Obama Administration Seeking Direct Line to Khamenei
Earlier this week, the Wonk Room’s Matt Duss said we needed less Kremlinology about Iranian politics and more focus on the Supreme Leader as the key decision-maker. Today, the Wall Street Journal reports that the administration is taking that advice to heart and “looking at ways to develop a direct line of communication to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.”
Sounds about right to me. There are a lot of issues we can (and should) be talking to Iranian officials about that are fairly low-level. We have not-so-different interests in Iraq and Afghanistan and there are lots of discussions that can be had at various levels about those things. But the Iranian nuclear program involves very deep questions about the strategic orientations of the United States and Iran. Only Khamenei can make those decisions.
89 Responses to “Obama Administration Seeking Direct Line to Khamenei”
Register
RSSLogin
Topic Cloud
ArchivesBlog RollAbout Matt YglesiasContact Me
Donate
March 13th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
McCain could send him some angry tweets.
March 13th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
This is a good move – if in fact is true.
One thing is for sure, Khamenei, under no circumstance, would agree to stop Iran’s uranium enrichment program. Iran has every right as an NPT signatory to pursue peaceful nuclear program. It’d be a grave mistake, if Obama administration followed Bush’s path i.e. letting thugs in Israel lobby dictate the format of negotiations.
March 13th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
If we’re looking to change their mind about us, is it such a smart move to start with the classic supervillain line of “We’re not so different, you and I?” Perhaps then we could explain our plans in specific detail, leaving just enough time for the Supreme Leader to defeat them and deliver a witty quip?
Didn’t the stimulus package include funds for volcano research? Secret lair, anyone?
March 13th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
An example of an ulber thug. He acts like a thug, walks like thug and certainly barks like a thug:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-dershowitz/defeating-freeman-a-patri_b_174656.html
March 13th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
Iranian Dude: I attended a presentation by Vali Nasr when he was still associated with the Naval War College. He stated that Iran, like any rational state, wants a comprehensive deal. They are not going to just discuss their nuclear program. They want to discuss their entire relationship with the US.
Until our diplomats realize that, nothing is gonna change.
March 13th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
By the way, Sullivan is back to his crazy self:
…..
March 13th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
But we can’t do that…Ahmadinejad is the guy that calls all the shots…He’s the second-coming of Hitler, right?
Seriously though, I don’t know if a direct line is a good idea. Take a look at that letter that Rohani wrote to Time magazine sometime back. I think that you’re better off going through channels on this one to work up to the top. A letter directly to Khamenei would likely be met with ridicule…Remember, what we want to do is talk to them about the nukes…we’re in no position to make demands.
And if Sullivan is back to his neoconish ways, that’s really not very intelligent. What we’re looking for here is a “bomb in the basement.” That’s the best we’re gonna get.
March 13th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
A president making overtures to the Supreme Leader of Iran, following a president that pretended like however-you-spell it was the last word on Iran—after a president that referred to Iran as the “Axis of Evil”— is a good start imo. If the Ayatollah doesn’t want to enter into talks with Obama directly, he can recommend one of his people for talks, and Obama can graciously accept.
March 13th, 2009 at 1:16 pm
Re Iranian Dude
All our discussions with the mad mullahs in Tehran should be done through the barrel of a gun, specifically some 15 megaton bombs on Iranian nuclear weapons facilities. As Curtis Lemay would say, make a parking lot out of Iran.
March 13th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
Let’s parachute SLC over Teheran armed with a gun and let him fight with glory to keep us safe from the terrorists!
March 13th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
SLC,
Citing Curtis LeMay doesn’t really help your argument. Moreover, we tried sending an entire fleet to intimidate these guys…and that didn’t work either.
Unless you’re prepared to actually use those weapons (and you’d have to be insane to), they’re not going to budge, because they calculate (correctly) that we’re not insane.
wiley,
Trial and error is not the best way to conduct a foreign policy. You can’t go directly to the top…that’s the reality in this case. God knows that people like Hillary don’t get that.
March 13th, 2009 at 1:27 pm
Also, I’d be curious to hear what you guys think that we can get out of this, and what it will cost.
I think we MIGHT be able to entice them not to test. But we’re never going to get rid of their indigenous capability. For that, it’s going to be full diplo relations and no more sanctions. Perhaps we can talk some more on the terror issue, but we won’t get any firm committments.
Of course, that’s going to be met with abject horror from the lobby…So it will be interesting to see if they have the guts to propose that offer. Per my previous posts, I don’t think that Hillary (and certainly not Ross) are interested in going down that route. I think they’ll simply improve the carrots but demand that they give up enrichment or their reactor. I suppose that the heavy water reactor (Arak) might be another chip…but that really depends on whether or not the Iranians believe that they can get it up and running.
March 13th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
@Ed Smithe
I still think it’s a good idea. Ayatoollah Khamanei would not reject such dialogues – he knows the difficulty facing Iran at present. I am 100% certain that his confidenate Dr Larijani – Iran’s parliment speaker – would be his delegate in such talks.
March 13th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
IranianDude,
But what is that difficulty? They’ve got their man installed in Baghdad, they’re on their way (if they haven’t already) to developing a nuke, they’ve got surrogates (or allies) surrounding Israel and making life difficult for them, the US is leaving Iraq and trying to keep a much more amenable government in Afghanistan.
I mean, their economy sucks…but their economy has sucked since the revolution. And oil will be coming back (not to 150 but certainly to the 70-90) range.
I think you’re overestimating our leverage in this case.
March 13th, 2009 at 1:51 pm
Re Ed Smithe
It’s really very simple. One doesn’t negotiate with Hitler. Chamberlain made that mistake and the world paid for it.
March 13th, 2009 at 1:53 pm
@ Ed Smithe
I know for fact that sanctions (even though it was imposed unfairly) have had a huge imapct on Iran’s economy. Ayatollah Khamenei knows this very well. US economic sanctions — incidentally renewed today by Obama (http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1070920.html) — has systematically hurt a lot of industries. Obama’s administration have enough administration to get some serious commitements from Iranians.
In a nutshell:
1- Guarantee security for the country
2- Lose the regime change approach
3- Remove sanctions
Demand:
1- Full coopeartion in Afghanistan
2- Full cooperation in Iraq
3- Expedaite Israel/Palestinian peace process (Iran wants and demands involvment)
4- Have a ton of IAEA officials monitor Iran’s nuclear program
5- Officially recognize the state of Israel
March 13th, 2009 at 1:55 pm
Argh …
have enough administration -> have enough leverage
March 13th, 2009 at 1:58 pm
http://www.derechos.org/nizkor/peace/icjopinion/weeramantry.html
March 13th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
@Wiley
Hence the case to start Israel’s nuclear disarmement process …
March 13th, 2009 at 2:26 pm
“One doesn’t negotiate with Hitler. Chamberlain made that mistake and the world paid for it.”
Chamberlain did nothing wrong in negotiating. What he did wrong was to accept a bad deal. Negotiations are free to fail. In fact they fail the time. Merely talking to someone doesn’t mean the world will end. But this case is quite a bit different. In Hitler, we had an enemy that was capable of going up against many armies at once and had already shown extreme belligerence. Iran has the capability of fighting a weak army to a stalemate and hasn’t invaded anyone in two centuries. The worst that could happen if Khamenei fails to uphold an agreement is that we would go to war against them. Given that war is the first option for the Iran-haters, how is it an unacceptable second option? The key thing is strict verification and making it clear that military action would follow any non-compliance. Iran says its program is peaceful. That may or not be the case. But if it’s a bluff, then let’s call it. If we find a single gram of uranium enriched beyond 8%, the deal’s off and we can bomb any facility in violation.
