Iran not nuclear weapons capable for "at least a year"-Gates

Do these people have ANY IDEA AT ALL of the level of credibility they carry?

How completely ABSURD they sound.

Iran is not expected to be capable of producing nuclear weapons for at least a year, maybe more, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Tuesday.

Asked about reported comments that Iran might be able to join the nuclear club in months, Gates said: "I don't believe it."

"I think that most estimates that I've seen, haven't changed since the last time we talked about it, which is probably at least a year, and maybe more," Gates told reporters on a flight to South America.

Maybe they think when they make these commitments of words we are just going to say, 'oh, ok' and then pay attention to something else, maybe watch Flashforward and find out what is really going to happen, since the experts who achieve everything are now in charge and telling us all is well.

Tick Tock Tick Tock Tick Tock

Ynet News:

Iranian official: We're month away from joining 'nuclear club'
Iranian Atomic Energy deputy chief says no country would consider attacking Islamic Republic after it reaches nuclear capabilities
Dudi Cohen

Iranian Atomic Energy deputy chief Behzat Sultani said Tuesday that the Islamic Republic will join the "nuclear club" within one month and added, "No country will consider attacking it after that." He provided no further details. Sultani added that 70% of the Arak nuclear reactor has been completed.

According to a report by the Iranian Fars news agency Sultani made the stataments during a meeting with students at the city of Kashan in central Iran. He boasted by saying, "despite the fact that our enemies thought Iran couldn't enrich uranium to a 20% level – we had no technical problem and it was performed under the agency's inspection."

Sultani stressed that Iran was only planning to use nuclear technology for electricity purposes. "Our next step is to expand the use of nuclear technology for other purposes than energy and fuel, so that food products, proteins and vegetables will sustain for longer periods and in higher quality."

'Different interpretation'
The Iranian Foreign Ministry issued a response to a meeting held between Chinese President Hu Jintao and US President Barak Obama during the NPT conference in Washington. Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said Tehran doesn't "consider the statement as approval of the US stance and unfair actions."

He told reporters on that "our interpretation is different" but didn't elaborate.

Meanwhile, French President Nicolas Sarkozy addressed the possibility of a military conflict with Iran during an interview with CBS.

"I would not want the world to wake up to a conflict between Israel and Iran, quite simply because the international community has been incapable of acting," Sarkozy said, calling a possible Israeli strike against Iran "a disaster".

The French president added, "I consider the fact that Iran should get its hands on a nuclear weapon - a military nuclear weapon, together with the many statements made by Iranian leaders against the democracy that is Israel is dangerous and unacceptable."

AP sources: Powers agree to pursue Iran sanctions

From the Associated Press:

WASHINGTON – Six major world powers have agreed to begin putting together proposed new sanctions on Iran over its suspect nuclear program after China dropped its opposition, U.S. officials said Wednesday.

China, long a holdout against fresh international penalties against Iran, signaled its willingness Wednesday to consider a U.N. Security Council sanctions resolution, two U.S. government officials said.

That would appear to improve prospects for passing a resolution aimed at increasing economic and diplomatic pressure on Iran to scale back its nuclear ambitions, which Tehran insists are limited to developing nuclear power for peaceful purposes.

In another sign of movement on the Chinese front, Iran's state media reported Wednesday that the country's top nuclear negotiator will travel to Beijing to discuss possible U.N. sanctions. Iranian state television said Saeed Jalili will hold talks Thursday with senior Chinese officials "concerning the nuclear program."

President Barack Obama had said Tuesday he hoped to have Iran sanctions in place within weeks — a timetable that appeared highly ambitious given China's reluctance to even discuss specific sanctions.

On Wednesday, however, two U.S. officials said that in a phone call among officials from the five permanent members of the Security Council — the U.S., Russia, China, Britain and France — plus Germany, the Chinese representative said his country was prepared to discuss specific potential sanctions.

Forgive me for my pessimism, but this will not stop Iran.

Why we can't let Iran have nukes. . .

Click here then pick your place and rocket.

