Israel to World: "Suck It."

setting a "red line" for military action really worked in the region before eh

they need to convince Iran that* they might

I mean how many of these goddamn countries are we gonna try to invade anyway, so far we've chalked up two failures with nothing to show for it but a lot of collateral damage and squandered resources

Iran knows all this

Things I think I know for sure:

1. Iran is going to make a play for nuclear weapons.

2. Bibi is going to intervene before that happens.

Only chance that (2) doesn't look like an Israeli airstrike on Iran is because Bibi believes Obama when he says he'll attack before that happens. Do you believe we know something about US willingness to bomb Iran that Bibi doesn't?

Think convincing Iran is not out of the question. Iran might have issues, but it's not some psycho despotic regime. Not exactly. Often unreasonable, but mostly talks a big game. It's no hermit kingdom.

Iranian nukes means Assad stays in power.

Meh. They might mean the civil war doesn't end and the country gets partitioned but there's no way he 'stays in power'. I predict someone's going to have to off him at some point, prolly someone in his own camp. You can fight to the death but at some point Syria or Alawia or whatever have to eat and want to make a pound or two.

but it's not some psycho despotic regime

I dunno they look pretty psycho to me. I can't really figure out what they think they'll gain from their nuclear program, the entire reasoning behind it is specious ("we need it to make sure no one fucks with us!" except by pursuing the program you are GUARANTEEING that people will fuck with you! so uh)

Iran might be fundamentalist but there's a rationality there born of many, many years of playing the game.

Assad's leaving in a bodybag, this is a foregone conclusion.

I'm pretty sure after last IAEA report that Iran is making a play for nukes. They are really out of plausible deniability about their program. If diplomacy + sanctions can still make a difference - which are the ones the world haven't used yet?

I dunno they look pretty psycho to me. I can't really figure out what they think they'll gain from their nuclear program, the entire reasoning behind it is specious ("we need it to make sure no one fucks with us!" except by pursuing the program you are GUARANTEEING that people will fuck with you! so uh)

― stop swearing and start windmilling (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, September 6, 2012 4:48 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

TBF, doesn't that almost exactly describe the Cheney Doctrine?

In light of '03, I can't see the US acting pre-emptively. Israeli cabinet and defense ppl are ambiguous about an attack. If push comes to shove and Barak and Bibi get their way, they attack pre-emptively with or without US foreknowledge and we end up beating the heck out of the Iranian airforce and navy.

TBF, doesn't that almost exactly describe the Cheney Doctrine?

ah yes Dick Cheney, the model of rational foreign policy

One of the weirder optics things re all of this is the attempt to reposition Iranian leadership as reasonable despite all indicators to the opposite (rhetoric, actual nuclear development, etc) and Bibi as unreasonable (despite what looks to me like a ton of patience considering his position).

I didn't say it was rational! I was half agreeing with you!

If Iran is 100% going to get nuclear weapons w/out intercession, I don't see how Bibi can not intercede. When a country says that your country is a cancer that needs to be wiped off the map, and they're trying to gets nukes, you're painted into a corner.

NB I'm not sure violent Iranian rhetoric means they'll def drop a nuke on Israel if they get a chance. I'm just saying that if you run the country of Israel and your job is to make sure that doesn't happen, you don't have many options.

I think "crazy" is a dangerous word to throw around in foreign policy. Are they "crazy" enough to pursue nuclear weapons no matter what we do? Seems like there's a good chance of it. Are they "crazy" enough to launch a nuclear attack on Israel? Sincerely doubt it.

yep. MWhite's scenario seems the most likely to me. inevitable even.

why pursue nukes at all if they have no intention of using them? seriously, idg why they are so fixated/dedicated to their nuke program. it seems thoroughly irrational/self-destructive.

If Israel took every bit of OTT rhetoric at face value, it'd be bombing more than Iran.

I think MWhite is right. Israel attacks using airstrike and US doesn't commit troops but does open fuel/ammo reserves to Israel until the job is done. I don't know what happens after that. Not good stuff, I'm sure.

I think it is a good question to ask what game Iran is playing. Obviously Iran knows Israel will not allow it, and that the US will support Israel. So why beg the conflict?

why pursue nukes at all if they have no intention of using them? seriously, idg why they are so fixated/dedicated to their nuke program. it seems thoroughly irrational/self-destructive.

― stop swearing and start windmilling (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, September 6, 2012 4:55 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This is a little too foreign policy 101 to even warrant a response, come on Shakey.

I get why Israel is scared of Iran and their rhetoric, but anybody who thinks they want nukes only to kill Israelis is dumb. Israel does have nukes so MAD makes a certain amount of sense to the IRI regime. Being able to tell the Saudis to fuck off and telling the Turks to leave Iranian Kurdish questions and Iranian influence in Syria alone makes sense, too. Everyone here gets Israeli fear/paranoia but can you fathom what it's like to be a Shia and a Persian surrounded by ppl who aren't? Esp after several thousand years of rooted history where everybody from the Greeks to the Romans to the Arabs to the Mongols to the Russians, Brits and Americans have either conquered you or fucked you over?

why pursue nukes at all if they have no intention of using them?

