Israel planning a possible nuclear attack on Iran.

An attempt, if true, to goad the US into taking action instead. I don't think it's true.



D&D. Fallout is a Bummer.

 

This would be one of those events that "changes the course of history" if they do it. The geopolitical implications of even a "tactical strike" using nuclear weapons on Iran by Israel would be enormous. I can't begin to get my brain around it right now.

And the Israelis had better hope the mission gets totally accomplished.

I hope at least part of the reason Israel leaked this was to increase the pressure on Iran to negotiate an acceptable settlement. Or it could be a matter of just allowing the world to brace itself before they do it. I fear it could be the latter.

 

If such an attack were to occur, i think the most significant casualty would be any hope that the Iranian people would be an ally in all of this. As far as I can tell, the government isn't popular with most Iranians. However Persian nationalism would take hold if such an attack were to occur and people would back the government just as they did when Iraq invaded Iran. Anything Israel does will be attributed to the United States, especially if the United States refuses to condemn the bombing. Looking at the political landscape it would be pretty unlikely for an American administration to criticize Israel, especially this one. Unfortunately, with the way it is going it looks like sooner or later there will be a confrontation with Iran.

 

won't happen...risk > benefit

 

Is there anything at all disingenuous about using nuclear weapons to end a nuclear program? Also, what kind of "damage" would these tactical nukes do, compared to conventional missiles? Do any countries in that region have large, well-equipped standing armies that would be ready to attack Israel if they chose to?

Incidentally, has Israel stated the intent to carry out these plans or are they just contingency plans, you know, like ours to invade Canada and/or Mexico?

 

If this actually happens, Israel would actually end up losing. Using nuclear bombs and building them are two distinct concepts. Nuclear weapons are defensive deterrence as opposed to an offensive weapon. The eventual embargo on the Israeli government would end the unpopular regime and the entire world will never be the same.

 

I applaud Israel's resolve. They survive because they are the baddest kid on the block. The are beset by enemies that would like nothing better than to wipe them out. To allow the country that provides the weapons that are used to attack Israel through proxies like Hizballah to develop nuclear weapons is something they cannot allow. Iran chose to have a nuclear program. Iran saw what happened when Iraq tried the same thing. They knew that Israel would not let them make nuclear weapons, so they built their facilities in such a way that a conventional air strike would not destroy them. If it happens, they will have brought it on themselves.

 

Give me a Fu&&& break. you Applaud Isreals Resolve?. you do know that there planning a Nuke Strike . you know how many innocent iranians will die?. not to mention the chemical resedues that will pollut the Region?. thousends will die and Tens of thousends will be effected. well, iran has every right to retaliate in every possible fashion. 100's of shahabs raining on isreal will sort them out.

 

As I said, any attack that Israel launches will have been invited by Iran. A country will not willingly let it's enemies build up the means to destroy it, if that country has the means to prevent such a thing from happening. Iran choosing to pursue this goal would have been like Saddam doing the same thing (wait, he did and the Israelis bombed his facilities).

Iran would have every "right" to retaliate in whatever fashion they so choose (just as the Iraqis have the "right" to fight the Americans after the invasion/liberation of Iraq. I wouldn't expect Iran to lanch a full scale missile attack, as that would only invite a major attack in response from Israel. Getting one's nuclear weapons facilities nuked (with tactical nukes, not strategic weapons) is one thing, getting one's cities nuked is something else.

More likely would be either no counter attack and running to the UN to get them to draft another resolution against Israel, or perhaps a number of strikes at military installations. Of course, Hizballah would suddenly start acting aggresive again and receiving a new influx of weapons (though Iran may need to install a new leader as the last one said that attacking Israel was a mistake and the cost was too high.)

 

Whilst i concur that mollah's are crazy SOB's , i think a military confrontation can be avoided. the mollah's are asking for security gurantees from the US in exchange for Scrapping there Nuclear Facilities. offcourse there is allways the chance of the mollah's will agree to halt there programs if the United states yeilds to there demands , but covertly go via the North Korean way of double crossing everyone.

 

Yes it would change the course of history by preventing Iran from getting nuclear weapons.

Let's hope Iran gets the message.

 

Nobody even knows if Iran's nuclear program has anything to do with weapons. Most analysts say that at the present time it doesn't, while others disagree. Using a first strike nuclear attack because of something that isn't even certain is as immoral as it comes.

 

Another black propaganda I got through spam.

 

Having a defensive plan in place by Israel is very, very moral. In light of Iran wanting to wipe them off the map coupled with a nuclear program makes it quite clear to me that planning a defensive operation is Israel's responsibility...

 

yeah right.

 

We started to touch on this topic in basso's Wes Clark hates jews thread. And I posted this article there, seems its appropriate here.

Israel's attack on Iran is looking more and more like a proxy attack for the US.


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

Analysis: Never again?

