Subscribe to Common Dreams News Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
War Game Shows How Attacking Iran Could Backfire
WASHINGTON - Here's a war game involving Iran, Israel and the U.S. that shows how unintended consequences can spin out of control:
With diplomacy failing and precious intelligence just received about two new secret Iranian nuclear facilities, Israel launches a pre-emptive strike against Tehran's nuclear complex. The strike is successful, wiping out six of Iran's key sites and setting back its suspected quest for a bomb by years.
But what happens next isn't pretty.
The U.S. president and his National Security Council try to keep the crisis from escalating. That sours U.S.-Israeli relations, already stressed by the fact that Israel didn't inform Washington in advance of the strike. The White House tries to open a channel for talks with Iran, but is rejected.
Instead, Iran attacks Israel, both directly and through its proxies in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip. It misinterprets U.S. actions as weakness and mines the Straits of Hormuz, the world's chief oil artery. That sparks a clash and a massive U.S. military reinforcement in the Persian Gulf.
This recent war game conducted at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy, part of the Washington-based Brookings Institution, a center-left think tank, appears to dampen hopes for a simple solution to Iran's real-world nuclear challenge.
The lesson is "once you start this, it's really hard to stop it," said Kenneth Pollack, a former White House and CIA official who oversaw the simulation.
Pollack and others who participated in the day-long exercise late last year are quick to point out that war games are imperfect mirrors of reality. How Iran's notoriously opaque and fractious leadership would react in a real crisis is particularly hard to divine.
But the outcome underscores what diplomats, military officers and analysts have long said: even a "successful" airstrike on Iran's nuclear facilities - setting the program back by two to four years - could come at a tremendous, unpredictable cost.
"It's ... an option that has to be looked at very, very, very carefully," a senior European diplomat said Friday. "Because we know what the results could be, and they could be disastrous." He requested anonymity to speak more frankly on the sensitive issue.
Tensions over Iran's nuclear program rose again this week after the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog reported that the country could be secretly developing a nuclear warhead to be placed atop a ballistic missile. Additionally, Iran has begun enriching uranium closer to the purity level needed for use in a nuclear weapon.
Israel, which sees Iran as a direct threat, has refused to rule out military force, although officials there say they are counting for now on diplomatic pressure. There have even been hints from Sunni Arab states, particularly Saudi Arabia, that they would look the other way in the event of a strike on Shiite Iran, a historic adversary.
Yet one of the Brookings war game's major conclusions is that Israel could pay dearly for an attack on Iran.
By the end of the simulation, eight days after the fictitious Israeli strike, Israel's prime minister, under heavy domestic pressure, is forced to launch a 48-hour air blitz in southern Lebanon to halt rocket attacks from Hezbollah, the militant group sponsored by Iran. Israeli officials know the blitz is unlikely to achieve its objectives, and prepare a larger, costlier operation in Lebanon, including ground forces.
Israel's relations with the United States, its most important ally, are damaged. To avoid damaging them further, Israel bows to intense U.S. pressure and absorbs occasional missile strikes from Iran without retaliating.
Some members of the "Israeli" team nonetheless felt that setting back Iran's nuclear program "was worth it, even given what was a pretty robust response," said one participant. He asked that his name not be used, because under the game's ground rules, participants are supposed to remain anonymous.
Jonathan Peled, an Israeli embassy spokesman, declined comment on the war game or its outcome.
"All we can say is that Iran constitutes a threat not only to Israel but to the region, to the US and to the world at large, and therefore should be addressed without delay by the international community, first and foremost through effective sanctions," he said.
The Brookings war game was one of three simulations regarding Iran's nuclear program conducted in December. The other two, at Harvard University and Tel Aviv University, reportedly found that neither sanctions nor threats dissuaded Tehran from its suspected nuclear weapons ambitions.
In the Brookings game, three teams of experts, including former senior U.S. officials, played the Israeli, Iranian and American leadership. They assembled in separate rooms at the think tank's Washington headquarters. Israeli and U.S. "officials" communicated with each other, but not with the Iranians.