Check out NYC and the ICBM.

That's why we can't let Iran have nukes.

h/t Jawa

Obama Says Iran Can Have Nuke Power, Israel Says It Will Build a Bomb

Obama says Iran may have a right to nuclear energy provided it proves by the end of the year it's intentions are peaceful.

Israel says Iran may have a bomb by the end of the year.

Washington Post:

Obama says Iran's energy concerns legitimate
By NANCY ZUCKERBROD
The Associated Press
Tuesday, June 2, 2009 9:24 AM

LONDON -- President Barack Obama suggested that Iran may have some right to nuclear energy _ provided it proves by the end of the year that its aspirations are peaceful.

In a BBC interview broadcast Tuesday, he also restated plans to pursue direct diplomacy with Tehran to encourage it set aside any ambitions for nuclear weapons it might harbor.

Iran has insisted its nuclear program is aimed at generating electricity. But the U.S. and other Western governments accuse Tehran of seeking atomic weapons.

"What I do believe is that Iran has legitimate energy concerns, legitimate aspirations," Obama said, adding that the international community also "has a very real interest" in preventing a nuclear arms race.

The president has indicated a willingness to seek deeper international sanctions against Tehran if it does not respond positively to U.S. attempts to open negotiations on its nuclear program.

Obama has said Tehran has until the end of the year to show it wants to engage with Washington.

"Although I don't want to put artificial time tables on that process, we do want to make sure that, by the end of this year, we've actually seen a serious process move forward. And I think that we can measure whether or not the Iranians are serious," Obama said.

Obama's interview offered a preview of a speech he is to deliver in Egypt this week, saying he hoped the address would warm relations between Americans and Muslims abroad.

"What we want to do is open a dialogue," Obama told the BBC. "You know, there are misapprehensions about the West, on the part of the Muslim world. And, obviously, there are some big misapprehensions about the Muslim world when it comes to those of us in the West."

Obama leaves in the evening on a trip to Egypt and Saudi Arabia aimed at reaching out to the world's 1.5 billion Muslims. He is due to make his speech in Cairo on Thursday.

Obama sounded an optimistic note about making progress toward resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, although he offered no new ideas for how he might try to secure a freeze on new building of Israeli settlements. The United States has called for a freeze, but Israeli leaders have rejected that.

Asked what he would say during his visit about human rights abuses, including the detention of political prisoners in Egypt, Obama indicated no stern lecture would be forthcoming.

He said he hoped to deliver the message that democratic values are principles that "they can embrace and affirm."

Obama added that there is a danger "when the United States, or any country, thinks that we can simply impose these values on another country with a different history and a different culture."

Newsmax:

Israel: Iran Could Build Nuke by Year's End
Monday, June 1, 2009 9:29 PM

Teheran could have enough low-grade uranium to build a nuclear bomb by the end of the summer, Brig.-Gen. Yossi Baidatz, head of Israel’s defense establishment’s research division, warned the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee on Monday.

Iran would not be able to immediately deploy a nuclear weapon, as the low-enrichment uranium would have to be processed into highly-enriched weapons-grade material before it could be used for a bomb, The Jerusalem Report reported.

Baidatz's comments echoed those of his boss, Maj.-Gen. Amos Yadlin, who told the committee last month that "Iran is intentionally advancing its nuclear development in such a way so as not to cross any nuclear red lines, by enriching low-grade uranium that is not sufficient for weapons development, but that can quickly be adapted to weapons-grade uranium in such a short period of time that the process can't be sabotaged."

But Baidatz added that there is "no connection between Teheran's diplomatic engagement and the trajectory of the military nuclear effort to attain the bomb" - and that the nuclear trajectory was outpacing the diplomatic one.

Iran was closely watching the Obama administration’s response to North Korea's nuclear tests, and moderate Arab countries were closely monitoring Iran's nuclear aspirations, Baidatz said, according to the Post.

The nation’s June 12's Iranian elections are essentially irrelevant, he argued. Both of the leading candidates - incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and reformist challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi - are equally worrisome for Israel.

