I’m a little late with this, but in case you haven’t seen it (h/t Tom Pechinski)… From the April 4 World Peace Herald:
On April 3 the Russian journal Novaia Gazeta reported that 250 nuclear warheads with a total yield of 20 megatons were not returned by Ukraine to Russia.
Novaia Gazeta suggested the warheads could have been sold to a third country, possibly Iran.
The 200-kiloton warheads were due to be returned to Russia in 1992 after Ukraine declared itself a nuclear-free zone following a payment by Moscow to Kiev of approximately $500 million. The missing warheads were inventoried on papers Ukraine submitted to Moscow that were officially accepted by Russia.
Besides reimbursement, Ukraine was to receive uranium for its reactors from Russia’s AES as part of the deal.
Sergey Sinchenko, a member of a parliamentary commission investigating illegal arms trafficking, revealed the discrepancies. According to Sinchenko, the nuclear warheads could remain combat-ready up to at least 2010.
Ukraine’s ForUm news agency reported on April 3 that Russian General Staff Chief and Deputy Defense Minister General Yuri Baluyevsky said, “Russia’s General Staff has no information about whether Ukraine has given 250 nuclear warheads to Iran or not. I do not comment on unsubstantiated reports.”
Well, General Baluyevsky might not comment on unsubstantiated reports, but I do. So here you go:
We now know that Iran’s recent showcasing of a number or “its” weapons were not indigenous—and their capabilities were overhyped—but Eastern bloc warheads atop Eastern bloc long-range missiles are still enormously dangerous, particularly in the hands of the Iranians, whose theocratic leadership just may elect to martyr themselves to the Muslim world by attempting to destroy Israel.
At the very least, their recent show of “strength” was meant as a deterrent—one that looks not to have been successful. Which means, perhaps, that western intelligence is convinced Iran is not yet ready to act, but that they will when and if they reach the point of readiness. To wit: “U.S. Studies Options for Iran Attack”:
The Bush administration is studying options for military strikes against Iran—strikes that could even include the use of tactical nuclear devices—as part of a broader strategy of coercive diplomacy to pressure Tehran to abandon its alleged nuclear development program, according to U.S. officials and independent analysts.
No attack appears likely in the short term, and many specialists inside and outside the U.S. government harbor serious doubts about whether an armed response would be effective. But administration officials are preparing for it as a possible option and using the threat “to convince them this is more and more serious,” as a senior official put it.
According to current and former officials, Pentagon and CIA planners have been exploring possible targets, such as the uranium enrichment plant at Natanz and the uranium conversion facility at Isfahan. Although a land invasion is not contemplated, military officers are weighing alternatives ranging from a limited airstrike aimed at key nuclear sites to a more extensive bombing campaign designed to destroy an array of military and political targets.
Preparations for confrontation with Iran underscore how the issue has vaulted to the front of President Bush’s agenda even as he struggles with a relentless war in next-door Iraq. Bush views Tehran as a serious menace that must be dealt with before his presidency ends, aides said, and the White House, in its new National Security Strategy, last month labeled Iran the most serious challenge to the United States posed by any country. Many military officers and specialists, however, view the saber rattling with alarm. A strike at Iran, they warn, would at best just delay its nuclear program by a few years but could inflame international opinion against the United States, particularly in the Muslim world and especially within Iran, while making U.S. troops in Iraq targets for retaliation.
“My sense is that any talk of a strike is the diplomatic gambit to keep pressure on others that if they don’t help solve the problem, we will have to,” said Kori Schake, who worked on Bush’s National Security Council staff and teaches at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y.
Others think it is more than bluster. “The Bush team is looking at the viability of airstrikes simply because many think airstrikes are the only real option ahead,” said Kurt Campbell, a former Pentagon policy official.
The intensified discussion of military scenarios comes as the United States is working with European allies on a diplomatic solution. After tough negotiations, the U.N. Security Council issued a statement last month urging Iran to re-suspend its uranium enrichment program. But Russia and China, both veto-wielding council members, forced out any mention of consequences and are strongly resisting any sanctions.
U.S. officials continue to pursue the diplomatic course but privately seem increasingly skeptical that it will succeed. The administration is also coming under pressure from Israel, which has warned the Bush team that Iran is closer to developing a nuclear bomb than Washington thinks—possibly within months—and that a moment of decision is fast approaching.
Bush and his team have calibrated their rhetoric to give the impression that the United States may yet resort to force. In January, the president termed a nuclear-armed Iran “a grave threat to the security of the world,” words that echoed language he used before the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Vice President Dick Cheney vowed “meaningful consequences” if Iran does not give up any nuclear aspirations, and U.N. Ambassador John Bolton refined the formula to “tangible and painful consequences.”