One of the simulation's major findings was how aggressively the Iranians responded to the attack - more aggressively, some participants felt, than they would in real life - and how Washington and Tehran, lacking direct communication, misunderstood each other.
Iran did not retaliate directly against the United States or U.S. troops in Iraq or Afghanistan. But it struck back at Israel, then attacked Dharan in eastern Saudi Arabia, then began mining the Straits of Hormuz.
"There would be almost no incentive for Iran not to respond" with force, said another participant, a member of the Iranian team. "It was interesting to see how useful it was for Tehran to push the limits."
Without knowing it, Iran's last two actions crossed U.S. "red lines," prompting an American military response.
"No one came out on top - (but) arguably the Iranians," the Iran team member said.
The Tehran regime was also able to crush its domestic political opposition.
59 Comments so far
Show AllWe didn't need a fancy war game to figure all this out. All we needed was to listen to Mel GIbson's drunken rant a few years ago during the rape of South Lebanon by the Jews.
Thank you revo, for lowering the bar here.
Undoubtedly your purpose on this site.
I was asked the question below on another post, but I think it fits here, also.
"Is Iran allowed under the Non Proliferation Treaty to legally develop Nuclear Weapons?"
No, but they are allowed to develop nuclear power under the watchdog of the NRC. They have done this for quite a few years. Even our own National Intelligence Estimate could find no evidence of a nuclear weapons program. Nobody has. Iran has had its labs, etc., carefully scrutinized by the NRC, who also has found no evidence of nuclear misuse or violations of the NPR.
Despite this, Israel and the US have propagandized a vast nuclear weapons development and research program in Iran. Far too many believe it. Frankly, with the deck being increasingly stacked against them, it might be a good idea if they did start, even though it would take an estimated eight to ten years to produce a weapon, let alone an arsenal.
Iran has a history of only fighting defensive wars. We promoted our puppet, Saddam Hussein, to make war on Iran in hope of destroying it and making it part of our hegemony. Iran fought back, with tremendous losses, and eventually kept their freedom.
It would be insane to work for ten years and pour millions or billions into an effort to produce one bomb, then use it against a rogue nation that has demonstrated its willingness to attack anyone it feels it can beat, armed currently with an estimated four hundred nuclear armed missiles (God knows how many ten years from now) who has signed no treaties and has contempt for every individual government in the world along with the UN.
It is the Israeli government who has stated that, if necessary, they would use the Sampson Initiative, using their nuclear arsenal to take everyone with them if they thought they were going to lose.
There, gentle reader, is true insanity. The Israeli government is even arresting and incarcerating their own people, if they are "guilty" of making a protest against Israeli policy.
Iran has broken no laws, except to protect itself against aggression. It would be nice to keep it that way. Unlike Iraq, with no spare parts for a decade, Iran has an excellent military with up-to-date equipment. They will not be a cake-walk like Iraq was. They can, and will, fight back, hard!
All of this would be so easy to avoid. Remember diplomacy? compromise? Reasoning?
In my book, that beats poisoning the world and slaughtering still more millions for the crime of not believing as our militant religious right says they should and, owning a lot of oil.
If we were not slaughtering our way across the Middle East, the oil would probably be shared, but the Corporate State would rather steal than bargain, especially if bargaining cut into their enormous profits.
While war games like this one can yield valuable insights into the consequences of "moves" in the war game, they may have limited utility in deterring the real life "players" from engaging with acts having these consequences. The response of the Israeli official that the consequences were "worth it" given the perceived gravity of the Iranian "threat," is all-too-typical of real players. The disastrous U.S. operations in Somalia, Yugoslavia, Iraq and Afghanistan could have been "war gamed" before hand to anticipate these disasters but, with exaggerated "threats" from the enemy in their minds they no doubt would have said, as did U.S. Secretary of State after being told the Clinton administration sanctions against Iraq had caused hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives, when she said it was "worth it," presumably because of the imaginary dire threat of Saddam Hussein to U.S. security interests.
