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The strategic genius of Iran’s supreme leader

March 2, 2015

The strategic genius of Iran’s supreme leader, The Washington Post, Ray Takeyh, March 1, 2015

(Please see also Adolph Hitler. However, a genius at strategy was not needed to best Obama. The words “thirty pieces of silver” keep going through my head. I wonder why.– DM)

As Khamenei held firm . . . the great powers grew wobbly. With the advent of the Joint Plan of Action in November 2013, Iran’s fortunes began to change.

As Khamenei presses toward an accord that will place him in an enviable nuclear position, he can also be assured that technical violations of his commitments would not be firmly opposed. Once a deal is transacted, the most essential sanctions against Iran will evaporate. It is unlikely that Europeans, much less China or Russia, would agree to their reconstitution should Iran be caught cheating. And as far as the use of force is concerned, the United States has negotiated arms-control compacts for at least five decades and has never used force to punish a state that has incrementally violated its treaty obligations. As the reaction to North Korea’s atomic provocations shows, the international community typically deals with such infractions through endless mediation. Once an agreement is signed, too many nations become invested in its perpetuation to risk a rupture.

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On the surface, there is not much that commends Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. An anti-Semite, he has frequently questioned the Holocaust and defamed Israel in despicable terms. As a conspiracy theorist, he endlessly weaves strange tales about the United States and its intentions. As a national leader, he has ruthlessly repressed Iran’s once-vibrant civil society while impoverishing its economy. And yet Khamenei is also a first-rate strategic genius who is patiently negotiating his way to a bomb.

After years of defiance, Khamenei seems to appreciate that his most advantageous path to nuclear arms is through an agreement. To continue to build up his atomic infrastructure without the protective umbrella of an agreement exposes Iran to economic sanctions and the possibility of military retribution. While in the past Khamenei may have been willing to cross successive U.S. “red lines,” the price of such truculence was financial stress that he feared could provoke unrest. Unlike many of his Western interlocutors, Khamenei appreciates that his regime rests on shaky foundations and that the legitimacy of the Islamic revolution has long been forfeited. The task at hand was to find a way to forge ahead with a nuclear program while safeguarding the regime and its ideological verities.

In many ways, a nuclear agreement is the answer to Khamenei’s multiplicity of dilemmas. A good agreement for the supreme leader, however, has to be technologically permissive and of a limited duration. Since the exposure of Iran’s illicit nuclear program in 2002, its disciplined diplomats have insisted that any accord must be predicated on the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which, in their telling, grants Iran the right to construct a vast nuclear infrastructure. In exchange for such a “right,” they would be willing to concede to an inspection regime within the leaky confines of the NPT. And for much of that time, the great powers rebuffed such presumptions from a state that has been censured by numerous U.N. Security Council resolutions and denies the International Atomic Energy Agency reliable access to its facilities and scientists.

As Khamenei held firm, however, the great powers grew wobbly. With the advent of the Joint Plan of Action in November 2013, Iran’s fortunes began to change. Washington conceded to Iran’s enrichment at home and agreed that eventually that enrichment capacity could be industrialized. The marathon negotiations since have seen Iran attempt to whittle down the remaining restrictions, while the United States tries to reclaim its battered red lines. For Khamenei, the most important concession that his negotiators have won is the idea of a sunset clause. Upon the expiration of that clause, there would be no legal limits on Iran’s nuclear ambitions. If the Islamic Republic wants to construct hundreds of thousands of sophisticated centrifuges, build numerous heavy-water reactors and sprinkle its mountains with enrichment installations, the Western powers will have no recourse. And once Iran achieves that threshold nuclear status, there is no verification regime that is guaranteed to detect a sprint to a bomb. An industrial-size nuclear state has too many atomic resources, too many plants and too many scientists to be reliably restrained.

As Khamenei presses toward an accord that will place him in an enviable nuclear position, he can also be assured that technical violations of his commitments would not be firmly opposed. Once a deal is transacted, the most essential sanctions against Iran will evaporate. It is unlikely that Europeans, much less China or Russia, would agree to their reconstitution should Iran be caught cheating. And as far as the use of force is concerned, the United States has negotiated arms-control compacts for at least five decades and has never used force to punish a state that has incrementally violated its treaty obligations. As the reaction to North Korea’s atomic provocations shows, the international community typically deals with such infractions through endless mediation. Once an agreement is signed, too many nations become invested in its perpetuation to risk a rupture.

Iran’s achievements today are a tribute to the genius of an unassuming midlevel cleric. In a region where many dictatorial regimes have collapsed, the Islamic Republic goes on. Khamenei is in command of the most consequential state from the Persian Gulf to the banks of the Mediterranean. He has routinely entered negotiations with the weakest hand and emerged in the strongest position. God is indeed great.

Categories: Foreign policy, Iran scam, Iranian nukes, Israel, Khamenei, Obama
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Special Report: How Iran’s military chiefs operate in Iraq

February 25, 2015

Special Report: How Iran’s military chiefs operate in Iraq, Reuters, February 24, 2015

File photo of a tank belonging to the Shi'ite Badr Brigade militia taking position in front of a gas station in Suleiman Beg, northern IraqA tank belonging to the Shi’ite Badr Brigade militia takes position in front of a gas station in Suleiman Beg, northern Iraq in this September 9, 2014 file photo. CREDIT: REUTERS/AHMED JADALLAH/FILES

The face stares out from multiple billboards in central Baghdad, a grey-haired general casting a watchful eye across the Iraqi capital. This military commander is not Iraqi, though. He’s Iranian.

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(Reuters) – The face stares out from multiple billboards in central Baghdad, a grey-haired general casting a watchful eye across the Iraqi capital. This military commander is not Iraqi, though. He’s Iranian.

The posters are a recent arrival, reflecting the influence Iran now wields in Baghdad.

Iraq is a mainly Arab country. Its citizens, Shi’ite and Sunni Muslims alike, have long mistrusted Iran, the Persian nation to the east. But as Baghdad struggles to fight the Sunni extremist group Islamic State, many Shi’ite Iraqis now look to Iran, a Shi’ite theocracy, as their main ally.

In particular, Iraqi Shi’ites have grown to trust the powerful Iranian-backed militias that have taken charge since the Iraqi army deserted en masse last summer. Dozens of paramilitary groups have united under a secretive branch of the Iraqi government called the Popular Mobilisation Committee, or Hashid Shaabi. Created by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s predecessor Nuri al-Maliki, the official body now takes the lead role in many of Iraq’s security operations. From its position at the nexus between Tehran, the Iraqi government, and the militias, it is increasingly influential in determining the country’s future.

Until now, little has been known about the body. But in a series of interviews with Reuters, key Iraqi figures inside Hashid Shaabi have detailed the ways the paramilitary groups, Baghdad and Iran collaborate, and the role Iranian advisers play both inside the group and on the frontlines.

