FBI Director Says Only Matter of Time Before Terrorists Acquire Nuclear Weapons; The MSM Buries The Warning

A sizeable portion of the one billion Muslims in this world believe the United States and the West are enemies to be destroyed by any means. We know that a handful of these suicidal zealots can cause immense destruction. Thus, the nightmare scenario is that any of these terrorist organizations may gain access to nuclear weapons. And apparently, this nightmare scenario is inevitable. In remarks made yesterday before the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism, FBI Director Robert Mueller made the dire warning that it was "only a matter of time and economics before terrorists will be able to purchase nuclear weapons . . .":

. . . Mr. Mueller said federal authorities, working with their counterparts overseas, must secure loose nuclear material, share intelligence about those who wish to buy and sell such material, and stop those who do -- adding that by some estimates, there is enough highly enriched uranium in global stockpiles to construct thousands of nuclear weapons.

Mr. Mueller said the economics of supply and demand dictate that someone, somewhere will provide nuclear material to the highest bidder, and that material will end up in the hands of terrorists. He said the al Qaeda terrorist network has demonstrated a clear intent to acquire weapons of mass destruction, noting that Osama bin Laden sought to buy uranium in Sudan in 1993.

But, he said, al Qaeda is not the only concern, adding that the United States faces threats from other terrorist cells around the world and from homegrown terrorists not affiliated with al Qaeda but who have been inspired by its message of hatred and violence.

"Several rogue nations -- and even individuals -- seek to develop nuclear capabilities," he said. "Abdul Khan, for example, was not only the father of Pakistan's nuclear bomb; he peddled that technology to North Korea, Libya and Iran. Khan was one of many to prove that it is indeed a seller's market in the so-called atomic bazaar."

Mr. Mueller said the next terrorist attack is not a question of if, but when. . .

Read the entire story here. Allowing rouge regimes to develop nuclear arsenal raises exponentially the liklihood that we will see a mushroom cloud over one or more of our cities. The time to try and reduce this threat is now, before Iran is able to acquire any nuclear weapons and sets off a nuclear arms race among equally or even more dangerous regimes such as Saudi Arabia.

In light of the threat that we face, I think there is no question that this should have been front page news accross the MSM. Yet, inexplicably, this dire warning is not even mentioned in the New York Times. The Washington Post, for its part, did a lead article on Director Mueller, but it had nothing to do with the existential threat of nuclear terrorism. Instead, their lead article criticized Mueller for using an FBI jet for 36 trips over a five year period. Apparently, none in the MSM care for the message that Director Mueller has to deliver on the inevitability of future terrorist attacks, nor the inevitability of nuclear terrorism. The reason is clear - if terrorism and national security take center stage in the 2008 elections, the Democrat stand a greatly diminished chance of electoral victory. Thus, newsworthy information that should inform every voter is buried and goes unreported. I wonder if the editors and reporters of the MSM will feel that they bear any responsibility for the blood that will be spilled because of it?

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Lieberman & The Military Target Iran While Democrats Dither

The Democrats, led by Harry Reid, let us all know once again why they cannot be trusted with our national security or the conduct of a war. On Sunday, Joe Lieberman, called for military strikes against Iran in response to the acts of war being daily committed by Iran against the US:

. . . "I think we've got to be prepared to take aggressive military action against the Iranians to stop them from killing Americans in Iraq," Lieberman told Bob Schieffer. "And to me, that would include a strike into... over the border into Iran, where we have good evidence that they have a base at which they are training these people coming back into Iraq to kill our soldiers."

. . . If the U.S. does not act against Iran, "they'll take that as a sign of weakness on our part and we will pay for it in Iraq and throughout the region and ultimately right here at home," Lieberman said.

. . . "We can tell them we want them to stop that, but if there's any hope of the Iranians living according to the international rule of law and stopping, for instance, their nuclear weapons development, we can't just talk to them," Lieberman said. "If they don't play by the rules, we've got to use our force, and to me that would include taking military action to stop them from doing what they're doing."

Read the entire story here. Joe Lieberman is spot on in his assessment (see here and here), But Harry Reid responded, once again embracing peace at all costs before the '08 election. He would give Iran a free pass to continue engaging in acts that kill our soldiers and destabilize Iraq, calling for diplomacy and a regional conference because "[t]he invasion of [Iran] is only going to destabilize that part of the world more." Perhaps Mr. Reid has forgotten that the precipitous withdrawal from Iraq that he proposes for partisan political gain will be the single greatest destabilizing act in the Middle East imaginable.

UPDATE: Bill Rogio writes that the Army now has proof beyond any reasonable doubt of Iran's complicity in the Karbala raid that ended in the death of five U.S. soldiers. Satelite photos show the Iran built a mock up of the target area in a city where they have been training Iraqi militants.

Meanwhile, the left are beginning to realize that, one, their Presidential candidates are going to be attacked on a daily basis for their incredible weakness on issues relating to national security and terrorism, and two, that these candidates have very little in the way of substantive response to the charges. The WSJ has the story of the left's conundrum here.

And on a final note, the Jerusalem Post is reporting that the U.S. military has drawn up its plans for a strike on Iran in response to their continuing quest for nuclear weapons:

Predicting that Iran will obtain a nuclear weapon within three years and claiming to have a strike plan in place, senior American military officers have told The Jerusalem Post they support President George W. Bush's stance to do everything necessary to stop the Islamic Republic's race for nuclear power.

. . . A high-ranking American military officer told the Post that senior officers in the US armed forces had thrown their support behind Bush and believed that additional steps needed to be taken to stop Iran.

Predictions within the US military are that Bush will do what is needed to stop Teheran before he leaves office in 2009, including possibly launching a military strike against its nuclear facilities.

. . . According to a high-ranking American military officer, the US Navy and Air Force would play the primary roles in any military action taken against Iran. One idea under consideration is a naval blockade designed to cut off Iran's oil exports.

The officer said that if the US government or the UN Security Council decided on this course of action, the US Navy would most probably not block the Strait of Hormuz - a step that would definitely draw an Iranian military response - but would patrol farther out and turn away tankers on their way to load oil.

. . . The US officer said that perhaps even more dangerous to Israel and the Western world than Iranian nukes was the possibility that a terrorists cell associated with al-Qaida or global jihad would acquire a highly radioactive "dirty bomb" or a vial of deadly chemical or biological agents. The officer said al-Qaida was gaining a strong foothold in the Middle East and that Israel was being surrounded by global jihad elements in Lebanon, Jordan and Sinai.

"Iran is a state-sponsored type of terrorism that can be dealt with," he said, adding that it was far more difficult to strike at the source of an isolated terrorist cell. . . .

Read the entire article here. Let us hope this article is accurate. It is difficult to imagine anything more dangerous to the world then a nuclear armed Iran.

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Bolton For Bomb'n

John Bolton, former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., is saying that the time for imposition of sanctions on the Iranian regime is near over and the time for lift off from the carriers is almost here. This story is getting zero play in the U.S. press, but its the lead on the U.K. Telegrasph.

The ball really is in the European court now. They face every bit as much danger from a nuclear armed theocracy in Iran as do we. But the Europeans are Iran's biggest trading partners. I think it is time to demand that the Europeans end their trade - or we can end it for them with a blockade of Iranian ports, which of course would itself be an act of war.

