John F. Kerry

Iran is doubling down on its previous strategy.

So much is evident from their responses to the IAEA report and to the past few weeks of news.

they warn of "crushing responses" and blah blah fucking blach... instead of emphasizing that they want to be in peace with the rest of the world, they are basically calling everyone out and daring them to do something.


well, it worked before, and has worked for a long time...so why not?

ill tell you - because things done changed.

Iran literally has no friends these days. Russia and China might be fairweather friends, sucking the excess oil out of ayatollahs sandbox... but even the rest of the arab world is shit scarred of the crazy shia in iran...

They literally couldnt be more isolated in the world, if they tried. China and Russia are only waiting for the West to offer them a sweeter deal than iran does...thats hardly friendship... and who are irans other "Friends"- hugo chavez and fidel castro?

i mean come on here.


But I keep seeing over and over how the coordinated response is a media response- pretty interesting actually- they respond via media to threats that were made via media... its like the whole world fights thru the media and the internet now...

so russia and china say "uh oh an attack would be devastating" etc ...even the pussies on the left in france say the same stuff- Its not that I dont see their point, its that for them to make that point is basically just being the oppourtunist peacenik pussy in this situation -the same way chirac took the anti iraq view not because he really knew, but because hes a pussy frog eater who wanted to act like he was better than britain and the us


but the point is- all this talk about "devastating responses" is nonsense... iran might be able to fight us on the internet- but if america and nato and israel and using saudi airspace decided to overthrow the ayatollah dictatorship it would happen. probably fairly quickly.

and the new elected representatives of iran would thank us, they wouldnt attack us.

so whats this "devastating" attack they threaten? well if its nukes of some sort, then they know what they get in return, so unless they want to die, (which is possible) it wont be a nuclear response.... and what else could they do ? lob a few of those bulshit iranian missles at israel or turkey or us ships ?

they couldnt do anything, and they would lose.... so all this talk is their strategy - make it seeem like they are big and bad and scary... and hopefully the other side will blink first.

If there was ever a clear bluff, and a clear opportunity to call the bluff, this is it.

my 2 cents. thoughts?

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Nasa under Obama

stoneric

I missed this. Here's my thought.

~1~

Iran is sure we're bringing on the apocalypse.


Stand back and watch, then pick up the pieces.

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Roach

along with the oppressive dictatorships of the east.

nothin like overlooking the obvious there Ackmadenayouranutjob .

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Canuck Wisdom

My thoughts are that it is America etc who are bluffing. They shouldn't and don't intend to take any military action against Iran.

American pundits like to generate buzz about Iran/war.

In my opinion, Iran is not much of a threat to anyone; America, Israel etc. America and the globalized capitalist world want more control over/access to that region, Iran is a middle power, doesnt play along, so they saber-rattle. Iran (even nuclear) isnt a threat to anything but a one sided balance of power. They are partly outside of the general world order and America (the world order's champion) wants it's version of the world order to be the only version.

Im not sure I believe they dont want nuclear weapons, they might just want power (electricity), but even if they do, who are they gonna bomb? No one, its a card they want up their sleeve to make their international relations balls bigger. And I don't blame them, considering how aggressive and unforgiving 'the west' can be.

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-Knowitall A&P type-

Roach

according to reports they are, and have been working on tactical nuclear weapons, missile launched, and capable of reaching Israel.

According to the Israelis.(you know, the ones whose every wish is our command)

America's interest in this uninteresting little country called Iran, started back in the late 20's early 30's .

and it brings to question, who exactly will benefit from this...

MacDILL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. — The Obama administration plans to bolster the American military presence in the Persian Gulf after it withdraws the remaining troops from Iraq this year, according to officials and diplomats. That repositioning could include new combat forces in Kuwait able to respond to a collapse of security in Iraq or a military confrontation with Iran.
The plans, under discussion for months, gained new urgency after President Obama’s announcement this month that the last American soldiers would be brought home from Iraq by the end of December. Ending the eight-year war was a central pledge of his presidential campaign, but American military officers and diplomats, as well as officials of several countries in the region, worry that the withdrawal could leave instability or worse in its wake.

