Abracadabrah

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That's A Relief Then

President Jacques Chirac said this week that if Iran had one or two nuclear weapons, it would not pose a big danger, and that if Iran were to launch a nuclear weapon against a country like Israel, it would lead to the immediate destruction of Tehran.

And Israel, too. But as they say, tant pis. On the plus side, this outcome would surely resolve the Israeli/Palestinian crisis right quick.

Chirac, I suspect, has not yet woken up to the realization that nuclear deterrence went out with the Soviets and that there is a Shi'ite president heading Iran, who wants to hasten the Messiah by bringing the apocalypse as soon as he can. i.e. with nuclear bombs. Preferably aimed at Israel.

Yet, the scary thing about Chirac's remarks is how much it overlaps with what Dr. Shmuel Bar, the director of studies at the Institute of Police and Strategy in Israel, claims is Iran's nuclear strategy claims is Iran's nuclear strategy vis-a-vis Israel.

Iran believes "that Israel is a one-bomb country, one bomb from the point-of-view of the receiving side; that the U.S. would not intervene against Iran under such conditions; and all of that with apocalyptic zeal may result in actual use of nuclear weapons," he said.

Bar, who for years worked in the Israeli intelligence community, told a conference on Jan. 9 that Iran was prepared to destroy Muslim cities as the price for firing nuclear missiles toward Israel. He said the ruling Islamic clergy would support a nuclear attack on Israel even at the risk of killing millions of Palestinian Muslims.

In this scenario, as we see, allowing Iran one bomb may very well be fatal - for Israel.

"They're developing weapons both as deterrents and that part of the Iranian regime — the more revolutionary part — has all of the components for developing a doctrine of use of nuclear weapons, as opposed to adoption of using nuclear weapons as deterrents," Bar said. "I think that it's a religious background which brings them to this sort of a doctrine."

Bar said Iran has studied the U.S. wars against the former Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq. The chief Iranian lesson was that only nuclear weapons could deter a U.S. attack.

"Nuclear weapons are strategic necessity for deterring the West and Israel and for achieving their strategic goals," Bar said. "Until they arrive at nuclear weapons, Iran's strategic deterrence must rely on terrorism and subversive potential."

As a way of effecting the situation in Iran ourselves, I heard something very interesting on Lawrence Kudlow's Finance show on CNBC earlier this week.

He was discussing Iran with a guest and one of them brought up the notion of disinvesting from Iran, in order to put the financial squeeze on Iran, now that the country is suffering from its truly rotten economy. They've already been outplayed, at least for a while, by the Saudis, who lowered the price of gas substantially, thus lowering the desperately needed revenue.

Divesting from stocks and mutual funds that have investments in Iran is something we can do at home to help put our own financial pressure on the country.

By the way, you'll be glad to know that Chirac retracted some of his remarks.

Mr. Chirac spent much of the second interview refining his remarks of the previous day.

He retracted, for example, his comment that Tehran would be destroyed if Iran launched a nuclear weapon. “I retract it, of course, when I said, ‘One is going to raze Tehran,’ ” he said.

What a relief!

Labels: Iran, Iraq, Israel

posted by Alcibiades @ 2:46 AM