WarSclerotic

In conflict with West, Iran stirs war memories at home – Reuters.

By Yeganeh Torbati

DUBAI (Reuters) – Iranian leaders hoping to lift morale at a time of rising prices, food shortages and threats of attack from Israel are drawing on memories of another era when people united against a common foe: Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.

But whether the government can rekindle the passion that powered Iran’s huge war effort a generation ago remains an open question.

The 1980-1988 conflict with Iraq, in which hundreds of thousands of Iranians were killed, provides a ready comparison for officials looking to frame Iran’s present isolation over its disputed nuclear programme as an unwarranted aggression.

“Saddam’s war against us was not a war between us and one government; it was an international war against us,” Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in July. “These challenges … are not new for the Islamic Republic.”

Western nations suspect Iran is covertly developing a nuclear weapons capability. Tehran says its nuclear activity is only for peaceful energy and medical purposes.

Memories of the hardships borne by Iranians during the war with Iraq are still seared into the country’s consciousness.

Tens of thousands of civilians died in bombardment of cities. Teenage boys volunteered for the front and were killed in droves. Decades later, thousands of Iranians still suffer the ruinous effects of Saddam’s chemical weapons.

The war, known in Iran as the “sacred defence,” is marked by memorials and large murals of battle scenes. Metro stations and many streets in Tehran are named after war “martyrs.”

Iranian officials say sanctions imposed by the United States and Europe against Iran’s oil and banking sectors to force Tehran to stop its nuclear work amount to “economic warfare.”

Renewed threats by Israeli leaders of a strike on the nuclear sites have contributed to the sense of siege.

Some leaders hark back to the “imposed war” terminology of the 1980s, adopted because the conflict began when Iraq invaded.

Influential cleric Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati invoked the sacrifices of Iranians in an era he compared to the present.

“During the imposed war, the entire nation was mobilised. Even women were helping behind the front,” he said in a sermon in August, the Fars news agency reported. “The economic crisis is in reality a war which the enemy is waging against Iran.”

Thanks partly to Western sanctions, Iran’s currency has lost about half its value this year, while an estimated 50 percent drop in oil exports compared to last year has cost billions in lost revenue. The government puts inflation at 23 percent, but unofficial estimates put it at double this.

The government has urged Iranians to adopt a “resistance economy”, without specifying what that means beyond preparing for tough times. One cleric has suggested Iranians meet their protein needs with egg soup if they cannot afford meat.

Queues this summer for government-subsidised chicken reminded older Iranians of the war years, when butter and sugar were luxuries and people lined up for hours to buy milk.

“They even used to give coupons for cigarettes in the early days of the (1979) revolution,” said a tweet in Persian. “Today, they said come and get subsidised chicken. Welcome to the past era.”

DEFINING THE ENEMY

But Iran is now a very different place from the Iran of 1980, and the enemy is much less easy to define – and demonize.

“During the war with Iraq, most people including me believed we were oppressed by big powers that were helping Iraq and giving Saddam weapons,” Nasrin told Reuters by telephone. The 43-year-old housewife once sewed sheets and clothing for Iranian frontline soldiers.

“Many young people nowadays are not happy with the government and think the government is to blame for the country’s isolation,” said Nasrin, who like all the Iranians interviewed for this article did not want her full name used.

“I see my own daughters today and I often think how different they are from when I was their age. They are peace-loving people who think it is wrong for Iran to have bad relations with the rest of the world.”

In 1980, the youthful Islamic Republic and its founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini enjoyed a deep reservoir of popular support, said Meir Javedanfar, an Iranian-Israeli analyst at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, Israel.

“Ayatollah Khomeini led the people of Iran through the initial stages of the war after leading them through a historic revolution,” he said.

That support will be difficult for Khamenei to replicate, Javedanfar said, especially after the widespread popular unrest that followed President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s 2009 re-election. Protesters said the vote, endorsed by Khamenei, was rigged.

“Iran’s young generation is not as passionate as the one during that time (the Iraq war),” said 49-year-old Sotoudeh, an interior designer, also via telephone. “They are disillusioned somehow.

“They want jobs, security and a free environment. They never experienced the social freedoms that we had before the revolution, but nevertheless they love Iran.”

Rising food prices sparked protests in the northeastern town of Neishabour in July in a rare expression of discontent, according to a YouTube video and reports on Iranian news sites.

“They (the government) will certainly attempt to recreate this narrative of Iran versus the world, but at the end of the day far more Iranians care about the price of chicken than they do enriched uranium,” said Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington.

Several Iranians said they believed people would unite behind the government if Israel struck Iran’s nuclear sites, though perhaps less fervently than during the Iran-Iraq war.

An Israeli attack would probably involve air strikes targeting nuclear sites, rather than the full-scale air and ground invasion undertaken by Iraqi forces, depriving the government of images that could help stir nationalist sentiment.

