but what should Neville Chamberlain have done? I'm not a pre-WWII expert (but I'm about to be forever tarred as a Chamberlain apologist). But this Slate article says that historians have forgiven him because he basically had no option. NC was advised that Britain was powerless to fight a German invasion of Czechoslovakia is Sept. 1938. The Axis already supported eachother whereas the Brits had potentially a dangerous Soviet Union, a shaky France, and no USA (legally neutral). Wouldnt necessarily have the support of the Canadians and Aussies. And a population that was weary as hell from WWI. Plus the knew Hitler was bad, but I dont think anyone in Sept. 1938 anticipated that he would be modern history's greatest monster. Or so the article outlines.
So I ask the question -- what was the alternative for Chamberlain? Go to war in 1938? Link - ( New Window )
I have read several summaries (the one below is from The Guardian). Among my concerns:
Quote:
Iran will reduce its enrichment capacity by two-thirds. It will stop using its underground facility at Fordow for enriching uranium.
I thought the goal was elimination.
Quote:
Iran’s stockpile of low enriched uranium will be reduced to 300kg, a 96% reduction. It will achieve this reduction either by diluting it or shipping it out of the country.
The core of the heavy water reactor in Arak will be removed, and it will be redesigned in such a way that it will not produce significant amounts of plutonium.
I have serious doubts Iran will let this happen. If they do, they probably have another facility that is unknown to the West.
Quote:
Iran will allow UN inspectors to enter sites, including military sites, when the inspectors have grounds to believe undeclared nuclear activity is being carried out there. It can object but a multinational commission can override any objections by majority vote. After that Iran will have three days to comply. Inspectors will only come from countries with diplomatic relations with Iran, so no Americans.
Once the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has verified that Iran has taken steps to shrink its programme, UN, US and EU sanctions will be lifted.
Again, sounds good "on paper"; the devil is in the details.
Quote:
If there are allegations that Iran has not met its obligations, a joint commission will seek to resolve the dispute for 30 days. If that effort fails it would be referred to the UN security council, which would have to vote to continue sanctions relief. A veto by a permanent member would mean that sanctions are reimposed. The whole process would take 65 days.
Good luck ever getting the sanctions reimposed.
lots of people with crystal balls and magical future predicting powers Â
but you came to the conclusion good luck enforcing it? So I take it that you don't have a clue regarding the layers of prevention that are written that Iran would have to cheat on to get to point where the deal is meaningless. You think that Iran will just do what it wants and there are no consequences.
RE: RE: RE: He shouldn't have addressed Congress. Â
I don't dislike 'progressive', you are closed minded
and your 'ego' will never allow you to see the obvious.
Sorry, I replied to you, exchanges with the closed minded
can only get worse, especially when you are an egotistic.
Sorry man, my bad......a 'mind' is a terrible thing not
to have :)
Quote:
In comment 12371136 SanFranNowNCGiantsFan said:
Quote:
But I put that more on John Boehner and the crazies who run Congress.
You mean of course, Wasserman, Wax, and Pelosi. I agree with
you, they are crazies.
Well, Pelosi opposed it. Waxman is retired. And Debbie was so so on it. I don't get your post, but knowing you, I shouldn't be surprised.
It was a tremendous slap in the face of the administration. You don't invite a foreign leader to come to your country and speak before Congress and piss all over the current president.
signed this shitty deal, rather than getting Iran to agree to much better terms. Which I just assume Iran would have agreed to because ... underpants.
Or that he didnt just say no deal and continue the sanctions ... which even Britain said we going to be less severe going forward.
Or that he doesnt just invade Iran. A country 5x the size of Iraq with 2x the population
And btw, if Iran is really run by the religious zealots hell bent on war/nukes, why would anyone believe that economic pressure via sanctions would bring Iran to its knees, especially after they didnt work for years (and leaving aside how much Europe and Russia didnt want them)?
I have read several summaries (the one below is from The Guardian). Among my concerns:
Quote:
Iran will reduce its enrichment capacity by two-thirds. It will stop using its underground facility at Fordow for enriching uranium.
I thought the goal was elimination.
Quote:
Iran’s stockpile of low enriched uranium will be reduced to 300kg, a 96% reduction. It will achieve this reduction either by diluting it or shipping it out of the country.
The core of the heavy water reactor in Arak will be removed, and it will be redesigned in such a way that it will not produce significant amounts of plutonium.
I have serious doubts Iran will let this happen. If they do, they probably have another facility that is unknown to the West.
Quote:
Iran will allow UN inspectors to enter sites, including military sites, when the inspectors have grounds to believe undeclared nuclear activity is being carried out there. It can object but a multinational commission can override any objections by majority vote. After that Iran will have three days to comply. Inspectors will only come from countries with diplomatic relations with Iran, so no Americans.
Once the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has verified that Iran has taken steps to shrink its programme, UN, US and EU sanctions will be lifted.
Again, sounds good "on paper"; the devil is in the details.
Quote:
If there are allegations that Iran has not met its obligations, a joint commission will seek to resolve the dispute for 30 days. If that effort fails it would be referred to the UN security council, which would have to vote to continue sanctions relief. A veto by a permanent member would mean that sanctions are reimposed. The whole process would take 65 days.
Good luck ever getting the sanctions reimposed.
As a signatory of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Iran was always permitted to enrich uranium for peaceful non-military purposes. The proble has always been their Highly Enriched Uranium efforts.
Sustaining the sanctions regime if the U.S. Walked away from the table because there was growing momentum and desire on the part of the Europeans for some kind of a deal. Plus if you walked away from a deal you were never going to get the Russians or the Chinese back on board who would probably accuse the United States of using sanctions to enact regime change in Iran.
You Guys Can Put Your Blind Faith In A Piece Of Paper Â
We'll see as the details are evaluated by independent experts whether there are true safeguards in this deal or not.
Hopefully there will be extensive hearings and investigations by the Congress. The Administration seemed to be in a "a deal at almost any cost" mode during the negotiations, which worries me greatly.
Frankly, I don't trust that the Administration negotiated with the long term best interests of country in mind and were much more concerned with the short term optics of "getting a deal done". I'm surprised we haven't heard, "We have to sign this treaty to find out what's in it."
It certainly doesn't appear that the Administration were tough negotiators and I'm very concerned about hidden concessions.
