Right Wing Nut House

If we’ve heard that saying once over the last century, we’ve heard it a million times.

As diplomatic manoeuvrings failed miserably in the summer of 1914 to prevent the cataclysm of World War I, exhausted negotiators were at a loss to figure out what happened. Why did the old diplomatic verities that had worked so well for more than a century fail in this instance to prevent a general European war?

The short answer is that most of the parties wanted war. Or refused to take advantage of any “out” that was offered. This was due to the suicidal interlocking alliance system that assured smaller, weaker states dictated whether the great powers went to war or not.

Germany was at the mercy of Franz Joseph’s Austria-Hungarian Empire whose ultimatum to Serbia following the Archduke Ferdinand’s assassination automatically dragged the Czar and Russia into any potential conflict. This made French participation inevitable as well as Britain’s forced march to disaster. Talking, it appears, was useless.

The war so horrified civilized people everywhere that new diplomatic paradigms were invented to deal with conflicts. International organizations were constituted in order to give belligerents a forum to air their grievances. A blizzard of treaties were agreed to outlawing war itself, placing limits on naval tonnage, establishing uniform methods of dealing with POW’s, chemical weapons, and a host of other war related issues.

A fat lot of good it all did. Almost exactly 20 years after the Versailles Treaty was signed ending the first World War, Adolph Hitler deliberately launched the second.

But Hitler’s actions prior to the war were unique in history. He used diplomacy not for the purposes of conflict resolution, but to legitimize his power grabs. Skillfully blending a masterful propaganda campaign with an in your face negotiating style, Hitler cowed both the British and French into accepting his vision of “A Greater Germany” that included a re militarization of the Rhineland, Aunchluss with Austria, the absorption of the Sudetenland into the Reich, and the final destruction of the Czech rump state as poor President Emil Hacha was verbally abused into handing what was left of his country over to the Nazis.

And yet, even as evidence of Hitler’s use of diplomacy as another kind of warfare piled up before their eyes, both Neville Chamberlain and Édouard Daladier convinced themselves that as long as they were talking, Hitler wouldn’t go to war. This use of negotiations not to solve problems but simply to carry on with the diplomatic niceties - negotiations for the sake of negotiating - led directly to World War II. Thanks to extensive records captured after the war, we know now that Hitler always intended to go to war with France and England and nothing those two nations did would have stopped him. But would the Allies have discovered this if they had not been so in love with the diplomatic process? If, for instance, a more hard eyed approach to dealing with Germany exposed Hitler for the deal breaker that he turned out to be, could France and Britain have been forced to act militarily before Hitler was ready?

This has been bothering me for months as the Israel-Palestinian war erupted and the Iranian/North Korean problems moved center stage. The fact of the matter is, I have zero confidence that negotiations with any of those parties will serve any other purpose than advancing their own plans for evil. Negotiations have been nearly continuous between Israel and the Palestinians for nearly 60 years and one must look realistically at what those talks have achieved. Is Israel safer? Do the Palestinians have a homeland? How much real progress has been made? Diplomats point to concessions made by Israel that have ceded land and sovereignty to the Palestinians. But has this made Israel safer, more secure?

Does anyone save Hosni Mubarak in Egypt view the Israelis with anything but hate and loathing? A similar question could be asked of the Jordanians or any other Arab state. Despots all whose hold on power is dependent on the barrel of a gun could be overthrown tomorrow. And 60 years of “negotiating” would be seen for the utterly futile exercise it truly is.

The Palestinians have no interest in living peacefully with a Jewish state. They wish that state gone. Through 60 years of negotiating, they have refused to recognize even the reality of that state’s existence. But somehow, “negotiations” are the end all and be all of statecraft and the proprieties must be observed.

I find similar myopia when it comes to Iran and North Korea. Here’s former Carter National Security Advisor who sums up the striped pants position perfectly:

Why won’t the Bush administration talk bilaterally and substantively with NK, as the Brits (and eventually the US) did with Libya? Because the Bush administration sees diplomacy as something to be engaged in with another country as a reward for that country’s good behavior. They seem not to see diplomacy as a tool to be used with antagonistic countries or parties, that might bring about an improvement in the behaviour of such entities, and a resolution to the issues that trouble us. Thus we do not talk to Iran, Syria, Hizballah or North Korea. We only talk to our friends — a huge mistake.

Talking solely for the reason that this is the way it’s always been done and doing or trying anything differently is crazy seems to be the position of our foreign policy elites. You can’t really blame them. It was how they were trained. The diplomatic dance is successful when both parties are rational and both parties see an advantage in reaching an agreement. Civil wars in Africa especially have lent themselves to negotiated settlement for this reason.

What advantage would accrue to Iran in reaching an agreement? I mean a real agreement that totally dismantled their nuclear program under strict and intrusive inspections. More importantly, how could we be sure that they would adhere to the agreement in the first place? Diplomats like to talk about “confidence building measures” and other intermediate steps before reaching an accord with an adversary. But what do you do when one party to the negotiations is not interested in settlement but rather in using the talks as a way to delay sanctions, or military action, or world condemnation, or any other fallout that would occur if and when the negotiations fail?

This is the great conundrum facing the Bush Administration with Iran. North Korea proved that they couldn’t be trusted as the paper mache “Agreed Framework” turned out to be nothing more than a way to put American policy makers to sleep while Kim continued his enrichment activities. When the Bush Administration called the North Koreans on their cheating, they unilaterally abandoned the agreement and brought their activities into the open. The six power talks, where it was believed China and Russia could convince Kim to stop his mad rush for the bomb, proved in the end to be useless. One wonders if China, who supplies the North Koreans with 90% of their fuel oil couldn’t dissuade Kim how the United States in bi-lateral talks could have done any better (without giving Kim another huge bribe as the Clinton Administration did with the Agreed Framework).

In a very roundabout way I am questioning this paradigm that posits the notion that negotiations - even if they won’t accomplish anything - are always preferable to the alternatives (not necessarily military). If only one side in the negotiations is seeking agreement while the other side wishes to use the talks to achieve the goals that the negotiations are trying to forestall, isn’t it common sense to ask why bother?

The old verities and certainties did not work on North Korea. They are not working with the Palestinians. And it is an open question whether they will work with Iran. One could legitimately ask then that if we don’t have negotiations, don’t we de facto have a state of war?

Not necessarily. There are still measures short of war that could be undertaken to dissuade an adversary from engaging in activities that are clearly unacceptable to the world at large. Sanctions and other measures that isolate an aggressive nation could - if they are broad enough and sting enough, threatening the stability and survival of the regime - accomplish far more than any negotiations ever could.

Unfortunately, that just wouldn’t be possible. Diplomats live to negotiate. And negotiating simply for the sake of talking would appear to be the preference of a world community who one day will wake up and realize that all of the talk expended over Iran and North Korea was as worthless as the rubble that will be left behind when one of their cities lies in ruins.

In a rather plaintive post, Glenn Reynolds bemoans the loss of “momentum” in the Iraq War , wishing to “take the war to our enemies.” rather than “sitting on our bayonets.” He believes that the way to recapture the advantage is by going after the foreign support given the insurgency and that perhaps it is time to “revive the pre-emptive war” strategy and take the war to Iran and Syria.

