Tag: Iran

‘Realists’ Pull Iran Report Because Neo-con Claims Went Too Far

Jon Ponder

It is interesting to learn that Sec. of State Condoleeza Rice felt empowered to withdraw a report on Iran’s weapons dealings because she and Sec. Defense Bob Gates thought some of its neo-con claims were too outlandish, but what we know about the neo-cons is that they always come out on top in this administration:

The big briefing planned by the Bush administration on supposed Iranian weapons shipments to Iraq had to be postponed because the presentation was judged exaggerated and unsubstantiated by Secretary of State Condi Rice and by Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates. So that raises the question of who was spearheading this presentation inside the Bush administration? Getting Iran is an obsession of the Neoconservatives at the American Enterprise Institute and their plants inside the administration, such as Iran-Contra felon Elliot Abrams in the National Security Council and David Wurmser and John Hannah on Cheney’s rump Veep national security council. Many Neoconservatives and other sorts of wingnut have a secret alliance with the Marxist Islamist MEK terrorist organization, which feeds them allegations about Iran in Iraq just as Ahmad Chalabi used to with regard to the Baath regime in Iraq.

So have the Cheney Neoconservatives been at least somewhat reined in by a new Rice-Gates axis of Realists?

Ayatollah Rebukes Ahmadinejad Over Nuclear Sabre Rattling

Jon Ponder

The slapfight between Pres. George Bush and his Iranian counterpart, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has resembled a pair of five-year-olds squabbling in a sandbox. Now it appears a grown-up, albeit a very scary one, has stepped in:

Iran’s outspoken president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, appears to be under pressure from the highest authorities in Iran to end his involvement in its nuclear program, a sign that his political capital is declining as his country comes under increasing international pressure.

Just one month after the UN Security Council imposed sanctions on Iran to curb its nuclear program, two hard-line newspapers, including one owned by the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called on the president to stay out of all matters nuclear.

In the hazy world of Iranian politics, such a public rebuke was seen as a sign that the supreme leader himself — who has final say on all matters of state — might no longer support the president as the public face of defiance to the West.

It is the first sign that Ahmadinejad has lost any degree of Ayatollah Khamenei’s confidence, a potentially damaging development for a president who has rallied his nation and defined his administration by declaring nuclear power Iran’s “inalienable right.”

Pentagon Surplus Sales of Fighter Jet Parts Going to Iran

Jon Ponder

Before the Iranian revolution in 1979, when the Shah was a U.S. ally against the Soviets, we sold the Iranians the latest, greatest state-of-the-art military equipment our contractors could produce. Now, three decades, Iran is our enemy, so when they need to repair their aging helicopters and fighter jets, who do they buy from? The Pentagon’s sidewalk sale:

“Right Item, Right Time, Right Place, Right Price, Every Time. Best Value Solutions for America’s Warfighters.”
— Pentagon advertisement

Fighter jet parts and other sensitive U.S. military gear seized from front companies for Iran and brokers for China have been traced in criminal cases to a surprising source: the U.S. Defense Department.

In one case, federal investigators said, contraband bought at auction from Defense surplus stocks was delivered to Iran, which President George W. Bush had in his “axis of evil” grouping. Just Tuesday, the State Department branded Iran as the world’s worst exporter of terror

In the Iran case, a Pakistani arms broker convicted of exporting U.S. missile parts to Iran resumed business after his release from prison. He purchased Chinook helicopter engine parts for Iran from a U.S. company that had bought them in a Pentagon surplus sale. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents say those parts made it to Iran…

“Right Item, Right Time, Right Place, Right Price, Every Time. Best Value Solutions for America’s Warfighters,” the Defense Reutilization and Marketing Service says on its Web site, calling itself “the place to obtain original U.S. Government surplus property.”

Federal investigators are increasingly anxious that Iran is within easy reach of a top priority on its shopping list: parts for its precious fleet of F-14 “Tomcat” fighter jets the United States let Iran buy in the 1970s when it was an ally.

In one case, convicted middlemen for Iran bought Tomcat parts from the Defense Department’s surplus division. Customs agents confiscated them and returned them to the Pentagon, which sold them again, customs evidence tags still attached, to another buyer, a suspected broker for Iran.