In either event, the Iranian economy is in a shambles at the moment, and on top of that is a very restive population which Ahmedinejad is attempting to control by turning up the repression. That is a classic scenario for revolt and revolution. Significant sanctions could in fact not only stop the Iranian march towards a nuclear weapon, but they could also lead to regime change - the textbook solution. A military strike might invoke a nationalist fevor that would see the theocracy through their economic crisis. Thus, the first choice has to be getting Europe to act with their long term interests at heart - for once. The only viable second choice is war.

At any rate, Bolton makes similar arguments for one last round of heavy sanctions and an attempt at regime change, then to war:

Iran should be attacked before it develops nuclear weapons, America's former ambassador to the United Nations said yesterday.

John Bolton, who still has close links to the Bush administration, told The Daily Telegraph that the European Union had to "get more serious" about Iran and recognise that its diplomatic attempts to halt Iran's enrichment programme had failed.

Iran has "clearly mastered the enrichment technology now...they're not stopping, they're making progress and our time is limited", he said. Economic sanctions "with pain" had to be the next step, followed by attempting to overthrow the theocratic regime and, ultimately, military action to destroy nuclear sites.

Mr Bolton's stark warning appeared to be borne out yesterday by leaks about an inspection by the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of Iran's main nuclear installation at Natanz on Sunday.

. . . Mr Bolton said: "It's been conclusively proven Iran is not going to be talked out of its nuclear programme. So to stop them from doing it, we have to massively increase the pressure.

"If we can't get enough other countries to come along with us to do that, then we've got to go with regime change by bolstering opposition groups and the like, because that's the circumstance most likely for an Iranian government to decide that it's safer not to pursue nuclear weapons than to continue to do so. And if all else fails, if the choice is between a nuclear-capable Iran and the use of force, then I think we need to look at the use of force."

President George W Bush privately refers to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has pledged to wipe Israel "off the map", as a 21st Century Adolf Hitler and Mr Bolton, who remains a close ally of Vice President Dick Cheney, said the Iranian leader presented a similar threat.

"If the choice is them continuing [towards a nuclear bomb] or the use of force, I think you're at a Hitler marching into the Rhineland point. If you don't stop it then, the future is in his hands, not in your hands, just as the future decisions on their nuclear programme would be in Iran's hands, not ours."

. . . Such a strike would only be a "last option" after economic sanctions and attempts to foment a popular revolution had failed but the risks of using military force, he indicated, would be less than those of tolerating a nuclear Iran. "Imagine what it would be like with a nuclear Iran. Imagine the influence Iran could have over the entire region. It's already pushing its influence in Iraq through the financing of terrorist groups like Hamas and Hizbollah."

. . . But his is still a highly influential voice and Mr Bush remains adamant that he will not allow Iran to become armed with nuclear weapons.

The Pentagon has drawn up contingency plans for military action and some senior White House officials share Mr Bolton's thinking.

Read the entire story here.

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An Ominous IAEA Report On Iran

In advance of the IAEA report expected next week the New York Times is reporting that the IAEA, in a "short notice" inspection of Iran's main nuclear plant, discovered that Iran now has some 1,300 centrifuges up and is expected to increase that total to 3,000 by June. It takes 3,000 centrifuges working for one year to produce sufficient fissle material for one nuclear bomb. Iran's intent is to have 8,000 centrifuges running by the end of the year. In other words, time for tepid sanctions appears be completely gone. Unless economy-crippling sanctions are imposed - or we launch off the carriers - Iran will either have or be positioned to have a nuclear arsenal in the very forseeable future:

Inspectors for the International Atomic Energy Agency have concluded that Iran appears to have solved most of its technological problems and is now beginning to enrich uranium on a far larger scale than before, according to the agency’s top officials.

The findings may change the calculus of diplomacy in Europe and in Washington, which aimed to force a suspension of Iran’s enrichment activities in large part to prevent it from learning how to produce weapons-grade material.

In a short-notice inspection of Iran’s operations in the main nuclear facility at Natanz on Sunday, conducted in advance of a report to the United Nations Security Council due early next week, the inspectors found that Iranian engineers were already using roughly 1,300 centrifuges and were producing fuel suitable for nuclear reactors, according to diplomats and nuclear experts here.

Until recently, the Iranians were having difficulty keeping the delicate centrifuges spinning at the tremendous speeds necessary to make nuclear fuel and were often running them empty or not at all.

Now, those roadblocks appear to have been surmounted. “We believe they pretty much have the knowledge about how to enrich,” said Mohammed ElBaradei, the director general of the energy agency, who clashed with the Bush administration four years ago when he declared that there was no evidence that Iraq had resumed its nuclear program. “From now on, it is simply a question of perfecting that knowledge. People will not like to hear it, but that’s a fact.”

It is unclear whether Iran can sustain its recent progress. Major setbacks are common in uranium enrichment, and experts say it is entirely possible that miscalculation, equipment failures or sabotage — something the United States is believed to have attempted in the past — could prevent the Iranian government from reaching its goal of producing fuel on what President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran boasts is “an industrial scale.”

The material produced so far would have to undergo further enrichment before it could be transformed into bomb-grade material. To accomplish that, Iran would likely first have to evict the I.A.E.A. inspectors, as North Korea did four years ago.

Even then, it is unclear whether the Iranians have the technology to produce a weapon small enough to fit atop their missiles, a significant engineering challenge.

While the United Nations Security Council has passed a resolution demanding that Iran suspend all of its nuclear activities, and it has twice imposed sanctions for Tehran’s refusal to do so, some European nations, and particularly Russia, have questioned whether the demand for suspension still makes sense.

The logic of demanding suspension is that it would delay the day that Iran gained the knowledge to produce its own nuclear fuel — what the Israelis used to refer to as “the point of no return.” Those favoring unconditional engagement with Iran have argued that the current strategy is creating a stalemate that the Iranians are exploiting, allowing them to make technological leaps while the Security Council steps up sanctions.

. . . In a telephone interview, R. Nicholas Burns, the undersecretary of state for policy, who is implementing the Iran strategy, said that while he has not heard about the I.A.E.A.’s newest findings, they would not affect American policy.

“We’re proceeding under the assumption that there is still time for diplomacy to work,” he said, although he added that if the Iranians did not agree to suspend production by the time the leaders of the Group of 8 industrial nations meet next month, “we will move ahead toward a third set of sanctions.”

Mr. ElBaradei has always been skeptical of that strategy, telling European foreign ministers that he doubts the Iranians will fully suspend their nuclear activities and that a face-saving way must be found to resolve the impasse.

“Quite clearly, suspension is a requirement by the Security Council and I would hope the Iranians would listen to the world community,” he said. “But from a proliferation perspective, the fact of the matter is that one of the purposes of suspension — keeping them from getting the knowledge — has been overtaken by events. The focus now should be to stop them from going to industrial scale production, to allow us to do a full-court-press inspection and to be sure they remain inside the treaty.”

