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US 'Silent on Israeli Nuclear Arms'
Israel has missiles that could be converted to carry nuclear payloads [GALLO/GETTY] Barack
Obama, the US president, has agreed to abide by a 40-year policy of
allowing Israel to keep nuclear weapons without opening them to
international inspection, according to a US newspaper.
In a report on Saturday, The Washington Times quoted three unnamed sources as saying Obama had confirmed to Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister, that he would maintain the "don't ask, don't tell" policy.
The incident reportedly occurred when the two met at the White House in Washington DC in May.
Neither Israel's embassy in Washington, nor the White House National Security Council would comment on the claim.
Avner Cohen, an Israeli expert and author, was quoted by the paper as saying that under the deal "the United States passively [accepts] Israel's nuclear weapons status as long as Israel does not unveil publicly its capability or test a weapon".
There is no official accounting of the deal, supposedly agreed in 1969 between Richard Nixon, then US president, and Golda Meir, the Israeli prime minister at the time.
'Strategic understandings'
In an interview last week with Israel's Channel 2 media company, Netanyahu spoke of his confidence that Obama's recent remarks on a world free of nuclear weapons would not apply to Israel.
"It was utterly clear from the context of the speech that he was speaking about North Korea and Iran," the Israeli leader said.
"But I want to remind you that in my first meeting with President Obama in Washington I received from him ... an itemised list of the strategic understandings that have existed for many years between Israel and the United States on that issue.
"It was not for naught that I requested, and it was not for naught that I received [that document]."
Although there is no formal record of the understanding - nor have Israeli nor American governments ever publicly acknowledged it - some documents hint at an agreement between the two nations.
In 2007, the Nixon library declassified a July 19, 1969, memo from Henry Kissinger, then national security adviser, that comes closest to articulating US policy on the issue.
That memo says "while we might ideally like to halt actual Israeli possession, what we really want at a minimum may be just to keep Israeli possession from becoming an established international fact".
- Posted in
73 Comments so far
Show AllWell, it's not like Israel has used them...
(whispers quietly, yet...)
Rahm wouldn't have it any other way.
And herein lies the crux of the entire matter. Even India and Pakistan got widely condemned with sanctions slapped for their tests in 1998 (now repealed of course in favor of nuclear industry exports).
But Israel? It can do anything and the Western powers will excuse or help cover-up its dirty deeds. The shameless rejection of the Goldstone report at the same time as warmongering over Iran reveals the inverted morality at play here.
I have asked my miserable, lying, wealthy, government pro-israhell politicians if there is any risk, or chance, of Israel’s undeclared, unaccountable nuclear WMD`s falling into "terrorists hands". Remember this is the same israhell that attacked the USS Liberty and has been responsible for dragging the US into unnecessary conflicts in the ME amoung other barbaric activities. Why in the hell would anyone trust israhell?
For common sense and the safety of the entire world Israhell should open its nuclear sites to international inspections. But they refused again citing "anti-Semitism". Assholes.
So keep up the boycott of israhell products and companies that sponser illegal settlements, like Starbucks.
Dead GI--Exactly. Israel's undeclared, unaccountable nuclear weapons are ALREADY in terrorists' hands. Israel is second only to the U.S. in being a rogue, terrorist nation.
'dead GI'
Israels 'nucs' already are in the hands of 'terrorists'--they are called 'Zionists' and they receive more support from the USA than any other terrorists organization any where. Well over 20 billion annually; so boycotts should start at the 'top'---since nickles and dimes make the 'Jews laugh'
And yes, you can expect them to use them. They have shown that they do not even respect their 'big daddy money bags'(the USA)---and the USS Liberty attack was just a 'smirk on their face' with a 'nudge and a grin' to go with it. They have no honor or integrity nor the trust of others--just like the USA---only smaller.
Only 'time ' will tell.
And the 'clock ticks even while we sleep'.
The only consolation the innocent of the future may have is that the USA and their Israeli 'pets' will have become extinct; and even though terrible memories, they will eventually be distant ones doomed to oblivion and never to be repeated.
Bring America Back !!!!
****Of course Uncle Sammy is 'silent' about Zionist Nukes,
where in the world do you think they got them from in the
first place ????
*Does not this give the clueless, a good size clue as to why Big Brother USA allows Little Sister Zion to call the shots around the globe, and all over the Middle East ????
WAKE UP AMERICA !!!!
I'm sure glad some of the posts in here remember the USS Liberty, but now those memories need to include a more recent day of Infamy====Sept 11, 2001. Proven Israeli
Mossad Agents captured dancing, laughing, celebrating
concert-style on the NJ side of the HUdson River, taking
pictures of a burning, smoldering NYC Twin Towers--then
3000 innocent humans perishing in the demolition of those buildings.