Mohamed ElBaradei Insists That Iranians "Are Not Fanatics"

From this article in Newsweek, with regard to the bargaining style of the Iranians, in ElBaradei's own words:

...They know what they want. They are excellent on the strategic goals, excellent on waiting for the right price. I don't want to make them sound like superhumans; you do see a lot of infighting among them. And part of it is about who is going to get credit for finally breaking out of this 30 years of fighting and confrontation with the United States. Everybody is positioning himself to be the national hero who would finally put Iran back onto the world map as part of the mainstream. They are not like the stereotyped fanatics bent on destroying everybody around them. They are not.

And this fellow - a Moslem and member of the ummah, of course - has been doing the following, according to Newsweek's own introduction to the article:

As head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohamed ElBaradei has spent the past 11 years trying to keep Iran from getting nuclear weapons. The Nobel Peace Prize winner recently spoke to NEWSWEEK'S Christopher Dickey about his intense, often frustrating dialogue with the Iranians—and with the Americans.

ElBaradei hasn't done a good job of keeping Iran from going nuclear. Iran has been proceeding in that direction for much of the time that ElBaradei has been employed by the IAEA.

Please see this May 16, 2009 posting by Reliapundit for one example of how ElBaradei rebukes Israel. He doesn't use that same tone about or with Iran.

Just how did ElBaradei merit receiving the Nobel Peace Prize?

(Crossposted to THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS)

FOX Reporting Iran Ships Sent to Gulf of Aden

Just to make it all even more fun, FOX News is reporting that Iran has sent 6 warships into international waters and the Gulf of Aden.

Iran has sent six warships into international waters in a move security experts are calling a "muscle flexing" show of defiance following missile tests last week.

"Iran has dispatched six ... warships to international waters and the Gulf of Aden region in a historically unprecedented move by the Iranian Navy," Iranian Adm. Habibollah Sayyari told a gathering of armed forces officials, Reuters reported.

Sayyari said the ships were moved to preserve Iran's territorial integrity in its southern waters, but foreign policy experts are calling it an aggressive move targeted at a Western audience as much as for regional powers like rival Saudi Arabia.

The deployment is "a signal of military strength, resolve and continued defiance to U.S. and U.N. Security Council efforts to end the impasse over Iran's nuclear program," said Jim Phillips, senior fellow for Middle Eastern Affairs at the Heritage Institute. "What's very important here is the timing of this move — and this naval muscle flexing comes after Iran's missile test earlier this week, which was saber rattling that was meant to send the same signal as this naval dispatch."

Phillips said Ahmadinejad was using the opportunity to thumb his nose at the U.S. and U.N. to advance his own popularity in Iran ahead of the country's hotly contested June 12 election.

Iran's naval access stretches along the Gulf of Aden, the Strait of Hormuz and the Sea of Oman. Iran has threatened to block the strait, through which about 40 percent of the world's traded oil is shipped, if it were attacked over its nuclear program. Nearly
20,000 ships pass through the Gulf of Aden each year, heading to and from the Suez Canal, Reuters noted. Seven percent of world oil consumption passed through the Gulf of Aden in 2007, according to Lloyd's Marine Intelligence Unit.

Ah... so this is "muscle flexing" and last week's missle tests were "saber rattling" and now the Evil Dwarf is "thumbing his nose". Thanks for clearing that up. So what are they going to call it if Ahmadhimmijerker decides to block the Strait of Hormuz, "bird flipping"?

UPDATE: Well, this just keeps getting better and better...

FOX is now reporting that the Evil Dwarf has challenged Teh One to a debate at the UN next month providing he, the ED, wins the upcoming Iranian election.

The NYPD is going to be so thrilled at this news...

Why Hamlet Died..reminder 8,101,372: Iran deploys missiles in Persian Gulf

THE JERUSALEM POST

Iran's Revolutionary Guards have begun deploying mobile launchers for surface-to-air and surface-to-sea missiles in the Strait of Hurmuz and other areas in the Gulf, it has been revealed.

