August 26, 2006

Iran christens new nuke reactor, US and/or Israel about to go blow it up


Hope those crazy Iranians didn't spend a lot decorating the reactor, you know, nice Ikea shelving, maybe some Pottery Barn settings in the cafe. Nope, it'll be dust soon... along with the world economy... Get ready for another wild week on the housing / economy / stockmarket / iran / iraq / worldpanic front

UNITED NATIONS — With increasing signs that several fellow Security Council members may stall a United States push to penalize Iran for its nuclear enrichment program, Bush administration officials have indicated that they are prepared to form an independent coalition to freeze Iranian assets and restrict trade.The strategy, analysts say, reflects not only long-standing U.S. frustration with the Security Council's inaction on Iran, but also the current weakness of Washington's position because of its controversial role in a series of conflicts in the Middle East, most recently in Lebanon.
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Defying U.N., Iran opens nuclear reactor

KHONDAB, Iran - Iran's hard-line president on Saturday inaugurated a heavy-water production plant, a facility the West fears will be used to develop a nuclear bomb, as Tehran remained defiant ahead of a U.N. deadline that could lead to sanctions. The U.N. has called on Tehran to stop the separate process of uranium enrichment — which also can be used to create nuclear weapons — by Thursday or face economic and political sanctions

Israelis Back Attack on Iran Reactor

Israeli adults would support a pre-emptive strike against a nuclear facility in Iran, according to a poll by Teleseker published in Maariv. 63 per cent of respondents think Israel should bomb the Iranian nuclear core.

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33 comments:

Anonymous said...

As soon as they cut the ribbon, we need to cut that reactor in half.

Anonymous said...

i love the smell of napalm in the morning

Roccman said...

Hey Keith - the US gave this exact nuc to the Iranians.

http://www.tvnewslies.org/news/#international

· Venezuelan Troops Take U.S. Embassy Bags
**Report: U.S. gave Iran 1st nuclear reactor - The dome-shaped
Tehran Research Reactor was given to the country as part of a
U.S. Cold War strategy to help the shah, who was also against
the Soviet Union. Compounding the irony in today's stand-off is
that the U.S. government also supplied Iran with 10 pounds of
weapons-grade uranium needed to power the facility, and which
is likely still there, the newspaper said.

blogger said...

richard - couldn't agree more. we created this mess. now we're going to make it messier

just like when we armed iraq during their war with iran

blogger said...

richard - send me your email address - I have a good programme for you to watch.

Roccman said...

same email as I have been providing the asshole anons that like to call names rather then read FACT.

roccman2003@yahoo.com

Anonymous said...

Keith,

Could you please put up the recommended video in a post too.

Thanks.
Rao.

Anonymous said...

Russia Says It Opposes U.N. Sanctions on Iran

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/26/world/middleeast/26russia.html

This is looking a bit dicey.
Rao.

blogger said...

great series on cheney - the dark side

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/darkside/view/

Anonymous said...

The U.S. gave the Shah a toy reactor 35 years ago, so by Richard's twisted logic we're 150% responsible for this nutcase and his mullah buddies today?

That makes as much sense as claiming the Brits were responsible for WWII because they bought a bunch of bombers from Italy in 1935.

Blame games don't cut it fools. It's 1938 and the clock is ticking. The Roman numerals after the "WW" this go around are III.

Anonymous said...

Your right, it is 1938 allover again and if the Iranians don't act fast to protect themselves, Bush and Cheney are gonna blitzkrieg all the way to Tehran.

Anonymous said...

Sure Theo, those planes on 9-11 were radio controlled. Bush and Cheney were flying them, right?

Look under your bed, there's an NSA microphone. It records your grunts as you whack off over that autographed photo of Michael Moore.

Anonymous said...

No, No, let's try negotiations, i'm sure they'll be more than willing to take anything we offer!

Take them out Now!

Them or us!

Anonymous said...

NEW YORK, May 10 (JTA) — With concern mounting over Iran’s atomic ambitions, the American Jewish community is lobbying intensively to ensure that the threat is taken seriously by the United States, the media and the world.

Careful to avoid giving the impression that it’s primarily an issue of Jewish or Israeli concern, however, U.S. Jewish groups are taking pains to highlight the greater regional and global threats posed by a nuclear Iran and its Holocaust-denying president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

“We have to mobilize public opinion in this country and around the word to understand the serious threat that this represents,” Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of President of Major American Jewish Organizations, told JTA...

