For all the nonsense about talks and engagement with Iran, nothing has changed and if anything, the Islamic Republic is upping the ante.
The Iranians are still barring UN inspectors from their nuclear sites in spite of three days of talks with Western diplomats The reaction of the West , of course, is to wait to see what happens at more talks scheduled later in the month - the same pattern the Iranians have used to game the West for the past five years or more, ever since their illegal nuclear program was outed by Iranian dissidents.
Iran is also continuing to develop its missile technology. It turns out that the Mullahs are working on advanced missiles with a range of over 6,200 miles ( 10,000 kilometers) capable of hitting any spot in Europe and America's east coast. One of the sites involved was the Iranian missile base in Bidganeh, where that mysterious explosion occurred back in November.
Today, after prayers marking the anniversary of the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei addressed a large crowd, and directly threatened the US and Israel with destruction. He pledged that Iran would not withdraw from its nuclear agenda under any circumstances and promised to retaliate against any western sanctions saying, “In response to threats of oil embargo and war, we have our own threats to impose at the right time."
"Americans say all options are on the table even the option of military strike [against Iran],” he declared.
“Any military strike is ten times more harmful for America. Such threats show that they have no sufficient discourse against Iran's logic and discourse."
The New YorkTimes oddly chose not to mention it in its coverage of this, but the Ayatollah also again threatened Israel with destruction, saying "The Zionist regime is a true cancer tumor on this region that should be cut off. And it definitely will be cut off.”
He also pledged Iran's help to "any nation or group that wants to confront and fight against the Zionist regime " and also admitted that Iran had assisted genocidal terrorist groups like Hezbollah and Hamas.
"We have intervened in anti-Israel matters, and it brought victory in the 33-day war by Hezbollah against Israel in 2006, and in the 22-day war," between Hamas and Israel in the Gaza Strip, he said.
This is not just the usual rhetoric. While the fact that Iran is an active supporter and sponsor of terrorism is well known, Iran's leaders almost never state it publicly. Of course Khamenei omitted any mention of al-Qaeda or the Taliban.
Meanwhile, the democracies of the West are sleeping, while Iran goes nuclear.
President Obama's huge foreign policy boast is that he 'got bin-Laden', a terrorist who deserved death but was essentially no threat to us at the time. It cost millions of dollars and it may arguably given al-Qaeda a new lease on life. We've spent a trillion dollars and lost many lives in Iraq and Afghanistan, neither of which were imminent threats to us.
Yet somehow two successive presidents have chosen to ignore animminent threat to America from a country that freely admits its in a state of war with us and has done everything in its power to wage that war. And they continue to do so. They apparently prefer to wait until it's too late, and we will pay dearly in blood if this folly continues.
"Still, if you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed, if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not so costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance for survival. There may be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no chance of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves."
- Sir Winston Churchill, 1936
This is a very good quote by Sir Winston Churchill. He seems to have been a great man!! We need someone like him to rise up today. As for where we are on this scale, we are at the point where the odds are heavily against us and we are VERY close to the point where we have to fight with no chance of victory because to persih would be better than living as slaves. In fact, we may already be at the point and are in denial as to how dire our situation really is.
ReplyDeleteThe problem is a fundamental flaw in our system of government. Leaders generally try to surround themselves with "yes" people. The establishment be the news media, government decision makers, and many corporate leaders don't want to hear about any problems, let alone try and address them. Essentailly it is a "hear no evil, see no evil" mentality and any one who tries to point out the problem and or to seriously try and address the problem is demonized and drummed out. This tendency among leaders is kept in check somewhat in the private sector in the small business community by the need to actually remain in business and to actually make a profit and the need to remain viable. Within large businesses where a form of "crony capitalism" is practiced profits are assured and within government there is no need to make a profit or to entice customers to buy your product or service. Within these entities there is no check on the desire of leaders to surround themselves with "yes" people or the "hear no evil, see no evil" tendencies. If we hear or see eviel, this is not comfortable. People generally stay within their comfort zones when and where possible.
I'd be interested to know how Sir Churchill defined "easily win without bloodshed." In the early to mid 300s it was estimated that the allies could have beaten Nazi Germany with about 50,000 casualties. Unfortunately the choice was made to kick the can down the road so to speak and when the problem had to be dealt with tens of millions of people died.
With regards to how this applies to Iran, Iran poses a far greater threat and a far greater challenge to America than Nazi Germany ever did or ever could have. With that said, while the threat is greater, the threat is different. Furthermore America of the ealy 21st century is not the same country it was in the early 1940s. As such, the strategy for dealing with the Iranian threat successfully will be different than the strategies used to deal successfully with the threat posed by Nazi Germany.