An Iranian official, quoted anonymously in the Saudi daily Al-Watan, said Iranian forces deployed the missile bases following secret reports that the United States and Israel were working on a military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities.

Iran's preparations for a potential military strike are not new. The republic has conducted several military exercises over the past few years, some with the explicit intention of preparing the armed forces for a possible confrontation with the West.

The source said the missiles were deployed a few weeks ago. Iran is said to have informed Arab countries in the region of its activities and reassured its neighbors that the missiles were not aimed at states in the region, a reference to Sunni Arab states such as Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, which has a Shi'ite majority but Sunni government.

Sunni Muslim Gulf states are allied with the US in and share Western concerns over Shi'ite Iran's nuclear plans.

Bahrain, for example, is closer to Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant than the Iranian capital Teheran. Any strike on the facility will affect Bahrainis more than Iran's center of power.

Hady 'Amr, Director of the Brookings Doha Center, said there were too many variables at play in the region to draw conclusions as to the deployment's underlying meaning. 'Amr spoke of the Obama administration's disposition towards dialogue with Iran, shifting alliances in the US dialogue with Syria, the Iranian presidential elections and the global financial crisis which has made both Iran and the Gulf states less secure.

On several occasions Iran has expressed its displeasure over potential US bases in its Arab neighbors' territories. "This may be part of their muscle-flexing in that regard," 'Amr told The Media Line, "to make sure that the Gulf states hosting American and French bases understand that there will be a price to pay."

The reports of missile deployments coincide with the US's declared intentions to bridge the rift with Iran.

US President Barack Obama is attempting a dialogue with Teheran to defuse tensions built up during the Bush Administration over Iran's controversial nuclear program.

The release of Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi from Teheran's Evin prison on Monday could be a response to US overtures.(PATHETICALLY HOPEFUL WEAKNESS)

Saberi, 31, was originally sentenced to eight years in prison on charges of espionage and had been held in prison since January, 2009. An appeals court in Iran reduced her sentence to a two-year suspended term and a five-year ban on reporting in Iran.

Iran has been under international pressure to abandon its nuclear program and uranium enrichment activities since 2002. The US, Israel and other countries are concerned that Iran is secretly pursuing nuclear weapons, although Teheran vociferously denies these accusations and claims its program is for peaceful purposes.

The US has not ruled out the possibility of a military strike on Iran. (ROTFLMAO)

Iran has threatened to retaliate to any aggression on its soil by closing down the strategic Strait of Hormuz, which will disrupt global oil supplies.

Last year Iran opened a new naval facility in Jask, in the entrance to the Gulf, the declared aim of which was to enable Iran to block the enemy from entering Iran in the event that the country were attacked.

Gulf countries, including Iran, hold more than half of the world's crude oil reserves and more than 40 percent of the world's proven gas reserves.

Congressional Report Warns U.S. Underestimating Iran's Nuclear Progress

No Shit Dick Tracy. Hell, we've been saying this for years. Now imagine, though, had the previous administration said this. "Fear mongering" "Scare Tactics"

What I can't figure out is if Obama is going to use this in negotiations, or use it to walk away from the table. Damn politicians are all alike and none of them worth a damn thing.

from Fox News:

Congressional Report Warns U.S. Underestimating Iran's Nuclear Progress

WASHINGTON -- Congressional investigators say some foreign intelligence analysts believe U.S. intelligence is underestimating Iran's progress toward designing a nuclear warhead before Tehran halted its program in 2003.

The foreign analysts believe that Iran ended its work because it had made sufficient progress, not because of international pressure, as the 2007 U.S. national intelligence assessment concluded.

The report by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee did not identify its sources, referring only to "intelligence analysts and nuclear experts working for foreign governments." It says some research was conducted in Israel, which has been publicly critical of the 2007 U.S. assessment.

The foreign analysts believe "intelligence indicates Iran had produced a suitable design, manufactured some components and conducted enough successful explosives tests to put the project on the shelf until it manufactured the fissile material required for several weapons," the report says.