----------------------------------

The fact is, Iran has no ICBMs and no reason to start a nuclear war with the U.S. If you are afraid of moslems, ask yourself which media has been selling war again and again. Why do they want to sell war on Iran? To maintain Israel's nuclear blackmail. Is that a reason for Americans to kill and be killed?

Anonymous said...

Where's the caliphate fanatic?

Anonymous said...

Iran offers no "nuclear threat". There is not the slightest evidence that it has the centrifuges necessary to enrich uranium to weapons-grade material. The head of the IAEA, Mohamed ElBaradei, has repeatedly said his inspectors have found nothing to support American and Israeli claims. Iran has done nothing illegal; it has demonstrated no territorial ambitions nor has it engaged in the occupation of a foreign country - unlike the United States, Britain and Israel. It has complied with its obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty to allow inspectors to "go anywhere and see anything" - unlike the US and Israel. The latter has refused to recognise the NPT, and has between 200 and 500 thermonuclear weapons targeted at Iran and other Middle Eastern states.

Anonymous said...

Posters who want war with Iran are demanding this for U.S. naval personel:

Iran tests upgraded surface-to-sea missile



Dated 26/8/2006
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Iran is said to have successfully tested an upgraded, indegenous, guided surface-to-sea missile, media reports confirmed on Saturday

The missile was tested at the Persian Gulf and Sea of Oman during the 'Blow of Zolfaqar' military exercises which began last Saturday.

Wargames spokesman Habib Sayari told reporters that the missile accurately hit its pre-determined targets. Sayari said that the missile has a suitable range, high shooting power and precision.

He added that the successful testing of the missile showed the strength, innovativeness, scientific and technical expertise of the country's defense forces and equipment as well as the potential and specialized skill of its experts.

Analysts however suspect this missile is based on the Russian SS-N-22 Sunburn missile that Iran is said to have acquired via China in 2004. The Sunburn missile is a Russian missile of the Soviet era and can carry a warhead of upto 300kg and is said to have a range of 100km-120kms.

Way to support the troops guys.

Anonymous said...

boycot is once again so correct. The Iranians are a peaceful lot, foresaking their Persian and Islamic heritage for a calmer, humanistic view of the world. A framed portrait of Rodney King hangs in the Mosque of the Supreme Leader, and he even carries rosary beads in his pocket during prayers to show solidarity of spirit with the Pope.

Their nuclear enrichment effort is purely a research program. Being environmentally conscious, they have moved the project deep underground to preclude even the smallest possibility of contamination. Iranians are a hardy lot, and rather than buy fuel rods from the EU or Russia, they have decided to build thousands of centrifuges and make their own enriched unranium.

This plant looks very much like the plants devloped in China, Russia and the U.S. for making weapons grade materials, but so what? We can surely count on the word of Iranian President Ahmadinejad who tells us that his nation only wants the uranium for power generation, and that the state of Israel must be wiped off the map.

Thanks for bringing all of this into focus boycot. Otherwise some crazies might get the notion that Iran was up to no good.

Kumbaya, my Lord, kumbaya!
Kumbaya, my Lord, kumbaya!
Kumbaya, my Lord, kumbaya!
O Lord, kumbaya!

Anonymous said...

when was the last time Iran commited aggresive war?
How about Israel?

Anonymous said...

"when was the last time Iran committed aggresive war?"

"Whenever the last IED in Iraq was detonated."

I agree with that, and agree even more with Hezbollah kidnapping Israeli soldiers and taking them back into Lebanon. It is very clear that Iran bankrolls Hezbollah and gave the green light for this event to happen.

Anonymous said...

Chris G,
It sounds like your loyalty is to Israel not America.

Anonymous said...

Chris G,
It sounds like your loyalty is to Israel not America.

Anonymous said...

Chris G,
It sounds like your loyalty is to Israel not America.

Anonymous said...

Chris G,
It sounds like your loyalty is to Israel not America.

Anonymous said...

Chris G,
It sounds like your loyalty is to Israel not America.

Anonymous said...

Chris G,
It sounds like your loyalty is to Israel not America.

Anonymous said...

Chris G,
It sounds like your loyalty is to Israel not America.

Anonymous said...

Chris G,
It sounds like your loyalty is to Israel not America.

Anonymous said...

Unknown who,
I guess in your book Iraqis have no right to defend thier country.

Anonymous said...

There are 2 schools of thought.

1. Those who think that the administration GENIUNELY thought there were WMDs in Iraq and went in there.

2. Those who think the administration KNEW there were no WMDs but still went in to Iraq...for control over its oil and a base in the region.