This claim requires a supporting link or reference.
How lazy can you be? It took me a few seconds to search "9-11 Mossad Agents dancing" and the first 2 hits were:
http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/fiveisraelis.html
http://www.erichufschmid.net/TFC/Bollyn-dancing-Israelis.html
Of course there were many more.
Lazy - shmazy.
It's up to the person making the claim to support it. That's why books and serious articles have pages and pages of bibliography and footnotes. Not because the reader is lazy but because that's the task of the writer. The question is always:"How do you know?"
And a claim that incendiary ought to be buttressed by sources.
But thank you for doing his work for him. I shall have a look at the sources you provided.
"And a claim that incendiary ought to be buttressed by sources." –redbaloon.
The case is not being made that Israel had a direct hand in 9-11, only that the continuance of its racist and genocidal policies of state terror benefited politically from it. I don't think that is debatable. Having said that, discounting a role in the darker conspiracy itself, is not in the realm of the totally implausible.
Certainly if it were "incendiary" then a bibliographic reference citation would be mandated; this would be true even in a casual public opinion format like a blog, which does not require the formal exegetic standards of a graduate thesis on Zionist terror.
Now, after the Gaza massacre, which has only added emphatic punctuation to what has always been highly plausible, only fools would not take it at face value as a simple statement of fact. Actually, all things considered, the truth itself is probably far worse than even a thousand laughing Mossad agents.
Israel is the very sine qua non of statist terror. Certainly its agents recognize even ad hoc terror when they see it from long having been all too familiar with its practices.
–(Jill Bains)
Maybe I'm slicing it finer than it warrants, but "not in the realm of the totally implausible" is still not proof or evidence. I get a little tired of people screaming "conspiracy" at every turn. Call it conspiracy fatigue.
The story of the laughing Mossad agents - are they proven to be Mossad? I really don't know and can't tell from the reports; it sounded like an assumption - is so outrageous, I am within rights to ask for some evidence. Of course, why I should be shocked anymore by anything Israel does is a puzzle.
I also suspect, as you do, that the "truth itself is probably far worse than even a thousand laughing Mossad agents".
Of course your concerns and calls for "proof' and "evidence" are well taken as are your grounds in claiming "conspiracy fatigue."
The unsubstantiated assertion could very well be a smear on Israeli agents as WHERE indeed, is the corroborating documentation?
My point being (and I cannot argue with yours) is that the very notions of 'proof' and 'evidence' have become vague and amorphous, almost spectral, fractured figurations, subsumed in suspicion and propaganda. This total 'deconstruction' of truth is indeed the ideology of modern high capitalism and Neo fascism both, mediated only by who has the ultimate power to make the claims and impose them.
Perhaps– in agreement with you– the human project aims at the 'truth' as a universal dictum, not one derived from a free floating hyper subjectivity or statist propaganda. Unfortunately 'proof' is now so elusive and suspect a concept, that it has become a luxury.
Only abject examples of what cannot be assailed– such as the Gaza massacre in its full horror– resist the annulment of the truth and make 'evidence' and 'proof' unecessary.
–(Jill Bains)
Thank you for articulating a feeling I've been having more and more often. In this age where it's so hard to see the truth, I sometimes have to wonder whether ignorance really is bliss...
What the Israelis are expert at is muddying the waters. The waters around 9/11 are very muddy indeed.
If there's a connection between Mossad and the assault on the WTF, it needs to be examined, free of a zillion half-baked conspiracy theories. I wouldn't rule it out, judging by Israel's history of betrayals and special-case claims, but that's not proof. No one is clean in the 9/11 incident, I'm sure, but the conspiracists don't help: the Kennedy assassination investigation is still not resolved to satisfy everyone.
It's all well and good to scorn "a zillion half-baked conspiracy theories".
There's a gauntlet of conspiracy-scorning extant, and the Scorners typically let us know that, first and foremost, they are Serious, Sober, Sensible, Practical thinkers. They often carry an Occam's Razor as long as their arm to menace opponents.
But in our present devolved political culture of malfeasance, corruption, and mendacity, state security and domestic law enforcement agencies do not conduct reliable investigations into heinous crimes, from events of terrifying mass violence to assassinations.
No, I won't stop to Google the links, but there was a report just this past week that video tape of the Murrah Building explosion in Oklahoma City-- the one supposedly blown up by Lone Nut Timothy McVeigh with a little help from his Lone Nut friends-- has mysterious gaps just before the blast. There's no official explanation for this; the FBI denies that the tapes were edited.