March 13th, 2009 at 2:35 pm
SLC,
I don’t know why I’m bothering, but whatever. What conceivable threat does Iran pose to the United States that would warrant wholesale genocide of the Iranian people (turning Iran into a parking lot, as you put it)? Also, how many countries has Iran invaded compared to the number Nazi Germany invaded? Hell, how many has Iran invaded compared to the number Israel has invaded?
March 13th, 2009 at 2:35 pm
@fostert
How can you bomb the knowlege? they’ve acquired the knowledge to enrich uranium.
And suppose you decide waging a war is the only option. Do you think Ayatollah Khamenei hasn’t thought about this scenario? Why do you think Iran has buit more than 4 thousands long range Shahab III missile?
March 13th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
Why not? Fully normalized relations, no sanctions, and a ironclad deal to supply whatever nuclear fuel they would otherwise be producing would at least be a tempting offer.
Unless we detect some highly enriched uranium or some evidence of reprocessing plutonium from spent fuel, we’ve got zero standing to bust out the bombfest. Hell, as long as the fuel is being properly monitored, a nuclear powered (as opposed to nuclear armed) Iran poses no materially greater theat to Israel or the US than an Iran that gets all its juice from oil or gas. The idea that we should hit their nuclear weapon locations (really? we know they have some, and where they’re located?) with megatons of nuclear warheads is an impressive combination of bloodthirsty and stupid.
March 13th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
Re fostert
Mr. fostert is 100% wrong. Chamberlain went into the Munich negotiations thinking that his opponent was someone who could be reasoned with. As Churchill warned before the conference, Hitler had an agenda and was, in addition, a megalomaniac and could not be reasoned with. Instead of negotiating away Czechoslovakias’ independence, he should have given Hitler an ultimatum. An invasion of Czechoslovakia would be considered by Britain and France an act of war against them and would be treated accordingly. Had he done so, it is highly likely that the German General Staff would have precipitated a coup to remove Hitler from power, planning for which was already underway, being as how they were well aware that Germany was that the German armed forces were in no condition to initiate hostilities at that time, thus saving untold millions of lives lost in WW 2.
Re Wiley
The essay, in part reproduced by Mr. Wiley contains a lot of truth, although the danger from fallout from large scale hydrogen bombs can be mitigated by adjusting the firing mechanism of the bombs to implode underground. However, if one is going to make on omelet, one will have to break a few egg shells.
Re Iranian Dude
3- Expedaite Israel/Palestinian peace process (Iran wants and demands involvment)
Not true. The current Iranian government is opposed to any peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians and is actively arming Hizbollah and Hamas for the purpose of preventing any such agreement.
Hence the case to start Israel’s nuclear disarmement process
Not going to happen. Given the huge disparity in population between Israel and the Arab world, there is no possibility that Israel will give up its 200 – 600 nuclear devices. They are its ace in the hole against a second Holocaust (the Iranian Government denies that the first Holocaust took place).
5- Officially recognize the state of Israel
Not going to happen. In addition to the resentment that the mullahs feel toward the non-Muslim State of Israel being in the middle of the Muslim world, they are also incensed by the close relationship between Israel and the Shah which existed before his abdication.
March 13th, 2009 at 3:03 pm
Well, Irandude, I think we should get going with our own disarmament process, and be very open about Israel’s status. Most Americans have no idea that Israel has undeclared nuclear weapons, long-range missiles, and nuclear armed submarines; and is not (unlike Iran) signatory to the NPT.
As long as Iran is complying with the treaty and inspectors, I see no reason to demand anything from them that we don’t demand of all other nations that have nuclear energy and are signatories to the NPT.
March 13th, 2009 at 3:15 pm
“Instead of negotiating away Czechoslovakias’ independence, he should have given Hitler an ultimatum.”
Yes, but he could have offered that ultimatum at the negotiations. The mere fact that he was in Munich and not London did not prevent him from making that ultimatum. You are arguing that simply offering up negotiations forces the results of the negotiations. I’m saying anything can happen in negotiations. Until you can prove that there was something in Munich’s water that brainwashed Chamberlain into accepting the deal, you don’t have an argument. He could have issued an ultimatum in Munich, he simply chose no to. The fact that there are bad negotiators in the world does not mean that negotiations always produce bad results. Yes, Chamberlain made a bad deal, but that’s an argument I’ve already conceded. The question is whether negotiations inherently result in bad deals. History has shown that negotiations can produce good results.
“(the Iranian Government denies that the first Holocaust took place)”
The Catholic Church apparently does too. Should we break off diplomatic relations with the Vatican? Given the Vatican’s history of slaughtering Jews in Palestine, maybe we should. Actually, all of Europe has a history of slaughtering Jews. Why do we talk to any of them?
March 13th, 2009 at 3:16 pm
SLC, the excerpt included the following:
A really good example of bland and disembodied language would be
Mitigating the fallout does not change the fact of
Using conventional bombs on a nuclear power plant is severe. A 15 megaton bomb is unforgivable. That’s when I would STOP supporting Israel’s right to exist.
AND it’s Ms. Wiley to you.
March 13th, 2009 at 3:20 pm
@daveNYC
There’s a concept in Shia muslem called Hagh – it litereally means ‘right’. Iranian government has made the case that peaceful nuclear program is our Hagh (right) and the west wants to deprive us of this right.
They have no problem being monitored but stopping uranium enrichment is off the table.
March 13th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
Re fostert
I think that the problem we are having is what is meant by negotiations. If chamberlain had gone to Munich for the purpose of giving Hitler an ultimatum, that would not constitute negotiations IMHO. By the way, the claim that the Vatican has denied the Holocaust is false. I am no great fan of Joe the Rat but he made it clear that he mishandled the reinstatement of Mr. Williamson and that the latters’ disbelief is unacceptable.
March 13th, 2009 at 3:38 pm
Fostert, perhaps you didn’t get the memo….
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29157071/
March 13th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
SLC,
Who’s Hitler in the Iranian regime?
March 13th, 2009 at 3:47 pm
Iraniandude,
Ok, so sanctions have had an effect on the country. How has that impacted the nuclear program? From my standpoint, sanctions, if anything, have accelerated the program. Remember, the objective is to ensure that the nuclear program isn’t a threat to the U.S. or the region. There shouldn’t be any other objective.
As for you list, let me play the part of Iran.
In a nutshell:
1- Guarantee security for the country (that doesn’t mean anything, there aren’t permanent guarantees, just permanent interests)
2- Lose the regime change approach (see above)
3- Remove sanctions (ok, what about treating us like an equal, currently we own you regionally).
Demand:
1- Full coopeartion in Afghanistan (like what?)
2- Full cooperation in Iraq (displace our boy in Baghdad? no.)
3- Expedaite Israel/Palestinian peace process (Iran wants and demands involvment) (how can we do that when the Israelis keep killing innocent people [their view not mine] and do you really think we have that much power)
4- Have a ton of IAEA officials monitor Iran’s nuclear program (no.)
5- Officially recognize the state of Israel (no.)
March 13th, 2009 at 3:47 pm
Re Wiley
AND it’s Ms. Wiley to you.
Sorry about that. It will be Ms. Wiley from here onward.
Using conventional bombs on a nuclear power plant is severe. A 15 megaton bomb is unforgivable. That’s when I would STOP supporting Israel’s right to exist.
If a bomb of this size were to be used, it would have to be delivered by a B52 of the US Air force. I would wager serious money that Israel does not have such a bomb, mainly because they have no means to deliver a weapon of that size. The US is certainly not going to sell or loan a B52 to Israel or anybody else for that matter.