The Iranian regime and their people (the "Death To America" crowd) shouldn't be trusted on anything that relies on "good faith", "better cooperation" or "turning them from enemies to friends".
My guess is that the Ayatollahs are celebrating and having a good laugh this evening.
Sustaining the sanctions regime if the U.S. Walked away from the table because there was growing momentum and desire on the part of the Europeans for some kind of a deal. Plus if you walked away from a deal you were never going to get the Russians or the Chinese back on board who would probably accuse the United States of using sanctions to enact regime change in Iran.
The US & Iran, are going to be allies. The fundementalism
of Iran is going, probably over the next 10 yrs.
In the end, we will give them nukes.
Persia, aka Iran, is an old culture and has been a world
power. We both have something to gain from each other,
things that are now, won't be tomorrow.
Remember the fall of Viet Nam, 1975, who would have thought
that today, we are strategic partners.
The 'propaganda' that is swallowed by the 'public' is not
the truth.
Today the 'Nuclear Club' consists of US, Russia, China,
India, Israel, Pakistan, Saudia Arabia, France, and probably
2 or 3 countries.
Countries who can join the club easily are Germany, Japan,
Iran,Eygpt, South Africa, Canada, Brazil, Australia,
Mexico, Italy, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Ukraine, Poland,
etc....Iran got our attention, and once we back down from
the stance we have had since the Shah's fall, we can be
friends. If you are under the impression, that Iran is the
only country using terrorism, look a little closer to
home. The nuclear issue was never what it was about,
it was about the dollar and oil. Those details can be
worked out.
Does anyone remember the Gulf of Tompkin, the 'Domino
Theory', let's wise up, an enemy needs to be 'demonized'
until we become 'friends'. In my lifetime, China has been
the enemy twice and our friend twice.
Stop reading the Times, they are a mouthpiece.
As Bismarck told the young Wilmelm II, we have no friends,
we have no enemies, we are here to preserve our state.
It's like a 'three card monte game', it's so obvious and
yet, it has been played since the beginning of time
because people prefer, the lie!
Roman aphorism: 'People want to be deceived, so deceive
them'. Some lose their lives to keep the game going,
which is very sad.
translations that insure that the Iranians could not say that language of any word(s) are able to be interpered by them to mean anything other that what clearly intended. There are technicalities that address every point in the document that were hammered out to insure that cheating was easily detected. This will be and should be scrutinized line by line and at the end of the day it will be known to everyone what the deal really is or really isnt
According to a recent poll published in the Iranian press, 90 percent of Iranians do not trust the US government in negotiations with their country, though they still support the idea of negotiations in general.
RE: RE: You were also going to have a though time Â
Sustaining the sanctions regime if the U.S. Walked away from the table because there was growing momentum and desire on the part of the Europeans for some kind of a deal. Plus if you walked away from a deal you were never going to get the Russians or the Chinese back on board who would probably accuse the United States of using sanctions to enact regime change in Iran.
The US & Iran, are going to be allies. The fundementalism
of Iran is going, probably over the next 10 yrs.
In the end, we will give them nukes.
Persia, aka Iran, is an old culture and has been a world
power. We both have something to gain from each other,
things that are now, won't be tomorrow.
Remember the fall of Viet Nam, 1975, who would have thought
that today, we are strategic partners.
The 'propaganda' that is swallowed by the 'public' is not
the truth.
Today the 'Nuclear Club' consists of US, Russia, China,
India, Israel, Pakistan, Saudia Arabia, France, and probably
2 or 3 countries.
Countries who can join the club easily are Germany, Japan,
Iran,Eygpt, South Africa, Canada, Brazil, Australia,
Mexico, Italy, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Ukraine, Poland,
etc....Iran got our attention, and once we back down from
the stance we have had since the Shah's fall, we can be
friends. If you are under the impression, that Iran is the
only country using terrorism, look a little closer to
home. The nuclear issue was never what it was about,
it was about the dollar and oil. Those details can be
worked out.
Does anyone remember the Gulf of Tompkin, the 'Domino
Theory', let's wise up, an enemy needs to be 'demonized'
until we become 'friends'. In my lifetime, China has been
the enemy twice and our friend twice.
Stop reading the Times, they are a mouthpiece.
As Bismarck told the young Wilmelm II, we have no friends,
we have no enemies, we are here to preserve our state.
It's like a 'three card monte game', it's so obvious and
yet, it has been played since the beginning of time
because people prefer, the lie!
Roman aphorism: 'People want to be deceived, so deceive
them'. Some lose their lives to keep the game going,
which is very sad.
Usa, Israel, Germany, France, South Africa, khan/Pakistan.
One take way is that they have been on the trail for 60 years. Another is that they are resourceful. Another is that 60 years is not a well funded priority. Another is that their proximity to Russia left them off our list of unable to visibly help for quite some time after Cuba Missile crisis resolution....and then again once we could not be two faced openly helping while working to deals with the Soviets. So we did it through proxies.
Remember Russia is very sensitive to Iran in that the largest Communist Party in the world by a wide margin used to be Iran and four of its regions were the only ones in history that voluntarily asked to join the Soviet Union. Like it or not the mullahs kicked major Soviet ass from 1920 to now.
I love the quote of Orwell:
'Some ideas are so wrong, they can only be accepted
by an intelligent mind'.
This is a very interesting series if you like it,
hit the person who posted it. There are about 9 episodes
and I don't think you'll look at history the same again. 1984 War Is Peace and It's Purpose - ( New Window )
As I understand it, the sanctions on some items vital to oil and gas production transport and refining have been very very effective.
Irans oil industry needs $300B a year of foreign investment to get to average technology for the fields. Recent years have attracted about $11b per year.
Letting them come on stream right now just hurts Russian mob cash flow and smacks Iran badly as China demand implodes with their slow motion wreck.
I would give dollars to donuts that there is a sidebar agreement that has them committed to trading in dollars as the reserve currency and not supporting the losing last hopes of China and Russia to change that.