Just a little technical snafu of some kind-- dare I label it a "Murrah Mixup"?
I mention this only because it's the latest in a continuing series of inexplicable glitches or lapses in official actions and information relating to alleged terrorism or external threat.
If duly established official institutions have become derelict, and either complacent, corrupt, or complicit in extra-legal criminal and clandestine conduct, the ordinary citizen is unable to trust official authority and investigations-- or the lack thereof.
In this vacuum created by the absence or abdication of generally trustworthy, reliable government and law enforcement, naturally "a zillion half-baked conspiracy theories" emerge to fill it.
And despite the chaos and lunacy that clings to any cause consigned to the Sphere of Deviance, the conspiracy theories ARE helpful to the extent that they resist the overwhelming forces of both public inertia and vested interests to consign unpleasant and sinister events to the Memory Hole.
Mentioning the JFK assassination only undermines your premise. If it weren't for the "half-baked conspiracy theories", nothing would have been disclosed that didn't support the preposterous Lone Nut theory.
Even revered iconoclasts of the Left like I.F. Stone and Noam Chomsky ran away from the untidy evidence that the Warren Commission was explicitly created to whitewash the question with a view to quashing dissent and exacerbating public fear and discontent. Apologists make the supercilious claim that these guys were/are simply miles above half-baked conspiracy theorists, and in effect know better than to trifle with crackpots.
Nice try, but it doesn't bear scrutiny.
My own experience in dumpster-diving into the Sphere of Deviance is that once one begins thrashing through so-called "conspiracy" arguments, one discovers a continuum of material ranging from true looney-tune speculation and fantasy to respectable, if shunned, research.
The pasteurized and homogenized discourse in the Sphere of Legitimate Debate is like taking the interstate highway route to a destination; apparently direct and straightforward, and the "best" way to get from Point A to Point B. On particularly challenging routes, there are even Popular Mechanics and NOVA rest stops to comfort the weary traveller.
Choosing to take "the scenic route" subjects the driver to uncertainty. There are twists and turns, occasional dead ends, and short-cuts that turn out to be anything but. It's a challenge! But, of course, one sees things one never sees while barrelling down the crowded expressway with sound barriers for blinders.
Although half-baking isn't for everyone, it's not like keeping an open mind turns one into a nut raving about extraterrestrial Nazi Jew Bilderbergers projecting holographic aircraft onto the WTC and Pentagon, and using thought-control to zap witnesses.
Those who subscribe to such fantasies were nuts before they became "Truthers". Otherwise, it's the "half-bakers" who actually make it possible for hidden and forbidden truths to be reclaimed from the Sphere of Deviance and rehabilitated.
Sorry for the tangent, but the US entrenched hypocrisy of cosseting Israel and its coy nuclear policy is a given. An appalling, reprehensible given.
· Yr Obd't Servant
Someday, Israel will be the second country to kill thousands of innocent women and children with a nuclear bomb, and the world will condemn us, because we did nothing to prevent it.
Didn't Obama's mommy ever tell him, "If you tell a lie it will lead to more and more lies?"
If you start by telling a little lie about some country not having nuclear weapons, it can lead to telling a bigger lie about how you won't cave to the insurance industry on health care, and then it leads to telling an even bigger lie about your own country not being an EMPIRE --- and soon you're lying about the entire thing not being a ruling-elite global corporate/financial EMPIRE hiding behind the facade of a two-party, 'Vichy' sham of democracy --- and you'll be having to employ an entire, equally 'Vichy' corporatist MSM pack of liars to help you fool your own citizens into thinking that you are bringing 'Hope' and 'Change'--- and then...
Well, "and then" ---- is where we are NOW!~
Alan MacDonald,
Sanford. Maine
The bigger question, always, is there not one single MSM person able to cover this story correctly? Even the commedians won't touch it. Maher, who is often critical of Israel, would not allow the statement that the media is bought and paid for when it comes to this subject. It surely isn't new, though it's comforting to know exactly what Obama's price is for his truth.
That "even the comedians" won't bring this up is an interesting observation that shows just how verboten the whole story really is: Humor cannot even address it.
Americans can usually only swallow unpleasant truths if they are couched in comedy, making them easier to dismiss as being 'unserious.'
The price for "Obama's truth" is obvious: It is his second term in office and his entire career after he leaves office. Perhaps even his future book deals.
A cynic wearing a tin foil hat would say the American presidency is decided first in Tel Aviv.
