Is attack on Iran imminent?

They should attack soon, the lack of exciting news lately is getting boring.

I really want to glue in front of my tv once awhile.
 
Rik Meleet said:
What about it?

Can you say with hand on heart that you are absolutely not bothered by a country such as Iran, with such close ties to terrorist psychos, having such weapons?

How about finding one in your backyard after the "Nijmegen Daily" publishes a picture of Mohamed with a bomb on top of his head? Would that be fun? Would that be an appropriate "thank you for your support of the legal rights of Iran"? Does the Netherlands have means to assure its security from psychos with a MAD deterrent? Does MAD deterrent even work on psychos in the first place?

Nah, Iran having WMD scares me. It may be legal or not but as long as the leadership talks about "Death to XXX" and "Wipe YYY off the map" and that sort of crap, who cares if it's "legal". It's just plain dangerous and whoever has a bit of sense will stomp out potential dangers before they become painfully real.

I really dont mean to be hit by Godwin's law here, but just look at what brought WWII about. Maybe it was "fair" to allow Hitler to have battleships, air force and so on, maybe it was their right to build those weapons, maybe it was "just" that other countries tolerated Hitler pissing on the constraints on German military after WWI. But just take a look at where it ended.

Now if Hitler wasn't Hitler with all his anti-Jew, anti-Slavic propaganda and sabre rattling, I would say that the Versailles treaty should have been renegotiated to lift those sanctions from Germany. But WITH Hitler at the steering wheel I would be completely against it! And that I think is the issue in Iran, that there is a mafia of psychos leading the country, and I for one don't want such people to arm themselves at will.

The real question to me is how to do this without making matters worse.
 
EolTheDarkElf said:
Can you say with hand on heart that you are absolutely not bothered by a country such as Iran, with such close ties to terrorist psychos, having such weapons?

How about finding one in your backyard after the "Nijmegen Daily" publishes a picture of Mohamed with a bomb on top of his head? Would that be fun? Would that be an appropriate "thank you for your support of the legal rights of Iran"? Does the Netherlands have means to assure its security from psychos with a MAD deterrent? Does MAD deterrent even work on psychos in the first place?

Nah, Iran having WMD scares me. It may be legal or not but as long as the leadership talks about "Death to XXX" and "Wipe YYY off the map" and that sort of crap, who cares if it's "legal". It's just plain dangerous and whoever has a bit of sense will stomp out potential dangers before they become painfully real.

I really dont mean to be hit by Godwin's law here, but just look at what brought WWII about. Maybe it was "fair" to allow Hitler to have battleships, air force and so on, maybe it was their right to build those weapons, maybe it was "just" that other countries tolerated Hitler pissing on the constraints on German military after WWI. But just take a look at where it ended.

Now if Hitler wasn't Hitler with all his anti-Jew, anti-Slavic propaganda and sabre rattling, I would say that the Versailles treaty should have been renegotiated to lift those sanctions from Germany. But WITH Hitler at the steering wheel I would be completely against it! And that I think is the issue in Iran, that there is a mafia of psychos leading the country, and I for one don't want such people to arm themselves at will.

The real question to me is how to do this without making matters worse.
My question was to invite Red Stranger to make a point on why he asked his question. My question did not neccesarily my opinion, the purpose was to unmask the incompleteness of RS's opinion.
I dislike one-liners and catch-phrases that aren't backed-up.

And no, I don't like the thought of Iran having nuclear weapons. The reason is that I don't like any nation having nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons are impractical on the battlefield. It's not unlike trying to kill a mosquito (sp) with a bulldozer.
Besides that, nuclear weapons are vulnerable for abuse.
 
Red Stranger said:
Iran is different from Iraq in that the elect that crazy guy. While I feel sympathy for the Iraqis who suffer in the hands of Saddam, I don't feel the same for people who elect an idiot.
Note that Iran is not a democracy. A group of clerics have to approve every candidate, leaving mr ultra-conservative against mr ultra-ultra-conservative at election day.
 
Rik Meleet said:
My question was to invite Red Stranger to make a point on why he asked his question. My question did not neccesarily my opinion, the purpose was to unmask the incompleteness of RS's opinion.

My mistake, I thought it was your heartfelt opinion. It read like one.

And no, I don't like the thought of Iran having nuclear weapons. The reason is that I don't like any nation having nuclear weapons.

Neither do I but I see a certain gradation of how much different countries bother me having WMD. I feel pretty comfortable with the fact that countries such as the US, France even Israel, have the WMD. For some reason even China doesn't scare me. Even Russia doesn't bother me despite Putin's recurring stunts, like the recent embracement on the "fairness" of Belarussian elections. I see more or less reasonable governments and power structures in those countries.

If, for example, Spain or Australia suddenly decided they want to develop WMD, I wouldn't be happy about it but it would not bother me that much.

Much unlike with Iran.

Nuclear weapons are impractical on the battlefield. It's not unlike trying to kill a mosquito (sp) with a bulldozer.

They are not meant for the battlefield. They are meant for anihilating industry, infrastructure, transport and human resources. Sad bad true, but as such if used they are extremaly effective and can enable a victory on the battlefield. They also create enormous pressure on the oponent.

Besides that, nuclear weapons are vulnerable for abuse.