“That would be evidence of a significant breakdown, in my view, in controls and processes,” said Greg Kutz, the Government Accountability Office’s head of special investigations. “It shouldn’t happen the first time, let alone the second time.”

Too bad the Pentagon didn’t offload some of their famous $500 hammers or $2,000 toilet seats on them.

The Mess in the Middle East: Iraq Insurgent, Iran Emergent, and Two Civil Wars Temporarily On Hold

Buck Banks

Muddled East: Given the limited and slanted reporting on the Middle East we get from in the MSM, and our Western lack of understanding of the political forces at work, not to mention our ignorance of the cultural and religious currents driving events in the region, it’s no wonder we don’t understand what’s happening there. A cogent, clear and unflinching assessment of the situation and its position in global politics is provided by a column in the latest edition of Challenge magazine.

Challenge is a bi-monthly leftist magazine written by Arabs and Israelis and published in Tel Aviv. It looks at the Israeli-Palestinian situation and attempts to contextualize it within the region and globally. It’s a good read:

From Challenge # 101, January – February 2007

Two Civil Wars with Brakes On

By Roni Ben Efrat

THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN conflict was once the mother of all problems in the Middle East. Today it is one among many. For this demotion we may largely thank US President George W. Bush and his war in Iraq. Apart from splitting that unhappy country into Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish sectors, Bush’s war has changed the geopolitics of the region. The Iraq of Saddam Hussein used to be the area’s major power, but today it is Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s Iran. Saddam was a secular dictator who represented Arab nationalism; Ahmadinejad represents Shiite fundamentalism — and his country, of course, isn’t Arab.

In Bush’s new Middle East, then, two axes have emerged. There is the American axis, which includes Fouad Siniora in Lebanon and Abu Mazen in Palestine, along with older members: Israel, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt. Over against them, in the Iranian axis, stand Hamas, Hezbollah and Syria. Does the Iranian axis aim to become America’s global opponent, like the Soviet Union in the Cold War? No. Apart from the central role of Islamic law in Iran, this axis presents no counter-agenda, political, social or ideological. Iran and its allies would prefer to have American and European recognition, but they aren’t willing to change their spots: they aren’t willing, that is, to become American lackeys, eradicating their own identities. They are encouraged in this self-assertion by the weakening of the US as a global power, thanks again to its entanglement in Iraq.

If we want a good example of lackeyism, we may look to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. In a recent cabinet meeting, he justified his rejection of Syrian peace overtures, saying that a positive response was forbidden at a time when President Bush, “the most important strategic ally of Israel, opposes any negotiations with Syria.”

The two axes confront each other at three flashpoints: (1) Iran, which opposes the world on the nuclear issue while backing Syria, Hezbollah, Hamas and the Shiites of Iraq.(2) Israel/Palestine, which includes not just the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but now also that between Fatah and Hamas.(3) Lebanon, where the opponents of Syria’s interfering hand are at odds with those who eat from it, namely Hezbollah.
[…]

Time for Bush to Stop Holding Our Breath and Turning Us Blue

Trish

So far, the Bush administration policy of freezing out governments who disagree with it and “enemy-izing” them is — who would have thought — not working. With North Korea and Iran, it’s taken us closer to nuclear annihilation. It’s made formerly friendly Central and South America defy us. European allies who thought that maybe the U.N. inspectors could be right about Saddam not having weapons of mass destruction have been turned into alienated exes.

The Baker/Hamilton Iraq Study Group is expected to suggest we commit to pulling troops out of Iraq. It will also say we need to stop acting like four-year-olds using the silent treatment on playmates who didn’t share their ice cream cones.

James P. Pinkerton in the Dallas Morning News says the Baker Commission will be right.

Back in the good ol’ days before that spoiled child who is our president took over, talking to people used to work.

[Baker] started the controversy in October: “I believe in talking to your enemies. I don’t think you restrict your conversations to your friends.” Then, anticipating his critics, he added: “In my view, it’s not appeasement to talk to your enemies.”

