Category: 05 Iran

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NIGHTWATCH: Iran a New Cuba? Worse, a Pakistan?

05 Iran

Iran: Supreme Leader Khamenei made a significant statement of defiance against sanctions and Israel during a rare Friday prayer lecture at Tehran University. “‘From now onward, we will support and help any nations, any groups fighting against the Zionist regime across the world, and we are not afraid of declaring this,' Khamenei said.

Comment: This threat looks serious. Iran's retaliation for sanctions will be unconventional. The hostility of its leaders to Israel looks implacable. Long before Iran executes the threat, the Ayatollah Khamenei must deal with the consequences of losing Syria as an ally and a bridge to its proxies, Lebanese Hezbollah and Hamas. The threat rings increasingly hollow, plus Iran is undergoing a monetary meltdown which provides a motive for the Ayatollah to appeal to the external threat to shore up national unity.

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Phi Beta Iota:  Between the Israelis, the US, and Saudi Arabia, Iran can be put in a very tight box.  One can only marvel at the hubris of these governments, and recollect how the same treatment of Cuba produced Che Guevara, how the arrogance of the British in thinking they new best produced a divided India, with Pakistan the rogue and Bangladesh the cesspool, both suffering for going against Gandhi's wisdom.  Governments stink at geo-politics.  In fact they stink at pretty much everything.  It's time for a mass non-violent uprising of collective intelligence.

See Also:

The Health of Nations: Society and Law beyond the State

The full force of the author's thinking comes into full stride in the concluding portions of the book as he integrates new concepts of international law, history, social relations, and new forms of intergovernmental relations truly representative of the species as a whole and the people as a moral force. He laments the manner in which an extraordinarily global elite has been able to “separate” people from morality and from one another, leading to a common acceptance of five intolerable things: 1) unequal social development; 2) war and armaments; 3) governmental oppression; 4) physical degradation; and 5) spiritual degradation.

THE OPEN SOURCE EVERYTHING MANIFESTO: Transparency, Truth, & Trust

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NIGHTWATCH Plus: Syria – Iran RECAP

02 Diplomacy, 03 Economy, 05 Iran, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Government, IO Impotency, Military

Syria a Satellite of Iran? Nah….

NIGHTWATCH: Syria, Iran, and the Regional Context

NIGHTWATCH: US Invades Iraq, Creates first Arab Shi’ite State

NIGHTWATCH: Push-Back on US Across AF PK IR SY

Mini-Me: Smoking Gun Documents on Iran From Israel Mossad?

Josh Kilbourn: Dollar Disappearing, US Sidelined on Syria / Iran

Journal: Turkey’s Emerging Grand Strategy

Journal: Turkey Emergent

Journal: The Rise and Rise Further of Turkey (Along with the Collapse of Israel and the NeoCons)

Journal: Stupid Is As Stupid Does–Israel…Again

Journal: Nuclear War Against Iran…Again

Journal: Here’s a Great Idea–Lets Piss Off Turkey

Iran–and the USA–Blew Arab Spring, Both Irreleva

Iran–and the USA–Blew Arab Spring, Both Irrelevant

Chuck Spinney: Israel, Not Iran, is Central Threat in Middle East

Chuck Spinney: Middle East New Geopolitical Map

Chuck Spinney: Paris-Berlin-Moscow Axis Reinstated

Chuck Spinney: Should We Fear Nuclear Iran or Nuclear Israel?

23 Worst Tyrants/Dictators (Yes, there’s more than 23) and Oops, there’s Saudi Arabia..

Phi Beta Iota:  Does not include relevant book reviews.

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NIGHTWATCH: China & Japan Coordinate Naval Patrols — DoD Clueless on Future in Pacific

02 China, 05 Iran, 08 Wild Cards, IO Impotency, Military

Somalia: For the record. India, China and Japan have begun coordinated naval patrols off the Horn of Africa with the assistance of counter-piracy mechanism Shared Awareness and Deconfliction (SHADE), Indian navy sources said. This is the first time that these three have coordinated in this fashion, though all have been engaged in anti-piracy operations for several years.

