Briefing: Attacking Iran

[Plane]

You are a bit behind the times on each of these facts.

Lebanon is thick with rockets, not homeade rockets, artillery grade rockets.

Lots of our casualtys in Iraq were struck with wepons sent from Iran for the purpose.

Do you feel annoyed when you get a grevious wound?

Iran seems determined that untill it can win , war will not cease.

[Xavier_Onassis]

Yeah right, lots of American troops in Iraq were killed by rockets from Lebanon.

I know this: no rocket in Lebanon is any threat to ME.

[BSB]

MAD, Mutual Assured Destruction, is still alive and well in the world when it comes to nation states. It may not hold when we're talking about non state sponsored terrorism, but when it comes to nation states like Iran and Israel it does.

If Iran got the bomb what would stop them from using it on Israel? Even if they wiped the state Israel off the map Israel could return the favor with nuclear strikes from their submarines. Is the Iranian leadership so fanatical that they'd do it anyway? I highly doubt it. They've shown no evidence of that kind of fanatical behavior. 


BSB

[Xavier_Onassis]

The Iranians are not insane. The Ayatollah & Co. are simply trying to stay in power. Since they have elections, they much appeal in some way to the citizens. They do this by touting the very real injustice of the Zionists to the Palestinians. Iranians feel that Israel cannot be attacked because Israel has the bomb. Iranians are fearful of war: they had a disastrous experience in the 1980's in the war with Iraq (started by Iraq) and more recently, they have US troops on both their Eastern and Western borders. Probably a majority of Iranians feel that they are less likely to be attacked if they have nukes. There is also a realization of the scarcity of oil because there is a shortage of gasoline in Iran. Iran has oil, but it lacks refinery capacity.

The reason why Israel is disliked by Iranians is because the US used Israelis as proxies to manage the Shah's military. Iranian pilots normally were not permitted to take off in the fanciest fighter aircraft: an Israeli would normally have to accompany any Iranian pilot.  The Iranians fee sorry for the Palestinians. Of course, nuking Israel would kill lots of Palestinians as well as lots of Jews. Therefore a nuclear attack would be unlikely by Iran.

Israelis are paranoid about Iran, which outnumbers them 10 to 1. Netanyahu exploits and encourages this paranoia.

Bombing Iran to prevent nukes would most likely make the Iranians more determined to get nukes. The only way to prevent Iran from not getting nukes is a mutual agreement. Such an agreement should include some concessions from Israel.

[Plane]

  Is Iran having elections that the incumbents can't fix?

[Xavier_Onassis]

I doubt that an election in which the ruling group got 10% of the vote would fool anyone.

Iran is a first world country in Teheran and several other large cities, but distinctly Third World in the small towns, villages and countryside.  There is the belief that the victory of the incumbent is the Will of Allah, which is diminished when the villagers discuss the election and find that nearly everyone voted for the opposition. Then they get on their cellphones and find that no one in any of the neighboring villages voted for the government, either. That is what happened to the Shah, that and the rumors, which turned out to be true, that he was dying of cancer.

Note that Ayatollah Kalmeinei and Amedinejahd have serious disagreements, even though Amedinejahd was vetted by the Ayatollah's panel and supported by them. Iran is NOT a dictatorship by a single person: the governmental structure is quite complex, and probably not understood by anyone in this country but the experts.

There must be at least the appearance to a large number of the people that the election COULD have been won by the incumbents, or it is useless, like the election Batista held in 1958, or the one that Assad recently held in Syria.

War is not going to stop Iran from trying to build a bomb. Iran is too large to be forced to do anything. The way to prevent Iran from having the bomb is to negotiate with them. They must feel that they are getting something important in return for their concessions beyond the lifting of the sanctions, like an end to Jewish settlements in East Jerusalem. Of course, the one thing that would really be effective would be the removal of all nukes from Israel.

Note that Israel has no more right to have a bomb than Iran.

[Plane]

  How would negotiaions work to reduce or delay the Iranian push twards having atomic wepons?

[Xavier_Onassis]

Iran would agree not to build nuclear weapons and would open its facilities to regular inspections in return for concessions from the US and Israel. Especially Israel.

Attacking Iran could delay Iran a bit, but it would intensify their resolve. Iran has oil, and will sell it, and therefore has a means of paying for the research a lot more easily than North Korea, that has almost nothing that anyone wants that it could profit from.

Negotiations are the best way by far to deal with this. War is not.

[Plane]

Iran would agree not to build nuclear weapons and would open its facilities to regular inspections in return for concessions from the US and Israel. Especially Israel.

Attacking Iran could delay Iran a bit, but it would intensify their resolve. Iran has oil, and will sell it, and therefore has a means of paying for the research a lot more easily than North Korea, that has almost nothing that anyone wants that it could profit from.

Negotiations are the best way by far to deal with this. War is not.

We have better leverage in North Korea.
It requires two to tango.
Peace is like a Tango.
War can be because just one side is stupid.

[Xavier_Onassis]

I do not think we have better leverage in North Korea.

After the current sanctions, the value of the Iranian rial went down by 50%. That is major leverage.

We are not really threatened by North Korea. South Korea and Japan have a minimal threat, but there is little to the US.

Iran is not much of a threat to the US, either.

War is not the solution. It would be monumentally stupid.

[Plane]

  North Korea is living day bto day on gifts of American food Japaneese cash and North Korean dry goods.

   If they were left alone they would starve, they are underfed inspite of the gifts.

This isn't leverage?

 Not if we stupidly keep giving and negotiating , they have no respect for US brainpower.
How are they wrong?

[Xavier_Onassis]

North Korea lacks food, but not everyone would starve without aid.

It appears that Kim Jung Un becoming the new leader is likely to result in better relations. There have been none of the acts of aggression that happened under Kim Jong Il, at least so far.

How do you think they should properly respect "US brainpower"?

[BSB]

"they have no respect for US brainpower. How are they wrong?"

How are they wrong? Just for starters, they're starving and we aren't.

BSB

[Plane]

North Korea lacks food, but not everyone would starve without aid.

It appears that Kim Jung Un becoming the new leader is likely to result in better relations. There have been none of the acts of aggression that happened under Kim Jong Il, at least so far.

How do you think they should properly respect "US brainpower"?

There hasn't ever been much problem with their leadership starving , that is true, but they have had a famine or two in recent years.

They take the brainpower of our present leadership to be weak, I don't think they are wrong.

[Plane]

"they have no respect for US brainpower. How are they wrong?"

How are they wrong? Just for starters, they're starving and we aren't.

BSB

They are woefully ignorant on running an economy.
But they seem to be pretty good at tricking a long series of US presidents into feeding them at a subsistance level while they work on wepons that can realisticly threaten us.