Those who spoke to Reuters include two senior figures in the Badr Organisation, perhaps the single most powerful Shi’ite paramilitary group, and the commander of a relatively new militia called Saraya al-Khorasani.

In all, Hashid Shaabi oversees and coordinates several dozen factions. The insiders say most of the groups followed a call to arms by Iraq’s leading Shi’ite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. But they also cite the religious guidance of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran, as a key factor in their decision to fight and – as they see it – defend Iraq.

Hadi al-Amiri, the leader of the Badr Organisation, told Reuters: “The majority of us believe that … Khamenei has all the qualifications as an Islamic leader. He is the leader not only for Iranians but the Islamic nation. I believe so and I take pride in it.”

He insisted there was no conflict between his role as an Iraqi political and military leader and his fealty to Khamenei.

“Khamenei would place the interests of the Iraqi people above all else,” Amiri said.

FROM BATTLEFIELD TO HOSPITAL

Hashid Shaabi is headed by Jamal Jaafar Mohammed, better known by his nom de guerre Abu Mahdi al-Mohandis, a former Badr commander who once plotted against Saddam Hussein and whom American officials have accused of bombing the U.S. embassy in Kuwait in 1983.

Iraqi officials say Mohandis is the right-hand man of Qassem Soleimani, head of the Quds Force, part of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard. Mohandis is praised by some militia fighters as “the commander of all troops” whose “word is like a sword above all groups.”

The body he heads helps coordinate everything from logistics to military operations against Islamic State. Its members say Mohandis’ close friendships with both Soleimani and Amiri helps anchor the collaboration.

The men have known each other for more than 20 years, according to Muen al-Kadhimi, a Badr Organisation leader in western Baghdad. “If we look at this history,” Kadhimi said, “it helped significantly in organizing the Hashid Shaabi and creating a force that achieved a victory that 250,000 (Iraqi) soldiers and 600,000 interior ministry police failed to do.”

Kadhimi said the main leadership team usually consulted for three to four weeks before major military campaigns. “We look at the battle from all directions, from first determining the field … how to distribute assignments within the Hashid Shaabi battalions, consult battalion commanders and the logistics,” he said.

Soleimani, he said, “participates in the operation command center from the start of the battle to the end, and the last thing (he) does is visit the battle’s wounded in the hospital.”

Iraqi and Kurdish officials put the number of Iranian advisers in Iraq between 100 and several hundred – fewer than the nearly 3,000 American officers training Iraqi forces. In many ways, though, the Iranians are a far more influential force.

Iraqi officials say Tehran’s involvement is driven by its belief that Islamic State is an immediate danger to Shi’ite religious shrines not just in Iraq but also in Iran. Shrines in both nations, but especially in Iraq, rank among the sect’s most sacred.

The Iranians, the Iraqi officials say, helped organize the Shi’ite volunteers and militia forces after Grand Ayatollah Sistani called on Iraqis to defend their country days after Islamic State seized control of the northern city of Mosul last June.

Prime Minister Abadi has said Iran has provided Iraqi forces and militia volunteers with weapons and ammunition from the first days of the war with Islamic State.

They have also provided troops. Several Kurdish officials said that when Islamic State fighters pushed close to the Iraq-Iran border in late summer, Iran dispatched artillery units to Iraq to fight them. Farid Asarsad, a senior official from the semi-autonomous Iraqi region of Kurdistan, said Iranian troops often work with Iraqi forces. In northern Iraq, Kurdish peshmerga soldiers “dealt with the technical issues like identifying targets in battle, but the launching of rockets and artillery – the Iranians were the ones who did that.”

Kadhimi, the senior Badr official, said Iranian advisers in Iraq have helped with everything from tactics to providing paramilitary groups with drone and signals capabilities, including electronic surveillance and radio communications.

“The U.S. stayed all these years with the Iraqi army and never taught them to use drones or how to operate a very sophisticated communication network, or how to intercept the enemy’s communication,” he said. “The Hashid Shaabi, with the help of (Iranian) advisers, now knows how to operate and manufacture drones.”

A MAGICAL FIGHTER

One of the Shi’ite militia groups that best shows Iran’s influence in Iraq is Saraya al-Khorasani. It was formed in 2013 in response to Khamenei’s call to fight Sunni jihadists, initially in Syria and later Iraq.

The group is responsible for the Baghdad billboards that feature Iranian General Hamid Taghavi, a member of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Known to militia members as Abu Mariam, Taghavi was killed in northern Iraq in December. He has become a hero for many of Iraq’s Shi’ite fighters.

Taghavi “was an expert at guerrilla war,” said Ali al-Yasiri, the commander of Saraya al-Khorasani. “People looked at him as magical.”

In a video posted online by the Khorasani group soon after Taghavi’s death, the Iranian general squats on the battlefield, giving orders as bullets snap overhead. Around him, young Iraqi fighters with AK-47s press themselves tightly against the ground. The general wears rumpled fatigues and has a calm, grandfatherly demeanor. Later in the video, he rallies his fighters, encouraging them to run forward to attack positions.

Within two days of Mosul’s fall on June 10 last year, Taghavi, a member of Iran’s minority Arab population, traveled to Iraq with members of Iran’s regular military and the Revolutionary Guard. Soon, he was helping map out a way to outflank Islamic State outside Balad, 50 miles (80 km) north of Baghdad.

Taghavi’s time with Saraya al-Khorasani proved a boon for the group. Its numbers swelled from 1,500 to 3,000. It now boasts artillery, heavy machine guns, and 23 military Humvees, many of them captured from Islamic State.

“Of course, they are good,” Yasiri said with a grin. “They are American made.”

In November, Taghavi was back in Iraq for a Shi’ite militia offensive near the Iranian border. Yasiri said Taghavi formulated a plan to “encircle and besiege” Islamic State in the towns of Jalawala and Saadiya. After success with that, he began to plot the next battle. Yasiri urged him to be more cautious, but Taghavi was killed by a sniper in December.

At Taghavi’s funeral, the head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Ali Shamkhani, eulogized the slain commander. He was, said Shamkhani, one of those Iranians in Iraq”defending Samarra and giving their blood so we don’t have to give our blood in Tehran.” Both Soleimani and the Badr Organisation’s Amiri were among the mourners.

A NEW IRAQI SOUL

Saraya al-Khorasani’s headquarters sit in eastern Baghdad, inside an exclusive government complex that houses ministers and members of parliament. Giant pictures of Taghavi and other slain al-Khorasani fighters hang from the exterior walls of the group’s villa.

Commander Yasiri walks with a cane after he was wounded in his left leg during a battle in eastern Diyala in November. On his desk sits a small framed drawing of Iran’s Khamenei.

He describes Saraya al-Khorasani, along with Badr and several other groups, as “the soul” of Iraq’s Hashid Shaabi committee.

Not everyone agrees. A senior Shi’ite official in the Iraqi government took a more critical view, saying Saraya al-Khorasani and the other militias were tools of Tehran. “They are an Iranian-made group that was established by Taghavi. Because of their close ties with Iranians for weapons and ammunition, they are so effective,” the official said.