“In case of an attack, we might not see as many young people volunteering to fight in a battle but I am sure they would not stay indifferent,” Sotoudeh said. “They would put up with harder conditions because they love their country.”

Others say Iranians, now accustomed to relatively high living standards, would not easily tolerate shortages and austerity again. Rising oil revenue in the last decade has enabled an expansion of the middle class. Foreign luxury goods fill shopping malls in major cities.

“The youth nowadays are much more materialistic and don’t give priority to the ideas that dominated our minds back then, such as preserving the Islamic government,” Ali, 53, an insurance manager who volunteered to fight in the 1980s, said by telephone.

“That said, I’m pretty sure these modern young Iranians would surprise everyone if a foreign country attacked,” he said.

“They might be after the latest cars, fashion and rock music but if they felt their country Iran was in danger, they would defend it with all they have.” (Editing by Sonya Hepinstall and Alistair Lyon)

Iran hits out at ‘irresponsible’ talk of more EU sanctions.

Sunday, 09 September 2012

Analysis: Can Israel surprise Iran? Maybe not, but could still strike.

German FM: Nuclear Iran would pos… JPost – Diplomacy & Politics.

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle emphasized the concerns his country shared with Israel over Iran’s nuclear program, following a meeting with Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Sunday.

“A nuclear-armed Iran would not only pose a threat to Israel but to the stability of the entire region. A nuclear-armed Iran is not an option,” he said.

He said that Germany would maintain sanctions and diplomatic pressure on Iran, adding that there was still room for diplomacy. “We urgently call on Iran to enter into substantial negotiations,” he said.

“We greatly appreciate the German government’s views on Iran,” Barak said during the meeting, calling Germany a “leading partner” in the international effort to use diplomacy and sanctions to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.

Barak also lauded the close security cooperation between the two countries, specifically mentioning the signed contract for a sixth submarine.

He further thanked Germany for for its contribution in strengthening the Palestinian Authority, the West Bank and Gaza and in promoting peace and normalization.

“Israel’s relationship with Germany is long-standing and based on a basic belief in democracy, value and memory, and we greatly appreciate your friendship,” Barak told Westerwelle.

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Report: Possible EMP Strike on Iran?.

U.S. intelligence agencies recently reported growing concerns that Israel will conduct a strike on Iran using a high-altitude nuclear burst aimed at disrupting all electronics in the country.

The intelligence worries were triggered by recent publication of an article in the Israeli press suggesting the Jewish state should carry out an electromagnetic pulse, or EMP, attack.

U.S. officials said the article likely reflects official Israeli government thinking about a possible preemptive response to Iran’s expected emergence as a nuclear weapons state in the near future.

Asked about the EMP report, an Israeli government spokesman declined to comment. A U.S. intelligence community spokesman also declined comment.

A U.S. official said the article in question appeared Aug. 6 in the news outlet Israel National News. The article stated that an Israeli nuclear burst over Iran could “send Iran back to the Stone Age.”

It was the first time the issue of a nuclear EMP attack by Israel had appeared in a mainstream Israeli press outlet.

U.S. officials also suspect the article was written by someone in the Israeli government who favors such a strike. Another theory among analysts is that the Israeli government, at a minimum, encouraged publication of the article.

The American author of the Israeli article, Joe Tuzara, wrote that growing signs Iran is speeding up development of nuclear weapons should lead Tel Aviv to launch the preemptive EMP attack.

“For the most part, Israel’s dilemma is focused singly on the use of electromagnetic pulse (EMP) without informing the U.S.,” Tuzara stated.

The attack could be carried out using a nuclear warhead detonated after launch by one of Israel’s Jericho III missiles at high-altitude over north central Iran.

EMP affects computers and other electronics and would disrupt critical infrastructure that relies on electronics and electricity, such as communications, transportation, and other networks.

The burst would create “no blast or radiation effects on the ground,” the article stated.

“Coupled with cyber-attacks, Iranians would not know it happened except for a massive shutdown of the electric power grid, oil refineries, and a transportation gridlock,” the article said.

“Food supply would be exhausted and communication would be largely impossible, leading to economic collapse. Similarly, the uranium enrichment centrifuges in Fordo, Natanz, and widely scattered elsewhere, would freeze for decades.”

Around the same time the article was published, state-run media in Iran announced that Iran plans to take all key government ministries off the Internet in September to protect against cyber attacks.

The announcement followed several cyber attacks that disabled Iranian computer networks, including those controlling the nuclear program.

The Israeli EMP article mirrors the doomsday scenario contained in the 2009 novel “One Second After” by American writer William R. Forstchen. The book has been widely read in U.S. military and intelligence circles, and examines the aftermath of an EMP attack on an American town.

Peter Pry, a former CIA analyst and a leading U.S. specialist on EMP, said he doubts the allegations that Israel is planning an EMP strike.