I had to blink and shake my head after reading what Mr. Reynolds wrote. Was he perhaps stuck in some kind of time warp, believing that it is 2004? The idea that any kind of momentum is possible to recapture - or that we ever had it in the first place - is an illusion. And how we can win in Iraq by widening the war to include the two strongest regional powers arrayed against us is, well, mind boggling.

I have become disenchanted of late with Greg Djerjian and his spiteful, hateful, personal attacks on Mr. Reynolds, Hugh Hewitt, Richard Fernandez, and others bloggers and commenters (Mark Steyn being a particular foil for Mr. Djerjian’s over-the-top barbs and rifled bric-a-brats). His disdain for the President and his advisors - unbalanced in my opinion - makes him a bore to read at times.

However Djerjian also offers clarity on many issues relating to Iraq and the War on Terror. And if there is one thing that he has been harping on for many months that rings true above all others is the crazy idea that taking the war to Iran and Syria is going to help the situation in Iraq.

The fallout from an attack on Iran would be especially suicidal. The Iranian backed militias in Iraq would almost certainly take up arms and challenge the Americans, complicating an already desperate situation enormously. And it would be expected that the Iranians would retaliate against our troops with rocket attacks from their stockpiles of long range missiles. And what of the delicate political dance al-Maliki is currently undertaking in his efforts to reform the police and army whose inaction allows Shia death squads to operate with impunity?

As for Syria, while Bashar Assad imperfectly implements our demands that he close off the border to foreign fighters entering Iraq, an attack will actually make the situation worse as he would be under no obligation to continue even the limited cooperation he has shown up to now.

Perhaps most importantly, we might want to ask what form our momentum establishing attacks would take? Would we initiate ground operations against the Iranian army? The Syrians? What would be the goals of such attacks? To punish? To interdict?

Punishment may make us all feel better but would hardly affect the efforts of either two countries to supply the insurgency in Iraq. As for interdiction of men and supplies, only more troops and vigilance on the borders can have an effect on the steady dribble of arms and terrorists that end up aiding the insurgents. A truck here and a bus there moving through a poorly guarded border crossing or making their way through the vast deserts of Iraq make poor targets for any kind of large scale military action.

As we know now (blessed with 20/20 hindsight), the egregious mistakes and numerous blunders by both civilian and military authorities that have led us to our current perilous position in Iraq were made in the context of false assumptions, wishful thinking, and a lack of understanding of the nature of the enemy. It just seems to me to be the height of stupidity to believe that we can improve what’s happening on the ground in Iraq by attacking Iran and Syria.

While attention in Washington has been riveted on the Foley mess, a significant development was occurring outside of the Capitol that makes the back and forth between the two parties seem very small indeed.

At a meeting of what is described as our “senior operatives and outside experts from the intelligence community,” it seems that a decision of sorts has been reached regarding stopping the Iranians from getting nuclear weapons; it can’t be done:

Bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities was rejected on the grounds that the intelligence needed for successful air strikes was lacking. “We only have an imperfect understanding of the extent and location of the Iranian programme,” said one source with knowledge of the meeting. “Even if we got the order to blow it up, we wouldn’t know how to.”

The White House’s earlier enthusiasm for military strikes if all else failed has cooled after warnings from the Pentagon and intelligence analysts that the risk to reward ratio of taking action was too high. At best 80% of the targets are mapped out and then only sketchily. The “collateral damage” to civilians could be considerable, sources say.

“Unless you can be 100% effective and set the programme back by two decades, you’ll just get a short-term delay and you may not produce a result that is better than the current one,” an intelligence analyst said.

General John Abizaid, commander of US forces in the Middle East, has warned that striking Iran could cripple oil supplies, unleash a “surrogate” terrorist army and lead to missile attacks on America’s regional allies. The army is particularly concerned about Iran’s ability to destabilise an already chaotic Iraq.

Whether or not this is a case of “cooler heads prevailing” with regards to military action against Iran it certainly is welcome news. Even if you support bombing the Iranians, what the intelligence community has been trying to impress on the President and his men is that we have time yet to deal with Iran via diplomacy:

John Negroponte, director of national intelligence, has told President George W Bush that there is no rush to use force as Iran’s nuclear programme is beset with technical errors. “He has been saying, ‘Slow down, it’s not an immediate problem’,” said Patrick Clawson, an Iran expert at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, has staked her reputation on achieving a negotiated settlement with the help of the “EU3” nations of Britain, France and Germany.

“President Bush is not going to take military action against the advice of the secretary of state, US generals and the director of national intelligence,” Clawson said.

Actually, Clawson may be talking through his hat about Bush. I have no doubt that if George Bush feels it is in the best interest of the United States to bomb Iran, he will do so regardless of who tells him otherwise. This is one of Bush’s greatest faults as well as one of his greatest strengths. Certainly not Carteresque in his decision making as the ex-President would agonize for days, sometimes weeks, over minor matters that were best left to subordinates in the first place. Once Bush decides on a course of action, it is near impossible to deflect him until the goal is achieved. One sees immediately the strengths and weaknesses such a personality trait brings to the table.

Having said that, it would seem improbable that Bush could ignore the entire military/diplomatic establishment’s advice on such an important issue. The bombing option was always going to be a temporary solution anyway since the liklihood of degrading the Iranian program significantly has always been doubted. The most optimistic estimates were that it could delay their program by as many as 5 years. And that would be after weeks of sorties and probably many thousands of civilian casualties.

In other words, our intel professionals as well as most professional soldiers have come to pretty much the same conclusion; the costs of such a campaign would significantly outweigh the benefits. The sad fact is, we just don’t have much we can offer the Iranians or threaten them with:

Intelligence analysts concluded at last week’s meeting that there were no negotiating carrots or sticks, such as sanctions, capable of persuading Iran to halt its pursuit of nuclear know-how — which it maintains is for peaceful energy purposes.

“The sobering view is that even if there is a deal, the Iranians would cheat,” another source said.

“The conclusion is that America is going to have to live with the bomb unless there’s some miracle, such as a major accident, a major defector or an orange revolution,” the source added, referring to the people’s protests that brought reformers to power in Ukraine. None of these scenarios is considered likely.

Ted Koppel comes to the right conclusion but, like a typical lefty, for the wrong reasons:

If Iran is bound and determined to have nuclear weapons, let it.

The elimination of American opposition on this issue would open the way to genuine normalization between our two nations. It might even convince the Iranians that their country can flourish without nuclear weapons.

But this should also be made clear to Tehran: If a dirty bomb explodes in Milwaukee, or some other nuclear device detonates in Baltimore or Wichita, if Israel or Egypt or Saudi Arabia should fall victim to a nuclear “accident,” Iran should understand that the U.S. government will not search around for the perpetrator. The return address will be predetermined, and it will be somewhere in Iran.

Is it really too difficult for a liberal to understand that if a nuclear device detonates in Baltimore or Wichita (much more likely Washington or New York) that BY THAT TIME IT IS TOO LATE TO DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT? Retaliation is meaningless. And, as Allah points out, Koppel would be one of the first to say so:

If a dirty bomb went off in Milwaukee and Bush answered with a nuke on Tehran, the left would start shrieking instantly about genocide, disproportionality, and the lack of evidence of culpability. Same playbook as their carping about “collective punishment” of Palestinians by Israel, only writ much, much larger. And they’d have a point: a dirty bomb could just as well come from AQ using material obtained from North Korean or Russian agents, with no assistance from Iran. It wouldn’t bother me if we held them responsible anyway. But I bet it’d bother Ted Koppel.