What Jonathan Peled, a Zionist apartheider with the Israeli Embassy, said: "All we can say is that IRAN constitutes a threat not only to ISRAEL but to the region, to the US and to the world at large, and therefore should be addressed without delay by the international community, first and foremost through effective sanctions."
What Jonathan Peled, a Zionist apartheider with the Israeli Embassy, meant: "All we can say is that ISRAEL constitutes a threat not only to IRAN but to the region, to the US and to the world at large, and therefore should be addressed without delay by the international community, first and foremost through effective sanctions."
Let's see Israel: 100+ sophisticated NUKES, Iran: 0. Who's the threat to the other and The WORLD? Critical mass can be seen down the Israeli gun barrel, as well as the mushroom smoke-ring from the foreseeable blowback. Cut the games and Stop The WARS!
"once you start this, it's really hard to stop it"
Uh, yes. Wars are pretty much like that in almost every case.
Sometimes the profundity of "military analysts" is almost beyond belief. I assume the networks won't be picking this one up anytime soon, however.
The Saban center at the Brookings Institute was financed by a US Billionare Zionist, so that might be where the impetus for this war game originated. I'm quite surprised that it wasn't fixed to allow Israel to win. Something like this happened in 2002 when the US military held a war game with the same type of plan. The Iraqi side was played by a US Marine General named Paul Van Riper who did the totally unexpected. He didn't use radios but couriers on motorcycles which gave the order to fire anti-ship missiles at the US fleet in the Persian Gulf. All of our aircraft carriers were sunk within a short time. That pissed off the US side which stopped the war game and whined that the Marine General wasn't playing fair and then declared that they had won. One story out of Washington in the early summer of 2008 when Bush turned down the Israelis when they asked for assistance in attacking Iran was that they would not be permitted to overfly Iraq to get to Iran. The Israeli papers even showed plans on flying around Saudi Arabia to attack Iran. The AIPAC controlled US papers will continue to put out all sorts of BS to try to con the US public into thinking Iran is a threat.
That means that the best course of action (assuming no one here wants to see the spread of nuclear weapons) is to increase the diplomatic pressure on Iran, trying halt its nuclear program in peaceful manners.
Or one might consider supporting Iran's own suggestion for global nuclear disarmament. Even a nuke-free Middle East would be a good start, except that Israel would never agree.
That means that the best course of action (assuming no one here wants to see the spread of nuclear weapons)
Pure bullshit. Iran will not have a nuclear bomb for years. Want to discuss all the nuclear weapons that Israel has that are not covered under the NPT treaty? Want to talk about Israel's constant attacks on it's neighbors and it's war crimes? Want to talk about Israels largest in the world outdoor prison camp called Palestine?
another hypocritical comment by the biggest hypocrite of all....
Coming from someone who in the past endorsed war crimes and crimes against humanity (according to Amnesty international and the Geneva convenation) for as long as the victims are Jews who live in Israel, I'm totally not surprised that you also endorse the nuclearization of the Midddle-East.
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/01/10-2#comment-1391297
Horrified January 10th, 2010 6:43 pm
endorse war crimes??? what fcking planet are you from Letto? You live in a country that commits war crimes on a daily basis. And you were probaly on that hill having a picnic while the most moral army in the world was busy killing women and childrem while you were chewing on kosher pork..you fcking hypocrite!
Me? Living in a country that commits war crimes on a daily basis? Do you mean Canada?
As for you, Horrified, didn't you endorsed on January 10th, firing rockets and mortar bombs against Israeli civilian targets (A crime against humanity according to Amnesty International) based on the argument that there are no civilians in Israel?
Everyone can see who you are by following your comments here:
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/01/10-2#comment-1391297
---
And you are truly grasping at straws....
Letto January 10th, 2010 4:57 pm
"Do you, quickstepper, support indiscriminate bombings against civilian targets?"
Answer to the above question: Horrified January 10th, 2010 6:43 pm
"There are no innocent civilians in Israel..Israel is made up of a civilian army you zionist buffoon!"
