Iran Air Strikes Growing in Probability

This is a clincher, which you can be assured your rhetorical opponents will refuse to acknowledge.

OK. I see how you characterize the misstep of acting militarily, and reducing Iran's nuclear progress to rubble.

Would you address the consequences of not acting to acheive said results ?

Non military options are best, but they aren't always successful. What if it can't be done, and Iran goes nuclear? Can you address that reality on the world stage?

The same conditions which apply to Pakistan and India would apply to Iran. Use a nuke, become a huge, glass-lined parking lot.

A "clincher"? In what sense? If you are going to tell me that the apparent success of a past practice mandates its future application, then you cannot oppose the concept of an airstrike on Iran. And if we want to look at the UN's track record in this area, we need look no further than North Korea.

There's your "clincher."

I'd rather like to address the non military options to prevent Iran from getting to that point. However, I have no reason to believe that the consequences would be vastly different from the consequences we are facing now with a, say, nuclear Pakistan. Why do you think that the concept of MAD would not work with a country that might, at some point, have an arsenal of half a dozen nukes vis-a-vis a nation armed with thousands of nuclear weapons?

That from one of the most "pairless" on the site!!

Anon

I can't quite follow your argument. You are saying that the Osirak air strike was a success. Does that imply that the 2003 invasion was unnecessary?

The probable outcome in re. Iranian nuclear weapons development is that they will acquire and test nuclear weapons in the next few years. Iran already has delivery capability of such weapons throughout the region, and has expressed its willingness to do anything in its power to utterly destroy Israel. Iran covertly supports and supplies military munitions to Islamic terrorists acting without national sanction .. a classical definition of piracy. Iran has no clear need of a nuclear arsenal other than to threaten regional neighbors and attempt to blackmail the rest of the world.

We should either (A) intervene to halt the Iranian nuclear weapons programs, which I personally would advise against, or (B) accept the very great and grave risk that Iran will either conduct a first-strike on Israel, or supply the means for a terrorist attack on an American city, and I really hate taking so great a risk with hundreds of thousands of lives.

I expect that the world, including the U.S. will opt for the (B) alternative. Later, if the worst happens, whatever American Administration is in power will take the heat for not acting decisively before the threat fully developed. Put off unpleasantness, and hope that it'll go away. Sometimes it does. If Iran is later found to have connived at murdering thousands, perhaps millions, the world will be faced with the alternatives of either massive nuclear response on Iran, or finding some other less drastic way of eliminating forever a regine that plunged the world into another nuclear war. I'm glad that I don't have the responsibility to make the decision.

Of course not. Iraq continued to pursue WMD ... but in the specific context of nuclear weapons, the Osirak airstrike crippled Iraq's nuclear weapons program. However, Iraq continued to seek the means to produce weapons grade uranium following that event, as well as other WMD. Iraq continued to ignore UN resolutions, failed to fully cooperate with UN weapons inspectors, breached UN resolution 1441, and repeatedly breached the terms of the 1991 cease fire agreement.

Old Europe,

"I'd rather like to address the non military options to prevent Iran from getting to that point. However, I have no reason to believe that the consequences would be vastly different from the consequences we are facing now with a, say, nuclear Pakistan. Why do you think that the concept of MAD would not work with a country that might, at some point, have an arsenal of half a dozen nukes vis-a-vis a nation armed with thousands of nuclear weapons? "

1. I believe everyone here is in agreement that the ideal would be for Iran to bend to diplomatic pressure and abandon its nuclear weapons program. However, that appears as the most unlikely of all scenarios.

2. You ask how a nuclear armed Iran is different from a nuclear armed Pakistan.

* Pakistan and India have been political enemies since the British left in 1948. The political antipathy beween the Muslim and Hindu populations has been extreme since that time, and conflict over who should govern the Kasmir has led to numerous limited conflicts. India has a large army and it acquired nuclear capability from the USSR during the Cold War. Pakistan had a reasonable fear that India would use its nuclear muscle to unfair advantage, and built its own small nuclear arsenal to balance India. The Pakistan-India has remained one of the most dangerous nuclear threats in the world. A nuclear war between the two would have serious consequences for the two principals, but would have little effect in the wider-world. In recent times the tensions between Pakistan and India have cooled somewhat, and the nuclear threat has diminished a little. Neither India nor Pakistan have made any threat to other neighboring states, but the danger of a limited exchange will continue for a long time to come.