Imho we are in www3 with China and Russia via monetary policy and cyberspying
RE: Boy am I inviting a shit storm with this question... Â
but what should Neville Chamberlain have done? I'm not a pre-WWII expert (but I'm about to be forever tarred as a Chamberlain apologist). But this Slate article says that historians have forgiven him because he basically had no option. NC was advised that Britain was powerless to fight a German invasion of Czechoslovakia is Sept. 1938. The Axis already supported eachother whereas the Brits had potentially a dangerous Soviet Union, a shaky France, and no USA (legally neutral). Wouldnt necessarily have the support of the Canadians and Aussies. And a population that was weary as hell from WWI. Plus the knew Hitler was bad, but I dont think anyone in Sept. 1938 anticipated that he would be modern history's greatest monster. Or so the article outlines.
So I ask the question -- what was the alternative for Chamberlain? Go to war in 1938? Link - ( New Window )
Deej, I think Chamberlain was reasonable and expected the
same of the Germans. Relying on others reasonability can
be fatal.
He recognized that the Germans had European demands that
were not unreasonable. His error was that Germany would
be placated when their legitimate claims were met and
the injustices of the Versailles Treaty were corrected.
Sometimes, we see circumstance and delude ourself.
The Nazi's were gangsters. They were never going to
be satisfied. Chamberlain realized that by the beginning
of 1939.
I think he has gotten a bad rap. His appearance may have
done him in. He looked like 'thinker' and difinitely
not a 'tough' guy. The intertwining of the German & English
upper classes was a something that the history books
conveniently forgot. Why did Rudolph Hess, parachute into
England. Why was he kept a prisioner until he died, never
telling the complience of the English upper class with
the Nazi. Look up Prescott Bush and John Foster Douglas
Americans who dealt with the Nazi's before WW2, kept the
lines of communications open during the war and assisted
many Nazi's to escape trial after WW2.
Also Check out Prince Bernhardt of Belgium, a prime Bilderburger who was also during the war a member of
the Waffen SS.
As I understand it, the sanctions on some items vital to oil and gas production transport and refining have been very very effective.
Irans oil industry needs $300B a year of foreign investment to get to average technology for the fields. Recent years have attracted about $11b per year.
Letting them come on stream right now just hurts Russian mob cash flow and smacks Iran badly as China demand implodes with their slow motion wreck.
I would give dollars to donuts that there is a sidebar agreement that has them committed to trading in dollars as the reserve currency and not supporting the losing last hopes of China and Russia to change that.
Imho we are in www3 with China and Russia via monetary policy and cyberspying
Bingo, they will trade in dollars.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, those countries who
try to destroy the dollar or create an alternative
are our 'enemies'. China & Russia are the 'last of the
Mohegans'. The problem, we have to be careful not to
back them against the wall. If they unite, which would
definitely be an alliance of convenience as they are not
natural allies....there may be problems. Before 'fighting'
I see a 'Gold War'. If gold increases, it weakens the dollar
and shows it vulnerability.
The strong dollar 'broke' Russia in '89-90, and it looks
like it is going to break Russia again.
China is 'structurally' unsound. The chickens are coming
home to the roost.
Actually, I don't know if Chamberlain was Prime Minister or not Â
but the best chance the British and the French had to take out Hitler was in the Rhineland in 1936. Hard to tell if it was self serving when told later on after the war but the German General Staff said they would have taken Hitler out had the French and British opposed the Rhineland re-occupation. The German army wasn't strong enough at that point, allegedly. After that, Hitler felt invincible and the war was on.
the section of the treaty, oh excuse me, agreement, that I read gives the Iranians plenty of time and room to screw around with the schedule of any inspectors that may want to visit. As for the Iranians in general, anybody who thinks they will honor this in any fashion is a fool. Not necessarily a Chamberlain but a fool anyway. They will just go on supplying their surrogates and being a pain in the ass to everyone on a larger scale with American and Western European funding.
and he took the election and took a victory for himself. Now what? He has been marginalized and how is helping Israel today? It was good for him to what end other than keeping his job you would have to explain to me when you stop shaking your head
I love how, you, the OP, starts the thread as if it were a question when you clearly only wanted to antagonize those that disagree. But carry on.
According to your logic, it must have helped Israel a ton. Because Obama got his plan through. Based on your thought process this plan is better than anything bibi wanted so I guess he did them good. No?
In the past 20 years : Iran goes from 16 experiments centrifuges to over 19,000 without an agreement. It stockpiles enough LEU to produce a bomb in as little as 2 months. No inspections of military facilities. We did have an arms embargo, but Russia and China did not.
Under new agreement: Reduces Iran's stockpile of LEU by 98%. Reduces number of centrifuges to 5,060. Inspections of military facilities. International Arms embargo--NOW including Russia and China-- to remain in effect for at least 2 years even if IAEA determines Iran never tried to build a bomb.
Funny how the hawks always hang Munich around of the necks Â
of anyone who believes in diplomacy, yet they totally ignore the hawkish mistakes of Versailles after WWI which helped hatch a climate ripe for someone like Hitler to hatch in the first place.
who are England, France, China ,Russia & the Eurozone?
Well, if you buy the analogy (which I don't) then France would be Premier Daladier. Pre-war France and it's situation is a subject in and of itself. China was already about 20% occupied by Japan while in the middle of a civil war. Stalin was busy purging his generals. I assume you already know who England and the Eurozone (Germany) are.
Hyperbolic but makes the very obvious point that if you evaluate this by the less than exacting standard of what the Administration itself said it would not do it looks like a shitty deal. Link - ( New Window )
I hear one POV and I'm for it, I hear the opposite POV then I'm against it. Bottom line it's going to take weeks if not months before i make up my mind
RE: Boy am I inviting a shit storm with this question... Â
but what should Neville Chamberlain have done? I'm not a pre-WWII expert (but I'm about to be forever tarred as a Chamberlain apologist). But this Slate article says that historians have forgiven him because he basically had no option. NC was advised that Britain was powerless to fight a German invasion of Czechoslovakia is Sept. 1938. The Axis already supported eachother whereas the Brits had potentially a dangerous Soviet Union, a shaky France, and no USA (legally neutral). Wouldnt necessarily have the support of the Canadians and Aussies. And a population that was weary as hell from WWI. Plus the knew Hitler was bad, but I dont think anyone in Sept. 1938 anticipated that he would be modern history's greatest monster. Or so the article outlines.
So I ask the question -- what was the alternative for Chamberlain? Go to war in 1938? Link - ( New Window )
Here are the problems I see. First, it's quite true that the UK was not prepared for war. But what the article fails acknowledge is that 1938 Germany, while more prepared than the UK, was not the Germany of September 1939. The panzers were not the panzers of May 1940, and the Czechs had some relatively formidable fixed defenses. There was no guarantee that they would have swept through in a 2 week campaign.