The first school of thought tends to THINK that IF ONLY Iran were to abandon their nuclear program we will leave it alone.

The second school of thought THINKS that the only choice that Iran has today, is to acquire a nuclear warhead in order to avoid an invasion...that is the only deterrent.

Keep in mind a few dozen warheads too arent a deterrent, in the face of a few thousand with the other side. Also, a few dozen takes years to acquire.

Like Kipling's East and West these two twains shall never meet. Only history will tell which one was right. And whether administration DECEIVED it's citizenry.

my 2 cents
Rao

Anonymous said...

New article by former CIA personel:

August 26, 2006
Hoekstra's Hoax: Hyping Up the Iran 'Threat'

by Ray McGovern
Talk about chutzpah! I was suffering a bit from outrage fatigue yesterday but was shaken out of it as soon as I downloaded an unusually slick paper, "Recognizing Iran as a Strategic Threat: An Intelligence Challenge for the United States," released this week by House intelligence committee chair, Pete Hoekstra.

No, not "Hoaxer." This is serious – very serious. The paper amounts to a pre-emptive strike on what's left of the Intelligence Community, usurping its prerogative to provide policymakers with estimates on front-burner issues – in this case, Iran's weapons of mass destruction and other threats. The Senate had already requested a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran. But Hoekstra is first out of the starting gate. Professional intelligence officers were "as a courtesy" invited to provide input to Hoekstra's report.

While you can't judge a book by its cover, you can glean insight these days from the titles given to National Intelligence Estimates and papers meant to supplant them. Remember "Iraq's Continuing Program for Weapons of Mass Destruction," the infamous NIE of October 1, 2002, by which Congress was misled into approving an unnecessary war? "Continuing" leaped out of the title, foreshadowing the one-sided thrust of an estimate ostensibly commissioned to determine whether WMD programs were "continuing," or whether they had been dead for ten years. (The latter turned out to be the case, but the title – and the cooked insides – provided the scare needed to get Congress aboard.)

Now suddenly appears a pseudo-estimate titled "Recognizing Iran as a Strategic Threat: An Intelligence Challenge for the United States." To wit, the challenge set before the Intelligence Community is to get religion, climb aboard, and "recognize" Iran as a strategic threat. But alas, the community has not yet been fully purged of recalcitrant intelligence analysts who reject a "faith-based" approach to intelligence and hang back from the altar call to revealed truth. Hence, the statutory intelligence agencies cannot be counted on to come to politically correct conclusions regarding the strategic threat from Iran.

Hoekstra to the Rescue

Pete Hoekstra apparently has set his sights on outstripping his Senate counterpart, Pat Roberts of Kansas, for first honors as intelligence partisan of the year. Roberts, who has torpedoed all attempts to complete the long-promised study on whether the George W. Bush administration played fast and loose with intelligence on Iraq, is a formidable competitor, but Hoekstra is moving up steadily on the right. Tellingly, his zeal (and that of FOX News) recently found him well ahead of even Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Citing an Army report that units had dug up corroded canisters of chemical agent dating back decades, Hoekstra and Senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) insisted that weapons of mass destruction had indeed been found in Iraq. "We were right all the time!"

Shameless as Cheney and Rumsfeld have been in stretching the truth, not even they would go along with that one. No doubt they pledged to find more credible ways to shore up Santorum's flagging campaign to hang onto his Senate seat. One can understand the pressure on Santorum to find some deus ex machina to rescue his campaign. What was most remarkable was his ability to enlist the chair of the House intelligence committee in this charade and make him the laughingstock of Washington. Was Hoekstra unfamiliar with the donnybrook over the administration's fatuous claims of WMD in Iraq, and its eventual concession that there were none there? Where has he been?

As recently as May 4, in answer to a question after a speech in Atlanta, Rumsfeld conceded, "Apparently there were no weapons of mass destruction." Was Hoekstra so naive as to think he could pressure the administration into recanting its painful recantation and risk opening that still festering wound?

Undiminished Zeal

The snub by the administration has not affected Hoekstra's zeal to do its bidding, even if further embarrassment waits in the wings. He has violated all precedent in consenting to have his committee author this faux-National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, making it out to be a strategic threat. But a threat to whom? The answer leaps off the cover. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is pictured giving a Nazi-type salute behind a podium adorned with a wide poster (in English) "The world without Zionism." And atop the first page stands an Ahmadinejad quote: "The annihilation of the Zionist regime will come ... Israel must be wiped off the map ..."