By ARNAUD DE BORCHGRAVE


WASHINGTON, Jan. 2 (UPI) -- Through history, rulers, despots, nations and empires have humbled and humiliated, and with the advent of Adolph Hitler, massacred Jews by the millions. From the Exodus from ancient Egypt to the First Crusade, which didn't distinguish between Jews and Arabs, to the Spanish Inquisition under Tomas de Torquemada, to Czarist pogroms, to the World War II Nazi genocide, some historians calculate that had Jews been treated like other citizens through the ages, they would number at least 200 million today. They now number less than 15 million. And from right to left, the five million Jews in Israel now feel threatened with extinction yet again.

In today's Israel, the overwhelming majority is now convinced Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is synonymous with a 2nd holocaust. "We stood idly by as we were led to slaughter in Hitler's concentration camps and gas chambers in the 1930s and 40s," is a refrain frequently heard in Israel these days, "but never again." In a New Year's Day message, superhawk and former Prime Minister Netanyahu Binyamin accused Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of the kind of appeasement that threatened Israel's very existence.

Ahmadinejad recently held an international conference of holocaust deniers. And Israelis are now reminded daily that the Iranian president is a new Hitler who has to be terminated "with maximum prejudice" before a Persian nuclear weapon terminates Israel. The existential threat to Israel looms even larger, in Netanyahu's view, with the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group (ISG) report. His critique's main points:


• The ISG report smacks of rank appeasement when it recommends talking to Syria and Iran at a time when Iran has been handed the whip hand in Iraq by the U.S. with a U.S.-facilitated, pro-Iranian Shiite-led government.

• ISG says a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a sine qua non to stabilizing the rest of the Middle East. The implied suggestion that it's now up to Israel to make further concessions to the Palestinians is yet another manifestation of appeasement. Israel must reject any perceived sign of weakness.

• In reality, if the problem of Iran, which Israel's enemies call "the strategic backbone of Hezbollah and Hamas," were solved by the forceful elimination of its nuclear facilities, or a highly unlikely voluntary return to nuclear power for peaceful purposes under U.N. inspection, the conflict with the Palestinians would become easier to tackle.

• Hezbollah and Hamas are rapidly arming themselves thanks to the Israeli government's decision to refrain from further action against them. Since the cease-fire was declared, dozens of Kassam rockets have been fired at targets in the western Negev.

• If Olmert's government reacts limply to Iran's statements about its intentions to destroy Israel, "why should we expect the world to act against them?"

• ISG says, "The majority of the political establishment in Israel has grown tired of a continuous state of a nation at war." When even Israel's leadership sends out a message of fatigue and weakness, "why should we be surprised that the world agrees?"

Netanyahu then said Israel "must immediately launch an intense, international, public relations front first and foremost on the U.S. The goal being to encourage President Bush to live up to specific pledges he would not allow Iran to arm itself with nuclear weapons. We must make clear to the government, the Congress and the American public that a nuclear Iran is a threat to the U.S. and the entire world, not only Israel."

There are signs this is already happening in Washington. Before the invasion of Iraq, the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld troika decided the ousting of Saddam Hussein had to become an integral part of the "war on terror." Eventually 60 percent of Americans thought Saddam was behind 9/11, even though there was no link between the two. Today, the Bush-Cheney team faces the same spin scenario: how to weave the global war on terror and the Shiite powers that be in Iran. This one is relatively simple: Iran trains and funds Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the Palestinian territories.

Anticipating the new line, Sen. Joe Lieberman (Independent-CT) referred to "Iran and al-Qaida" on Wolf Blitzer's Sunday program on CNN. That Iran is Shiite and al-Qaida Sunni becomes irrelevant in the new game plan that will most probably lead to U.S. air strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities in 2007/08. Can a Democratic Congress be bypassed under a blanket authorization already secured to hunt down transnational terrorists wherever they may be hiding?

The "neocons" who work closely with Netanyahu on what could be the next phase of a nascent regional war in the Middle East, say Bush has the authority to take out Iran's nuclear threat. Because it has only one purpose -- to take out Israel. One Hiroshima-type nuclear weapon and Israel ceases to exit.

There is little doubt president Bush's geopolitical legacy as it stands today is unacceptable to someone who identifies with Winston Churchill roaring against appeasement in the 1930s. Iraq is either an unmitigated or mitigated disaster. And year-end analyses widely published at home and abroad listed Bush among the four worst presidents in U.S. history.

And if Bush doesn't take on Iran, prominent Israelis are speculating that president Clinton 2 (Hillary) will do so. Oded Tira, the chairman of Israel's Association of Industrial Manufacturers, and former chief artillery office in the IDF, said, "Bush lacks the political power to attack Iran. As an American air strike in Iran is essential for our existence, we must help pave the way by lobbying the Democratic Party, which is conducting itself foolishly, and U.S. newspaper editors."

Writing in Ynet News (online Yedioth Ahronoth), Tira said, "We need to turn the Iranian issue to a bipartisan one and unrelated to the Iraq failure. Hillary Clinton and other potential presidential candidates in the Democratic Party (must) publicly support immediate action by Bush again Iran."


As for target Iran, Tira voiced widespread belief in Israel that the Jewish state must coordinate strikes with the U.S. -- "and prepare for the Iranian response." Fearless forecast: It will be formidable.

http://www.upi.com/InternationalInt...02-125318-7565r



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It stopped making sense starting there, btw...

 

I'm sorry you feel that way.