The Atlantic magazine is full of stories on Iran. It should be compulsory reading for our Board.
After some thought, I've come to the conclusion the more Iran lies about its nuclear programme, the more the West bullies it and the more the West bullies it, the more likely it is to try to acquire a nuclear bomb (regime life insurance?), and the more likely it is to acquire one, the more likely we are to attack. Despite the coherent well argued articles below for not attacking Iran, I believe it will happen for the simple reason that the main argument against attacking Iran, namely that attacking it will encourage it all the more, diminishes in strength as they get closer to achieving their goal anyway. An attack is all but inevitable in my view, since the leadership probably can't back down without regime change occurring from within Iran (the hardship endured will have been for nothing?).
So should we stop bullying Iran? No, I don't think so.
The Atlantic magazine has a monthly survey of experts where it is asked for its views on the prospects for regime change. The last survey (for August) is here:
AUG 29 2012, 12:25 PM ET 24 Our expert panel gauges the odds that the United States or Israel will strike the Islamic Republic in the next year.
The probability of conflict with Iran is now at 40 percent, according to The Atlantic's Iran War Dial.
We've assembled a high profile team of experts from the policy world, academia, and journalism to periodically predict the chances that Israel or the United States will strike Iran in the next year. For more on the Iran War Dial and the panelists, visit our FAQ page.
Peace remains more likely than war. But the chances of conflict have ticked upward for the second month in a row, from 36 percent in June, to 38 percent in July, and now 40 percent in August.
This month, three of the panelists offered comments explaining why there was a serious risk of war.
Shibley Telhami, the Anwar Sadat Professor for Peace and Development at the University of Maryland, sees the rhetorical battle between Israel and Iran, and Israel's desire to protect its reputation, as potentially powerful forces for war.
In my opinion, the chance of an Israeli attack has slightly increased since the last estimate. It is still uncertain whether or not the Israeli posture is a mere bluff or a function of a real desire to attack Iran under the right circumstances. But in a world where perception of power is sometimes almost as important as power itself, the rhetorical escalation between Iran and Israel, and the seeming rise in Iran's influence in hosting the Non-Aligned Movement summit and gaining the important participation of Egypt's new president, have created a new challenge for Israel. Israel's deterrence posture is very a much a function of how strong Arabs and Muslims believe it is in comparison to its enemies.
For now, there are many who have come to believe a view expressed by one of the readers of Aljazeera.net: "For the second week in a row, Israelis are demonstrating in Tel Aviv in front of the minister of war, Ehud Barak, opposing his statements regarding the waging of war on Iran, as they are very scared of the consequences of an Iranian [counter-]attack. They chanted that Barak and Netanyahu would hide in fortified hideouts while the Israeli people will be totally destroyed by an Iranian attack....Shimon Peres and others oppose an Israeli strike against Iran because of the fear of the consequences of the Iranian counter-attack which will render Israel's very existence in the future unknown."
So add to all the other calculations that Israelis have to make, this one: If they don't attack, people in the region will see their refrain to be a direct function of Iran's growing power and Israel's weakness--something that Israelis have always seen as undermining their deterrence. This is why I had expressed the view that rhetoric matters more than politicians sometimes know. The outcome in this case may be disastrous.
Dalia Dassa Kaye, a senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation, also believes that Israel's concerns over protecting its credibility may heighten the odds of war.
The main variable in weighing the likelihood of a military attack against Iran in the coming year is the cost-benefit assessment of such an option in Israel. Unfortunately, Israelis who believe the advantages of attacking Iran outweigh the dangers may have the upper hand at the moment, making the odds of an attack higher now than in previous months.
Yes, the majority of Israel's military and security establishment oppose an attack (preferring the United States take the lead instead) and the Israeli public is divided and wary of a strike without U.S. support. There is also broad understanding among Israel's security elites that a military strike can only slow but not stop Iran's program and may only give Iran more incentive to reconstitute its program, much as Saddam Hussein did after Israel attacked Iraq's nuclear reactor. For this reason, many speculate that the recent spike in Israeli war talk is more bluff designed mainly to elicit even tougher international and American actions against Iran. But it would be a mistake not to take Israeli threats seriously this time.