I can only agree. Again, I could order the countries that have WMD from the one that bothers me the most in this respect to the one that bothers me the least, and Iran would be probably at the top of the list if they completed the bomb.
 
GinandTonic said:
Thats by far the best saying I've heard this week. I'm going to keep it and use it next time a customer wants something totally unrealistic.

TBH, i would question why you are crapping in your hand :crazyeye:

I just think it would be benefitial if the US really felt the heat for sturing up trouble, rather than just hearing it on the newsfeeds "oh yeah, lots of people are suffering way more than before in Iraq, but dont worry, they are harbouring terrorist so its ok. And dont worry, Democracy is better than a job, food, shelter, clean water all wrapped into one!"

If the US felt the consequences of its actions before, perhaps it wouldnt be acting like a spoilt brat.
 
Anyone remember the Genie missile,a nuclear air-to-air missile?It had a destructive range of about 300 meters(1.5 kiloton IIRC)with very little radiation.

Nuclear weapons are not impractical at all.
 
Respectability is the key element here, not practicality. The United States cannot present a moral high ground against Iran if they use nuclear weapons to thwart Iran's nuclear ambitions. The "war against terror" would have a massive setback due to the diplomatic fallout, quite separate from any nuclear fallout that might result from the bombings.

If the USA truly wants to fight terrorism and sponsorship of terrorism, they can't do it with nuclear warheads. Leading by example is the only way.
 
Red Stranger said:
What if Iran is developing a nuclear weapon?

I don't think sending group troops in would be the best option. We should just bomb it to the stone ages then leave. No casualties.
Please don't ever work for the American government.

Iran is different from Iraq in that the elect that crazy guy. While I feel sympathy for the Iraqis who suffer in the hands of Saddam, I don't feel the same for people who elect an idiot.
Dude, it's like you don't even read your own posts. Your last sentence is perfectly applicable to yourself.
 
Cleric said:
Anyone remember the Genie missile,a nuclear air-to-air missile?It had a destructive range of about 300 meters(1.5 kiloton IIRC)with very little radiation.
Oh yeah, that one. :goodjob: I scratch built one myself to go with my 1:72 scale F-102.
 
Currently, the world is asking Iran to prove that it does not have nuclear weapons, or is planning on having such.

It is impossible to prove a negative.
 
JerichoHill said:
Currently, the world is asking Iran to prove that it does not have nuclear weapons, or is planning on having such.

It is impossible to prove a negative.

On the other hand, Iran is hardly attempting to comply; if anything they appear to be reinforcing their nuclear image with their public statements.
 
After the fact...

But legally speaking, it supposed to be that "prosecutor" proves that "defendant" is guilty. The defendant does not have to prove innocence.

@Poster 2 up

No, they're not really. Yes, their President is crazy. My roommate is Iranian, so I have a good bit of information from a different perspective.

Nowhere in the NPT does it say that a nation cannot pursue nuclear power for energy purposes. In fact, when the US put the Shah in power, we certainly did not have a problem building him a nuclear power plant.

And to think he ruled as a dictator, when at least. Mr. Crazy was elected...
 
Unless it's 'National scare an Iranian week' I'd say that the US are going to pull something....

What seems to be confusing Mr Bush is that his country is called the US of A. He seems to think it's called the UN of A.

Doesn't someone over there have an encycopedia and can use it to teach him the difference?
 
At least GWB has made enough of a show of erratic behaviour previously to make sure we won't dimiss even the more outrageous possibilities this time.

That's a pretty good bargaining position actually.

Any threat made by the US with GWB at the helm must be considered credible.

Stuff that would normally be shot down as counter productive, insanley expensive or just dumb by the application of what passes for political savvy just might not cut the mustard with this one.:lol:
 
Gr3yL3gion said:
They should attack soon, the lack of exciting news lately is getting boring.

I really want to glue in front of my tv once awhile.

:goodjob:

on a more serious note, I think the Iran played a perfect diplomatic game. They took advantage of the worldwide resentment against the US attack on Iraq to go ahead with their nuclear program, betting on the fact that the US would not dare another attack.

Saying it the other way, I'm not sure Iran would have gone in a head-on confrontation had not the US played its trump on Iraq.
 
An atack on Iran is immenint only if Iran continues on its path to gain nukes, fund terrorists and call for the destroction of Isreal. The majority of Iran is young and hunger for change. Its the fundy imams in power with thier hard line stance that will doom Iran and push it into a war with the west.
 
I've seen several articles that are saying we will use our nukes to destroy their nukes (well, their manufacturing plants anyway). I would say that we just initiate a massive bombing campaign that makes the ones in Korea and Vietnam combined look like firecrackers.

I do believe that to stop Iran from getting nukes, the UN will be far more supportive. Iran is about as stable as the Chernobyl reactor, and it would take very little effort by terrorists to acquire nukes from them.
 
Great thinking; destabilise a country by atacking it's neighbours, supporting it's enemy during an extremely bitter war (then irony of ironies invading it) and threatening it and then saying it's too unstable to hold a weapon.

Iran needs to hold a nuclear capabilty under these circumstances, so would anyone. If Americans, British and French didn't monkey around with other people's countries this wouldn't have happened.

In fact the only member of the security council that isn't a complete psycho is China.
 
Top Bottom