Asarsad, the senior Kurdish official, predicts Iraq’s Shi’ite militias will evolve into a permanent force that resembles the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. That sectarian force, he believes, will one day operate in tandem with Iraq’s regular military.

“There will be two armies in Iraq,” he said.

That could have big implications for the country’s future. Human rights groups have accused the Shi’ite militias of displacing and killing Sunnis in areas they liberate — a charge the paramilitary commanders vigorously deny. The militias blame any excesses on locals and accuse Sunni politicians of spreading rumors to sully the name of Hashid Shaabi.

The senior Shi’ite official critical of Saraya al-Khorasani said the militia groups, which have the freedom to operate without directly consulting the army or the prime minister, could yet undermine Iraq’s stability. The official described Badr as by far the most powerful force in the country, even stronger than Prime Minister Abadi.

Amiri, the Badr leader, rejected such claims. He said he presents his military plans directly to Abadi for approval.

His deputy Kadhimi was in no doubt, though, that the Hashid Shaabi was more powerful than the Iraqi military.

“A Hashid Shaabi (soldier) sees his commander … or Haji Hadi Amiri or Haji Mohandis or even Haji Qassem Soleimani in the battle, eating with them, sitting with them on the ground, joking with them. This is why they are ready to fight,” said Kadhimi. “This is why it is an invincible force.”

Categories: Combat troops, Foreign policy, Iran, Iran military, Iraq, Iraqi military, Islam, Islamic State, Middle East, Obama, Shia, Sunni, Supreme Leader
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Why is Obama fixated on Iran?

February 20, 2015

Why is Obama fixated on Iran? Israel Hayom, David M. Weinberg, February 20, 2015

America is ready to legitimize a seismic shift in the global balance of power through a grand civilizational bargain with the ayatollahs of Iran.

It is ardor for Islam and sympathy for Islamic ambitions of global leadership, not just distaste for American overreach, that apparently fuels Obama’s secretive dash toward a deal with Iran.

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Why does U.S. President Barack Obama so desperately want a deal with Iran? Why is he so fixated on a grand bargain with the Islamic republic, the world’s biggest killer of Americans? What explains the president’s passion to embrace the radical mullahs of Tehran, despite the fact that all America’s traditional allies in the region are calling for him to check Iran’s advances? Why the deferential approach that seeks Iran’s partnership, instead of its isolation?

The question becomes even sharper when you consider the fact that Iran is patently not seeking integration in the Middle East or reconciliation with the West, but rather obviously domination of the region and apocalyptic victory over the West.

After all, you don’t have to be an expert to discern the expansionist and threatening Iranian strategy. Tehran is seeking to create a land corridor under its domination from the Persian Gulf through Iraq and Syria to the Mediterranean. The only missing link in this land bridge of Shiite supremacy is Anbar province in western Iraq, now under Islamic State control. Now you understand why Iranian troops are leading the fight against ISIS in this zone.

What is harder to understand are American airstrikes against ISIS in Anbar, which seem to be tailored to match the movements of Iranian ground advances. The clear U.S.-Iranian military coordination in this theater of operations gives lie to Washington’s denials that it has already entered into a tacit alliance with Iran.

While the defeat of ISIS is a rational American policy goal, acquiescence to Iranian ascendancy in ISIS’s stead is not. Nor is American acceptance of the Iranian takeover of Yemen, through its Zaydi/Houthi Shiite allies — which gives Iran choke-off control of the vital Bab el-Mandeb waterway at the opening the Red Sea. Obama’s Washington hasn’t even whimpered in protest or concern about this.

We also have no indication that in its current negotiations with Tehran the administration has tackled Iranian adventurism in Syria and Lebanon, and along Israel’s northern and southern borders. Just the opposite: The administration says that the talks with Iran have been narrowly focused on centrifuges and uranium stockpile limits. Iran’s regional subversion (plus its long-range missile capabilities and its human rights record, etc.) has not been on the agenda.

I don’t believe for a second that Obama truly thinks he can bring about substantial moderation of Iranian diplomatic and military behavior; that by giving Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei the comprehensive sanctions relief and renewed international legitimacy that Iran seeks, the Islamic republic will stop being the expansionist and aggressive Islamic republic it is.

That’s just not believable. Iran has consistently cast its quest for regional power as a movement of “Islamic resistance” against the U.S. and its sidekick, Israel. There is no basis for the assumption that moving to a less polarized relationship with Iran will accelerate a transition toward a more democratic, less theocratic, and less expansionist regime within Iran. On the contrary: A nuclear deal that lifts sanctions without addressing Iran’s regional ambitions would have the effect of greatly strengthening Iran’s hand.

And indeed, an Iranian Islamic empire is emerging in vast swaths of territory, from Shiraz to Sanaa and from Tabriz to Tripoli, right under Obama’s nose.

So again, what could possibly explain Obama’s relentless pursuit of strategic partnership with Iran — a partnership that is so perceptibly detrimental and dangerous to the West and to Israel and other long-standing American allies in the region?

A spate of recent articles by American analysts (Anthony Cordesman, Bill Kristol, Colin Dueck, Eli Lake, Elliott Abrams, Eric Edelman, Jonathan Tobin, Josef Joffe, Michael Doran, Michael Ledeen, Raymond Ibrahim, Victor Davis Hanson, Walter Russell Mead) have sought to plumb the depths of Obama’s fervor for rapprochement with Iran.

They mostly conclude that the roots of Obama’s approach rest in the fairly widespread, basically liberal, and quintessentially leftist convictions that America has for decades been sinful and diplomatically domineering, and must atone for its arrogance through retrenchment and accommodation. Obama shares the progressive aversion to the use of American power. Hence his chronic need to apologize for it.

Thus, U.S. Cold War culpability — in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Africa, South America and Cuba — is a burden on America that must be addressed by shrinking America’s global footprint, and allowing indigenous, revolutionary movements to legitimately emerge and stabilize.

As such, the rules of nuclear non-proliferation are an unfair Western construct and need not apply to Iran. China is an authentic power with vast continental rights. And Israel is an abnormality, a Western outpost of capitalism and privilege where it has never really belonged, an irritant that should be treated like any other country as much as politically possible — no more.

In short, Obama believes that he will be leaving the world a better place by cutting America down to size.

To me, this is an insufficient explanation of Obama’s symptoms. Nor does it help to call Obama messianic and self-absorbed — as in George Will’s delicious quip this week that “If narcissism were oil, this president would be Saudi Arabia.”

None of this explains the depth of commitment to a deal with Iran that Obama has evinced since his first day in office (and perhaps, even before taking office, as Michael Doran has sought to show in Mosaic magazine). Nor does it explain the administration’s commitment to keeping everybody in the dark about the extent of its apparent pact with Iran.