Nightline might even run a special two-hour episode where they read the names of some of the Iranian dead.

There has never been a country that pursued nuclear weapons and was deterred from getting them by anything but force or the threat of force. Only the Israeli attack on the Osirak reactor prevented Saddam from getting a nuke back in the 1980’s. And our invasion of Iraq along with the toppling of Saddam convinced Qadaffi to give up on his nuclear ambitions (we also interecepted nuclear hardware on its way to Libya which the frightened Libyan strongman believed gave the US an excuse to invade).

Israel, South Africa, and North Korea ignored international conventions, pressure, and pleadings on their way to building their own nukes. And now apparently Iran will get its chance to impoverish its people even further and try its hand at pulling the nuclear rabbit out of a hat.

Fortunately, the technical challenges are such that they are still at least 3 and more likely 5 years from having the ultimate defense against slanderous Muhammed cartoons. While diplomacy will probably be futile, the mullahs have more immediate concerns; the Israelis are most likely not going to be deterred as they see Iranian nukes as a threat to their national existence:

The biggest deterrent might come from the Israelis, not the Americans. Israeli defence sources are increasingly convinced that it will fall to them to stop a nuclear Iran. In their view Iran should not be allowed to get to the “point of no return” where it has the know-how to build a bomb.

“The Israelis are going to have to make a decision earlier than we do,” Clawson said. “That’s a real problem for us.”

Indeed. The tiny nation of Israel going up against a regional power with hundreds of missiles capable of reaching their vulnerable cities not to mention enemies who would strike at her back while she was engaged in the life and death struggle with Iran would almost certainly draw the US into the conflict in some meaningful way. And the fact is Iran is getting stronger every year, their conventional arms are being modernized thanks to their friends in Russia and China. Israel’s overwhelming material superiority is diminishing. The Jewish state is very aware of this and will almost certainly strike sooner rather than later.

And when that happens, will the American President, whoever it may be, stand behind Israel?

FRENCH PRESIDENT JACQUES CHIRAC EXPRESSES SURPRISE AT A REPORTER’S QUESTION ABOUT IRAN’S NUCLEAR PROGRAM

I am running out of English language adjectives to describe what a dirty rotten, low-down, double-crossing, two-timing, floor four-flushing, loutish galoot French President Jacques Chirac is. And since there really are no nasty sounding adjectives that I could use in French (a beautiful language, music to the ear), I’m going to try some in German:

Chirac ist ein Schurke.

(Chirac is a scoundrel.)

Der französische Präsident hat das Gesicht eines Kojoten.

(The French President has the face of a coyote.)

Ich habe Schildkröten als altes Jacques besser schauen gesehen.

(Ive seen better looking turtles than old Jacques.)

Thank God for the Anglo Saxons. There’s something marvelously guttural about the German language, alternately spitting and swallowing words. It’s the perfect language to express the absolute and utter disdain I feel for the French President at this moment.

What has our wussy friend done now? Oh, nothing much. Just undermined the position of the United Nations Security Council, the United States, the European Union, and anyone else trying to get Iran to stop enriching uranium. In what only can be described as a towering conceit born of a false sense of French superiority in diplomatic affairs, the weasel has offered to allow Iran to continue enriching uranium until “formal” negotiations begin:

In an effort to jump-start formal negotiations between six world powers and Iran over its nuclear program, President Jacques Chirac of France suggested Monday that Iran would not have to freeze major nuclear activities until the talks began.

Over the years, Mr. Chirac has consistently taken an extremely hard line against Iran both in public and private. But his remarks in a radio interview could be interpreted as a concession to Iran, whose officials have said they will not suspend their production of enriched uranium as demanded by the United Nations Security Council.

“Iran and the six countries together, we must first find an agenda for negotiations, then start a negotiation,” Mr. Chirac told Europe 1 radio. “During this negotiation I propose that on the one hand, the six refrain from referring the issue to the Security Council, and that Iran refrain from uranium enrichment during the duration of the negotiation.”

Anyone want to guess how long it will take to find that elusive “agenda” that Chirac says is necessary to come up with before formal negotiations begin? As long as the Iranians will be able to continue to work toward building a bomb, it may take years to come to an agreement.

Is that the extent of Chirac’s perfidy? Hardly:

Ahead of what is now certain to be a contentious meeting with President Bush today, President Chirac of France reneged on his previous support for a united international approach to halting Iran’s nuclear program.

In two interviews on the eve of his trip to Turtle Bay to attend the U.N. General Assembly, Mr. Chirac threatened to restart negotiations with Iran. His comments called into question the united position of the five permanent members of the Security Council and Germany, whose foreign ministers had said that unless Iran suspended enrichment by the end of August, the council would consider punitive measures.

“I don’t believe in a solution without dialogue,” Mr. Chirac told Europe 1 radio. “We must, on the one hand, together, Iran and the six countries, meet and set an agenda, then start negotiations.”

The French president added, “I suggest that the six renounce referring” Iran to “the U.N. Security Council and that Iran renounce uranium enrichment during negotiations,” according to an Associated Press translation.

(HT: Malkin)

Not even the insufferable DeGaulle would have pulled something like this. Chirac’s contempt for his European partners and his intense dislike of America could end up burying us all unless someone takes him down a peg or two. Unfortunately, we’re stuck with the lickspittle for at least another 7 months. Elections are scheduled for next year at which time it is possible Anglo-French relations could take a turn for the better.

One of the candidates on the right is Nicolas Sarkozy. He has expressed a strong desire to improve relations with the United States, even going so far as to say nice things about America both in France and here during a recent visit. Of course, that won’t erase the virulent strain of anti-Americanism among ordinary Frenchmen - especially those on the left. And the far right, with their hyper-patriotic notions of the French nation as a world power (not to mention being ferocious guardians of French culture and language that they feel is under constant attack by us yanks) looks at America with suspicion.

Where France does exercise world class clout is among the so-called non-aligned nations. And with the French wavering on sanctions against the Iranians, members from that bloc may be getting cold feet:

But though the steering group appeared to be diverging yesterday, with some nations calling for more dialogue and others urging a more muscular stance, there were also indications it could expand.

[snip]

With Mr. Chirac’s remarks, France joins China and Russia, whose officials have expressed strong reservations about imposing sanctions, making a Security Council decision on punishing Iran unlikely. “We, too, don’t like sanctions,” Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told reporters at Turtle Bay yesterday.

Bush administration officials, as well as British diplomats, indicated Mr. Chirac’s change of tack was not part of a coordinated new strategy for the international group. The American ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, told reporters that the Iranian nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, did not even bother to explain his country’s decisions to council members.

“The discussions with Iran appear to have come to a stop, in the sense that Mr. Larijani, whom we expected in New York, is not here,” Mr. Bolton said. “We are now 18 days, by my calculation, after the August 31 deadline. Our position remains unchanged: Unless there is a full and verifiable suspension of uranium enrichment activities, we will seek sanctions in the Security Council.”