Diplomacy is of course the first avenue of attack, but Iran—like North Korea before it—has shown a willingness to lie, delay, and obfuscate just long enough to reach nuclear capability. And western diplomats, convinced of their own ability to solve any problem with talk and the threat of sanctions (which, to reach “consensus,” are generally watered down so much as to be feckless).
So the Bushies are right to view the ongoing diplomatic efforts with skepticism and not get caught unprepared.
Iran has expressed a desire and willingness, once nuclear armed, to launch offensive strikes. JFK famously called the bluff of one nuclear threat. But the mullahs are not the Russians, and saving face in the Muslim world is more important than saving face in Moscow.
Can we really afford to disbelieve the stated aims of a nuclear-ready Iran? Because the last time we made a similar error in judgment, the Twin Towers burned to the ground, and 3000 of our countrymen died…
I don’t think the Bushies are likely to make that same mistake twice. And I’m fairly sure Israel is not going to stand by and let itself be attacked, either.
There was a reason Iran joined Iraq and North Korea as part of the Axis of Evil. Some say that naming those countries actually provoked them into an aggressive posture. Which is, of course, nonsense.
If anything, the selection proved to be dead on—though diplomatically, several countries have been just as troublesome to us. I expect the way those countries behave in the coming showdown with Iran will tell us a lot about the breakdown of the current global order.
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update: Via Allah, video of video of Sy Hersh trying yet again to relive his “edgy” glory days by denouncing militaristic posturing in favor of empty diplomacy. More here and here.)
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update 2: More from Seymour here. (h/t Terry Hastings)
That about sums up our ability to reason about ‘stated aims’ and make ‘similar error[s] in judgment.’
I knew as soon as I got to the bottom of the post and saw that there was 1 comment, that the commenter would be actus. Either I’m gaining psychic powers or there’s a pattern developing here.
Parsing down into the quantum-syllabic level is actuse’s only claim to fame. To actuse, being a legal student on mommy’s dime means that nouns and verbs are to legalese what quarks are to physics. Avoiding the big picture is what you get paid for.
Think of pw as the little clown’s personal space to practice
lyinglawyering-for-food.It may be why I came, but its the astute analysis that brings me back.
If you like that, you’ll luv this…
Hopefully, Junior will light up Iran so hot that even our allies will start crying into their laderhossen*.
But, if they have nukes, good until 2010, they might figure they have an insurance policy to finish their program. The longer they wait, the longer we wait.
How many more so? The B52 can carry only 51 500 lb conventional bombs, or 180 small diameter bombs.
Keep waiting, fuckers, you’ll lose every tank in your army with the first wave of America bombers. Then we depants you. Then we get mean.
*Achtung! The colors!
Ah, shitting in your host’s parlor willfully then is it? Then those who think you merely dishonest do you a service you do not deserve.
How else am I to find these sorts of truths about me:
Its the analysis that I come for my friend.
Actus, the best way to convince anyone of anything is to be sincere.
As you have yet to fake that, you get exactly what you have earned; scorn for your endless, pedantic word games.
And it’s the useless bullshit you leave behind, anonymously, shamelessly.
There is analysis and there are personal comments. You’ve shown your ass enough times around here to give credence to comments such as mine.
On the other hand, astute analysis would be the forum’s topic of the day, such as they
arewere before you shat all over them.As a lawyer wannabee, you may want to be succinct. Unless, of course, you mean to be misunderstood.
How does he do it? What does he eat? When does he sleep?
I’m afraid it’s the attention.
Coming back to this report…
I’m skeptical. Don’t get me wrong, I think it will be a catastrophe for the world if Iran is allowed to acquire nuclear weapons, and I think we should do all we can, short of bringing about a comparable catastrophe, to stop them. That said:
First, I don’t trust any journal named World Peace Herald. If lefties can write off anything in the Washington Times by yelling “Moonies!”, then I should be able to take this with a grain of salt.
Second, “250 nuclear warheads with a total yield of 20 megatons were not returned by Ukraine to Russia….The 200-kiloton warheads were due to be returned to Russia in 1992.” These people can’t even do arithmetic, and I’m supposed to take this intelligence seriously?
That’s flippant. This isn’t. Thermonuclear warheads are, I gather, more difficult to sneak around than small fission devices. I worry about Russian tactical nukes going astray. Missile warheads? It’s not impossible, but it’s a lot harder to conceal.
Finally, Occam’s razor feeds my skepticism. If Islamic terrorists had got hold of nukes, I think they’d use them just as soon as they are able. If Iran did, I think they’d be behaving a lot differently and a lot more aggressively. The simplest conclusion that fits the facts is that the Russians have actually been better about holding onto their warheads than we’d fear. God help us all if I’m wrong.
