http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=260984

Well, let's summarize and draw parallels. First the US. cries, "They've got weapons of mass destruction!" (nuclear). So far, there's no hard evidence of this, and this cannot be confirmed by international investigators. Of course, they are part of the "Axis of Evil" as president Bush stated, so this is enough to get the average American worried. Next, Colin Powell (poor sap) makes some administrative statement that "We really know they've got them." Then...

Now, this situation seems strangely familiar to me.

But are the Iranians really arming up because they are justifiedly scared shitless due to the Bush administration's aggressive use of force instead of diplomacy? Or is it all a smoke screen, as it was last time? Or something else altogether? Hmmmm....

Keep your eyes out folks.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/17/in...amp;oref=login

From the new York Times.


Scott

Subscription log-in Scott. What's the summary?

I hope nothing nasty happens. My guitar teacher was Iranian, and a very cool guy. Nearly all his family live in Iran, I don't wanna have to hear anything about "civilian casualties" again...

My mentor through most of my theatre years is living in Iran now, as is a friend who almost single-handedly taught me stage carpentry. I feel the same way ... civilian casualties in an attack on Iran wouldn't just piss me off from an ethical standpoint this time.

[ QUOTE ]
President George W. Bush Feb. 11 offered a strong endorsement of U.S. programs to safeguard or destroy the arsenal of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons and materials formerly possessed by the Soviet Union. However, in his fiscal year 2005 budget request to Congress, released just a week earlier, Bush did not substantially increase funding for these programs and actually proposed cuts to the Department of Defense component as well as suggested spending shifts in programs in the Departments of Energy and State.

[/ QUOTE ]

-http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2004_...garFunding.asp

[ QUOTE ]
The Tehran government has a developed a plan to begin competing with New York's NYMEX and London's IPE with respect to international oil trades – using a euro-based international oil-trading mechanism. This means that without some form of US intervention, the euro is going to establish a firm foothold in the international oil trade. Given U.S. debt levels and the neoconservative project for U.S. global domination, Tehran's objective constitutes an obvious encroachment on US interests in the oil market.


[/ QUOTE ]

-http://www.altpr.org/modules.php?op=...le&sid=355

scary stuff.

[ QUOTE ]
Group Says Iran Has Secret Nuclear Arms Program
By DOUGLAS JEHL

WASHINGTON, Nov. 16 - An Iranian opposition group says it has new evidence that Iran is producing enriched uranium at a covert Defense Ministry facility in Tehran that has not been disclosed to United Nations inspectors.

The group, the National Council for Resistance in Iran, is planning to announce its finding in Paris on Wednesday. The group says that inspection of the site would demonstrate that Iran is secretly trying to produce nuclear weapons even while promising to freeze a critical part of its declared nuclear program, which it maintains is intended purely for civilian purposes.

A senior official of the group, Muhammad Mohaddessin, said in a telephone interview late on Tuesday that the group had shared the new information "very recently'' with the International Atomic Energy Agency. But he and other officials of the group said it had not discussed the matter with the United States government, and its claims could not be verified.

Iran's mission to the United Nations did not return messages seeking comment on the assertion.

The group, based in Paris, is the political arm of the People's Mujahedeen, which is listed by the United States government as a terrorist organization because of its involvement in attacks on Americans in the 1970's. But the group also has a successful track record in gathering intelligence on Iran, and was the first, in 2002, to disclose the existence of what was then the secret Iranian nuclear site at Natanz.

United Nations inspectors "should not be fooled or deceived by the Iranian regime,'' Mr. Mohaddessin said.

A spokesman in Washington for the National Council for Resistance in Iran provided a seven-page summary of the assertion to The New York Times.

It says that the previously undisclosed site, in northeastern Tehran, covers 60 acres and houses biological and chemical warfare projects as well as nuclear activity. It says that the site, known as the Modern Defensive Readiness and Technology Center, now houses operations previously carried out at another Defense Ministry site in Tehran that was destroyed by the Iranian government this year before international inspectors could visit it.

The assertion by the opposition group is surfacing in a week in which France, Britain and Germany announced a formal agreement with Iran committing the country to freeze a critical part of its nuclear program in exchange for an array of possible rewards.

As part of the pact with the Europeans, the International Atomic Energy Agency said Iran had promised to suspend its uranium enrichment program starting a week from now. But the agency said it could not rule out the possibility that Iran was conducting covert activities.

"All the declared nuclear material in Iran has been accounted for, and therefore such material is not diverted to prohibited activities," the agency said in a report, referring to possible Iran nuclear weapons activity. "The agency is, however, not in a position to conclude that there are no undeclared nuclear materials or activities in Iran."

The United States and European countries have argued that Iran's nuclear program is intended to produce weapons. Iran's leadership has insisted that is not engaged in a nuclear weapons program but has the sovereign right to enrich uranium.

Officials of the opposition group said they believed that the Iranian Defense Ministry and Revolutionary Guards Corps were pursuing their program in secret and had not told Iran's atomic energy agency of the existence of the facility in Tehran.

[/ QUOTE ]

Scott

I pointed out this very real. possibility on the old site's long-running war thread. What nation is west of Iran? Iraq. What nation is east of Iran? Afghanistan. Knowing that, the rest is paint by numbers...

FOUR MORE WARS! FOUR MORE WARS!