In a world where conspiracy theories naggingly seem to contain a kernel of the truth, make of that what you will. –(Jill Bains)
Is the continuation of the don't ask, don't tell policy regarding Zionist nukes a surprise? It would have been newsworthy had the U.S. Administration decided on a change of policy. Ho-hum!
Support the Iranian right to develop nuclear missiles in self defense against Zionist/American state terror. –(Jill Bains)
Are you kidding? I hope you cannot find anybody here or in Iran that supports Iran's right or anyone else’s right to posses or use nuclear weapons as a deterrent to nuclear weapons or state terror.
Nuclear weapons are the epitome of terrorism. They are a threat of mass genocide against innocent civilian populations. They cannot be considered as strategic defence weapon and all agreements aim towards their total elimination and banning.
I hope nobody reading this would support any development of any counties’ nuclear weaponry. Jill, you seem to swing from Johnsonese verbosity to plain mindless ignorance. I thought you bright and well informed, or are you just trying to take the Mickey out of the people on this site?
[Are you kidding? I hope you cannot find anybody here or in Iran that supports Iran's right or anyone else’s right to posses or use nuclear weapons as a deterrent to nuclear weapons or state terror.]
As the usa has demonstrated no interest in respecting the disarmament provision in the NPT, and has not condemned its close allies when they have built bombs in defiance of that treaty (or when those nations have chosen just not signed onto the thing), I'd have to say that the rest of the world does indeed have the right to build their own bombs in an effort to prevent the usa (or Israel) from attacking them.
You're quite right that Nukes are a threat of genocide against civilians. Then again, conventional war is and has always been the same threat; it just takes a bit longer to kill everyone if you use swords or guns than it does if you use nukes to do it.
[They cannot be considered as strategic defence weapon and all agreements aim towards their total elimination and banning.]
I'm not convinced by either of your claims here. As there has been no major war between powers armed with nukes in the last 60 years (a record for the human race), the presence of these weapons could indeed be acting as a strategic defence. None of the nuttiest of the world's leaders are (or seem to be) willing to risk that it would be their nation that could be annihilated if they push that little button. Although the NPT does have a provision that says the nation's who sign on will work to eliminate those weapons, none of the nuke powers have really done much to accomplish that goal. The usa isn't the only nation that has them, nor are they the only nation to be upgrading their nuke arsenals.
A nuanced, intelligent discussion and and a necessary expansion of my deliberate provocation above. Clear headed and avoiding the silly 'peacenik' sentimentality which despoil the criticisms of my original statement.
Sometimes a direct intervention cuts to the chase and jettisons the sentimental bullshit that underscores and rationalize the unilateralist prerogatives of Israel and its apologists.
I am an advocate of complete and utter universal nuclear disarmament; I am not an advocate of a world where only Israel and the United States have them exclusively at their PRIVATE disposal.
I understand that the very existence of nuclear weaponry may be seen as inherently 'terroristic.' I agree with that assertion.
Having said that I stand by my contention that Iran has every right in the world, given no other alternative, to defend itself against the flagrant bellicosity of Israel and the United States. Iran is clearly not the problem here.
In the savage world of murderous realpolitik that imperialism and its Zionist mirror state Israel seem to purvey without conscience or remorse, these hypocritical proponents should suffer the same mutually assured destruction they brutally impose on others.
A little classic detente and 'tit for tat' in the spirit of the Cold War, in lieu of any morality, and in the complete vacuity of serious diplomacy (Israel's refusal to submit to inspections) is not always a bad thing.
Israel represents the greatest threat to world peace. It must be stopped by any means necessary to stop the holocaust it seems hell bent on externalizing. Detente is a small price to pay. –(Jill Bains)
Thank you for re-affirming my belief in the continuity of your sanity. I understand and sympathise with your writing. I just don't see MAD as a reasonable counter tactic. Rather it is what the acronym spells. A global ban on nuclear weapons as on biological and chemical WMD is the only realistic goal.
In the meantime though, I read an article by Pepe Escobar here on pipe lines for natural gas: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/10/02-9
And it helped me to see that the US / Iranian position is far more nuanced in a larger perspective of power balance including the traditional cold war adversarial relationship adopted by the US vis. Russia.
It is into this bigger picture that the Israeli nukes become the apparent loose cannon, so to speak which, may or may not appear to be looser or tighter depending on what stance Washington is favouring at the time.
The threatened Iranian response is one that is far more intelligent, non nuclear, and in my personal opinion anyway, morally justifiable. The response to a nuclear attack will be conventional and "asymmetric" retaliation, perhaps less devastating, sure, but certainly effective at undermining the political and economic base of the powers. (How would 20 Hamasses or Hezbollahs suit the western world?)