…Baker was doing his best to clear a path toward negotiating with players in the Middle East – most notably Syria and Iran – without those negotiations being tagged with the scarlet letter “A,” for appeasement.

It didn’t work. On Monday, the hawkish Wall Street Journal editorial page sounded the alarm [and] worried that Baker and the “foreign policy establishment” might pressure Bush to “appease” Syria.

But there’s no good alternative to diplomacy, Pinkerton says. […]

Hersh: Cheney Lying About Iran Nukes

Trish

History repeats itself. Vice President Dick Cheney is trying to bury a classified draft assessment by the CIA that shows Iran, like Iraq before it, might be telling the truth about it nuclear weapons program. Be sure to pick up the Nov. 27 issue of the New Yorker, with the full article by Seymour Hersh.

The C.I.A. assessment warned the White House that it would be a mistake to conclude that the failure to find a secret nuclear-weapons program in Iran merely meant that the Iranians had done a good job of hiding it.

The C.I.A. found no conclusive evidence, as yet, of a secret Iranian nuclear-weapons program running parallel to the civilian operations that Iran has declared to the International Atomic Energy Agency….

But Cheney and the Bush administration aren’t going to let little details like the truth stop them from pursuing their goals, whatever the hell they are.

Cheney and his aides discounted the assessment, the former senior intelligence official said. “They’re not looking for a smoking gun,” the official added, referring to specific intelligence about Iranian nuclear planning. “They’re looking for the degree of comfort level they think they need to accomplish the mission.” […]

Draft Women First

Jon Ponder

Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-New York) says he will reintroduce a bill to reinstate the military draft. Rangel believes putting the lives of sons of the middle class on the line would deter the Republicans’ penchant for war-making. I think he should go one step further and draft young women first. Putting their daughters in harm’s way would really give the chickenhawks pause before going to war on whim.

This won’t happen, I know. We haven’t even had the debate yet about whether to draft women when (not if) the draft is needed again.

As a feminist, I believe the argument against drafting women in moot. Women have demanded equality in our society, and that means they should be called up equally with men in an involuntary muster.

Still, I think Rep. Rangel is right. We need the draft to keep rightwing hawks like Pres. Bush, Vice Pres. Cheney and the rest of their cabal honest in their war-making.

One solid indicator that the threat to the United States is real would be the willingness of the country’s leaders to send their daughters into the conflict first.

(Except, of course, Cheney’s daughter Mary is who is gay and thus would get a free pass.)

U.S. Conducting War Games off Iranian Coast

Jon Ponder

Tick… tick… tick…

There is a massive concentration of US naval power in the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Sea. Three US naval strike groups off the Iranian coastline are deployed: USS Enterprise, USS Eisenhower and USS Iwo Jima Expeditionary Strike Group.

The naval strike groups have been assigned to fighting the “global war on terrorism.”

Tehran considers the US war games to be conducted in the Persian Gulf, off the Iranian coastline as a provocation, which is intended to trigger a potential crisis and a situation of direct confrontation between US and Iranian naval forces in the Persian Gulf:

“Reports say the US-led naval exercises based near Bahrain will practise intercepting and searching ships carrying weapons of mass destruction and missiles.

Iran’s official news agency IRNA quoted an unnamed foreign ministry official as describing the military manoeuvres as dangerous and suspicious.

Reports say the US-led naval exercises based near Bahrain will practise intercepting and searching ships carrying weapons of mass destruction and missiles.

The Iranian foreign ministry official said the US-led exercises were not in line with the security and stability of the region. Instead, they are aimed at fomenting crises, he said.” (quoted in BBC, 23 October 2006)

Surprise! Bush Will Have Warships in Position and Ready to Bomb Iran This Saturday

Jon Ponder

Bombing Could Start 17 Days before Mid-Term Elections

Based on stories last month in Time magazine and The Nation, it appears that the U.S.S. Eisenhower Strike Group left Norfolk, Virginia, on Oct. 1 and will reach the shores of Iran at the Strait of Hormuz this Saturday, Oct. 21 — 17 days before the mid-term elections.