The revelations by the committee, headed by Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., come as President Barack Obama is promising direct engagement with Iran and seeking diplomatic openings. The report backs the Obama administration's approach but recommends balancing new openings with continued pressure.

In an introduction to the report, Kerry wrote that a major obstacle the administration will have to negotiate "is the suspicion surrounding Iran's nuclear program." (Waffles wrote that?!?!?!)

The report also provides new details on Iran's nuclear program and its attempts to thwart U.N. inspectors. Citing an unidentified official at the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency, it says that Iran reneged at the last minute on an agreement last summer to allow inspectors to visit suspected nuclear workshops.

"Unclassified U.S. intelligence assessments and staff interviews with government officials and diplomats in Washington and foreign countries leave little doubt that Iran has the technological and industrial capacity to eventually develop an atomic bomb," the report concludes.

The report examines material provided to the IAEA by U.S. intelligence from a laptop computer that reportedly was smuggled out of Iran. In 2005, U.S. intelligence assessed that information as indicating that Tehran had been working on details of nuclear weapons, including missile trajectories and ideal altitudes for exploding warheads.

The material on the laptop also included videos of what intelligence officials believe were secret nuclear laboratories in Iran.

Iran has accused the United States of fabricating the material. The report says that U.N. and non-U.S. intelligence officials told committee investigators that they could not rule out an intelligence ruse, but they say other documents corroborate some of the information from the laptop.

The report says that officials the committee talked to concluded the documents "appear to be authentic, right down to the names, addresses and telephone numbers of the workshops."
Iran insists that its nuclear program is purely to provide electric power, not weapons.

The report also reveals that Iran agreed to allow the IAEA to inspect the workshops last August. After a senior IAEA official arrived in Tehran, however, the agency was told that the government had changed its mind.

The report concludes that Iran continues to use front companies to look for important components on the black market. It says that it is particularly eager to obtain carbon fibers and specialized metals for use in advanced centrifuges.

UPDATED The Middle East prepares..... The world waits.....

Update at bottom.



Is this the inevitable war? The "JOLT" I spoke about here?

This is where the roaring has been emanating from for years. The "dry tinder" is ready and waiting for the "spark".

What decision will our talking head in his throne make, without our input?

Will he side with Iran ideologically or worse, militarily? Will this be an explosion in the ME, or become our next world war?

The Middle East prepares..... The world waits.....

DE BORCHGRAVE: Jitters over expected Israeli air attack
Gulf states get set for a raid on Iran's nuclear sites
By Arnaud de Borchgrave | Friday, April 17, 2009

COMMENTARY:

Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) members - Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Oman - are getting ready for what many now assume will be retaliation from Iran after an Israeli bombing of Iran's nuclear facilities later this year.

Up and down the Gulf, Patriot missile batteries have been quietly deployed around key oil installations. The Patriot system is designed to detect, target and hit incoming missiles that may be no more than 10 to 20 feet long and flying at three to five times the speed of sound. Iran has hundreds of missiles and rockets.

There is also a steady traffic in and out of Washington of high-ranking GCC military and defense officials, including Army, Air Force and Navy chiefs. Gulf rulers are fearful Israel's new government - headed by the tough, uncompromising Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu - will walk away from any possibility of a Palestinian solution. Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said as much when he it made clear that "we are no longer bound by the previous government's undertakings for the negotiation of a Palestinian state."

The Annapolis accord of 2007 for a two-state solution? Didn't happen on our watch, said Israel's new governing team. Mr. Lieberman even wants to strip any rights from Arab Israelis who are disloyal to the Jewish state.

Undeterred, George Mitchell, the new supernegotiator for a Middle East settlement, went back to the region for the third time since Barack Obama became president. He sees a glimmer of hope for a peace deal with Syria that would detach the ruling dictatorship from its close ties with Iran. However, a Netanyahu government in Israel is not about to give up control of the Golan Heights it has occupied since the 1967 Six-Day War.