March 13th, 2009 at 3:48 pm
There is no comparison between Iran and the Third Reich, or any Iranian leader and Hitler. Hitler isn’t Hitler anymore, it’s such an overwrought epithet. Iran is invading no one and has no program to exterminate any people.
March 13th, 2009 at 3:48 pm
Iraniandude,
These guys are smart and ruthless. Put yourself in their shoes…why would you ask for less when you could ask for more?
March 13th, 2009 at 3:51 pm
SLC,
No, that’s not correct about the size of the weapon. Now, whether or not Israel has the capability is an entirely different issue.
Moreover, it’s important to remember that most warheads (these days) are in the 1 megaton range thanks in part to improved guidance. It’s impractical to produce a 15MT warhead when you can get the job done with at 750KT warhead.
March 13th, 2009 at 3:57 pm
A 15 megaton warhead can be mounted on an ICBM. The U.S. has plenty of 20 megaton warheads on missiles, and the Russians have 40 megaton warheads.
March 13th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
@Ed Smithe #32
Security guarantee is important for Iranians. They’ve been living under constant threats since ‘79.
As for the sanctions, I think it has slowed down the nuclear program not halted.
Iran can play a vital role in stablizing Iraq and containing Afghanistan. Both the US and Iran have interests in both countries. It’s something to start your negotiotions.
As for Israel, Iran may not officially recognize the state of Israel but can wield a great deal of influence over both Hamas and Hezbollah – however that might benefit both parties.
Ed Smithe @ 35
Iranians, for historical reason, are very skeptical when there are talks about US/Iran relations. As former president Khatami mentioned once: “Both countries have buit a tall war of mistrust between one another.” Sure, it’s a difficult and slow task to build trust but I think we’ve got to start somewhere.
March 13th, 2009 at 4:00 pm
I need to learn how to type. My apologies … it should read tall wall not war.
Cheers.
March 13th, 2009 at 4:03 pm
Can we please not talk about multi megaton nuclear warheads? It gives me a serious chill this Friday afternoon. My parents, two sisters, grandparents, close relatives etc. live in Iran for crying out loud.
Whether you approve of Iran’s government or not my loved ones deserve to live just like yours.
March 13th, 2009 at 4:12 pm
Re wiley
Would Ms. Wiley care to provide a source for the claim that 15 megaton bombs can be carried on any US missile. The largest bomb that any US missile could carry was a 5 megaton bomb on the Atlas II which was taken out of the inventory at least 30 years ago, being as how it was a liquid fueled missile. The only US weapon system that can deliver a 15 megaton bomb is the B52 which can carry up to 4 of them.
Re Ed Smithe
The reason we have gone to smaller bombs is because the latest US missiles are designed to carry MIRVs which can hit multiple targets from one missile, thus making an anti-missile system impractical.
In principal, the missiles that are used for the shuttle could be used to deliver a 15 megaton bomb; however, being liquid fueled, they are not a practical weapons system, all of which are solid fueled. A solid fueled missile can be launched on short notice because the fuel can be stored in the missile while a liquid fueled missile can take several days to be made ready for launch. It is impractical to store the liquid fuel on missiles for extended periods of time.
March 13th, 2009 at 4:20 pm
Iraniandude,
Sorry to hear that your family lives over there.
Sure, security guarantees are important, but let’s not pretend that they are much of a bargaining chip. What enforces a security guarantee? That’s just icing on a much larger cake.
As for the program…they’re done. They have the capability to produce fissionable material. The question now is will they make (and test) a weapon. We’re not going to take that capability away from them…it’s far too valuable to lose (and I’d argue to SLC it’s far to valuable to use).
On Afghanistan, that’s another icing on the cake issue. They don’t create many problems there so there’s not much that they can do to change the dynamic. The problem is the fact that we’re trying to build a functioning state out of an area of the world that has never really functioned. Moreover, our “allies” (Pakistan) are not terrible capable of helping us in the ways that we need to be helped to keep that situation from boiling over. We need to be real about what we can and can’t accomplish over there, and Iran doesn’t really move the needle too much.
As for Hamas and Hezbollah, I disagree with Iran’s influence over them (or for that matter their willingness to just drop the issue that, in part, keeps them relevant and in power).
On starting somewhere, my impression (and arguments) are more “inside baseball.” What I don’t want to see is a repeat of the Russia disaster, thanks in large part, to the morons (read Wilsonians) over at State. We need to be patient and realistic. I agree with you 100% that we need to start somewhere, which is why I advise that we don’t start at the top. This has backchannel written all over it…and I’d imagine that we’re doing that right now. What I am unsure about is our expectations…and what I worry about is that they are unrealistic given the players (Ross and Clinton), both of which have more in common with the neocons than you and I have with one another on this particular subject.
March 13th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
SLC,
You’re partially right. However the real reason is that our guidance systems are so accurate that you don’t need to use a weapon that large. Frankly, we could use a much larger yielding warhead on our MIRVs, but we don’t need to because a 750KT gets it done (in other words taking out a strategic target like a missile silo).
As for your analysis of fuels, I don’t know where you’re going with this. Strategic nuclear defense (AND I HIGHLIGHT THE WORD DEFENSE…NOT PREVENTIVE WAR) is about neutralizing nuclear threats…it’s not about non nuclear targets of choice. We don’t use 15MT warheads because we’re not interested in using an explosive to hammer a nail.
I would halt this conversation. It’s as silly as it is completely unrealistic.
March 13th, 2009 at 4:27 pm
Also SLC, you didn’t answer my question. Who’s Hitler in the Iranian regime? You’ve got to give me one person who calls the shots and is planning to militarily take over the region.
March 13th, 2009 at 4:52 pm
SLC,
I’m going to assume that you’ve come to your senses and recognize that there is no “Hitler” in this regime. Just a bunch of scumbags that are trying to ensure that they remain in power.
We’ve dealt with regimes like that time and time again throughout our history. And as far as I can tell, we’ve had a great deal more success not going to war with these “problem children” than we have going to war with them.
March 13th, 2009 at 4:52 pm
Re Ed Smithe
Currently, Mr. Amadinejad is Hitler, since he talks like Hitler did. Like Hitler, he is a megalomaniac with delusions of grandeur. Of course, unlike Hitler, at the moment, he can’t do much more then run his mouth and use Hamas and Hizbollah to irritate Israel. However, give him some nuclear weapons and he suddenly becomes a player, allowing him to do more then just irritate Israel and, in Iraq, the US.
However, Mr. Smithe should also consider what the effect of a nuclear armed Iran would have on Saudi Arabia and Egypt, who have not, apparently, been too concerned about Israels’ nuclear arsenal which has been around for at least 35 years.
1. They would be forced to consider whether it would make sense for them to develop nuclear weapons in response. Like Israel, could they really depend on the US to deter an Iranian first strike?
2. If they don’t have them and Iran does, they would become liable to nuclear blackmail. For instance, the Iranian government could order Saudi Arabia to reduce its oil output in order to raise the price and make Irans’ oil more lucrative.
Relative to liquid fueled missiles vs solid fueled missiles, the problem is that a liquid fueled missile which takes 2 days to fuel up isn’t much of a nuclear deterrent as a first strike by the opposition has an excellent chance of destroying them on the ground. A solid fueled missile, on the other hand, is already fueled and can be fired at very short notice. An opponents’ first strike could not be sure of getting them before launch and thus they present a much better deterrent.
