N News: Op-Ed ~ Time For Military Strikes In Iran
*Source: Examier.com Toronto Populist Examiner Bruce Maiman....(click here link)
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - December 27, 2009: In what one observer has called the first NY Times op-ed "explicitly advocating a military campaign against Iran," Alan Kuperman argues that diplomacy has failed with Iran and military strikes are the only way to prevent the country from developing its nuclear program.
It's a good thing that Iran rejected the U-N deal, writes Kuperman, because the plan would only have provided the country with a steady stream of enriched materials that could eventually be 
used for weapons. "This raises a question: if the deal would have aided Iran's bomb program, why did the United States propose it and Iran reject it?"
According to Kuperman, the United States proposed the plan in order to appease GOP critics, and Iran rejected it for similarly political reasons --it feared it would appear to be were pandering to the West. Ultimately, because Iran needs enriched uranium, the only plans it will agree to are those that allow it to slowly accrue nuclear weapons-grade materials over time.
"Since peaceful carrots and sticks cannot work, and an invasion would be foolhardy," Kuperman says, "the United States faces a stark choice: military air strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities or acquiescence to Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons."
Kuperman contends that precision attacks at nuclear facilities could seriously impair the country's nuclear development, and the backlash would be manageable. Diplomacy is always preferable, Kuperman concludes, "but in the face of failed diplomacy, eschewing force is tantamount to appeasement."
One of the more persistent illusions among some neoconservatives is the idea that people subjected to random extermination respond by becoming less belligerent. A recent embarrassing examples was the notion that we'd be "greeted with flowers" as we marched into Baghdad, which delivers us to yet another conclusion about some neoconservatives: They don't learn their lessons from history. It's worth noting that there's a reason why terrorism is also known as asymmetrical warfare. It is the unfortunate but rational countermeasure in the face of overwhelming force.
Kuperman's proposal is the sort of pathetic war-mongering that gives conservatives and neoconservatives such a bad name, particularly when it's not only a bad idea but a bad piece of scholarship on the part of a person representing the University of Texas at Austin as director of that institution's Nuclear Proliferation Prevention Program (with a PhD in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology).
used for weapons. "This raises a question: if the deal would have aided Iran's bomb program, why did the United States propose it and Iran reject it?"
According to Kuperman, the United States proposed the plan in order to appease GOP critics, and Iran rejected it for similarly political reasons --it feared it would appear to be were pandering to the West. Ultimately, because Iran needs enriched uranium, the only plans it will agree to are those that allow it to slowly accrue nuclear weapons-grade materials over time.
"Since peaceful carrots and sticks cannot work, and an invasion would be foolhardy," Kuperman says, "the United States faces a stark choice: military air strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities or acquiescence to Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons."
Kuperman contends that precision attacks at nuclear facilities could seriously impair the country's nuclear development, and the backlash would be manageable. Diplomacy is always preferable, Kuperman concludes, "but in the face of failed diplomacy, eschewing force is tantamount to appeasement."
One of the more persistent illusions among some neoconservatives is the idea that people subjected to random extermination respond by becoming less belligerent. A recent embarrassing examples was the notion that we'd be "greeted with flowers" as we marched into Baghdad, which delivers us to yet another conclusion about some neoconservatives: They don't learn their lessons from history. It's worth noting that there's a reason why terrorism is also known as asymmetrical warfare. It is the unfortunate but rational countermeasure in the face of overwhelming force.
Kuperman's proposal is the sort of pathetic war-mongering that gives conservatives and neoconservatives such a bad name, particularly when it's not only a bad idea but a bad piece of scholarship on the part of a person representing the University of Texas at Austin as director of that institution's Nuclear Proliferation Prevention Program (with a PhD in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology).Almost every non-neoconservative observer, including, unanimously, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, believes that bombing Iran's nuclear facilities would be a) ineffective and b) immeasurably dangerous, given that Iran has many effective ways to strike back --not only at U-S troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, but also utilizing its international Hezbollah network to mount terror attacks at home.
Further, the risk of destabilization in an already-unstable part of the world is the last thing the global economy needs now that it's beginning to climb out of the recession --yet another flaccid trait of the selfish warmonger who thinks only about what he wants without considering the consequences.
Iranian protester (AP file) Finally, start dropping bombs on Iran and you can kiss that country's internal resistance movement goodbye, a populist resistance now on terra firma of the kind that Iran hasn't seen since the 1979 revolution. Bomb Iran and see how fast those freedom fighters turn their zeal against outside interlopers bent on killing innocent Iranians.
Kuperman, of course, discounts these matters in his op-ed, or he doesn't bother acknowledging them. He does concede that aerial strikes against any suspected nuclear facilities "might not work." But he thinks history is on his side, citing Israel's 1981 attack on a nearly-finished Iraqi reactor, and NATO's 1999 air campaign against Yugoslavia, which he says "briefly bolstered support for President Slobodan Milosevic, but a democratic opposition ousted him the next year."
These are specious arguments at best and outright crap at worst.
