Countdown to Iran?

Make More Offers to Iran
Thursday, May 19, 2005

WASHINGTON — A senior State Department official ruled out on Thursday the possibility of providing Iran with fresh economic incentives as a means of curbing its nuclear ambitions.

“There is no reason to believe that extra incentives offered by the United States at this point would make a real difference,” Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said.

Burns, testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the normal or near normal diplomatic and trade relations that European allies have maintained with Iran over the years have had little impact on Tehran’s nuclear policies.

Burns said “it does not stand to reason” that a U.S. “opening of the trade gates” would encourage Iran to give up its nuclear weapons aspirations.

ns was responding to question by committee chairman Richard Lugar, R-Ind., who mentioned economic incentives as one of four possible options for the United States in dealing with Iran.

The other three Lugar listed were regime change, military attack and a decision to accept Iran as a nuclear weapons state. Lugar did not ask Burns to discuss the merits of these possible options.

To encourage Iran to alter its nuclear policies, the United States agreed two months ago to drop opposition to Iranian membership in the World Trade Organization and to allow some sales of spare parts for civilian aircraft.

The offer was made after Iran had agreed to suspend all uranium-enrichment related activities. Lately, Iran has been threatening to reverse the suspension, reinforcing concern in Washington and elsewhere that Iran remains wedded to becoming a nuclear weapons power.

Britain, Germany and France have suggested that any Iranian move to end the freeze could touch off a diplomatic process leading to U.N. Security Council consideration of economic sanctions against Iran.

This would have the strong backing of the United States, which rejects Iran’s contentions that its nuclear programs are aimed merely at generating electricity.

“We believe that Iran needs to face the united will of the international community,” Burns said.

He said Russia has joined with Britain, Germany and France in encouraging Iran not to break the current agreement.

Iran’s top nuclear negotiator, Hasan Rowhani, is scheduled to meet foreign ministers of the three European Union countries on May 24 to discuss the nuclear issue.

Source: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,157067,00.html

So, if economic offers are out, and the other three options are regime change, military strikes, and just dealing with their possession of nukes, how long will it be before the US military moves from Iraq to Iran?

Personally, I have no problems with the idea of a nuclear Iran. They’ve got no missiles that can range to the US. They’re not about to shoot one at us in the Gulf anyway, as they know we’d just shoot back. They have to be too smart to hand Al Qaeda a nuclear warhead: if it blows on US soil, do you think we’re going to take a long time,investigate, build a UN-approved coalition, and then ask Iran to apologize nicely in the Security Council? No. About 30 minutes after the detonation, Tehran would evaporate. So, as far as the US is concerned, I see no reason why we can’t live with a nuclear Iran.

Unfortunately, we are slaves to the survival of Israel, so anytime anything happens that might affect Israel we have to et involved. That is all this will be about, Israel. Feel free to disagree, but that’s the way most US foreign policy in the Middle East seems to be directed these days. And the sad fact is, we aren’t getting a worthwhile return on our investment. Feel free to take that as anti-Israeli or anti-Jewish if you want to, tht’s standard procedure when someone speaks out against Israel, right?

Anyway, the only problem with the regime change or military option is that, well, we’ve kinda got a bunch of guys tied up in Iraq right now. This would make you believe that the limited option would be preferred, whereby we’d just send in the B-2s and take out the nuclear sites piece by piece. However, given our relations with Iran, it wouldn’t suprise me if we tried to go for broke and take down the regime. After all, we do have the numbers.

And what about a coalition operation this time? The UK, France, Germany, and Russia are all against the idea of Iran going down this road, as are we. Would a coalition-style military operation, sanctioned by the UN, be out of the question? If the UK, France, Germany, and the US were all in agreement, it would probably be relatively easy to get approved and pull off.

But going back to the issue of UN approval, that’s where this becomes irritating. Lugar stated that the four options mentioned above were being considered by the US for dealing with Iran. That raises the question of whether we might go and attack Iran without some sort of UN approval or whatnot. Now, as far as I’m concerned, being the sovereign nation we are, we can do as we damn well please if it is genuinely in our interest to do so. So can Iran, for that matter, this is by no means a double standard. And that’s part of why I think Iran should be able to have nuclear weapons if they should desire. They’d have to know there are massive consequences should they use one, but having a gun and shooting up a bus full of people are two different things. Back to the UN issue, if we went in alone and dealt with Iran outside of the UN, we’d probably **** off a good deal of the world again. Pissing off a good deal of the world so we can protect ANOTHER NUCLEAR STATE, one that sells sensitive technology to the PRC, is completely asinine.

Oh yeah…speaking of double standards? If Iran can’t have nuclear weapons, I want to see the Israeli’s give up theirs. It’s all about equality on the global stage.

And speaking of equality I just noticed I can say pissing off but not **** off. What?