WAR: Israel Prepares Troops for Attack on Iran

Why don't we put this in an objective light for a minute? I hate to interrupt this fascinating exercise of moral and intellectual flexibility whereby people first deny the threat against Israel, thereby making Israel's actions aggressive in nature, then re-acknowledge the threat to Israel and hail it as the coming of justice, but as impressive as that trick is, I'd really like to think about this in something at least slightly more akin to a fair way.

Does anybody on the Iranian side of this discussion think it's a good idea for America to build bunker-buster nukes? We've said all of these awful things about North Korea, we've been to war with them before, we've threatened the heck out of them, etc etc etc.
If America were to build bunker-buster nukes, and then George Bush said that we were going to wipe Yongbyong off the map, North Korea would have to do something to stop us, wouldn't they? China, Russia, and even the UN Security Council (assuming we did not obstruct) would almost be morally obligated to prevent aggression there, wouldn't they?

Or take Cuba if you prefer. We've looked for ways to kill Castro, we've tried to back an insurgency in their nation, we've completely denied the right of Cuba to continue to exist as a Communist nation, etc etc. What then if we started building a new super-weapon and declared out intent to wipe Cuba off the map?

We'd be the bad guys, wouldn't we? We'd be threatening a nation which has done nothing to us. Well- that's exactly what Iran is doing, is it not? Iran wants to do to Israel exactly what many of its supporters in this discussion would accuse America of doing to Iraq- waging a war of political convenience because diplomacy might not get the target to bend over and spread its cheeks wide enough.

So why the double standard? Why is Israel not considered to be on the defensive side here? The holocaust isn't an argument in and of itself, but it is an interesting parallel to the situation in the middle east. Arab Terrorists sometimes take the name Hitler as a boast of how many Jews they've killed!
Jews constituted roughly half of the holocaust's victims and to the best of my knowledge are the only group of holocaust targets which are still the target of a sincere and potentially successful movement to eradicate them.
We're not talking about the events of 65 years ago as a justification for new attrocities- we're talking about the push by Arab terrorists and the nations which support them to repeat the attrocities of 65 years ago, and that is a justification for defense.

If Israel is under a compelling threat, then Israeli actions are not aggressive but defensive, and if Israel has not acted aggressively then the introduction of any new threat to them, for instance Iranian nukes, can clearly not be regarded as defensive, but is rather defense against defense, or in other words, insurance of the right to offense.

That is exaclty what the Iranian program is about; nuclear weapons would give them carte blanche to set whatever terms they like for any dispute with the other gulf states, arm the enemies of Israel, etc etc etc. If Iran gets the bomb, it will not be a cold war- it will be a protracted, low intensity hot war with many flareups and it will probably evelate to the point of a nuclear exchange.


It also bears mentioning that Israel had nukes before the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty was signed; they are the only non-signatory nation in this position. Under the NPT, the Israeli program would be legal if only they had conducted a test of one of their weapons before 1967.

Iran on the other hand signed the NPT while they did not have nuclear weapons and certainly did not have them before 1967. The case could easily be made that Israel didn't violate international law because they were not involved in proliferation- they already had them. Iran on the other hand would clearly be violating international law.

Furthermore Israel has a compelling need for nuclear weapons- on average, somebody tries to wipe Israel off of the map every 20 years or so. Iran has only seen unprovoked aggression once since its independence, and the nation responsible for that has since been conquered. The only threat to Iran's security stems directly from Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons, which is almost without a doubt of an offensive nature.

Any way you slice it, Iran is the aggressor here. You don't see Israeli citizens making suicide bombings. Israel hasn't announced plans to wipe anyone off of the map. (Don't bother saying that Israel wiped Palestine off the map because that's a gross misrepresentation of History- Jordan wiped Palestine off the map then lost control of it.)

Excellent post, you took the words right out of my mouth. Except the part of Jordan and the Palestinians. Do you have any information about that? That is something I have no knowledge of, Id appreciate if you could send me some. Thanks.

Luda

Some excellent posts

Different sides of the coin, both views have some truth to their story...

What is sometimes not realised fully though is that if one or two Nuclear weapons are used, in the current geopolitical climate... it wil IMHO lead to many more within maybe a year or two... however maybe minutes.

