117 Obama agrees to keep Israel's nukes secret - Washington Times

(1) Obama agrees to keep Israel's nukes secret - Washington Times
(2) "Inglourious Basterds" attests to Jewish domination of Hollywood's film culture
(3) Israel pressures Palestinians to withdraw request to International Criminal Court
(4) What Is Iran Up To? by Stephen Walt
(5) The Iran Attack Plan
(6) Save Darfur: "Fast the Eid" call shows fake Universalism

(1) Obama agrees to keep Israel's nukes secret - Washington Times

From: ish314 <ish314@yahoo.com> Date: 05.10.2009 11:35 PM
Subject: [shamireaders] Stephen Sniegoski reads the Washington Times

Obama, Nuclear Arms Reduction, and the Immense Power of the Israel Lobby

Stephen Sniegoski

Saturday, October 3, 2009 5:41 PM

http://america-hijacked.com/2009/10/03/obama-nuclear-arms-reduction-and-the-immense-power-of-the-israel-lobby/

As the US berates Iran for its nuclear program — though there is no substantial proof that Iran even intends to develop nuclear weapons —the United States intentionally overlooks Israel's existing nuclear arsenal so that it will remain free from international inspection. As an article in the "Washington Times" by Eli Lake (October 2) points out, Obama has apparently pledged to Israel that the US will continue this "head-in-the-sand" approach towards Israel's nuclear arsenal despite his pontificating about the need for a nuclear-free world.

As Lake's article indicates, this secret agreement between the US and Israel was initially made in 1969, and Israel successfully sought to have Obama reiterate it. Obama has, in fact, put this agreement on much firmer ground since no formal record of such a previous agreement actually exists.

Undoubtedly, such a secret agreement makes a mockery of Obama's idealistic talk of a nuclear-free world as well as his call for government transparency. It is quite reminiscent of the idealistic preaching of the Allies in the World War I period about a just peace based upon national self-determination and "open treaties openly arrived at" while at the same time having secret treaties to enable the victors to carve up the spoils of war among themselves. When revealed, this hypocrisy caused popular disillusionment with the post-war peace settlement and helped pave the way for World War II.

Is Obama simply a hypocrite, with his anti-nuclear arms preaching being only empty rhetoric? The nations of the world can see the obvious double standard, making any real international agreement impossible. However, even if Obama were totally indifferent to improving the world, which I don't think is the case, he would derive personal benefits (e.g., international acclaim) if his nuclear arms reductions proposals achieved some type of implementation.

Why does Obama, the head of the most powerful country in the world, allow the parochial interests of a small foreign country, Israel, to stand in the way of his global agenda for the reduction of nuclear armaments? As one Senate staffer told the author of the "Washington Times" article: "the president gave commitments that politically he had no choice but to give regarding Israel's nuclear program." Let's emphasize and then analyze those key words: "POLITICALLY HE HAD NO CHOICE." The Senate staffer (and it should be noted that Senate staff make their living by understanding political reality) presented this lack of choice as an objective fact, not a subjective fear on Obama's part. It is not simply that Obama fears the power of Israel and the Israel lobby; rather, according to the Senate staffer, if Obama went against the interests of Israel on the nuclear issue, the Israel lobby would wreck his presidency and prevent his re-election. This would explain why Obama did not even dare to try to get the Israeli government to make any compromise on its position of ambiguity regarding nuclear weapons, such as declaring itself a member of the nuclear club and allowing inspections.

While the idea of a powerful Israel lobby is vociferously denied by the mainstream and is often excoriated as an example of "anti-Semitism," the power of the Israel lobby over the president of the United States in this case underscores the very immensity its political influence. Of course, the Israel lobby is so powerful that every significant mainstream figure who wishes to remain in an august position must never publicize its real power.