It seems to me that Obama’s fervor for Iran lies somewhere much more fundamental: In a deep-seated ideological belief that Islam has a rightful leadership place in the world.

Consider the fact that Obama’s inaugural address abroad was “A New Beginning,” delivered in Cairo in 2009 — a contrite appeal to the Muslim world for forgiveness and for partnership. Go back and listen to Obama wax eloquent about “hearing the call of the azaan” as a young man in Indonesia, and about the historical achievements of Islamic civilization in algebra and architecture. This is Obama speaking from the recesses of his soul.

Consider Obama’s refusal to acknowledge the Manichean and irreconcilable nature of the challenge posed to the West by radical Islam; his refusal to even mutter the words “Islamic extremism” or “jihadism”; and his absolute unwillingness to connect terrorism to Islam or even admit that Islamic terrorists deliberately target Jews (like those Jews in Paris’ Hyper Cacher grocery).

The terms radical Islam and Islamic terrorist aren’t in Obama’s lexicon because deep down Obama doesn’t believe that Western (or Judeo-Christian) civilization is any better than Islamic civilization.

No better, perhaps, than even the Islamic State group. Speaking to the National Prayer breakfast in Washington on February 5, Obama said: “Before we get on our high horse and think this [ISIS beheadings, sex slavery, crucifixion, roasting of humans, etc.] is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ.”

This is tantamount to saying that the West is rooted in immorality, and that it is time for other, no less moral, and possibly more moral, powers to emerge — specifically, Islamic powers. It is equivalent to saying that the denouement of America and rise of an Islamic superpower will elevate world politics to a better sphere.

It is like saying — actually this is exactly what Obama is saying! — that America is ready to legitimize a seismic shift in the global balance of power through a grand civilizational bargain with the ayatollahs of Iran.

It is ardor for Islam and sympathy for Islamic ambitions of global leadership, not just distaste for American overreach, that apparently fuels Obama’s secretive dash toward a deal with Iran.

Categories: Caliphate, Foreign policy, Ideology, Iran, Iran scam, Islam, Islamic State, Israel, Middle East, Obama, P5+1, Supreme Leader, Terrorism, Violent extremism
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Iran-Syria-North Korea Nuclear Nexus

January 28, 2015

Iran-Syria-North Korea Nuclear Nexus, Front Page Magazine, , January 28, 2015

Hassan

As Iranian and American chief diplomats continue to meet to find ways to speed up nuclear negotiations and strike a final nuclear deal that would lead to the removal of all international sanctions on the ruling clerics, the Obama administration persists in ignoring the recent revelations about the Islamic Republic and its covert operations in the region.

A new Western intelligence assessment points to efforts by the Syrian government to renew its operations in an underground and clandestine nuclear facility near Qusair, close to the border of Lebanon, in order to produce nuclear weapons. Citing the Western intelligence assessment, the German weekly Der Spiegel pointed out that the reconstruction of the nuclear facility is being conducted with the assistance of the Islamic Republic, North Korea, and Hezbollah.

The intelligence report indicates that dialogue between Ibrahim Othman, head of the Syrian Atomic Energy Commission of Iranian, and North Korean and Hezbollah affiliates were “intercepted.” In addition, according Abu Muhammad al-Bitar, the Free Syrian Army has also noticed the “unprecedented” presence of Iranian and Hezbollah security members in the town of Qusair on the suburbs of Homs.

If Iran is engaged in such operations assisting Syrian President Bashar al Assad, it is breaching the protocols of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), as well as posing a great threat to security in the region.

If, even before obtaining nuclear weapons, the ruling clerics of Iran are assisting their allies to become nuclear states, how can we trust the Islamic Republic in nuclear negotiations and how can one rely on their claim that they are not seeking to build a nuclear bomb?

Iran-Syria and North Korean-Syria military and nuclear cooperation has been going on for a long time. When it comes to the issues of ballistic missiles, Syria has previously cooperated with both Iran and North Korea.

Syria possess approximately 50 tons of uranium which could be adequate enough to create 5 nuclear bombs. For developing nuclear weapons either highly enriched uranium or an adequate amount of plutonium is required.

Some might make the argument that Syria developed the uranium by itself without the assistance of other countries or other non-state actors. Nevertheless, technically, pragmatically and realistically speaking, Syria does not possess the capability of developing an estimated 50 tons of natural uranium. This suggests that the role of other states and non-state actors have definitely played a significant role. Some of the only allies that the Syrian government has still kept are Iran, North Korea and Hezbollah.

It is crucial to point out that, without a doubt, becoming a nuclear state for the Syrian and Iranian government would be a formidable tool in to suppress opposition, maintain power, and deter foreign intervention in case of crimes against humanity.

There are two major nuclear site in Syria. The first one is the Al Kibar reactor in the northeast of the city of Deir Ezzour and the second one is Marj Sultan in the outskirt of Damascus where the fuel is reportedly stored.

News with respects to the Syrian government renewing its nuclear program were previously reported in 2013. There had been reports that some activities were being carried out at an alleged Syrian nuclear facility close to an eastern suburbs of Damascus, Marj Sultan.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported previously that Damascus was building a nuclear reactor in Deir Ezzour. Reportedly tons of enriched uranium in Damascus are being protected by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps and Hezbollah.

According to Der Spiegel, “Syria’s dictator has not given up his dream of an atomic weapon and has apparently built a new nuclear facility at a secret location…..It is an extremely unsettling piece of news.”

In addition to the aforementioned concerns about the undeclared Syrian nuclear site and nuclear proliferation, one of the crucial issues is that the nuclear material might fall in the hands of multiple other players and Islamist groups. In other words, if these nuclear sites are seized by some radical groups or Al Qaeda-linked affiliates, they might be capable of utilizing the highly enriched uranium and produce nuclear weapons.

Iran’s other indisputable and multi-layered activities and engagements in Syria — including the military, financial, intelligence, and advisory assistance to the Syrian government which have further radicalized and militarized the ongoing Syrian war — persist. In addition, the recent intelligence report and satellite images of secretly renewing nuclear activities with the assistance of the Iranian and North Korean governments poses a grave threat to stability and security in the region. Unfortunately, despite the seriousness of this issue, the Obama administration continues to ignore these issues and persists on trusting the Islamic Republic in the nuclear negotiations.

Categories: Assad, Foreign policy, Hezbollah, Iran, Iran scam, Israel, North Korea, Nukes, Obama, P5+1, Supreme Leader, Syria, Terrorism
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Argentine Prosecutor Death in Iran Terror Case Gets Curiouser

January 23, 2015

Argentine Prosecutor Death in Iran Terror Case Gets Curiouser, Legal Insurrection, , January 23, 2015

He documented enough of his charges that Interpol issued “red notices” for seven high-ranking Iranian officials, including Ali Akbar Rafsanjani and Ali Velayati, who were Iran’s president and foreign minister respectively at the time of the AMIA bombing. (Interpol does not have the power to arrest, so a “red notice” is as close as it comes to issuing an arrest warrant) Rafsanjani, despite being implicated in an act of terrorism in another nation is often referred to as a “moderate” nowadays. He is also considered to be a mentor to Iran’s current president, also often referred to as a “moderate,” Hassan Rouhani.

