Friday, March 23, 2012
More Tea Leaves
Galrahn at Information Dissemination blog reports that the US and China, among others, are stockpiling crude oil, even though, in the case of China, demand and supply are in balance, and in the US there is not enough refinery capacity to process the 11 supertankers full of crude that Saudi Arabia is sending here over the next 2 months. He has noted that the US Navy is moving equipment and ships to the Persian Gulf that would be used against Iran if hostilities were to begin.
Galrahn's analysis (and he is much better informed than I) tends to validate my theory that we will probably be at war with Iran before election day. He thinks the flash point will be reached if and when Israel determines that the current sanctions on Iran, which will take 3 to 6 months to show any effect, aren't working.
I have no reason to disagree.
(0) comments
Galrahn's analysis (and he is much better informed than I) tends to validate my theory that we will probably be at war with Iran before election day. He thinks the flash point will be reached if and when Israel determines that the current sanctions on Iran, which will take 3 to 6 months to show any effect, aren't working.
I have no reason to disagree.
Labels: Iran, Israel, military, Navy, Saudi Arabia
Tuesday, March 06, 2012
Obama vs. Netanyahu
President Obama said this weekend that the United States "will always have Israel's back" in connection with Iran.
I don't believe that to be an operational statement, and I don't think Prime Minister Netanyahu does either. Else why would Netanyahu emphasize Israel's right to defend itself and be "master of its own fate".
In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if Obama ordered the US military to interdict any Israeli strike against Iran and I don't think it would surprise Netanyahu either. Else why would Israel, perhaps one of the US's closest allies anywhere, state that they won't warn the U.S. ahead of time of a pre-emptive strike against Iranian nuclear facilities.
There's too much in Obama's past behavior that suggests his attitude towards Iran is, er, less aggressive than previous administrations for Netanyahu to be able to rely on US support against Iran. And let's face it, the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.
I think Obama's statement is pure political campaigning, because he's afraid American Jews, who have for a very long time been solid Democrat voters, are beginning to have second thoughts about him. Not to mention the millions of other Americans who realize that Israel is the only reliable ally the US has in the Middle East, and may be the only ally there, period.
As I said last week, I expect that the US will be at war with Iran by Election Day, although I wouldn't care to guess what will set the conflict off. I can appreciate Obama needing to walk a tightrope without either increasing the likelihood of such a conflict, on the one hand, or making Israel feel that his administration is abandoning them, on the other, but the elephant in the room is that Iran continues to act in ways that scream it is bent on acquiring nuclear weapons, irrespective of what Khameini and Ahmadinejad say for consumption by the gullible. There is much danger in facing that fact too late.
(0) comments
I don't believe that to be an operational statement, and I don't think Prime Minister Netanyahu does either. Else why would Netanyahu emphasize Israel's right to defend itself and be "master of its own fate".
In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if Obama ordered the US military to interdict any Israeli strike against Iran and I don't think it would surprise Netanyahu either. Else why would Israel, perhaps one of the US's closest allies anywhere, state that they won't warn the U.S. ahead of time of a pre-emptive strike against Iranian nuclear facilities.
There's too much in Obama's past behavior that suggests his attitude towards Iran is, er, less aggressive than previous administrations for Netanyahu to be able to rely on US support against Iran. And let's face it, the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.
I think Obama's statement is pure political campaigning, because he's afraid American Jews, who have for a very long time been solid Democrat voters, are beginning to have second thoughts about him. Not to mention the millions of other Americans who realize that Israel is the only reliable ally the US has in the Middle East, and may be the only ally there, period.
As I said last week, I expect that the US will be at war with Iran by Election Day, although I wouldn't care to guess what will set the conflict off. I can appreciate Obama needing to walk a tightrope without either increasing the likelihood of such a conflict, on the one hand, or making Israel feel that his administration is abandoning them, on the other, but the elephant in the room is that Iran continues to act in ways that scream it is bent on acquiring nuclear weapons, irrespective of what Khameini and Ahmadinejad say for consumption by the gullible. There is much danger in facing that fact too late.
Labels: Iran, Israel, Netanyahu, Obama
Saturday, January 01, 2011
The Middle East "Peace Process" ...
Is a failure, and will always be a failure as long as the goal is to keep talking and not to resolve the problems.
The biggest problem is, (and I must credit the unknown person who first expressed this idea) that if the Palestinian Arabs were to lay down their arms, there would be peace. If Israel were to lay down its arms, Israel would cease to exist.
There will be no peace until and unless one of two things happens: either the Palestinian Arabs win and Israel ceases to exist (this being a necessary, but not sufficient condition because of the factions among the Palestinian Arabs), or the Palestinian Arabs accept that the State of Israel has a right to exist and the "right of return" is abandoned.