The leaders most associated with favoring a military option and the ones who could ultimately make the decision--Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak--have staked their domestic and international reputations on these threats. They are not just talking about war but they are asking the Israeli population to prepare for it. And Israel is telling the United States and the international community that diplomacy and sanctions have run their course.
Despite the unprecedented levels of U.S. assistance and military cooperation with Israel in recent years, Netanyahu's government does not appear convinced that the United States will deal with Iran down the road (i.e., launch a military attack) if Israel holds off now, when it believes it has the best operational ability to set back Iran's program before the so-called 'zone of immunity' kicks in. Israeli leaders may also believe they will be more immune from American censure if they act during a presidential election.
As a consequence, Israel may be conditioning its own society and the world for military action. Israeli leaders must understand how their threats at a certain point lose their credibility, both among their own population and abroad, if they never act on them. The effectiveness of such threats in ramping up international pressure against Iran in order to stave off an Israeli attack also begins to diminish at a certain point, and we may be reaching that point.
Some prominent Israeli analysts have recently suggested an exit strategy from Israel's escalation of military threats--get the United States to more forcefully and explicitly commit to military action if Israel holds off attacking Iran now. But boxing the United States into commitments to take military action against Iran would be a dangerous way to avoid an Israeli attack. The risks and drawbacks of military action that have led many Israelis to oppose this option are just as pertinent to a U.S. strike. Let's hope we can find other ways to convince the Israelis that a military strike against Iran is a bad idea. But assuming the Israelis aren't serious is not an option.
Ken Timmerman, executive director of the Foundation for Democracy in Iran, sees a "dramatic uptick" in the odds of war in recent weeks.
It is warranted by a volume of recent statements from top Israeli leaders warning about an impending decision on whether to strike Iran. Israel has made clear that it views Oct. 1 as a "threshold" for Iran's nuclear weapons capability, since that is when the IAEA estimates Iran will have enriched enough 20% uranium to make at least one 1st generation nuclear explosive device after further enrichment. Since the IAEA has also concluded that Iran has tested all the non-nuclear components for an implosion device, this clearly is a key capability. By most estimates, Iran will be able to carry out further enriching to weapons grade in somewhere between 6 to 8 weeks.
Israel has two parallel fears. The first is that the spinning centrifuges will produce an imminent Iranian nuclear capability. The second is that the failure to strike Iran--after all of Israel's tough language--will destroy Israel's credibility so that its promises and threats will no longer be believed. Would a country really fight a war to protect its reputation? The single biggest reason why the United States fought the Vietnam War for eight years, with 58,000 American deaths, was the hope of avoiding a humiliating defeat and defending American credibility. _____________________________________________________
The most insightful post (an argument against attacking Iran?) I've seen from an ordinary member of the public on Iran is here (from the FT)
"Iran is not interested quite as much in the bomb, as in 'being interested' in the bomb, seeking to polarize its own people against the democratic west by stimulating the west's hostility. The west's interest in popular sovereignty, rule of law, and anti-corruption agendas is a threat to Iran's selfish leaders. If the leadership were to proceed to the bomb on its own initiative, it exposes its cynicism to its own people, and weakens itself. But if the west manages to achieve this polarization through its own violence, the leadership is then free to move from 'interest' in the bomb to actuality."
Some of the most coherent articles I've seen against attacking Iran are below:
http://www.economist.com/node/21548233
From the Economist 25/2/12
Bombing Iran
Nobody should welcome the prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran. But bombing the place is not the answer.
FOR years Iran has practised denial and deception; it has blustered and played for time. All the while, it has kept an eye on the day when it might be able to build a nuclear weapon. The world has negotiated with Iran; it has balanced the pain of economic sanctions with the promise of reward if Iran unambiguously forsakes the bomb. All the while, outside powers have been able to count on the last resort of a military assault.