Alberto Nisman’s work exposed the danger that Iran poses to world security. Iran continues to violate international law with impunity and unfortunately there are too few Nisman’s daring to challenge Iran’s brazen misbehavior. His death will make the task of reining in Iran’s ambitions that much more difficult.

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Sunday night Argentinian prosecutor Alberto Nisman was found shot to death in his apartment. Nisman had been scheduled the following day to present his criminal complaint against Argentinian President  Cristina Fernández de Kirchner before a closed session of Argentina’s congress.

The initial claim (one made by Kirchner herself on her Facebook page) that Nisman committed suicide hardly seemed credible at the time. How many people would kill themselves before the high point of their careers? Nisman had spent ten years investigating the 1994 AMIA Jewish center bombing in Buenos Aires and now he was about to charge the president and other officials of his country with conspiring to cover up the Iranian involvement in that attack. (Now Kirchner says he was killed but “suggests that Nisman was murdered on the instructions of his foreign masters in order to create a scandal damaging to her and to her government.”)

Subsequent revelations during the week have made the claim of suicide even less credible now. At Business Insider, Armin Rosen recounted some of those revelations.

The lack of an exit wound suggested the fatal shot was fired at a further distance than Nisman could have managed had the wound been self-inflicted. His last WhatsApp was a photo of stacks of documentation related to the next day’s testimony and Nisman had apparently given his maid a grocery list for the following week. A 10-person government security detail was reportedly pulled off of his apartment the night of his assassination. Most damningly, there was no gunpowder residue found on Nisman’s hands, physical evidence that he didn’t discharge a firearm prior to his death.

Fausta has more, including some gleaned from the Spanish press. Notably despite earlier claims that Nisman’s apartment was locked from the inside, there are reports that there were two other ways into his apartment that were not locked. Fausta is also right that Nisman’s murder is all about Iran. (Rosen also wrote, “no matter who’s responsible for Nisman’s death, the Iranian regime benefits.”)

Nisman’s work on the AMIA case was invaluable in documenting Iran’s efforts to build a terror infrastructure in South America. Matt Levitt, an expert on Hezbollah, who recently published a book about the Iran-backed terror organization, wrote this week, “As I was writing my book, trying to navigate the convoluted details of the AMIA bombing and other Hezbollah plots, Nisman was an invaluable resource.”

Nisman’s work wasn’t just academic though. He documented enough of his charges that Interpol issued “red notices” for seven high-ranking Iranian officials, including Ali Akbar Rafsanjani and Ali Velayati, who were Iran’s president and foreign minister respectively at the time of the AMIA bombing. (Interpol does not have the power to arrest, so a “red notice” is as close as it comes to issuing an arrest warrant) Rafsanjani, despite being implicated in an act of terrorism in another nation is often referred to as a “moderate” nowadays. He is also considered to be a mentor to Iran’s current president, also often referred to as a “moderate,” Hassan Rouhani.

The AMIA bombing was not the only time Iran’s leadership was implicated in an attack on foreign soil. In addition to Rafsanjani and Velayati, a red notice was issued for Ali Fallahian for the AMIA bombing. Rafsanjani, Velayati and Fallahian were all implicated in another terror attack on foreign soil.

A German prosecutor “without naming them … implicated Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati and Intelligence Minister Ali Fallahian” in the 1992 massacre at the Mykonos restaurant in Berlin.

Iran’s revolutionary government is lawless. The Iranian actors in these foreign terror attackes weren’t rogue operators but members of the country’s political elite. It’s something to keep in mind when the Obama administration insists that it will make a nuclear agreement with Iran that will make everyone safer and more secure.

Even assuming the P5+1 nations can come to an agreement with Iran (an agreement is hardly a foregone conclusion, Iran would probably be very happy with a series of temporary agreements that free up billions and don’t force it to dismantle any element of their nuclear program), what grounds are there to trust Iran to keep its commitments?

Remember that the crisis with Iran over its nuclear program stems from Iran’s violations of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty that it signed. Six UN Security Council resolutions – three of them unanimous – were passed imposing sanctions on Iran for its violations. Iran isn’t looking to come into compliance but to be granted absolution for its violations.

Alberto Nisman’s work exposed the danger that Iran poses to world security. Iran continues to violate international law with impunity and unfortunately there are too few Nisman’s daring to challenge Iran’s brazen misbehavior. His death will make the task of reining in Iran’s ambitions that much more difficult.

Categories: Argentina, Iran, Iran scam, Iranian nukes, Islam, Islamic jihad, Obama, P5+1, Rouhani, Supreme Leader, Terrorism
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Russian Defense Minister in Iran for Arms Pact Talks

January 20, 2015

Russian Defense Minister in Iran for Arms Pact Talks, Washington Free Beacon,  , January 20, 2015

Mideast Iran Nuclear TalksIran’s Ghadir submarines / AP

Iran and Russia have been strengthening their military ties for quite some time. Moscow is largely responsible for Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and has provided the Islamic Republic with much of its missile arsenal.

“So long as we have an administration that’s not inclined to do anything in response, they’re going to keep it up. They’re going to speed ahead.”

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Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu is in Iran for high-level talks with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei about boosting Tehran’s supply of submarines, torpedoes, and sea-based cruise missiles, according to Russian media reports and sources familiar with details of the talks.

Shoigu, whose trip is being kept quiet with few details being released publicly, landed in Tehran on Monday to talk with Iranian leaders about “increasing defense cooperation and arms trade with the Islamic republic,” the Moscow Times reported.

The talks will focus on Iran’s desire to purchase from Russia a slew of advanced military hardware that would significantly boost Tehran’s sea power, particularly in the Gulf of Oman, according to one source familiar with the substance of the talks.

The arms deal talks also come a day after Iranian military leaders claimed that they have the ability to sink U.S. aircraft carriers.

Iran and Russia have been strengthening their military ties for quite some time. Moscow is largely responsible for Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and has provided the Islamic Republic with much of its missile arsenal.

The latest talks are a sign that both countries aim to maintain the relationship, particularly as Russia helps Iran build several new nuclear reactors in the southern portion of the country.

“Iran gets a lot of military advice and missile equipment from the Russians,” said Michael Ledeen, an Iran expert and former consultant to the National Security Council (NSC), State Department, and Defense Department.

However, “the bulk of that stuff nowadays seems to have to do with sea power, and it’s delivered across the Caspian Sea,” said Ledeen, who has been in contact with Iranian sources familiar with the latest negotiations with Russia.

Iran is seeking to fortify its military edge in the Gulf of Oman and could employ Russian-made missiles as a deterrent to the United States and other nations present there.