This is not to say that the power of the Israel lobby is unlimited. Israel and the Israel lobby have not yet demonstrated the power to directly force the United States into a war on Iran. And the war on Iraq required skillful propaganda manipulation by the neoconservatives who were strategically ensconced within the Bush administration. Israel and its lobby's inability so far to pressure the United States to attack Iran is largely due to resistance from the old foreign policy establishment and the military, along with the general realization of the likely catastrophic consequences of such military action. However, Israel and its lobby have been able to get the US to pursue policies that bring the US close to war, and without that pressure the relations between the US and Iran would be far more tranquil. (See, for example, the CFR-sponsored report "Iran: Time for a New Approach," 2004, discussed on p. 259 of "The Transparent Cabal")

Unless greater resistance to the Israel lobby is demonstrated by politicians, especially the president, it is quite likely that the United States will eventually drift into war with Iran. And effective resistance to the Israel lobby would require politicians to take positions that could lead to their political destruction. Perhaps this is not possible. ==

Obama agrees to keep Israel's nukes secret

Eli Lake
Washington Times
Originally published 04:45 a.m., October 2, 2009, updated 07:56 a.m., October 2, 2009

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/oct/02/president-obama-has-reaffirmed-a-4-decade-old-secr//print/

President Obama has reaffirmed a 4-decade-old secret understanding that has allowed Israel to keep a nuclear arsenal without opening it to international inspections, three officials familiar with the understanding said.

The officials, who spoke on the condition that they not be named because they were discussing private conversations, said Mr. Obama pledged to maintain the agreement when he first hosted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House in May.

Under the understanding, the U.S. has not pressured Israel to disclose its nuclear weapons or to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which could require Israel to give up its estimated several hundred nuclear bombs.

Israel had been nervous that Mr. Obama would not continue the 1969 understanding because of his strong support for nonproliferation and priority on preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons. The U.S. and five other world powers made progress during talks with Iran in Geneva on Thursday as Iran agreed in principle to transfer some potential bomb fuel out of the country and to open a recently disclosed facility to international inspection.

Mr. Netanyahu let the news of the continued U.S.-Israeli accord slip last week in a remark that attracted little notice. He was asked by Israel's Channel 2 whether he was worried that Mr. Obama's speech at the U.N. General Assembly, calling for a world without nuclear weapons, would apply to Israel.

"It was utterly clear from the context of the speech that he was speaking about North Korea and Iran," the Israeli leader said. "But I want to remind you that in my first meeting with President Obama in Washington I received from him, and I asked to receive from him, an itemized list of the strategic understandings that have existed for many years between Israel and the United States on that issue. It was not for naught that I requested, and it was not for naught that I received [that document]."

The chief nuclear understanding was reached at a summit between President Nixon and Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir that began on Sept. 25, 1969. Avner Cohen, author of "Israel and the Bomb" and the leading authority outside the Israeli government on the history of Israel's nuclear program, said the accord amounts to "the United States passively accepting Israel's nuclear weapons status as long as Israel does not unveil publicly its capability or test a weapon."

There is no formal record of the agreement nor have Israeli nor American governments ever publicly acknowledged it. In 2007, however, the Nixon library declassified a July 19, 1969, memo from national security adviser Henry Kissinger that comes closest to articulating U.S. policy on the issue. That memo says, "While we might ideally like to halt actual Israeli possession, what we really want at a minimum may be just to keep Israeli possession from becoming an established international fact."

Mr. Cohen has said the resulting policy was the equivalent of "don't ask, don't tell."

The Netanyahu government sought to reaffirm the understanding in part out of concern that Iran would seek Israeli disclosures of its nuclear program in negotiations with the United States and other world powers. Iran has frequently accused the U.S. of having a double standard by not objecting to Israel's arsenal.

Mr. Cohen said the reaffirmation and the fact that Mr. Netanyahu sought and received a written record of the deal suggest that "it appears not only that there was no joint understanding of what had been agreed in September 1969 but it is also apparent that even the notes of the two leaders may no longer exist. It means that Netanyahu wanted to have something in writing that implies that understanding. It also affirms the view that the United States is in fact a partner in Israel's policy of nuclear opacity."

Jonathan Peled, a spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in Washington, declined to comment, as did the White House National Security Council.

The secret understanding could undermine the Obama administration's goal of a world without nuclear weapons. In particular, it could impinge on U.S. efforts to bring into force the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and the Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty, two agreements that U.S. administrations have argued should apply to Israel in the past. They would ban nuclear tests and the production of material for weapons.