While Iran may unclench its fist in words, as President Obama unclenched America's, no one in Israel, and very few in other countries, believe Iran's theocrats will relinquish the nuclear ambitions they have been working on secretly for the last quarter century. Mr. Netanyahu echoed nearly unanimous Israeli feelings when he said an Iranian bomb, coupled with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's threats of destruction against the Jewish state, is an "existential crisis" that Israel cannot and will not ignore.

Israel's moderate President Shimon Peres added a stern warning. If forthcoming talks with Iran don't yield results, he admonished, "We'll strike." But, he added, this cannot be done without the United States.

Would they really depend on Obama? That would be suicide. But then again, going forward without Obama's approval, would also be suicide. Wait a minute, not doing anything, will be suicide. Shit!

Israel's military intelligence chief Amos Yadlin told the Knesset's foreign-affairs and defense committee that the emergence of a nuclear arsenal in Iran is now "mainly dependent on a political decision."

The assumption among most GCC rulers is that Israel will launch bombers against some of Iran's 27 nuclear sites as soon as it becomes clear the mullahs won't agree to surrender their nuclear option at upcoming six-power talks. The United States and Iran will be at the same negotiating table - along with China, Russia, Britain, France and Germany - for the first time since the Iranian revolution ousted the late shah 30 years ago.

Iran's next presidential elections are scheduled for June 14, when Mr. Ahmadinejad may lose the presidency to a candidate judged by Western powers to be comparatively moderate. However, the latest word from Iran-watchers is that the supreme religious leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, favors the re-election of his extremist protege. This would be another green light for the Netanyahu coalition government to order an attack.

In response to the comments, I have added a simplified timeline of the lead up to WWII. Substitute these timelines, with those of the building ME crisis.

Despite Obama, a major war is brewing.

1921 Because of the political weaknesses of the League of Nations, the major powers held diplomatic conferences outside the organization; the first of these conferences was held in 1921 and 1922 in Washington DC.

1928 Paris: American seceratary of state, Frank B. Kellogg and french foreign minister, Aristide Briand, drafted a treaty condemning war at an international conference.

Late 1920's Military gained increasing power in Japan.

1930 Japan's liberal prime minister, Yuk Hamaguchi was fatally shot. Political disorder followed, and within two years militarists controlled the Japanese government.

1931 Explosion near the city of Mukden, Manchuria damaged Japanese-controlled railroad.

1932 Japan declares Manchuria an independent nation under the name of "Manchukuo."

1933 Hitler had taken Germany out of the League of Nations and announced his intention to re-arm the country.

1934 Italian border patrol in Italian Somaliland clashed with an Ethiopian border patrol.

1935 Mussolni waged an all out campaign to conquer and colonize the independent nation of Ethiopia.

1936 September: Hitler and Mussolini formed a military alliance called the "Rome-Berlin Axis" and began referring to themselves as the axis powers."
February: A "Populat Front" government that included Socialists and Communists won a major election

Spring: Italians entered the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa

Summer: League of Nations called off its sanctions on Italy.

1937 In the Neutrality Act of 1937, the United States expressed its determination to remain neutral in future wars.

Japanese and Chinese troops clashed near Beijing. Japanese armies captured the city and at once began to move southward. China tried to resist, but it didn't really work.

1938 Threats from both Hitler and Mussolini forced the Austrian government to include Nazi members it's cabinet.

By spring, nationalist forces in Spain had grown strong enough for a large-scale offensive. They defeated the weak loyalist troops in March 1939.

April: Mussolini invades Albania

September 22: Hitler demands that sudetenland be turned over to Germany, and if not he threatened to take it by force.

1939 September 1: Hitler declared the annexation of Danzig to the Reich, while at the same time without warning, his air force made a massive attack on Poland. Within 48 hours of the unannounced attack on Poland had become the beginning of WWII
Japan lost nearly 500,000 troops in China and spent 10 billion. Chinese losses were uncountable.

