The media have been positively awash with dire predictions that Israel is on the verge of attacking Iran. Meanwhile, the ‘covert’ war is already ongoing with reports that an Israeli-backed Iranian group known as the MEK are responsible for the murder of Iranian scientists. (Glenn Greenwald provides considerable background about this group and its Israeli and bipartisan US backers.) In addition both the US and Israel are waging cyberwar against Iran, while hypocritically condemning it when it is done by other countries.
Ira Chernus provides a good discussion of what is going on behind this war propaganda barrage. He disposes of the common argument that Israel is facing an existential threat from Iran, saying that “The Israelis are considering an attack on Iran, fraught with immense dangers, so the Jewish state can keep its symbolic status as the region’s only superpower.” Meanwhile, he says that the Obama administration is trying to simultaneously wash its hands of the worldwide negative consequences of an Israel attack while placating the Israel lobby at home by not vetoing it.
Iran isn’t biting and has not attacked. All the surreptitious and illegal goings-on are being done to incite a war, to get Iran to strike first. Why?
During the Nuremburg trials in 1945, pre-emptive warfare was declared a war crime. Unlike 2002, the US and Israel know that this time they won’t be able to manufacture fictions and “justify” another pre-emtive strike. So the only way to rationalize it is to antagonize Iran.
It reminds me a lot of the tactics that neo-nazis and white supremacists use to engage in violence against minorities. They harass someone (black, gay, latino, or some other) and engage in small but aggressive behaviours (shoving, tripping, grabbing possessions, etc.) that upset the intended target.
When the intended target finally lashes out in frustration, the neonazis, skinheads, KKK or others then claim it is “self-defense” for them to violently assault or kill the person. Skinheads who do this are not victims, they are trying to get away with violence.
The US and Israel are behaving in the exact same way, trying to provoke an action that will “justify” attacking Iran.
.
Can anyone point me to a summary of evidence for & against the accusation that Iran is enriching uranium for a bomb rather than or in addition to enriching uranium to fuel a light water reactor?
Has either side in the dispute suggested some means of monitoring Iran’s enrichment facility to ensure the uranium is not enriched to more than eg: 5% U235 so it is only usable in a power reactor?
It makes a lot of sense for an oil rich country to use nuclear fission to generate electricity rather than burn oil, so it can export more oil for more income.
I would like to see a move toward reactors that don’t require enriched fuel (eg: CANDU, or the not quite yet commercially available IFR & LFTR) so that the one nuclear technology that is usable for both energy & weapons, ie: enrichment, is taken out of the arguments over nuclear power.