Text 15297, 583 rader
Skriven 2007-06-06 07:53:32 av Vorlonagent (1710.babylon5)
     Kommentar till en text av rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated
Ärende: Re: unions
==================

"Josh Hill" <usereplyto@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:cl9b6318ej24jaat3i4s1vdntl4rpna4ss@4ax.com...
On Tue, 05 Jun 2007 04:56:22 GMT, "Vorlonagent"
<nojtspam@otfresno.com> wrote:

>
>"Josh Hill" <usereplyto@gmail.com> wrote in message
>news:ehqr43tr0jh8a85um0gn5qv0uaqgbu3u0f@4ax.com...
>> But, in the end, it doesn't make a difference. Even if there were only
>> a 25% chance that a second North Korean bomb would take out Seoul or
>> New York, it's more than enough, because we aren't going to take that
>> risk if we can possibly avoid it.
>
>Agreed. Unfortunately diplomatic constraints make the simple solutions
>(bombing the crap out of NK reactors and known fissionables storage)
>somewhat problematic.  Neither the SKs nor the Chinese are thrilled with
>the
>prospect of military force used against the NKs.

The North Koreans would take out Seoul, perhaps Tokyo. China could
depose the regime without force, but they don't want to deal with the
resulting mess.

Seoul for sure.

Tokyo, depends on whether their last rocket was destroyed on purpose or
failed spectacularly.  This kinda stuff is why the Japanese (and Taiwanese)
are very interested in helping the US develop anti-missile technology.


>On the other hand, the chinese, at least, aren't thrilled at the prospect
>of
>a nuclear Japan either and the NK threat pushes Japan in that direction.
>Japan can have a nuke very very easily if they want one.
>
>But the fact of the matter is that the NKs DO NOT have a workable bomb.
>They may have ideas on how to build a workable bomb based on their test.
>Without another test, they have a halfway nuke and nobody, not even the
>NKs,
>will know better until/unless they test.
>
>They're only probationary members of the nuclear club at this point.  They
>don't get the full prestige of being a nuclear power.  Nor implied the
>invulnerability that comes with having a bomb.

I don't think the last is true, given that no one wants North Korea to
hold their next nuclear test in Tokyo. They have their data: the
probability of a second dud is fairly low.
-----------------------------

That's overreaching in my view

Obviously we want to play it cautiously, but without a test,
nobody--NOBODY-- can be sure the NKs can build a working bomb.  You assume
the NKs know what went wrong with the first test and while they may, it's
not a sure thing.  I mean it's not like they can examine what's left and
learn anything useful.

You CAN build a uranium bomb without a test (the South africans did), but a
uramium bomb is much simpler to construct.

The NKs can drop a dirty bomb on Tokyo and that's the best threat you can be
sure of.  (but then they could do that in 2003).


>>>'In the master document, Iran talks about ensuring "full transparency"
>>>and other measures to assure the U.S. that it will not develop nuclear
>>>weapons. Iran offers "active Iranian support for Iraqi stabilization."
>>>Iran also contemplates an end to "any material support to Palestinian
>>>opposition groups" while pressuring Hamas "to stop violent actions
>>>against civilians within" Israel (though not the occupied
>>>territories). Iran would support the transition of Hezbollah to be a
>>>"mere political organization within Lebanon" and endorse the Saudi
>>>initiative calling for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian
>>>conflict.
>>>--------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>>...and you believe them?
>>
>> I don't think that's the real question. Iran isn't a monolith: they
>> have doves and hawks, reformers and conservatives just as we do. We're
>> popular with the Iranian public, and we know that there are voices in
>> the Iranian elite who have been asking why they're still at odds with
>> the United States when we've taken care of their worst enemies, Saddam
>> and the Sunnis and Al Quada and the Taliban. And Iran took /our/ side
>> after 9/11.
>
>Who talked about "full transparency"?  The iranian government?  The best
>use
>for the paper it's printed on would be either wiping one's butt or
>firestarter (make sure you know which use you prefer and print on
>appropriate stock)

We don't know that, and we won't know that if we don't negotiate.
-------------------------------------------------------------

No point.  There is nothing we can gain from this Iranian government.  No
promise we can extract that we can reasoably expect they'll honor.  Iran and
the mideast have a long enough track record that we don't need to naively
follow after evey silky-smooth turn of phrase that sounds like moderation
from our enemies.  They'll say all the right things ("Full transparency")
but that is worth nothing.  You are being sold a bill of goods.