The problem is that the energy content of solid fueled missiles, per pound of fuel, is considerably less then for liquid fueled missiles (the reason why the rockets used for the shuttle are liquid fueled).
March 13th, 2009 at 4:55 pm
WTF are you talking about? The shuttle has two solid rocket boosters attached to the fuel tank, and three liquid fueled engines on the shuttle itself. I doubt that the boosters could be used as offensive weapons though, they aren’t exactly designed to be used as stand-alone items. Also, our original ICBMs were all liquid fueled. Being liquid fueled makes maintenance a pain in the ass, but by itself does not make a particular launcher unusable as a weapon system.
While we don’t have any 15MT devices in our stockpile, and I really doubt that Israel would have wasted any of it’s nuclear material on something so large and relatively inefficient, we do have the B83 which can do 1.5MT and can be dropped from pretty much any plane worth mentioning in our air force.
March 13th, 2009 at 5:05 pm
Currently, Mr. Amadinejad is Hitler, since he talks like Hitler did. Like Hitler, he is a megalomaniac with delusions of grandeur.
Does he control a military and industrial superpower like Hitler?
However, give him some nuclear weapons and he suddenly becomes a player, allowing him to do more then just irritate Israel and, in Iraq, the US.
Who’s going to give them to him? He doesn’t even control Iran’s foreign policy.
March 13th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
SLC,
As a follow-up to that question, will you still consider Ahmadinejad Hitler if he loses the upcoming election?
Secondly, I’d remind you SLC that in the Iranian system, the Supreme Leader is the one in charge of the military of Iran. Did Hitler have a higher-up that overruled him on military issues in Nazi Germany?
As for proliferation across the Middle East, I don’t think it’s so cut and dry to say that a limited strike (or are you advocating invasion) will deter Turkey, Saudi and Egypt (perhaps Syria) when it comes to the development of a nuclear program. In fact, I don’t know if there’s anything we can do to deter that. What I do think we can hope for is that we can entice these regimes to keep their nuclear programs a “screw-turn” away from becoming weapons programs. Iran falls into that category as well.
As for the Saudis, no, I’d disagree with you on Israel. In fact, they’ve been very concerned about Israel’s program for sometime. What keeps them in line is the fact that we give them billions of dollars and don’t have a crazy relationship with them like we do Iran. BTW, can you remind me how many of the 9/11 hijackers were Iranian?
As for Blackmail, that’s laughable. So you’re telling me that Iran would be prepared to use a nuclear weapon if Saudi Arabia pumped too much oil? Tell me, how stable a regime do you think North Korea is these days? When was the last time that they used their nuclear weapons to blackmail South Korea?
March 13th, 2009 at 5:14 pm
“If chamberlain had gone to Munich for the purpose of giving Hitler an ultimatum, that would not constitute negotiations IMHO.”
I’d agree. But if Chamberlain went to Munich thinking there was room for compromise, then realized he was wrong and issued an ultimatum, it would still be negotiation. In fact, the very definition of ‘negotiation’ precludes predetermined results. Your example is a predetermined outcome. Negotiations can both open and close minds. The way we should approach the negotiations is to be very wary but still open to compromise. If things go bad, and our wariness proves to be wise, we can always fall back on issuing an ultimatum. That was the very reason I said “negotiations are free to fail.” And there’s always the possibility that the negotiations could go well. In that case, Reagan’s words “trust, but verify” would be very applicable. But the reason negotiations should be done first is because leaders usually say different things in private than in public. We can structure a back room deal that allows everyone to give a little without losing face. If we resort to public shouting matches, leaders get backed into rigid positions because they don’t want to look weak. Bush’s threats and ultimatums towards North Korea did nothing to stop them from reprocessing plutonium and building bombs. Clinton’s negotiations did. As for your assertion that an ultimatum from Chamberlain would have stopped Hitler in his tracks, I really doubt it. Hitler knew damn well there would be serious retaliation if he invaded France, and he did it anyway. Unreasonable people do not to respond to ultimatums any more than they respond to negotiations.
March 13th, 2009 at 5:20 pm
Guys, enough with debating 1939…Good Lord!
In 1939, was Hitler in danger of losing his job, and secondarily, did he answer to someone else regarding the German military?
Come on…Don’t debate history with her. You might as well debate whether or not Ahmadinejad is really the 12th Iman.
March 13th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
“As for the program…they’re done. They have the capability to produce fissionable material.”
Umm no. The United States had the capability of producing fissionable material before World War II started. So why didn’t we just nuke Hitler when he invaded Poland? Well, because we didn’t have any bombs. So far, Iran has produced enough uranium enriched to 4% that they could produce one bomb if they further enriched it to 90%, which would take many months after they first kicked all the IAEC inspectors. And then they’d have to build a bomb after that. This is kind of like O’ Henry’s assertion to his editor when he was late writing “The Gift of the Magi.” To appease his editor, he wrote page numbers on a stack of blank sheets of paper and said “there, I’m done, now all I have to do is write it.”
March 13th, 2009 at 5:40 pm
fostert,
I’m not sure what part of “they have the capability to produce fissionable material” you’re disagreeing with me on.
The reason why we didn’t make a weapon in 1939 was because we didn’t understand the science. That’s no longer a burden these days…as even I could make a weapon with 20+ kilos of HEU. In fact, if you’d like to spend 10 minutes googling the subject…I imagine that you could figure out how to make a “gun-type” weapon too. Or do you think that the Iranian scientists aren’t that intelligent?
So no, it’s not like the “Gift of the Magi.” They can produce the stuff and the only way that you’re going to ENSURE that they can’t is if you invade them. These cascades don’t have to be very large (although they may take more time) so they can be easily hidden…and I’m going to guess that they learned from Osiriq and have redundancy.
Let me ask you, are you a conservative? Do you consider yourself one? If so, from one conservative to you…you’re not a conservative. Conservatives are supposed to analyze and examine facts. You haven’t done your homework on this stuff, which leads me to believe that you’re molding the facts to serve your own emotional ends…namely that we can stop Iran if we put our mind to it.
Short of invasion, we’ve failed to stop Iran. It’s over…now it’s time to salvage what we can to ensure that they don’t become a threat to us or the region.
March 13th, 2009 at 5:42 pm
And by the way, you can thank the previous President (and especially his VP) for the situation we’re in with Iran. They blew it.
March 13th, 2009 at 5:55 pm
Re fostert
I agree that the discussion about Germany in 1938 is rather far off the subject. However, apparently, Mr. fostert has a reading comprehension problem. I stated that an ultimatum to Hitler at the Munich conference might well have resulted in the removal of him from power by the General Staff, which considered him reckless and was already planning such a coup d’etat. I suggest that Mr. fostert refer to, “A History of the German General Staff,” by Walter Goerlitz.
Re Ed Smithe
Mr. Smithe makes a good point relative to the actual authority that Mr. Amadinejad has. However, I have seen no indication that the supreme leader, Mr. Ali Khamenei, in any way, shape, form, or regard differs from Mr. Amadinejad in his views on acquiring nuclear weapons or toward the events in Palestine.
Re daveNYC
Would Mr. daveNYC like to provide a link to his claim that the US currently has no 15 megaton bombs in its arsenal. The B52 was specifically designed to carry and deliver 4 such bombs when it was developed. Therefore, we certainly had some at one time and I think it unlikely that all of them were discarded. Now it is true that the largest bomb ever set off by the US was in the neighborhood of 6 megatons but my information is that it was a tamped down version of the larger one. By the way, the former Soviet Union set off a 57 megaton bomb, a video of which can be found on Youtube. It’s awesome!
