israel was able to use this agreement to view targets of interest in western Russia (as well as to obtain targeting information for the attack on the Osirak reactor). Israel received more such data during the mid-1980s through the espionage activities of Jonathan Pollard.
Although commonly viewed as the ultimate guarantor of its security, the nuclear option has not led Israel to be complacent about national security. On the contrary, it has impelled Israel to seek unquestioned superiority in conventional capability over the Arab armies to forestall use of nuclear weapons as a last resort - as early as 1962-63, prime minister David Ben-Gurion eschewed restructuring the IDF to base it on nuclear weapons. Instead, IDF doctrine and tactics stress quality of weapons versus quantity; integration of the combined firepower of the three branches of the armed forces; effective battlefield command, communications, and real-time intelligence; use of precision-guided munitions and stand-off firepower; and high mobility.
As of 2000, Israel had not acceded to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (1968). It was, however, a party to the Treaty Banning Nuclear Weapons Tests in the Atmosphere, in Outer Space, and Under Water (1963).
I am a investment manager and recently sent this to my clients and friends:
Dear Friends
I will keep this short. The matter I present is of far greater consequence and complexity than this short letter conveys. I don't mean to be alarmist, but I can't reconcile to be silent.
For years the United States has been embroiled in affairs in the middle east. Our recent invasion of Iraq raised many questions. I have always believed, that despite the administration being cryptic on the entirety of it's timing of the invasion, that there was a larger reason than what we were ever explicitly given. It has been my belief since the early 1990s, when I was a student studying foreign affairs, that Iran and Syria were potential global trouble spots in the world on par with any threat of the twentieth century. I believe more than ever that to be true. I believe one of the central reasons for the timing of the Iraq invasion- which was probably ethically supportable for fifteen years- was to potentially deal with Iran.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's statements to the world regarding Israel, the Holocaust, his disdain of Europe and America, and nuclear ambitions have me more than concerned. I believe this man is the most dangerous political leader on the planet. I acknowledge that he may very well be in power due to American and European political missteps and lack of foresight (It should be noted however that the mullah's of Iran, who largely run the country with an iron fist, only allow certain people to vote.) That no longer matters, except in regards to how we approach the fix to this problem now- which must be with an overt sensitivity to the Iranian people. A strong response is now needed to counteract this man and his followers- many who are terrorist in my opinion and many others who simply know no other way than militant Islam.
There is a large portion- a majority by most accounts- of the Iranian population who support a more open and secular democracy, and would like to become a peaceful and responsible member of the world community. These people have been held down for decades by force and convention. I believe it is vitally important that the world community reach out to these people immediately- BEFORE IRAN BECOMES A NUCLEAR MILITARY POWER. Failing to do so, with as much support as necessary- to the point of supporting a revolution at every level- will likely lead to acts of terrorism at home and war of a very significant scale.
I don't suppose to know how to take action on this matter. I do believe that fostering democracy in the middle east must include an even larger effort by the international community. A broader conciliation with the international community seems to be necessary and right at this point to support this effort. My call to action here is to contact our elected representatives and voice our support for immediate diplomatic, political and economic action to support the democratic movement in Iran. Only strong action and extremely firm negotiation- not what the U.N. has done to date- is likely to avert war. The world needs to know that America is not apathetic on this matter and willing to lead. American leaders must make clear that is in the entire planet's best interest to address this issue, not just for our friends to address. This must be an out front argument that does not bow to electoral pressures and opinion polls.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060105/ts_nm/nuclear_iran_ahmadinejad_dc
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060105/ts_nm/nuclear_iran_dc
http://www.kentimmerman.com/
"A public opinion poll is no substitute for thought." Warren Buffett
"Peace has to be created, in order to be maintained. It is the product of Faith, Strength, Energy, Will, Sympathy, Justice, Imagination, and the triumph of principle. It will never be achieved by passivity and quietism." Dorothy Thompson
"There is nothing so likely to produce peace as to be well prepared to meet the enemy. " George Washington
Sincerely,
Kirk
You've been here since Halloween '01 and held off posting this long?
How?
The Democrats like power. If they did not fight they would be committing political suicide. Political power is their first goal and driving force. Therefore, they would also do the same thing. They would launch a nuclear strike.
from a year ago.
Anti-Euroweenie Sarcasm TorpedoTM ARMED. FIRE!!
Piker! A lot of folks would pay for a chance to fire the guns.
Cheers!
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