Consider this as well. Hitler had made all his land grabs through bluff and bluster. When his troops crossed over the bridges into the Rhineland in 1936, their commanders had been told that if they saw resistance from the French who were marginally occupying the territory (IIRC no forces there but the right send troops in) they were to turn around and return to the east side of the Rhine. We will never know what calling his bluff in 1938 would have created. One thing I will posit is that if Hitler had invaded he would have been in no position to blitz the rest of Western Europe within a year and the French/British et. al. would have rearmed much quicker.
Finally, by proclaiming "peace in our time" Chamberlain oversold, badly oversold the agreement.
I hear one POV and I'm for it, I hear the opposite POV then I'm against it. Bottom line it's going to take weeks if not months before i make up my mind
I did not go into it with an open mind. There are things about it I like. But I can't get around the fact that I didn't think it was a good idea in the first place and that despite the entreaties of people here whom I like and respect to separate Iran's nuclear ambitions from its bad behavior in the region I don't think that they should, or can, be separated.
I hear one POV and I'm for it, I hear the opposite POV then I'm against it. Bottom line it's going to take weeks if not months before i make up my mind
It's not even months. In 15 years Iran will have the ability to produce enriched uranium and then there is no stopping them. And they don't mind waiting 15 years. Israel is completely boxed in now. If they want to do something, they have to do it now.
Kerry was asked why the release of the three Americans being held in Iran wasn't part of this deal. He said this was just about nukes. But the final deal lifts the weapons embargo for conventional weapons. You can't trust anything Kerry says.
I hear one POV and I'm for it, I hear the opposite POV then I'm against it. Bottom line it's going to take weeks if not months before i make up my mind
I did not go into it with an open mind. There are things about it I like. But I can't get around the fact that I didn't think it was a good idea in the first place and that despite the entreaties of people here whom I like and respect to separate Iran's nuclear ambitions from its bad behavior in the region I don't think that they should, or can, be separated.
The fact that the deal lifts sanctions against Qasem Soleimani, who was responsible for the death of so many US troops in Iraq but is not involved in their nuclear program means they can't be separated. Sanctions are also lifted against other Quds Force and Revolutionary Guard commanders. People say that we may be looking at a new ruling class in 10-15 years, but these people (as opposed to the septuagenarian and older ayatolas and clerics) are in their 50's and younger, some in their 30s. They're not going anywhere in the next 10-15 years.
again I may be hopelessly biased on the subject, but I don't see the wisdom, the necessity or the justice in going from EFP Alley and several hundred dead American servicemembers to lifting sanctions in 7 or 8 years with no intervening improvement in Iranian behavior.
The type that I save for offline viewing so I can digest it all on the subway while I commute. Of course you can sometimes see the left vs right snowballs and people's biases, but still, by and large, it's fascinating to read everyone's insight into this deal.
Reb8VA, your previous post was a really awesome take on this treaty and the situation with Iran. Thanks for posting it.
While reading, a couple questions/thoughts crossed my mind:
1) This might seem naive, but why isn't mutually assured destruction still a viable deterrent for the use of nuclear weapons on an "informal" level. Obviously we cannot hedge our bets to mutually assured destruction on a geopolitical level, but there seems to be a fear of Iran having a nuclear weapon from many people on this board. We have second strike capability, as does Israel - is there a reason that people feel mutually assured destruction doesn't offer some layer of protection against a nuclear Iran?
2) There's been a multitude of articles that I've read and a ton of anecdotal evidence (much of it coming from people I know on a personal level) that there is a deceptively large, growing, liberalized segment of Iran. A strata of their population that aren't just dogmatic religious fanatics, don't hate western culture (even embracing it to an extent), and believing in secular governance. I've also heard a lot of this stems from their youth.
Obviously any country has divisions, but the contention that Iran is just completely filled with religious crazies top to bottom is something I haven't read/heard. Now the amount of power that these subsections of Iranian society hold is something that I have no idea about, and I know Greg from LI alluded that they don't really have much influence. I know a lot of Iranian-Americans, and while I'm sure their view might be skewed somewhat by being American, they have placed emphasis on the fact that a large portion of the country, particularly the youth, are not really religious zealots.
3) Which brings me to my next question... it's clear the sanctions have impacted Iran enough to bring them to the negotiating table. However, would it be safe to assume that the impetus for their willingness to negotiate, or maybe more appropriately the source of their economic pain imposed by the sanctions is more about economic issues for their populace as opposed to an inability to fund other terrorist groups? And if this is the case, would opening up trade and allowing funds to flow into Iran benefit the aforementioned [comparatively] liberalized groups in Iran in a way that could benefit us by liberalizing their internal politics a bit? Or would it swing in the other direction - effectively strengthening the hard line stances of the theocracy in power by making the population of Iran more content?
(Is Iran even really a true theocracy?)
4) I think many people ignore the fact that this distrust is mutual. While we may not have much of a reason to trust the Iranians, they have absolutely zero reason to trust the US. We overthrew their democratically elected leader. If that happened here 35 years ago, there wouldn't be many people who would be willing to negotiate with the country that organized the coup. Yes, they have made "Death to America" statements - but we have called this country an axis of evil as well.
that we can just get Iran to do whatever we want it to if we just act tough enough.
I have news for people - Iran is a country of close to 80 million people and those people (the Persians) have been a major factor in the region for over 2000 years and will continue to be indefinitely. We have to be able to talk to them.
disputes that there are non-crazy elements in Iran, we simply dispute that they have a meaningful role in government.
And mutually assured destruction does and doesn't apply here. It would likely have the impact of preventing a willful state action to nuke Israel. It would not, however, have a significant deterrent effect regarding any other serious geopolitical dispute Iran might have, such as ongoing feuds with the Sunni states of the region. Natural restraint might, but not the certainty that the United States or Pakistan would retaliate for a warhead launched at a non-nuclear state. But the bigger issue is that Iran has proven bellicose even without a nuclear deterrent, there is no reason to suggest that they would be less so with them, when the fear of any sort of regime change or other existential threat to Tehran is essentially off the table.
mention of the government/military officials in Iran who are going to be removed from the non-proliferation sanctions list, including Soleimani. I don't generally believe that it's a good idea to negotiate with an adversary that has advocated destroying Israel and believes that the U.S. is the devil and deserves death. I also don't believe that the U.S. was negotiating from a position of strength, which runs contrary to principles of war and diplomacy.
and they revolted in 2009. But Obama did nothing to help them. The time to encourage that movement was then, not now.