Leave it to Bolton to remind the UN of its responsibility. The idea that the Democrats refuse to confirm this guy is just incomprehensible to me. He has been a breath of fresh air not only representing America’s interests very well but also in his advocacy for making the United Nations Security Council into a serious body that serves the cause of peace rather than the laughingstock of thugs and dictators that it currently is.

Iran is still on the agenda at the Security Council. I hope that Bolton can hold them together long enough so that at least a formal vote can be taken on sanctions in order to reveal who is standing in the way of putting pressure on the Iranians to halt their drive to acquire nuclear weapons.

And at the head of the pack of betrayers and renegers; Jacques Chirac. Perhaps we can impose on Ahmadinejad to have his picture taken kissing the French President on the cheek. Thanks to the weasel Chirac, he’s already gotten his 30 pieces of silver.

UPDATE

Commenter John points out that the correct adjective is “four-flusher” not “floor-flusher” that I had originally. Must brush up on my poker nomenclature.

Also, I couldn’t resist. Two commenters have mentioned the perfect epithet to call Chirac: Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey. Here it is in German (courtesy Alta-Vista):

Käse, der Auslieferungaffen ißt

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has to be one of the most ineffective international organizations in history. They have yet to prevent any nation anywhere who wished to develop nuclear weapons from doing so. In fact, one could successfully argue that many of their actions have contributed in no small way to the development of nuclear weapons in these countries despite the fact that the Agency is in charge of verifying that signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty abide by their commitments.

Part of the problem is the dual nature of their mission. Not only are they charged with verification of compliance with the NPT, they are also required to promote the “peaceful” use of nuclear energy. By definition, this means helping countries build reactors and nuclear infrastructure that, with some modifications, could be used to construct a bomb.

Of course, there are many steps between fueling a reactor and building a nuke and some of those steps would require forays into the international nuclear markets - markets that are closely watched for just such activity. The sale of fissile material for instance is one of the most regulated activities in the world. Despite this, Israel and South Africa (whose nuclear program while presently dismantled could probably be reactivated with little trouble) were able to gather enough nuclear technology and fuel to build nuclear weapons.

This points up the need for a real international nuclear watchdog. Not a poodle but rather a Rottweiler - preferably one with great big teeth and a nasty bite. Instead, under Nobel Peace Prize winner and Chief Nuclear Enabler Mohamed ElBaradei, the IAEA has proven that rather than confronting rogue states who wish to build the ultimate weapon, the Agency does everything in its power not to offend the thugs and potential mass murdering crazies who seek the means to make their nuclear fantasies come true.

Case in point is the reaction by the IAEA to the report issued last month by House Republicans on the Intelligence Committee who have had it up to here with ElBaradei’s wishy washiness toward the radioactive mullahs in Iran. In a letter to Chairman Hoekstra, the IAEA angrily pointed to 5 major inaccuracies in the report:

The agency noted five major errors in the committee’s 29-page report, which said Iran’s nuclear capabilities are more advanced than either the IAEA or U.S. intelligence has shown.

Among the committee’s assertions is that Iran is producing weapons-grade uranium at its facility in the town of Natanz. The IAEA called that “incorrect,” noting that weapons-grade uranium is enriched to a level of 90 percent or more. Iran has enriched uranium to 3.5 percent under IAEA monitoring

[snip]

Among the allegations in Fleitz’s Iran report is that ElBaradei removed a senior inspector from the Iran investigation because he raised “concerns about Iranian deception regarding its nuclear program.” The agency said the inspector has not been removed.

A suggestion that ElBaradei had an “unstated” policy that prevented inspectors from telling the truth about Iran’s program was particularly “outrageous and dishonest,” according to the IAEA letter, which was signed by Vilmos Cserveny, the IAEA’s director for external affairs and a former Hungarian ambassador.

It should be pointed out that no Democrats on the Intelligence Committee signed off on this report and that it was written by an ex-CIA Committee staffer who may or may not have an ax to grind with ElBaradei. The CIA also came in for some scathing criticism in the report for its National Intelligence Estimate written last summer that stated the Iranians were a decade or more away from building a nuke. The Israelis believe that they mullahs could go nuclear in 5 years or less.

And someone else agrees with the Israelis; ElBaradei himself:

IAEA chairman Muhammad ElBaradei on Monday confirmed Israel’s assessment that Iran is only a few months away from creating an atomic bomb.

If Tehran indeed resumed its uranium enrichment in other plants, as threatened, it will take it only “a few months” to produce a nuclear bomb, El-Baradei told The Independent.

And the allegation that ElBaradei removed a senior inspector is true. But the reason he did it is even more craven than indicated by the House report: the Iranians demanded it. The reason? The inspector believed that the Iranians were building nuclear weapons:

Iran has asked the International Atomic Energy Agency to remove the head of the inspection team probing Tehran’s nuclear program, U.N. officials said Sunday.

The inspector, Chris Charlier, has not been back to Iran since April because of Iranian displeasure with his work, the officials said.

However, Charlier remains the head of the team, they said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the issue was confidential.

The German newspaper Welt am Sonntag reported Sunday that Charlier had been removed from his post and assigned to other duties. It quoted him as saying he believes Iran is operating a clandestine nuclear program and suggested it was linked to weapons.

IAEA spokespeople in Vienna, Austria, declined comment Sunday.

Charlier, 61, has previously complained publicly that Iranian constraints made inspection work there difficult.

In other words, in order to avoid a confrontation, ElBaradei acceded to Iranian demands that the inspector be cashiered. The IAEA chief can spin it anyway he would like but the fact is his chief inspector isn’t even allowed into Iran to do his job and the Iranians appear to have a veto over IAEA personnel matters.

As far as ElBaradei having an “unstated” policy that inspectors not tell the truth about the Iranian program, just what the hell are we supposed to think when the Iranians can order him around like a poodle and pick and choose which inspectors will be allowed into their country? In fact, it would make sense for ElBaradei to have such a policy if only to prevent further erosion of his authority - if that’s possible.

As for the belief that there is Highly Enriched (HE) uranium at the Natanz nuclear site, I guess we can chalk this up to “naturally occurring” uranium enriched to weapons grade levels:

The U.N. atomic agency has found traces of highly enriched uranium at an Iranian site linked to the country’s defense ministry, diplomats said Friday. The finding added to concerns that Tehran was hiding activities that could be used to make nuclear arms.

The diplomats, who demanded anonymity in exchange for revealing the confidential information, said the findings were preliminary and still had to be confirmed through other lab tests. But they said the density of enrichment appeared close to or beyond weapons grade _ the level used to make nuclear warheads.

The IAEA has only recently revealed this fact and are casting about desperately to find an explanation for it - anything except the possibility that the Iranians are already able to enrich uranium not to the measly 3.5% they have demonstrated so far but rather to the 80% or 90% necessary to build a bomb.

While there is a possibility that the HE uranium is there as a result of the contamination of the equipment when it was being used in another country - Pakistan comes to mind - we haven’t heard a peep from the IAEA that what is going on at Natanz is anything other than what the House Committee speculates that it is; bomb making.