In meetings with Khamenei and other Iranian leaders, Russia’s Shoigu is likely to discuss arming Tehran with new submarines, torpedoes, cruise missiles, and sea-to-sea arms, according to Ledeen, a freedom scholar for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

“Those are the things the Russians and Iranians will be talking about, and it’s obviously a very important meeting because [Shoigu] is scheduled to see Khamenei himself,” Ledeen said.

These talks are “very important” to both Moscow and Tehran as they seek to bolster their alliance.

“After all,” said Ledeen, “the Iranian nuclear program is basically a Russian program: Russian reactors, Russian equipment. They’re the ones who make it all possible. So Iranian military power is heavily dependent on Russia technology, Russian advisers, and Russian counsel.”

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani announced last week that Iran has begun construction on two new nuclear reactors with Russia’s assistance.

Following the announcement, the U.S. State Department told the Washington Free Beacon that Iran is permitted to pursue these nuclear reactors under the terms of an interim nuclear deal meant to curb Iran’s contested program.

The State Department’s revelation elicited harsh criticism on Capitol Hill and from other proponents of a tougher U.S. stance against Iran’s nuclear program.

Meanwhile, Iranian naval commander Ali Fadavi, a member of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), bragged that Tehran has the ability to sink U.S. aircraft carriers.

“The U.S. military officials have admitted in their remarks that they have spent $13 [billion] for building aircraft carriers, but the IRCG can sink it with its speed boats,” Fadavi claimed.

Ledeen said these comments speak directly to Iran’s desire to boost their power in the sea.

“Their long term objective is to destroy us, and they say that all the time,” he said. “So long as we have an administration that’s not inclined to do anything in response, they’re going to keep it up. They’re going to speed ahead.”

Categories: Iran, Obama, Russia, Supreme Leader
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Implications of Iranian Cheating at Arak

December 10, 2014

Implications of Iranian Cheating at Arak, Commentary Magazine, , December 10, 2014

[T]he State Department never conducts lessons-learned exercises to determine why previous episodes of diplomacy have failed.

Kerry is like a gambler who has lost everything, but figures if only he is given one more round at the craps table, he can win big. American national security, however, is nothing with which to gamble. Especially when a gambler is desperate, the house will always win. In this case, however, the house is not Washington, but rather Tehran.

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As Jonathan Tobin notes, Colum Lynch’s Foreign Policy bombshell report about Iran’s covert efforts to buy equipment for its Arak plant, a facility which could produce plutonium for a nuclear bomb, raises questions about the logic of the Obama administration, and the recent comments by both Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State John Kerry with regard to the wisdom of extending nuclear talks with Iran.

If Lynch’s report is true—and it appears very much to be so—then there are two possibilities as to what happened vis-à-vis American diplomacy. The first is that Iranian diplomats were always insincere in pursuit of a nuclear resolution, and lied outright to Kerry, Undersecretary Wendy Sherman, Clinton, Biden-aide Jake Sullivan, and other officials who have championed the drive for nuclear talks with the current Iranian administration. That possibility is troubling enough, but the second scenario is as troubling, and that is that Iranian diplomats were perfectly sincere, but that the regime simply couldn’t care less what its diplomats said and pursued its own goals irrespective of any commitments they made.

A key theme of my recent book exploring the history of U.S. diplomacy with rogue regimes (of which Iran is the marquee example) is that the State Department never conducts lessons-learned exercises to determine why previous episodes of diplomacy have failed. One example they might consider is the pre-Iraq War negotiations with Iran: Immediately prior to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, National Security Council official Zalmay Khalilzad along with Ambassador Ryan Crocker met with Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran’s UN ambassador (and its current foreign minister) in secret talks in Geneva. Almost simultaneously, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw met with Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi. Both talks solicited the same Iranian pledge: Iranian officials would not interfere with coalition forces in Iraq, and Iran would not insert its own personnel or militias into Iraq.

In hindsight, the Iranians there, too, lied. Soon after Saddam’s fall, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) infiltrated 2,000 fighters, militiamen, and Qods Force personnel into Iraq replete with radio transmitters, money, pamphlets, and supplies. The source for that statement? Iranian journalists. Those most enthusiastic for rapprochement, however, are now placing their hopes in the same Mr. Zarif, the man who a decade ago either lied shamelessly or bluffed about the power he did have to control the behavior of the IRGC and influence the supreme leader. Then again, there is a reason why, before he became vice president, Joe Biden was Tehran’s favorite senator.

Kerry is like a gambler who has lost everything, but figures if only he is given one more round at the craps table, he can win big. American national security, however, is nothing with which to gamble. Especially when a gambler is desperate, the house will always win. In this case, however, the house is not Washington, but rather Tehran.

Categories: Iran, Iran scam, Iranian nukes, Kerry, Lies, Nukes, Obama, P5+1, Rouhani, Supreme Leader
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A Victory For the Ruling Clerics

December 8, 2014

A Victory For the Ruling Clerics, Front Page Magazine, , December 8, 2014

(The Iran Scam continues to plod along and along as Iran gets what it demands. — DM)

Irans-supreme-leader-Ayat-007

The nuclear extension definitely lacks any clear key terms upon which prospective nuclear talks would be anchored or that give any idea how a final nuclear deal could be reached.

But what is clear is that the Islamic Republic, particularly the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and senior cadre of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), have gained considerable amount of geopolitical, geostrategic and economic advantages from this offer by the Obama administration. The Supreme Leader’s strategies to buy time, regain full recovery in the economy, pursue his regional hegemonic and ideological ambitions,  and reinitiate his government’s nuclear program have been fulfilled.

[T]he extension of nuclear talks offered to the Islamic Republic is not going to alter Iran’s stand on its nuclear program.

The extension not only will not alter the Islamic Republic’s position on its nuclear program, but will give the ruling clerics the opportunity to be further empowered, making them more determined to pursue their regional hegemonic ambitions.

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While the Obama administration formerly stated that extending the nuclear talks is out of equation, nevertheless, President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry raised the option of an extension a day before the November 24th deadline. Iran’s foreign minister, Javad Zarif, definitely welcomed the idea.

After over a year of negotiations, which have traveled across the globe from Vienna, to Oman, and to New York, the negotiators (the Islamic Republic and the P5+1: China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) planned to extend the nuclear talks for another seven months in order to finalize the preliminary deal reached last year in Geneva. Accordingly, the nuclear negotiations will continue through the end of June.

The obscure objectives are to achieve a “headline” agreement by March 1st and seal the complete technical details of the headline agreement by July 1st. Details and nuances of the nuclear talks, with regards to agreements and gaps, have yet to be released, but some diplomats stated the repeatedly-heard phrase that “progress has been made.”

The nuclear extension definitely lacks any clear key terms upon which prospective nuclear talks would be anchored or that give any idea how a final nuclear deal could be reached.

