Israel Hints At Military Preparation Against Iran
Posted on January 21, 2006
Israel’s defense minister hinted Saturday that the Jewish state is preparing for military action to stop Iran’s nuclear program, but said international diplomacy must be the first course of action.
“Israel will not be able to accept an Iranian nuclear capability and it must have the capability to defend itself, with all that that implies, and this we are preparing,” Shaul Mofaz said.
His comments at an academic conference stopped short of overtly threatening a military strike but were likely to add to growing tensions with Iran.
Things are heating up with this threat. The rhetoric of diplomacy continues at this point, but diplomacy will not work with the insane.
If the United States does not forcibly prevent Iran from producing nuclear weapons, every country in the area will know to a moral certainty that they cannot rely on the United States for protection against Iranian nuclear attack, or Iranian nuclear blackmail in support of domestic opposition to the generally shaky regimes of the Middle East. American prestige and influence there will collapse. If we won’t protect ourselves by pre-emption, we can’t be relied on to protect anyone else.
So every country within reach of Iranian nuclear weapons will have enormous strategic pressure to develop their own nuclear weapons to deter Iranian nuclear threats. As a recent strategic survey noted, Syria has many times the per capita and absolute GDP of North Korea, and Egypt several times the per capita and absolute GDP of Pakistan. If North Korea and Pakistan can develop nuclear weapons, so can Syria and Egypt, and also Saudi Arabia, all three of whose regimes are shaky. And they won’t be the only countries to develop nuclear weapons after Iran does – many more will join the nuclear “club” within a few years, some within months.
This is a highly suggested read. Read the whole thing.
The conclusion:
And if we don’t invade this year, it won’t matter much after that. We’ll be in the worst case scenario. And President Bush will be reviled as America’s worst President – the one who through inaction cost us our freedom.
Rightwing Nuthouse has a differing view:
If all this is true, the good news is we have time – time to get serious about working with dissident groups in Iran to affect regime change. Because in the end, no other option seems viable at this point. The fact is that the Iranians could hurt us in retaliation far more than we could hurt them by taking out their nuclear capability. And with not much prospect of European cooperation on meaningful sanctions, the regime change route may be our best bet to thwart the murderous designs of the mullahs.
However we decide to deal with the threat, I agree with both of these excellent analysis on one point, it should be carefully planned, and doing nothing is not an option. The question, the NY Times asks today, is whether or not a military option is possible. Could we handle the aftermath?
All we have heard from the Democrats and their media partners such as the NYT since 2003 is that the administration doesn’t work in concert with our allies, and that our arrogance and unilateralism has isolated the United States. Now, suddenly, they want the electorate to believe that they’ve become more Catholic than the Pope in foreign policy by proclaiming that the Bush administration “outsourced” the Iranian negotiations by doing exactly what they demanded we do with Iraq — a nation with whom we still were in a state of armed conflict, unlike Iran. And the Times provides this follow-up as a potential legitimization of military force against Iran without even taking the issue to the UN, a step Democrats and the NYT demanded on Iraq and one which held up military operations five months, allowing Saddam to prepare for the invasion and possibly to move the WMD we sought.
Iran responds: Israeli threats are a ‘childish game’
» Filed Under News, War On Terror
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4 Responses to “Israel Hints At Military Preparation Against Iran”
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Moderates don’t win elections. Conservatives do. I hope Bush has figured that out. His first term was inspiring. Since then, he has played politics by trying to appease the left, and where his approval ratings were once sky-high, (back when he didn’t take any crap) now they are low. Not to make this political, but if Bush and the Republican party don’t nail Iran to the wall, I’ll be giving that serious thought come ‘06 and ‘08. I didn’t vote Republican in every election since I turned 18 to have my life threatened by a Muslim extremist.
I agree with the comment from Winds of Change that the strike against Iran has to come within the year. The rhetoric and defiance of Ahmadhinejad make it quite clear that they have no intention of doing business with the international community, especially if it means reining in their nuclear ambitions.
There have been various estimates about how much time they would need to be in a position to deploy nukes – estimates range wildly, all the way from one year to ten – depending on the expert. However, the immediate problem is the Islamo Fascist leadership and the measures Ahmadhinejad has been taking to purge the system of reformers in order to entrench his power.
It’s not a stretch to note eerie similarities between between Ahmadhinejad and Hitler. Both adhere to a fanatical belief in their higher mission; both espouse a quasi-mystical philosophy – in Hitler’s case an aryan mythos derived from legend … in Ahmadhinejad’s case an ultra-orthodox messianic branch of Shia Islam. Hitler believed that he was in possession of psychic powers – Ahmadinejad has been know to refer to a golden aura that supposedly surrounds him. Both men share similar traits … defiant, obstructionist and with a sneering regard for international law and conventions. Both share the same to drive to acquire advanced weaponry and threaten their neighbors.
There is no way Ahmadhinejad will ever back off his mission in order to accommodate international demands. At some point he will have to be confronted and we are fast moving to that point.
When he was strong, President Bush identified N. Korea, Iran, and Iraq as the “Axis of Evil”. How prophetic. Now we are up to our neck and something must be done.
But, given President Bush’s open borders/mass amnesty policy it seems like he really isn’t against terrorists (or else why welcome them across our southern border?). So, what is he about besides fawing over the liberals and their MSM? Seems he has lost his way and abandoned his conservative support.
This guy in Iran is fearless because he is insane. What happens when Israel hits Iran and Iran hits back with nukes?
It could very well happen. Are we ready for that? Frightening.