Yoram Ettinger will have none of it.
The Iranian nuclear mazeThe assumption that tougher sanctions could deny Iran nuclear capabilities, pacify Iran’s nuclear program and produce a regime change in Tehran all defy reality. These assumptions, and the suppositions that Mutually Assured Deterrence would enable the free world to coexist with a nuclear Iran and that the cost of a military pre-emption would be prohibitive, reflect a (foolish) determination to learn from recent history by repeating – and not by avoiding – critical errors; a victory of delusion over realism.
[..] Specifically, world leaders need to think how they can subject Iran to more stringent sanctions, while keeping open channels for diplomacy.
The US has done quite a bit to impose sophisticated sanctions which criminalise certain commercial dealings with Iran already.
Barclays Bank ($298 million) Lloyds TSB ($350 million) and Credit Suisse ($536 million) have all been fined the amounts I’ve put in brackets for camouflaging illicit wire transfers of money on behalf of Iranian state agencies which might have been used in the arms procurement process.
Further sanctions could be imposed on the Bank of Iran itself, and anyone dealing with it. Here in Britain the security services could take a hard look at anyone with financial involvements with Tehran, including a few well known political personalities, who are apologists for the Mullah’s regime.
Other sanctions have been imposed already on spare parts and the like for the Iranian national air carrier. Flying with them is a lethal lottery now.
But the big one is Iran’s import of refined petroleum products. At present, Iran derives 85% of its revenue from exporting crude oil, but, because of its lack of domestic refining capacity, it has to import 40% of its fuel.
This is heavily subsidised by the state before it reaches the consumer, and wastefully used. Sanctions need to stop the French or Malaysian tankers reaching Iran. Now.
It was also noticeable that when the Americans used the Stuxnet worm to wreck Iranian centrifuges, they got hold of the blueprints for the industrial operating computers at Natanz and elsewhere from the German manufacturer Siemens.
A key question to ask is why, when the UK or France are demanding heightened sanctions, the Germans are peddling advanced computer systems to the Iranian nuclear programme? What justification do German firms have for this business? Mr Hague should be aggressively asking his German opposite numbers about that trade.
The US is going to find talking with the Iranians hard since there is no embassy in Tehran. Sanctions are likely to be frustrated in the UN, certainly by the Russians, who just want to poke a finger in the West’s eye, and maybe by China, for whom Iran is the Number 3 oil supplier. Smarting over Libya, Russia will oppose any military actions.
The US is also reliant on Iran for its smooth exit anytime soon from both Iraq and Afghanistan which are both bordered by Iran. It wants out, with a decent interval ensuing before the Taliban return to power, by which time -as Kissinger said of South Vietnam – no one ‘will give a damn’.
China is important in another respect. Its Number 2 oil supplier is Saudi Arabia. Indeed in recent years, China has developed relations with the Saudis who like the Chinese ‘hear no evil, see no evil’ approach to the internal affairs of sovereign states.
China is currently under contract to build 16 nuclear reactors inside Saudi Arabia, as well as a high speed rail link between Mecca and Medina. Rumour has it that the Chinese construction workers and engineers are being inducted into Islam to get round the ban on non Muslims in these holy places.
This means that, uniquely, China has a foot in both camps, as a purchaser of oil, and as a source of development projects. It is highly probable that the US will take advantage of this route to speak to the Iranians.
If Beijing is convinced that Israel or the US are going to attack Iran, with all the disruption of their own oil supplies that entails – not to speak of a gas pipeline they want to build – then the ball is in their court to get the Iranians to dial down their nuclear ambitions. Disruption to the Straits of Hormuz is going to affect China just as badly as it will effect us, with our economies teetering on the brink of disaster because of the Eurozone crisis.
It is incumbent on anyone saying that there should be no air attacks on Iran to come up with enough measures to reassure Israel about its security for it to moderate its bellicose rhetoric. Otherwise a deadly silence will ensue, and then we’ll all know those attacks are imminent.
Just do it
The Chinese have more self-respect than any people I know. At the same time, they tend (when the government lets them) to be practical: If they state says they are to become Moslems for a time, they will become Moslems for a time. It’s Islam that gets little respect here. Getting the Chinese to eat raw vegetable, though… that’s another matter.
There are no sanctions of any kind strong enough to stop the present Iranian government from using nuclear weapons or any other weapons of mass destruction against Israel. If you want to live and if you want your country to live, you had all better assume that they will find ways to try to kill you through massive destruction the moment the lay hands on the means to do so, including an assured delivery system.
If any of you are worried so greatly about the condemnation of the world that will fall upon you if you massively attack the Iranians, and if that causes you to fall into inaction, you will be attacked, and the world will say that its just too bad, but that you were too weak and too useless to deserve an independent country of your own, under the world’s house rules that they make up just for Jews.
This is the time — right here and now — that push has come to shove. You either kill them or they will kill you.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Don’t these Chinese workers have any self-respect?
Why isn’t the writer worried about Iran’s bellicose rhetoric? Like most of the western media and governments, they see an Israeli strike on Iran as a greater threat than Iran itself acquiring nuclear weapons.
The Iranian leaders are quite serious. The Middle East is not the Midwest. Consider this:
Atheists like Farkash and others in the Israeli leadership can’t comprehend a people actually acting out their convictions. If they understood reality, after all, they wouldn’t be atheists. They are welcome to their beliefs, but not when it endangers the people of Israel.