99% chance of attack on Iran

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-11-1999
99% chance of attack on Iran
26
Sun, 09-19-2004 - 11:49pm
99% chance of attack on Iran 30/08/2004 11:28 - (SA)

Amman - A prominent Jordanian journalist on Monday expected the United States or Israel to launch a "pre-emptive strike" against Iran in September or October with a view to enhancing President George Bush's re-election chances.

"A pre-emptive strike is coming 99% either in September or October before the US presidential elections early in November," said Fahd Fanek in an article in the daily Al-Rai.

"If the United States decides to carry out the strike, the timing will be before the elections so as Bush guarantees his re-election. If Israel launches the attack, it will do that for the avowed aim of ensuring Bush will be the next president," added Fanek, an economics expert and respected newspaper columnist.

Fanek contended that Iran "was well aware of this and, accordingly, it was heating up the war language with the Americans".

"What Moqtada al-Sadr did in Iraq could be part of an Iranian plan designed to foil any American blueprint to proceed eastward," he said, alluding to the recent bloody confrontation between al-Sadr's militias and the US troops at the holy town of Najaf. - dpa

Edited by Andrea Botha

dablacksox


Cynic: a blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be.---Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-31-2003
Mon, 09-20-2004 - 7:49pm
Russia has close ties with Iran and has been helping them build this nuclear reactor we want to bomb. My prediciton is that Putin will okay a US or Israeli strike against the Iranian nuclear capabilites if we let him do whatever he wants to crush the Chechans. Anybody else want to start a preventive war...c'mon, everybody's doin' it!
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Tue, 09-21-2004 - 10:45am
Israel is the one that will most likely take out the facility, just as they did with the one in Iraq that France was helping them build.

You could be right about the entire Russia / Putin / Chechnya thing too.

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-11-1999
Tue, 09-21-2004 - 10:12pm
Eyeing Iran Reactors, Israel Seeks U.S. Bunker Bombs

Reuters logo Tuesday, September 21, 2004 10:42 a.m. ET

By Dan Williams

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - The United States plans to sell Israel $319 million worth of air-launched bombs, including 500 "bunker busters" that could be effective against Iran's underground nuclear facilities, Israeli security sources said on Tuesday.

The Pentagon said in June it was considering the sale to Israel of 500 BLU-109 warheads, which can penetrate 15 feet of fortifications, in a package meant to "contribute significantly to U.S. strategic and tactical objectives." U.S. and Israeli officials had no immediate comment.

Israeli security sources said the procurement would go through. "This is not the sort of ordnance needed for the Palestinian front. Bunker busters could serve Israel against Iran, or possibly Syria," an Israeli source said.

Haaretz daily, citing Israeli government sources, said the sale would take place after the U.S. elections in November.

Earlier this month, Haaretz said Israel wanted bunker buster bombs for a possible future strike against Iran's atomic program, which the Jewish state considers a strategic threat.

"Our response to any invasive measure will be massive," said Massoud Jazaeri, spokesman for Iran's Revolutionary Guard.

Iran, which does not recognize Israel's right to exist, says its nuclear program has only peaceful purposes. This week it rejected international calls to comply with the U.N. nuclear watchdog's demand to halt all its uranium-enrichment activities.

An Iranian Defense Ministry spokesman said the disclosure of a U.S.-Israeli deal could be "psychological warfare to test us."

Mounted on satellite-guided bombs, BLU-109s can be fired from F-15 or F-16 jets, U.S.-made aircraft in Israel's arsenal. This year Israel received the first of a fleet of 102 long-range F-16Is from Washington, its main ally. "Israel very likely manufactures its own bunker busters, but they are not as robust as the 2,000-pound (910 kg) BLUs," Robert Hewson, editor of Jane's Air-Launched Weapons, told Reuters.

IRAN PROGRAM BELIEVED TO HAVE GONE UNDERGROUND

Among the nuclear facilities that Iran has declared are uranium mines near the city of Yazd and a uranium-enrichment plant in Natanz incorporating large underground buildings that could accommodate thousands of gas centrifuges.

Western diplomats accuse Iran of having several undeclared facilities close to Tehran thought to be related to uranium enrichment, which can produce fissile material for weapons.

The exiled Iranian opposition group known as the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) says Iran is constructing numerous secret facilities under its Defense Ministry.

Widely assumed to be the Middle East's only nuclear-armed nation, Israel wants to stop Iran going atomic, but its officials say diplomatic pressure on Tehran is the best method.

"I think (military action) should be a last, last, last resort. Unlike Iraq and North Korea, there is at least some chance of bringing about an undermining of the Velayat-e Faqih's authority," former CIA director R. James Woolsey told Reuters this month, referring to Iran's ruling Islamic clerisy.

Convinced Saddam Hussein was developing nuclear weapons, Israel bombed Iraq's Osiraq reactor in 1981. While the move drew international censure, eventually many Western experts saw it as an important blow to Saddam's strategic weapons capabilities.

"The response of the United States was, unfortunately, negative with respect to Osiraq," Woolsey said. "The Israelis were right and everybody else was wrong, including us, in 1981."

The Osiraq strike did not stop Saddam's quest for the bomb. Instead, Iraq went underground and worked in secret until the program was uncovered by the U.N. nuclear watchdog in 1991.

dablacksox


Cynic: a blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be.---Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Wed, 09-22-2004 - 9:58am
If Israel does go after the nuclear plant, it is not going to be by an air attack....they will use their special forces.
iVillage Member
Registered: 05-24-2004
Thu, 09-23-2004 - 12:06am
I have one thing to say, maybe I'm way off base. I had heard that Iran was merely looking at Nuclear energy as a way to cover there energy needs. Now, we have had nuclear power plants for a long time, which I don't like the idea but it's part of where our energy comes from. If we can have this kind of thing, who are we to tell others they can't.

I know they could just be claiming that's what the technology is for, but who knows.

Venus
iVillage Member
Registered: 11-11-1999
Thu, 09-23-2004 - 12:13am
"If Israel does go after the nuclear plant, it is not going to be by an air attack....they will use their special forces."

I'm not too sure about that. There would be too much of a chance that Israelis might be captured, and Israel doesn't like to leave them behind, not even bodies.

I would bet on an Israeli air strike followed by an Iranian missle barrage.

Also, a lot of radiation might be released and I don't think Israel would want to endanger their special forces that way.




Edited 9/23/2004 12:14 am ET ET by dablacksox

dablacksox


Cynic: a blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be.---Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary.

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-11-2004
Thu, 09-23-2004 - 3:03am
We have already been attacked by muslims, pakistanis, and extremists. They are called terrorists. They strike without warning. They have no boundries, they hate us and the freedom we have and for our religion. We have to fight them before they get us. Wake up! This is a war like no other. We are not fighting an enemy we can see. We cannot place a dollar value on an enemy who is so barbaric as to cut off people's heads. We must fight until we win!
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Thu, 09-23-2004 - 10:11am
I dont think the plant is operational yet, but I could be wrong.

Also, when they destroyed the plant in Iraq many years ago, it was with ground forces, and the Iraqi's didnt even know what happened.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Thu, 09-23-2004 - 10:12am
Except for a few problems with Iran's argument.

Iran controls some of the largest oil reserves, as well as natural gas reserves in the world, which more than satisfy their needs for energy.

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-23-2004
Thu, 09-23-2004 - 9:23pm


Considering they're sitting on like the second or third largest oil reserves in the world, I doubt they will need to rely on nuclear power anytime soon.


Edited 9/23/2004 9:24 pm ET ET by liveanew