First word of the Eisenhower’s deployment to the Persian Gulf came from angry Navy officers, who contacted military critics of the Iraq war and complained that they were being sent to attack Iran without any order from the Congress.

According to the mid-September 2006 article in The Nation, the strike group includes:

[The] nuclear aircraft carrier Eisenhower as well as a cruiser, destroyer, frigate, submarine escort and supply ship…

And:

First word of the early dispatch of the “Ike Strike” group to the Persian Gulf region came from several angry officers on the ships involved, who contacted antiwar critics like retired Air Force Col. Sam Gardiner and complained that they were being sent to attack Iran without any order from the Congress.

“This is very serious,” said Ray McGovern, a former CIA threat-assessment analyst who got early word of the Navy officers’ complaints about the sudden deployment orders. (McGovern, a twenty-seven-year veteran of the CIA, resigned in 2002 in protest over what he said were Bush Administration pressures to exaggerate the threat posed by Iraq. He and other intelligence agency critics have formed a group called Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.)

Colonel Gardiner, who has taught military strategy at the National War College, says that the carrier deployment and a scheduled Persian Gulf arrival date of October 21 is “very important evidence” of war planning. He says, “I know that some naval forces have already received ‘prepare to deploy orders’ [PTDOs], which have set the date for being ready to go as October 1. Given that it would take about from October 2 to October 21 to get those forces to the Gulf region, that looks about like the date” of any possible military action against Iran. (A PTDO means that all crews should be at their stations, and ships and planes should be ready to go, by a certain date–in this case, reportedly, October 1.)

So why has the president sent the strike group to Iran?

[…]

Sweden to Deport Gay Iranian to Iran Where He’ll Probably Be Hanged

Buck Banks

Don’t swish, don’t swing: A Swedish migration board ruled Friday to deport a gay Iranian back to his homeland despite the fact that he might be hanged by the Iranian government. The deportation would be the first since a moratorium was imposed a year ago after two gay teenagers were hanged after being deported from Sweden to Iran.

The moratorium was lifted after the Swedish embassy in Tehran was assured by the Iranian government that it would not hang gay deportees as long as they didn’t act gay. Right, and those guys aren’t developing nuclear weapons, either, right?

It sounds like the system is set up so that there’s almost no way a gay Iranian wouldn’t be caught, according to The Local, an English-language newspaper published in Stockholm:

The court referred to a 2005 report from the Swedish foreign ministry, which said that Islamic law as applied in Iran prescribed “terrible penalties” for homosexual acts. Men who are found to have had penetrative sex can face the death penalty.

But the report also said that most gay people in Iran managed to avoid danger by living “discrete and withdrawn” lives.

Sören Andersson [chair of gay rights group RFSL] said it was unreasonable for Sweden to demand that gay people live “hidden lives.”

The report also said that most gay people in Iran managed to avoid danger by living ‘discrete and withdrawn’ lives.

“We are very critical of the Foreign Ministry’s reporting,” he said.

He also pointed to a report from the United Nations’ Philip Alston, in which he detailed a number of cases in which men were sentenced to death for “private, consensual sexual conduct.”

Alston also described a Special Protection Division, which empowers police officers to conduct surveillance of citizens’ private sexual behaviour.

“There’s a certain cynicism in the foreign ministry, in the Migration Board and in courts — they don’t care whether people live or die,” said Andersson.

RFSL has also raised the case of a lesbian from Pakistan, who also faces deportation to her homeland. Andersson says she was raped by police with the aim of “rehabilitating” her.

Asked whether people claiming asylum due to persecution on the grounds of sexual orientation were treated less favourably than political asylum seekers, Andersson said he was “beginning to wonder whether that is the case.”

“People who seek political asylum do seem to be seen as more important. This is hair-raising reasoning about sexual orientation.”

The Iranian’s legal representative, Lars Lundin, said he would probably appeal Friday’s ruling.

“This case is of great interest on a point of principle, and the new migration courts lack a body of precedents,” he said.

It’s difficult to accept taht an open and accepting society like Sweden would treat victims of political sexual repression in such a manner. But then again, the country just elected a conservative government, so maybe this is just another sign of a lefty nation taking a disturbing turn to the right.