Free Republic

Despite labeling Iran’s nuclear program as a “critical threat” to U.S. interests, a clear majority of Americans oppose a military strike against Tehran and support a policy of UN sanctions and diplomatic dialogue. The new annual poll published this week by the Chicago Council for Global Affairs on American attitudes towards foreign affairs – dubbed “Foreign Policy in the New Millennium” - found that 70% of Americans oppose a strike on Iran that is not authorized by the UN Security Council, and 51% are opposed even if the UN body does sanction the attack. In addition, 59% of Americans are...

Iran could hit U.S. bases in the Middle East in response to any Israeli strike on its nuclear facilities even if American forces played no role in the attack, the leader of Lebanon's Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah said on Monday. "A decision has been taken to respond and the response will be very great," Hezbollah Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said in an interview with the Beirut-based Al Mayadeen television. "The response will not be just inside the Israeli entity—American bases in the whole region could be Iranian targets," he said, citing information he said was from Iranian officials. "If Israel...

Washington reportedly sends Tehran indirect message saying it will not back Israeli strike on nuclear facilities as long as Iran refrains from attacking American facilities in Persian GulfThe United States has indirectly informed Iran, via two European nations, that it would not back an Israeli strike against the country's nuclear facilities, as long as Tehran refrains from attacking American interests in the Persian Gulf, Yedioth Ahronoth reported Monday. According to the report, Washington used covert back-channels in Europe to clarify that the US does not intend to back Israel in a strike that may spark a regional conflict.In return, Washington...

The Iranian nuclear program has hit with a severe case of heavy metal. Al Arabiya reports that technicians at two of Iran's secret nuclear facilities were startled in the middle of the night when their computer consoles started blaring AC/DC's classic metal hit "Thunderstruck" at full volume.

Israeli officials said in a report Wednesday that a mysterious explosion at an Iranian nuclear facility two days ago was no accident. The eyebrow-raising remarks surfaced in a Times of London story reporting that satellite images show smoke billowing from the uranium enrichment facility in the city of Isfahan. “There aren’t many coincidences,” retired Major-General Giora Eiland told Israel’s army radio, noting that it was the second attack on an Iranian nuclear site in a month. “When there are so many events, there is probably some sort of guiding hand, though perhaps it’s the hand of God,” said Eiland, who...

The large, deadly explosion at an Iran military base in Iran on Nov. 12, which Iranian authorities have called an accident that set back research work there by a few days, appears to have been far more devastating than their description suggested, according to an analysis of newly released commercial satellite images of the blast site. The images reveal vast destruction and chaotic disarray across a sprawling complex composed of more than a dozen buildings and large structures. The Institute for Science and International Security, a private group in Washington, made the satellite images public Monday, along with an analysis...

The Times reported on Wednesday that the mysterious explosion that rocked the city of Isfahan two days ago struck the uranium conversion facility located just outside Iran's third-largest city. According to the British newspaper, satellite images clearly show billowing smoke and destruction, despite Iran's claim that no such blast had taken place. The Times quoted Israeli intelligence officials as saying there was "no doubt" that the blast struck the nuclear facilities at Isfahan and that it was "no accident."

Another week, another explosion at or near an Iranian military installation (or is it a nuclear research facility?). As usual, the regime doesn’t know what to say. The mullahcracy is so intensely divided that different “spokesmen” from different ministries/news outlets/cults/mafias put out different versions. There was an explosion, or at least “the sound of an explosion.” This goes out on the wires. Then, no, there was no explosion, it was just the sound of our fierce military training. Then again, yes, there was something, but not to worry, just go home and shut up. And so it goes in the...

Source, target of Isfahan blast unclear; satellite image shows extensive damage to missile base blown-up Nov. 12. A mysterious explosion rocked the Iranian city of Isfahan on Monday, home to a key facility in Tehran’s nuclear program. The source and target of the explosion were unclear. Some reports claimed that it took place in a military base and others claimed it was a gas explosion. Isfahan hosts a nuclear facility involved in processing uranium which is fed to the Natanz fuel enrichment facility. Two weeks ago, on November 12, an explosion hit an Iranian military base near the town of...