JPS, I think you’re at least partly right. What I think is that the mullahs aren’t as completely in control as some would think; that there are, still, influential Iranians not part of the ayatollah axis who can persuade them not to go off half-cocked. Along with that is the fact, known for a long time, that Soviet-made nukes are high maintenance. If the mullahs have Soviet nukes, the sane people may have convinced them that they might not work after having been out of the system for so long.
And on top of that, it’s now clear that at least part of the Iraq war has worked, perhaps not as well as it could have absent actus and the NYT, but worked nevertheless. That is: the mullahs now know that if George Bush is provoked sufficiently he will respond, and respond in force. (So does everybody else. Part of what we’re hearing nowadays is frustration that that’s true.) This gives the diplomats some room to maneuver.
“War is the continuation of diplomacy by other means.” von Clausewitz’s cynical comment is symmetrical; diplomacy and war are two sides of the same thing, and the choice of which to use in any given case depends on circumstances. But if your war-making capability is insufficient, your diplomacy is likely to fail. There is no reason for anyone to yield to persuasion if they are convinced that they can get away with not doing so indefinitely, with no untoward consequences. Diplomacy in a situation where you have no credible military power devolves into euphemisms for paying Danegeld—trying to buy them off. That’s tough in this situation, where the ayatollahs have flatly declared that we have nothing they want that we are willing to pay.
But now they know that, while they may well be shithouse crazy, so is George. That acts as something of a brake. We should be happy for that.
Regards,
Ric
Ya. we might go in there and help the pro-iran factions come to power.
I wonder if it ever crossed Iran’s mind that our taking out their regional enemy and increasing the power of pro-Iran forces in Iraq is a favor to them. Thankless assholes.
I love this attitude.
Not.
Prior to Gulf War I, Iraq was widely considered to have the roughest, toughest military in the region. After 1991, Saddam’s defiant announcement that he had won (because he was still in power and Bush I was not) was added to the rebuilding of the Iraqi army with Russian assistance. The result was, as the honest will recall, dire predictions from all and sundry that the Iraqi defenders would exact a heavy toll on the American invaders.
This turned out not to be the case.
Iran’s military has always been held to be on a par with Iraq’s. This is confirmed by the Iran-Iraq war(s) over the years, which have consisted of push and pull by one side or the other, neither achieving any permanent advantage.
Iraq’s military was destroyed for all practical purposes by the invasion. Most of them didn’t even fight, simply bugged out and went home, and American forces encountered no, repeat no, significant opposition other than a few minor pockets. The comparison with American forces, whom they outnumbered by large proportions, was clear to all concerned.
That military has now been reconstituted—by Americans, with American-style training and using American doctrine. They even have an equivalent of the National Training Center, and use it. The fact that they’re still using Soviet equipment is not particularly relevant. So is everybody else in the area, and Americans have always bragged that they’d swap gear with anybody and still engage (and win!) at two to one against or better.
So from the ayatollahs’ point of view, their ancient rival may very well have achieved the status of America, Jr.—not nearly the capability of American troops, but if they manage twenty percent of American capability they can eat the lunch, as well as the breakfast and dinner, of anyone they’re likely to take on. Including Iran. And given the American influence, and the fact that Iraqi soldiers tend to respect and even like their American teachers, the suggestion has been made that, should we wish to invade Iran, Iraqi units might well participate in the festivities. After the events of the past Brutal Iraqi Winter, that suggestion is not only credible, it’s scary.
I don’t expect Mr. Ahmadinejad to be grateful, exactly.
As for religious influence, I think you’ve missed a few clues (as usual.) Sistani is an Iranian; he left Iran and set up shop in Iraq because he didn’t like the “Revolutionary” ayatollahs. He’s at least as senior as anybody below the Supreme—call him Cardinal, seriously in the running for Pope. And he’s sitting in the mosque where the Shi’ia schism happened, the home and center of Shi’ism. If you think that works in any way to Iran’s advantage, I suppose I should admire your naivete but can’t quite manage it.
The only things Iran has going for it are (1) Sadr and (2) the terrorists. They’ve been pumping money and bombs into the terrorist ranks for the whole time, hoping to run the Americans out and thus gain prestige. That effort has, umm, not borne particularly succulent fruit. As for Sadr, the man’s as much of a loose cannon for his Iranian subsidizers as he is for Sistani; he’s an egotist, a person who’s declared himself a religious authority on the strength of his dad’s status and not much more. And the only reason he can run loose is that his main operating area is supervised by the Brits, who have gone out of their way to be “soft” occupiers. Nobody, but nobody, thinks Sadr could get away with it if he was working in a zone controlled by Americans, including Sadr. The few times he’s tried something he got cut off at the knees, the last couple by Iraqi troops with Americans along to kibitz. Not a particularly valuable cat’s-paw, especially since (for the Iraqis) the distinction between Sadr’s goons and the criminal gangs now cropping up is minimal.