March 13th, 2009 at 5:58 pm
We’re both wrong, SLC. A Titan used to carry a 9 megaton warhead. (I should have assumed I was lied to (again) and looked that up before speaking). The 15-25 megaton warheads have been retired, and the yields on our warheads have gotten progressively smaller, nevertheless there are MIRVS.
We’ve had plenty of warheads with 15 megaton yields or more—but you’re right—they were loaded on bombers.
I was reacting to your 15 megaton overkill, and would like to get closer to the point—
http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Tactical_nuclear_weapon
Even lower-yield tactical nukes used against a city can do incomparable damage–unlike anything we’ve seen. Also, yields are theoretical. Sure it’s physics, but we’ve shocked ourselves before.
More to the point
http://www.puaf.umd.edu/Fetter/1991-IS-WMD.pdf
Granted, Iran is not an Arab country, intercontinental is unambiguous. Israel is the country that’s threatening an attack. Israel already has the nuclear capability to effectively destroy Iran. So Israel would be well advised to STFU before it starts bombing active nuclear facilities (Bushehr was not yet on-line when Hussein bombed it). And it should not ever use nuclear weapons in a preventive strike. That would then become the ULTIMATE CRIME AGAINST PEACE and it would be very sad to see Israel do that to the world, to Iran, to itself. I think the threat itself may be criminal and I’m guessing it doesn’t win support for Israel among any but the most vicious, self-righteous, detached, and evangelically deluded supporters, when touted by anyone.
If Israel draws the line at bombing a working nuclear power plant with conventional weapons, then Iran has an incentive to hurry on-line if they want to generate nuclear power. And Israel may want to consider following Iran’s lead, joining the NPT, and letting in the inspectors so we can be honest about who’s zooming who.
March 13th, 2009 at 6:10 pm
Why do you guys humor SLC? Either he’s a parody, or he needs to move to Israel and join the IDF.
The US will spend $30 billion in aid to Israel, the richest country of the region with no real enemy whatsoever. My guess is that those dollars could find a better use here.
March 13th, 2009 at 6:44 pm
SLC,
Then you haven’t read enough. Iranian politics isn’t black and white. They don’t just stick to a specific line. There are shades of grey, and in those shades are the opportunities for the U.S. diplomatically. Read the Time article from his spokesman (perhaps his old spokesman now) Mr. Rohani. That’s a much more realistic line than anything I’ve ever seen reported by the neocon talking heads.
Moreover, actions speak louder than words. When the Iranians captured those Brits, did they put them to death? Where was Ahmadinejad for the time in which they were in Iranian custody?
March 13th, 2009 at 6:48 pm
Currently, Mr. Amadinejad is Hitler…
SLC, did you read the post you’re commenting on? Ahmadinejad is not the ruler of Iran! If you have to make a Nazi comparison, say that Ahmadinejad is Goebbels — that would at least be kinda clever.
…make a parking lot out of Iran.
Oh SLC, is there anyone against whom you don’t advocate genocide? Here I thought you only rooted for the mass murder of Palestinians (”Hama rules!”).
the problem is that a liquid fueled missile which takes 2 days to fuel up isn’t much of a nuclear deterrent
That’s not a problem for you, since you want to see the US conduct an unprovoked first strike. Fuel up at your leisure.
I have to ask — why do you want to use 15MT bombs? First, the US has no 15MT nukes (circa 2002) and has not had them since the 60’s. You just don’t need a bomb that big to destroy even a hardened target, not if you can aim your missile with any accuracy. I assume you want to use uber-bombs because you want to create as large a cloud of fallout as possible. Maybe you want to kill as many people as possible in Pakistan and Afghanistan (and elsewhere downwind), maybe you just want to raise worldwide leukemia rates — only you can say.
March 13th, 2009 at 6:58 pm
“I’m not sure what part of “they have the capability to produce fissionable material” you’re disagreeing with me on.”
I’m not disagreeing with you at all on it. And I will freely admit that the path between that and producing a bomb is shorter today than it was seventy years ago. I disagree with your assertion that a weapons manufacturing program is ‘done’ when fissionable material is produced. There are additional steps which you now seem willing to acknowledge. But you still seem to think these steps are trivial:
“That’s no longer a burden these days…as even I could make a weapon with 20+ kilos of HEU.”
Really? Are you just going to form the uranium with you hands? Surely not, you need some pretty sophisticated manufacturing capability to do that, and Iran doesn’t have it yet. And trust me, if you start asking the manufacturers who can perform such tasks, you’ll be getting a knock on your door from the Feds real soon. They also need a working design, which they do not yet have. As North Korea’s dud test shows, the designs you can get from AQ Khan don’t always work right. And AQ Khan knew a lot more about designing nuclear weapons than the crap designs you’ll find on Google. In theory, it is easy. In reality, it is not. If Iran worked hard, got the inspectors to leave, and got really lucky, they could have a bomb in 18 months. But that’s 18 months after they kick the inspectors out, which would obviously trigger a much more aggressive posture on our part.
“They can produce the stuff and the only way that you’re going to ENSURE that they can’t is if you invade them.”
No. Inspectors and cameras monitoring all the enriched uranium is sufficient. If any of it disappears, we can take those facilities out in a few days. It would take them more than a year to make use of it. And these facilities aren’t very easy to hide. Yes, if you want to make a tiny amount of HEU for you lab experiment, you can hide that easily. And if you ran that setup for a hundred years, you could produce a bomb. But if you want to produce enough for a bomb in less than a year, it’s a big building with a super-stable foundation. The construction of such a facility requires a highly unusual amount of steel and concrete for the size of the building. Such a building looks very suspicious very quickly. It’s easy to detect with the satellites we surely have staring at Iran. But I have to ask you this: how does an invasion ensure that they don’t produce any weapons? I can see how aerial bombing targeting the facilities would, but an invasion? How does slaughtering innocent people prevent the more heavily protected scientists from continuing their work?
And no, I’m not a conservative. I get my science knowledge from science, not the Bible and Rush Limbaugh.
March 13th, 2009 at 7:08 pm
“I stated that an ultimatum to Hitler at the Munich conference might well have resulted in the removal of him from power by the General Staff, which considered him reckless and was already planning such a coup d’etat.”
Look I know many of Hitler’s staff wanted to take him out. But that plan took years to get going. Here some things that didn’t get it going: the invasion of the Sudetenland, the invasion of Poland, the invasion of Russia, the invasion of France, the invasion of Belgium, and the invasion of the Netherlands. None of these were sufficient to get Hitler’s staff to stop Hitler. Yet a threat by Chamberlain would have been more effective in convincing Hitler’s staff that he was reckless than all of these invasions? Give me a break. The Allied response to Hitler took a few years to get any real assassination plot really rolling. Yet a few hollow words from Chamberlain would be more effective than bombing the shit out of Germany? And any threats by Chamberlain would have been hollow as Hitler quickly proved.
March 13th, 2009 at 7:12 pm
Why oh why, here’s why:
If SLC’s a parody, he’s doing a good job of it and needs to be encouraged. His unhinged rants merit attention because they are amusing.
If he’s for real (and I sincerely hope he isn’t), then he’s a would-be genocidal monster. Week after week he tells us how he wants to see huge numbers of innocent people die (”Hama rules!”), and the thought of their deaths seems to make him feel good. SLC told us today that if he had his finger on the button he would “make a parking lot out of Iran” — that means 70 million people dead, plus more people killed in countries downwind of Iran. That’s more people than died in WWII. Except that he has no power to make his sick little dreams come true, SLC is worse than Hitler. At least as far as bodycount goes, that’s actually not hyperbole. I find it entertaining to point and laugh at this advocate of genocide — is that wrong of me?