They want you to do exactly what you're doing: hearing the codewords that
make you think the guys running Iran can be reasoned with and as a result
make it harder for the US to act against Iran when and if that time arises.
They can't be reasoned with.  Not under the certain circumstances.  We have
little credibility by which they would either respect an agreement or fear
to break it.  Before iraq, we had none.  We could have more, but the leftist
news outlets and politicians have done their level best to minimize it by
opposing and undermining the war at every turn and by any means at their
disposal.  Bush mistakes in iraq haven't helped things either.

When the US restores a reputation for being strong, resolute and very
dangerous to cross, THEN we can negotiate with the iranian clerics with some
expectation of good faith. Until then, they'll negotaiate to keep action
against them stalemated and continue to deliver arms and money to
terrorists, including to those in Iraq.  And continue to seek a nuclear
weapon.  Such a reputation is not built by running away from Iraq.  If we
want to negotiate in the mideast credibly, we must destroy organized
resistance in Iraq.

We may wish to hold talks with opposition leaders in private and see what we
can do to help topple the clerics fro power but those negotiations would be
highly unofficial.


>The fact that the Iranian took our side after 9/11 means nothing really.
>We
>were attacked by sunni extremists who are heretics in shia eyes.  We
>removed
>a sunni stronghold from one of their borders.  The fact that iran took in
>Al-Queda leadership refugees and now appear to be training and funding them
>sheds much more light on their true sympathies.

Unfortunately, experience has shown that we can't trust the
Administration's claims about intelligence or who supports Al Qaeda,
so we're in the dark as to what's actually happening. Which being
said, why would Iran support Al Qaeda? Al Qaeda is fighting against
the side they favor in Iraq, the Shites.
-------------------------------------------------
Al Queda is fighting for their own side.  Al Queda wants Iraq as a staging
area, not unlike what Afghanistan was for them.  They aren't anything more
than allies of convienence with the shiites.  They bombed the Golden Mosque,
remember?  They fight for the (radical) shiites because they get their money
from iran.


If they think it suits their interests, Iran may reach this or that
accommodation with one or another Al Qaeda operative, Middle Eastern
style (we ever-provincial Americans tend to forget that Middle Eastern
society is better defined by Scheherazade's scheme than by western
notions of forthright action). But that's not the same as saying that
Iran supports Al Qaeda.
-------------------------------------------------
They do.  They aren't comitted to Al Queda's cause, no, but Iran does
support Al-Queda.


Bottom line: I think you're overlooking Iran's self-interest, the
regime's sensitivity to pressure, and the diversity of opinion within
the Iranian elite, a diversity that was present even in the days
following the revolution, when an anti-American course was not a
given. We have what appears to be a real opening. But as so often the
Administration chose to overlook the signs of a thaw and set
unrealistic requirements for opening negotiations, thus undercutting
the progressive elements within Iran.
---------------------------------------------------
We have no "opening" of the sort.  We have Iran spinning neat-sounding lies
for you to latch onto.  It's fodder to earn and reatin your sympathy so as
to reinforce talks that block action.


This Administration never gets the carrot and stick thing right. They
bluster rather than applying measured pressure. They refuse to
compromise, they refuse to talk, and so eliminate the possibility of
progress. They overplay our hand, turn a position of overwhelming
strength and strong support into one of weakness and isolation. And as
the failed consequences of their hubris have become increasingly
obvious, they've been retreating like Napoleon's troops from Moscow,
settling in every case for less than we could have had at the start.
Iran is a good deal less afraid of us than they were a few years ago,
before we snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in Iraq and
stretched the army to the breaking point.
-----------------------------------------------------
That's strange.  Bush's political foes are those who are calling for a
retreat.  Bush isn't retreating.  It's more like the Tet offensive, which
the US media blew up into a US defeat when it was nothing of the sort.