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Phi Beta Iota:  The old US model, of a very expensive and now unsustainable “forward presence” including over 1000 “locations” outside the USA, all prime targets for asymmetric attack, can be contrasted with the new Chinese model, of coordination, using shared information as the “loose glue” for building trust.  The US has refused to entertain these notions since they began in force from 1988.  The U.S. military is not thinking seriously about the future — for example, Hawaii as an autonomous state (if not a free Republic) that evicts all US forces as part of an internationalization and conversion to a Pacific “neutral” zone such as China has been thinking about for at least fifty years.  Boneheads will label this idea insane.  The more intelligent will plan for it.  Put bluntly, the US Navy does not have a clue how to be influential in a sustainable (cost effective) manner in the Pacific or anywhere else, absent big bases, hundreds of billions, and tolerance for zero strategic smarts.

See Also:

NIGHTWATCH: China Leads Multinational Intelligence and Operations Initiative within Mekong River Basin

US Intelligence & Policy on China & Pakistan Lack Consistency & Common Sense (i.e. Integrity)

NIGHTWATCH Extract: China-Iran Rail + China ReCap

NIGHTWATCH Extracts: China-Fiji, China Carriers, Venezuela-Colombia Re-Set

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NIGHTWATCH: Syria, Iran, and the Regional Context

05 Iran, 08 Wild Cards

Syria-Iran: The Iranian news agency reported Ayatollah Khamenei on Tuesday criticized the US for interfering in Syria's internal affairs, but said Iran would accept political reforms in Damascus. Khamenei said, “Iran's stance towards Syria is to support any reforms that benefit the people of this country and oppose the interference of America and its allies in Syrian domestic issues.

Special Comment: The NightWatch hypothesis is that a consortium of interests has coalesced to deliver a strategic setback to Iran, not over nuclear issues, but in Syria. In this hypothesis, the nuclear issue is less immediately significant for Iran than the probability that the Alawite government in Damascus is nearing its end.

The Syrian government, which is an ally of Iran, has been key in facilitating Iranian communications with and support to its proxies, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. If the Sunni Arab opposition take power in Damascus, Iran's connection to the Mediterranean would be broken. Iran's apparent objective of achieving an outlet in the Mediterranean through friendly, Shiite states would be thwarted.

The Sunni Arab interests that back the Arab League and are arrayed against the al Asad government in Damascus seem to have decided that the westward expansion of the Shiite heresy and the proliferation of pro-Iranian states and groups in traditional Arab regions must stop at the western border of Iraq. Their bridgehead in Syria must be eliminated by the installation of a Sunni government in Damascus in order to consolidate the Sunni Arab community, or ummah.

The implications for Iran and its proxies are worth considering. For example, if Iran cannot protect its most loyal allies in Damascus, then its aspirations to regional leadership are not credible, regardless of its nuclear program. The fragility of the Syrian security situation also presents Iranian leaders with the choice of escalating Iran's direct intervention in Arab affairs to try to save the al Asad government or accepting the loss of Syria, including the disruption of the supply route to Lebanese Hezbollah and Hamas.

 

Expect more Iranian support for Damascus and more Iranian Islamic Republican Guard Corps personnel to show up in Syria and in southern Lebanon. The Iranians do not appear ready to abandon Syria yet. If increased Iranian support for Syria does not become apparent, that would mean that Iran has accepted that it cannot prevent the strategic setback resulting from the loss of Syria to the Sunni Arabs. One important unknown is how the Baghdad government might be pressured into supporting Iranian strategic goals.

The international media focuses primarily on the Iranian nuclear program, the UN and the sanctions regime against Iran. In this analysis, the international attention on Iran's nuclear program provides cover and time for Iranian leaders to decide what to do about Syria. Both crises threaten to dim Iran's vision of itself as the regional power in the Middle East.

NIGHTWATCH KGS Home

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David Isenberg: Iran Prepared for the Worst with A2/AD

03 Economy, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Iran, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 10 Transnational Crime, 11 Society, Analysis, Commercial Intelligence, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Director of National Intelligence et al (IC), Government, IO Deeds of War, Military, Misinformation & Propaganda, Money, Banks & Concentrated Wealth, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests
David Isenberg

Iran well prepared for the worst

David Isenberg

31 January 2012

Most discussions of possible United States military operations in the Persian Gulf, should Iran try to prevent maritime traffic from going through the Strait of Hormuz, generally say that while it would not be a cakewalk, it would not be an enormously difficult task either.