“It is not based on any Israeli source, but is the result of the U.S. media recycling its own speculation,” Pry told the Free Beacon in an email.

Pry said he was present at a meeting with a U.S. journalist who first advocated the idea. The notion was later picked up and reported by other U.S. reporters.

Pry said the speculation “is creating a misimpression that there is some credible Israeli source behind it.”

“In fact, I have been to Israel, at the invitation of their government, to help convince officials that Israel should protect its electric grid from EMP,” said Pry, who now heads a group called EMPact America.

“I have been invited to return to continue this mission in October,” he said. “If Israel has such high confidence in the efficacy of an EMP attack, why do they need to be educated on the consequences to their own grid by me?”

Pry also said it is not clear an EMP attack would shut down the Iranian nuclear program since Iran’s centrifuges, which are being used to spin uranium gas into nuclear weapons fuel, are underground in bunkers protected from earth-penetrating weapons.

He also said the electromagnetic shockwave produced by an EMP blast could affect centrifuges, but the wave cannot penetrate too deeply into the earth.

“The EMP would certainly take down Iran’s national electric grid, and nuclear weapons programs do require vast amounts of electricity (less so when based on centrifuges),” Pry said. “But the underground facilities probably have emergency generators.”

“An EMP attack could conceivably stop Iran’s nuclear weapons program, not by destroying nuclear facilities, but by paralyzing the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and allowing the people to successfully revolt and achieve regime change,” Pry said.

Tuzara said his analysis of the prospect of a preemptive strike is based on five signs that Iran has reached what Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak has called a “zone of immunity.”

They include Iran’s plans to speed up uranium enrichment to 80 to 90 percent or weapons grade; along with indications that Iran has tested its ballistic missiles in an EMP mode with help from North Korea.

Other indicators include reports that Iran can further enrich its stocks of low-enriched uranium for weapons; and satellite photos that show recent fortification of underground nuclear facilities in Iran.

Last, the Iranians have begun loading fuel rods into the core of the Bushehr nuclear power plant reactor.

“In light of the latest developments, there is no question that Iran is now a de facto nuclear state—a ‘casus belli’ for Israeli military action,” Tuzara said.

U.S. intelligence analysts and military intelligence officials are on high alert for any indications Israel will conduct a strike on Iran that could lead to a large-scale regional conflict.

Some U.S. officials believe Israel could conduct some type of action against Iran in October, prior to the U.S. presidential election.

America’s closest ally in the Middle East might act without warning.

U.S. concerns over an Israeli attack were heightened by Ehud Barak, the Israeli defense minister, who said July 25 that any military strikes to set back Iran’s nuclear program would be costly, but that the loss of human life in a future Iranian nuclear attack on Israel would be far greater.

Iran has threatened counterattacks against Israel if it conducts a strike.

Iranian legislator Avaz Heidarpour was quoted in state-run Fars News Agency that if Israel attacks Iran, Iran could not guarantee that even one single Zionist living in the occupied Palestinian territories will survive.

“We have no doubt that the Zionists’ claims about attacking Iran are nothing but psychological warfare,” he said.

‘Israel could send Iran back to Stone Age’ – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Sunday Times quotes defense experts as saying that Jewish state could cripple Islamic Republic’s power grid with electromagnetic pulses

Ynet

British newspaper Sunday Times has exposed one of the “surprises” the Israel Defense Forces has in store in case of a military strike in Iran.

According to the Sunday morning report, the Jewish state could cripple the Islamic Republic’s power grid with electromagnetic pulses as part of a concerted attack to halt Iran’s military nuclear program, which could “send Iran back to the Stone Age.”

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The report, by Uzi Mahnaimi, claims that the possible use of such a weapon has been raised in several quarters as a debate rages among Israel’s politicians about whether a swift strike should be launched against Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Bill Gertz, a veteran American defense specialist, is quoted as saying that US intelligence agencies have reported “growing concerns that Israel will conduct a strike on Iran using a high-altitude nuclear burst aimed at disrupting all electronics in the country.”

The technology behind EMP, which is regarded as non-lethal, has been known for decades, the Sunday Times reports.

An electromagnetic pulse is an intense burst of gamma energy that reacts with the Earth’s magnetic field to produce a powerful current. This sets off a shockwave with the potential to “fry” electronic devices and circuits.

Although the potential of EMP was first noted as a side effect of high-altitude nuclear tests in the 1950s and 1960s, the report says, a pulse can also be produced by non-nuclear means such as a microwave generator.

Such a pulse could knock out the power grid and communications for transport, financial and emergency services.

The newspaper quotes Uzi Rubin, who helped develop Israel’s anti-missile defense shield, as saying that “the use of a nuclear device even for non-lethal use such as EMP is out of the question. There are methods to operate EMP from the ground.”