There are those who believe that Iran (at least some of the mullahs) don't care about mutually assured destruction. They have no problem with suicide bombing, this would be that on a much larger scale.
RE: Funny how the hawks always hang Munich around of the necks Â
of anyone who believes in diplomacy, yet they totally ignore the hawkish mistakes of Versailles after WWI which helped hatch a climate ripe for someone like Hitler to hatch in the first place.
At best it delayed a nuclear Iran down the road a bit.
At worse it made the region less stable and will cause the Saudis etal to follow suit.
I don't think it was an "historic" agreement. Sanctions were were being eased by others. It's an arms agreement. Those of us a little long in the tooth were use having them occur on a regular basis.
What technology and spare parts Iran can obtain will be telling. Something Bill2 could opine on.
RE: RE: Funny how the hawks always hang Munich around of the necks Â
of anyone who believes in diplomacy, yet they totally ignore the hawkish mistakes of Versailles after WWI which helped hatch a climate ripe for someone like Hitler to hatch in the first place.
That is a brilliant observation.
Brilliant? One was a peace treaty imposed on a defeated adversary and is still pitifully misunderstood and referenced at least as often as Munich. The other was an act of appeasement in advance of a likely war. The relationship between the two is tenuous at best.
that we can just get Iran to do whatever we want it to if we just act tough enough.
That's the rub of it to me. There are a lot of people who are comparing this ACTUAL deal to some fantasy world where we can dictate terms to Iran, or where the sanctions regime was not teetering as it is. So you get a lot of people saying "no deal is better than a bad deal" as if that is a truism. In part:
Quote:
When critics focus incessantly on the gap between the present deal and a perfect one, what they’re really doing is blaming Obama for the fact that the United States is not omnipotent. This isn’t surprising given that American omnipotence is the guiding assumption behind contemporary Republican foreign policy. Ask any GOP presidential candidate except Rand Paul what they propose doing about any global hotspot and their answer is the same: be tougher. America must take a harder line against Iran’s nuclear program, against ISIS, against Bashar al-Assad, against Russian intervention in Ukraine and against Chinese ambitions in the South China Sea.
If you believe American power is limited, this agenda is absurd. America needs Russian and Chinese support for an Iranian nuclear deal. U.S. officials can’t simultaneously put maximum pressure on both Assad and ISIS, the two main rivals for power in Syria today. They must decide who is the lesser evil. Accepting that American power is limited means prioritizing. It means making concessions to regimes and organizations you don’t like in order to put more pressure on the ones you fear most. That’s what Franklin Roosevelt did when allying with Stalin against Hitler. It’s what Richard Nixon did when he reached out to communist China in order to increase America’s leverage over the U.S.S.R.
And it’s what George W. Bush refused to do after 9/11, when he defined the “war on terror” not merely as a conflict against al-Qaeda but as a license to wage war, or cold war, against every anti-American regime supposedly pursuing weapons of mass destruction. This massive overestimation of American power underlay the war in Iraq...
Along these lines, and interesting (if a bit too political) take from Beinart at the Atlantic. Link - ( New Window )
is not absurd. Saying you need to send in the tanks everywhere is absurd. Weakness is self-perpetuating, as is strength. If every expansionist or terrorist (or separatist) power went on the march at once, even a strong hegemon would not be able to hit them all. But if each in its rational calculation believes there is a probability of active opposition and serious consequences, it is more likely that each would decline to do act. If, however, a hegemon (regional or global) is perceived to be weak, the leaders of expansionist powers or terrorist or separatist movements may rationally decide that the hegemon is unlikely to act against them, certainly not if more than one such event is already in progress. This is why revolutions tend to happen in waves (1848, the 1860's, etc etc).
By putting Germany in a financially broken state of abject misery, the victorious allies of WW I essentially guaranteed the rise of vicious nationalists in Germany, and an eventual re-match. One could easily say that we have been doing much the same to Iran, making a permanent enemy of a country that is, in many ways, a potential natural ally.
So, yes, I think this is a rather apt comparison. Certainly much more apt than comparing Obama and Kerry's role in a 6-way negotiation to Chamberlain's summit with Hitler in Munich.
Deej is spot on again. If we were any "tougher" we risked losing the rest of the P5+1. Russia is not our friend. Neither is China. And really, in some ways, neither is the Eurozone (Germany).
If we adopted a more difficult stance, we would have been left standing alone. The sanctions would have likely come down from the rest of the major powers, and our leverage would have evaporated.
This is what you and others are complaining about, and this is why you are wrong. We are not omnipotnent, and this wasn't a bi-polar negotiation. It was multipolar, and if Iran had succeeded in isolating us in these negotiations, the result would have been much, much worse for us and for Israel than the result that was obtained.
Now, you'll go and rationalize something to say in response, because you don't like Obama and always find something to kvetch about, but you really can't rebut this point, because it is reality.
So I ask the question -- what was the alternative for Chamberlain? Go to war in 1938?
Link - ( New Window )
I thought the goal was elimination.
The core of the heavy water reactor in Arak will be removed, and it will be redesigned in such a way that it will not produce significant amounts of plutonium.
I have serious doubts Iran will let this happen. If they do, they probably have another facility that is unknown to the West.
Once the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has verified that Iran has taken steps to shrink its programme, UN, US and EU sanctions will be lifted.
Again, sounds good "on paper"; the devil is in the details.
Good luck ever getting the sanctions reimposed.
I don't dislike 'progressive', you are closed minded
and your 'ego' will never allow you to see the obvious.
Sorry, I replied to you, exchanges with the closed minded
can only get worse, especially when you are an egotistic.
Sorry man, my bad......a 'mind' is a terrible thing not
to have :)
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In comment 12371136 SanFranNowNCGiantsFan said:
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But I put that more on John Boehner and the crazies who run Congress.
You mean of course, Wasserman, Wax, and Pelosi. I agree with
you, they are crazies.
Well, Pelosi opposed it. Waxman is retired. And Debbie was so so on it. I don't get your post, but knowing you, I shouldn't be surprised.