While there is little doubt that the House Committee exaggerated the shortcomings of both the IAEA and the CIA in the monitoring of Iran’s nuclear program, there is equally little doubt that both organizations are doing their best at bureaucratic CYA rather than aggressively confronting the mullahs over their nuclear program.

The fact is, I don’t trust either the CIA or the IAEA to do the job of monitoring Iran’s nuclear program and giving American policymakers enough warning to prevent the catastrophe of the fanatics in Tehran from getting their hands on nuclear weapons. But for the moment they’re all we have. And since they’re the only game in town, we are going to have to swallow our doubts about their shortcomings and hope that they can do their jobs in preventing the mullahs from acquiring the ultimate defense against cartoon blasphemy.

UPDATE

I find it a little amusing and very revealing that the left has swallowed the IAEA letter to Hoekstra hook, line, and sinker, without even batting an eyelash.

In fact, Kevin Drum is pouting because the House report made it to page A1 last month while the IAEA letter appears on A17:

Today, the IAEA — which, you may recall, turned out to be right about Iraq — wrote Hoekstra a letter complaining that the report contained “erroneous, misleading and unsubstantiated statements.”

I’ve reproduced the Washington Post’s coverage of these two events below. Do you notice any differences? I’ve provided some subtle clues in case you’re having trouble figuring it out.

And, just for the record, the IAEA report was so full of qualifiers and spin that if it turned out Saddam had an underground nuclear arsenal they could have pointed to the report and still said ” See? I told you so.”

Would it have been too much trouble for Drum and others to point out the laughable discrepancies between the charges made in the IAEA letter and the truth?

Well, the best I can say is that we’re still here.

The fruit and nut cake President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, did not “light up the sky” over Jerusalem as some of our more excitable blog brethren were breathlessly speculating in recent weeks. Perhaps some of us were hoping that rather than light up the sky, he would light up himself and disappear to join the prophet in heaven in a blaze of self-immolated glory.

No such luck.

In fact, it appears judging by the actions of the Iranian government today that it’s just more of the same for a man competing either for “Best Hitler Impersonation in 60 years” or the coveted title of “Most Outrageous Goofball on Planet Earth.” The former making him a dangerous man indeed. The latter still making him a threat but one that we can probably manage without overturning the apple cart in the Middle East.

But that’s the problem with this fellow. Do we take him seriously when he says:

If you want to have good relations with the Iranian people in the future, you should acknowledge the right and the might of the Iranian people, and you should bow and surrender to the might of the Iranian people. If you do not accept this, the Iranian people will force you to bow and surrender.

(HT: LGF)

Or when he says:

Is it possible for us to witness a world without America and Zionism? But you had best know that this slogan and this goal are attainable, and surely can be achieved…

How to attain the goal of enjoying a world without America or Zionism? Here’s Hassan Abbassi, a Revolutionary Guards intelligence theoretician who teaches at Al-Hussein University and someone considered to be Ahmadinejad’s strategic guru:

We have a strategy drawn up for the destruction of Anglo-Saxon civilization… we must make use of everything we have at hand to strike at this front by means of our suicide operations or by means of our missiles. There are 29 sensitive sites in the U.S. and in the West. We have already spied on these sites and we know how we are going to attack them.

Personally, I think that it would take far fewer than 29 targets hit to destroy what we now know as America but maybe the thug just wants to be certain. But I urge you not to mention this to the left. You see, by their way of thinking the fact that we have plans to invade Iran means that we are going to invade, no ifs, ands or buts. However, if the lefties see what Abbassi is planning they will be forced to make a 180 degree flip flop and say “Well of course, all countries have plans. That doesn’t mean anything.”

And they’d probably be right. With at least one of those theories. How long do you think it will take them to catch on that they can’t be right about both?

No matter. It is Ahmadinejad’s jew hating, holocaust denying rhetoric that has the sane world up in arms. That and the small matter of his nuclear program. Are we supposed to take the man at his word when he says it is for peaceful purposes only? If so, we are being asked to take the word of a serial exaggerator and liar. For if, as we are led to believe by some, Ahmadinejad’s rhetoric can safely be ignored since he’s only playing to the home folks, do praytell how one can divine when he’s propagandizing and when he’s telling the truth? In other words, who has insight into the man’s soul in order to tell us when he’s lying and when he’s not?

Our betters on the left, of course, Ye needn’t ask. That’s why any attempt to delay, impede, or otherwise destroy his nuclear enrichment capability is seen as just more of the same from the crazy neocons running our government. The dhimmi left has already decided there’s nothing to be done except believe Ahmadinejad because the alternative would mean that they were wrong and George Bush was right.

Never fear, however. We will keep talking to Iran - fat lot of good it will do. But from Iran’s perspective, it helps them play our useful idiots if they seem sincere about talking:

Iran’s semi-official news agency reported today that Tehran has “rejected suspension of its nuclear activities” as demanded by the United Nations Security Council but has proposed a “new formula for resolving the issue through talks.”

The details of the new formula were not immediately apparent.

Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator delivered Tehran’s response to the ambassadors of Britain, France, Germany, China, Russia and Switzerland and was briefing them on the substance, reported Iran’s Fars news agency.

Diplomats in Washington, Tehran and European capitals had said yesterday that the Iranian government is willing to enter negotiations and to consider a freeze of the program, but it will not accept a freeze as a precondition for the talks.

Now we’ll have another ring around the rosy at the United Nations as Britain, France, Germany, and the US struggle to come up with sanctions watered down enough so that China and Russia will accept them. Under discussion are sanctions of the harshest sort like denying Iranian leaders the opportunity to fly on foreign airlines and delaying the mullah’s entry into the WTO.

That’s showing ‘em.

In the meantime, Iran is making it very clear that they have a very good reason for keeping their nuclear program under wraps:

Iran turned away U.N. inspectors from an underground site meant to shelter its uranium enrichment program from attack, diplomats said Monday, while the country’s supreme leader insisted Tehran will not give up its contentious nuclear technology.

Iran’s unprecedented refusal to allow access to its underground facility at Natanz could seriously hamper U.N. attempts to ensure Tehran is not trying to produce nuclear weapons, and might violate the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, diplomats and U.N. officials told The Associated Press.

Speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information, the diplomats and officials from the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, described other signs of Iranian defiance.

They said Iran denied entry visas to two IAEA inspectors in the last few weeks after doing the same earlier this summer for Chris Charlier, the expert heading the U.N. agency’s team to Tehran. Additionally, they said, other inspectors were given only single-entry visas during their visits to Iran last week, instead of the customary multiple-entry permits.

And just in case we didn’t get the message to “bow and surrender” to the Iranian regime, they tried a little strong arm action today:

Iran attacked and seized control of a Romanian oil rig working in its Persian Gulf waters this morning one week after the Iranian government accused the European drilling company of “hijacking” another rig.

An Iranian naval vessel fired on the rig owned by Romania’s Grup Servicii Petroliere (GSP) in the Salman field and took control of its radio room at about 7:00 a.m. local time, Lulu Tabanesku, Grup’s representative in the United Arab Emirates said in a phone interview from Dubai today.

“The Iranians fired at the rig’s crane with machine guns,” Tabanesku said. “They are in control now and we can’t contact the rig.” The Romanian company has 26 workers on the platform, he said.