A Senate staffer familiar with the May reaffirmation, who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the issue, said, "What this means is that the president gave commitments that politically he had no choice but to give regarding Israel's nuclear program. However, it calls into question virtually every part of the President's nonproliferation agenda. The president gave Israel an NPT treaty get out of jail free card."

Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, said the step was less injurious to U.S. policy.

"I think it is par for the course that the two incoming leaders of the United States and Israel would want to clarify previous understandings between their governments on this issue," he said.

However Mr. Kimball added, "I would respectfully disagree with Mr. Netanyahu. President Obama's speech and U.N. Security Council Resolution 1887 apply to all countries irrespective of secret understandings between the U.S. and Israel. A world without nuclear weapons is consistent with Israel's stated goal of achieving a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction. Obama's message is that the same nonproliferation and disarmament responsibilities should apply to all states and not just a few."

Israeli nuclear doctrine is known as "the long corridor." Under it, Israel would begin to consider nuclear disarmament only after all countries officially at war with it signed peace treaties and all neighboring countries relinquished not only nuclear programs but also chemical and biological arsenals. Israel sees nuclear weapons as an existential guarantee in a hostile environment.

David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, said he hoped the Obama administration did not concede too much to Israel.

"One hopes that the price for such concessions is Israeli agreement to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and the Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty and an acceptance of the long-term goal of a Middle East weapons-of-mass-destruction-free zone," he said. "Otherwise, the Obama administration paid too much, given its focus on a world free of nuclear weapons."

(2) "Inglourious Basterds" attests to Jewish domination of Hollywood's film culture

From: Iskandar Masih <iskandar38@hotmail.com> Date: 05.10.2009 09:35 AM

I had chance to visit a cinema last week to see Quentin Tarantino's latest effort, titled 'Inglourious Bast...ds" (I find that last word quite repulsive, so I prefer not to have to use it in full).

It is of course hopelessly anachronistic, full of tired plot devices, and majors on shocking violence without needing such to tell the story. It has also been promoted incorrrectly. Synopses state that it is about a gang of Jewish - American assassins of Nazis in WWII France. However, that is not the main plot at all, it's merely a background for the revenge planned by a Jewish girl whose family is massacred by a famed Nazi Jew hunter. She goes on to run a cinema in Paris, and uses that position to plot the massacre of all the Nazi top brass who attend a premier film screening at her cinema. Some members of Brad Pitt's assasination squad (the 'Bas...rds') are also involved, but they are really a side issue. Revenge and violence is again Tarantino's main theme. However, this film for the most part lacks authenticity and emotional depth. Even Kill Bill tugged the heart's strings more than this one, with the Bride portrayed as an avenging angel.

But what is really interesting about this movie is its blatant celebration of 'Jewish power'- not only in its fantasy of a war-time Nazi-killing squad, but also a forthright statement of the Jewish domination of Hollywood's film culture. Josef Goebels is shown as deliberately seeking to create a National Socialist film culture which repudiates the Jewish cultural power of 1920s Germany, according to a British film commentator, who becomes a special operations agent sent behind enemy lines in France. Of course the Nazi films which Goebells champions are portrayed as mere war flicks with only violence, shooting and without any depth of anything.

One wonders actually where Tarantino stands in all this?

(3) Israel pressures Palestinians to withdraw request to International Criminal Court

From: Sadanand, Nanjundiah (Physics Earth Sciences) <sadanand@mail.ccsu.edu> Date: 05.10.2009 10:50 PM

Palestinians cry 'blackmail' over Israel phone service threat

By Ben Lynfield in Jerusalem, The Independent

Thursday, 1 October 2009

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/palestinians-cry-blackmail-over-israel-phone-service-threat-1796145.html

Israel is threatening to kill off a crucial West Bank economic project unless the Palestinian Authority withdraws a request to the International Criminal Court to investigate alleged Israeli crimes during last winter's Gaza war.