Hey, the PRK have nukes...

I think those are good points, but I also don't buy that the Israeli regime's fear of Iran having nuclear weapons is limited to "they'll nuke us"

yeah yeah I get all that, but the short-term politics dictate that their program will never reach the stage where they get to flex their regional muscle with their nukes, because that will all be preceded by a massive conflict with the US/Israel which is likely to destabilize their regime and country and relegate them to an even weaker position.

xp

Hey, the PRK have nukes...

right but someone suggested that the IRI is NOT a crazy despot regime, unlike the PRK.

Let's separate crazy from incapable of acting rational. Hitler was crazy and irrational. Stalin was crazy and quite rational. The way the IRI has played the West isn't the fruit of smoking pcp; it's been quite clever even if the goal is one I can't quite figure out.

it's been clever in a "courting disaster" way... I think you spelled out what their goal is in a previous post, it's just that their present course has no chance of getting there. that's the disconnect I can't fathom.

What if their real goal is to sprint past the post, get the nukes, and brandish them in view of keeping Turkey/US/Israel/SA/maybe even Russia at bay?

Can't imagine any of those players allowing Iran to be in that position.

so not gonna happen

In fact, that would be the stupidest thing Iran can do. "Hmm, now that we have a nuke, what should we do? I know! Provoke a coalition into stopping us at any cost!"

Like I said, a crazy IRI regime may think it's a form of insurance. Khameinei, Rafsanjani, Ahmadinejad all crazy but not just pious fools. Heck even the Green revolution leaders supported Iran having a nuclear program, as much from 'we're as entitled as any of you countries' nationalism as anything else.

I bet you there's someone in the WH praying that any attack can be postponed till next Nowruz

I can quite easily imagine why Iranians who lived through the war with Iraq would want a massive defence mechanism. Not being in a position where your neighbour, with the connivance of the west, can kill 750,000 - 1,000,000 of your people would probably count as "rational".

In the grand scheme of things it's still not a good idea but i can't really see any practical way of stopping it. For all the rhetoric, there is probably an awareness that Iran would use nuclear weapons in a defensive capacity only and that provoking a pre-emptive war with no guarantee of stopping them in the long term would be counter-productive.

Also, teh US has them in bind in the Gulf and I can't imagien what it was like having teh US on either border after '03.

In the grand scheme of things it's still not a good idea but i can't really see any practical way of stopping it.

What does practical mean?

For all the rhetoric, there is probably an awareness that Iran would use nuclear weapons in a defensive capacity only

I don't know how anyone could know this with any level of certainty.

An attempt at "regime change" might be the only way to stop it from happening but that would not be practical. Targeted strikes against suspected facilities wouldn't necessarily work and could provoke a war - again not necessarily practical.

If Iran used nuclear weapons in an offensive capacity it would be annihilated.

The worst-case scenario i could see would be increased defensive abilities emboldening Iran to do a lot more of the sneaky, underhand stuff they're up to in Lebanon, Iraq, etc and putting more pressure on Israel through even more overt support of its enemies. Obviously not a good thing, but idk what the other options are.

That's best case scenario imho.

There have been what? Half a dozen global conflicts where the participants got nuclear weapons. Not exactly a huge set of statistics to make any kind of absolute statement about what a particular country would do. I'm sure we can all think of things that have happened in history that seemed to be completely unpredictable - actions taken by governments that defied logic or human feeling. Mutually assured self destruction is very persuasive, but is not the "truth."

I don't know how that "self" slipped in there but I guess it makes as much sense as without.

Perfect Rationality for example major issue undermining MAD - and one obv in play here since I don't know how you know that Iran is rational actor.

There's defying logic and there's signing a death warrant for every man, woman and child in the country. Absolutes are impossible - we can't know that China isn't going to launch missiles at the US or India isn't going to launch them at Pakistan - but we can assume the probability is extremely low. I don't really see it being much higher here.

That remote risk has to be weighed against the probability of extended hostilities if anyone took a shot at Iran now.

The best case scenario for Iran, as far as i can see, is a gradual process of democratisation and the eventual normalisation of relations with the rest of the world. Starting another war is not going to help that process.

Tbh, my opinion on what Iran will and won't do with nukes doesn't really matter. I would certainly rate it as very low possibility but I'm glad I don't have to make a decision based on that possibility. What matters is Bibi's belief. I think he thinks Iran would use a nuke. Or at least thinks it's possible enough that he needs to intervene. Obama may or may not agree, but until now he's been signaling that containment is unacceptable aka chance of Iran using a nuke is high enough that they can't be allowed to get one.

You may be right. The pressure on Bibi to act upon the assumption that Iran would use nuclear weapons, leaving aside any strategic analysis which might cloud the issue, must be enormous.

The timing is just so weird, seeing as Iran has no real arch enemies right now ... except the countries that would bomb it if it got nuclear weapons. It's some self-fulfilling saber rattling.

The region is so unpredictable, it's not necessarily possible to assess who could pose a threat to Iran in the near future.

It's worth remembering that provoking Israel, at least to some extent, also plays into the hands of the current government. The economy isn't performing well and getting people distracted by national security issues helps keep them in power.