The report to the Security Council next Monday is expected to say that since the Iranians stopped complying in February 2006 with an agreement on broad inspections by the agency around the country, the I.A.E.A.’s understanding of “the scope and content” of Iran’s nuclear activities has deteriorated. I

. . . The inspection conducted on Sunday took place on two hours notice, a time period so short that it appears unlikely that the Iranians could have turned on their centrifuges to impress the inspectors. According to diplomats familiar with the inspectors’ report, in addition to 1,300 working centrifuges, another 300 were being tested and appeared ready to be fed raw nuclear fuel as soon as late this week, the diplomats said. Another 300 are under construction.

“They are at the stage where they are doing one cascade a week,” said one diplomat familiar with the analysis of Iran’s activities, who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the information. A “cascade” has 164 centrifuges, and experts say that at this pace, Iran could have 3,000 centrifuges operating by June — enough to make one bomb’s worth of material every year. Tehran may, the diplomat said, be able to build an additional 5,000 centrifuges by the end of the year, for a total of 8,000.

The inspectors have tested the output and concluded that Iran is producing reactor-grade uranium, enriched to a little less than 5 percent purity. But that still worries American officials and experts here at the I.A.E.A. If Iran stores the uranium and later runs it through its centrifuges for another four or five months, it can raise the enrichment level to 90 percent — the level needed for a nuclear weapon.

In the arcane terminology of nuclear proliferation, that is known as a “breakout capability,” the ability to throw inspectors out of the country and then produce weapons-grade fuel, as North Korea did in 2003. . .

Read the entire story here. What to do next should not be a tough call. Europe needs to pony up to the bar and end its lucrative trade with Iran. It is that or war with Iran in the very near future.

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UK Intel Leak: Al Qaeda Plan Nuke Attack In Europe

Unfortunately, it will not be until such an attack occurs that the occidental and Western world finally react to the twin existential threats of Khomeinist Shia'ism and Wahhabi / Salafi Islam:

AL-QAEDA leaders in Iraq are planning the first “large-scale” terrorist attacks on Britain and other western targets with the help of supporters in Iran, according to a leaked intelligence report.

Spy chiefs warn that one operative had said he was planning an attack on “a par with Hiroshima and Nagasaki” in an attempt to “shake the Roman throne”, a reference to the West.

Another plot could be timed to coincide with Tony Blair stepping down as prime minister, an event described by Al-Qaeda planners as a “change in the head of the company”.

The report, produced earlier this month and seen by The Sunday Times, appears to provide evidence that Al-Qaeda is active in Iran and has ambitions far beyond the improvised attacks it has been waging against British and American soldiers in Iraq.

There is no evidence of a formal relationship between Al-Qaeda, a Sunni group, and the Shi’ite regime of President Mah-moud Ahmadinejad, but experts suggest that Iran’s leaders may be turning a blind eye to the terrorist organisation’s activities.

The intelligence report also makes it clear that senior Al-Qaeda figures in the region have been in recent contact with operatives in Britain.

It follows revelations last year that up to 150 Britons had travelled to Iraq to fight as part of Al-Qaeda’s “foreign legion”. A number are thought to have returned to the UK, after receiving terrorist training, to form sleeper cells.

The report was compiled by the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre (JTAC) - based at MI5’s London headquarters - and provides a quarterly review of the international terror threat to Britain. It draws a distinction between Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda’s core leadership, who are thought to be hiding on the Afghan-Pakistan border, and affiliated organisations elsewhere.

The document states: “While networks linked to AQ [Al-Qaeda] Core pose the greatest threat to the UK, the intelligence during this quarter has highlighted the potential threat from other areas, particularly AQI [Al-Qaeda in Iraq].”

The report continues: “Recent reporting has described AQI’s Kurdish network in Iran planning what we believe may be a large-scale attack against a western target.

“A member of this network is reportedly involved in an operation which he believes requires AQ Core authorisation. He claims the operation will be on ‘a par with Hiroshima and Naga-saki’ and will ‘shake the Roman throne’. We assess that this operation is most likely to be a large-scale, mass casualty attack against the West.”

The report says there is “no indication” this attack would specifically target Britain, “although we are aware that AQI . . . networks are active in the UK”.

Analysts believe the reference to Hiroshima and Naga-saki, where more than 200,000 people died in nuclear attacks on Japan at the end of the second world war, is unlikely to be a literal boast.

“It could be just a reference to a huge explosion,” said a counter-terrorist source. “They [Al-Qaeda] have got to do something soon that is radical otherwise they start losing credibility.”

Despite aspiring to a nuclear capability, Al-Qaeda is not thought to have acquired weapons grade material. However, several plots involving “dirty bombs” - conventional explosive devices surrounded by radioactive material - have been foiled.

Last year Al-Qaeda’s leader in Iraq called on nuclear scientists to apply their knowledge of biological and radiological weapons to “the field of jihad”.

Details of a separate plot to attack Britain, “ideally” before Blair steps down this summer, were contained in a letter written by Abdul al-Hadi al-Iraqi, an Iraqi Kurd and senior Al-Qaeda commander.

According to the JTAC document, Hadi “stressed the need to take care to ensure that the attack was successful and on a large scale”. The plan was to be relayed to an Iran-based Al-Qaeda facilitator.

Read the article here. Is the Roman throne the Vatican, possibly? In any event, how do you feel about a nuclear armed Iran now, and the realistic possibility of nuclear weapons in the hands of all major middle east regimes?

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Fred Thompson on the Iranian Hostage Taking

Fred Thompson, should he choose to enter the presidential race, will be a strong candidate indeed - as this insightful essay Mr. Thompson penned in Red State demonstrates:

Oil prices fell. The stock market rose. Video images of smiling British soldiers with Iranian President Ahmadinejad were everywhere. So were pictures of the 15 freed hostages embracing family members back home. The relief over the return of the Brits was so tremendous; you could almost hear birds singing.

Maybe it's because military action won't be needed or maybe it's just because the ordeal won't drag on and on, but the world is breathing easier now. A lot of folks are happy. The problem, as I see it, is that Ahmadinejad seems to be the happiest.

And why shouldn't he be? He has shown the world that his forces can kidnap British citizens, subject them to brutal psychological tactics to coerce phony confessions, finagle the release of a high-ranking Iranian terror coordinator in Iraq, utterly trash the Geneva conventions and suffer absolutely no consequences.

The UN Security Council summoned its vaunted multilateral greatness to issue a swift statement of sincere uneasiness. The EU, which has pressured Britain to rely on Europeans for mutual defense instead of the US, wouldn't even discuss economic sanctions that might disrupt their holidays. Even NATO was AWOL.

Tony Blair doesn't appear to be in much of a mood for celebrating. I don't know how he could be, given the troubling spectacle of British soldiers shake the hand of their kidnapper as a condition of release. In the old days, they would have kissed his ring -- but wearing Iranian suits and carrying swag more appropriate to a Hollywood awards ceremony may have been as embarrassing. Ironically, Blair's options are fewer by the day as his own party moves to mothball the British fleet, once the fear of pirates and tyrants the world over.

Some in the West seem part of Iran's propaganda war; claiming that the release of the hostages was a victory that proves the Iranian dictatorship can be reasoned with. To misrepresent unpunished piracy as a victory is as Orwellian as the congressional mandate banning use of the term "the global war on terror." What are we — Reuters?

Ahmadinejad must be particularly pleased to see "deep thinking" journalists making the case that American actions in Iraq were the true cause of the kidnappings. To believe this, all you have to do is ignore the history of the Iranian Revolution, which has been in the extortion business ever since it took power. Between the 1979 American embassy crisis in Tehran and the seizure of Israeli soldiers last year by Iran's Hezbollah proxies, there have been more than a hundred other examples.