Cut and run from Iraq is the path to failure, with Iran and the mideast.


>Regardless of factins in Iran, the goivernment is in the hands of just one:
>shia extremists.  Saying they have doves and hawks like we do would give
>the
>very false impression that the presence of these groups makes a difference
>in how Iran forms its policy.  By and large it does not.  Iran is a true
>theocracy and a very authoriatrian one.

But the theocracy isn't monolithic, immune to public pressure, or
without self-interest.
-------------------------------------------------
Yes it is immune.  By and large, yes.  And mostly monolithic for our ability
to deal with it.  Clerics in the courts routinely veto legislation they
don't like and nothing is or can be done short of violent revolution, which
nobody will start because nobody will back it unless it is a sure bet to win
(the US has the same problem in iraq).  The mideast mindset moves along the
lines of accomodating, even appeasing, the powers in their lives.  The
powers, in turn have nothing but the other powers to check their excesses
and often press any dominant position with great corruption and casual
violence.

Thus a fearful-appearing group of clerics can and does run roughshod over a
mostly-passified majority.  Iran's self interest is to be THE power in the
mideast.  Most of the power blocs in iran sinply want a large piece of a
larger pie.  They want to win the power game (inside iran and out), not
table it for something more equitable to all.  It's a very
dominant-submissive, top-down situation.  It is this way throughout the
mideast and what the US is trying to end by taking down saddam's iraq and
putting up a democracy.

Yes, there are people fed up with the clerics, but there's no way to tell
when critical mass will occur for action.  It could be tomorrow or 20 years
from now.  Either way there's no official negotiating we can undertake with
anyone among the fed-ups.


>That said, there are large factions in the Iran that prefer a more tolerant
>society and ties to the US.  What they have to say is of import.  That why
>bombing the crap out of Iran is unpalatable, because it drives undecideds
>into the arms of the shia clerics.  You will note back up this thread when
>I
>answered what I would do in Bushs place, I did NOT advocate abombing run on
>iran from the get-go and this was why.
>
>Iran is vulnerable economically.  they need to sell oil far more than the
>US
>needs them to sell it (the US does not buy iranian oil itself but its
>presence on the market factors into the price we pay nontheless).

Unfortunately, it isn't true that we don't need the oil. Iran is a
huge producer, and current oil supplies are, as we know, extremely
constrained -- the Saudis can no longer just turn up the tap to take
up the slack as they could have a few years ago. The Europeans,
Indians, and Chinese are directly dependent on Iranian oil and would
never agree to a boycott. But even if that weren't the case, Americans
probably wouldn't be willing to face the economic consequences of a
serious cut in the world's oil supply -- not just soaring prices at
the pump, but the possibility of a serious worldwide economic
downturn.

I agree that oil is our best bargaining chip against the Iranians, and
that if we /could/ use it, it would give us the upper hand. The thing
is, to do that, we need to move the world away from oil, to provide
alternatives. And the Administration has refused to do that, despite
its overwhelming strategic, economic, and environmental advantages.
It's another example of how this Administration's myopia has weakened
us.
-----------------------------------------
You misunderstand.  I never suggested a boycott of iranian oil.  But I bring 
these points out to show why there is little to fear from an *iranian* 
refusal to sell.  They need to keep the black gold flowing far more than we 
need them to.

And no, oil is not the best bargaining chip against iran, only the most 
obvious.

The iranian economy is in a shables.  Apparently the Prophet didn't speak 
many useful passages on economics.  Iran imports a huge amount of the 
gasoiline its people use.  I forget where it's 40% they import or 40% they 
refine locally.  An embargo of incoming gas would be highly effective.

if you want to be especially mean, an air strike on their big refinery would 
be equally catastrophic, but has all the negatives of a strike on thir 
centrefuges.