Japanese occupied about one fourth of China, including all of its seaports, the Chang Jiang valley as far as Hankou and many other interior cities.
A revised Neutrality act allowed American Firms to sell munitions to belligerent nations, but only on a cash-and-carry basis

1940 Fall: Germany held almost all of western Europe

September: President Franklin D. Roosevelt, by executive agreement transferred 50 old American naval destroyers to Great Britain. In exchange, Great Britain gave the United States long-term leases on British naval and airbases in Newfoundland, The British West Indies, and British Guiana.

November: At a Soviet-German conference in Berlin, Soviets demanded that Bulgaria, Istanbul, the Dardanelles, and the Bosporus be included in their sphere of influence.

1941 June 22: The war entered a new phase. Without a declaration of war, German armies invaded the Soviet Union.

December: Expanding conflicts and events in the Pacific area drew the US into war.

December 7: While Tojo's representatives were still in Washington, the Japanese launched a surprise attack on the American naval base at Pearl Harbor.

December 8: Congress declares war on Japan as did the British Parliament. Three days later, Germany and Italy declared war on the United States, and congress replied with its own declaration of war.

Ahmadinjad to Imams: "I believe everything that people like you taught me."

Jihad Watch yesterday posted this summary of a recent speech by Iran president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to a group of clerics in Mashad, Iran. As Robert notes, even this brief summary is more than what we will hear from the MSM.

It would make little difference to most of the public if they did hear it. The American people have been taught by the MSM and the ostriches in our own leadership that Ahmadhimmijerker is merely a buffoon and a canny politician (interesting combination, that) who is using Iran's nuclear program to get what he wants from the rest of the world. What he wants is the return of the 12th Imam, the Imam Mahdi, who he believes is in control of the world, that time is short and Iran must devote all its resources to bringing about the Mahdi's return. Yet our "practical" leaders and pundits and diplomats refuse to believe that he believes what he is saying.

Our foreign enemies thought that by passing resolutions in the United Nations,
they could stop us from becoming a nuclear country. But with God’s help, now we
are a nuclear country and they cannot do anything about it.

Shia Muslims believe the Mahdi will end his "occultation" and reappear in Mecca when the world has fallen into chaos. The development of nuclear weapons by Iran is a key part of Ahmadinejad's plan to create that chaos by provoking nuclear conflict. There is virtually no other way to interpret his actions and the words he uses to justify them.

From the beginning of humanity, all of the prophets said that the world must be
managed through divine direction. We have to create a situation for the
establishment of divine government...

Let me tell you something, one day one of the grand Ayatollahs, whom many
of you know, told me, “I have heard that you are talking about the return of
Imam Mahdi and that you are in contact with him. Is that right?” I told him that
I believe Imam Mahdi is managing the world. Furthermore, I told him, “Do you
know what my problem is? My problem is that I believe everything people like you
taught me.”

Ahmadinejad is not fool enough to come right out and state that he believes it is his sacred duty to intiate chaos in the world. But for those who understand the mythology of the "12th Imam", the message is clear:

We must solve Iran's internal problems as quickly as possible. Time is
lacking. A movement has started for us to occupy ourselves with our global
responsibilities, which are arriving with great speed.

This is the man with whom Barack Hussein Obama -- child of a Muslim father and stepfather, member of Jeremiah "God damn America" Wright's congregation, student of black liberation theology, admirer of Louis Farrakhan's Nation of Islam, friend of Weathermen bombers William and Bernadine Ayers -- has promised to hold "talks" should he be elected President of the United States of America. What sort of "concessions" might he be expected to make in a deal with this devil?

Iran: Nuclear News

The dance continues:

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband made the following statement on Friday on behalf of the five permanent Security Council members and Germany after they met to discuss Iran's nuclear program.

"We've just had a positive and productive meeting of five foreign ministers and the vice-foreign minister from China to talk about the next steps in our approach to the grave problem that we see in respect of Iran's nuclear program.

"Firstly, we are united in our belief that the threat posed by this enrichment program to stability is very serious and it's one that we want to address directly.