If you include the imprisonment of pro-Democracy dissidents and non-Shi'a Muslim minorities within Iran, the number reaches easily into the tens of thousands. The dwindling and persecuted Christian population of Iran, I suspect, found little joy in Ahmadinejad's explanation that he was freeing his victims as an "Easter gift."

It is critical that we see this incident as part of a long pattern of behavior -- that will continue as long as the current leadership is in power. More importantly, it will escalate unimaginably if Iran achieves nuclear status, and with it the ability to hold millions rather than individuals hostage.

I have no idea if Ahmadinejad and those who put him in power really believe the Shi'a Twelver doctrine that they can spur the messiah to return by triggering Armageddon. You have to admit, though, that the possibility that they look forward to entering paradise as martyrs would make them a whole lot scarier as a nuclear power than the USSR ever was.

There is hope, though. The Iranian people are not an anti-Western horde. They're an educated and freedom-loving people for the most part, and reformers there have been begging us for support and sanctions that would weaken the ruling theocracy. Instead, they've just seen the Iranian dictatorship successfully bully the West into impotent submission. This is not a good thing.

We need to understand this and use every means at our disposal, starting with serious and painful international sanctions, to prevent Iran's rulers from becoming the nuclear-armed blackmailers they want to be. Unfortunately, we are hearing demands that we abandon the people of the Middle East who have stood up to Islamo-fascism because they believed us when we said we would support them.

If we retreat precipitously, the price for that betrayal will be paid first in blood and freedom by the Iranian people, the Kurds, the Afghanis, the secular Lebanese, the moderates in Pakistan and the Iraqis themselves. And America's word may never be trusted again.

Right now, the pirate Ahmadinejad is clearly more confident about the outcome of the Global War on Terror than we are. That ought to give us pause.

I will admit to being a bit jealous of the communication skills of Mr. Thompson who is able to say forcefully in a page what seems to take me a tome. Mr. Thompson's communication skills are a major consideration when one reflects upon the tremendous problems of the Bush administration and the current crop of Congressional republicans, none of whom seem to have the communication and debating skills of a moderately talented high school student.

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The Hostage Crisis Ends . . . So Where Are We?

The hostage crisis has come to a surpassingly anti-climatic end. We were treated to the sickening spectacle of a smiling Ahmedinejad making a “gift” to the UK of the hostages “for Easter.” Does anyone believe that was Iran's true motivation? So where does this leave all the players in the Iran UK-Hostage Kabuki dance?

Iran –

1. They did themselves no favors by this act of hostage taking. They let the hostages go after twelve days for the same reason they apparently took them – i.e., no clearly discernable logical reason. Most of the world will likely look on this rouge action by Iran – one which fits right in with their historical pattern of such actions – and have to wonder if the U.S. is not right, that Iran can under no circumstances be allowed to have a nuclear weapon. Update: Walid Phares has his own analysis up of the detailed logic of the mullahs. See here. As does Victor David Hanson. See here.

2. A few, such as the hard left in Britain and our own hard left appearing in the New York Times, argue that Ahmedinejad’s agreement to end this charade of Iran’s own making demonstrates that Iran is amenable to diplomacy. They reason that we should forgo the military option against Iran over the nuclear issue, withdraw our carriers from the Gulf, and, darn’it, just start acting nicer. I kid you not. See this NYT editorial and this one from the UK’s Guardian. They could have been written Ahmedinejad himself. Such a position defies belief. It ignores Iran’s rouge nature in causing this hostage crisis, their incredibly bloody history in much of the death and destruction occurring to this day in the Middle East, and Iran's history of both duplicity and failure to engage in any diplomacy over its nuclear program. The words craven, contemptible, and out of touch with any semblance of reality are just a few of the descriptive terms appropriate for that crowd.

3. This event clarifies, as well as any, Iran’s power structure when it comes to foreign policy and the acts of the IRGC. Ahmedinejad is a mouthpiece, nothing more. The person calling the shots is the Supreme Guide Ali Khamenei and his band of mad mullahs. It is quite interesting that Ahmedinejad was effectively muzzled by the mullahs throughout this whole event, until he was allowed before the camera's at the end to announce Iran's "grand gesture" of "good will."

4. Iran took this action likely in an attempt to rally support for their cause at home and abroad. They found neither. As the WP explained:

. . . Iran is also likely to pay a long-term price for the detention drama, again appearing to undertake rogue actions in violation of international law, experts and officials said. In the end, Iran recognized that the crisis was beginning to exact a cost, as it came under pressure even from allies and other Islamic countries, officials and experts said. Even Syria urged Iran to release the Britons, Syrian and U.S. sources said.

"They are so consumed with short-term issues -- how to undermine the West and how to gain leverage -- at the expense of long-term strategy. They have undermined themselves," said Karim Sadjadpour of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "They're playing the immediate moves of checkers and not the long-term strategy of a chess game. In the long term, it undermines their ability to attract foreign investment and have good relations" with the outside world.

Tehran was also unable to rally significant public support for another long-term showdown like the 1979-1981 hostage ordeal involving 52 American diplomats, experts added. "There was no nationalist bounce out of this," said Patrick Clawson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. "All the usual people you'd expect to be frothing at the mouth simply weren't."

5. The USS Nimitz, a third U.S. Carrier Group, is enroute to the Persian Gulf at this moment. I am waiting to see if it acts as a replacement for one of the two carriers already in place, or adds another to their number. In any event, I think Iran made a tactical error with this one. Overall, the likelihood that Iran will face a military strike on its nuclear facilities and other strikes aimed at its economic infrastructure went up palpably with this hostage taking.

The EU –

The EU established their bona fides as worse then utterly useless by refusing to help one of their own members against a regime that ultimately threatens every one of the EU members themselves. See here. Also see Krauthammer today here. The EU holds the key to shutting down Iran, stopping their nuclear program in its tracks. And we hold the key to making the EU do that. I suggest we all start a campaign to convince the Republicans to dust off the Iran Freedom Support Act and see if we can’t sanction every EU and US foreign subsidiary doing business in Iran today. It would take political courage – something that seems in short supply these days beyond Bush and Lieberman – but it is the next logical step.

Britain

1. The Brit's are more then a little upset. This is a people who learn about Nelson and Trafalgar while still suckling at the tit, and they remember with pride Britain’s travelling half way around the world to spank Argentina when they tried to seize the Falklands. The majority, judging from the news coverage, are not in a mood to play games with Iran again. They are asking all of the right questions (See Updates here). Iran will never get another free shot at British soldiers, sailors or marines again.

2. What this means for Britain’s long term deployment in Basra, Iraq is an open question. Even as they draw down, it appears that Iran is picking up the pace of its actions in Basra. I do hope this gives the Brits the kick in the ass they need to become as deadly efficient in clearing out Basra of the mullah’s infestation as I know that they can be.

Overall:

The US needs to continue doing what it is doing in terms of targeting Iranians inside Iraq as well as seeking regime change inside Iran and hurting the mullahs everywhere else that they are weak. If anything, this event shows that Iran is feeling the heat -- which usually is a good sign that it would be appropriate to turn the heat up a lot more in the coming weeks.