Today this stand-off looks as if it is about to fail. Iran has continued enriching uranium. It is acquiring the technology it needs for a weapon. Deep underground, at Fordow, near the holy city of Qom, it is fitting out a uranium-enrichment plant that many say is invulnerable to aerial attack. Iran does not yet seem to have chosen actually to procure a nuclear arsenal, but that moment could come soon. Some analysts, especially in Israel, judge that the scope for using force is running out. When it does, nothing will stand between Iran and a bomb.
The air is thick with the prophecy of war. Leon Panetta, America's defence secretary, has spoken of Israel attacking as early as April. Others foresee an Israeli strike designed to drag in Barack Obama in the run-up to America's presidential vote, when he will have most to lose from seeming weak.
A decision to go to war should be based not on one man's electoral prospects, but on the argument that war is warranted and likely to succeed. Iran's intentions are malign and the consequences of its having a weapon would be grave. Faced by such a regime you should never permanently forswear war. However, the case for war's success is hard to make. If Iran is intent on getting a bomb, an attack would delay but not stop it. Indeed, using Western bombs as a tool to prevent nuclear proliferation risks making Iran only more determined to build a weapon—and more dangerous when it gets one.
A shadow over the Middle East
Make no mistake, an Iran armed with the bomb would pose a deep threat. The country is insecure, ideological and meddles in its neighbours' affairs. Both Iran and its proxies—including Hizbullah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza—might act even more brazenly than they do now. The danger is keenly felt by Israel, surrounded by threats and especially vulnerable to a nuclear bomb because it is such a small land. Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, recently called the “Zionist regime” a “cancerous tumour that must be cut out”. Jews, of all people, cannot just dismiss that as so much rhetoric.
Even if Iran were to gain a weapon only for its own protection, others in the region might then feel they need weapons too. Saudi Arabia has said it will arm—and Pakistan is thought ready to supply a bomb in exchange for earlier Saudi backing of its own programme. Turkey and Egypt, the other regional powers, might conclude they have to join the nuclear club. Elsewhere, countries such as Brazil might see nuclear arms as vital to regional dominance, or fear that their neighbours will.
Some experts argue that nuclear-armed states tend to behave responsibly. But imagine a Middle East with five nuclear powers riven by rivalry and sectarian feuds. Each would have its fingers permanently twitching over the button, in the belief that the one that pressed first would be left standing. Iran's regime gains legitimacy by demonising foreign powers. The cold war seems stable by comparison with a nuclear Middle East—and yet America and the Soviet Union were sometimes scarily close to Armageddon.
The dream of pre-emption
No wonder some people want a pre-emptive strike. But military action is not the solution to a nuclear Iran. It could retaliate, including with rocket attacks on Israel from its client groups in Lebanon and Gaza. Terror cells around the world might strike Jewish and American targets. It might threaten Arab oil infrastructure, in an attempt to use oil prices to wreck the world economy. Although some Arab leaders back a strike, most Muslims are unlikely to feel that way, further alienating the West from the Arab spring. Such costs of an attack are easy to overstate, but even supposing they were high they might be worth paying if a strike looked like working. It does not.
Striking Iran would be much harder than Israel's successful solo missions against the weapons programmes of Iraq, in 1981, and Syria, in 2007. If an attack were easy, Israel would have gone in alone long ago, when the Iranian programme was more vulnerable. But Iran's sites are spread out and some of them, hardened against strikes, demand repeated hits. America has more military options than Israel, so it would prefer to wait. That is one reason why it is seeking to hold Israel back. The other is that, for either air force, predictions of the damage from an attack span a huge range. At worst an Israeli mission might fail altogether, at best an American one could, it is said, set back the programme a decade (see article).