Regards

Elf

Vagabond,

Your argument does not make much sense.
Israel is invincible, but on the other hand, it will be destroyed if the Iranians manage to produce a few nukes (to Israel's hundreds.)

I've always found this dual theory coming from the right kind of hard to follow:
"The US/Israel are invincible against mere lowly Arabs/Persians." + "If Iran/whoever gets nukes they will destroy us utterly, we must attack now or we're doomed!"

Make up your mind one on or the other contradictory theories at least...

[edit on 12/13/05 by xmotex]

Originally posted by xmotex
Israel is invincible, but on the other hand, it will be destroyed if the Iranians manage to produce a few nukes (to Israel's hundreds.)

Looked at a map of Israel lately, xmotex?
How many nukes would it take to feasibly 'destroy' Israel in relation to 'destroying' something the size of Iran? Furthermore, you have the possibility of nukes in the hands of a radicalized Iranian government who has stated over and over for decades that it would/will destroy Israel. When this radicalized Iranian government acquires such nuclear weapons capabilities, will the above government just over night suddenly become un-radicalized, nuke responsible, sane, and not seek the annihilation of Israel? But hey, Iran acquiring nukes is a good thing and that they have every right to do so, correct? Ironic that regional dis-stabilizing has always been attributed to Israel's having nukes, but then again, no one ever brought the notion up of a radicalized Iranian government acquiring nukes into the regional dis-stabilizing equation....




seekerof

Originally posted by xmotex
Your argument does not make much sense.
Israel is invincible, but on the other hand, it will be destroyed if the Iranians manage to produce a few nukes (to Israel's hundreds.)

[obvious]
Isreal is invincible as long as Iran doesn't have nukes
[/obvious]

Vagabond's argument makes complete sense to me and was well written.

Xmotex- when did I say Israel was invincible? I think that's your own insecurity at work, because I only said that Israel, by virtue of having the more viable NATO-model military, would most likely win a war against Iran or even a minor alteraction (but not a full-blown war) with Russia.
I think we have pinpointed the source of your hatred for Israel. It's what George Carlin has called "the bigger (phallus) foreign policy theory". It goes something like this- "what, they have more subtantial anatomies than us? BOMB THEM!"

Ludacris- I'd be happy to share my info there. I was expecting somebody to take exception .

During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, The Palestinian state was destroyed. King Abdullah of Jordan planned from the very beginning to take the West Bank when the British Mandate ended. Originally he offered Israel control of the Jewish areas within the West Bank and this was tacitly accepted, however by the time that actual negotiations came around, all that Abdullah was willing to offer the Zionist militias was an autonomous province within Jordan, which would have included all of what is now Israel had Abdullah got his way.

en.wikipedia.org...

Right after the UN partition plan was approved, joint Jordanian, Egyptian, Syrian, Lebanese and Iraqi troops invaded Palestine, which Israel, the US, the Soviet Union, and UN Secretary-General Trygve Lie called illegal aggression

On May 10, Golda Meir represented the Yishuv in the last of a long series of clandestine meetings between the Zionists and Transjordan's King Abdullah. Whereas for months there had been a tacit agreement between the Zionists and Transjordan to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, with Transjordan taking over the Arab areas, at the May 10 meeting Abdullah offered the Yishuv leadership only autonomy within an enlarged Hashemite kingdom. This was unacceptable to the Jewish leadership.

On May 13, the Arab League met and agreed to send regular troops into Palestine when the Mandate expired. Abdullah of Transjordan was named as the commander-in-chief of the Arab armies

In 1949, Israel signed separate armistices with Egypt on February 24, Lebanon on March 23, Transjordan on April 3, and Syria on July 20. Israel was generally able to create its own borders, comprising seventy-eight percent of Mandatory Palestine, fifty percent more than the UN partition proposal allotted it. These cease-fire lines were known afterwards as the "Green Line". The Gaza Strip and the West Bank were occupied by Egypt and Transjordan respectively.

Granted that the Jews and the Palestinians had been fighting through their militias for years, but it was an Arab attack which destroyed Mandatory Palestine. Even afterwards, Israel did not press its advantage- Israel was in a position to take the West Bank and Gaza Strip, possibly even the Sinai, but they didn't. They chose peace, and Jordan was all too happy to devour the remains of the vanquished Palestinian state, which probably would have survived with UN protection if it its Arab neighbors had not initiated a major war.