Based on the context, it is clear that someone named Horrified, support indiscriminate bombings against civilian targets, for as long as the victims are Israelis.
Having said that, if you think I'm wrong, all you have to do is to publicly declare that you oppose the Hamas indiscriminate bombings against civilian targets in Israel. Can you clearify that once and for all?
Aside from being morally repulsive--showing imperialist psychopaths brainstorming murder--the article full of factual errors and omissions. Poster Aarky has already pointed out that the Saban Center (at Brookings) is a Zionist front group.
The single most blatant factual error pertains to the article's scenario, whereby ". . . Israel didn't inform Washington in advance of the strike." The geniuses at the Brookings Institution need to acquire a map not provided by the Zionists: Given Israeli air force capabilities, the assault on Iran described would have to cross Iraq, whose airspace is controlled by Uncle Sham. USA complicity in the Zionist war crime under consideration would therefore be assured. US military "intelligence" capabilities likewise assure US foreknowledge of the contemplated attack. There is no way that such an assault could occur without US connivance. This little fact vitiates the rest of the "war game"; which, please note, manages to get the US involved in the killing while pretending that the US was only a surprised bystander in the initial assault. --It follows that what is being "gamed" is not the crime itself buts its Public Relations packaging--a "trial balloon" at work.
The single greatest factual omission is the failure to state that Iran, and everybody else in the Middle East, is under constant threat of mass murder from Israel's nuclear arsenal. Hypocrisy attains to the emetic when Iran's "suspected," etc., nuclear threat is discussed without mentioning the very real Zionist threat, maintained with US approval.
One of the Zionist trolls who deface Common Dreams (Letto) pretends to pacifistic intent by encouraging "diplomatic pressure on Iran"; without expending one word on the need to "pressure" Israel regarding its nuclear arsenal. Such "diplomatic pressure" on Iran is merely a euphemism for the War Process now under way. Recall the "diplomatic pressure" against Iraq's WMD before the US invaded in 2003 . . . .
This is a news story about a war game. It's importance is understanding these facts.
We are fighting multiple illegal wars around Iran based on lies. Our past president and the entire top level of our government lied and cover up any truths about it.The present administration is doing the same. They have ruled by privilege. Based in latin from "privi" private "lege" law. They are not accountable to anyone as they have their finger on the trigger.
minitrue February 21st, 2010 7:01 pm is quite well informed and speaks more truth than our government when he states that Iran is years away from a usable nuclear weapon. Most of the information about our wars coming from the pentagon and fed to us by the corporate press is along the lines of the Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman stories. Poorly crafted lies.
Saban Center for Middle East Policy who did this study is filled to the top with very sick people who played this game for funding.With the premise that the basis of the game is based on a lie. This then when written in an article like this is pure propaganda meant to stir up the "people". Pure bull shit in a fur hat.
Where in this article is the mention of the fact that a strike on a nuclear facility even with conventional (how crazy to call them conventional) weapons will produce a nuclear mess. Perhaps one up to six Chernobyls. There will be clouds bursting up to all levels of the atmosphere and depending on if the wind carries the radiation south over India or goes north and is bounced off the Himilayas and turns north to Europe as Chernobyls did it will sooner or latter flow over the US. As particles in the air do they collect moisture droplets until so heavy they fall as rain sprinkling cancerous radioactive particles onto unborn babies, children, our parents and all the food we eat.Ah, did you think of that Saban Center?
This is no puff piece. It is a reflection of the rot that infests our government and the pentagon. A story of terrible war based on what seems an everyday product of our government, lies. That lie would be used to intimidate us and cover for and goad on Israel to commit a war crime, another product of the USA. After the attack on the USS Liberty Israel to then attack, such as in this game would find it's self on thin ice with the American people.
The question perhaps is "how long will we tolerate these liars who actually have their finger on our nuclear triggers?"
"Because we know what the results could be, and they could be disastrous."