But that conventional wisdom is wrong, according to a recent report issued by an independent, non-profit public policy research institute in Washington DC. The report found that the traditional post-Cold War US military ability to project power overseas with few serious challenges to its freedom of action may be rapidly drawing to a close.

. . . . . . .

It stressed that “a Strait of Hormuz closure could trigger a much larger price spike, including by limiting offsetting supplies from other producers in the region”.

Read full article.

Phi Beta Iota:  Two themes are emerging in the open source world.  First, the depth and breadth of Israel's clandestine agreements with its Arab neighbors is not clearly understood–a National Intelligence Estimate is required, but the collection, processing, and analysis capabilities are simply not there, and the management will to do this as a multinational task is not there either.  Second, as the US loses its ability to actually project force, the finance of war is being replaced by the theater of war, such that oil prices can still be manipulated, but at a fraction of the blood, sweat, and tears previously mobilized – financial fraud on the cheap, as it were.

 

 

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Chuck Spinney: Should We Fear Nuclear Iran or Nuclear Israel?

05 Iran, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, Corruption, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military, Peace Intelligence
Chuck Spinney

Fact #1: Only one country in the Middle East has nuclear weapons – Israel.  The quantity is unknown, with estimates of the Israeli arsenal range between 60 and 400 bombs, the upper range of 200-400 being the most often cited.  Fact #2: Only one country in the Middle East has refused to the sign the Non Proliferation Treaty – Israel.  These two facts are not in dispute.

While most observers (except for the leadership of Israel and its agents of influence in the west, especially the US) believe making the Middle East a nuclear free zone would be a positive step toward peace, no one is pressuring Israel to give up its weapons.  The goal of a nuclear free zone may be great for raising grant money, but without a commitment to pressure Israel into giving up its weapons, it will remain a pipe dream.
On the other hand, Israel and the US claim the unilateral right to insure that all of the Middle East other than Israel remains a nuclear free zone, by preemptive military action, if either country deems it to be necessary.   To this end Israel, attacked the Osirak reactor without warning in Iraq (1981) and an alleged Syrian nuclear site without warning in 2007.  Ironically, at the time of the Osirak attack, the Iraqi program was moribund and going nowhere, but the attack spurred Saddam into developing a more vigorous covert program. [Pillar]  The real purpose of the alleged “nuclear” site in Syria remains in dispute, with some arguing that recent evidence proves it was a textile factory.  Ironically, the Osirak attack set in course a chain of events that eventually combined to lead to the US attacking and destroying Iraq in 2003, justified primarily by false claims that Saddam Hussein was close to fielding nuclear weapons.
Now Iran is in the crosshairs for the same reason, although Iran is complying with IAEA nuclear safeguards and inspection requirements.  Given the sorry history of “nuclear preemption,” perhaps it is time to ask the unmentionable question: So what?  What is the debate really about?  The attached essay by William Pfaff takes a stab at this question.  One interesting point, an Israeli general indirectly confirmed Pfaff's hypothesis about Israel's real reason for going beserk over the possibility of Iran getting a nuclear weapon — you can find it here, but read Pfaff's op-ed first.

By William Pfaff,

Tribune Media Services, 01/24/2012

PARIS — The obsession of the American foreign policy community, as well as most American (and a good many international) politicians, by the myth of Iran's “existential” threat to Israel, brings the world steadily closer to another war in the Middle East.

Read full article.

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Chuck Spinney: Israel, Not Iran, is Central Threat in Middle East

05 Iran, 08 Wild Cards, IO Deeds of War
Chuck Spinney

Robert Fisk: We've been here before – and it suits Israel that we never forget ‘Nuclear Iran'

The Ayatollah ordered the entire nuclear project to be closed down because it was the work of the devil

Robert Fisk, Independent

Wednesday, 25 January 2012

Turning round a story is one of the most difficult tasks in journalism – and rarely more so than in the case of Iran. Iran, the dark revolutionary Islamist menace. Shia Iran, protector and manipulator of World Terror, of Syria and Lebanon and Hamas and Hezbollah. Ahmadinejad, the Mad Caliph. And, of course, Nuclear Iran, preparing to destroy Israel in a mushroom cloud of anti-Semitic hatred, ready to close the Strait of Hormuz – the moment the West's (or Israel's) forces attack.

Read full article.