The West Bank and Gaza Strip did not come under Israeli control until the 1967 Six Day War. This is important to realize because there was very good cause for the seizure when it eventually came. The Israeli strikes at the outset of major hostilities in 1967 was preemptive. Several Arab nations not bordering Israel had mobilized their forces (including Algeria, Sudan, Kuwait and Iraq) immediately after Egypt had signed an alliance with Jordan, at the signing of which Egyptian President Nasser said "Our basic objective will be the destruction of Israel. The Arab people want to fight".

Jordan conquered Palestine, and once that was done Israel fought part of it away from Palestine for valid strategic reasons in 1948. Even still at least part of Palestine remained under Arab control as part of Jordan, but in 1967 Jordan agreed to host foreign armies for an invasion of Israel, so Israel had to take the West Bank after that war to defend itself.

Gee, where did the pro-Iranians go? I wasn't trying to kill the thread, just injecting a little truth.

Aversion Therapy

Originally posted by The Vagabond
Gee, where did the pro-Iranians go? I wasn't trying to kill the thread, just injecting a little truth.

Probably had to attend a mandatory Holocaust-denial rally.

A thing to bear in mind about Iran is that there are a lot of Iranis who are as fond of President Ahmadinejad as American Democrats are of President Bush.

The all-too-common trap so many of us fall into again and again is the trap of painting large groups of people with the same brush.

It is possible to be pro-America, pro-Mexico, pro-Canada, pro-Europe, pro-Russia, pro-Japan, pro-China, pro-Taiwan, pro-Korea, pro-Australia, pro-Indonesia, pro-Iraq, pro-Israel and pro-Iran (and many others) all at the same time. I happen to be in that camp, in fact.

Unfortunately, there are many Powers That Be who have other plans.

Lining up to throw the stones of nationalist bigotry is nothing more nor less than acting as their puppets.

There is a better way, for those who care to pursue it. However, I doubt it will become very popular, despite my wish that it be otherwise.

Dark times are coming -- far worse than any known so far.

On the bright side: after that, it can only get better.

If Sharon is elected there will be another bloodbath... SHARON THE RACIST!

"If I became a prime minister, I would wipe out all Arabs, kill every newly-born Palestinian baby and knife the abdomen of every woman who is pregnant from an Arab. Those dogs should not be close to the chosen people of god"

"Genociding the Arabs and killing them are the only weapon in dealing with them. There will not be peace between us and the Arabs as our future is built only by wiping them out. Keeping one Arab alive in the region is a dagger in the back of Israel"

"The might of Israel lies in occupying the lands of the Arabs and in expelling them. We shall terminate them individual after individual without making them feel we are killing them"!

"Give me power for a short time and I will show you what to do with the Arabs"

Ariel Sharon


signs-of-the-times.org...

Originally posted by Majic

A thing to bear in mind about Iran is that there are a lot of Iranis who are as fond of President Ahmadinejad as American Democrats are of President Bush.

That may well be, Majic, but Iran’s "Supreme leader" Ayatollah ‘Ali Chamanai backs President Ahmadinejad and even Iran’s former president and strongman Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani joined other senior officials of the Islamic Republic in defending remarks by the country’s hard-line President against the state of Israel.

But there are not only remarks against Israel:

Ahmadinejad said that if Iran gave in on the nuclear dispute, there was no guarantee the West might not refuse to sell nuclear fuel in the future.

"I assure you that we won't step back one inch from our nuclear rights," the president told the crowd, drawing chants of "Death to America!" (AP)

[edit on 15-12-2005 by Riwka]

But hey, Iran acquiring nukes is a good thing and that they have every right to do so, correct?

Yeah, that's what I said

The "right" to do so is irrelevant, the relevant factors are intent and capability.

I do not think Iran getting nukes is a "good thing". I simply think a) it's not the US's job to attack Iran to protect the Israelis, who are manifestly capable of protecting themselves b) the benefits of a US strike are likely to be outwieghed by the costs and c) constant threats of "preemptive" attacks make them more determined to get nukes, not less.

Simple metaphor: my neighbor, who I've had a long history of disputes with, has a gun. He keeps saying that if I try to get a gun, he's going to come over and shoot me. He has no way of knowing for sure whether I am trying to get gun or not. Do I get a gun, with which I at least have a viable chance of defending myself, or do I wait around to get shot, hoping he takes me at my word that I don't have a gun?