Let's leave the final words to Amir Taheri, the Iranian author speaking in the UK's Times today:

The seizure of the British naval personnel is the latest episode in a low-intensity war that the Islamic Republic has waged against the West for almost three decades. In this war, Iran has killed hundreds of Western, especially American and French troops, in suicide attacks in Lebanon and Saudi Arabia. More recently, its agents have killed at least 200 American troops and an unknown number of British soldiers in Iraq. Its influence against Nato in Afghanistan, against President Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan and against Lebanon and Israel, through Hezbollah and Hamas, are well known.

So far, the West’s response has been timid and occasional. The mullahs play a long-term game, acting as carpet-weavers, knotting one mischief at time, day in and day out. They know that their fragile regime, hated by a majority of Iranians, would not survive a full-scale clash with the West. This is why they deal their poison in small but steady doses, enough to weaken the foe but not too much to mobilise Western opinion in favour of full confrontation.

The debate on what to do about the mullahs hits a deadend because it is limited to two options: regime change or surrender. Those who blame the West for the world’s evils urge surrender, in atonement of sins supposedly committed against Iran over centuries. They hope that once the mullahs are given everything, they would start behaving reasonably. This argument ignores the fact that the Khomeinist regime’s political DNA would not allow it to act reasonably. A scorpion does not sting because it wants to misbehave but because it is programmed to do so.

When it comes to the regime-change option, the usual suspects who still cry for Saddam Hussein would be up in arms. President Ahmadinejad knows that no American or British leader can garner popular support for preemptive war against Iran.

The alternative, however, is not one of surrender or regime change. The Western democracies could give the Islamic republic a taste of its own medicine — and engage it in the kind of low-intensity warfare that Iran itself indulges in. The mischief must not be cost-free. It would be resisted though diplomatic and economic means as well as through support for the democratic and reformist forces inside Iran. Throughout history, adversaries end up by adopting aspects of each other’s strategy.

The Islamic Republic wants a Khomeinist Middle East. The “Infidel” want a democratic, pro-West Middle East. The two visions are incompatible. Eventually, one must win as the other loses. As the British celebrate the return of their hostages they would do well to decide which vision deserves support.

Read the entire article here.

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The Sauds Read Ahmedinejad the Riot Act

The Arabs are getting a bit nervous and upset with their Persian brethren across the Gulf. Saudi Arabia has evidently read the riot act to Ahmedinejad in recent meetings:

On the 15 British hostages late of the HMS Cornwall:

The Saudi foreign minister . . . said it was "a catastrophe" for Iran to be holding 15 British sailors and marines it had captured on March 23. . . "This is just not the time for them to have a problem like that looming."

On the reality of the US threat to stop the Iranian nuclear program by force:

Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah warned Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that he should not underestimate the US military threat on Iran.

Ahmadinejad met with King Abdullah on March 4 in Riyadh, and publicly the two leaders agreed to fight growing Sunni-Shiite strife in the region.

Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal said that the king meanwhile warned Ahmadinejad to take seriously threats of US military strikes over Iran's refusal to halts its uranium enrichment program. "On the nuclear issue, we warned him: 'Don't play with fire. Don't think the threat [of an American attack on Iran] is a nonexistent threat; think that it's a real threat, maybe even a palpable threat,'" Faisal said in the interview posted on the Newsweek website Friday.

On Iran's meddling in internal affairs of other countries:

Faisal said, adding that his ruler bluntly told Ahmadinejad: "You're interfering in Arab affairs," a reference to Iran's alleged interference in other Middle East countries.

The Saudis also told the Iranians "that their interference in Arab affairs is creating a backlash in the Arab world and in the Muslim world. Other Muslim countries are complaining of [Iranian] interference in internal affairs," Faisal said.

Read the story here. It seems that acting thuggish can only go on for so long before everyone starts to get really annoyed. In this case, its taken 28 years, but still, it seems that the world's collective patience - other then the vile EU (see here) - is running out for Iran.

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Russia Turning?

According to the NYT:

Russia has informed Iran that it will withhold nuclear fuel for Iran’s nearly completed Bushehr power plant unless Iran suspends its uranium enrichment as demanded by the United Nations Security Council, European, American and Iranian officials say.

This is a fortunate turn of events. The only question is why?

It is tought to discern much with clarity about Russia these days, as it has returned to a vestige of its autocratic past. Putin has gone a long way to dismantling the nascent democracy in Russia and, in its place, inserting a thuggish regime where serious dissenters are engaged by bullets rather then debate and the ballot box. Russia has taken the place of the old Soviet Union as the premier arms dealer for all rouge regimes. And Russia has been involved in the very lucrative deal to build nuclear reactors in Iran.

Given Russia's own problems with radical Islamists in Chechneya and the growth of Islamist regimes on its borders, it has always appeared that Russia's relationship of conveinance with Islamic countries was near insanity.

So is Russia reassessing its long-term strategic intersts and placing those interests over short term economic gain? Or are Putin and friends upset because Iran because its checks are bouncing? Or are there yet other motivations?

“We’re not sure what mix of commercial and political motives are at play here,” one senior Bush administration official said in Washington. “But clearly the Russians and the Iranians are getting on each other’s nerves — and that’s not all bad.”

A senior European official said: “We consider this a very important decision by the Russians. It shows that our disagreements with the Russians about the dangers of Iran’s nuclear program are tactical. Fundamentally, the Russians don’t want a nuclear Iran.”
. . . .
The Russian Atomic Energy Agency, or Rosatom, is eager to become a major player in the global nuclear energy market. As Security Council action against Iran has gained momentum and Iran’s isolation increases, involvement with the Bushehr project may detract from Rosatom’s reputation.

In a flurry of public comments in the past month, Russian officials acknowledged that Russia was delaying the delivery of fuel to the reactor in the Iranian port city of Bushehr. It blamed the decision on the failure of Iran to pay what it owes on the project, not on concerns about nuclear proliferation.

But last month, Foreign Minister Sergey V. Lavrov informed some European officials that Russia had made a political decision not to deliver the fuel, adding that Russia would state publicly that the sole reason was financial, European officials said.

Read the article here. Whatever the true motivation or mix of motivations, this is welcome news. The pressure on Iran just got ratcheted up - and we have just taken a small step back from war with Iran.

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Taliban Alledged to Have Kidnapped Nuclear Scientists For Al Qaeda

This is ominous. From a report today by India's Zeenews:

Two top nuclear scientists of Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) are currently in Taliban custody. The two were working at PAEC’s facility in North West Frontier Province. Zee News investigations reveal that the two scientists were kidnapped about six months ago. To avoid international embarrassment Pakistan Government has kept this information under wraps.

According to information available with Zee News, nuclear scientists have been kidnapped by Taliban at the behest of Al-Qaeda. Further investigations reveal that Al-Qaeda may be using the expertise of the scientists to produce nuclear bombs. The two scientists are reportedly being held somewhere in Waziristan, near Afghanistan border.

We will have to see if this is confirmed. Read the rest of the story here.

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U.S. - Iran Conflict is Existential

Amir Taheri has an excellent article analyzing the existential nature of the U.S. Iran conflict.