But uncertainty would reign. Iran is a vast, populous and sophisticated country with a nuclear programme that began under the shah. It may have secret sites that escape unscathed. Even if all its sites are hit, Iran's nuclear know-how cannot be bombed out of existence. Nor can its network of suppliers at home and abroad. It has stocks of uranium in various stages of enrichment; an unknown amount would survive an attack, while the rest contaminated an unforeseeable area. Iran would probably withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, under which its uranium is watched by the International Atomic Energy Agency. At that point its entire programme would go underground—literally and figuratively. If Iran decided it needed a bomb, it would then be able to pursue one with utmost haste and in greater secrecy. Saudi Arabia and the others might conclude that they, too, needed to act pre-emptively to gain their own deterrents.
Perhaps America could bomb Iran every few years. But how would it know when and where to strike? And how would it justify a failing policy to the world? Perhaps, if limited bombing is not enough, America should be aiming for an all-out aerial war, or even regime change. Yet a decade in Iraq and Afghanistan has demonstrated where that leads. An aerial war could dramatically raise the threat of retaliation. Regime change might produce a government that the West could do business with. But the nuclear programme has broad support in Iran. The idea that a bomb is the only defence against an implacable American enemy might become stronger than ever.
Get real
That does not mean the world should just let Iran get the bomb. The government will soon be starved of revenues, because of an oil embargo. Sanctions are biting, the financial system is increasingly isolated and the currency has plunged in value. Proponents of an attack argue that military humiliation would finish the regime off. But it is as likely to rally Iranians around their leaders. Meanwhile, political change is sweeping across the Middle East. The regime in Tehran is divided and it has lost the faith of its people. Eventually, popular resistance will spring up as it did in 2009. A new regime brought about by the Iranians themselves is more likely to renounce the bomb than one that has just witnessed an American assault.
Is there a danger that Iran will get a nuclear weapon before that happens? Yes, but bombing might only increase the risk. Can you stop Iran from getting a bomb if it is determined to have one? Not indefinitely, and bombing it might make it all the more desperate. Short of occupation, the world cannot eliminate Iran's capacity to gain the bomb. It can only change its will to possess one. Just now that is more likely to come about through sanctions and diplomacy than war.
2 JUN 20 2012, 5:05 PM ET 18 Nicholas Kristof, who has been traveling across Iran, has some insights about the effect of sanctions on the Iranian economy that Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel, and his partner, the defense minister Ehud Barak, ought to read: Kristof is finding that sanctions are, indeed, hurting the economy, and that Iranian citizens are not blaming the West for the economic pain:
Western sanctions have succeeded in another way: Most blame for economic distress is directed at Iran's own leaders, and discontent appears to be growing with the entire political system. I continually ran into Iranians who were much angrier at their leaders on account of rising prices than on account of the imprisonment of dissidents or Bahais.
"We can't do business as we used to, and our quality of life is getting worse," one man, who lost his job as a salesman, said forlornly. "We blame our regime, not Western countries."
The economy, he finds, is issue number one:
Economic pressure also may be distracting people from other nationalist issues. For example, many ordinary Iranians side with their government on nuclear issues and are angry at assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists. But people are much more focused on lost jobs and soaring prices."The economy is breaking people's backs," a young woman told me in western Iran.
Kristof endorses, with some caveats, the sanctions regime:
I regret this suffering, and let's be clear that sanctions are hurting ordinary Iranians more than senior officials. I'm also appalled that the West blocks sales of airline parts, thus risking crashes of civilian aircraft.
Yet, with apologies to the many wonderful Iranians who showered me with hospitality, I favor sanctions because I don't see any other way to pressure the regime on the nuclear issue or ease its grip on power. My takeaway is that sanctions are working pretty well.
I continue to believe that Netanyahu and Barak are a) serious about attacking the Iranian nuclear program, but b) hesitant to do so unless there is, in their minds, no alternative. Well, what Kristof has found, through on-the-ground reporting (I wish I could do some myself, but the bastards/very agreeable and rational people who dispense Iranian visas haven't been interested in giving me one lately) is that there might still be an alternative: The sanctions are concentrating the attention of the regime in a way that nothing else has. If the people blame the regime for their straitened economic situation, well, that's a positive.