But what is clear is that the Islamic Republic, particularly the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and senior cadre of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), have gained considerable amount of geopolitical, geostrategic and economic advantages from this offer by the Obama administration. The Supreme Leader’s strategies to buy time, regain full recovery in the economy, pursue his regional hegemonic and ideological ambitions,  and reinitiate his government’s nuclear program have been fulfilled.

Based on the extension offered by the Obama administration, the Islamic Republic will continue receiving $700 million per month in frozen assets during the extended seven month period. Secondly, Iran will further consolidate its economy through increased sales in oil, particularly to Asian countries, heighten business deals with some Western companies, regain the value of its currency, and enjoy the removed sanctions on some of its industries. As a result, Iran will attempt to address the economic challenges which were threatening the hold on power of the ruling politicians.

From the economic perspective, the $700 million in sanctions relief will boost Iran’s economy as it is an equivalence of approximately 350,000 more oil barrels a day, based on the current market price.

The Islamic Republic exports roughly one million barrels of crude oil in a day. The sanctions relief would be equivalent to a 30 percent increase in oil sale.  In the next few months, Tehran will attempt to push for additional sanctions relief as well as ratchet up its economic deals, such export of gas and other goods, to some European and Eastern countries including France, Germany, Russia, Japan, and China.

Some European countries’ exports to Iran have already ratcheted up due to the prospects of the nuclear negotiations. Tehran Times, the Islamic Republic’s state newspaper, stated that Germany was Iran’s leading trade partner “The European country (Germany) exported €207 million of goods to Iran in June 2014, an 88 percent rise compared to June 2013.” Nevertheless, Tehran needs the complete lifting of economic sanctions in order to gain the optimal potentials of its economy and gain full recovery.

Third, the extension of the nuclear negotiations will ensure to the Iranian leaders that the international community, specifically the West, will not make efforts in further isolating Iran and pressuring it economically or politically.

In addition, the extension of nuclear talks offered to the Islamic Republic is not going to alter Iran’s stand on its nuclear program. Iran will continue holding the position that their demands for the following issues to be met: maintaining a specific number (tens of thousands of) fast-spinning centrifuge machines, Tehran should have the capacity to produce nuclear fuel in the future, and maintain specific level of enriching uranium. In the next few months, the Islamic Republic is not going to give up its capacity to produce plutonium which can be utilized for weapons at its heavy water reactor in the city of Arak. Iran is less likely to provide more evidence proving that it did not carry out secret tests on the development of atomic weapons in Parchin or other military complexes. The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency recently pointed out that the Islamic Republic continues to deny the IAEA access to sensitive military site which are suspected to be used for nuclear activities.

Finally, the Islamic Republic’s antagonistic stance towards the United States and the West will remain the same as well. This week, while Khamenei officially granted his blessing to Rouhani to continue with the game of nuclear negotiations, he also called the West “arrogant.” Earlier, he published a “9-step plan” to eliminate Israel. After the extension of the nuclear talks, President Rouhani pointed out on state television that “I promise the Iranian nation that those centrifuges will never stop working.” The extension not only will not alter the Islamic Republic’s position on its nuclear program, but will give the ruling clerics the opportunity to be further empowered, making them more determined to pursue their regional hegemonic ambitions.

Categories: Iran, Iran scam, Iranian nukes, Kerry, Nukes, Obama, Supreme Leader
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Obama’s Parallel Universe

November 26, 2014

Obama’s Parallel Universe, Front Page Magazine, , November 26, 2014

obama_iran_0117-383x350

[T]here is not a single aspect of Iran’s nuclear program that has stopped advancing. On the contrary, they are making progress by leaps and bounds.

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You’ve got to hand it to Obama. He is no slouch when it comes to redefining reality.

He can look at an elephant and proclaim it a donkey without a bat of the eye. Or in the case of Iran, look at spinning centrifuges and see no threat.

Over the weekend he told George Stephanapolous that the nuclear deal with Iran, which his negotiators extended for another eight months on Monday without a single concession from Iran, has “definitely stopped Iran’s nuclear program from advancing.”

Welcome to Obama’s Parallel Universe.

Iran continues to spin centrifuges and expand its stockpiles of enriched uranium. It continues to develop new generations of centrifuges that will allow Iran to race to the bomb five times faster than it can today. As we learned earlier this month, the International Atomic Energy Agency even found that Iran was feeding uranium gas into some of these new generation centrifuges in violation of the interim nuclear deal. The U.S. declined to call out the Iranians for cheating.

Iran also continues work on the plutonium bomb plant at Arak, rather than dismantling it as the U.S. initially demanded. It continues to deny full scope inspections and to refuse inquiries from the IAEA to explain its past nuclear weapons-related activities, without which the United States and its allies cannot map the full scope of the Iranian program or verify it.

In fact, there is not a single aspect of Iran’s nuclear program that has stopped advancing. On the contrary, they are making progress by leaps and bounds.

When Stephanapolous played the sceptic and asked Obama whether he could get the deal through Congress, Obama said he was “confidant that if we reach a deal that is verifiable and assures that Iran does not have breakout capacity, not only can I persuade Congress but I can persuade the American people that it’s the right thing to do.”

The problem is, no one believes that is what this deal will accomplish, including the French and German foreign ministers who took part in the months-long farce in Vienna, Austria that gave birth to yet another extension of talks.

Former CIA Director General Michael Hayden told Congress last week that without an “invasive inspections regime” attached to any deal, “I am unwilling to guarantee American intelligence can sufficiently verify the agreement on its own.”

That’s a pretty damning admission. Given the track record so far – massive U.S. and Western concessions on sanctions relief and enrichment, and no meaningful concessions on Iran’s side – it’s unlikely such an inspection regime will ever exist.

Former U.S. Ambassador Eric Edelman told a Washington, DC conference last week that the Western powers have been in “serial retreat” on their negotiating demands toward Iran since the EU-3 first started unsuccessful talks in 2003.

At the start of the current process, one year ago, Secretary of State John Kerry was still talking about “dismantling” Iran’s centrifuge enrichment program.

But in the first stage of talks, the P5+1 (US., UK, France, Russia, China + Germany) swept that demand off the table, caving into Iran’s demand that the great powers recognize a supposed “right to enrich,” which I and others argue Iran forfeited in the mid-2000s when the United Nations Security Council passed resolutions condemning Iran for violating its commitments under the Nonproliferation treaty.

Why would Iran agree to make meaningful concessions when the United States continues to back off its demands and to throw away its trump card: the complex tissue of U.S. and multilateral sanctions that had crippled Iran’s economy and brought it to the negotiating table in the first place?

The Economist published a series of revealing economic charts on the impact of the Iran sanctions in its November 1st edition, drawing on sources from the Economist Intelligence Unit, the Energy Information Administration, the Statistical Centre of Iran, and the Central Bank of Iran.