It was a tremendous slap in the face of the administration. You don't invite a foreign leader to come to your country and speak before Congress and piss all over the current president.
I don't know where you guys come up with this stuff. You can disagree with the deal without going to such extremes.
Or that he didnt just say no deal and continue the sanctions ... which even Britain said we going to be less severe going forward.
Or that he doesnt just invade Iran. A country 5x the size of Iraq with 2x the population
And btw, if Iran is really run by the religious zealots hell bent on war/nukes, why would anyone believe that economic pressure via sanctions would bring Iran to its knees, especially after they didnt work for years (and leaving aside how much Europe and Russia didnt want them)?
What's the magic solution that Obama missed?
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Iran will reduce its enrichment capacity by two-thirds. It will stop using its underground facility at Fordow for enriching uranium.
I thought the goal was elimination.
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Iran’s stockpile of low enriched uranium will be reduced to 300kg, a 96% reduction. It will achieve this reduction either by diluting it or shipping it out of the country.
The core of the heavy water reactor in Arak will be removed, and it will be redesigned in such a way that it will not produce significant amounts of plutonium.
I have serious doubts Iran will let this happen. If they do, they probably have another facility that is unknown to the West.
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Iran will allow UN inspectors to enter sites, including military sites, when the inspectors have grounds to believe undeclared nuclear activity is being carried out there. It can object but a multinational commission can override any objections by majority vote. After that Iran will have three days to comply. Inspectors will only come from countries with diplomatic relations with Iran, so no Americans.
Once the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has verified that Iran has taken steps to shrink its programme, UN, US and EU sanctions will be lifted.
Again, sounds good "on paper"; the devil is in the details.
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If there are allegations that Iran has not met its obligations, a joint commission will seek to resolve the dispute for 30 days. If that effort fails it would be referred to the UN security council, which would have to vote to continue sanctions relief. A veto by a permanent member would mean that sanctions are reimposed. The whole process would take 65 days.
Good luck ever getting the sanctions reimposed.
As a signatory of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Iran was always permitted to enrich uranium for peaceful non-military purposes. The proble has always been their Highly Enriched Uranium efforts.
Hopefully there will be extensive hearings and investigations by the Congress. The Administration seemed to be in a "a deal at almost any cost" mode during the negotiations, which worries me greatly.
Frankly, I don't trust that the Administration negotiated with the long term best interests of country in mind and were much more concerned with the short term optics of "getting a deal done". I'm surprised we haven't heard, "We have to sign this treaty to find out what's in it."
It certainly doesn't appear that the Administration were tough negotiators and I'm very concerned about hidden concessions.
The Iranian regime and their people (the "Death To America" crowd) shouldn't be trusted on anything that relies on "good faith", "better cooperation" or "turning them from enemies to friends".
My guess is that the Ayatollahs are celebrating and having a good laugh this evening.
The US & Iran, are going to be allies. The fundementalism
of Iran is going, probably over the next 10 yrs.
In the end, we will give them nukes.
Persia, aka Iran, is an old culture and has been a world
power. We both have something to gain from each other,
things that are now, won't be tomorrow.
Remember the fall of Viet Nam, 1975, who would have thought
that today, we are strategic partners.
The 'propaganda' that is swallowed by the 'public' is not
the truth.
Today the 'Nuclear Club' consists of US, Russia, China,
India, Israel, Pakistan, Saudia Arabia, France, and probably
2 or 3 countries.
Countries who can join the club easily are Germany, Japan,
Iran,Eygpt, South Africa, Canada, Brazil, Australia,
Mexico, Italy, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Ukraine, Poland,
etc....Iran got our attention, and once we back down from
the stance we have had since the Shah's fall, we can be
friends. If you are under the impression, that Iran is the
only country using terrorism, look a little closer to
home. The nuclear issue was never what it was about,
it was about the dollar and oil. Those details can be
worked out.
Does anyone remember the Gulf of Tompkin, the 'Domino
Theory', let's wise up, an enemy needs to be 'demonized'
until we become 'friends'. In my lifetime, China has been
the enemy twice and our friend twice.
Stop reading the Times, they are a mouthpiece.
As Bismarck told the young Wilmelm II, we have no friends,
we have no enemies, we are here to preserve our state.
It's like a 'three card monte game', it's so obvious and
yet, it has been played since the beginning of time
because people prefer, the lie!
Roman aphorism: 'People want to be deceived, so deceive
them'. Some lose their lives to keep the game going,
which is very sad.
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Sustaining the sanctions regime if the U.S. Walked away from the table because there was growing momentum and desire on the part of the Europeans for some kind of a deal. Plus if you walked away from a deal you were never going to get the Russians or the Chinese back on board who would probably accuse the United States of using sanctions to enact regime change in Iran.
The US & Iran, are going to be allies. The fundementalism
of Iran is going, probably over the next 10 yrs.
In the end, we will give them nukes.
Persia, aka Iran, is an old culture and has been a world
power. We both have something to gain from each other,
things that are now, won't be tomorrow.
Remember the fall of Viet Nam, 1975, who would have thought
that today, we are strategic partners.
The 'propaganda' that is swallowed by the 'public' is not
the truth.
Today the 'Nuclear Club' consists of US, Russia, China,
India, Israel, Pakistan, Saudia Arabia, France, and probably
2 or 3 countries.
Countries who can join the club easily are Germany, Japan,
Iran,Eygpt, South Africa, Canada, Brazil, Australia,
Mexico, Italy, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Ukraine, Poland,
etc....Iran got our attention, and once we back down from
the stance we have had since the Shah's fall, we can be
friends. If you are under the impression, that Iran is the
only country using terrorism, look a little closer to
home. The nuclear issue was never what it was about,
it was about the dollar and oil. Those details can be
worked out.
Does anyone remember the Gulf of Tompkin, the 'Domino
Theory', let's wise up, an enemy needs to be 'demonized'
until we become 'friends'. In my lifetime, China has been
the enemy twice and our friend twice.
Stop reading the Times, they are a mouthpiece.
As Bismarck told the young Wilmelm II, we have no friends,
we have no enemies, we are here to preserve our state.
It's like a 'three card monte game', it's so obvious and
yet, it has been played since the beginning of time
because people prefer, the lie!