I can't believe this is happening. It was only days ago I was reading an article explaining how Iran was temporarily stopping all Unranium Enrichment programs in order to have talks with European nations. The result could lead to help for Iran in using non-weapon related methods of producing energy for the country.

AND NOW... the American government is pulling out more scare techniques to frighten the bible humping rednecks that put W back in the saddle. And all for oil. What ever happened to the statements Bush made about alternate fuel sources during the debates? I think he spit up some fairy tale about a method of burning coal without pollution. I have the 1st and 3rd debates downloaded on CD waiting to be used against him. So much for America being innovative in technology. But hey, atleast Bush isn't making whores and faggots out of our little girls, right?

[ QUOTE ]
But hey, at least Bush isn't making whores and faggots out of our little girls, right?

[/ QUOTE ]

Hey, where was that in the Republican platform? I would have voted for that... A world full of whores and faggots would be much more safe and peaceful than a world full of sexually repressed religious zealots. Not sure if I'm talking about Shiites or Southern Baptists? Neither am I.

That's a strange turn of phrase, Elysium, does that refer to anything specific? All I can think of is, the Bush girls are sorority partiers, and Dick Cheney's daughter is gay.. Hmmmmm.

/jzero

jzero - it was a quote from a Bushlamic Fundamentalist that called in to a show on Cspan. Ranted about how she was voting for Bush because Kerry attended the "Black Mass" and wanted to turn all of our little girls into whores and our little boys into faggots.

Yeah, I remember that AZ. But even the other wacky right wingers were like "WTF is this loon talking about?!"

You guys are amazing.... and Predictable...

Scott

[ QUOTE ]
That's a strange turn of phrase, Elysium, does that refer to anything specific?
/jzero

[/ QUOTE ]

I thought I would throw that in to see if some remember the phone segment from Cspan. It's unlike me to use the "F" word, because I have no stance on the same sex marriage issue. The purpose of my phrase was to show how revolting it is that we (Americans) have elected an administration on such a trivial domestic issue, while "Operation Oil Pipeline Security", rages on killing hundreds of innocent victims in the Middle East.

I'm getting exhausted from all these political threads. [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

[ QUOTE ]
You guys are amazing.... and Predictable...

[/ QUOTE ]

I knew you were gonna say that.

[img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

Yea, that's the typical condescending and righteous tone we've come to know and expect from the right [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

You know you guys are slamming the bloody shite out of the “right” without considering you have applied the same BIGOT filter & stereotyping that you claim we have.

[ QUOTE ]
Face it, you guys lost, get over it.

[/ QUOTE ]

You're right. Sounds like what the North has been saying to the South since the Civil war. But man, I'll tell you what, we sure are gonna kick some ass over there in Afganustan, err...I mean Irak, uhm....I mean that one in between 'em. *spit*

[ QUOTE ]
Excuse me now, I have to go phuct my cousin/wife, drink beer, listen to a sermon against gays on my old 8 track player in my mobile home & then go hunting for prairie dogs….

[/ QUOTE ]

HAHAHAHA! [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

Ok, let's hear more about Iran. What do you Republicans think about the issue? More WMD's? Kill the ragheads? TERRORISTS!

Yes, I'd like to know what people who voted Bush think about the Iran issue. Is there any solid evidence that they Iranian government are manufacturing weapons of mass destruction? Did they let weapons inspectors into the country quite happily? When was the last Iranian terrorist attack on western civilisation?

Thanks Ely for bringing this back to the focus of what was posted.

The scary thing to me is almost everyone I work with here is past military or has kids in the service, really, and they seem like they need little evidence to go ahead and invade Iran.

Mop – Some the older people about me, myself included are not too young and still recall the Iranian hostage crisis in 1978. Basically the Iranian revolution took over and they over powered the American embassy and held hostages for like 478 or more days while Jimmy Carter acted like a little pussy cat. Finally after Ron Reagan got elected the Iranians released the hostages 23 days later. Bascially people around me see Iran as a religiously ruled Islamic state and feel it is less dangerous than Iraq, but they still recall vividly in their memories about the hostage crisis.

Contrary to the standard redneck process, I know about a dozen Iranians in the US and most are work associates who are cool Guys. One of my best Pals in school was an Iranian student from Tehran & also a few local vendors. I hope nothing weird happens in their homeland. I can only visualize the chaos since the other two countries we invaded are still unsettled.

I really don't think a 26-year old event is a basis for a war now... Has anything like that happened more recently?

I agree Mop, 26 year old issue is very old.

I don't have much more opinion on it but that I hope no invasion happens. I need to read up on it. But I am overwhelmed by a home remodel/moving, gba games, ebay, gba rom flash cards, my fantasy fighting card game, random names, ut2003, burning books on tape to cd's. Sheesh my head hurts........

[ QUOTE ]
I really don't think a 26-year old event is a basis for a war now... Has anything like that happened more recently?

[/ QUOTE ]

Rumsfield and Cheney were in the government at the time, they remember.

Saddam seemed more feasible to topple over because he invaded neighboring countries, Iran/Qwait. Iran? I don't know.

It's like convicting Scott Peterson because he's an asshole. No direct evidence of wrong doing, we just feel he coulda done it.

Seems like if the US does anything in Iran it will be a lot different (sorry, I meant ALOT different Rick) because all of our troops will probably still be tied up in Iraq for the next four years. So there might be some bombing of targets or something but no "Operation Iranian Freedom".