With AfPak and Iraq winding down, war profiteering chickenhawks need to start another war.
This is a NO BRAINER. I could have saved Brookings a lot of taxpayers dollars. Iran has over 74 million people, 3000 year old civilization, 3rd largest oil and 2nd largest gas reserves. To make things even worse for US or the Zionist mutt, Iran has a battle tested military of over 645,000, IRGC 225,000 annd Baseej volunteers numbering into millions. Iran has a first rate deterrent capability, including long-range missiles and perhaps nukes or just a screw-driver turn away. The Zionist regime with 5 million imported people has been used to lording over inept and fractured Arabs, taking on Iran with a landmass of over 1.64 million sq kms of mountain terrian is even beyond crazy Nothing Yahoo's fantasies. There will no military option vis a vis Iran, unless we all want to initiate WW3 and collective suicide. Even Bush/Chaney the Zionist collective of demented neo-cons could "Bomb, bomb Iran" when their hubris was at its peak in 2003. Today, it is a whole new ball game in the multi-polar world. Any war with Iran will eventually burn the whole Middle-East down and bring China in too and cause global economic collapse and conflagration.
"This recent war game conducted at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy, part of the Washington-based Brookings Institution, a center-left think tank, appears to dampen hopes for a simple solution to Iran's real-world nuclear challenge."
McClatchy is putting ideas in its shop window in hopes we'll buy them. But I'm not buying McClatchy's idea that the Brooking Institution's activities mean anything. Anybody can create a pile of funny munny and fund a room full of chimps in neckties who will say anything to support their little enterprise.
And so to determine if you should listen to them or ignore them, look to see if they are serving the public interests.
If the Brookings Institution cared about the public interests, it would be condemning and ridiculing the warmongers in the USA, Israel and everywhere else, instead of speculating on the subtle textures of death and destruction.
Kaka on Brookings and McClatchy, and all the rest of the chimps in neckties. The public interest demands ridicule of the warmongers.
"...forced to launch a 48-hour air blitz in southern Lebanon to halt rocket attacks from Hezbollah, the militant group sponsored by Iran."
I'm curious... I keep reading and hearing that Iran 'sponsors' Hezbollah and Hamas, but I have yet to be shown the proof. It is always stated as a matter of fact because US or Israeli intelligence says it is so.
Has anybody here on CD read any articles that shows or explains the actual proof of this claim? Or has Ahmadinejad openly stated that he sponsors or supplies weapons to these groups and I just didn't hear about it?
I know Ahmadinejad openly 'supports' the rights of Palestinians... but the articles always say 'sponsor'... and to me the word 'sponsors' has a different connotation than the word supports.
I could understand if this claim was true, but after all of the crappy (or maybe even fake) intelligence that surfaced during the US invasion of Iraq, I can't help but be skeptical of these types of claims.
Let's suppose that Iran does "sponsor" Hezbollah and Hamas. It would have to go a long way even to approach U.S. "sponsorship" for the opposing terrorists.
I have read that Iran does indeed supply weapons to Hezbollah and Hamas, two independent, nationalist movements that have proved themselves to be viable opponents of Zionist racism and land grabs in the Middle East. The Lebanese and Palestinian peoples, not Iran, “sponsor” Hezbollah and Hamas. This unwelcome truth, however, doesn’t square well with the Pentagon-sanctioned MSM propaganda campaign to prepare the U.S. public for war with Iran. According to the official MSM narrative, Iran is a terrorist state that sponsors client terror organizations, which have little popular legitimacy other than as stalking horses for Iran.
We are at war in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan's tribal areas, Yemen. The national debt is at 14 trillion dollars and growing. Joining Israel in fighting Iran will destroy us. China, most likely, will cash in its treasury bonds. The consequences can not be fully known but they will be BAD. Where are the peacemakers?
Where are the leaders with just plain common sence? Have all of our elected official sworn loyalty to Israel over all? Does anyone in D.C. give a hoot about the people of the United States?