After unsuccessfully pressing both the Obama administration and the Iraqi government to permit as many as 20,000 American troops to remain in Iraq beyond 2011, the Pentagon is now drawing up an alternative.

In addition to negotiations over maintaining a ground combat presence in Kuwait, the United States is considering sending more naval warships through international waters in the region.
With an eye on the threat of a belligerent Iran, the administration is also seeking to expand military ties with the six nations in the Gulf Cooperation Council — Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman. While the United States has close bilateral military relationships with each, the administration and the military are trying to foster a new “security architecture” for the Persian Gulf that would integrate air and naval patrols and missile defense.

The size of the standby American combat force to be based in Kuwait remains the subject of negotiations, with an answer expected in coming days. Officers at the Central Command headquarters here declined to discuss specifics of the proposals, but it was clear that successful deployment plans from past decades could be incorporated into plans for a post-Iraq footprint in the region.

For example, in the time between the Persian Gulf war in 1991 and the invasion of Iraq in 2003, the United States Army kept at least a combat battalion — and sometimes a full combat brigade — in Kuwait year-round, along with an enormous arsenal ready to be unpacked should even more troops have been called to the region.

“Back to the future” is how Maj. Gen. Karl R. Horst, Central Command’s chief of staff, described planning for a new posture in the Gulf. He said the command was focusing on smaller but highly capable deployments and training partnerships with regional militaries. “We are kind of thinking of going back to the way it was before we had a big ‘boots on the ground’ presence,” General Horst said. “I think it is healthy. I think it is efficient. I think it is practical.”

Mr. Obama and his senior national security advisers have sought to reassure allies and answer critics, including many Republicans, that the United States will not abandon its commitments in the Persian Gulf even as it winds down the war in Iraq and looks ahead to doing the same in Afghanistan by the end of 2014.

“We will have a robust continuing presence throughout the region, which is proof of our ongoing commitment to Iraq and to the future of that region, which holds such promise and should be freed from outside interference to continue on a pathway to democracy,” Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in Tajikistan after the president’s announcement.

During town-hall-style meetings with military personnel in Asia last week, the secretary of defense, Leon E. Panetta, noted that the United States had 40,000 troops in the region, including 23,000 in Kuwait, though the bulk of those serve as logistical support for the forces in Iraq.

As they undertake this effort, the Pentagon and its Central Command, which oversees operations in the region, have begun a significant rearrangement of American forces, acutely aware of the political and budgetary constraints facing the United States, including at least $450 billion of cuts in military spending over the next decade as part of the agreement to reduce the budget deficit.

Officers at Central Command said that the post-Iraq era required them to seek more efficient ways to deploy forces and maximize cooperation with regional partners. One significant outcome of the coming cuts, officials said, could be a steep decrease in the number of intelligence analysts assigned to the region. At the same time, officers hope to expand security relationships in the region. General Horst said that training exercises were “a sign of commitment to presence, a sign of commitment of resources, and a sign of commitment in building partner capability and partner capacity.”

Col. John G. Worman, Central Command’s chief for exercises, noted a Persian Gulf milestone: For the first time, he said, the military of Iraq had been invited to participate in a regional exercise in Jordan next year, called Eager Lion 12, built around the threat of guerrilla warfare and terrorism.

Another part of the administration’s post-Iraq planning involves the Gulf Cooperation Council, dominated by Saudi Arabia. It has increasingly sought to exert its diplomatic and military influence in the region and beyond. Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, for example, sent combat aircraft to the Mediterranean as part of the NATO-led intervention in Libya, while Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates each have forces in Afghanistan.

At the same time, however, the council sent a mostly Saudi ground force into Bahrain to support that government’s suppression of demonstrations this year, despite international criticism.

Despite such concerns, the administration has proposed establishing a stronger, multilateral security alliance with the six nations and the United States. Mr. Panetta and Mrs. Clinton outlined the proposal in an unusual joint meeting with the council on the sidelines of the United Nations in New York last month.

The proposal still requires the approval of the council, whose leaders will meet again in December in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, and the kind of multilateral collaboration that the administration envisions must overcome rivalries among the six nations.

“It’s not going to be a NATO tomorrow,” said a senior administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss diplomatic negotiations still under way, “but the idea is to move to a more integrated effort.”