The authors make a college try to persuade that Iran is also a threat to the US, but is singularly unpersuasive. Like Cheney's major speech of August 26, 2002, which provided the terms of reference and conclusions of the subsequent NIE of October 1, 2002, it merely asserts that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons and probably has offensive chemical and biological weapons programs and "the largest inventory of ballistic missiles in the Middle East." The text then tacks on for good measure Iranian support for terrorist groups and support for the insurgency in Iraq.

The paper gives most space to the nuclear issue (shades of the "mushroom cloud" conjured up before Congress voted to authorize war on Iraq in October 2002). But the best it can do in conjuring up a threat that most see as 5 to 10 years out is that a nuclear-armed Iran might be emboldened to "advance its aggressive ambitions in and outside of the region ... [and] ... threaten US friends and allies." Stretching still further, the authors argue that Iran might think that a nuclear arsenal might protect it from retaliation and thus would be "more likely to use force against US forces and allies in the region." Last, but hardly least: "Israel would find it hard to live with a nuclear armed Iran and could take military action against Iranian nuclear facilities."

Principal Author

The Hoekstra-issued draft bears the fingerprints of one Frederick Fleitz – the principal drafter, according to press reports. Fleitz did his apprenticeship on politicization under John Bolton when the latter was Under Secretary of State, and became his principal aide and chief enforcer while on loan from the CIA. In this light, his behavior in trying to cook intelligence to the recipe of high policy is even more inexcusable. CIA analysts, particularly those on detail to policy departments, have no business playing the enforcer of policy judgments; they have no business conjuring up "intelligence around the policy."

Fleitz must have flunked Ethics and Intelligence Analysis 101. For he is the same official who "explained" to State Department's intelligence analyst Christian Westermann that it was "a political judgment as to how to interpret" data on Cuba's biological weapons program (which existed only in Bolton's mind) and that the intelligence community "should do as we asked."

But Iran Doesn't Need Electricity

The authors include this familiar canard: "Iran's claim that its nuclear program is for electricity production appears doubtful in light of its large oil and natural gas reserves." But back in 1976 – with Gerald Ford president, Dick Cheney his chief of staff, Donald Rumsfeld secretary of defense, and Henry Kissinger national security adviser – the Ford administration bought the Shah's argument that Iran needed a nuclear program to meet its future energy requirements.

They persuaded the hesitant president to offer Iran a deal that would have meant at least $6.4 billion for US corporations like Westinghouse and General Electric, had not the Shah been unceremoniously ousted three years later. The offer included a reprocessing facility for a complete nuclear fuels cycle – essentially the same capability that the US, Israel, and other countries now insist Iran cannot be allowed to acquire. Cheney must have forgotten all this, when he noted early last year that the Iranians are "already sitting on an awful lot of oil and gas. Nobody can figure why they need nuclear as well to generate energy."

The Current Hype on Iran

Hoekstra's release of this paper is another sign pointing in the direction of a US attack on Iran. Tehran is now being blamed not only for inciting Hezbollah but also for sending improvised explosive devices (IEDs) into Iraq to kill or maim US forces. There is yet another, if more subtle, disquieting note about the paper. It bears the earmarks of a rushed job, with very little editorial scrubbing. There are misplaced modifiers, and verbs often do not take enough care to agree in number with their nouns.

One wag suggested that the president may have taken a direct hand in the drafting. My guess is even more troubling. It seems to me possible that the Cheney-Rumsfeld cabal told Hoekstra to get the paper out sooner rather than later, as an aid to Americans in "recognizing Iran as a strategic threat."

Anonymous said...

Boycot,

I dont see any reason to get worried. There are umpteen resources to know about the machinations that led to the 2003 episode. Below is one that I came across.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0743270665/sr=8-1/qid=1156707588/ref=pd_bbs_1/002-3289444-5299260?ie=UTF8

So is this time any different? Will the action taken be any different?

I think negative on both.

We did have an election in the interim. Did we do anything different? We get what we deserve.

Rao.

Anonymous said...

Christians have an obligation, a mandate, a commission, a holy responsibility to reclaim the land for Jesus Christ -- to have dominion in civil structures, just as in every other aspect of life and godliness.
But it is dominion we are after. Not just a voice.
It is dominion we are after. Not just influence.
It is dominion we are after. Not just equal time.
It is dominion we are after.
World conquest. That's what Christ has commissioned us to accomplish.