We are witnessing the start of what could be a long, complicated conflict - not a prelude to the sharp, short exchange that many expect. What is at stake is the future not only of Iran but also of the place of American power in the world. This showdown cannot end without a clear winner and loser.

As Taheri explains:

Fantasists such as Javier Solana, the European Union's ineffective foreign-policy czar, have tried to present the Islamic Republic's uranium-enrichment program as a technical issue. Others, like French President Jacques Chirac, have advised acceptance of what they regard as a fait accompli.

For Ahmadinejad, however, the issue is political in the grand sense of the term - with nothing less at stake than the survival of the Khomeinist regime.

The 1979 revolution had a tripartite slogan: "independence, liberty and Islamic government" - and the regime that emerged tried to build its legitimacy on that basis. Over the last quarter-century, however, it has failed to deliver.

In practical terms, Iran today is more dependent on the outside world than before the Khomeinists seized power. In 1977, Iran imported 11 percent of the food it needed; today, it imports almost half. In 1977, Iran was an overall exporter of crude oil and petroleum products; today, it imports more than 40 percent of its gasoline.

In 1977, there were no outside forces in the Gulf. Today, the United States and its allies control the waterway. Iranian ships passing through the Gulf, and aircraft flying over it, have to clear their routes with the Americans.

As for liberty, most Iranians today know that they are much less free, especially in social and cultural terms, than they were before the mullahs seized power. A recent study by the International Monetary Fund shows Iran experiencing the largest brain-drain of any country in history, largely because the educated elites are fleeing an oppressive atmosphere.

The slogan's third part, Islamic government, has also remained a chimera. Many genuinely religious Iranians, including some Shiite clerics, see Khomeinism as an "evil innovation" (bed'aah) because it violates a fundamental principle of the faith by pretending that it can create a truly Islamic government before the return of the Hidden Imam.

Ahmadinejad is conscious of the Islamic Republic's massive loss of legitimacy in the early 1990s (at least). But he knows that he can't restore it by offering greater liberty: Any loosening of the regime's tight grip on power could open a Pandora's box of political, sectarian and ethnic grievances and demands that no undemocratic regime can deal with.

That leaves the radicals with two options: thickening the Islamic coloring of the regime, and emphasizing its claim of independence.
Ahmadinejad has tried to thicken the regime's religious coloring by casting himself in the role of the proverbial Islamic ghazi (holy warrior) who will ride his white horse into Jerusalem to liberate it from the infidel.

The regime's claim of independence is best illustrated by its refusal to kowtow to the diktats of the major powers, especially the United States. The nuclear program would not have been an issue in Iran just two or three years ago - most Iranians knew nothing of the program and the controversy it had provoked. But today, largely thanks to Ahmadinejad's constant hammering of the theme during his ceaseless provincial tours, most Iranians are familiar with the issue.

And, because Ahmadinejad has presented the dispute as an attempt by the great powers to deny Iran nuclear energy, many Iranians, while suspicious of the regime's motives, nevertheless support its position.
Ahmadinejad's supporters hailed his election as the second Khomeinist revolution, in the hope that the cooling embers of Islamist passion could be fanned again into raging flames. They have promoted such ideas as a "clash of civilizations," in which Khomeinist Iran would provide the hard core of a new Islamic "superpower" to challenge the United States and offer humanity an alternative to the existing international order.

Thanks to Ahmadinejad, the nuclear issue has become a regime-change issue.

If the Khomeinist regime emerges victorious from the current confrontation, it would move to a higher degree of radicalism - thus, in effect, becoming a new regime. The radical faction would be able to purge the rich and corrupt mullahs by promoting a new generation of zealots linked with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard and the security services. It would also move onto the offensive in the region, seeking to reshape it after the Khomeinist revolution's geostrategic interests.
If, on the other hand, the regime is forced to back down on this issue, the radical moment would fade, while the many enemies of the regime regroup either to topple it or to change it beyond recognition, as Deng Xiaoping did with China's Maoist regime.

Read the whole story here.

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IRAN STEPS CLOSER TO ICBM CAPABILITY

Iran reports that it has successfully launched a rocket into space. We know that they have the plans for an ICBM -- indeed it is one of the issues into which the IAEA is looking.

In an exchange today between the ever bellicose President Ahmadinejad and Secretary Rice. Ahmadinejad stated there is there is "no reverse gear" on Iran's nuclear program and that Iran had thrown away the "break." Secretary Rice's reply was that Iran needed a "stop" button. The march to war is being beaten by Ahmadinejad. But for all of his rants, it is Supreme Guide Khamenei who controls the gears and buttons of Iran's nuclear program. I wonder how long he will allow this suicidal game to continue?

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GUARDIAN SEES MORAL EQUIVALENCE BETWEEN UK AND IRAN

In an earlier post on a gem of a Guardian hit piece here, I wrote, "The Guardian is the leading far left newspaper in Britain. . . . Much of its straight reporting is some of the finest out there. The really whacky stuff comes in the Opinion pieces, . . ." And here is one of them -- "Why Can't MP's See The Folly of Trident" by Mary Riddell. The secondary heading is "Britain can have no moral authority over Iran's nuclear crusade while we are hellbent on upgrading our fleet." You can read the opinion piece here.

The story is nominally about whether Britain can and should upgrade its Trident nuclear weapons systems. It quickly morphs into an argument about Iran, invoking the British left's cherished doctrine of multiculturalism and its intertwined concept of moral equivalency -- embraced by both the author and, apparently the head of the IAEA:

Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the UN nuclear watchdog, warned that Britain cannot expect other countries to refrain from acquiring nuclear weapons if it upgrades Trident.

The author not only adopts this position whole, she further argues that "the idea that we merit the means of mass annihilation because we are 'good' and other countries are 'bad' is seen as risible throughout the non-nuclear world."

As an aside, some of the arguments I raise here I have already raised in other posts. Nonetheless, I will repeat them here for clarity.

In terms of logic, reason, facts and factual accuracy, this Guardian opinion piece is fairly typical -- it fails miserably in all four areas. Let’s start with the moral equivalency argument – a truly suicidal aspect of multicultural philosophy.

Britain and Iran do not inhabit the same moral plane. State sanctioned murder on a grand scale is not something in which Britain normally engages. No one on this earth is worried that the U.K. will decide to smuggle a nuclear bomb into Delhi and then either ignite it or otherwise use it as a form of nuclear blackmail. Britain does not open its meetings of parliament each week by asking for death to all of the people who inhabit Israel and America. Britain does not pay terrorist groups on a varying scale dependent on how much death and destruction they cause in Israel or elsewhere as needed. Britain does not use real physical torture as an state sanctioned instrument of its policies. Britain does not glorify suicide and suicidal cults. Britain has never sent tens of thousands of teenagers to their death by sending them unarmed to clear minefields or to charge machine gun nests in time of war. And Britain is not a theocracy founded upon an incredibly aggressive and triumphalist religion. As the preeminent American scholar on the Middle East, Bernard Lewis wrote a few months ago:

A passage from the Ayatollah Khomeini, quoted in an 11th-grade Iranian schoolbook, is revealing. "I am decisively announcing to the whole world that if the world-devourers [i.e., the infidel powers] wish to stand against our religion, we will stand against their whole world and will not cease until the annihilation of all them. Either we all become free, or we will go to the greater freedom which is martyrdom. Either we shake one another's hands in joy at the victory of Islam in the world, or all of us will turn to eternal life and martyrdom. In both cases, victory and success are ours."