I will say that SLC’s comment on Charles Barkley was charming and apposite. Kudos, sir.
March 13th, 2009 at 7:23 pm
Re Ian
Since the information about the US strategic forces is highly classified, I would be very suspicious that these data are complete. However, it is possible that we have discarded all of our very high yield nuclear weapons as it is my understanding that most of the B52s have been modified to perform carpet bombing missions with conventional dumb bombs or act as a platform for cruise missiles launches. In any csse, they wouldn’t be very survivable if opposed by modern anti-aircraft missile systems (I seem to recall that several B52s were shot down over North Vietnam during the Vietnam War).
Re Wiley
Ms. Wiley is correct. The large liquid fueled missile that was designed to deliver 6 – 9 megaton bombs was the Titan II, not the Atlas. The Titan II was retired from the inventory several decades ago as liquid fueled missiles do not make a very credible deterrent, as I have previously stated. Mea culpa.
Re Ed Smithe
I am most certainly not a conservative; I am a liberal Democrat and have been so my entire life. Mr. Smithe is apparently operating under the delusion that a requirement for being a liberal is to be an Israel basher. Not so.
Re Why of Why
That’s 30 billion over 10 years and in my opinion the US and Israel should mutually agree to phase out this aid as quickly as possible. Therefore, I oppose this allocation, for what little good my opposition will do. Such phasing out will be for the best interest of both parties.
March 13th, 2009 at 7:31 pm
I feel obligated to speak out against any advocacy for the use of nuclear weapons. If you are not gung-ho to use nuclear weapons, and aren’t locked into a Cold War scenario—and I assume the Ayatollah isn’t because he has issued a fatwah against them—then it makes sense to look at possessing a nuclear weapon from more angles than just having destructive power. It’s a terrible burden to have nuclear weapons. It’ very costly, hideously dangerous, and it has a profound impact on one’s own role in the world. You don’t make friends with nuclear weapons. Iran is cultivating relationships in Asia, and appears to be doing a good job of it. Why would they want to blow it?
March 13th, 2009 at 7:48 pm
Re wiley
India has nuclear weapons and that doesn’t seem to be hurting them in East Asia. In fact, India, which is developing close relations with Israel might also feel threatened by an Iranian nuclear capability.
The fact is that, from the US point of view, an Iranian nuclear capability would be destabilizing in what is one of the most strategically important parts of the world which contains a very large fraction of the worlds’ proven oil reserves. It could very well set off a nuclear arms race involving Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia, with Israel moving toward thermonuclear weapons, if they don’t already have them. I don’t see this as good for us.
March 13th, 2009 at 8:52 pm
Re fostert
I am not going to bother commenting on Mr. fosterts’ last comment as it is totally idiotic. I will just refer him to the book by Walter Goerlitz, which I referenced earlier, where he will be informed of the 1938 plot to remove Hitler from power and the reason why it never got off the ground (i.e. Chamberlain cut the legs from under it by caving in to Hitler demands; pretty hard to get a coup going against somebody who just scored a great bloodless victory). The reason why future plots never amounted to anything, at least until the 1944 assassination plot, was because the two main plotters who were at the top of the General Staff, von Blomberg and Frisch, were removed by Hitler in 1939 and replaced by toadies.
March 13th, 2009 at 8:56 pm
I just don’t think that argument is good enough, SLC. Fair is fair. The nuclear arms race has been treated as an abstraction for too long. Where damage is concerned, it really doesn’t get more concrete than a nuclear blast.
Guessing at intentions, and injecting bigotry and fear into the handling of nuclear issues is bulls*it. Trust but verify. We reduced our arsenals significantly during the Cold War in which two superpowers were locked into a bizarre and dualistic rivalry, such that we agreed to destroy each other if one attacked the other. It was a bizarre death cult. We can do better than that.
Level headed professionals have made headway with Korea, only to see it trounced by rhetoric and reactionary behavior. Equally level headed professionals can negotiate nuclear issues with Iran and Korea and make progress. It’s a slow and deliberate process that is hindered by vilification and neocon simple mindedness.
Israel needs to calm the f*ck down. If they can’t bring themselves to negotiate, then they can at least stop with the hysterical threats and let cooler heads prevail.
I doubt that Iran wants a nuclear arms race in the mideast. If they were hellbent on destroying Israel with nuclear weapons, then why did they sign the NPT and agree to more stringent monitoring than they were required to?
March 13th, 2009 at 9:23 pm
“I will just refer him to the book by Walter Goerlitz, which I referenced earlier, where he will be informed of the 1938 plot to remove Hitler from power and the reason why it never got off the ground (i.e. Chamberlain cut the legs from under it by caving in to Hitler demands; pretty hard to get a coup going against somebody who just scored a great bloodless victory).”
It’s pretty sad when you think that One Book holds all knowledge and every evidence to the contrary is planted by sinister people. But let’s face it, Hitler’s invasion of Russia was the stupidest thing ever done in military history. The idea that people who were theoretically disturbed by Hitler’s nature, and were theoretically disturbed by Hitler’s outwitting of Chamberlain, were the same people who somehow were not disturbed at all about the invasion of Russia simply astounds me. The facts speak for themselves, it took a few years after the invasion of Poland for anyone to mount a credible assassination attempt on Hitler. And the by ‘credible’, I mean attempts that have little chance of working. But somehow you think such an attempt would be immediately possible and effective if Chamberlain had offered a hollow ultimatum? An ultimatum might have delayed Hitler by three hours, but not much more. The guy was crazy, threatening him wasn’t going to help. I know that, I’m crazy too. If you point a gun at me, I tell you to shoot me. I generally stick to the seven point data rule before I think there’s a trend. Only three more to go.
March 13th, 2009 at 9:56 pm
Fostert,
First off, I think you’re overestimating the technical know-how on how to produce a weapon…and you’re underestimating the capabilities that the Iranians bring to bear.
Molding uranium into a sphere (or other more effective shapes) is not a particularly challenging exercise for a country that’s been working with uranium since the 1970s. From that point it’s simply a matter of explosive compression to achieve a critical mass. As for me, if I could purchase that much uranium it wouldn’t be difficult to build a crude device. What you’re getting into is more an issue of explosive yield than it is the ability to achieve a detonation.
As for North Korea, your guess is as good as mine. What I can say is that it is not clear what kind of material they were using (was it plutonium or uranium). Moreover, I don’t know if it was “dud.” If by “dud” you mean it didn’t achieve it’s planned yield, then I’d agree. If by “dud” you mean that it didn’t achieve a nuclear detonation, then I’d disagree. But considering the reality that neither of us saw the MASINT, neither of us can be certain.
As for your solution to monitoring…Good luck. Just how are you going to convince the Iranians to submit to that regime? Moreover, I don’t think that you appreciate just how sophisticated their program is. You’re completely wrong about facility size, it’s not some massive factory that can be picked out by a satellite. It can be buried underground (as parts of Natanz clearly are), and there can be multiple facilities. Considering how successful our intel was in two tries at Iraq, I wouldn’t count on us getting this right, by a long shot. Moreover, are you telling me that they started this effort now? This has been going on for a decade or more (and quite a bit while we focused all of our attention on Iraq).
Finally, I guess I haven’t made it clear enough that I’m not advocating military action. But the reality is, if you are to be sure, you’re going to needs boots on the ground to verify. That’s the lesson that we should have learned from Iraq. That’s the reality of this situation…and believing that there’s a silver bullet like installing cameras, is naive.