It's as simple as that, and as difficult as that. Anybody who thinks otherwise is either incredibly naive or has an agenda.
(0) comments
The biggest problem is, (and I must credit the unknown person who first expressed this idea) that if the Palestinian Arabs were to lay down their arms, there would be peace. If Israel were to lay down its arms, Israel would cease to exist.
There will be no peace until and unless one of two things happens: either the Palestinian Arabs win and Israel ceases to exist (this being a necessary, but not sufficient condition because of the factions among the Palestinian Arabs), or the Palestinian Arabs accept that the State of Israel has a right to exist and the "right of return" is abandoned.
It's as simple as that, and as difficult as that. Anybody who thinks otherwise is either incredibly naive or has an agenda.
Labels: Israel, Middle East, Palestinans, Peace Process
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Iran's 10 New Nuke Plants
Iran announced today that it intends to build ten new uranium enrichment plants, with construction to begin as early as January 2010. The plants are to be hardened against attack by building them inside mountains. This announcement came only days after the IAEA dumped on Iran for lack of cooperation, with the outgoing director Mohammed El Baradei saying the IAEA's monitoring of Iran's nuclear efforts is "at a dead end." For Iran's part, its Vice President Salehi said that the announcement was a response to the IAEA.
This morning I saw a short interview on Fox News Sunday with a man who I believe is the former Israeli ambassador to the United Nations, who sounded like Israel is ready, willing and able to carry out a preemptive strike on Iran whether or not the UN, the US or anyone else is on board with the idea.
Not. Good.
This will be a gut check for the United Nations. If it cannot agree on something relatively harsh to punish Iran for its intransigence, the UN will be starkly exposed as ineffectual. This will be duly noted not only by Iran, but also by other dictators around the world. Hugo Chavez comes to mind.
What scares me most is that I don't think our current president has either the intellect, inclination or cojones to do anything about Iran, whether or not the UN approves. I think that opinion is shared by Ahmahdinejad, Chavez and the like.
(0) comments
This morning I saw a short interview on Fox News Sunday with a man who I believe is the former Israeli ambassador to the United Nations, who sounded like Israel is ready, willing and able to carry out a preemptive strike on Iran whether or not the UN, the US or anyone else is on board with the idea.
Not. Good.
This will be a gut check for the United Nations. If it cannot agree on something relatively harsh to punish Iran for its intransigence, the UN will be starkly exposed as ineffectual. This will be duly noted not only by Iran, but also by other dictators around the world. Hugo Chavez comes to mind.
What scares me most is that I don't think our current president has either the intellect, inclination or cojones to do anything about Iran, whether or not the UN approves. I think that opinion is shared by Ahmahdinejad, Chavez and the like.
Labels: dictators, Iran, Israel, Obama, United Nations
Wednesday, January 07, 2009
Perspective on Gaza From San Diego County
Just for kicks and grins, I got out an atlas and traced the borders of Israel and the Gaza strip, then overlaid the tracing on a map of Southern California in the same scale. To quote Arte Johnson, "Verrry interesting."
I aligned the coastline of Israel with the coastline of San Diego County, and the southern border of Gaza with Egypt with the US-Mexico border at San Ysidro/Tijuana. That pretty much overlays Gaza City onto downtown San Diego, with Tel Aviv falling around Oceanside/Camp Pendleton, and Haifa in the vicinity of Long Beach. Jerusalem coincides with a point approximately 10 miles north of Mt. Palomar.
Ashkelon is roughly equivalent to Solana Beach, and Sederot to Rancho Bernardo. Netivot is matched with El Cajon, and Kiryat Gat with Escondido, more or less.
You can see a rocket range map here, to get an idea of how vulnerable the outlying towns would be if we had a bunch of terrorist rocket launchers in, say, Balboa Park.
I wish some enterprising person at one of the news networks would do this with flashy graphics so the average American could get an idea of the the scale of the conflict.
(0) comments
I aligned the coastline of Israel with the coastline of San Diego County, and the southern border of Gaza with Egypt with the US-Mexico border at San Ysidro/Tijuana. That pretty much overlays Gaza City onto downtown San Diego, with Tel Aviv falling around Oceanside/Camp Pendleton, and Haifa in the vicinity of Long Beach. Jerusalem coincides with a point approximately 10 miles north of Mt. Palomar.
Ashkelon is roughly equivalent to Solana Beach, and Sederot to Rancho Bernardo. Netivot is matched with El Cajon, and Kiryat Gat with Escondido, more or less.
You can see a rocket range map here, to get an idea of how vulnerable the outlying towns would be if we had a bunch of terrorist rocket launchers in, say, Balboa Park.
I wish some enterprising person at one of the news networks would do this with flashy graphics so the average American could get an idea of the the scale of the conflict.
Labels: California, Gaza, Israel, Rockets, San Diego, Terrorisim