These constant and growing wars are going to cause the collapse of our nation. We have already lost our democracy. I don't know how we can stop this madness. Maybe if we stop paying taxes we can stop the wars. Rich people don't pay, why should we?
Unfortunately for those who would like to see peace in the Middle East, the only way for Palestine to get relief from the heel of the Zionist boot is for Iran to take the lead in standing up to Israel. They are not going to do it unless they are attacked. Their rise as a player in the region is aided by obtaining a nuclear weapon, which will do nothing to help Palestine. Palestinians have always be occupied.
The Jews could have improved the economic lot of everyone in Palestine just as they have created a viable nation for Jews to live in. The Jews, instead, chose to become the most violent racists since the Nazis. Palestinians have always been subjugated, yet have endured. Unfortunately, Israeli racism against the inhabitants of the land they want has prevented them from sharing the abundance they created by bringing western technology to the agriculture of the region. Why care a damn about the Palestinians has been the attitude and it shows in the economic disparity between the Jews and Palestinians that has grown since 1947.
If Palestinians are to ever have a chance of surviving in Palestine, Israel must continue to irritate the entire Arab and Muslim world. Repetition of brutality is the best way to inflame the Arab street, a long dismissed demographic, in the equation. If, indeed, Iran is willing to use oil as weapon, mine the harbor, set itself on disrupting the oil to the rest of the world as it defends Islam from its enemies, the stage could be set for a resounding defeat of Israel and its lapdog, the United States.
Anything that requires Israel to retreat even an inch from its land grab will be a victory for Palestine. Oil is the only real weapon that the Middle East has. The wealth generated by their oil, for the most part has been badly distributed by the oligarchy. This creates a climate where US and Israeli air power will not be enough to stop the power that could be unleashed against Israel if it can be attacked on all geographic, economic, and political fronts.
“The Jews, instead, chose to become the most violent racists since the Nazis.”
Damnliberal, are you referring to Jews as a religious group, ethnic group, race, or what? In my experience, most Jews, broadly defined as a diverse social/ethnic group, reject the racist supremacy implicit in Zionist ideology.
No nation, unless they are attacked will attack Israel. Why: because they have nuclear weapons to retaliate with. All countries near and far lose.
Does Iran have nuclear weapons? The sooner the better. Why because then no one will dare attack them. Again it is called MAD: mutually assured destruction.
How easily so many forget. The death paradox is ' If all countries had nuclear weapons, then all countries would have peace. That is until someday some Leader thought he had a better smarter way to attack and defend.
Isn't that what 'think tanks' are paid to do? If they don't come with a better attack plan, they don't get paid.
So it seems that the people of this planet are doomed if they don't all have nuclear weapons and doomed if they do.
I can see Dr. Stranglove riding that bunker buster low yield nuke bomb now.
SPLAT! Dead on arrival! I imagine him to be Dick Chezny singing 'Unchain my heart, baby set me free"
M.A.D - Mutual Assured Destruction - is the doctrine of military strategy in which a full scale use of nuclear weapons by one of two opposing sides would result in the destruction of both the attacker and the defender.
The theory, is that no one will initiate a conflict because they know such a conflict means their own destruction.
With regards to Iran, there are two problems with this concept.
1. A nuclear Iran will trigger a nuclear arm race in the Middle-East. Countries like Saudi-Arabia, Turkey and Egypt would want nukes too. Then other countries and smaller organizations.
2. Iran is a fundamentalist theocracy ruled by people who believe that if they die in a holy war, they will hasten the arrival of the hidden Imam, and will go to Heaven. - Hence - they may not be deterred by the M.A.D principle.
Me thinks you don't know Muslims very well. I am married to one; and even the stupid ones don't want to die before its time.
Besides the big Bosses are usualy educated; thereby leaving only the Dick (swiss) Chezey types to drop them nukes. Last I heard he was Amerikan and MAD as hell.
Not part of the Brookings game but from the article:
"Tensions over Iran's nuclear program rose again this week after the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog reported that the country could be secretly developing a nuclear warhead to be placed atop a ballistic missile. Additionally, Iran has begun enriching uranium closer to the purity level needed for use in a nuclear weapon."