March 13th, 2009 at 10:14 pm
If Hitler had decided to seize Leningrad first, I think he would have been shot.
I think the most important lesson we can draw from WW I and WW II is that polarizing forces take on a life of their own. It’s vital not to let mythos rule the logos. We should do everything that is reasonably in our power to avoid war. Once the war begins, violence is the norm.
Diplomacy includes letting ones “opponent” save face. Winning at all costs and making inflexible demands a precondition for negotiation is martial. Diplomacy is an art that politicians aren’t particularly well suited for, because it isn’t a zero sum contest.
March 13th, 2009 at 10:19 pm
“I am not going to bother commenting on Mr. fosterts’ last comment as it is totally idiotic.”
Ad hominen attacks can be wonderfully funny, but you have failed because you cannot attack my facts. The basis of humor is really the truth, and that’s why you don’t attain humor. I am willing to engage you in humor, and I’m not good at it. But you have already lost on facts, which is the only field I concern myself with.
Here’s the simple facts: military ultimatums have never shown much success. Treaties and trade negotiations have shown at least a modicum of stability. People can get together when they need to make money. But if they need to kill each other because they are different, there is no hope. Palestine/Israel is such a place. We could give every little girl a magic pony and every little boy an AK-47, and they will still kill each other. And the next time some conservative wants to tell me how guns make people safe, they can explain why Phnom Penh is so violent despite the fact everyone owns an AK-47.
March 13th, 2009 at 10:32 pm
Ed Smyth, Iran is submitting to that regime. They are making LEU, which is not bomb grade. Making bomb grade uranium and plutonium is a conspicuously larger operation. You can not eliminate the possibility of Iran getting a nuclear weapon. You cannot eliminate the possibility of Bora Bora getting a nuclear weapon. Most adults know this and deal with it. The knowledge to build nuclear weapons is cinchy. Enriching bomb grade material and developing missiles for delivery is very hard.
Iran has no reason to disregard or scrap the agreements that they are abiding by. Why give them a reason? As signatories to the NPT, we are obligated to work toward disarmament and to assist nations in the development of nuclear energy. If we want to challenge that, we should challenge that, not single Iran out because of ideological differences. The presumption that they cannot be reasonably negotiated with is just that.
Israel has nuclear weapons, nuclear power, and delivery devices, and is not signatory. Israel has a tendency to attack peoples. Iran doesn’t. If they want Iran to play by the rules (and Iran is playing by the rules) then Israel should play by the rules or STFU.
March 13th, 2009 at 10:52 pm
“Good luck. Just how are you going to convince the Iranians to submit to that regime?”
They already submit to the regime, that’s why we have these reports. If you want to deny that the IAEC reports came from people who were actually monitoring this situation, go ahead. I’ll trust the IAEC before I trust you.
“What you’re getting into is more an issue of explosive yield than it is the ability to achieve a detonation.”
Um, detonation of a nuclear product is much different that blowing up explosives around nuclear material. Granted, the explosives needed to set off a chain reaction would blow the shit out of a New York apartment building, but it wouldn’t be much bigger than that. But the resulting nuclear explosion would be much bigger. It would take out Manhattan completely. But these are rudimentary bombs. The bombs we make now use plutonium and are fusion devices. They use bombs that compare to the Hiroshima bomb just to trigger them properly. That’s what my local facility, Rocky Flats, used to work on. And we have the cancer to prove it.
But my real issue is why we stopped making the big bombs. We figured out really quickly that several small bombs placed correctly would be much more effective than one big bomb of the same combined yield. It’s just smarter to kill people faster that way. Obviously, such a decision involves no ethics. It’s simply a desire to kill people faster. I’ll let the reader to decide whether that’s the correct ethical position.
March 13th, 2009 at 11:27 pm
Our combined arsenals became so huge, that coupled with MAD, our ability to destroy became overwhelming even to the hawks. And the arsenals and bombs became huge in a very short period of time.
Of course, the smaller and more specific the weapons get, the more likely we are to have scenarios of winning nuclear war, rather than MAD. A long slow extinction of say, a 100 years, is actually more frightening to me, personally, than an overnight apocalypse.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki are the only places where nuclear weapons have been tested on cities. A tendency to play down the risks is very dangerous, especially when long-term environmental impacts are not considered.
I wouldn’t dismiss the possible catastrophe of conventional weapons and an on-line power plant. Chernobyl was very bad. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.
March 13th, 2009 at 11:56 pm
“First off, I think you’re overestimating the technical know-how on how to produce a weapon…and you’re underestimating the capabilities that the Iranians bring to bear.”
Umm, no. I assume from the start that the Iranians are working with a team that is as good as any team I’ve ever worked with. That’s probably giving them credit, but that credit works to your argument’s advantage. So I will grant it. But no engineering team will come up with a workable nuclear weapon in less than 18 months. A great engineering team can barely come up with receipt printer in that time. We can’t come up with a new design for a lumbar implant in twice the time. There is simply no way that anyone can come up with a nuclear bomb design and the entire production capacity in 18 months without an absurd amount of luck. My experience as engineer says that just ain’t possible. And let’s face it, I have manufactures that make things for me that nobody in Europe can make. You think such things can be made in the Middle East? Please. But keep in mind that we are talking about a manufacturing level that rises to level of what’s needed to make a good bomb. Granted, the dumb fucks in Europe can make a bomb, thanks to our help and their scientists. Iran is on its own and can’t get the materials and equipment they need, but they do have scientists that are damn good. Their process will go slower and has international regulators watching their every move. If they work fast, I would expect they’d have a pretty good weapon in three years. But that would assume that we’d allow them to process and then let them use their uranium. I can’t imagine we’d do that. Nor can I even imagine that Iran would even bother with it. It is certainly in their interest to develop nuclear power, given their resources. But nuclear weapons don’t work for them if they fire to the west. The fallout falls on them. Not a good idea. The only reason for them to develop weapons is because they want to bomb the Islamist freaks in Afghanistan (whose government we support). But they’ll have to wait until Afghanistan builds something worth bombing. But there is another reason: defense. They face a very serious and existential threat from Israel, and they have no other means of defense. They need those weapons to defend themselves against the obvious Israeli threat. We can talk all we want about Ahmadinejad’s one-time statement against Israel, but can we once talk about the regular threats Israel makes against Iran? We can’t go a day before some Knesset Member says that Israel must annihilate all Arabs. But Jews saying that Arabs should be killed is somehow never considered to be racist or a possible faltering of the beautifully poly-religious establishment that Israel claims to have created. You might not be surprised to hear that I’ve met many Palestinians who don’t share the view that economic blockades and aerial bombings don’t make you feel really warm inside. The Israelis would like us to believe that the Palestinians just love their occupation, but if you believe that, I have have a 42nd Street diamond merchant who will sell for half price.
March 13th, 2009 at 11:58 pm
It seems I’m reverting to my old Jack Keroac ways. Paragraph separations would be nice, wouldn’t they?
March 14th, 2009 at 12:46 am
That would be nice Fostert, but I gotta tell ya, though I didn’t sleep a wink last night, and I normally balk at long “paragraphs”, I didn’t have any trouble reading that post. It covers a lot of territory, but one idea connects to the next in a compelling way that opens the dialogue up to a broader and more nuanced discussion. It invites reflection.
I get really sick of trying to have a conversation where everyone is assaulted by a sea of a priori, knee-jerk assumptions and reactions before they finish a though. This is especially daunting with mideast and Iranian issues.
Hope we have more informative blogs about the mid-east and Iran in the coming weeks/months/years with fresh insights.