Shalom Kital, an aide to defence minister Ehud Barak, said today that Israel will not release a share of the radio spectrum that has long been sought by the Palestinian Authority to enable the launch of a second mobile telecommunications company unless the PA drops its efforts to put Israeli soldiers and officers in the dock over the Israeli operation. ...

"This is sheer blackmail by the Israelis," said Nabil Shaath, the former PA foreign minister. "Israel has no business stealing the frequencies, keeping them and using them as blackmail to escape an international inquiry into its violations." ...

The Israeli stance on the frequencies marks a flouting of the efforts of the international community's Middle East envoy, Tony Blair, who last month urged that they be released and warned of harm to the local economy if Israel persisted in its refusal. Mr Kital said today that Mr Blair "is very aware" there will be no release unless the Palestinians drop their request to the ICC.

(4) What Is Iran Up To? by Stephen Walt

From: IHR News <news@ihr.org> Date: 05.10.2009 03:00 PM

Stephen Walt
http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/09/25/what_is_iran_up_to

What is Iran up to?
Fri, 09/25/2009 - 12:42pm

The big story this morning, of course, is the revelation that Iran has been building a second nuclear enrichment facility. Here's what I think it means, with the caveat that the story is about three hours old and I still have lots of unanswered questions.

To start, it is not good news for those who have been hoping for a gradual improvement in Iran's relations with the outside world, hopes that were already undermined by the repercussions of the fraudulent election this past summer. At a minimum, it is bound to create new doubts about Iranian assurances regarding its nuclear program, although I don't know anyone who took those assurances at face value. After all, the whole idea behind inspections and other safeguards, and the whole reason that Western intelligence agencies have continued to watch Iran closely, is because we don't necessarily believe what Iran's government tells us.

That said, it is not clear from the early press reports exactly how blatant a violation this really is. According to the Washington Post, Iran notified the IAEA on September 21 that it was constructing a new pilot enrichment plant. Assuming that it has not already introduced nuclear material into this facility (and Tehran says it hasn't), Iran is therefore in compliance with the NPT's Comprehensive Full Scope Safeguards Agreement, which requires it to notify the IAEA six months before nuclear material is introduced into any new facility. Iran previously withdrew from the more demanding Subsidiary Agreement 3.1, which would have required more detailed and timely notification, in response to the IAEA's decision to refer Iran's nuclear program to the U.N. Security Council. So from Tehran's perspective, this new facility is not a violation at all: they are permitted to enrich under the NPT and they have complied with the Comprehensive Safeguards agreement by notifying the IAEA of the new facility. (Even that rather generous interpretation might not let Tehran entirely off the hook, however, as it seems likely that they informed the IAEA on September 21 because they had discovered that the United States had penetrated the program and they wanted to pre-empt today's revelation.)

The United States has an obvious response: unilateral withdrawal from Agreement 3.1 is not permissible, and so technically Iran is still in violation of its past commitments, but this legalistic back-and-forth is part of a long pattern. In addition, the U.N. Security Council has passed several resolutions demanding that Iran cease all enrichment, and its refusal to comply provides the main legal basis for sanctions. Iran is hardly the first country to ignore Security Council resolutions, however, and Tehran undoubtedly believes that the construction of a second plant is not a direct violation of its more basic obligations under the NPT.

The bottom line is that we still don't yet know just how serious the new discovery is. If nuclear material is already present there (despite what Iran now says), then it is a clear violation of the agreements that Iran's government has repeatedly claimed it is upholding, and thus casts even more doubt on its credibility. If the facility is still under construction and no nuclear material has been introduced, then Iran is technically in compliance of the basic safeguards agreement, and trying to exploit various legal loopholes. (Again, it is defying the SC resolutions, but it was doing that already and so today's announcement adds nothing new).

The New York Times story also makes it clear that this discovery is not by itself evidence that Iran has an active nuclear weapons program. The new facility is an enrichment plant, not a bomb-building factory, and everyone knows that Iran was already producing low-grade enriched uranium. Accordingly, the new revelation does not contradict earlier intelligence estimates which concluded that Iran was not actively trying to build a bomb.