Grup had a contract with an Iranian oil firm whose activities were suspended last year due to corruption charges and (lefty tin foil hat alert) for having dealings with Halliburton. Evidently, the Iranians feel the rig is theirs even if they’re not paying for it.

Sounds to me like Haliburton is trying to engineer a confrontation between Iran and the West. If so, they did a lousy job picking Romania as the pigeon. I mean, you think they would have at least tried for a “B-List” European country like Spain or Portugal or maybe Monaco. Hell, Lichtenstein would have been a better choice than Romania for God’s sake!

Seriously, the western media will simply file this incident under “Outrageous Iranian Provocations” and let it go at that. How much longer they can keep pretending that “wiping Israel off the map” and “bow and surrender” is not really worth reporting on remains to be seen. Hopefully they will realize it sooner rather than later.

Otherwise, we’ll be the ones seeing a “light in the sky” someday.

UPDATE

Allah has a nice round up of blog and MSM react to the news that the Iranians want to talk but not if suspending their program is a precondition.

That nuke facility at Natanz shows activity that denotes centrifuge assembly. Talk about speaking out of both sides of your mouth…

The state of Israel awoke this morning to the realization that their world has suddenly become a lot more dangerous.

And that’s saying something. Given that their country is surrounded by enemies that wish to annihilate them, it is hard to imagine how their precarious situation could have gotten any worse. But the sad fact is that the forces representing anti-modernism, anti-Semitism, and genocide are in the ascendancy today over those who represent freedom, tolerance, and civilization.

Welcome to the new Middle East, a place where purposefully ordering the launching of thousands upon thousands of lethal rockets into towns and villages with the sole and exclusive goal of killing as many civilians as possible makes one a hero to the overwhelming majority of its people rather than a monster to be stoned in the street on sight. It is also a tactic that has been green lighted by the United Nations in that they have given these gleeful, murderous, rocketeers the opportunity to start their bombardment all over again just as soon as the international community loses interest and moves on to the next outrage that the world body also will be unable to do anything to stop.

A true United Nations, one that would live up to one tenth of the noble sentiments contained in its charter, would have voted to join with Israel to destroy Hizbullah. In fact, their actions have now enabled the terrorists to look forward to round two in their genocidal war against the Jews.

For make no mistake, this “cease fire” is nothing of the sort. It is a pause in Hizbullah’s undeclared war on the Jewish state that has been going on since Israel voluntarily left southern Lebanon in 2000. The aggression from Hizbullah didn’t start with their incursion into Israel’s territory on July 12. It has been going on for more than two years with nary a peep from this same international community that now seeks to dictate to Israel how it should best defend itself. Where was the outrage when Hizbullah carried out unprovoked attacks on IDF outposts? Where were the tears from these slobbering humanitarians when Hizbullah infiltrated suicide bombers across the border in order to kill Israeli children?

To those who truly wish for a just and peaceful international order, that kind of world just became much more remote with the shameful capitulation to the tactics of terror that the United States, the United Nations, and the rest of the international community agreed to in this cease fire resolution. It will come back to haunt all who worked for expediency over substance, all the while pretending that a “solution” to Hizbullah’s murderous designs on the Jewish state could be “negotiated” - as if the terrorists cared one whit about anything except their own survival as well as the killing of more Jews which is now guaranteed thanks to both the incompetence of Israeli leadership and the world’s timidity in the face of outright savagery.

The conduct of France in this affair has been one dizzying change of direction after another. Evidently, the French believed that if they kept churning their legs fast enough on the treadmill of international diplomacy, they would eventually get someplace. Beginning with a near agreement with the Americans on the need for a strong international force with a robust mandate to check and disarm Hizbullah, the French ended up groveling before the Sheiks of Araby by accepting their formulation of using an expanded United Nations force that has proven to be about as effective at stopping Hizbullah from attacking Israel as any United Nations force of its kind - which is to say it has failed utterly and completely.

In fact, I’m sure Hizbullah was overjoyed to hear that UNIFIL outposts would be augmented. It means they now have that many more locations to place their rocket launchers, safe and secure in the knowledge that no one will do anything to stop them from placing their Vergeltungswaffe next to locations that proudly fly the UN flag. (Funny thing about that flag. There don’t seem to be too many people willing to die for it although there is no lack of goons, thugs, and terrorists willing to use it for their own nefarious purposes. In that respect, it is something of an anti-flag.)

In this new Middle East, an emboldened Iran will be able to continue to thumb its nose at the international community as they go about the task of building their very own “Final Solution to the Jewish Question.” No need to bother with gas chambers and death camps this time around. Those crude instruments of mass extinction have been made obsolete both by science and the willful blindness of a world community that actually believes that if they pretend hard enough, ignore the extinguishing rhetoric emanating from Tehran, and blame Bush and the “Neo-Cons” in a loud enough voice, that the horror will either go away or only haunt them in their dreams and not be realized in the flesh.

Maybe they’ll be proven correct. Maybe Ahmadinejad is a rational actor and only wants to live in peace. Maybe all of his talk about the return of the 12th Imam is for domestic consumption. Maybe he really didn’t say that he’d “wipe Israel off the map” or that he didn’t really suggest transplanting the state of Israel onto European soil.

Maybe. Or maybe he means everything he says to the very core of his being in which case maybe someone should stop him before he carries out his threats.

But in order to stop Ahmadinejad, someone somewhere is going to have to stand up to his aggression. Israel tried and was slapped down for their effort. And since everyone knows that the only reason America would do anything to try and stop the Persians is to steal their oil, that leaves the fate of Israel and probably the world in the hands of those who preach “collective security” but in practice, carry out “collective surrender.”

Much has been made in conservative circles recently about events occurring now being reminiscent of events in the 1930’s and that mirror Hitler’s march to war. It is always problematic to try and graft one historical period onto another to glean “lessons from history” so that we don’t make the same mistakes again. I believe that kind of thinking dangerously simplistic and overwrought. Iran isn’t Nazi Germany. And America is not Great Britain or France. We see these parallels largely because of the nauseating anti-Semitism raising its ugly head not just in the Middle East but in Europe and America as well. That and the seeming paralysis of the world when confronted with the evil designs of evil men makes the simile an easy reach, almost a writer’s shorthand to explain it all in two paragraphs or less.

The differences between then and now are profound and obvious - so much so that I am not going to list them. But I would agree that the lessons from that time of world turmoil should never be forgotten regardless of whether there are historical connections to be made between the two epochs. Nations like Iran will not be deterred by diplomatic give and take. They will not be “contained” in any meaningful way by sanctions (especially the kind of sanctions being discussed at the UN Security Council).

They must be defeated. And by allowing their proxy Hizbullah to literally get away with terrorist murder, the UN has made the monumental mistake of legitimizing Hizbullah tactics while punishing Israel for exercising its right of self defense.

If there is a worse signal the world body has ever sent in its entire, miserable existence, I can’t think of one.