In this context, mutual assured destruction, the deterrent that worked so well during the Cold War, would have no meaning. At the end of time, there will be general destruction anyway. What will matter will be the final destination of the dead--hell for the infidels, and heaven for the believers. For people with this mindset, MAD is not a constraint; it is an inducement.

The ultimate truth is this -- moral equivalency is always a utopian canard. Britain and Iran do not inhabit the same moral plane. There is no hypocrisy in Britain's retaining or improving its nuclear arsenal in this imperfect and dangerous world even as it demands that a truly dangerous theocracy cease and desist in its own drive for nuclear weapons. And the assertion that the U.K. "merit[s] the means of mass annihilation because [they] are 'good' and other countries are 'bad' is seen as risible throughout the non-nuclear world" is meaningless. When any country predicates its defense on polls taken in other countries . . . Do I need to finish?

To continue, the Khomeiniist mullahs have a saying – roughly translated, “the West can’t do a damn thing [against or to stop the Iranian theocracy]. It has shown through in their intransigence in complying with the IAEA. Not only have they have flatly refused to come to the negotiating table, they have increased the speed at which their nuclear program is advancing. Having said that, we know that they are also feeling the pinch of the first round of sanctions, mild as they were, because of the the incredible mess of their command driven economy (see here and here).

The author suggests that we not only jump at this offer, but that we go do away with sanctions altogether while talks are ongoing. According to the author, to the contrary, Europe must act to help "strengthen the Iranian economy." Does the author have a death wish? Does she have any clue as to the nature of Khoemeinism or the bloodthirsty aggressiveness of Iran's theocracy? Or is she just, on a fundamental level, disconnected from reality?

Europe has had years of talks with Iran, which the U.S. fully supported, including with an offer of a package of economic incentives that was rejected only because Iran’s true objective is a nuclear arsenal. Further talks with Iran, absent significant punitive actions, would be not only useless, but counterproductive. What Iran seeks at this point is to buy time – time to complete their weapons program; time to patch the numerous leaks in the dam of their floundering economy; time to wait until George Bush leaves office; and, ultimately, time to gain a position of advantage over the West. The author would give it to them and more.

And so would Russia and China. But they are allies of Iran in this matter – and have no doubt it is with the intention of weakening the United States and the West strategically while gaining a financial advantage. Thus, any realistic sanctions will have to take place outside of the U.N. security council. I have no doubt that the U.K. will join the U.S. in seeking more sanctions – the question will be whether the rest of Europe, as they often do, seek a free ride at the expense of the U.S. and U.K.

Sanctions, coupled with an aggressive covert action campaign to disrupt the theocracy are by far the most palatable options to address Iran. However, they must be coupled with a credible threat of military action. The author paints a view of an apocalypse if the U.S. were to overtly attack Iran. While the Iranians do have the potential to create havoc, I do not believe the author has any clue just how much havoc the West can create for Iran if it becomes absolutely necessary. Nonetheless, for a host of reasons -- not emotions, but reasons -- military force must be the last option, not the least of which is because a military strike would galvanize an Iranian populace that is disenchanted with its own regime and becoming increasingly restive and pro-American.

I will not address all of the Bushisms or other anti-American comments save for one that concerns a matter of fact. The author makes a bald assertion that the U.K.'s nuclear deterrent is "signed over to America," -- in essence, that the U.S. controls Britain's nukes. The author needs a fact checker. Britain's nuclear deterrent is assigned by agreement to NATO control with the written caveat that U.K. may exert independent command over such assets should they "decide that supreme national interests are at stake". See here.

As to the author's take on upgrading the U.K.'s nuclear deterrent, her arguments are a hollow shell. Unfortunately, she does not give us enough information to do what absolutely needs to be done -- to come to a reasoned decision after assessing all of the available facts. A typical Guardian opinion piece. Emotional left wing arguments with lots of labels but bereft of fact.

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DEATH TO AMERICA -- THE IRANIAN PROBLEM RATCHETS UP

The MSM documents that Iran has failed to comply with UN resolutions requiring it to cease its nuclear production. The best of the articles comes from the Washington Post:

Iran has not suspended its enrichment-related activities," the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency reported. The report also said that Iran "has not agreed" to permit sufficient scrutiny of its nuclear program as required to determine whether it is pursuing nuclear weapons. "Iran has not agreed to any of the required transparency measures, which are essential for the clarification of certain aspects of the scope and nature of its nuclear program," the six-page report said.

The IAEA said Iran has not been forthcoming in its response to documents obtained by U.S. intelligence indicating that Iran was trying to build a missile to accommodate a nuclear warhead and constructing a covert facility to convert uranium.

Read the entire story.

The ball is again in our court. Our next move is dependent on how our government assesses the threat of a nuclear armed Iran.

As a threshold matter, no one, not Harry Reid, not Nancy Pelosi, not Joe Biden, not Jacques Chirac, and not even Jack "retreat to Okinawa" Murtha -- hmmm, scratch that, maybe only Jack Murtha -- can possibly believe that Iran's nuclear activities are intended for anything other then building atomic weapons.

Two, we know that Iran is a theocratic police state that, to quote Amir Taheri, seeks to see its religion . . . transformed into a political ideology [that can be used throughout the Middle East as] an instrument of power for the ruling clergy." It is aggressively expansionist.

Three, the unique brand of Shiaism practiced in Iran is a triumphalist religion that, as interpreted under the ageis of Khomeinism, glorifies death and suicidal actions, seeing in them "martyrdom" that is a sure ticket to particularly earthly delights in heaven (for the males, at least). And there are very many true believers in the Shia world. How many tens of thousands of teenage boys drank the Kool Aid offered by Khomeini, took the plastic key made in Taiwan that Khomeini told them was the key to heaven, and then marched weaponless across the sands of Iraq to clear minefields and to die charging Iraqi positions during the Iran-Iraq War?

It is clear that true believers in Khomeini's Shiaism do not operate from the same set of rational principals that protected us during the cold war -- i.e., MAD, the concept of mutually assured destruction. Bernard Lewis, the preeminent Middle East scholar in America, expounded upon this in an article some months ago:

A passage from the Ayatollah Khomeini, quoted in an 11th-grade Iranian schoolbook, is revealing. "I am decisively announcing to the whole world that if the world-devourers [i.e., the infidel powers] wish to stand against our religion, we will stand against their whole world and will not cease until the annihilation of all them. Either we all become free, or we will go to the greater freedom which is martyrdom. Either we shake one another's hands in joy at the victory of Islam in the world, or all of us will turn to eternal life and martyrdom. In both cases, victory and success are ours."

In this context, mutual assured destruction, the deterrent that worked so well during the Cold War, would have no meaning. At the end of time, there will be general destruction anyway. What will matter will be the final destination of the dead--hell for the infidels, and heaven for the believers. For people with this mindset, MAD is not a constraint; it is an inducement.

Coupled with this mindset, we know that the Iranian government has no moral qualms with murder and that the government is unconcerned with collateral damage, whether it be Christian, Jew, or even Islamic blood spilled. A common refrain is that Allah will sort them out in Heaven.