I must totally agree with your last paragraph: "Israel represents the greatest threat to world peace. It must be stopped by any means necessary to stop the holocaust it seems hell bent on externalizing. Detente is a small price to pay."
In some ways asymmetric war has eclipsed the nuclear age. But in fact the "interests" of government players, have become indistinguishable from corporate interests and counter to human interests, which should show us something about how to achieve higher ends. Personally I feel these pawns of corporatism have sounded their own death knells and obsolescence, it is only a matter of time that their means of causing destruction grinds to a halt from lack of economic sustainability, as the global financial and economic machine self destructs.
As Einstein said, something to the effect of, "I don't know if the third world war will be fought with nuclear weapons, but I’m sure the fourth will be with sticks and stones."
Lucitanian--are YOU kidding? Who in the world has not realized that it is only through possession of nuclear weapons that any nation can protect itself from U.S./Israeli aggression? At this moment, N. Korea would be a pile of rubble, like Gaza, if they hadn't had nuclear weapons.
Israel has 200-400 nuclear weapons, all illegal. The U.S. is starting on the next round of improvements/enhancements to its nuclear weapon arsenal, which it shares with Israel.
Why should the U.S./Israel and their allies have nuclear weapons, while everyone else has to live in fear of their attacks? The people of the world are calling bullshit on this. The irony of the lawless U.S./Israel calling Iran to task is not lost on anyone.
I hope that China and Russia give Iran and every other country the nukes, missiles, etc. that they need to keep themselves safe from us and Israel. It's time to level the playing field.
The nice thing about the use of nuclear weapons is that the wind will blow the fall-out everywhere, so that the citizens in Europe, the U.S. and Israel will get to share in the suffering they are so willing to inflict.
Precisely!
Nothing could be more to the point and commonsensical.
–(Jill Bains)
no. basically you're advocating a world *cold* war which is short-sighted and just as insane as the activities of the first cold war
Thank you Vern; Yes the waste of resources is what got America and the USSR to the point of economic and social collapse. That history is repeating. Asymmetric war is the apparent replacement game mode and we'll soon all have to be making bombs from hair peroxide and garden fertilizer, if we're not one of the brainlessly servants working for the "boss man" or watching the box for the latest quiz show or the ball game (bread and circus).
My crystal ball says we're already ahead of these pawns of corporatism as they try to hang on to their already eclipsed power base.
Their greed has insured that we have nothing left to loose except the chains that bind us to their wheel and perhaps our life which is limited and under their dominance is forfeit anyway.
Advocating a "world cold war?" As if that is some futuristic concept that we have not already embraced?
Please! naiveté only goes so far. What you seem to be left with, although you are not advocating it, is the potential for a unilateralist 'hot' war' imposed by Israel and the United States.
If there will be war, then let it be 'cold.'
The impetus for escalation into 'hot' war comes solely from Israel and America who are both beyond moral suasion.
–(Jill Bains)
"I hope that China and Russia give Iran and every other country the nukes, missiles, etc. that they need to keep themselves safe from us and Israel. It's time to level the playing field."
It would be the height of idiocy for China and Russia to give nuclear weapons to everyone who wants them, just so that "the citizens in Europe, the U.S. and Israel will get to share in the suffering they are so willing to inflict".
China and Russia have NO interest in "leveling the playing field". China has no interest in Taiwan for example, having nuclear weapons.
"
The nice thing about the use of nuclear weapons is that the wind will blow the fall-out everywhere, so that the citizens in Europe, the U.S. and Israel will get to share in the suffering they are so willing to inflict.""
Everywhere means China, Russia, and Iran too.
Thankfully, unlike you, neither China nor Russia nor Iran have a death wish.
That's not an improvement. That's ridiculous!
Get the EU and the UN to grow a couple and make Israel live according to the laws and values the world has agreed on. I'm thinking EU wimpishness re Israel's crimes is almost worse than Israel's crimes.
"Get the EU and the UN to grow a couple and make Israel live according to the laws and values the world has agreed on." –(redbaloon)
–Who are you kidding? What 'laws and values'? There are no 'laws and values' only the brute force of realpolitik and imperial thuggery. Who is going "to make Israel' do anything? Please, say anything but DON'T insult my intelligence.
The Western world obeys the dictates and values of imperialist hegemony only; the UN is a defanged eunuch.Israel is immune to diplomatic entreaties. There is no 'serious' diplomacy, there is only force. That is not going to change.
You believe in peace? I reiterate: Support Iran's right to defend itself against against Israeli and American state terror by guaranteeing mutually assured destruction. If Israel has the right to have missiles with nuclear warheads, then so should Iran.
