Bolton: It's 'crunch time'
Those of you who are basketball fans know that 'crunch time' is the last few minutes of a close game when all the exhausted starters are on the floor and every shot counts. If you're a coach, you want your best players on the floor during 'crunch time' and you want to have them control the game flow as much as possible.Former US ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton argues that it's 'crunch time' for Israel on Iran's development of nuclear weapons. According to Bolton, Israel is going to have to make a decision to go it alone in the next few months, or the world will be staring at a nuclear Iran.
Mr. Obama has no new strategic thinking on Iran. He vaguely promises to offer the country the carrot of diplomacy—followed by an empty threat of sanctions down the road if Iran does not comply with the U.S.’s requests. This is precisely the European Union’s approach, which has failed for over six years.Will Israel do it? I believe the answer is yes.
There’s no reason Iran would suddenly now bow to Mr. Obama’s diplomatic efforts, especially after its embarrassing election in June. So with diplomacy out the door, how will Iran be tamed?
Mr. Gates’ mission had extraordinary significance. Israel sees the political and military landscape in a very inauspicious light. It also worries that, once ensnared in negotiations, the Obama administration will find it very hard to extricate itself. The Israelis are probably right. To prove the success of his “open hand,” Mr. Obama will declare victory for “diplomacy” even if it means little to no gains on Iran’s nuclear program.
Under the worst-case scenario, Iran will continue improving its nuclear facilities and Mr. Obama will become the first U.S. president to tie the issue of Israel’s nuclear capabilities into negotiations about Iran’s.
Israel understands that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s recent commitment to extend the U.S. “defense umbrella” to Israel is not a guarantee of nuclear retaliation, and that it is wholly insufficient to deter Iran from obliterating Israel if it so decides. In fact, Mrs. Clinton’s comment tacitly concedes that Iran will acquire nuclear weapons, exactly the wrong message. Since Israel, like the U.S., is well aware its missile defense system is imperfect, whatever Mr. Gates said about the “defense umbrella” will be politely ignored.
Relations between the U.S. and Israel are more strained now than at any time since the 1956 Suez Canal crisis. Mr. Gates’s message for Israel not to act on Iran, and the U.S. pressure he brought to bear, highlight the weight of Israel’s lonely burden.
Someone asked in the comments the other day what would happen if Israel tries to take out Iran's nuclear capability and fails. He (she?) suggested that would be an even worse scenario for Israel than facing a nuclear Iran.
That is true. But no one here seriously considers the possibility that Israel will fail. It's like 'crunch time': You give it your best shot and you coolly try to sink it. If Iran goes nuclear, it's almost irrelevant whether we tried to stop them. From our perspective the deadly consequences are the same. We must do all we can to stop them.
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 7:26 PM
4 Comments:
ok, i know i'm radical
but as our fearless messiah says "never waste a good crisis" and "it's a teaching opportunity"
I say hit iran hard...
take out their oil refineries, ALL advanced military and industrial targets, in west iran (desert areas) use a few nukes (population is low)
destroy them to the stone age with no possible recovery in 15-25 years...
a lesson must be taught, so that 3000 years from now, a story will be told how the evil took over persia and once every 3000 years the jews came and cleansed it of that evil...
we need a response that will be remembered as the modern Purim...
The world needs to understand that threats of genocide of the Jews will not be tolerated...
PERIOD
Never Again...
We're living at a pivotal moment in history. The fate of the Jewish people though is now in their own hands. It is truly "crunch time."
I am the one who asked the question about possible failure the other day. I am a "he" by the way!
I agree with the comment from "what is occupation" that Israel must not focus on nuclear installations as the only goal. Iran's economy is highly vulnerable in many ways. Israel should destroy Iran's only refinery and oil fields as well as Iran's harbors and airports. By depriving Iran's population of gas and the regime of revenue, Iran's economy will come to a screeching halt. Add the destruction of Iran's power grid for good measure and all centrifuges etc...come to a halt.
I think when Israel hits, it will surprise the Iranians who are most likely defending their nuclear installations above all.
Acting without informing the U.S., Iraqi troops seized control Tuesday of a camp of Iranian exiles ferociously opposed to the regime in Tehran. It was the most significant operation undertaken by Baghdad since U.S. troops withdrew from the cities last month, and is a likely nod to Iran's ayatullahs, who brand the group as terrorists, as does the U.S. Yet, in the convoluted politics of the region, the U.S., despite tagging the organization on its terror list, had been a sort of guarantor of the safety of the Mujahideen-e-Khalq (MEK) because it was the enemy of its enemy, Iran.
The MEK, however, had become an embarrassing inconvenience to Baghdad's increasingly cozy ties to Tehran. Although Iraq has repeatedly said that it is in its own national interest to remove the group, Iran's supreme leader, Ayatullah Ali Khamenei, meeting with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani in late February, left little doubt as to what he expected the Iraqis to do. "We await the implementation of our agreement regarding the expulsion of the hypocrites," he was quoted as saying.
Post a Comment
<< Home