Of course, this does not mean Iran is not interested in getting nuclear weapons, or at least achieving a "breakout" capability that it would allow it to go nuclear rapidly at some point in the future. As I've noted before, there are good reasons why Iran might want a nuclear deterrent of its own, just as there are good reasons why the United States and its allies would prefer that it didn't. In any case, this new report is bound to reinforce suspicions about Iran's long-term intentions and hardliners will undoubtedly use this information to press for tougher economic sanctions. This is of course, why the United States, Britain, and France released it, and if I had to guess, I'd bet that stricter sanctions will in fact be imposed.

That's another puzzle, by the way. The Times's story says the United States "has been tracking the project for years," which makes one wonder why its existence was not disclosed previously. Perhaps the United States was trying to protect "sources and methods," or lacked fully convincing information. In any case, the timing of the release seems to be clearly related to the current push for more stringent sanctions. ...

(5) The Iran Attack Plan

From: IHR News <news@ihr.org> Date: 05.10.2009 03:00 PM

Anthony H. Cordesman

The Wall Street Journal

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204518504574418813806271306.html

SEPTEMBER 25, 2009

Iran's acknowledgment that it is developing a second uranium-enrichment facility does little to dispel the view that the regime is developing a weapons program. Israel must consider not just whether to proceed with a strike against Iran—but how. By Anthony H. Cordesman

When the Israeli army's then-Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Halutz was asked in 2004 how far Israel would go to stop Iran's nuclear program, he replied: "2,000 kilometers," roughly the distance been the two countries.

Israel's political and military leaders have long made it clear that they are considering taking decisive military action if Iran continues to develop its nuclear program. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned at the United Nations this week that "the most urgent challenge facing this body is to prevent the tyrants of Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons."

Reporting by the International Atomic Energy Agency and other sources has made it clear that whether or not Iran ties all of its efforts into a formal nuclear weapons program, it has acquired all of the elements necessary to make and deliver such weapons. Just Friday, Iran confirmed that it has been developing a second uranium-enrichment facility on a military base near Qom, doing little to dispel the long-standing concerns of Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia, and the U.S. that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.

Iran has acquired North Korean and other nuclear weapons design data through sources like the sales network once led by the former head of Pakistan's nuclear program, A. Q. Khan. Iran has all of the technology and production and manufacturing capabilities needed for fission weapons. It has acquired the technology to make the explosives needed for a gun or implosion device, the triggering components, and the neutron initiator and reflectors. It has experimented with machine uranium and plutonium processing. It has put massive resources into a medium-range missile program that has the range payload to carry nuclear weapons and that makes no sense with conventional warheads. It has also worked on nuclear weapons designs for missile warheads. These capabilities are dispersed in many facilities in many cities and remote areas, and often into many buildings in each facility—each of which would have to be a target in an Israeli military strike.

It is far from certain that such action would be met with success. An Israeli strike on Iran would be far more challenging than the Israeli strike that destroyed Iraq's Osirak reactor in 1981. An effective Israeli nuclear strike may not be possible, yet a regional nuclear arms race is a game that Iran can start, but cannot possibly win. Anyone who meets regularly with senior Israeli officials, officers and experts knows that Israel is considering military options, but considering them carefully and with an understanding that they pose serious problems and risks.

One of the fundamental problems dogging Israel, especially concerning short-ranged fighters and fighter-bombers, is distance. Iran's potential targets are between 950 and 1,400 miles from Israel, the far margin of the ranges Israeli fighters can reach, even with aerial refueling. Israel would be hard-pressed to destroy all of Iran's best-known targets. What's more, Iran has had years in which to build up covert facilities, disperse elements of its nuclear and missile programs, and develop options for recovering from such an attack.

At best, such action would delay Iran's nuclear buildup. It is more likely to provoke the country into accelerating its plans. Either way, Israel would have to contend with the fact that it has consistently had a "red light" from both the Bush and Obama administrations opposing such strikes. Any strike that overflew Arab territory or attacked a fellow Islamic state would stir the ire of neighboring Arab states, as well as Russia, China and several European states.