* Iran is not faced with a hostile neighbor armed with nuclear weapons. Popular opinion in Pakistan favors the sort of Islamic Republic that governs Iran, and that isn't likely to change. There is no danger to Iran from Afghanistan, or the north where they are protected by terrain and distance. Iraq was once a direct and real threat to Iran, but that threat went away with the fall of Saddam, and the Ba'athist Party. Further a field in the region, there is no threat to Iran from the tiny Gulf Sheikdoms, Syria, or Saudi Arabia where radical Islam is popular. The only nuclear power in the region is Israel, and even Israel may be decieving the world into believing it has weapons that it does not. We all believe that Israel has nuclear weapons, but it has never threatened anyone with them, tested them, or shown them publically to the world. Israel's weapons are almost the perfect utilization of a nuclear deterrent against a very real and determined enemy with the capability of destroying the whole people. Iran has no delivery capability outside the region, so who is it that Iran hopes to deter? In point of fact, the Iranian government does not cite deterrance as the reason they want nuclear weapons. What we do hear from them is that Israel should be wiped from the earth, and that Western materialism as represented by the Great Satan America should be the target of a Jehad.

* If Iran, or the DPRk for that matter, were to join the world community and give up their pipe dreams, things might be different. Neither have shown the least rationality, and both have long histories of threats, blackmail and intimidation as a means of achieving their ends.

Few nations in the world are so openly hostile to regional stability and world peace as Iran. These are a dangerous and fanatical people who believe paradise awaits those who die for their religous supermacy. They can destroy Israel and set the stage for a wider and bloodier conflict in the Middle East. They can not destroy the United States, but they could put the means of destroying a large American City into the hands of international terrorists.

Perhaps acting preemptively against Iran will continue the downward spiral of American influence, and American favor in the Middle east (if it can be said to be "favor"--at least in Iran, it's not hostility and anti-Americanism).
It would also further the perception that that the only "madman" with "doomsday weapons" and the willingness to use them, is Bush himself.
Iran's desire to wipe Isreal off the map is analogous to the threat of turning Iran into a parking lot. This is the hypocracy that characterizes United States foreign policy: What you do is terrorism, what we do is counter-terrorism, what you do is evil, what we do is virtuous.

Exactly, i'd say the chances are 1,000,000/1 if we don't attack and 10/1 if we do.

Interesting odds F4F. Would you please explain the mathematics of how you arrived at them? This seems a strange outcome if the Iranian nuclear program were seriously damaged and delayed. A well-planned and executed air attack might well do serious enoogh damage that Iran would be incapable of building a nuclear device for years to come. The odds of that I think are pretty good, but not nearly good enough that I would strongly advocate that approach.

If on the other hand, Iran does develop and test nuclear weapons they will be capable of making a nuclear missile attack on Israel, and they would be capable of transfering a nuclear weapon to terrrorists. Iranian capability to carry out either of those two scenarios is obviously higher than the risk of an Iranian nuclear attack if their capability has been seriously degraded, or eliminated. Do you see what I mean, the mathematics seem to argue against your stated odds.

Perhaps you can demonstrate the logic and/or math supporting your odds-making.

I suppose that 4f4's numbers are predicated upon the irrationality of Dr. Stranglove who now occupies the oval office.

I see, humerous and fictional numbers from a humerous and fictional character. These things can be calculated. See Hermann Kahn's Thinking the Unthinkable, among other highly regarded works on the subject of analyzing probable outcomes of various public policy scenarios.

I suspect that F4F has no rational support for the odds that he's given. Those are probably only a reflection of how deeply he wants any policy considered by the United States government to be wrong and likely to cause the sky to fall in on us. But, I could be wrong. If so then F4F should be able to demonstrate his logic, if not the mathematcis from which they are derived.

My Dear Fascist (That's you Ash),

I address you today with new respect since I find that you and your fine son have served this country, unlike some who don't have the inclination or courage to so!

I stll however believe to be one fine fertilizer salesman. I think you have the Iran thing fairly well pegged, but I do have a question for you. Just as a side, I notice today the Iranians have successfully enriched uranium for the first time.

Do you not believe that Iran could in one way or the other, obtain a nuclear weapon without actually developing it. I'm thinking particulary from those missing from Russian stocks, or perhaps from North Korea?

Do you also think it impossible that they could see that it finds it's way here, or Isreal, and detonated?

I guess that's actually two questions, however ...

Anon

I am philosophically a Federalist, and a voting Republican. Neither of those have anything whatsoever in common with either the Italian Fascists nor the German Nazi's. I'd appreciate you recognizing the difference and refraining from the insults.

"Do you not believe that Iran could in one way or the other, obtain a nuclear weapon without actually developing it. I'm thinking particulary from those missing from Russian stocks, or perhaps from North Korea?"