Then there is the South Africa solution, which is even more elegant and less 
sledgehammer: Disinvestment in companies that do business in Iran.  The US 
has already made it illegal for US companies to do business there so this 
would hit companies in europe or elsewhere.


>You talk as if iran were a democracy where power could be handed over
>peacefully.  That's very wishful thinking.  If anyone wants to wrest
>control
>from the clerics they will have to fight to do it.  And the way mideast
>culture works, nobody will jump on the bandwagon until they are sure they
>know who's going to win.
>
>Nor can I think of any US action that has seriously jeopardized the chances
>of a second Iranian revolution, up to and including the invasion of Iraq.
>
>I've seen it put forward that the iranian seisure of a british ship was an
>attempt to provoke a military reprisal specifically because the clerics are
>having internal problems.  If true, it puts the kibosh on any notion that
>the US has messed up chances of a moderate revolution in Iran.

A revolution shouldn't be necessary to shift the balance, just a new
consensus among the elite. See forex the selection of Gorbachev after
military expenditures threatened to bankrupt the Soviet economy or the
alliance of convenience between Mao's China and the US.
-----------------------------------------
Note that Gorbechev had to deal with a US that was a threat, not a US trying 
to be harmless, unintimidating and accomodating.

Gorbechev's glasnost was an attrempt to evolve in order to keep the 
communists in power.  It percipitated a collpase of the Soviet government 
instead.

Treating iran as a threat may produce the same solution, but as you note 
yourself, it wasn't negotiations that brought down the Iron curtain, it was 
US military spending, at the time hotly opposed by US liberals of the day. 
Those liberals still in public life now oppose a US posture that might tip 
Iran the same direction.


>> Like we denied them to North Korea? We can't deny them the weapons,
>> because we aren't willing to take the steps that would be necessary to
>> do that -- stop the world from buying their oil or invade.
>
>Point of order: the US does NOT buy Iranian oil.  Not a drop.  Europe does,
>as does india and china.

Hence "stop the world from buying their oil" rather than "stop buying
their oil."
--------------------------------
1) Won't happen.  The cheating we see across the planet on the Kyoto accords 
should tell you that nobody is going to torpedo their economy just because 
the US or a piece of paper wants them to.

2) better, more elegant solutions are available.


>We can bomb their (european-made) centrefuges.  That's all we need do to
>keep them from getting a nuke.

Unfortunately, they'd just rebuild the centrifuges underground. The
one estimate I've seen said that an attack would delay their
activities by only a few years. And in doing so, we'd pretty much end
to any diplomatic possibilities, as well as ending the popular support
that may one day lead to regime change or liberalization.
-------------------------------------------
It depends.  The centrefuges are precision equipment.  I'm told fingerprints 
on the wrong part can cause a centrefuge to tear itself apart.  A good 
carpet-bombing might be quite effective.  Unless europe simply sells them 
more centrefuges or more spare parts.  The again a warhead full of copy 
machine toner might be as well.


It would make much more sense I think to destroy their oil
infrastructure or interdict shipments, but we've managed to close off
that possibility by failing to reduce consumption and develop
alternatives.
---------------------------------------
If you want to get violent, merely destroy their refineries and interdict 
inbound gasoline.


>But you're right.  the Left in the US and the world has done its level best
>to erode any will to take that kind of action.

The left has little if anything to do with that. The military options
just aren't very good.
---------------------------------------
The left has had a central role to play, by undermining the US in iraq, by 
taking Iranian propaganda at face value and pushing for useless 
negotiations, the Left has had a huge impact, and quite a negative one too.


>> We do have
>> a chance to persuade them that they don't need those weapons, that the
>> threat of limited military action and the limited sanctions we can
>> manage outweigh any advantages the weapons would provide. All we have
>> to do is make them feel secure. And that's what this proposal allows
>> us to do. It gives us most of what we want -- hell, it's a wet dream
>> of a proposal -- and that would allow us to let them off the hook.
>
>You are completely misundertanding Iran.  They think we don't have the guts
>to do what it takes to stop them.  That certainly was what Al-Queda took
>away from "Black Hawk Down".