Last week the International Atomic Energy Agency released its report on the Iranian nuclear program. The report exposed Iranians plans to militarize their nuclear program despite their claims that it was for energy production and medical use only. This claim isn’t far fetch. Because of Iran’s lack of crude oil refining capability approximately 30 percent of the petroleum products it needs must be imported. Sanctions If the United States and/or our Allies wish to demand that Iran answer for its nuclear program or face economic sanctions they will be thwarted in the U.N, by Russia and China. Iran will be...

More than seventeen years after a Clinton administration State Department spokesperson told USA Today that Iran’s nuclear program had none of the characteristics of a peaceful energy program and all of the hallmarks of a weapons program, the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has released a statement indicating that they are “increasingly concerned” about intelligence that shows that Iran is in fact working on nuclear weapons.

The United Nations nuclear watchdog released a report Saturday stating that Iran is pursuing the development of nuclear weapons, adding that the Islamic Republic has upgraded its nuclear facilities in order to defend them from possible cyber attacks. According to the report by the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iran has installed new and improved 2IR as well as 4IR centrifuges, which according to experts, will be immune to cyber attacks that were able to breach the older centrifuges. The centrifuges have allegedly been installed, the report states, in a fortified underground facility for uranium enrichment near the city of Qom.

A man shot dead on a Tehran street by motorcycle-riding gunmen last weekend was a scientist involved in suspected Iranian attempts to make nuclear weapons and not a student as officially claimed, a foreign government official and a former UN nuclear inspector said Thursday. The man was shot Saturday by a pair of gunmen firing from motorcycles in an attack similar to other recent assassinations of nuclear scientists that Iran blames on the United States and Israel. Iran's State-run media initially identified him as Darioush Rezaei, a physics professor and expert in neutron transport, but backtracked within hours, with officials...

Having experienced the Cuban Missile Crisis at the CIA, Langley, ion 1962, I have little enthusiasm for a repeat. But we may get one. A German newspaper is running a disturbing report: BERLIN – The Iranian government is moving forward with the construction of rocket launch bases in Venezuela, the German daily Die Welt wrote in its Friday edition. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is Teheran’s most important South American ally. Iran is building intermediate- range missile launch pads on the Paraguaná Peninsula, and engineers from a construction firm – Khatam al-Anbia – owned by the Revolutionary Guards visited Paraguaná in...

In his State of the Union speech, President Obama addressed one of the biggest threats to the free world in the 21st century in just one sentence: "Because of a diplomatic effort to insist that Iran meet its obligations, the Iranian government now faces tougher and tighter sanctions than ever before." However, the president failed to mention that his policies toward Iran, in the two years he's been in office have proven to have been a complete failure. .... We would do well to remember the words of President Reagan to the nation on the night of our bombing of...

A high-stakes international standoff over Iran's nuclear ambitions came no closer a resolution Saturday as the latest round of talks aimed at curtailing the controversial program ended in failure in Turkey. The two-day meeting in Istanbul between Iran and six world powers was in effect stalled from the very start, with Tehran insisting that it has the right to continue enriching uranium and demanding an end to United Nations sanctions. Ashton said any expectations that Iran would respond positively to the ideas Western diplomats brought to the table were crushed.

Iran's nuclear agency is trying to combat a complex computer worm that has affected industrial sites throughout the country and is capable of taking over power plants, Iranian media reports said. Experts from the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran met this week to discuss how to remove the malicious computer code, or worm, the semi-official ISNA news agency reported Friday. The computer worm, dubbed Stuxnet, can take over systems that control the inner workings of industrial plants. Experts in Germany discovered the worm in July, and it has since shown up in a number of attacks — primarily in Iran,...

A report has surfaced in the British press indicating that President Barack Obama is set to meet with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. (Increasingly, the British press is playing the role of watchdog when it comes to the Obama administration since US “journolists” have become essentially messengers for the regime.) In this case, as Obama promised in his presidential campaign, he is reportedly set to meet directly with the Iranian president. Readers may recall that during the campaign Obama spun this idea by claiming that he was “not afraid” to meet with Ahmadinejad. This is a foolish concept. Meeting with Ahmadinejad...

The odds of an Israeli military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities within the next year have risen to above 50 percent, according to a report in a leading U.S. magazine.

Back when the US first imposed sanctions on Iran and Libya barring US oil companies from giving corporate life support to the regime in Iran, Total established a business strategy to pursue business in those terrorist, rogue nations so they wouldn’t have to compete with US oil companies.