I believe that Iran might purchase a nuclear weapon, but that the probabilities are against it. The old Soviet weapons have, in general, not been properly maintained and today would just as likely result in a fizzle as a pop. This is especially true of those uncounted devices that appear missing from the official inventory. These weapons remain dangerous, but to be put to use would probably have to be disassembled for the remaining fissionable materials. Though that is most likely, this isn't the sort of thing one casually bets on. Possible, but improbable can bite you on the butt in a big way if you're wrong with nuclear devices.

The DPRK probably doesn't have enough weapons in its arsenal that it would be willing to part with one, just to please an ally. They could conceivably work a swap where Iran would receive one warhead in return for testing another. This presupposes that the DPRK could transport the weapon to Iran. The problem is the DPRK might find it difficult to export a nuclear device these days. They have no merchant marine to speak of, and could not transport the device by ground or air over China without causing an international incident. DPRK designs are believed to be based on obsolete Soviet models. We expect them to be relatively large, certainly not capable of being MIRV'd., and we expect quite a bit of radiation leakage. We are watching with all the technological means we have available to detect movement of nuclear weapons out of the DPRK. Again possible, but improbable so far as we can tell.

The most likely source for an Iranian Bomb not of native design and manufacture, would be from Pakistan. There is some indication that some Pakistani nuclear scientists and technicians have provided some level of support to the Iranian programs. Here the problem is that Pakistan probably doesn't have enough weapons grade fissionables to spare, and the Pakistani government does not want to disturb its relationships with either the United States, or India (who would go bonkers to learn that Pakistan was providing nuclear arms to another radical Islamic state in the region.

"Do you also think it impossible that they could see that it finds it's way here, or Israel, and detonated?"

I have trouble understanding the question. Do you mean, is it possible that an Iranian nuclear device be detonated in Israel, or the United States? If that is the question, then yes I believe that both scenarios are possible. Iran already possesses missiles capable of striking almost any point in Southwest Asia, so launching a nuke against Israel once a warhead was mated to the missile would not be a technological problem. Less likely targets of an Iranian missile strike in the region might be Iraq, India, and U.S. naval forces that might be within range.

Iran does not have the reach to directly attack the United States, but it could easily transfer a nuclear device to a radical terrorist group. The device, most likely, would go by sea to a West Coast port ... Los Angeles, San Francisco, or Seattle would all be high priority targets. U.S. intelligence services would try to discover and eliminate the threat. I wouldn't like to speculate on the odds of terrorists sneaking a device past our security and into one of our major port cities.

This danger of a nuclear attack on one of our ports exists today, but the risks would be greatly increased if Iran possessed a nuclear arsenal. Today's terrorists would have difficulty in acquiring a fully operational nuclear device, see my comment above. What is most likely today, is that a terrorist operation would detonate a fizzle of some sort. No pop, just the release of radioactive materials that would be dispersed by conventional blast and wind patterns. Most probably a nuclear attack would cause more panic and political repercussions than actual damage and/or deaths. But ... is even that an acceptable risk? I don't think so, but have no easy and inexpensive solution to the threat. There are no good solutions, and even the best security plans have consequences that might be almost as damaging to the nation as a whole as a small dirty nuclear planned fizzle.

I'll read your actual answers separately.

I however, find the Republicans to be very much like their Italian and German counterparts! It's no surprise to me that the Bush family was financing them during WWII!!

Anon

Yes, and old Joe Kennedy was both Hitler's buddy and appolgist for the Nazis long after the war broke out.

What is the conservative/Republican uniform, party salue and flag? Who are the political storm troopers whose job it is to beat opponents to death? Is there a racial ideology here that I'm missing? Where are the concentration camps for undesirables. Is there a Secret Police that breaks down doors in the middle of the night to carry away Jews and Gypsies to oblivian? Where are the mass rallies with stirring march music and torches? Have the libraries been purged of literature by degenerate authors? Is art being restricted to propaganda glorifying the Party's ideals?

Back during the Great Depression there were movements like that in this country led by the Kingfish, Father Maclaughlin, and others. The term may apply to the KKK, but they aren't much in evidence these days.

Just tone down the rhetoric, and lets see if some useful exchange of views isn't possible. Oh, and BTW if I might have one thing "pretty well pegged", isn't it possible that my views on other things be worth serious consideration?

In any event, Iran is claiming it is in the "nuclear club." I think the guy thinks either that if has has nuclear weapons he won't be bombed or he wants the US to strike Iran for some crazy reason.

Iran declares: we are in the nuclear club

I am not sure why some countries are allowed to have weapons and some are not, is it only the crazy threats against Israel which makes them thought so much more dangerous than India Pakistan and Israel and the US and other nuclear nations? Are words more powerful than actual actions? Personally the thought of George Bush being in the position of being behind the push of a nuclear button scares the begees out of me. I think we should concentrate on doing away with all nuclear weapons period.