.

As far as the size of Israel goes, its probably the most densely armed piece of real estate on the planet. With four or five fission bombs, or even a dozen, Iran still cannot be certain of taking away Israel's ability to retaliate with a massively superior (on the order of ten to one at least) nuclear force. And they have absolutely no hope whatsoever if the US chooses to participate.

Iran cannot hope to launch a nuclear attack on Israel, not without guaranteeing it's own destruction. Even if they manage to build the bomb, it's unlikely they will be able to reach anything close to parity with Israel for decades, if ever.

As for the "terrorist nuke" scenario, it bears examination also.
Iran develops and tests a bomb. A year later a terrorist nuke goes off in Tel Aviv. What do you think happens to Tehran next, "proof" or not?

Again, the Iranians have absolutely nothing to gain, and everything to lose...

IMHO, the people calling for strikes on Iran are fully aware of this.
The "necessity" of a strike is not to prevent Iran from launching a first strike, a scenario that is at best extremely unlikely. The "necessity" is to prevent Iran from having a credible deterrent to attack, because it limits our freedom of action.

Originally posted by xmotex
The "right" to do so is irrelevant, the relevant factors are intent and capability.

Dang right. Keep that in mind as you read my response.

b) the benefits of a US strike are likely to be outwieghed by the costs and c) constant threats of "preemptive" attacks make them more determined to get nukes, not less.

Preemptive strikes will make them more determined but less able. Ability scares me a hell of a lot more than determination. Believe me when I say that I am absolutely determined to break the bank at every casino in Las Vegas, but however determined I may be, I don't think they've got anything to worry about.

The problem with your neighbor analogy is that 1. You've introduced a so far unsupported assumption that the "neighbor" won't find out about your weapons program (when in fact the US -DOES- know about Iran's weapons program) and from that faulty assumption you have drawn the conclusion that your neighbor isn't going to shoot you before you get a gun.

There is a pretty solid chance that Iran is going to get shot unless they're pretty dang lucky. Afterall, if we adjust your analogy to the facts of reality, we find that you have gone over and knocked on your neighbors door and informed him that you will not be deterred from getting a gun and that you plan on shooting him when you get it. Don't you think your neighbor would shoot you then? So don't you think that Iran's going to get "shot"?

Iran still cannot be certain of taking away Israel's ability to retaliate with a massively superior (on the order of ten to one at least) nuclear force.

Mutually Assured Destruction is nice and all, but wouldn't you rather just not even have the possibility of a war? For decades Israel has had nuclear weapons and Iran has not. In all of those years, how many times did Israel and Iran go to war? NONE. If it aint broke, don't break it!

Again, the Iranians have absolutely nothing to gain, and everything to lose...

We'll file that under "Top 10 Things That The Iranian Government and Suicide Bombers Have In Common"- it'll be number three because an radical islam and anti-semitism are already in the top two spots.
Of course they do have one thing to gain- the 72 Virgins... or was it Virginians?... and you hear a lot of different numbers too- it seems like the worse things get for Al Qaida, the higher the number of Virginians in paradise goes.

The "necessity" is to prevent Iran from having a credible deterrent to attack, because it limits our freedom of action.

If I've said this once I must have said it a dozen times, deterrence defends a lot more than your territorial integrity. Deterrence defends your foreign policy too. Deterrence is a license to bully small nations that nobody is willing to fight a big war over. Could America have backed Iraq during the Iraq-Iran war if nukes didn't exist? Probably not. Russia could have made that war far too costly to be worthwhile in the strictly conventional sense, but they couldn't afford to because it would escalate to a nuclear exchange eventually and even they couldn't afford that. Same thing with Vietnam. Even more so with Korea if Russia had possessed nukes and we hadn't.

So what will Iran's nukes really deter? I've been over this before. If Iran gets the bomb, the UAE is going to have to bend over and grab its ankles and oil exports through the Strait of Tiran are going to have to comply with any rules that Iran sets, which means they'll have near-total control over OPEC's prices. Afghanistan will be back under Talliban rule faster than you can say "Caspar Weinberger warned us", unless of course America can run a convincing nuclear bluff over the 3rd or 4th most worthless nation in Asia, and there's a pretty fair chance that Israel will be backed into a corner and forced to defend itself- even if Iran didn't take the initiative to actually push the button first, they may get the idea that they can force the rest of the region to follow them into a conventional war and use their nukes to prevent American interference or Israeli escalation. I don't think that would work against Israel, but 1. I might be wrong. 2. If I'm right, Iran might not realize it.

