Category Archives: nuclear wepoans

Iran, Jews, North Korea, nuclear Iran, nuclear wepoans, Pakistan, US Foreign Policy

North Korean Bomb: Israeli Speculation, Iranian Angle, Joe Stalin and the Rosenbergs, Frying Burgers at the Sing Sing Greasy Spoon……….

         

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“In addition to provoking the West, North Korea’s nuclear test on Tuesday may have also been carried out on behalf of Iran, and in the presence of Iranian atomic scientists, a security expert warned on Tuesday. North Korea is making progress both in its nuclear weapons capabilities and its ICBM missile research, Dr. Alon Levkowitz, coordinator of Bar-Ilan University’s Asian Studies Program and a member of the BESA Center for Strategic Studies, told The Jerusalem Post. “The most disturbing question is whether the Iranians are using North Korea as a backdoor plan for their own nuclear program. The Iranians didn’t carry out a nuclear test in Iran, but they may have done so in North Korea,” Levkowitz said. “There is no official information on this… but Iran may have bypassed inspections via North Korea. If true, this is a very worrying development.”………………”

This is purely Israeli speculation. But it is to be expected under the circumstances. It would be stupid not to speculate on this issue, even if the speculator is the right-wing Jerusalem Post which has an axe (possibly even ax) to grind. After all: it was Pyongyang which provided Bashar Al-Assad with all those nuclear facilities that probably existed only in Western and Saudi media but the Israelis bombed anyway for mysterious reasons.

Besides, does anyone know any country that willingly provided either nuclear weapons or nuclear weapons technology to another country? Other than the USA giving it to Joe Stalin, something which exposed both the two Rosenbergs to the undeniably barbaric horrors of the electric chair at Sing Sing. Justly or unjustly, I don’t know. A few years earlier, the Nazis would have tortured then beheaded them on the guillotine for it (or just for being there). But the electric chair must be more barbaric than beheading (provided the blade is sharp and the executioner is sober). I read somewhere that it took long minutes to die on the chair in those Rosenberg days. Like frying a burger at a greasy spoon. I don’t think anyone uses ‘the chair’ it anymore, I hope not, probably not even Texas nor any God-fearing neighboring states that we see in those BP commercials on TV. Executions of any kind  are barbaric and only some theocracies (Muslim and Christian and other) in third world countries and the USA impose them.
(Speaking of pushing nuclear weapons technology: I know there were reports about nuclear ‘pusher’ A.Q. Khan of Pakistan, who became their national hero, even more so than Osama Bin Laden. There have even been reports of the Pakistanis promising to supply the Al-Saud and the Wahhabi Mufti with nukes at some future date, if and when the princes decide to become a world power).
Cheers
mhg

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Iran, Israel, nuclear wepoans, US Foreign Policy, War on Iran

Netanyahu Raises Chutzpah to a New Level: Hiroshima Mon Amour…….

 

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“They all said it would end the war,
And we thanked Christ for the bomb,
And the priests and witches all agreed,
They should die to keep them free.
The fireball that shamed the sun,
Burning the shadows on the ground,
As the rain falls to dry the land,
Leaving the desert for the thirsty man.

Hiroshima Mon Amour………………”  Alcatrazz

  
“Netanyahu: Iran must commit to halt all enrichment in upcoming nuclear talks. In unusual move, PM invites Barak, Lieberman and newcomer Mofaz to join meeting with EU foreign policy chief Ashton, in which he accused Iran of playing for time and said world powers must demand that Iran take tangible steps toward halting uranium enrichment……….. On Wednesday afternoon, the prime minister met with European Union Foreign Affairs Chief Catherine Ashton, who arrived in Israel to brief Netanyahu on the preparations for the second round of nuclear talks with Iran………….”

It would be funny if it weren’t so outrageous. Here is the leader of a small Middle East country, one that has built many nuclear bombs and never joined the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and it is annexing occupied lands against international law. And he is “demanding” that Iran stop all uranium enrichment. He should be the last person, his government the last government that would talk about nuclear threats and enrichment and hiding and deception. Demanding: and European leaders actually listen to this charlatan and hustler! I can understand how they would worship him in the U.S. Congress: selling snake oil in some constituencies is an honorable old tradition that goes back to the Frontier days.
Now he is trying to set the agenda for the Baghdad meeting, perhaps hoping to provoke an Iranian withdrawal. That would apply more pressure on the White House in this year of Our Lord of Elections.
Cheers
mhg


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Iran, nuclear wepoans, United Nations International Organizations

Iran and Yukia Amano: no Chemistry, no Love Lost…………….

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“An Iranian lawmaker says the Director General of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is endangering global peace through his biased approach towards Iran’s nuclear program. “It appears that [Yukiya] Amano has become an anti-peace element who is dangerous to global peace,” Member of the Majlis (parliament) National Security and Foreign Policy Committee Javad Jahangirzadeh said. The lawmaker advised the IAEA to reconsider its communiques and statements and to speak based on accurate information, Mehr News Agency reported on Monday. “Naturally, if the Agency continues on the current path, [if it still] releases political reports which do not conform to realities and [if] the agency [continues to] act as a [US] State Department think tank, we will definitely see new decisions with regards to [our] relationship with the IAEA,” ……………”

No chemistry (no pun here), no love lost, no more comment.
Cheers
mhg


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Afghanistan, Al-Qaeda, Middle East Nuclear, nuclear wepoans, Pakistan, Terrorism, US Foreign Policy

The Next Nuclear Failed State………….