Iran had been enriching uranium to under 10% U-235 enrichment. It announced that it is going to enrich to 20% U-235 to create isotopes for medical purposes. There have been back-channel efforts for years to avoid this, with Russia as probably the prime interlocutor.
Weapons-grade uranium would have to approach 90% U-235.
The article says "Iran has begun enriching uranium closer to the purity level needed for use in a nuclear weapon." Technically correct, but how is 20% CLOSE to 90%.
Iran "...could be secretly developing a nuclear warhead to be placed atop a ballistic missile." Ostensibly Iran could then use it on Israel. But if it did so proactively, the cloud of radiation resulting would probably kill more muslims than jews. Depending on the wind, Lebanon could die. The only possible purpose for an Iranian nuclear missile is DEFENSIVE.
Also, I heard an NPR report earlier today that asserted that Iran is committed to the destruction of the State of Israel. Another lie. Iran is committed to the destruction of Zionism as it is expressed in the Middle East, namely through the seizure of the lands of other peoples, the displacements of millions of refugees into other countries, and the destruction of the Palestinian infrastructure. Israel is in violation of so many UN Resolutions that one loses count.
Most of the rest of the world knows this. Why don't Americans? Because they are being actively brainwashed by the MSM.
What really pisses off U.S. elites is that, with some early exceptions immediately following the 1979 Revolution, the leadership of Iran has shown incredible clarity of purpose and intent. This fact flies in the face of the article's claim: "How Iran's notoriously opaque and fractious leadership would react in a real crisis is particularly hard to divine." Total bullshit, but the American people are made more ignorant by that allegation. Meanwhile, we have "bipartisanship" here at home! Eh?
People need to ask themselves, How is it that a bunch of evangelical muslims learned how to ENRICH uranium, when I can't even begin to think about rebuilding my grandfather's alcohol still, and I'm supposed to have a high IQ? Isn't there something called "science" involved here?
I had thought that McClatchy was one of the few remaining traditional news sources of integrity. This article raises doubts on that score.
But it is interesting reading, including the thread.
-30-
OleManRiver: "I heard an NPR report earlier today that asserted that Iran is committed to the destruction of the State of Israel. Another lie."
If this is true, that how can you explain this?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FckLO8HcNyo
Ahmadinejad is clearly inciting the audience with "Death to Israel", and NOT with "End Zionism."
hahahaha!!! you are truly grasping...you are a pathetic little zionist insect!
Horrified: "hahahaha!!! you are truly grasping...you are a pathetic little zionist insect!"
It seems that you, Horrified, being a pro-nuclear pro ethnic war crime person, share another common attribute with some of the worse war criminals. You compare people to animals. What you do here is called "dehumanization." On many cases, that's the first step in preparing public opinion for genocide.
I'm not an insect. I'm human.
Just in case you don't realise it, you're playing Letto's game of provoking angry responses that detract and distract from rational discussion. Admittedly, it's sometimes very difficult to resist the temptation as he plays the game quite well.
True.
CD is a place that supports free speech and diversity of views. We don't need to agree on everything. Nevertheless, the discussion should be civilized and without name calling.
Letto, racists like you shouldn’t be allowed to disseminate your lies on public forums, but then again it’s good of you to keep reminding us exactly why Zionism deserves to be vilified. Every time you post you make a new enemy.
I'm not racist as you claim, nor am I an incest as Horrified claims.
Can you prove or provide any evidence for your claim? Or, are you simply one of the people who chose to reduce the level of this discussion to name calling?
As 99% agree this is Zionist BS agit prop.
They were those reports a couple of months ago about a israeli nuclear sub and cruiser off Iran.
One poster claimed Obomber got the Nobel for stopping israels imminent attack.
As I see it Isreal has 100's of deliverable Nukes, correct?
Iran has no nukes and it has only a handful of clumsy rockets that can barely make it to israel.