Iran, as it has been for more than three decades, remains the most worrisome threat to many of those nations, as well as to Iraq itself, where it has re-established political, cultural and economic ties, even as it provided covert support for Shiite insurgents who have battled American forces.

“They’re worried that the American withdrawal will leave a vacuum, that their being close by will always make anyone think twice before taking any action,” Bahrain’s foreign minister, Sheik Khalid bin Ahmed al-Khalifa, said in an interview, referring to officials in the Persian Gulf region.

Sheik Khalid was in Washington last week for meetings with the administration and Congress. “There’s no doubt it will create a vacuum,” he said, “and it may invite regional powers to exert more overt action in Iraq.”

He added that the administration’s proposal to expand its security relationship with the Persian Gulf nations would not “replace what’s going on in Iraq” but was required in the wake of the withdrawal to demonstrate a unified defense in a dangerous region. “Now the game is different,” he said. “We’ll have to be partners in operations, in issues and in many ways that we should work together.”

At home, Iraq has long been a matter of intense dispute. Some foreign policy analysts and Democrats — and a few Republicans — say the United States has remained in Iraq for too long. Others, including many Republicans and military analysts, have criticized Mr. Obama’s announcement of a final withdrawal, expressing fear that Iraq remained too weak and unstable.

“The U.S. will have to come to terms with an Iraq that is unable to defend itself for at least a decade,” Adam Mausner and Anthony H. Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies wrote after the withdrawal announcement.

Twelve Senators demanded hearings on the administration’s ending of negotiations with the Iraqis — for now at least — on the continuation of American training and on counterterrorism efforts in Iraq.

“As you know, the complete withdrawal of our forces from Iraq is likely to be viewed as a strategic victory by our enemies in the Middle East, especially the Iranian regime,” the senators wrote Wednesday in a letter to the chairman of the Senate’s Armed Services Committee.

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Canuck Wisdom

Im not sure if you were just looking for a segway to your article or if you misunderstood, because your quote is very selective... I am NOT SURE that they dont want nukes... or; I think they might, but it doesnt mean they want to be violent.

Also, I don't care what media reports suggest, or even direct reports from the white house, Iran is not some wild card, its just not in goose step with the dominant (read american/capitalist interest) world order. If/when they pose a serious economic threat to that order, such as Iraq's selling oil in a basket of currencies, then there might be military action. And even then, it will be America being the aggressor.

Consider the Iraq and Afghanistan wars (in addition to/outside of their individual causes), as positioning and threats against Iran, a country which they didnt invade then, and wont invade now, because its a much more serious power, who plays a stronger role in regional (if not resource based) power struggles.

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-Knowitall A&P type-

Terry

A war with Iran would be disastrous. The last thing we need is to antagonize the Iranian people, who are so close to bringing about a better government themselves. There is no perfect bombing campaign, no Night of the Long Knives that would pacify the people, there is nothing to be gained in an attack for Israel or the United States.

If we stopped this constant faux War Games bullshit our government and media have been engaging in maybe we could deal with them as people rather than constantly threatening full use of force and pretending that's diplomacy.

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I don't know but I've been told,
If you never die you'll never grow old

Canuck Wisdom

Exactly

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-Knowitall A&P type-

~1~

Sadly.

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Jewish Pork

The problem with Iran getting a nuke isn't that they're going to actually attack Isreal or any other country in that region....

Home Wrecker

I am pretty sure that is exactly why they want nuclear weapons. Not so they can bomb Tel Aviv, just a deterrent to make sure no one tries to invade them and to balance the power in the region with Israel's stockpile of nukes.

I think these kinds of warnings are just them trying to stall long enough to produce their own nukes and make Israel think twice about attempting a strategic strike on their nuclear facilities.


There is also the interesting case of the "accidental" explosion at a weapons depot in Iran that killed one of their generals. Israeli papers seem to be considering it a covert operation by the Mossad, and with the multiple assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists recently you can understand why they would. Iran is insisting it was an accident, and it may well have been, but who really knows.

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Mr. Pink: You kill anybody?
Mr. White: A few cops.
Mr. Pink: No real people?
Mr. White: Just cops.