This might not stop Israel. Hardly a week goes by without another warning from senior Israeli officials that a military strike is possible, and that Israel cannot tolerate a nuclear-armed Iran, even though no nation has indicated it would support such action. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad continues to threaten Israel and to deny its right to exist. At the same time, President Barack Obama is clearly committed to pursuing diplomatic options, his new initiatives and a U.N. resolution on nuclear arms control and counterproliferation, and working with our European allies, China and Russia to impose sanctions as a substitute for the use of force.

Mr. Ahmadinejad keeps denying that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons, and tries to defend Iran from both support for sanctions and any form of attack by saying that Iran will negotiate over its peaceful use of nuclear power. He offered some form of dialogue with the U.S. during his visit to the U.N. this week. While French President Nicolas Sarkozy denounced Iran's continued lack of response to the Security Council this week, and said its statements would "wipe a U.N. member state off the map," no nation has yet indicated it would support Israeli military action.

Most analyses of a possible Israeli attack focus on only three of Iran's most visible facilities: its centrifuge facilities at Natanz, its light water nuclear power reactor near Bushehr, and a heavy water reactor at Arak it could use to produce plutonium. They are all some 950 to 1,000 miles from Israel. Each of these three targets differs sharply in terms of the near-term risk it poses to Israel and its vulnerability.

The Arak facility is partially sheltered, but it does not yet have a reactor vessel and evidently will not have one until 2011. Arak will not pose a tangible threat for at least several years. The key problem Israel would face is that it would virtually have to strike it as part of any strike on the other targets, because it cannot risk waiting and being unable to carry out another set of strikes for political reasons. It also could then face an Iran with much better air defenses, much better long-range missile forces, and at least some uranium weapons.

Bushehr is a nuclear power reactor along Iran's southwestern coast in the Gulf. It is not yet operational, although it may be fueled late this year. It would take some time before it could be used to produce plutonium, and any Iranian effort to use its fuel rods for such a purpose would be easy to detect and lead Iran into an immediate political confrontation with the United Nations and other states. Bushehr also is being built and fueled by Russia—which so far has been anything but supportive of an Israeli strike and which might react to any attack by making major new arms shipments to Iran.

The centrifuge facility at Natanz is a different story. It is underground and deeply sheltered, and is defended by modern short-range Russian TOR-M surface-to-air missiles. It also, however, is the most important target Israel can fully characterize. Both Israeli and outside experts estimate that it will produce enough low enriched uranium for Iran to be able to be used in building two fission nuclear weapons by some point in 2010—although such material would have to be enriched far more to provide weapons-grade U-235.

Israel has fighters, refueling tankers and precision-guided air-to-ground weapons to strike at all of these targets—even if it flies the long-distance routes needed to avoid the most critical air defenses in neighboring Arab states. It is also far from clear that any Arab air force would risk engaging Israeli fighters. Syria, after all, did not attempt to engage Israeli fighters when they attacked the reactor being built in Syria.

In August 2003, the Israeli Air Force demonstrated the strategic capability to strike far-off targets such as Iran by flying three F-15 jets to Poland, 1,600 nautical miles away. Israel can launch and refuel two to three full squadrons of combat aircraft for a single set of strikes against Iran, and provide suitable refueling. Israel could also provide fighter escorts and has considerable electronic-warfare capability to suppress Iran's aging air defenses. It might take losses to Iran's fighters and surface-to-air missiles, but such losses would probably be limited.

Israel would, however, still face two critical problems. The first would be whether it can destroy a hardened underground facility like Natanz. The second is that a truly successful strike might have to hit far more targets over a much larger area than the three best-known sites. Iran has had years to build up covert and dispersed facilities, and is known to have dozens of other facilities associated with some aspect of its nuclear programs. Moreover, Israel would have to successfully strike at dozens of additional targets to do substantial damage to another key Iranian threat: its long-range missiles.

Experts sharply disagree as to whether the Israeli air force could do more than limited damage to the key Iranian facility at Natanz. Some feel it is too deeply underground and too hardened for Israel to have much impact. Others believe that it is more vulnerable than conventional wisdom has it, and Israel could use weapons like the GBU-28 earth-penetrating bombs it has received from the U.S. or its own penetrators, which may include a nuclear-armed variant, to permanently collapse the underground chambers.