Once crippling oil and financial sanctions imposed in 2010-2011 began to kick in, Iran’s economy went into a freefall. Iran’s GDP has been gradually expanding for several years. In 2012, the economy went into full recession, retracting by 6%. Consumer prices skyrocketed by 40%, as did the youth unemployment rate. Vehicle production plunged, the currency collapsed, while both imports and exports declined dramatically.

By all accounts, the halving of Iran’s oil exports – a much greater impact than most analysts had expected – resulted in bringing Iran to the table.

But now, all of that is changing.

Mark Dubowitz, of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, estimates that real sanctions relief over the first year of negotiations was close to $20 billion – far more than the administration has claimed.

“The Geneva process has turned around Iran’s economy,” he told a Washington, DC conference last week. As a result, “their nuclear intransigence has increased, not decreased.”

Former IAEA nuclear safeguards chief Olli Heinonen told the same conference that the negotiations were “rewarding Iran for its past bad behavior,” and set a “bad example for future proliferators.”

The Iranians “will just lie their faces off to get a bomb,” Senator Mark Kirk (R,IL) added.

On Monday, Secretary of State John Kerry declared in Vienna that a final agreement, to be negotiated in the coming months, would “close off all the pathways for Iran to get fissile material for a nuclear weapon.”

The formula was designed to meet a key criterion set down by Democrats in the House and Senate, such as Florida Rep. Ted Deutch, who agree with their Republican colleagues that Congress must set a high threshhold for what an acceptable deal must look like.

For these security-minded Democrats, an acceptable nuclear deal “must dismantle Iran’s centrifuge program to prevent Iran from becoming a threshold nuclear state, create robust verification and monitoring mechanisms to prevent undetectable breakout, force Iran to come clean on its past nuclear activities including possible military dimensions and cover a long enough duration that the regime won’t simply ‘wait it out.’”

If a deal along these lines cannot be reached, “Congress must make clear to Iran that sanctions will be ratcheted up dramatically at the end of the extension period,” he added.

The problem is, Obama has no intention of letting that happen, and has made it clear he will remove additional sanctions by the stroke of his Executive Order pen or by issuing waivers to legislative sanctions. (On pages 5-7 of his excellent testimony before Congress last week, FDD’s Dubowitz outlines “the administration’s plan to circumvent Congress” through executive branch sanctions relief).

Die-hard Obama loyalists in Congress, such as Virginia Democrat Gerry Connolly, argue that a bad nuclear agreement is better than no agreement. “Beware making the perfect the enemy of the good,” he said last week. “Without an agreement, we are condemning the world to a conflict with Iran.”

That in the end is Obama’s hammer. He will accuse anyone who opposes his massive concessions to Iran as a war-mongerer – a charge that Rep. Ted Deutch has tried to tackle head on. “Those who oppose a bad deal do not support a ‘march to war,’ but refuse an agreement that allows Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon,” he said.

Want to bet what Obama will be saying about him when he and Kerry finally reveal the terms of the bad deal they want Congress to approve? “They’ve red-teamed this. They will paint their opponents as war-mongers,” Dubowitz says.

Get ready to enter Obama’s parallel universe.

Like Hassan ibn Saba, leader of the 11th century hashish cult fictionalized by novelist Vladimir Bartol, Obama believes himself to be a master of illusion. If you can make people believe the illusion, then the illusion becomes reality. Perception is everything.

So here we go. Obama wants us to watch his hands and repeat after him: Iran is not a threat. We have stopped Iran’s nuclear weapons development. Iran is our ally against ISIS. Iran is a rational regime.

It’s up to us and to Congress to break the spell. Don’t look at his hands but at the fire burning just behind him.

Categories: IAEI, Intelligence, Iran, Iran scam, Iranian nukes, Kerry, Obama, P5+1, Rouhani, Supreme Leader
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McCain: Failed Korea Nuke Negotiators Now Bringing You Iran Talks

November 24, 2014

McCain: Failed Korea Nuke Negotiators Now Bringing You Iran Talks, National Review, Michael Auslin, November 24, 2014

Halifax — As news spreads that the failed Iranian nuclear talks require a second extension, this time for seven-months, U.S. officials at an international security conference here essentially admitted that North Korea was now a nuclear power, underscoring the failure of decades of high-level diplomacy. Yet the White House is doubling-down on its equally suspect negotiations with Tehran.

General Charles H. Jacoby, outgoing commander of U.S. Northern Command and NORAD, told the Halifax International Security Forum that he was treating North Korea as a “practical threat” due to its nuclear and ballistic missile capability that could potentially reach the U.S. homeland. Jacoby did not specify whether this meant that North Korea’s missiles and nukes were an operational threat, nor how he had changed NORAD’s operating posture, if at all. Admiral Cecil Haney, commander of U.S. Strategic Command (in control of all of America’s nuclear weapons), refused to answer whether he also considered Pyongyang a practical threat, but noted that he wanted more focus on trying to understand North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un. The generals’ comments came just weeks after General Curtis Scaparotti, commander of U.S. Forces Korea, testified before Congress that he believed Pyongyang could build a nuclear warhead and mount it on a ballistic missile.

There is little doubt that America’s policy towards North Korea has failed, and that Pyongyang has played Democratic and Republican administrations alike, promising concessions, making agreements, and playing for time. Time enough to be close to a nuclear break out, which may be imminent. When Pyongyang mates a functional nuclear warhead with a reliable long-range or intercontinental ballistic missile, then two things will happen: first, the nuclear balance in Asia will tip, second, the Iranians will be opening their checkbooks immediately for access to both technologies. Above all, Japan will begin thinking seriously about either dramatically expanding its strike capabilities or maybe even its own nuclear deterrent. After all, given that two decades of American diplomacy resulted in a rogue regime with nukes, how much can the U.S. nuclear umbrella be trusted? Will Washington really be willing to trade Los Angeles for Tokyo? Our ally won’t admit it publicly, but highly doubts it.

To paraphrase: Diplomacy has consequences. Unfortunately, it seems that Washington doesn’t quite get that. Instead, the dialogue dependency trap continues to ensnare our top officials, who convince themselves that talking is always better than the opposite, that rationality and self-interest will ultimately win out. That’s probably true, but the Obama administration’s problem (like the Bush administration’s) is that they don’t understand North Korean concepts of self-interest. Hence, an Asia about to get much more dangerous.

The real dangers of our failed diplomacy were summed up by Senator John McCain in Halifax, who bluntly stated that the North Koreans have nuclear weapons and delivery systems. “It’s a wake up call,” said McCain, who topped it off by looking at the greater danger of Iran. “The same people who negotiated with North Korea are now negotiating with the Iranians,” McCain explained, likely referring to Acting Deputy Secretary of State and Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman. Sherman, who is lead negotiator for the flailing Iranian talks, was the point person for talks with the North Koreans back in the Clinton administration, under Madeleine Albright. If McCain is right, then expect years more of failed negotiations and a nuclear Iran sometime this decade or next.

Categories: Iran, Iran scam, Iranian nukes, McCain, Obama, P5+1, Supreme Leader
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