It is incumbent on Israel and the U.S to make the initial move for universal disarmament, not Iran. –(Jill Bains)
"What 'laws and values'? There are no 'laws and values' only the brute force of realpolitik and imperial thuggery. Who is going "to make Israel' do anything? Please, say anything but DON'T insult my intelligence."
I don't mean to insult your intelligence but higher ups in the IDF who were involved in orders related to "lead casket" got the memo a couple of months ago not to visit the UK, Spain, and Belgium (NATO HQ) and a couple of other European states because they might face arrest on possible war crimes charges. This is after a couple of years ago when I believe it was a colonel sat on board an El Al flight after it landed in london and until it returned to Israel because he had been made aware of his imminent arrest if he deplaned on British soil.
At least they are facing restricted travel for now, as time goes on the restrictions may get tighter if they refuse to apply the laws in vigour. Also there is mounting pressure inside Israel to face this music too. But this is an example of how outside pressure effects behavior
Amfortas, you are right.
(See my commentary above this)
yes hope you're kidding, MAD is still madness
check your thinking, there's a better way
The other argument against the argument that "if US/Israel are allowed then so should Iran be allowed to defend themselves.. i.e. MAD" is, such proliferation actually gives the original nuclear terrorists, US, Britain, France, Russia, China, and clandestine Israel, India, Pakistan, another pillar on their foundation of justification as proliferation expands. With only non nuclear enemies Israel has no justification to threaten with nuclear weapons and by so doing is seen to be the terrorist it is. Whereas once Iran is nuclear armed, with the mad logic of MAD Israel’s position becomes justifiable.
For this reason alone we should be glad that Iran has renounced such WMD and is rightly in fact calling for a non-nuclear Middle East, and we must all put pressure through private and public boycott to support the nuclear disarmament of Israel as well as the end of its belligerence towards the Palestinians and its neighbours.
Calling for Iran’s right to nuclear arm, is therefore indirectly supporting the US and Israel’s terrorist position.
"With only non nuclear enemies Israel has no justification to threaten with nuclear weapons and by so doing is seen to be the terrorist it is. "
–(Lucitanian)
This is wishful thinking at best; speculative and specious reasoning at worst. Certainly proliferation is to be opposed, but the whole concept of proliferation has degenerated into a sentimental construct at best based on a bankrupt and naïve idealism that is only payed lip service to.
Israel has never been interested in "justifications" for its criminality and state terrorism despite after the fact attempts to justify.
That Iran has renounced WMD is all too its credit, but it is a politics inspired more by tactical considerations and contingencies it has been forced into than anything else. The reality of what it is facing is far more grim.
Your contention that supporting nukes for Iran actually supports American and Israeli terrorism is inane and a prima facie example of circular reasoning.
Let the first indications of the good intentions you dream of come from the United States and Israel, otherwise you appear to be 'pissing into the wind.'
–(Jill Bains)
The circular logic is not mine it is what I see as that of America / Israel today.
If Iran were to get nuclear weapons, Israel/USA would be saying : you see that's why we are right to have weapons to protect ourselves from IRRISPONSIBLE ILLEGAL Iran which has always been aggressing us and now threatens our destruction and existence with these terrible weapons. That is why we have always been justified in possessing ours. We are responsible peacekeeper. Iran is not. We have the right of defence. Of course it is balls and illogical but internally self reinforcing, and once Iran is armed it becomes more difficult to disarm them all WHICH IS THE OBJECTIVE.
As things stand their is the pressure of information; of rational logic and politics which we are enjoying now by informing one another in this exchange, a body of applications of international treaty and law in such forums as the US constitutional bodies, IAEA, UN, diplomatic pressure and even public protest, embargos and boycotts, which can be used; some or all to different levels of efficacy, but the power of being right is at least with us and with all those against nuclear arms. And no, it is not naive to foresee a world without nuclear weapons.
It is certainly dangerous to think that further armament is the only way to get rid of arms. That is convoluted and circular and I believe just plain stupid. Bristling the world with nuclear weapons will never force the US or Israel to disarm and certainly will increase the risk of them being used. But if the few cannot use their weapons and are getting hammered on all sides in other ways for possessing them while not being threatened by other nuclear arms, it may be possible.
Amfortas, thank you for thinking about my comments. Your many adjectives and patronizing dismissals bring little sense into your replies though. I enjoy constructive exchange but I’d really appreciate it if you could try and keep it simple, please. I don’t need to be impressed. I know you are clever but frankly less verbosity goes a long way to better clarity.