March 14th, 2009 at 6:34 am
I hope the Obama administration doesn’t mind an exercise in futility, then. Khamenei has undermined virtually every reconciliation effort, including Khatami’s. When Albright apologized for the 1953 Mossadegh removal, he turned around and spit in our faces.
You know why? He needs the US as an enemy. Iran is a total pressure-cooker seething with different factions of all variety of stripes and colors, all of them competing for power. Khamenei’s group is sitting on top of them, but the only way they believe they can keep it up is by generating outside pressure on Iran, and they do that by antagonizing the US abroad, and constantly stoking anti-US and anti-Western sentiment within Iran.
March 14th, 2009 at 7:25 am
Re fostert
It’s pretty sad when you think that One Book holds all knowledge and every evidence to the contrary is planted by sinister people.
I find it amazing that Mr. fostert bad mouths a book he hasn’t read and fails to supply a reference that says otherwise.
But let’s face it, Hitler’s invasion of Russia was the stupidest thing ever done in military history.
This is true only because he invaded Russia before eliminating Great Britain from the war. By failing to eliminate Great Britain, he ended up with a two front war. In addition, had he eliminated Great Britain, it would have been far more difficult down the road for the US military to take effective action against him. As it was, the German armed forces came perilously close to defeating the former Soviet Union. Had Great Britain been eliminated, it is possible that he could have achieved that victory over the former Soviet Union as their would have been no side shows in North Africa to distract him.
Actually, I would argue that he made two strategic mistakes long before the war started that gravely reduced his chances of winning.
1. He made the same mistake that the Kaiser made before WW1, namely attempting to build up a large surface fleet to challenge the British Navys’ surface fleet. Thus, Hitler, who was enamored with battleships, had the Bismark and the Tirpitz built, neither of which contributed anything to the German war effort. If instead, he had used the same materials and labor to construct Uboats, he could easily have had 50 or 60 such vessels ready for deployment after the defeat of France in 1940; as it was, he had less then a dozen at that time. With 50 or 60 Uboats in 1940, he would have starved Britain out of the war by the end of the summer.
2. In building the Luftwaffe, he failed to construct a fleet of 4 engine heavy bombers with sufficient range to undertake a strategic bombing campaign. Thus, during the Battle of Britain (which would never have occurred if the 50 – 60 Uboats had been available), the medium 2 engine bombers at his disposal did not have sufficient range to effectively attack the British aircraft factories which had been located well west and north of London. In addition, their bomb load capability was too small to effectively carry out a strategic bombing campaign (compare them with the British Lancasters and the American B17s) and they were inadequately armed with antiaircraft protection to defend against enemy fighters. This latter problem was further exacerbated by the German fighter planes not having sufficient range to protect the bombers for more then a few minutes over London and its environs.
Moreover, the lack of a fleet of long range 4 engine heavy bombers was even more serious during the invasion of the former Soviet Union. The Soviet government, had moved all their arms manufacturing capability east of the Ural mountains so that they were out of range of the German bombing fleet. These plants were thus able to crank out tanks and aircraft by the thousands with no interference from German military operations.
Counterfactuals are always interesting to consider but lets just be grateful that Hitler made these mistakes, in addition to his many tactical blunders which certainly helped the good guys defeat him. A German victory in WW2 is too awful to contemplate.
March 14th, 2009 at 9:52 am
Fostert,
On the tech know-how, it’s increasingly becoming apparent that you haven’t thought this through, or, for that matter, spoken to folks that do that stuff for a living. I have…And I can tell you that they have the capability. It’s not difficult to produce a nuclear weapon once you have the materials (the materials are by far the most difficult part). What’s really difficult is maximizing that weapon and making it small enough to deliver on a warhead. That might be difficult for them…but putting this stuff in a van and driving it across Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and to Israel (assuming they can sneak it across the border which is probably very difficult)…isn’t that hard. Moreover, sticking on a ship wouldn’t be terribly difficult either. That’s part of the reason why these things are so frightening.
As to your reasoning why their producing them…I don’t know about Afghanistan (certainly they have their qualms…but not enough to risk annihilation, but I completely agree with your defense assessment. But let me add something else, prestige. The reality is that these weapons are far too valuable to ever use (unless you’re facing an imminent existential threat…and I don’t think that Israel or the U.S. counts as imminent.)
Finally on the regime, you and wiley are completely wrong. What they “submit” to is weaker/older version of the NPT which doesn’t allow for snap inspections and other more intrusive measures. The U.S. has been trying to get them to sign the additional protocol for that reason…but, predictably, they’ve refused.
And one more note for Wiley…Wiley, you have to be pretty naive to assume that these guys aren’t putting in place the infrastructure for a weapons program. Just what do you think the heavy water reactor at Natanz is for? Making a toxic mess? Moreover, they never declared that they were building that reactor until a guy by the name of David Albright (someone who I’ve worked with) discovered it.
March 14th, 2009 at 9:53 am
Sorry, not Natanz, Arak. The heavy water reactor at Arak.
March 14th, 2009 at 9:54 am
Sorry, not Natanz, Arak. The heavy water reactor at Arak.
March 14th, 2009 at 5:17 pm
http://209.85.173.132/search?q=cache:HMZeCLPLWp4J:www.fas.org/rlg/XiamenSlides1.pdf+%22heavy+reactor%22+AND+%22nuclear+power+plants%22&cd=7&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
Dismissing the possibility that there are sound reasons to have a heavy-water reactor, on behalf of demonizing Iran is a form of naivete.
The idea that Iran needs nuclear power plants to acquire nuclear bombs is also specious, and that that constitutes “proof” that Iran intends to develop nuclear weapons is specious.
ANY NATION that has nuclear power plants has the potential to gather fissile material. Hence, international safeguards are critical to non-proliferation efforts. Dealing with the threat objectively is important.
We should be no less guarded with out handling of security than we are guarded (and paranoid) about Iran’s ability to make fissile material for the purpose of making nuclear weapons.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/japan-stockpiles-plutonium-as-threat-of-nuclear-escalation-spreads-across-asia-500868.html
Iran may be an excellent argument for better safeguards, but so is Japan and the U.S. Due to the impersonal nature of nuclear weapons, it is vital to treat all fissile material as fissile material — not an emotional prop. Nuclear weapons and emotional drama is a sinister combination. We should approach all the challenges of non-proliferation in a rational and even-handed manner. The days of good/evil nuclear weapons policy has proven itself to be a threat to humanity.
Personally, I am opposed to nuclear power plants, and even more opposed to nuclear weapons; but I am not so naive as to believe that we can eliminate threats by brow-beating and threatening states that we consider to be a threat because of ideological differences and Israeli “intelligence” (which is notoriously inaccurate due to some pathological need to demonize Arabs and Persians).
March 17th, 2009 at 3:01 pm
У меня одного какие-то проблемы с кодировкой в комментариях? Вместо ответов – одни знаки “?”
March 24th, 2009 at 1:43 am
Buy Viagra Online…
http://url.edna.edu.au/4bbN Buy Viagra Online…
March 25th, 2009 at 5:08 pm
Buy Propecia…
http://www.folkd.com/user/buypropeciaonline Buy Propecia…
March 27th, 2009 at 9:20 am
Buy Propecia…
http://url.edna.edu.au/eVAJ Buy Propecia…
April 12th, 2009 at 8:26 am
Hello very nice site! sitemap
April 16th, 2009 at 10:13 pm
Hi. A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.
I am from Sierra and learning to speak English, give true I wrote the following sentence: “Find airline tickets through travelzoo supersearch.”
Thank you very much
. Ronn.