Second Holocaust Countdown: 979 Days

Continuing on the thread from last time, here is an update on the Iranian threat to Israel's existence.

The EU diplomats have opted for the two things it does best: write reports and act defeatist, as reported by the UK's Financial Times:

Iran will be able to develop enough weapons-grade material for a nuclear bomb and there is little that can be done to prevent it, an internal European Union document has concluded.

In an admission of the international community’s failure to hold back Iran’s nuclear ambitions, the document – compiled by the staff of Javier Solana, EU foreign policy chief – says the atomic programme has been delayed only by technical limitations rather than diplomatic pressure. “Attempts to engage the Iranian administration in a negotiating process have not so far succeeded,” it states.

This must really get the Europeans depressed. Not the fact that there will be a nuclear Iran. That the Iranians don't want to negotiate.

The downbeat conclusions of the “reflection paper” – seen by the Financial Times – are certain to be seized on by advocates of military action, who fear that Iran will be able to produce enough fissile material for a bomb over the next two to three years. Tehran insists its purposes are purely peaceful.

Who to believe? Tehran or the advocates of military action?

“At some stage we must expect that Iran will acquire the capacity to enrich uranium on the scale required for a weapons programme,” says the paper, dated February 7 and circulated to the EU’s 27 national governments ahead of a foreign ministers meeting yesterday.

“In practice...the Iranians have pursued their programme at their own pace, the limiting factor being technical difficulties rather than resolutions by the UN or the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Heresy! Surely the UN or IAEA are the answer to global policing?

“The problems with Iran will not be resolved through economic sanctions alone.”

Instead, it's back to the negotiating table, even if the other side of the table has an empty chair.

France's Jacques Chirac wins the quote of the month for January regarding Iran:

I would say that what is dangerous about this situation is not the fact of having a nuclear bomb. Having one or perhaps a second bomb a little later, well, that's not very dangerous.

Chirac has worked out the Iranian hit list is (1) Israel, (2) United States, and (3) Europe. So a maximum of two nuclear bombs is OK.

Elsewhere in Europe, the UK Daily Telegraph's Legal Editor Joshua Rozenberg lists four ways of tackling Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, according to Irwin Cotler, former attorney general to Canada. To paraphrase, these four ways are:

1. taking legal action using the international treaty, Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide,
2. taking legal action through the International Court of Justice,
3. taking legal action through the International Criminal Court,
4. taking legal action through a nation's own judicial system.
   

Not wanting to spoil all of Cotler's legal eggs sitting in the one basket, but what if legal action against a single man doesn't stop the Iranian nuclear program and the mad mullahs in the shadows?

In the same article, Rozenberg quotes Benjamin Netanyahu:

The real danger is that Iran could become one gigantic suicide bomber.

Somehow, the thought of legal action wouldn't appear to phase Ahmadinejad. Bore him perhaps, but not phase him.

Meanwhile, Russia continues to triangulate, as reported in Jerusalem Post:

Russia believes it is "crucial" to have a nuclear-free Iran, Andrey Demidov, currently Russia's top diplomat in Israel, has said in an interview with The Jerusalem Post, distancing Moscow from those saying a nuclear Iran is inevitable.

Crucial enough to have a nuclear-free Iran to provide them with the Bushehr nuclear reactor.

Demidov, Russia's acting ambassador, said Russia did not agree with French President Chirac's comment that one or two nuclear bombs in Iranian hands would not be disastrous.

The difference between France and Russia? France's Chirac doesn't care and is open about it. Russia doesn't care and is duplicitous about it.

"We want Iran to be nuclear-free, and we will work in that direction. Iran is very far away from France, and he [Chirac] can say whatever he wants, he is going to leave [office soon]. But for us it is crucial, important to have a nuclear-free Iran," Demidov said.

"The Americans are trying to change the regime. What if the ayatollahs go, and there is a new shah?" he said. "The shah was very hostile to my country. First of all we want to have a friendly regime in Iran, and secondly we want it to be nuclear-free."

In that order of priority.

Jerusalem Post's Anshel Pfeffer describes the second-order effects of a nuclear Iran. Whether or not Iran has a nuclear weapon, the mere possibility it may have one is enough to cause Israel problems:

To change that, Iran doesn't even need to announce it has a bomb or carry out a nuclear test like North Korea did last year. It would be enough for the Middle East to think that it had the bomb. Iran might even take a page out of Israel's book and develop its own brand of nuclear ambiguity.

An Iranian nuclear umbrella would be spread over its allies and proxies within the range of a Shihab-3 missile. This would embolden all sorts of groups, organizations and countries, radical streams among Israeli Arabs, Hizbullah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, Syria and the front movements it has already set up on the Golan border.

Israel's deterrent factor, already damaged in the Lebanon war, would be further downgraded once there was another nuclear power in the region. Hassan Nasrallah would have a much freer hand in trying to overthrow the Lebanese government with the backing of a nuclear Iran. Egypt and Jordan would also be destabilized.

So what's the bad news then?

Surprisingly, good news comes from Caroline Glick in her op-ed piece in Jerusalem Post:

Today positive and negative indicators regarding the nature and outcome of a US confrontation with Iran run together and so forecasting the likely form and outcome of the contest is all but impossible.

On the one hand, the US is beginning to openly target Iranian agents and assets in Iraq. This limited move has been enough to unnerve Iranian leaders who apparently fear that it is but the first step towards an all-out American offensive against Iran.

Their fears are also raised by the US naval buildup in the Persian Gulf, the Iraqi government's announcement that it is sealing its borders with Iran and Syria and the build-up of NATO forces near the Afghan border with Iran.

Economically, the pressure that the US has been exerting on European and Asian oil companies to curtail their operations in Iran is beginning to pay off. Tuesday The New York Times reported that the Iranian economy, which is completely dependent on oil and gas exports, is beginning to show signs of distress. Without foreign assistance, the Iranians cannot long maintain their current export rate or develop their reserve capacity. This shortfall will force the regime to curtail government subsidies of gas and oil prices and so encourage civil unrest.

The regime's fear of unrest grows by the day as the regime itself shows increased signs of disintegration. With the supreme leader Ali Khamenei reportedly suffering from the late stages of cancer, Iran expert Michael Ledeen reported this week that factional fighting for succession between forces loyal to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and forces loyal to former president and leader of the powerful Guardians Council Hashemi Rafsanjani is gaining momentum. The succession battle has engulfed the ayatollahs who are themselves turning against one another.

Furthermore, according to the Iran Press Service, the attack in Baluchistan that killed a dozen Revolutionary Guards troops on Tuesday was only one of many violent attacks against regime targets to have occurred in recent days. If the US and its allies act wisely, there is every reason to believe that they could successfully foment a revolution that would bring down the regime.

So that was the good news. Of course, there is always the small print:

For both Bush and Rice made it clear this week that they do still cling to the fantasy that diplomacy can carry the day with Iran. While touting her deal with North Korea on Tuesday, Rice said it should be viewed "as a message to Iran that the international community is able to bring together its resources, and that strong diplomacy has achieved results."

Wouldn't it be lovely if Iran decided to negotiate? Better still, it chose the South African nuclear disarmament option? Even better still, it shed its Islamofascist theocracy for a genuine democracy?

Yes, it would be lovely.

But that isn't the point.

The point is, as is most likely, what if they do not?

What then?

979 days until we find out.