Anyone watching Obama's speech?

[PLATO]

Dude I know I tend to call you an idiot, but please take this as a genuine response. You are very, very wrong about this. Iran is not Libya, and it's not Iraq. The Iranians have been building a program that means you can't just bomb it from the air and shut the whole thing down. US military commanders have made it very clear that all you can achieve by an air campaign is to delay the program by maybe a few months, maybe a few years tops. The cost of doing so would be to destroy the moderate faction in Iran, cause Iran to strike out against US and Israeli interests across the Middle East including a huge new wave of terrorist support, and potentially make them start hitting vessels in Hormuz and/or tossing missiles into Israel. It also means that the current near total support for sanctions is likely to dissolves as many countries will simply not support a US attack on another middle eastern country.

You're right of course, a nuclear armed Iran is a scary, potentially dreadful thing, but the uncomfortable truth is that there is no easy answer. A non-nuclear air campaign is not sufficient, a land war would make Iraq look like a picnic, and sanctions will almost certainly not work. If Iran are as close as people think, they will dig in until the bomb is ready and then tell the world to go **** itself afterwards.

TLDR: There is no easy win strategy.

We don't often agree, but I think you are spot on here.

Sadly, I don't believe that the sanctions will work and then we are faced with a true dilema. Do we accept a nuclear Iran or do we force regime change. One thing I had not really considered is that a nuclear strike could stop them...I hope and pray that an option other than that is used. Pandora needs to stay in the box she has been in since 1945.

I have seen many analysis of the non nuclear consequences of a nuclear Iran and they are indeed quite frightening. Nearly all of them evaluate the situation to Iran being much more agressive in asserting its influence in the Midddle East as the possibility of repriasal in minimized. The Middle East could be facing a nightmare no matter what happens. Low level war seems nearly inevitable unless it is displaced by full scale war.

It is quite depressing to me because I see no other options for the U.S. in the end other than abondon the ME (which I am sure we will not do) or to implement regime change in Iran. This one would be costly...in many different ways.

[Jon Miller]

I think we welcome Iran into the nuclear club, and tell them that if they attack their neighbors they are glass.

JM

[Hauldren Collider]

I wouldn't count on Iran being sane enough to let that deter them from passing out nukes to their terrorist buddies.

[PLATO]

I think we welcome Iran into the nuclear club, and tell them that if they attack their neighbors they are glass.

JM

You miss the point Jon. It is the level of the current type of subversive activities that they engage in that will become much more aggressive. They will have little fear retaliation because they will have been "welcomed to the nuclear club." It is not the use of their nukes that would embroil the ME in heightened levels of conflict, it is their mere possesion of them.

[PLATO]

I wouldn't count on Iran being sane enough to let that deter them from passing out nukes to their terrorist buddies.

All nuclear material has a "signature" detailing where it was made. If a terrorist group popped a an Iranian made nuke, then the world would hold Iran responsible. They might as well do it themselves.

[Imran Siddiqui]

I doubt Iran would be that stupid. Let's be honest, for all the stuff we say about Iran, they aren't ridiculously irrational or stupid. The biggest fear, as PLATO has said is that Iran would perhaps be more aggressive in supplying its clients. But they are smart enough to stay somewhat under the radar enough to prevent full scale warfare.

I don't think US intervention would really accomplish anything. I think we may have to resign ourselves to a nuclear Iran. Once the nuclear genie was out of the bottle it was only a matter of time before this occurred (not specifically Iran, but Iran-type countries).

[OzzyKP]

I doubt Iran would be that stupid. Let's be honest, for all the stuff we say about Iran, they aren't ridiculously irrational or stupid. The biggest fear, as PLATO has said is that Iran would perhaps be more aggressive in supplying its clients. But they are smart enough to stay somewhat under the radar enough to prevent full scale warfare.

I don't think US intervention would really accomplish anything. I think we may have to resign ourselves to a nuclear Iran. Once the nuclear genie was out of the bottle it was only a matter of time before this occurred (not specifically Iran, but Iran-type countries).

Agreed.

[kentonio]

HC, have a read of this if you get a few minutes..

http://www.thedailybeast.com/article...an-attack.html

[regexcellent]

Heh, "Israeli aggression."

I wouldn't call it aggression if the very existence of your country is at stake.

Hopefully Israel has the balls to do what we don't, just like every other time.

More importantly, Obama didn't call on the PA to recognize Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state, which is a pretty glaring omission. The PA is only willing to accept peace terms that leave open a pretext for future war, which should come as no surprise since it doesn't actually want peace in the first place.

More proof that Harper > Obama.

[DinoDoc]

So was Guy a big woman or was Obama really laying the groundwork for war?

[regexcellent]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/in-meeting-obama-to-warn-netanyahu-against-military-strikes-on-iran/2012/03/02/gIQA5Wf0mR_story.html?hpid=z3

Definitely not the second one.

[giblets]

More importantly, Obama didn't call on the PA to recognize Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state, which is a pretty glaring omission.

Well, that sounds like an endorsement of theocracy.

[regexcellent]

Kind of like what the PA is?

Israel is a Jewish state in the sense that Jews live there and it is a homeland for the Jews. Refusing to recognize that just lays the groundwork for war later in order to make it not Jewish.

Every single Arab state is Muslim. Israel can damn well be Jewish.

[Hauldren Collider]

Israel is Jewish in the same way that the UK is Anglican.

[Guynemer]

So was Guy a big woman or was Obama really laying the groundwork for war?

I'll thank you not to comment on my weight.