One of the wisest old heads on Islam and the Middle East is issuing a shocking warning: Beware of August 22:

What is the significance of Aug. 22? This year, Aug. 22 corresponds, in the Islamic calendar, to the 27th day of the month of Rajab of the year 1427. This, by tradition, is the night when many Muslims commemorate the night flight of the prophet Muhammad on the winged horse Buraq, first to “the farthest mosque,” usually identified with Jerusalem, and then to heaven and back (c.f., Koran XVII.1). This might well be deemed an appropriate date for the apocalyptic ending of Israel and if necessary of the world. It is far from certain that Mr. Ahmadinejad plans any such cataclysmic events precisely for Aug. 22. But it would be wise to bear the possibility in mind.

Bernard Lewis is no tin foil hat nutcase. He is as sober and as realistic as anyone you’re likely to listen to about Islam. Here’s a good backgrounder on Lewis written by Reuel Marc Gerecht.

Lewis also makes a chilling statement about why mutual assured destruction (MAD) may not work with President Ahmadinejad:

There is a radical difference between the Islamic Republic of Iran and other governments with nuclear weapons. This difference is expressed in what can only be described as the apocalyptic worldview of Iran’s present rulers. This worldview and expectation, vividly expressed in speeches, articles and even schoolbooks, clearly shape the perception and therefore the policies of Ahmadinejad and his disciples.

[snip]

A direct attack on the U.S., though possible, is less likely in the immediate future. Israel is a nearer and easier target, and Mr. Ahmadinejad has given indication of thinking along these lines. The Western observer would immediately think of two possible deterrents. The first is that an attack that wipes out Israel would almost certainly wipe out the Palestinians too. The second is that such an attack would evoke a devastating reprisal from Israel against Iran, since one may surely assume that the Israelis have made the necessary arrangements for a counterstrike even after a nuclear holocaust in Israel.

The first of these possible deterrents might well be of concern to the Palestinians–but not apparently to their fanatical champions in the Iranian government. The second deterrent–the threat of direct retaliation on Iran–is, as noted, already weakened by the suicide or martyrdom complex that plagues parts of the Islamic world today, without parallel in other religions, or for that matter in the Islamic past. This complex has become even more important at the present day, because of this new apocalyptic vision.

Lewis has fingered something that most other “experts” either refuse to acknowledge or are simply unable to grasp; the determined fanaticism of our enemy.

This weird and dangerous blind spot in many leading academics, diplomats, and even military and intelligence analysts is something I’ve noted before. By insisting that fanatics like Ahmadinejad can be reasoned with, or bargained with, or deterred in any “traditional” way, the experts are able to rationalize almost any policy or proposal except confronting the madness in an effort to totally marginalize it or destroy it.

We’ve all heard the “explanations.” The Iranian President is “playing to his domestic supporters” with his apocalyptic rhetoric. He really doesn’t mean it. He’s a “rational actor” on the world stage and can be trusted to keep any agreement he reaches because it is in his “interest” to do so. He won’t give nukes to terrorists because he is deterred from doing so by the prospect of a massive retaliatory strike by the US or Israel.

Like colonial Indian negotiators trying to end border predations, the diplomats believe that by offering nice, shiny baubles to the Iranian President - WTO membership, unlimited enrichment of reactor fuel, a place at the table of civilized nations - they can entice him to give up his dream of building a nuclear weapon and destroying the “Great Satan.” This attitude presupposes that the Iranian President is interested in any of those things except as a strategy that would lull the West into somnolence and assuage their fears for a time.

With almost a childlike faith in inspections and monitoring, the experts would then pronounce the fanatic “in a box” and made relatively harmless.

And we all lived happily ever after…

The idea that Ahmadinejad can’t be deterred, or bought off, or deflected in any way from his fanatical, religiously inspired goal is such an anathema to most of our “wise men” that perhaps it is a concept that simply escapes them. Like the theory of quantum mechanics escapes almost everyone, maybe there is nothing in these very smart, very able people’s life experience that would allow them to face up to and recognize that, like Hitler, Ahamadinejad is announcing exactly what he intends to do, so pleased he is with his grand designs that he simply must share them with the world.

It took American soldiers fighting in the Pacific only a few run ins with the Japanese army to understand the kind of fanaticism they were up against. The average GI being a practical sort of fellow and very interested in staying alive, realized very quickly not to trust the Japanese when they surrendered. This led to many incidents where the Japanese (whose martial code saw surrender as the ultimate disgrace) would only pretend to surrender in order to get the Americans to expose themselves. Not a few GI’s were killed as the enemy would reinitiate combat once the Americans were in range.

And the Japanese human wave attacks were enormously disconcerting at first to our men. These “Banzai charges” where the enemy was killed to the last man in what appeared to be a futile gesture but was actually part of the Bushido (”Code of the Warrior”), troubled the GI’s. But they adapted very quickly so that even the psychological impact of the charges were lessened over time.

Perhaps our experts simply have not been able to apply the necessary lessons of history to the present circumstances with Ahmadinejad. Perhaps, like most diplomats, they are so in love with the idea of “process” that the end result of any negotiations aren’t as important as the negotiations themselves. This is a mindset that seems especially prevalent with our Middle East diplomatic community. For 60 years, the “process” has dominated. But what have been the practical, real world benefits accrued over that time? To the United States? To Israel? During the cold war, this “process” kept the lid on the Middle East so that there would be no direct confrontation between the superpowers who might feel obligated to come to the rescue of one of their surrogates if things got too out of control.

We saw this in the 1973 Arab-Israeli War as the Russians, fearing a complete collapse of their Egyptian client, almost sent combat troops to assist Sadat. Nixon responded by going to a high nuclear alert. That disabused the Russians of any idea they may have had of intervening in the conflict and Nixon cancelled the alert within 48 hours.

The Russians, being rational actors, understood Nixon’s message and stood down. Would Ahmadinejad do the same? Bernard Lewis has his doubts. And when an old wise man like Lewis can look fanaticism in the face and speak the truth, we should listen closely. And we should hope that anyone anywhere who has anything to do with any potential negotiations with that dangerous fanatic is listening also.

Allah is reporting that Condi Rice is announcing that the Administration will deal with Iran regarding their nuclear program:

The long and short of it is that the ball’s back in Iran’s court: if, as suspected, they refuse to stop enriching uranium then we’re off the hook for not talking to them directly. We offered, they declined. But here’s the thing: why on earth would she acknowledge Iran’s right to nuclear energy? Presumably that’s a concession to the Iranian people, who have had propaganda to that effect drummed into them for months. But what happens if Iran calls our bluff, suspends enrichment temporarily in order to get us to the table, and then starts enriching uranium again for its “energy” program? She’s already conceded they have the right to do so. On what grounds does she object next time?

Allah asks the correct questions and the answers to all of them is an unsatisfactory “I don’t know.” But the idea that this changes the strategic situation in any way is incorrect. We still have the full range of military options on the table if this Administration or the next feels it necessary to slow down the Iranian bomb program. We still have the option to invade if we’re of a mind to, although God knows what kind of a hornets nest that would stir up in the region.

The only thing that changes, as Allah correctly points out, is that the diplomatic ball is back in the Iranian court. Given the extremely troubling news that Ahmadinejad is not being reined in by the conservative mullahs who actually run the country but is, in fact consolidating his power by continuing his purging of what passes for “moderates” in Iran, it will come as no surprise if talks that would stop the lunatic’s bomb making program go nowhere.

