The Phantom Menace: Iranian nukes

[ProfessorPlum]

So Bush and Cheney are doing a lot of saber-rattling right now, and it is clear that they want to start a war with Iran. The arguments are all depressingly familiar to people who paid attention during the run up to war with Iraq. In both cases, we have a lie repeated so many times that it becomes “truthy”: for Iraq, that Saddam had beyond-conventional weapons, for Iran that they are busy killing American servicemen in Iraq. They have produced zero evidence for this yet it is repeated over and over by their minions in the press. (Even if it were true, who could blame Iran? After all, we overthrew their democratically elected leader Mossadegh in 1953 and installed a brutal dictator, and then, throughout Reagan’s term, supplied Saddam with weapons to kill them with during the Iran-Iraq war.) And in both cases, we have an existential threat pounded into us: either Iraq or Iran is going to blow us up!

Now this news: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21440162/

George W. Bush on Tuesday said a missile defence system was urgently needed to protect the US and Europe from Iran, warning that Tehran could have the capability to strike the US and Europe with ballistic missiles within eight years.

Never mind the mind-blowing wastefulness, stupidity, and complete ineffectiveness of “missile defence systems”. I have news for Bush: there are thousands of nuclear weapons that pose much greater dangers for the US that exist TODAY, which we are doing nothing constructive about. Nukes are in the hands of Pakistan, China, Russia, India, North Korea, and Israel. All of which I’m much more concerned with than Iranian nukes in the future. Absolutely nothing is being done about Russia’s nuclear materials and warheads as far as I can tell, and the danger of them being sold off in Russia’s new wild west economy is much greater than any problem from Iran, you idiot. Russia has 16,000 total nuclear warheads, nearly 6,000 of which are still active and probably pointed at us. Nukes in Iranian hands are no more, and quite possibly much less, threatening to us than those in Pakistan. And certainly nukes “within eight years” are not something to get your panties in a twist over.

Here’s the kicker: An invasion of Iran will make our relations with Russia and China much worse, as Russia and China both depend on Iranian oil and have interests there. So, an attack on Iran is, on the face of it, simply suicidal for the US. China will destroy our economy by ceasing to buy our debt, if it comes to it, and that will be the end of the US, both economically and as a world power. Keep up the saber-rattling, you jackasses.