In happier news for US Marines Panetta says US Force is an option
Everyone is all smiles as Pannetta tells a good one about the US Air Force pilots being replaced by thousands of Predator drones.
U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Wednesday that Iran must either negotiate acceptable limits on its nuclear program or face the possibility of U.S. military action to stop it from getting the bomb.
Panetta made his remarks outside the city of Ashkelon in southern Israel, with an "Iron Dome" anti-rocket defense system as a backdrop.
The Pentagon chief said repeatedly that "all options," including military force, are on the table to stop Iran, should sanctions and diplomacy -- the preferred means of persuasion -- ultimately fail.
He said he still hopes Iran will see that negotiations are the best way out of this crisis.
However, Panetta said, "If they continue and if they proceed with a nuclear weapon, ... we have options that we are prepared to implement to ensure that that does not happen."
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http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/08 ... z22OGQbjB5This is a little shift here marking the first time the US has says it will bomb Iran to keep it from making bombs. Because if Iran had the bomb than the US could not bomb them. Which really removes all doubt as to why Iran wants the bomb.
Israel says "The US said we could so it must be ok"
"I see an ayatollah regime that declares what it has championed: to destroy us," Netanyahu said. "It's working to destroy us, it's preparing nuclear weapons to destroy us. ... If it is up to me, I won't let that happen."
With "matters that have to do with our destiny, with our very existence, we do not put our faith in the hands of others, even our best of friends," Netanyahu said, hinting that Israel might act alone despite American misgivings.
Netanyahu said both Romney and Obama have said "Israel has the right to defend itself."
So if Iran wins the challenge of weaponizing nukes they will get the immunity idol and be safe for another decade or so.
While the U.S. is closely coordinating with Israel on all its Iran activities, including the negotiations via the European Union–led P5+1 group, there’s an unmistakable gap — at least publicly — between the two sides when it comes to redlines that would trigger military action. President Obama has made clear that he would be willing to bomb Iran to prevent it from building nuclear weapons. Of course, the international consensus is that Iran is using the cover of its nuclear-energy program to steadily assemble the infrastructure to build nuclear weapons but has not moved to weaponize nuclear material, or even taken a strategic decision to do so. Thus President Obama’s insistence that there’s still plenty of time for sanctions to make the difference.
Israeli leaders, however, have publicly laid out a different redline, based on Israel’s more limited military capabilities. Defense Minister Ehud Barak, for example, has insisted that Iran’s nuclear program can’t be allowed to enter a “zone of immunity,” where, even if it hasn’t moved to weaponize nuclear material, it has placed enough of its nuclear infrastructure inside the hardened facility at Fordow, buried deep in a mountainside near Qom, to put it beyond the reach of Israel’s aerial-bombardment capabilities. Although the “zone of immunity” is a fuzzy indicator with no time line attached, the implication is that Israel will have to strike before Iran reaches that point or else forfeit its own military option for dealing with Tehran’s nuclear program.
Panetta told reporters that “it is the wrong characterization to say we’re going to be discussing potential attack plans. What we’re discussing are various contingencies and how we would respond.” Well, yes. And President Obama, soon after taking office, replaced the term global war on terror with overseas contingency operations. In practical terms, that may be a distinction without a difference.
Obama himself appears unable to entertain any compromise on the enrichment issue in an election year, which is why there is little prospect of any nuclear deal before November. The sanctions are certainly having a painful effect in Iran, but what’s less clear is whether or not this economic pain will force Iran to capitulate on the nuclear issue — and that’s a question unlikely to be answered this year.
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http://world.time.com/2012/08/01/new-sa ... z22OJgn4M9The idea that sanctions will work in Iran after they failed to produce in meaningful results in Iraq after 11 years would be laughable if not so sad. The laundry list of failed programs of sanction policy is amazing. Dictatorships don't give a shit if their people suffer they just become more brutal and dictatorial. Apparently we have failed to learn a single thing in the last 230 years.
Iran is getting ready:
Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told top Iranian military chiefs to expect “war within weeks,” at a recent war council meeting, according to Israeli news outlet DebkaFile.
“While retaliation had been exhaustively drilled in regular military exercises in the past year, Khamenei ordered the biggest fortification project in Iran’s history to save its nuclear program from even the mightiest of America’s super-weapons. Rocks are being gathered from afar, piled on key nuclear installations, covered with many tons of poured concrete and finally plated with steel,” states the report.
Despite more substantive reports speculating that any decision to attack Iran on behalf of Israel had been delayed until spring 2013, a parallel narrative that a military strike could take place in September or October has been doing the rounds more recently.
Whether the DebkaFile report is accurate or not, Iran has finalized preparations for conflict with its recent announcement that plans for closing the Strait of Hormuz, a key choke point through which 33% of the world’s oil shipments pass every day, are now complete.
Video at link
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GE5c_9re ... r_embedded[/YouTube]
http://www.infowars.com/iranian-ayatoll ... hin-weeks/My money says: US intel reports will apparently all state that Iran has no chance of getting the bomb until either right before the election (if poll numbers are way down) or until right after the US election (if poll numbers are way up). One way or another this thing is inevitable.
Don't know about being underway with the anchors out like that...
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