Roman aphorism: 'People want to be deceived, so deceive
them'. Some lose their lives to keep the game going,
which is very sad.
One take way is that they have been on the trail for 60 years. Another is that they are resourceful. Another is that 60 years is not a well funded priority. Another is that their proximity to Russia left them off our list of unable to visibly help for quite some time after Cuba Missile crisis resolution....and then again once we could not be two faced openly helping while working to deals with the Soviets. So we did it through proxies.
Remember Russia is very sensitive to Iran in that the largest Communist Party in the world by a wide margin used to be Iran and four of its regions were the only ones in history that voluntarily asked to join the Soviet Union. Like it or not the mullahs kicked major Soviet ass from 1920 to now.
'Some ideas are so wrong, they can only be accepted
by an intelligent mind'.
This is a very interesting series if you like it,
hit the person who posted it. There are about 9 episodes
and I don't think you'll look at history the same again.
1984 War Is Peace and It's Purpose - ( New Window )
Irans oil industry needs $300B a year of foreign investment to get to average technology for the fields. Recent years have attracted about $11b per year.
Letting them come on stream right now just hurts Russian mob cash flow and smacks Iran badly as China demand implodes with their slow motion wreck.
I would give dollars to donuts that there is a sidebar agreement that has them committed to trading in dollars as the reserve currency and not supporting the losing last hopes of China and Russia to change that.
Imho we are in www3 with China and Russia via monetary policy and cyberspying
So I ask the question -- what was the alternative for Chamberlain? Go to war in 1938? Link - ( New Window )
Deej, I think Chamberlain was reasonable and expected the
same of the Germans. Relying on others reasonability can
be fatal.
He recognized that the Germans had European demands that
were not unreasonable. His error was that Germany would
be placated when their legitimate claims were met and
the injustices of the Versailles Treaty were corrected.
Sometimes, we see circumstance and delude ourself.
The Nazi's were gangsters. They were never going to
be satisfied. Chamberlain realized that by the beginning
of 1939.
I think he has gotten a bad rap. His appearance may have
done him in. He looked like 'thinker' and difinitely
not a 'tough' guy. The intertwining of the German & English
upper classes was a something that the history books
conveniently forgot. Why did Rudolph Hess, parachute into
England. Why was he kept a prisioner until he died, never
telling the complience of the English upper class with
the Nazi. Look up Prescott Bush and John Foster Douglas
Americans who dealt with the Nazi's before WW2, kept the
lines of communications open during the war and assisted
many Nazi's to escape trial after WW2.
Also Check out Prince Bernhardt of Belgium, a prime Bilderburger who was also during the war a member of
the Waffen SS.
Irans oil industry needs $300B a year of foreign investment to get to average technology for the fields. Recent years have attracted about $11b per year.
Letting them come on stream right now just hurts Russian mob cash flow and smacks Iran badly as China demand implodes with their slow motion wreck.
I would give dollars to donuts that there is a sidebar agreement that has them committed to trading in dollars as the reserve currency and not supporting the losing last hopes of China and Russia to change that.
Imho we are in www3 with China and Russia via monetary policy and cyberspying
Bingo, they will trade in dollars.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, those countries who
try to destroy the dollar or create an alternative
are our 'enemies'. China & Russia are the 'last of the
Mohegans'. The problem, we have to be careful not to
back them against the wall. If they unite, which would
definitely be an alliance of convenience as they are not
natural allies....there may be problems. Before 'fighting'
I see a 'Gold War'. If gold increases, it weakens the dollar
and shows it vulnerability.
The strong dollar 'broke' Russia in '89-90, and it looks
like it is going to break Russia again.
China is 'structurally' unsound. The chickens are coming
home to the roost.
I love how, you, the OP, starts the thread as if it were a question when you clearly only wanted to antagonize those that disagree. But carry on.
Under new agreement: Reduces Iran's stockpile of LEU by 98%. Reduces number of centrifuges to 5,060. Inspections of military facilities. International Arms embargo--NOW including Russia and China-- to remain in effect for at least 2 years even if IAEA determines Iran never tried to build a bomb.
Well, if you buy the analogy (which I don't) then France would be Premier Daladier. Pre-war France and it's situation is a subject in and of itself. China was already about 20% occupied by Japan while in the middle of a civil war. Stalin was busy purging his generals. I assume you already know who England and the Eurozone (Germany) are.
Link - ( New Window )
So I ask the question -- what was the alternative for Chamberlain? Go to war in 1938? Link - ( New Window )
Here are the problems I see. First, it's quite true that the UK was not prepared for war. But what the article fails acknowledge is that 1938 Germany, while more prepared than the UK, was not the Germany of September 1939. The panzers were not the panzers of May 1940, and the Czechs had some relatively formidable fixed defenses. There was no guarantee that they would have swept through in a 2 week campaign.
Consider this as well. Hitler had made all his land grabs through bluff and bluster. When his troops crossed over the bridges into the Rhineland in 1936, their commanders had been told that if they saw resistance from the French who were marginally occupying the territory (IIRC no forces there but the right send troops in) they were to turn around and return to the east side of the Rhine. We will never know what calling his bluff in 1938 would have created. One thing I will posit is that if Hitler had invaded he would have been in no position to blitz the rest of Western Europe within a year and the French/British et. al. would have rearmed much quicker.
Finally, by proclaiming "peace in our time" Chamberlain oversold, badly oversold the agreement.
I did not go into it with an open mind. There are things about it I like. But I can't get around the fact that I didn't think it was a good idea in the first place and that despite the entreaties of people here whom I like and respect to separate Iran's nuclear ambitions from its bad behavior in the region I don't think that they should, or can, be separated.
It's not even months. In 15 years Iran will have the ability to produce enriched uranium and then there is no stopping them. And they don't mind waiting 15 years. Israel is completely boxed in now. If they want to do something, they have to do it now.
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I hear one POV and I'm for it, I hear the opposite POV then I'm against it. Bottom line it's going to take weeks if not months before i make up my mind
I did not go into it with an open mind. There are things about it I like. But I can't get around the fact that I didn't think it was a good idea in the first place and that despite the entreaties of people here whom I like and respect to separate Iran's nuclear ambitions from its bad behavior in the region I don't think that they should, or can, be separated.