Big words, must mean they have finally had it, right? Well, no.....

Same tactic, different day:

"Secondly, we are united in our determination to pursue a twin-track strategy. Last month, at our instigation the U.N. Security Council passed Resolution 1803 setting out a range of sanctions, the third set of sanctions against Iran.
[snip]
"And our meeting today has been dedicated towards taking the offer that we made in June 2006, reviewing it and updating it, and I'm glad to say that we've got agreement on an offer that will be made to the government of Iran.

In the meantime, Khamenei has stepped into the ring. You know, just to set the record straight:

Ali Khamenei, mullahs’ supreme leader in a speech on Sunday (5/4/08) vowed that Iranian regime would press ahead with its nuclear program, two days after major powers said they had prepared a new offer to convince Tehran's regime to halt its nuclear activities.

“We will continue on our own path with strength” and “no threats would deter” us to “back down”, the sate-run radio quoted Khamenei as saying on a visit to the southern Fars province.

Khamenei's remarks came after the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council -- the United States, France, Britain, China and Russia -- and Germany agreed on Friday to offer a new package of incentives to the Iranian mullahs in return for ceasing uranium enrichment activities, a major component of building a nuclear bomb.

So, it seems the Security Council is still, singing in the wind. And, Rt. Hon. Lord David Waddinton, QC, agrees:

The Iranian Regime’s nuclear ambitions are a threat to world peace. In dealing with this threat and with the Regime’s unbridled meddling in Iraq and the Middle East, the West needs to make a strategic choice.

Iran’s mullahs have managed to remain several moves ahead of us thus far, and last August Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was able to say with conviction: “Soon, we will see a huge power vacuum in the region. Of course, we are prepared to fill the gap.”

The chairman of the United States’ Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Michael G. Mullen acknowledged in April that Tehran was continuing to funnel weapons and other aid to extremists in Iraq for use against Coalition troops. He highlighted in particular the “increasingly lethal and malign influence” exercised by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s extra-territorial Qods Force, which is bent on destabilizing not only Iraq but the rest of the Middle East.

Admiral Mullen’s words were then backed up by the U.S. ambassador to the UN, Zalmay Khalilzad, who on Monday told the Security Council that the Revolutionary Guard Qods Force "continues to arm, train, and fund illegal armed groups in Iraq”. He then added, "This lethal aid poses a significant threat to Iraqi and multinational forces and to the stability and sovereignty of Iraq."

The Revolutionary Guard has also had a pivotal role in furthering the regime’s clandestine nuclear weapons program. The main opposition coalition, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), claims that the Revolutionary Guard is running a secret center to build a nuclear warhead at Mojdeh, southeast of Tehran. The Guard also supervises all uranium enrichment activity at the infamous Natanz complex.

Today, the Security Council’s five permanent members plus Germany meet in London to expand on an earlier offer of economic incentives to Tehran in return for a promise by the Regime to halt uranium enrichment.

The international community seems to be almost entirely unaware of the regime’s stated intention to pursue its atomic work at any cost, and yet Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has been quite brazen about it.
In February he boasted that Iran had gradually managed to pacify the international community’s demands that Iran comply with UN resolutions.

“Those people who used to say Iran's nuclear activity must be dismantled are now saying they are ready to accept our advances, on condition that it will not continue indefinitely,” Khamenei said. “This is a great advance that would not have been realized except with perseverance."

Ahmadinejad is also on record as saying in February,

"If they [the Security Council] want to continue with that path [of sanctions], we will not be harmed. They can issue resolutions for 100 years. ... If they continue [with this pressure], we have designed reciprocal actions." I fear that the “reciprocal actions” would be felt on the streets of Baghdad, Beirut and the Gaza Strip in attacks masterminded by the Revolutionary Guard.

Surely if the West is really determined to address the threat from Tehran, it needs to show some muscle rather than offer more concessions to a regime with no intention of abandoning its unlawful activities.

So what is the answer? Could it be Israel, again?

Israel Has Specific Inelligence On An Iranian Nuke