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“Shi’ites, who make up over a quarter of Pakistan’s population, are deemed “apostates” by many extremist sectarian Sunni groups. Responsibility for the attack on the long-suffering Hazaras of Baluchistan was claimed by Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) — a group also suspected of a devastating attack earlier in the week on the home of a senior police officer in Karachi who has a record of taking on the militants. Though little known in the West, LeJ, a sectarian extremist outfit linked to al-Qaeda and to the Pakistani Taliban, is now widely considered Pakistan’s most dangerous terrorist group…….. The army is reluctant to confront its bases with force; the police have failed to protect those it threatens; the judiciary is unable to successfully prosecute its leading members; and some politicians have sought to appease it with shady deals. While al-Qaeda has suffered a series of setbacks after CIA drone strikes killed successive leaders based in Pakistan’s tribal areas, its local affiliate remains unimpeded. LeJ began life as a particularly vicious offshoot of the banned anti-Shi’ite Sipah-e-Sahaba organization. The sectarian group, with its cells seeded throughout the country, held both doctrinal and organizational appeal for al-Qaeda, which used LeJ’s deep and pervasive network to expand its own presence into Pakistan. While al-Qaeda had operational command, LeJ supplied foot soldiers to carry out attacks…………..”

“Admiral Mullen accuses Pakistan’s ISI of treachery, but says let’s keep talking…….The chairman of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff said to the Senate Armed Services Committee yesterday that Pakistan’s
intelligence agency was in the background of the recent attack on our embassy,
as well as a bunch of other assaults. But he seems happy to keep on chatting
with them……….” Media (Sept 23, 2011)

What was all the ‘Western” talk about the dangers of nuclear weapons falling into the wrong hands through “extremist” states?
Cheers
mhg


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Gulf states, Iran, Middle East, nuclear Iran, nuclear wepoans, WTF

On Bushehr Nuclear Power, Zaroastrian and Royal Pagan Rites on my Gulf of Madness……..

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“Iran has condemned the “negative” position of the Gulf GCC which had criticized the Iranian “provocations” toward some Arab states in the Gulf. The spokesman for the Iranian foreign ministry, Ramin Mehmanprast that the “regional policies of the Islamic Republic has always been one of mutual respect, good neighborliness, and noninterference……Regrettably some have waged a campaign against Iran…….. He considered that the GCC ministers expressing their deep worry about developments in the Iranian nuclear issue” an unnecessary thing……..”

Okay: the “GCC” ministers have criticized Iran’s nuclear program, just as the new Bushehr plant is now providing electric power. The Iranians interpret the IAEA reports different from the way Western powers interpret them (the glass half-full vs. the glass half-empty syndrome). As for me, I have no idea if the glass is half-full or half-empty: there is an important difference, depending on which half is empty and which is full and taking into consideration one of Newton’s Laws. I do hope the Iranians are right and there will be no nuclear weapons in the Middle East (except in Israel), but I have my doubts on this issue. I would dread the prospect of a nuclear arms race between the mullahs in Tehran and the potentates in Abu Dhabi. I also wonder if mullahs would lie to us? In any case, nuclear technology has a logic of its own, sort of like when……..oh well, no sense getting obscene here.
What is
 intriguing in this brief and ordinary report from a daily newspaper in my home town on my Gulf, is the unrelated picture and the caption it added to this report. This picture below is captioned with the words “Iranian Zaroastrians perform their religious rites at the Temple
of  Fire in Tehran”.
    Also sprach the mullahs?
To
 foreign eyes it looks quite innocent, maybe even quaint and cute (as it does to me in fact in a different context). Now WTF does the photo have to do with the nuclear program? This is something that divisive semi-official Saudi media outlets like Alarabiya or Asharq Alawsat often publish, not a daily that claims some remnant of the old bygone pre-Salafi liberalism of my hometown. In the Gulf of Madness, such photo and caption only serve to fan flames and divisions these days. Before you know it, there will be retaliation: some Saudi princes will start bowing to al-Lat or Hubal of the good old pagan Jahiliya days, or some Egyptian expatriates who have gone native will start worshiping a Pharaoh again (that era may be over now but there are plenty of princes available). In this age of confessional and sectarian tensions stoked by irresponsible potentates and their retainers……………..
(I found the photo rather cute: men and women performing their common rites. WTF is wrong with that?)
Cheers
mhg


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Economics, Iran, Iraq, nuclear wepoans, Sanctions, US Foreign Policy, Weapons deals

On Iraq Sanctions, Iran Sanctions, Cuba Sanctions, Smart Sanctions, Asinine Sanctions, ………….