"I don’t need to be impressed. I know you are clever but frankly less verbosity goes a long way to better clarity." –(Lucitanian)
–When you can't seriously argue the substantive claims on the basis of ideas, the last resort of someone who is discomfited is to attack your interlocutor's writing 'style.'
Your writing 'style' is of no importance to me, one way or the other. What does bother me is your disingenuous and barely masqued pro-Israel and anti-Iranian circumlocutions, hiding under the veneer of an anti-nuclear sanctimony.
Oh yes! What could be LESS verbose, or more 'clear' than to say that in my opinion, your arguments amount to "pissing in the wind?"
Not an adjective in sight.
–(Jill Bains)
Amfortas: Thank you for your straight talk. You see, once all the flowers fall away the self important ass that cannot read or comprehend shows through. If you had read any of the comments I have made on CD in the last two years or even what I write here on the subject of Israel you would know just how stupid what you wrote about me here is. You haven’t got a clue.
And as far as you being verbose is concerned, you've now added stupidity to your qualifications. You can have a bad argument (like; supporting the right of more countries to arm with nuclear weapons as a way to arrive at the goal to eliminate all nuclear weapons) and still prove youself as stupidity too, giving me all the more reason to attack you and your ill founded stance. A bad argument and stupid person are not exclusive to attack, especially if the reason for the faulty argument is the ignorance of the arguer. It's just your illogical and unfounded opinion that suggests otherwise. You are if anything proving my point for me. Anyway you are not the first thing I attacked here, but the last. But finally I cannot let your dumb statements, and lame arguments wrapped in condescension and self aggrandizing verbosity go unanswered.
Being totally against any country including Iran having nuclear weapons IS in fact the position and stated decisions of policy made by Iran’s Supreme Leader and Guardian Council, who have termed these abhorrent weapons as anti-Islamic. So I don't see how my position directly or indirectly can somehow be construed by you as anti Iranian or supporting the interest of the belligerent Zionist entity.
It is only by isolating and applying pressure on protagonist nations and the supporters of their policies, that enables their possession and use of these hideous weapons. Only by total rejection, without compromise, of these abominations of state terror can they be eliminated, and the policies of those regimes that build and maintain them can be changed.
Simply stated even the anilhilation of israel would not "justify" israels policy of genocide and violence.
No, what appears "mad" is your failure to acknowledge or even sense that if there were better ways they would be realistic considerations in the real world, not in the sentimental world of dreams and illusions.
I wish you were right, I really do. Israel and America have no intentions whatsoever to 'do the right thing.' They never have and by all indications do not intend to turn over a new leaf. They abjure any diplomacy that is not predicated by force alone.
Obama's actions regarding Israel's nuclear arsenal should be abject proof of that sordid reality.
Let the twin pillars of state terror be the first to declare their 'good' intentions, not Iran.
–(Jill Bains)
YES!
While the U.S. government does their "thing" and rails against Iran getting nuclear weapons, they also need to tell Israel, IN NO UNCERTAIN TERMS, (heavy emphasis on this) that they cannot have them either.
(By-the-way, why the Hell didn't the U.S. government scream to high heaven when Pakistan and India were developing them???)
And our government (and all American citizens) need to remain fully concious that we were rotten for being the first to develop nuclear weapons, & even more rotten for being the first to use them against another country -- TWICE (August 6 and August 9, 1945).
Shame on us.
And shame on us for supporting the Israeli government in possessing nuclear weapons.
your arrogance is kind of disturbing... do you even know what it really means to develop nuclear weapons?
Unless you do, please don't advocate that every nation under the sun needs to develop them to protect themselves..
"...do you even know what it really means to develop nuclear weapons." –(vernn)
–You bet I do!
It means, in the case of Iran, which is constantly dealing with threats from the unrepentant, known terror state of Israel-possession of said nuclear weaponry may allow its people to sleep better at night. No small feat.
Are there better ways? I wish there were. I really do.
I never said I "advocate that every nation under the sun needs to develop nuclear weapons." Quite the contrary. I support complete and utter universal disarmament.
Don't ignorantly put words in my mouth and try to 'cheap shot' me. I said only Iran needs to do so, in lieu of no other alternative other than to be a willing and complacent victim of Israeli and American state terror. I do not see this position as contradictory.
The particular situational exigency mandates the necessity. Parity sets the only groundwork from which any truly serious future disarmament negotiations may proceed that are not imposed by imperial dictates.
It sounds like what you really believe to mean is that 'the development of nuclear weapons' are the sole prerogative of Israel and the United States. After acting as a tacit apologist for the exclusivist privileges of imperial bellicosity, you then try to spuriously claim the moral high ground as a 'holier than thou' peacenik.