>You are making the classic Neville Chamberlain mistake of looking for what
>will "satisfy" an enemy.  They'd take all the bennies we offer and wait a
>few years and start developing nukes again.  NK just got through doing
>exactly this to us.

North Korea did what it did because of the Bush Administration's
backpedaling.
-----------------------------
They did it because they wanted more money.

That's the thing with many powerful men, especially dictators and autocrats. 
You give them what they want now and their appetite merely gets bigger. 
Chamberlain made that mistake with Hitler, just as Amassador Fox made that 
mistake with the Centauri.

Pay Iran not to make nukes and they will cheat, move the goalposts or both. 
And all the time continue to fund and encourage terroism.


>As long as the clerics are in power iran **is** a member of the Axis of
>Evil.  NOT just A member but THE PRINCIPAL member.

Thanks to right-wing saber-rattling, it took us years and a President
with a history of red baiting to recognize that Communism was no
longer a monolith and that we could play Russia off against China. The
Axis of Evil is even more nonsensical than Global Communism.
----------------------------------------
We can play Iran and the sunni Arab nations against each other too.

But that does not change iran's status one bit.

Nor does playing china and the soviets against each other change the status 
of the Soviet Union.  The USSR  was the US' prime enemy during the Cold War, 
just as Iran is its prime enemy now.


The Communists had, at least, been allies in the days of Stalin. But
neither history nor philosophy nor on-the-ground reality suggest that
Iran, Iraq, and North Korea were ever an axis of anything, evil or
otherwise. The North Koreans aren't Muslims. The Iranians and Iraqis
were dominated by Shites and Sunnis respectively and had fought a
bloody war for God's sake. And none of them were allies of Al Qaeda.
-------------------------------------------
The soviets, as I recall, supported Mao's revolution so there is definite 
history there.

Bush identified the three worst rogue nations on the planet.  They were the 
three nations to be the most wary of and that posed the greatest threat.  I 
can't think of anybody that took Bush to indicate that they *were* allied so 
it means nothing to nitpick the phase he used.

The fact they they were not in a formal alliance doesn't mean they were 
logically separate either.  Weren't Iraq's missiles under saddam based on NK 
designs?  Doesn't Iran buy missiles and the like from NK as well?


This particular bit of jingoistic nonsense led to one senseless,
unnecessary, and strategically disastrous invasion. It led to a
country that was gradually opening to the West and had back-burnered
its nuclear program resuming it and testing a bomb, then agreeing to
the same terms it had already reached with Clinton. It led to a
country that had, after years of unfailing enmity, sent a very clear
signal by cooperating with us to drop everything and hasten to join
North Korea in the nuclear invulnerability club. In short, it's been a
disaster.
-------------------------------------------
If that were the actual case, I might agree.

NK resumed their nuclear program to try to finesse more money from the US. 
Pre-2003 Bush Admin policies did not have a great impact on that decision 
save to open a convienent moment for attempting the finesse.  The results 
are at best a mixed success, despite your alarmist rhetoric.  You assume far 
more capability for the NKs than reason would support.  They are not 
invulnerable by any means.

Saddam's Iraq is gone and we are that much to the good and no great harm 
done to the iranian people's desire to be free of their mullahs.  Indeed, by 
putting pressure on the clerics by invading iran, we might be hastening 
Iran's demise than putting it off, the same way that Reagan's 
Leftist-reviled military buildup pushed the Soviets over the precipice.  We 
see iraninas turning toward iraq's Al-Sistani and away from the 
iranianclerics, something not possible wihtout an iraqi invasion.

I also heard a NPR radio report of organizations in iraq making common cause 
with the americans locally and trying to take it nation-wide.

You want to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory?  Side with the liberals 
in congress and pull US troops out.


>>>But -- and this is where I think the Adminstration let us down:
>>>
>>>'Instead, Bush administration hard-liners aborted the process. Another
>>>round of talks had been scheduled for Geneva, and Ambassador Zarif
>>>showed up - but not the U.S. side. That undermined Iranian moderates.
>>>
>>>My jaw fairly dropped when I read that.
>
>The US has been letting the Europeans take the lead in dealing with Iran.
>For all the good it has done.