Yugoslavia was an ethnically fractured part of the world held together by the iron grip of Marshal Tito. Ethnic tensions grew after his death in 1980 as nationalism and separatist movements fueled regional wars throughout most of the 1990s. The fall of Milosevic was inevitable. Nor was anyone in the region threatening to build nuclear reactors, nor did they have ownership to some of the world's largest oil and natural gas supplies, nor was there any jihadist animosity towards Israel or the United States. In short, there's no comparison between the two examples. You might as well argue that we can rebuild Afghanistan because the Marshall Plan was such a great success in the rebuilding of post-World War II Europe.
The Israeli example proves nothing. Anyone familiar with Desert Storm knows that Israel's attack failed to deter Saddam Hussein's imperial and biological or nuclear ambitions, though that 1991 invasion finally did put an end to the Iraqi dictators chemical warfare efforts. Further, the Persian Gulf War was a coalition operation consisting of 3 countries, few of which would support a bombing campaign against a sovereign nation that has every right to develop whatever energy needs and military weapons it sees fit.
It's great being an American, where it's OK that we have nukes, but we can sanction or attack any other country that wants them who we don't want to have them. 
It's worth remember in this part of the world that Iran is a signatory of the 1968 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. Guess who isn't: India, Pakistan and Israel, the only three nations in the region that have nuclear weapons. If Mr. Kuperman is worried about an unstable country having nuclear weapons, he might do better to find solutions to the problem represented by Pakistan, a nation crawling with insurgents who have comfortably embedded themselves while the United States goes gallivanting around in Afghanistan.
However, Israel's 1981 attack on Iraq's Osirak reactor did demonstrate a signal reality: She can take care of herself and will, in no short order, make mincemeat out of anything Iran might represent should Mr. Ahmadinejad and the clerics foolishly decide to push any envelopes.
Indeed, the whole business of fulminating over Iran getting "the bomb" is ludicrous when there's a much easier way to address the concern. Just make it very clear to Iran's president and its clerics:
No problem, boys. You can pursue your nuclear energy aspirations. And maybe that will result in you developing nuclear weapons --we'll know you'll have them when you test them. But having them will come with a price: Never mind the obvious firing of a missile to some target in Israel, or even Europe. Our response to that will be no brainer.
But if there is a single nuclear incident anywhere in the world connected with any form of jihadism, if a dirty bomb goes off in London or New York or Tel Aviv, we will blame you and innocent Iranians will die because their government decided to play fast and loose with a dangerous privilege. Let the Iranian people know, let the resistance movement know, that if their leaders want nuclear weapons, they will be held to account at the slightest incident, and that the United States will not hesitate to turn Tehran or any other city into a glass parking lot. As long as you understand those terms, you can have your nukes.
Oh, and if you're worried that maybe insurgent elements in Pakistan may actually perpetrate said dirty bomb attack because they think you'll get blamed for it, all the more reason to get with the United States to help stabilize Afghanistan and defuse tensions in Pakistan from the emerging radical elements using that country as a base of operations. How's that for a sanction?
Call us when you want to talk. The number's 202 456-1414
It's worth remember in this part of the world that Iran is a signatory of the 1968 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. Guess who isn't: India, Pakistan and Israel, the only three nations in the region that have nuclear weapons. If Mr. Kuperman is worried about an unstable country having nuclear weapons, he might do better to find solutions to the problem represented by Pakistan, a nation crawling with insurgents who have comfortably embedded themselves while the United States goes gallivanting around in Afghanistan.
However, Israel's 1981 attack on Iraq's Osirak reactor did demonstrate a signal reality: She can take care of herself and will, in no short order, make mincemeat out of anything Iran might represent should Mr. Ahmadinejad and the clerics foolishly decide to push any envelopes.
Indeed, the whole business of fulminating over Iran getting "the bomb" is ludicrous when there's a much easier way to address the concern. Just make it very clear to Iran's president and its clerics:
No problem, boys. You can pursue your nuclear energy aspirations. And maybe that will result in you developing nuclear weapons --we'll know you'll have them when you test them. But having them will come with a price: Never mind the obvious firing of a missile to some target in Israel, or even Europe. Our response to that will be no brainer.
But if there is a single nuclear incident anywhere in the world connected with any form of jihadism, if a dirty bomb goes off in London or New York or Tel Aviv, we will blame you and innocent Iranians will die because their government decided to play fast and loose with a dangerous privilege. Let the Iranian people know, let the resistance movement know, that if their leaders want nuclear weapons, they will be held to account at the slightest incident, and that the United States will not hesitate to turn Tehran or any other city into a glass parking lot. As long as you understand those terms, you can have your nukes.
Oh, and if you're worried that maybe insurgent elements in Pakistan may actually perpetrate said dirty bomb attack because they think you'll get blamed for it, all the more reason to get with the United States to help stabilize Afghanistan and defuse tensions in Pakistan from the emerging radical elements using that country as a base of operations. How's that for a sanction?
Call us when you want to talk. The number's 202 456-1414Disclaimer statement
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