The fact that the deal lifts sanctions against Qasem Soleimani, who was responsible for the death of so many US troops in Iraq but is not involved in their nuclear program means they can't be separated. Sanctions are also lifted against other Quds Force and Revolutionary Guard commanders. People say that we may be looking at a new ruling class in 10-15 years, but these people (as opposed to the septuagenarian and older ayatolas and clerics) are in their 50's and younger, some in their 30s. They're not going anywhere in the next 10-15 years.
Reb8VA, your previous post was a really awesome take on this treaty and the situation with Iran. Thanks for posting it.
While reading, a couple questions/thoughts crossed my mind:
1) This might seem naive, but why isn't mutually assured destruction still a viable deterrent for the use of nuclear weapons on an "informal" level. Obviously we cannot hedge our bets to mutually assured destruction on a geopolitical level, but there seems to be a fear of Iran having a nuclear weapon from many people on this board. We have second strike capability, as does Israel - is there a reason that people feel mutually assured destruction doesn't offer some layer of protection against a nuclear Iran?
2) There's been a multitude of articles that I've read and a ton of anecdotal evidence (much of it coming from people I know on a personal level) that there is a deceptively large, growing, liberalized segment of Iran. A strata of their population that aren't just dogmatic religious fanatics, don't hate western culture (even embracing it to an extent), and believing in secular governance. I've also heard a lot of this stems from their youth.
Obviously any country has divisions, but the contention that Iran is just completely filled with religious crazies top to bottom is something I haven't read/heard. Now the amount of power that these subsections of Iranian society hold is something that I have no idea about, and I know Greg from LI alluded that they don't really have much influence. I know a lot of Iranian-Americans, and while I'm sure their view might be skewed somewhat by being American, they have placed emphasis on the fact that a large portion of the country, particularly the youth, are not really religious zealots.
3) Which brings me to my next question... it's clear the sanctions have impacted Iran enough to bring them to the negotiating table. However, would it be safe to assume that the impetus for their willingness to negotiate, or maybe more appropriately the source of their economic pain imposed by the sanctions is more about economic issues for their populace as opposed to an inability to fund other terrorist groups? And if this is the case, would opening up trade and allowing funds to flow into Iran benefit the aforementioned [comparatively] liberalized groups in Iran in a way that could benefit us by liberalizing their internal politics a bit? Or would it swing in the other direction - effectively strengthening the hard line stances of the theocracy in power by making the population of Iran more content?
(Is Iran even really a true theocracy?)
4) I think many people ignore the fact that this distrust is mutual. While we may not have much of a reason to trust the Iranians, they have absolutely zero reason to trust the US. We overthrew their democratically elected leader. If that happened here 35 years ago, there wouldn't be many people who would be willing to negotiate with the country that organized the coup. Yes, they have made "Death to America" statements - but we have called this country an axis of evil as well.
I have news for people - Iran is a country of close to 80 million people and those people (the Persians) have been a major factor in the region for over 2000 years and will continue to be indefinitely. We have to be able to talk to them.
And mutually assured destruction does and doesn't apply here. It would likely have the impact of preventing a willful state action to nuke Israel. It would not, however, have a significant deterrent effect regarding any other serious geopolitical dispute Iran might have, such as ongoing feuds with the Sunni states of the region. Natural restraint might, but not the certainty that the United States or Pakistan would retaliate for a warhead launched at a non-nuclear state. But the bigger issue is that Iran has proven bellicose even without a nuclear deterrent, there is no reason to suggest that they would be less so with them, when the fear of any sort of regime change or other existential threat to Tehran is essentially off the table.
There are those who believe that Iran (at least some of the mullahs) don't care about mutually assured destruction. They have no problem with suicide bombing, this would be that on a much larger scale.
That is a brilliant observation.
At best it delayed a nuclear Iran down the road a bit.
At worse it made the region less stable and will cause the Saudis etal to follow suit.
I don't think it was an "historic" agreement. Sanctions were were being eased by others. It's an arms agreement. Those of us a little long in the tooth were use having them occur on a regular basis.
What technology and spare parts Iran can obtain will be telling. Something Bill2 could opine on.
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of anyone who believes in diplomacy, yet they totally ignore the hawkish mistakes of Versailles after WWI which helped hatch a climate ripe for someone like Hitler to hatch in the first place.
That is a brilliant observation.
Brilliant? One was a peace treaty imposed on a defeated adversary and is still pitifully misunderstood and referenced at least as often as Munich. The other was an act of appeasement in advance of a likely war. The relationship between the two is tenuous at best.
That's the rub of it to me. There are a lot of people who are comparing this ACTUAL deal to some fantasy world where we can dictate terms to Iran, or where the sanctions regime was not teetering as it is. So you get a lot of people saying "no deal is better than a bad deal" as if that is a truism. In part:
If you believe American power is limited, this agenda is absurd. America needs Russian and Chinese support for an Iranian nuclear deal. U.S. officials can’t simultaneously put maximum pressure on both Assad and ISIS, the two main rivals for power in Syria today. They must decide who is the lesser evil. Accepting that American power is limited means prioritizing. It means making concessions to regimes and organizations you don’t like in order to put more pressure on the ones you fear most. That’s what Franklin Roosevelt did when allying with Stalin against Hitler. It’s what Richard Nixon did when he reached out to communist China in order to increase America’s leverage over the U.S.S.R.
And it’s what George W. Bush refused to do after 9/11, when he defined the “war on terror” not merely as a conflict against al-Qaeda but as a license to wage war, or cold war, against every anti-American regime supposedly pursuing weapons of mass destruction. This massive overestimation of American power underlay the war in Iraq...
Along these lines, and interesting (if a bit too political) take from Beinart at the Atlantic.
Link - ( New Window )
So, yes, I think this is a rather apt comparison. Certainly much more apt than comparing Obama and Kerry's role in a 6-way negotiation to Chamberlain's summit with Hitler in Munich.
If we adopted a more difficult stance, we would have been left standing alone. The sanctions would have likely come down from the rest of the major powers, and our leverage would have evaporated.
This is what you and others are complaining about, and this is why you are wrong. We are not omnipotnent, and this wasn't a bi-polar negotiation. It was multipolar, and if Iran had succeeded in isolating us in these negotiations, the result would have been much, much worse for us and for Israel than the result that was obtained.
Now, you'll go and rationalize something to say in response, because you don't like Obama and always find something to kvetch about, but you really can't rebut this point, because it is reality.