No one knows what specialized weapons Israel may have developed on its own, but Israeli intelligence has probably given Israel good access to U.S., European, and Russian designs for more advanced weapons than the GBU-28. Therefore, the odds are that Israel can have a serious impact on Iran's three most visible nuclear targets and possibly delay Iran's efforts for several years.

The story is very different, however, when it comes to destroying the full range of Iranian capabilities. There are no meaningful unclassified estimates of Iran's total mix of nuclear facilities, but known unclassified research, reactor, and centrifuge facilities number in the dozens. It became clear just this week that Iran managed to conceal the fact it was building a second underground facility for uranium enrichment near Qom, 100 miles southwest of Tehran, and that was designed to hold 3,000 centrifuges. Iran is developing at least four variants of its centrifuges, and the more recent designs have far more capacity than most of the ones installed at Natanz.

This makes it easier to conceal chains of centrifuges in a number of small, dispersed facilities and move material from one facility to another. Iran's known centrifuge production facilities are scattered over large areas of Iran, and at least some are in Mashad in the far northeast of the country—far harder to reach than Arak, Bushehr and Natanz.

Many of Iran's known facilities present the added problem that they are located among civilian facilities and peaceful nuclear-research activities—although Israel's precision-strike capabilities may well be good enough to allow it to limit damage to nearby civilian facilities.

It is not clear that Israel can win this kind of "shell game." It is doubtful that even the U.S. knows all the potential targets, and even more doubtful that any outside power can know what each detected Iranian facility currently does—and the extent to which each can hold dispersed centrifuge facilities that Iran could use instead of Natanz to produce weapons-grade uranium. As for the other elements of Iran's nuclear programs, it has scattered throughout the country the technical and industrial facilities it could use to make the rest of fission nuclear weapons. The facilities can now be in too many places for an Israeli strike to destroy Iran's capabilities.

Israel also faces limits on its military capabilities. Strong as Israeli forces are, they lack the scale, range and other capabilities to carry out the kind of massive strike the U.S. could launch. Israel does not have the density and quality of intelligence assets necessary to reliably assess the damage done to a wide range of small and disperse targets and to detect new Iranian efforts.

Israel has enough strike-attack aircraft and fighters in inventory to carry out a series of restrikes if Iran persisted in rebuilding, but it could not refuel a large-enough force, or provide enough intelligence and electronic warfare capabilities, to keep striking Iran at anything like the necessary scale. Moreover, Israel does not have enough forces to carry out a series of restrikes if Iran persisted in creating and rebuilding new facilities, and Arab states could not repeatedly standby and let Israel penetrate their air space. Israel might also have to deal with a Russia that would be far more willing to sell Iran advanced fighters and surface-to-air missiles if Israel attacked the Russian-built reactor at Bushehr.

These problems are why a number of senior Israeli intelligence experts and military officers feel that Israel should not strike Iran, although few would recommend that Israel avoid using the threat of such strikes to help U.S. and other diplomatic efforts to persuade Iran to halt. For example, retired Brigadier General Shlomo Brom advocates, like a number of other Israeli experts, reliance on deterrence and Israel's steadily improving missile defenses.

Any Israeli attack on an Iranian nuclear target would be a very complex operation in which a relatively large number of attack aircraft and support aircraft would participate. The conclusion is that Israel could attack only a few Iranian targets—not as part of a sustainable operation over time, but as a one-time surprise operation.

The alternatives, however, are not good for Israel, the U.S., Iran's neighbors or Arab neighbors. Of course being attacked is not good for Iran. Israel could still strike, if only to try to buy a few added years of time. Iranian persistence in developing nuclear weapons could push the U.S. into launching its own strike on Iran—although either an Israeli or U.S. strike might be used by Iran's hardliners to justify an all-out nuclear arms race. Further, it is far from clear that friendly Arab Gulf states would allow the U.S. to use bases on their soil for the kind of massive strike and follow-on restrikes that the U.S. would need to suppress Iran's efforts on a lasting basis.