So their terrorists have failed, the guy they thought they could buy off is obviously setting up his own shop, their opposition in Dueling Ayatollahs is highly credible and influential and getting more so, and the army across the border has been upgraded enormously. And they don’t appreciate the favors. The ingrates.
Regards,
Ric
Ric, I got 5 bucks that says Actus doesn’t reply to your masterful effort with much more than a couple of block quotes, with a sentence or two underneath each – one of which is a question.
I’ll throw a fin on that bet as well, but on one of the sentences being incoherent.
Quite reconstituted. And handed over to a regime friendlier to Iran.
Wow.
I think they like the fact that Basra is run more in tune to their thinking than they ever got it under the Iran/Iraq war. You’re also leaving out Da’wa and SCIRI. Both better for Iran than the baathists.
I’m sure they’re very scared of the fact that we’ve proven that we’re so good at regime change. So good that as soon as we’re done, they’re next.
I never thought they could run the place. Its just they probably prefer the place as it is now than as it was before.
But nothing, nothing, beats “America Jr.”
There really isn’t that much left to say after the america jr. bit.
damn! i showed up too late to make a bet!
Someone needs a history lesson:
Iraqi Shi’ites: Arabs. Speak Arabic. Center of spiritual belief is the holy city of Najaf.
Iranian Shi’ites: Persians. Speak Farsi. Center of spiritual belief is the holy city of Qom.
The Iraqi Shi’ites don’t like the Iranian Shi’ites. Some of the fiercest fighting during the Iran/Iraq War was in the al-Faw peninsula between Iraqi Shi’ite units and Iranian units. Not all Shi’ites are the same.
Ayatollah al-Sistani studied at Qom with Ayatollah Khomeini. They differed completely on the issue of the <cite>velayat-i-fayiq</cite> – the ability for clerics to rule in the absence of the Prophet. Al-Sistani believes that the influence of secular affairs poisons religion. He believes in the separation of mosque and state – for the exact opposite reasons we do – but he believes in it never the less.
Except the political wing of SCIRI isn’t at all friendly towards Iran. The Badr Brigrades may be getting some Iranian support, but it looks like the mullahs in Tehran have decided that Moqtada al-Sadr is their man. Abdul al-Mahdi may be a member of SCIRI, but he’s probably the most competent politician in Iraq now.
The whole argument about Iranian influence ignores the huge ethnic and political difference between Iranian and Iraqi Shi’ites. Then again, I guess to some people all those brown people look and think alike…
Will some of the amateur pontificators tell me what is going to happen? Go out on a limb won’t you? Then we can laugh when you are wrong. From the safe distance of 7000 miles talk is cheap.
My prediction…government that does not include Jalafari (sp) forms within a month. Revenge killings continue. US will not commit troops to pacifying Baghdad for the time being. Prevarication, success minimization, etc continues unabated in world media.
In other words a semi-rolling disaster.
<b>
I’m caling Bullshit on that one.
We know by over 2000 years of experience that coreligionists never fight, but simply get along wonderfully.
Don’t believe me, look at Europe, or as serious historians like to call it “Happy New Funlund”.
There the French and the Germans and the Dutch and the Poles and the Ruskies and the Swedes and the Austrians and the Hungarians and the Serbs and the Croats and the Turks and the Italians and the Spanish and the Portuguese and the Irish and the British and the Scottish…they’ve enjoyed a continuous blissful two millenium of intraconfessional multiple orgasms.
True story.
If only you neocons could see the world as it truly exists: in one dimension, black and white.
Not really no. Its not like we’ve put in place an Iranian puppet. Just something the Iranians prefer to what was there before. Even if they don’t come out ahead, their chances of coming out ahead are now greater.
But sure, they’ll hate “america jr.”
Because, Saddam Hussein was an Ally!
Get it?
The enemy of your enemy is your friend, and Saddam was our enemy’s enemy. Ergo sum, Friend. Yay!*
*That he was actually a bigger enemy of the US than Iran, you know with that whole war thing and the sanctions and the three decades of murder, hey, we in the [alternate-]reality community ignore that.
My best guess is, Iran has gone passive/aggressive.
Their ploy is to be as outrageous and provocative as possible in order to draw a military action so they can employ the use of weapons they already have from the Ukraine. That will let them proclaim that they were wrongly attacked first. The proof of being wrongly attack is in that they had weapons all along, but we so peaceful they never used them except in self defense.
It’s the one way I can see where they (Iran) get to employ nuclear weapons, effectively wipe out Israel, and then stop just short of an all out war with the US and with the world view NOT making them the villain.