So if the mullahs of Iran get nuclear weapons, what is the likelihood that they will use them and how would they use them? The permutations and scenarios are endless. But clearly, no one can possibly expect the theocracy in Iran to lessen their aggression or bellicosity once they have nuclear weapons. Quite the opposite. Thus they will become even more of a threat to their neighbors and to the Western world. Several possible scenarios and their probability are discussed in detail here, including:

Abdullah and Mubarak, two of the most prominent Sunni leaders, have, along with senior Saudi officials, evoked the specter of a new Middle East divided along sectarian lines. It would set the ­long-­downtrodden Shia against their traditional Sunni masters, rulers, and landlords. If the first battlefield was Iraq, the two leaders suggested, the next would be the ­oil-endowed regions of the Persian Gulf, southern Iraq, and Azerbaijan, where Shia happen to live. In this scenario, the ayatollahs of Shiite Iran could then secure control of the Iraqi, Saudi, and Caspian oil and gas fields by placing them under the protection of their own nuclear arsenal, thus establishing the first Islamic state to achieve great-power status since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in
1918.

Given the clear threat, it is impossible to see how we could allow the mullahs in Iran to have a nuclear weapon. Failure to make the tough decisions now will only increase exponentially the potential for war and casualties on a grand scale later.

That does not mean that we should act militarily now. Our window for military action against Iran -- without having to worry about a nightmare scenario such as described above -- is between one to five years. There is no question that we would decisively win such a confrontation, but the costs would be dear. Further, if we only engaged in an air strike to "set back the clock" on Iran’s nuclear development while leaving theocracy intact, that could prove very problematic. It raises a significant possibility of imbuing a nationalism among Iranians that is now absent and, with the population backing them, there is no doubt that Iran would become very aggressive in attacking American and Western interests world-wide.

So our aim must be to exploit Iran’s weaknesses by other means. There are many. Twenty-eight years of theocratic rule has alienated and secularized a large portion of the population. There is wide scale unemployment and very high inflation, As one commentator has described it:

Despite ample natural resources, Iran continues to suffer double-digit rates of inflation and unemployment. A million young Iranians enter the job market every year, but the economy produces less than half that many jobs. The clerics' penchant for centralization has bred an inefficient command economy with a bloated bureaucracy. Extensive subsidies for basic commodities, such as wheat and gasoline, waste tens of billions of dollars but do little to alleviate poverty. Massive foundations that are philanthropic only in name monopolize key sectors of the economy, operating with little competition, regulation, or taxation. Inefficient state-owned enterprises drain the government budget, and a vast gray market of commercial entities has been spun off from government ministries. The recent increase in oil prices is not a long-term solution to Iran's woes; the economy's flaws run much too deep. Twenty-five years after Iran's revolution pledged to deliver a more just society, the Islamic Republic has spawned an economy that benefits only an elite group of clerics and their cronies and stifles private enterprise.

And therein is Iran’s Achilles heel. Indeed, the relatively mild sanctions that we have already placed upon Iran are showing fault lines in the theocracy. What Iran seeks to do now is forestall any further actions. In the past two weeks, we have seen Iran profess a renewed interest in talks and a ratcheting down of the bellicosity:

[On February 11] Ali Larijani, Iran's top nuclear negotiator, briefly met with European diplomats for the first time since talks collapsed in September and said Iran was willing to return to formal discussions.
. . . .
Larijani also said Iran was a force for regional stability in the Middle East and had no designs on any of its neighbors, including Iraq and Israel. "We pose no threat, and if we are conducting nuclear research and development, we are no threat to Israel," he said.

And two days ago, as described by Powerline, there was a "breathless" report on CNN about

. . . a "top government official" of Iran--identity, unfortunately, unknown--and reports that Iranian officials, at least those who don't dare divulge their identities, are hungry for good relations with the U.S.:

"Natural allies," this official said.

It was a surprising choice of words considering the barbs Washington and Tehran have been trading of late.

"We are not after conflict. We are not after crisis. We are not after war," said this official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "But we don't know whether the same is true in the U.S. or not. If the same is true on the U.S. side, the first step must be to end this vicious cycle that can lead to
dangerous action -- war."

This anonymous, but presumably very powerful, Iranian assured Ms. Amanpour that the desire for peace with the U.S. goes to the very top of the Iranian hierarchy: He confided that what he was telling me was not shared by all in the Iranian government, but it was endorsed so high up in the religious leadership that he felt confident spelling out the rationale.

"This view is not off the streets. It's not the reformist view and it's not even the view of the whole government," he replied.

But he insisted he was describing the thinking at the highest levels of the religious leadership -- the center of decision-making power in Iran.

I asked whether he meant Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei himself.

"Yes," he said..

Does anyone believe this? (Mr. Murtha, please put your hand down)

These actions are so obviously disingenuous as to be laughable. The clear purpose of these acts is to exploit the two major weaknesses of the West. One, a largely amoral and pacifistic Europe, usually led by France’s Chirac, whose professions of motivation by high principles is quite literally always naught but smoke to hide a profit motive that might be mined while America foots the bill with money and blood. Two, a Democratic party now in power that is equally amoral and almost as spineless, and whose profession of motivation by high principles is predicated on attaining partisan political advantage.

Europe has had years of talks with Iran, which we have fully supported, including our offer of a package of economic incentives that was rejected only because Iran’s true objective is a nuclear arsenal. Further talks with Iran, absent significant punitive actions, would be not only useless, but counterproductive. What Iran seeks at this point is to buy time – time to complete their weapons program; time to patch the numerous leaks in the dam of their floundering economy; time to wait until George Bush leaves office; and, ultimately, time to gain a position of advantage over the West.

Yet, it would seem that Iran’s last minute gambit is already paying dividends. Russia and China are, in essence, allies of Iran in this matter – and have no doubt it is with the intention of weakening the United States strategically while gaining a financial advantage. They are stabbing us in the chest, not the back. The target on our back is reserved for the Europeans who are already grabbing for the knife:

A senior European diplomat said it is not a foregone conclusion that "we will go down the sanctions lane," adding: "There are quite a number of European Union countries who believe we should go easy because there seems to be an opening on the Iranian side."

So what to do? One, Bush needs to publicly and forcefully put the military option back on the table if for naught else then to impress upon all parties – mostly immediately our "allies" – that it is now time to impose harsh sanctions before the military option is the only one left. Now is not the time for any mixed signals. Iran and the Democrats must be disabused of any belief that we will quietly acquiesce to Iran's attainment of nuclear weapons. Two, we need to adopt an aggressive policy of destabilizing Iran’s theocracy with the intent of achieving regime change. Clearly Iran can make much trouble for us in Iraq, but we need to quickly get to the point that we can go one better, both in Iran and Iraq. Glen Reynolds is spot on in his calls for targeted covert action against Iranian high value targets, and it needs to happen both in Iraq and Iran. Lastly, Amir Taheri, a brilliant Iranian author, has written very thorough article on the how and why of regime change in Iran. Rather then repeat him, I urge you to read this in full.

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TEHRAN'S TIME IS UP. "Iran faces a deadline today to suspend its enrichment of uranium or, according to the terms of a U.N. Security Council resolution unanimously adopted last December, face further sanctions." AEI weighs in on the issue of engaging Iran in talks.

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