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“Economic sanctions rarely hurt a disfavored regime or its powerful supporters, at least in the short run. They hurt those at the bottom of the ladder. This is a point that we Westerners, with our addiction to the imposition of sanctions to punish bad behavior, should take more seriously than we do………..  This has always been the problem with the West’s sanction addiction. Sanctions nip at those whose lives are already marginal…….. Dictators everywhere try to control the economy, to funnel resources to their friends……… In the case of Iran, the sanctions are manifestly failing, unless their point was to force the government to redistribute the wealth. The regime is proceeding with its nuclear weapons development, and may even be picking up the pace. Western experts differ on how close the regime is to completing its research. The head of Israeli military intelligence recently estimated that Iran may have the capacity to build at least one nuclear explosive device by next year. Things may change. The Iranian regime may give up its nuclear dreams, making the world that much safer, and, incidentally, handing the Obama administration a much-needed foreign-policy victory. But no matter the result in Iran, let us remember, the next time we debate the imposition of sanctions on a rogue state, exactly whom we are really punishing…………”

It is highly unlikely that the ruling Iranian mullahs (or any replacement regime) will suddenly give up their nuclear program anytime soon.
As for the forces behind economic sanctions: they are more complex than the writer notes. The famous sanctions against Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath regime in Iraq did not harm the dictatorship or its elites: it hurt the ordinary people. But these were broad wartime sanctions, not as selective or nuanced as what Iran “supposedly” faces currently. Then there are so-called smart sanctions that are as almost dumb as other sanctions, but maybe not as dumb as asinine sanctions. One reasonable definition of asinine sanctions is that they are the kind that neoconservatives usually prefer. A good example of asinine sanctions are those no one believes in but they are kept in place out of political fear or expediency, like the sanctions against Cuba. In fact, the American sanctions against Cuba are some of the most asinine in history.
Take the sanctions against Iran: they are only partly driven by IAEA requirements, but their depth and scope also reflect the influence of domestic American political pressure groups. These groups include the Israeli lobby (AIPAC, etc), as well as defense hawks on the right (and some on the left). These sanctions are also partly driven by a regional rivalry for domination between the United States (directly and/or through its proxy allies) and Iran. In summary, the scope of the sanctions is the result of domestic American politics as much as Iranian “infractions”. Then there is the ego of some regional allies that the U.S. administration needs to massage, in this case the Israelis, the Saudis and possibly the UAE potentates (there is oil and huge contracts at stake). Then there is the need of some in both Israel and the USA to inflate the Iranian threat and its urgency in order to divert attention away from the urgent need to resolve the issue of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Among other things………
(Personally, I believe the only “smart” sanctions are those that target weapons and individuals, not institutions. Targeting large institutions almost always tends to harm many ordinary people).

Cheers
mhg


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Iran, Israel, nuclear Iran, nuclear wepoans, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Weapons deals

Nuclear Theocratic Powers of the Middle East and Beyond…….

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“Particularly worrisome in the Saudi case is the potential departure from the Gold Standard established by the UAE 123 agreement. If, as has been suggested, the Saudi agreement is concluded without an accompanying commitment to abjure reprocessing and enrichment technologies, there could be profound consequences for the administration’s nonproliferation objectives and for the long-term stability of the Middle East. Although Saudi Arabia has not previously been judged to be a proliferation threat, as it “lacks the technological expertise, industrial base, and disciplined commitment required to develop an indigenous weapons capacity,” recent developments may have altered this assessment. The alacrity with which the United States dispensed of its long-standing support for the regime of Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak no doubt gave pause to the House of Saud, which continues – 30 years later – to be troubled by American abandonment of the Shah on the eve of the Iranian revolution. Nor is Saudi threat perception likely to be relieved by the regional meddling of its frequent ideological competitor. This is to say nothing of the Kingdom’s concerns regarding Iranian weaponization. Indeed, Saudi Arabia appears increasingly unnerved by the trajectory of the Iranian program, a trend that can be seen in the country’s shifting characterizations of its own nuclear ambitions. ……..”

  • There are fears that Saudi Arabia may try and shift any nuclear program toward military use. In fact that is exactly what Prince Turki al-Faisal warned about last month. There is now this fear, but the difference is that the Saudis will need American (and maybe other) help in any nuclear plan they have.

  • There are, there have been, fears of the Iranian nuclear program. These fears are based on possibilities that the Iranian may be trying to either build nuclear weapons or, more likely, reach the point ehre they can build nuclear weapons.

  • Then there is Israel. Everyone knows that Israel has many nuclear warheads, although no one can prove it. Israel is not a signatory of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), hence it is not under any Western pressure to allow international (IAEA) inspection.
  • Pakistan has several nuclear weapons, and it is not an NPT signatory either. Pakistan was created as a quasi-theocratic state: it was carved up as an Islamic state from parts of India. The country has been veering toward fundamentalism and back over its history. It may be closer now than at any other time.


What do all these West and South Asian countries have in common? No, not the geographic proximity. They are all either declared theocracies, undeclared theocracies, quasi-theocracies, or threatened theocracies. They are all within one of these categories I noted above. Scary, no? (The United States is not a theocracy, although the Tea Party and other elements would like it to be and try to push it that way).
Cheers
mhg


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