Posted on 01/23/2006 8:23:53 AM PST by robowombat
"Could we do it?" one administration official who was deeply involved in planning the Iraq invasion said recently. "Sure. Could we manage the aftermath? I doubt it."
Similar fears, he said, gave President Bill Clinton pause about launching a strike on North Korea in 1994. Later that year he reached an accord for a freeze on the North's nuclear production facilities. But in 2003 everything unfroze, and now the North, by C.I.A. estimates, has enough fuel for at least half a dozen bombs.
The Iranians took careful notes then, and here in Washington today the Korean experience underlies diplomacy-versus-force arguments that rarely take place on the record.
The problem is not that Washington lacks targets. Many of Iran's nuclear facilities, or at least those that American intelligence agencies know about, are in plain view or in underground sites whose construction was recorded by spy satellites. The problem is the global consequences of an attack to cripple them.
"The irony is that this is the opposite of Iraq," said John J. Hamre, a deputy defense secretary from 1997 to 1999. "We know a lot about what they have because the international inspectors have been there." Those inspection reports have helped Pentagon planners who, in imagining every contingency, have already mapped out Iran's most vulnerable facilities.
"Elimination of the nuclear program is not possible, but with the right strikes you could decisively set them back," said Ashton B. Carter, an expert at Harvard on proliferation problems.
(Excerpt) Read more at 2006 ...
Let's Stike it to them!
Stike 'em with Shrikes.
I say three stikes and they're out!
More from article:
But if Iran knows the United States and its allies ultimately have no stomach to put military muscle behind their demands, what is its incentive to give up its weapons program? Efforts by the Europeans and Russia to come up with formulas that would provide Iran with nuclear material that cannot be used for weapons have been rejected, at least so far. And no one wants to threaten truly tough sanctions, for fear that by hurting ordinary Iranians they will only drive moderates into the camp of their leaders. Those leaders have been threatening retaliation, even to measures as weak as a letter of warning from the United Nations Security Council.
They have threatened to cut off oil exports and send the markets into a panic, though most experts said an embargo is not something Iran could execute for very long without damaging its own economy. Iran could also step up interference in Iraq and dispatch Hezbollah on terror missions. In addition, the Iranians often boast that their missiles can reach Israel.
Some of those threats may be inflated. And for now, at least, Iran's centrifuge program appears to have hit some technical hitches. I.A.E.A. inspectors are still in Iran, and the Iranians have not yet dared throw them out, as the North Koreans did three years ago. A senior European diplomat involved in the talks with Iran dismissed most of the country's threats last week as "bluster meant to buy them some time, and keep us paralyzed."
But, he added, "it may work."
Several American officials, when promised anonymity, said they thought that in 5 or 10 years, Iran will most likely have a weapon.
"They have read us pretty well," Mr. Hamre said. "They have skated right at the edge of controlled pugnaciousness."
The debate among the West, Russia and China is whether, together, they are willing to skate to the same edge in hopes that, in a repeat of the cold war, the other side blinks first.
Four balls and they walk......
That's because it's hard to run with four balls...
BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZT!
Correction: But in 2003 everything unfroze we realized that NK NEVER lived up to the agreement in the first place!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This article doesn't seem to sort out that with NK, THEY played us and WE blew it. Iran doesn't have NK's military and the lesson of NK is to NOT let them keep working on nukes. According to liberals nothing effective can ever be done. I submit to the contrary that of course Iran can be defeated.
The U.S. really didn't "blow it" with North Korea. The U.S. treated the North Koreans with kid gloves in 1994 because that's what the South Koreans wanted us to do. It's easy for us to sit here in the U.S. and pontificate about what should or should not have been done on the Korean Peninsula 12 years ago, but you tend to have a much different perspective on things when your capital city is located 25 miles from a de-militarized zone that marks your border with a country that has been your enemy for the last 55 years.
"Similar fears, he said, gave President Bill Clinton pause about launching a strike on North Korea in 1994."
Ah, yes -- the wisdom of the gallant and brave warrior...
Gag, barf, retch....
Another NYT lie. Clinton didn't strike North Korea because he was getting campaign money from them. Traitor.
The goal was to prevent a nuclear North. We signed a treaty to that effect and we got snookered. South Korea does not dictate American foreign policy. In that case, Bill Clinton did.
I stopped reading right there. This is a major distortion of the truth. NK's nuclear weapons program was never actually frozen. They kept right on going and never lived up to their agreement with us, so the "accord" couldn't possibly have unfrozen in 2003. Who is Sanger trying to fool here? He's not fooling us. The distortions and flagrant bias of the NY Times never cease to amaze me. Then they try to claim they are serious journalists.
Another amazing thing I just noticed is that the first time the NY Times refers to President Bush, they usually refer to him as "Mr. Bush." But of course with Clinton they use the correct standard and they refer to him as "President Clinton." The kids working at the NY Times these days are just a bunch of amateurs and political hacks.
I believe the use of the term "President Clinton" instead of former President Clinton is OK here because the sentence is in the past tense about an event in 1994.
In the case of North Korea, it sure does. North Korea's relationship with South Korea is the only thing that matters to us in that region, especially when you consider that North Korea has almost no capability of projecting military force any further than the 25 miles that separates the DMZ from Seoul.
Nah. Let Israel do it. It'll take us 5 years to complete it and they can kick butt in 48 hours and go home.
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