The broader problem for Iran, however, is that Israel will not wait passively as Iran develops a nuclear capability. Like several Arab states, Israel already is developing better missile and air defenses, and more-advanced forms of its Arrow ballistic missile defenses. There are reports that Israel is increasing the range-payload of its nuclear-armed missiles and is developing sea-based nuclear-armed cruise missiles for its submarines.

While Iran is larger than Israel, its population centers are so vulnerable to Israeli thermonuclear weapons that Israel already is a major "existential" threat to Iran. Moreover, provoking its Arab neighbors and Turkey into developing their nuclear capabilities, or the U.S. into offering them a nuclear umbrella targeted on Iran, could create additional threats, as well as make Iran's neighbors even more dependent on the U.S. for their security. Iran's search for nuclear-armed missiles may well unite its neighbors against it as well as create a major new nuclear threat to its survival.

(6) Save Darfur: "Fast the Eid" call shows fake Universalism

From: WVNS <ummyakoub@yahoo.com>  Date: 06.10.2009 05:13 PM

Save Darfur: Fast the Eid!

"Save Darfur" isn't about Sudan, or indeed Darfur, at all–it's about an imagined empathy and generating a domestic American political agenda.

Save Darfur": Fast the Eid!
Alex de Waal
http://blogs.ssrc.org/darfur/2009/09/14/save-darfur-fasting-at-eid/

America's Darfur campaign sometimes goes beyond parody. The last few weeks have shown this to the full, beginning with the fantastical "Sudan Now" campaign and culminating in the proposal to fast the Eid. It beggars belief.

Having spent most of the last few months in Sudan, especially Darfur, it is increasingly evident that "Save Darfur"—here meaning not just the Save Darfur Coalition but the wider movement—is out of touch with realities. What they describe and prescribe has little or no relation to what is happening and what should be done. Three recent "Save Darfur" activities highlight this.

First is their campaign to push Obama to "keep the promise" and the ridiculous advertisements in newspapers and the Obamas' vacation destination. They might do well to recall John Maynard Keynes's well-known riposte to someone who accused him of inconsistency: "When the facts change, I change my mind? What do you do sir?" The facts have changed, the campaign hasn't. A few months ago I asked rhetorically, "Can Sudan activism transform itself for the Obama era?" So far, the record is dispiriting.

There's an episode in Joseph Heller's Catch 22 where the principal character, Yossarian, is tending to a badly wounded young airman, Snowden. He goes about stemming a leg wound in the airman's leg, while the boy mutely nods, until Yossarian realizes that he is meaning that there's another wound too—a piece of shrapnel has got inside Snowden's flak jacket and torn open his side. Yossarian has been busy bandaging the wrong wound while the poor boy is dying. It's the defining trauma of the book. And it's the defining error of the "keep the promise" campaign—money misspent on a campaign that is only hampering General Scott Gration the task he has correctly identified, which is finding a workable political settlement for Sudan as a whole. The efforts by "Save Darfur" to try to link its clamour on Darfur with the national issue stretches credibility.

Next was a revealing quote from John Prendergast in response to the remark by Gen. Martin Agwai, outgoing UNAMID Force Commander, that the war in Darfur was essentially over. He could not dispute Gen. Agwai's facts nor his integrity. Prendergast's criticism was that this was "something that takes the wind out of the sails of international action." ...

Third–and simply stunning–is the choice of date for a fast for Darfur: 21 September. Muslims have been fasting since the beginning of Ramadhan and Eid will fall on 20 and 21 September. As soon as I mentioned the date to my wife, who is a Muslim, she laughed out loud. Not just her: every Muslim, Sudanese or otherwise, I have mentioned this to (trying my best to keep a straight face) has guffawed in amazement. Just as Darfurians are breaking their fast, Save Darfur's campaigners will be starting theirs. The choice of day is astonishingly ignorant of, and insensitive to the Muslim world.

Save Darfur" may be a multi-faith initiative, but Muslims hardly count. "Save Darfur" isn't about Sudan, or indeed Darfur, at all–it's about an imagined empathy and generating a domestic American political agenda. Shame on you, Prendergast and your fellow "activists", shame, shame, shame.