Buy yourself a copy of The Next War and take a little gander at this, then try to realize that the strategic balance of this world is quite fragile- deterrence and all these wonderfully over-simplified things that we read one paragraph about in public school are not fool-proof. Very bad things have happened over very trivial causes all too often in history.
For instance, are you aware that a minor insult to the national pride of Great Britain almost turned the tide of the American Civil War? Look up the Trent Affair.


I can feel this post getting sort of long-winded and ranty, so let me sum up. Iranian nukes would be a naturally hostile and destabilizing development. Preemption makes perfect sense, provided of course that other effective means cannot be discovered (and don't insult my intelligence with the convenient one-word answer of "diplomacy", which doves are so often fond of. Diplomacy is all well and good when you've got a solid diplomatic gameplan, but you better actually have a promising diplomatic plan, or else the "diplomacy" option is really just a choice to sit back and reap the whirlwind.)

Originally posted by Vitchilo
If Sharon is elected there will be another bloodbath... SHARON THE RACIST!

"If I became a prime minister, I would wipe out all Arabs, kill every newly-born Palestinian baby and knife the abdomen of every woman who is pregnant from an Arab. Those dogs should not be close to the chosen people of god"

"Genociding the Arabs and killing them are the only weapon in dealing with them. There will not be peace between us and the Arabs as our future is built only by wiping them out. Keeping one Arab alive in the region is a dagger in the back of Israel"

"The might of Israel lies in occupying the lands of the Arabs and in expelling them. We shall terminate them individual after individual without making them feel we are killing them"!

"Give me power for a short time and I will show you what to do with the Arabs"

Ariel Sharon


signs-of-the-times.org...

Dont you think its kind of odd that he would PUBLICALLY make these speaches and ONLY the Syrian times would report it?

www.adl.org...

Do you have ANYTHING else top back up this stuff? I would think every neewspaper in the world would have JUMPED on this.

Vitchilo, I think you know as well as the rest of the world that your quote is a load of garbage.

Reminds me of the supposed quote attributed to Sharon about how Israel owns the American government. That quote was posted everywhere, including in Anti-Israel members signatures until some more responsible members (myself included) proved that Sharon never uttered the words, including a statement from the author of the article who said someone told him their friend heard someone say that and said it was him.

A usual method that intelligent people use to distinguish garbage from truth is looking at the source. If the only source for Sharon saying he would knife pregnant ladies is a "media" (i mean government controlled) outlet in Syria... take the hint. Comments like that would have been page one in every paper in the Middle East, in the Muslim World, and in every left wing Israel bashing newsletter on the planet. But no, it's only in that one.

Come on. Show a little bit of caring for truth huh?

Iran will get PE OD and fight back, then Isreal sends a nuke over. Just like the bible codes say. Damn it, they say I get drafted in 2006 or 2007.

Don't be too worried by the bible codes my friend. Language is structured; when you play crosswords a lot (as I do) you begin to notice that the frequency and coincidence of certain letters.
This leads me to theorize that any book which was checked for equidistant codes would likely yeild a higher percentage of words than a randomly distributed collection of characters of similar length. I've also noticed that many websites in the proponency of bible codes show past predictions which are very certain and unambiguous, whereas many unfulfilled codes are vague, and sometimes even say "chance of".

I think the best place to look for prophecy in regards to Israel and Iran is in history, military literature, and news analysis.

Anyways, I've gotta get back to researching my first Skunk Works post- it's gonna be a real piece of work if I ever get it finished.

this could happen next march 2007?

no, it was supposed to be march of 2006. i was wrong then, and i dont think it's going to happen any time soon.

Not with Olmert around. That guy is pathetic. He'll march 6 million Jews into the next Holocaust if someone doesn't wake up in Israel.

Course Iran is now saying end of March for celebrating their completed nuke program. Russia is delivering fuel for the reactor they built. US is sending war ships.

www.msnbc.msn.com...