The ultimate solution here -- for Israel, the Arabs states, the West, and most crucially, the Iranian people -- is regime change. But short of that, if sanctions somehow make the regime feel that its grip on power is precarious, the Supreme Leader may look for a nuclear off-ramp. Is this likely? No, not particularly. The regime is committed, quite obviously, to its nuclear program. But a ratcheting-up of sanctions makes sense as a test of Kristof's reporting. And certainly, once the European oil embargo kicks in on July 1, the regime will be feeling even more intense pressure. It would be a terrible shame for someone to preempt what might be an effective economic campaign against the Iranian regime by dropping bombs on the country's nuclear facilities, which as Meir Dagan noted in this interview with Goldblog, would serve to unify the people behind a regime they otherwise despise. Don't get me wrong: I believe, based on what various experts say, that a strike on the Iranian nuclear program could set that program back in some sort of serious way. But it would also provide the impetus for Iran to drop the mask and pursue nuclearization with no brakes, and with the help of Russia and others, who surely wouldn't honor the sanctions regime if Israel were to attack preemptively.
7 Reasons Why Israel Should Not Attack Iran's Nuclear Facilities
7 AUG 11 2012, 7:32 PM ET 541 Israeli officials may see a "zero hour" for attacking Iranian nuclear facilities, but it could backfire.
On his Twitter feed, Oren Kessler reports that news analysts on Israel's Channel 2 are in agreement that an Israeli strike on Iran's nuclear facilities seems to be imminent. Ari Shavit, of Haaretz, is reporting that an unnamed senior Israeli security official he interviewed who is identified in a headline as "the decision-maker" (If you guess Ehud Barak, the defense minister, you would not be wrong) is arguing that the zero-hour is approaching for an Israeli decision:
"If Israel forgoes the chance to act and it becomes clear that it no longer has the power to act, the likelihood of an American action will decrease. So we cannot wait a year to find out who was right: the one who said that the likelihood of an American action is high or the one who said the likelihood of an American action is low."
Aluf Benn, the editor of Haaretz, writes that the world seems to have accepted the idea that Israel will soon strike Iran: "All the signs show that the 'international community,' meaning the western powers and the U.S. in the lead, seem to have reconciled themselves with Israel's talk of a military strike - and now they are pushing Netanyahu to stand by his rhetoric and send his bombers to their targets in Iran. In general terms, the market has already accounted for the Israeli strike in its assessment of the risk of the undertaking, and it is now waiting for the expectation to be realized." And then, of course, there is Efraim Halevy, the former head of the Mossad, who warned earlier this month that Iran should fear an Israeli strike over the next twelve weeks.
I'm not going to guess whether Israel will strike Iran tomorrow, next month, next year, or never. I believe it is highly plausible that Netanyahu and Barak will do so at some point over the next twelve months, if current trends remain the same. (The Atlantic Iran War Dial, which is set by a panel of 22 experts, currently puts the chance of an Israeli or American strike over the next 12 months at 38 percent.) Obviously, the Obama Administration believes that Netanyahu and Barak are itching to give the strike order soon. Otherwise, why would it have sent half the senior national security team to Israel over the past several weeks?
Though I have no idea what's going to happen in the coming weeks, this seems like an opportune moment to once again list the many reasons why an Israeli strike on Iran's nuclear facilities is a bad idea. Believe me, I take seriously the arguments made by Netanyahu and Barak in favor of action against Iran (read the Shavit piece, linked above, for a very good summary of all the reasons why a nuclear Iran would be a catastrophe for Israel, and pretty damn bad for the Arabs and the West as well), but the negatives still outweigh the positives in my mind: Here are some potential consequences of an Israeli strike:
1) Innocent people will die. It is quite possible that even a limited Israeli strike could kill innocent Iranians, and it is an almost-sure thing that Iranian retaliation will kill innocent Israels.
2) It very well might not work at all. The Israeli Air Force is very talented and brave, but it doesn't have the capacities of the USAF. It would only have one shot at these facilities, and it might not do much in the way of significant damage. It could also lose pilots, or see its pilots shot down and captured.