Let Israel and the United States be the first to commence good faith nuclear disarmament. That and only that would constitute a breakthrough.Why don't I hear you saying that?
Gee, maybe I really shouldn't have to ask? I suspect I already know: Shake the rafters and Neo-Cons fall out from the wood work!
" Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran!"–(Jill Bains)
Amfortas, "I never said I "advocate that every nation under the sun needs to develop nuclear weapons." Quite the contrary. I support complete and utter universal disarmament."
If you say nations threatened... should excersise their "right"... advocating proliforation willy nilly, because technically all are threatened.
He is not ignorantly putting words in your mouth, there's no space with both your feet in there already!
Amfortas,"in lieu of no other alternative other than to be a willing and complacent victim of Israeli and American state terror",
Who said there are no alternatives. Some mentioned already some starting to be applied at different levels?
Amfortas, "It sounds like what you really believe to mean is that 'the development of nuclear weapons' are the sole prerogative of Israel and the United States. After acting as a tacit apologist for the exclusivist privileges of imperial bellicosity, you then try to spuriously claim the moral high ground as a 'holier than thou' peacenik."
Now that really is "putting words in someone’s mouth". then cutting down the straw men you build", It does not sound like that at all, to anybody who has read what Vernn wrote. What is your point and who are you pretending to debate against???
So that you hear someone say it, I'll say it for me, and I have no doubt Vernn agrees:
Let Israel and the United States be the first to commence good faith nuclear disarmament. That and only that would constitute a breakthrough.
But I have no doubt that it will not happen without pressures from many sides, and BTW commencement alone means nothing. What I need to see is a plan and supervision to successful decommissioning under the IAEA as in South Africa and for all nuclear states.
How does not having said that make Vernn a NeoCon? You're big on throwing stupid sh.. around, when your not decorating your pointless arguments, aren’t you?
Just because people don’t agree with your half baked argument does not mean they are Zionist apologists as you suggest of me or NeoCons in hiding as you suggest of Vernn. A little maturity in these exchanges might help more than your condescension and verbosity!
Amfortas, you write "No, what appears "mad" is your failure to acknowledge or even sense that if there were better ways they would be realistic considerations in the real world, not in the sentimental world of dreams and illusions."
There are diverse and many "better ways .... realistic considerations in the real world" which include the fundamental impossibility under convention and law of a nuclear armed country attacking a non nuclear power and surviving the blow back, politically, economically, internally or externally. So these expensive toys, designed to threaten between developed states are also redundant in any real sense of power. Also in the non-"sentimental world of dreams and illusions" of the 21st century, conflict has change from state to non-state players, also making the use of a weapon that is inherently directed at entire "populations", and the breakdown of social order against the state rather than strategic military targets, redundant, hence the new wars are nebulous "wars against terror" which have made a new playing field in which WMDs against states are more or less obsolete anyway.
You write, "Israel and America have no intentions whatsoever to 'do the right thing.'" So what, for example, they also don't talk to Hamas but that doesn't mean "in the real world" that the power of Hamas is not augmented by their denial. Sooner or later, here to, they will have to come to terms with it.
Statesmanship is just show biz and Obama is what he is, a figure head of the status quo that is also existing by its own self delusion too. But that does not mean that change is not afoot. It always is.
Change comes from the inevitability of circumstance which dictates that "eventually" the American and Israeli position is untenable, and contrary to the real interests of the people and powers in those countries.
In the same way the maintenance and threat of nuclear weapons will be eclipsed by their uselessness and impracticality in dealing with "realpolitik". They are already expensive and useless status symbols in most cases without logical reason of application.
Put it another way. Israel could not get away as a state without major "regime change" if it were to nuke Iran, a non nuclear power. If Iran was armed with retaliatory nukes, and used them, Israel could get away with it.
Does that make sense to you?
You write: "Let the twin pillars of state terror be the first to declare their 'good' intentions, not Iran."
The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
I thought "don't ask - don't tell" was about whether the boys and girls that drop bombs on various brown people around the world including civilians, women and children, killing them by the hundreds of thousands, or man (woman, either, or, or something in between) the great illegal aggressions, decided and mounted by the righteous, noble, free democratic great leading states of the West, NATO, etc, etc....
In short I thought it was whether these boys and girls like to take it "up the hooter", so to speak, NOT whether the US likes to give to the rest of the world that way.
I know it seems that we are bending over already but it is this short sited, exceptionallism and double standard that makes a mockery of all non-proliferation and disarmament agreements and undertakings. The Zionists being left with hundreds of nukes means the world is screwed, sooner or later. By the manner in which this is being handled it seems more obvious that we're screwed already!