Right, it's a failed policy. Bush used the same failed policy in North
Korea. In both cases, he refused to talk one-on-one. Didn't work.
Nothing he ever does works. It's astounding.
---------------------------------------
Say it enough times, it may actually come true.

Unilateral talks with the NKs impinge on too many other nations. 
Non-starter.  Everybody's voice needs to be heard.

The US has nothing to say to this Iranian government .  Entering into 
diplomacy would put all other options on hold so as to "not jeapodize the 
talks".  Again, a bad, bad idea.


>>>You could only be disappointed if you thought the Iranians were being
>>>genuine.
>>>
>>>You're projecting your own viewpoint onto the Iranians.
>>
>> No, see above. And if the Iranians weren't genuine, so what? We'd be
>> no worse off than we are today.
>
>Yes we would.  By playing useless diplomatic games we let Iran play its
>not-so-diplomatic games, such as through hezbollah, last summer against
>Israel.
>
>I see no point in useless talking since it delays what needs to be done
>instead of working toward it.

It costs nothing to talk: the worst that can possibly happen is that
the Iranians say no, and we're back where we were.
-------------------------------------
The cost is any other course of action or the posibility of other action. 
See above.  It's stasis.  Iran has nothing to lose, which is why they can 
say so many of the things you want to hear and intend none of them.  It's a 
way of buying time for their nuclear program to complete, buying time to get 
a grip on Lebanon, drive the US out of Iraq and make better inroads among 
palestinian terroists


>> That's one of the reasons this administration makes me cringe. They're
>> so arrogant that there's no possibility of success, no possibility of
>> progress. We alienate our allies, we lose opportunities to reach
>> agreements with our enemies, and as a result, we keep ending up on the
>> losing end of the stick. They've taken an overwhelming military,
>> economic, and moral advantage, and left us treading water in the
>> middle of the Atlantic. It's like Caligula sending the Roman legions
>> to conquer a marsh. It's like a tyrannosaur sinking in a tar pit. It's
>> like whaling with Ahab.
>
>Better that that letting Hitler and Stalin divide Poland.
>
>Better that than blaming ourselves for Pearl Harbor.
>
>Better that than backing down from the Barbary Pirates when they decided to
>prey on US merchant ships.
>
>This is a time to fight.

Except that Roosevelt and Churchill knew damn well that one fought the
most important enemy and sought help where you could get it. Roosevelt
decided to concentrate initially on Germany rather than the
less-threatening Japan. Both he and Churchilll made alliances with
Stalin; as Churchill put it, "If Hitler invaded Hell, I would at least
make a favourable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons."
------------------------------------
We sought help.  Our genuine allies answered.  The US put together a 
52-country coalition, IIRC.

Bush selected the proper country at the proper time for the proper action.



Bush, by way of contrast, decided to make war on everyone we didn't
happen to like with little regard for priorities and capabilities. It
was a shameful mistake that created far more headaches than it solved
and detracted from our ability to address the real threat, Al Qaeda
and its allies.
---------------------------------------
That is leftist propaganda.


-- 
Q: There's a lot of debate right now over the best way to communicate about 
global warming and get people motivated. Do you scare people or give them 
hope? What's the right mix?

Gore: I think the answer to that depends on where your audience's head is. 
In the United States of America, unfortunately we still live in a bubble of 
unreality. And the Category 5 denial is an enormous obstacle to any 
discussion of solutions. Nobody is interested in solutions if they don't 
think there's a problem. Given that starting point, I believe it is 
appropriate to have an over-representation of factual presentations on how 
dangerous it is, as a predicate for opening up the audience to listen to 
what the solutions are, and how hopeful it is that we are going to solve 
this crisis.

Al Gore, Grist Magazine, 2006
--- SBBSecho 2.12-Win32
 * Origin: Time Warp of the Future BBS - Home of League 10 (1:14/400)