3) Even if a strike does work, it may only delay the Iranian program, and it might even speed it up. Any Israeli preventive strike would justify, in the minds of Iranians -- even non- or anti-regime Iranians -- that their country needs nuclear weapons as protection. Certainly much of the world would agree, and the sanctions put in place on Iran may crumble. So acceleration of the nuclear program may be a consequence of an Israeli strike.
4) An Israeli strike may cause a surge of sympathy for Iran among Sunni Arabs across the Middle East, who right now despise the regime for, among other reasons, supporting the Assad government in Damascus. Right now, Arab opinion is hardened against Iran and its Lebanese proxy, the terror group Hezbollah. An Israeli strike could reverse this trend, and would be a boon to Assad and Hezbollah in many other ways as well -- for one thing, it would take attention away from the continuing slaughter of innocent Syrians by Assad. Conversely, an Israeli strike would be very useful for those forces around the world trying to delegitimize and isolate Israel.
5) A strike could trigger an overt war without end (Iran, of course, has been waging subterranean war on Israel, and America, for a long time now, and Israel and America respond, in subterranean fashion), and an all-out missile war may escalate into something especially horrific, so in essence, Israel would be trading a theoretical war later for an actual war now.
6) A strike could be a disaster for the U.S.-Israel relationship. It might not be -- there is no sympathy for the Iranian regime among Americans (except on the left-most, and right-most margins) and there is plenty of sympathy for Israel. But an attack could trigger an armed Iranian response against American targets. (Such a response would not be rational on the part of Iran, but I don't count on regime rationality.) Americans are tired of the Middle East, and I'm not sure how they would feel if they believed that Israeli action brought harm to Americans. Remember, American soldiers have died in the defense of Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia, but they've never died defending Israel. I doubt Israel wants to put Americans in harm's way now. And it certainly isn't healthy for Israel to get on the wrong side of an American president.
7) The current American president is deeply serious about preventing Iran from going nuclear. I believe he would eventually use force (more effectively, obviously, than Israel) to stop Iran from crossing the nuclear threshold. His position will be severely compromised if Israel jumps the gun and attacks now. Again, what I worry about, at bottom, is that an Israeli attack would inadvertently create conditions for an acceleration of the Iranian nuclear program.
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Even Mr Goldberg, the author of the above, believes the USA will use force against Iran to bring an end to the nuclear programme. I can't see how such an objective can be achieved without regime change at the same time. So I can't understand why our directors have sold us out of our valuable Mehdiabad agreement, which, if they hadn't done, could have been put back into force under a new regime. Our directors' behaviour in trying to dilute us out of Mehdiabad while retaining control of it for themselves, and worse giving untrue information about the dilutive effect on us on Boardroom Radio, is despicable of course.
Our Board seem to be suffering from "mouth locked-up" syndrome: they can't communicate the underlying logic for exchanging Mehdiabad for Wonarah (there isn't any except to befriend the MAK Board and to save Mr Jordinson the burden of having to master the politics of a region he has no interest in - he hasn't bothered to learn Persian or to play the tar or the hammered dulcimer, has he? - and he will be spared the embarrassment of having to reveal his "Iran ignorance" in the quarterlies if small shareholders' stake in Mehdiabad doesn't justify the MD spending more than a sentence on it, won't he?).
I see Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer (the author of a Special Operations book on Afghanistan called "Operation Dark Heart") in a recent interview on FoxNews thinks it is too late to stop Iran getting a nuclear weapon and that the debate should be about stopping Iran acquiring the bomb delivery technology).
I continue to hope our directors drop dead. Without them dropping dead I can see no prospect for any short term increase in shareholder value, only further losses. They need to be sacked: they do not understand Iran and they show no interest in it: at the very least they've acted perversely and outside their core competencies in choosing to dilute us out of Mehdiabad at this time. All IMO. DYOR.
UCL Price at posting:
15.0¢ Sentiment: None Disclosure: Held