Therefore Irans Large well equiped army and great landmass is irrelevant in the face of enough nukes to fry the whole of Iran ten times if in fact israel has enough missiles to launch 200 nukes, but hitting the ten largest cities would pretty much destroy Iran, since it lacks large enough Navy and air force to threaten isreal unless it does indeed have enough planes to penetrate israeli air space and do significant damage.
And this is with Rahm son of Irgun, only supplying, arms,munitions, money, technolgy and intelligence to israel, gee that is quite a bit isn't it?
I have 10 neighbors. I have ten really big guns. Two of them neighbors each have two or three guns each. But I have decided that I don't want any more neighbors to have guns. SO I am going to tell those ones they can't go buy guns. Why? I am going to let the ones who have guns threaten those people when they try to buy guns. Why? And I am going to pay them lots of money to threaten those people to not buy guns. Why? And when they decide to get one gun to cover a couple of them, then I will let slip that it's now ok to take one or two of my big guns and go blow up their houses and kill their kids when they attempt to buy a gun..WHY? WTF? Guns and bombs do not kill people, people kill people. Why? WTF?
Nuclear bombs are not handguns. Humanity won't survive if you'll allow everyone to buy nukes at the local gun shop.
Imagine that all the news articals about hate crimes, or someone going postal, will be replaced with 'a city was wiped out in a nuclear explosion.'
Humanity won't survive if you allow ANYONE to own nukes.
As long as some people have nukes, other people who don't have them will want them. And the people, such as you, who want to hold onto your nukes, while preventing other people from having them, are like Canute trying to stop the tide, or like Bill Gates once claiming that no one wants to use the internet. Technological advancement will render the idea of some people having nukes, while others do not, completely obsolete.
I don't have nukes, rfloh. As far as I know, there are no nukes in Canada.
I noticed that not one of the destructive, costly or unintended consequences of the predicted outcome of this 'game' included loss of life. Perhaps I shouldn't have been surprised that killing thousands if not hundreds of thousands of Iranians and no doubt others, was simply of no importance to these players or to Mr. Strobel the reporter. But after reading more than 30 comments here I was shocked that I didn't see any of you mention this as a concern either.
If we can't stay connected to the real values here, to the real flesh and blood consequences of what our governments are doing, then we have already lost.
Very true. It's all framed in terms of how aggression might "backfire" on the aggressors. Self-absorbed "exceptionalism" seems very deeply ingrained in the American psyche, even amongst those who consciously deplore it.
remember the pre-2003 war game about a US invasion of Iraq?
remember how the US lost it?
remember how this was ignored?
more importantly: remember the concurrency of war games being run on sept11, 2001?
remember the scenario of one was planes flying into buildings?
remember how "no one could imagine"?
remember.
We seem to be very sensitive about other countries having atomic bombs. Is it guilt?
So what if Iran as a few. Pakistan has a bunch, as does North Korea. Israel has a lot of them.
If Iran were to use them, their whole country would be toast. We loose say New York or Chicago maybe both. That's the end of those cities but not the rest of the nation. Cities are where most of the liberals reside anyway.
It must be that the US is the only country that really should have "the bomb" since we are the ones that have already used it. We are the ones that have shown that we are not chicken to use it.
There are two ways to be sure that a nuclear war does not happened on planet Earth.
1. No nation posses a nuclear arsenal.
2. All or most nation have a nuclear arsenal.
The first is a sane choice but this choice is no longer available because a few nations which have the arsenals will never give it up. Many reasons are advanced for this.
The second choice is insane but will work to prevent a nuclear war breaking out because of the knowledge that anyone starting a nuclear war will ITSELF perish, with or without a national, regional or global defence system against nuclear second strike in place. Retaliation should be 100 percent guaranteed with a "suitcase nuclear device" which must be invented very, very soon. Mutual guranteed destruction or MAD has been proven to be effective in preventing nuclear was for over half a century already.
In conclusion if either of the above two scenarios is not a reality planet Earth can never be safe from a nuclear holocaust.