What all this maneuvering comes down to is a very simple, straightforward question: Can we allow the current regime in Iran to arm itself with nuclear weapons? If we cannot, then the rope we allow Mr. Ahmadinejad to hang himself with must be very short indeed. In other words, we should not stand for any tomfoolery about stopping and starting an enrichment program that could very well be proceeding along two tracks anyway - a civilian component that is verifiable by the UN and a secret military program that the CIA doesn’t believe exists but that troubling indications have surfaced of such a possibility.

I understand why many would look upon any talks with Iran as a fruitless exercise. But given the perception of the United States around the world - a perception eagerly promoted by left wingers in this country and abroad - that the US is hell bent on blood and conquest, it would assist our efforts, however feebly, to garner some support from states where our friends need the political cover of negotiations in order to support us.

We may end up going it alone if we take action against the Iranian nuclear program. But it would be prudent and wise to do everything we can to prevent such a development by negotiations even if there be a small chance of success. Events themselves might overtake the mullahs and Ahmadinejad which would make any military action unnecessary.

A small chance indeed. But one that we owe to those we will be sending into harms way to protect us.

UPDATE: NOTE TO MOONBATS

In contrast to the rambling, insulting, laughably ignorant letter sent by President Ahmadinejad to President Bush that didn’t contain anything resembling a diplomatic proposal, this short statement by Condi Rice shows the DUmmies and KosKids how it’s done:

“To underscore our commitment to a diplomatic solution and to enhance prospects for success, as soon as Iran fully and verifiably suspends its enrichment and reprocessing activities, the United States will come to the table,” Rice says in her prepared text. “We hope that in the coming days, the Iranian government will thoroughly consider this proposal.”

Now would you please shut your yaps about how the Administration “spurned” or “rejected” or “turned down” that lunatic’s offer for peace? That piece of fluff had about as much to do with a diplomatic overture as Barry Bonds legitimately breaking Babe Ruth’s home run record.

Is there any relevance at all to the salutation that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad used in his letter to President Bush? Was it just a throw away line that had no meaning? Or was it a specific warning to America and the west to convert to Islam or be conquered?

Taken by itself, the line as translated “Peace only unto those who follow the true path.” would seem to indicate more religious hyperbole from the the man we are assured by our intellectual betters is only talking in apocalyptic terms for “domestic consumption.” Let him rant, they tell us, for Iran is no danger to the United States and after all, we’ve been beastly to them in the past, haven’t we?

But if that ending salutation was included deliberately - and given the huge importance placed by the Iranians on the letter this seems a pretty good bet - then one is left to ponder what exactly President Ahmadinejad meant when he used it.

Is the Iranian President echoing the Prophet Mohamed from 1500 years ago?

It is a phrase with historical significance in Islam, for, according to Islamic tradition, in year six of the Hejira – the late 620s – the prophet Mohammad sent letters to the Byzantine emperor and the Sassanid emperor telling them to convert to the true faith of Islam or be conquered. The letters included the same phrase that President Ahmadinejad used to conclude his letter to Mr. Bush. For Mohammad, the letters were a prelude to a Muslim offensive, a war launched for the purpose of imposing Islamic rule over infidels.

The exact words? Pretty chilling, that. But as I said, are we taking these words out of context? After all, this is not the 7th century and no one in their right mind would declare war on America and the west, right?

Here’s the Iranian President talking about exactly what he means during his visit to Indonesia:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said here Thursday that his letter to President George W. Bush did not concern the nuclear dossier, but rather was an invitation to Islam and the prophets culture.

He made the above remarks in reply to a reporter while attending press conference on his letter to President Bush in Jakarta in the afternoon of the third day of his stay in Jakarta. Stressing that the letter was beyond the nuclear issue, the chief executive said that in principle, the country’s nuclear case is not so significant to make him write a letter about it.

“We act according to laws and our activities are quite clear. We are rather intent on solving more fundamental global matters.”

“The letter was an invitation to monotheism and justice, which are common to all divine prophets. If the call is responded positively, there will be no more problems to be solved,” added the president.

The president said that the letter actually contained a clear message of invitation to human beliefs, adding that its response will determine the future.

The fact that this statement reconciles with what he wrote throughout his letter to President Bush should give any thinking person in the western world pause to consider how exactly Ahmadinejad might go about making good on this “invitation.”

Of course, our betters are already assuring us that Ahmadinejad was only speaking truth to power when he wrote that strange, insulting letter to the President. He, like his ideological soulmate Adolph Hitler, only used such language and such a tone to get attention. They are not really serious about “ridding Europe of the Jew menace” or “wiping Israel off the map.” This is all exaggerated rhetoric and therefore not even worth writing about. Best to portray the Iranian as a reasonable sort, someone the west can do business with if only we stopped being so darn insistent that someone be allowed to take a close look at his nuclear program to make sure (and believe me, we’re sure) that he’s not building one of those nuke thingies.

I am perplexed that we in the west have become so supine about our invincibility that when someone who has proven in thought, word, and deed that they are the mortal enemy of everything we hold near and dear to our hearts - that which falls under the rubric of “western liberal democracy - and then spells out in language that his culture and background tell him is a merciful warning to the infidel to change or be consumed, at which point we do absolutely nothing, I wonder if we in the west still has what it takes to defend our values and our beliefs.

Has Ahmadinejad taken note of our disinterest? I daresay we will regret the day we find out the answer to that question.

UPDATE: FROM OUR “HOLY SH*T!” FILE

The IAEA bumblers have apparently stumbled across some uranium residue that has been enriched far beyond anything the Iranians need for nuclear fuel. While further tests are needed, the residue tested is “beyond” weapons grade:

The U.N. atomic agency found traces of highly enriched uranium at an Iranian site linked to the country’s defense ministry, diplomats said Friday, adding to concerns that Tehran was hiding activities aimed at making nuclear arms.

The diplomats, who demanded anonymity in exchange for revealing the confidential information, said the findings were preliminary and still had to be confirmed through other lab tests. But they said the density of enrichment appeared to be close to or above the level used to make nuclear warheads.

Still, they said, further analysis could show that the traces match others established to have come from abroad. The International Atomic Energy Agency determined earlier traces of weapons-grade uranium were imported on equipment from Pakistan that Iran bought on the black market during nearly two decades of clandestine activity discovered just over three years ago.

Why the IAEA has not revealed this is obvious; if they did so, then they would have to do something about it. And that means confrontation, something that ElBaradei and his cohorts try to avoid at all costs. Never mind that their job is to “speak truth to nuclear power.” Never mind that the Security Council relies on them to give members all the facts so that one of the momentus decisions of the young century can be made.

Is this what has emboldened Ahmadinejad? Could it be possible, even remotely, that the Iranians already have the bomb or are within an angel’s hair of building one?

I want to disbelieve what this news portends. But frankly, I do not trust the IAEA and ElBaradei to stop any country from developing nuclear weapons if they are so inclined. If Iran did indeed (as many suspected as recently as 6 months ago) have a two track nuclear program with greater urgency and secrecy given to the military end, it is remotely possible that they are much further along in developing a working nuclear weapon than we have been led to believe by our own experts as well as the CIA.

Will we even hear if the IAEA determines that the uranium residue is not from equipment bought in Pakistan but is actually the result of experiments done on site in Iran?

Don’t go there….