The Daily Gouge, Monday, February 27th, 2012

On February 26, 2012, in Uncategorized, by magoo1310

It’s Monday, February 27th, 2012….and here’s The Gouge!

Leading off the first edition of the week, the WSJ offers two views on what may well prove in retrospect to have been Team Tick-Tock’s Munich Moment; first, Frederick Kagan and Maseh Zarif detail….

America’s Iranian Self-Deception

Let’s admit the facts about its nuclear program and then have an honest debate about what to do.

 

Americans are being played for fools by Iran—and fooling themselves. There is no case to be made that Iran is not pursuing a nuclear weapons capability. There is no evidence that Iran’s decision-makers are willing to stop the nuclear program in exchange for lifting sanctions or anything else. The International Atomic Energy Agency reported on Friday that it has made no progress in its negotiations with Iran and that Iran continues to accelerate its enrichment operations, which are in violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions and agreements with the IAEA.

Yet the policy discussion in the U.S. is confused. Former Ambassador Dennis Ross writes that the Iranians are ready for talks. Anonymous administration officials refer to one of the most dangerous Iranian nuclear installations, Fordow, outside the city of Qom, as “a Potemkin facility.” The media are full of comparisons to Iraq in 2003, when suspicions that Iraq was pursuing a covert nuclear program led to war.

People are conflating intelligence assessment with policy recommendation. The prospect of war with Iran is so distasteful that people are desperate to persuade themselves that the problem is not serious.

IAEA inspectors on the ground at Iran’s nuclear facilities reported the following facts on Friday: Iran’s inventory of centrifuges enriching uranium isotopes has been steadily expanding, along with the stockpiles of uranium enriched to 3.5% and 20%—important stages on the road to weapons-grade uranium. Iran has installed and run advanced centrifuges in the Natanz Pilot Fuel Enrichment Plant. Iran has buried an enrichment facility under a small mountain at Fordow, installed air-defense systems around it, and brought new centrifuges online there.

Iran is developing techniques and technologies needed to turn weapons-grade uranium (which it is not yet producing) into an atomic bomb. The IAEA reported that the Iranians “dismissed the Agency’s concerns [about weaponization] . . . largely on the grounds that Iran considered them to be based on unfounded allegations.” The Iranians have denied inspectors access to the facilities that inspectors suspect are being used to work on weaponization.

The price of this refusal, including U.N. and international sanctions, has devastated the Iranian economy. Unemployment and popular dissatisfaction with the regime are high. Unprecedentedly harsh sanctions imposed by the Obama administration are driving off customers for Iran’s oil.

What peaceful purpose could be served by accepting such damage to pursue an illegal nuclear program? The international community has repeatedly offered Iran enriched uranium for its reactors to produce both electricity and medical isotopes—and Iran has refused. Iran’s behavior makes sense only if its leadership is determined to have a nuclear program that can develop and field atomic weapons.

The pressure on Iran’s economy and tensions within its political elite persuade some observers that Iran’s leaders are nearing a decision to trade the nuclear program for relaxed sanctions. That may be true—but there is no evidence for it. Iran’s leaders continue to insist on Iran’s right to the nuclear program as it is being built. No Iranian leader has suggested that Iran should comply with the IAEA or abandon the program.

Western observers are confusing internal Iranian disagreements about how to manage their economic challenges with disagreements about foreign policy. Increasing external pressure this year could fracture the Iranian leadership on this issue, but no one has adduced any convincing evidence that is happening.

Iran is, however, preparing rhetorically for war with the West. Iran’s military has threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz, attack American naval ships passing through it, and pre-empt what it perceives to be preparations for an attack on Iran. The Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other political figures have seconded these threats, and no Iranian leader has denounced them.

By contrast, there has been no vocal outcry for military action against Iran in the U.S. Even Israel’s threats have been muted and confused. The bellicosity in this crisis is coming almost entirely from Tehran. Why should a state seeking a peaceful nuclear program work so hard to whip up war fever?

Some say that Iran’s leaders are irrational. But their statements and actions in this instance—juxtaposing bellicosity with offers of negotiations—make perfect sense if they are intended to cover the acquisition of a nuclear weapons capability.

The Iranians are advancing technically as fast as they can to acquire the fuel for a nuclear bomb. They also are pursuing key elements of a weaponization program separately and covertly. At the same time, they have attempted to draw the IAEA inspectors into protracted negotiations that would buy time to reach what the Israelis call the “zone of immunity” after which Israel no longer has a viable military option.

Add it up any way you like: Iran is starting to race to reach a breakout point at which the international community will be unable to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons, short of a massive American military strike. The evidence available supports no other conclusion.

This is not a recommendation for a military strike on the Iranian nuclear program. One could decide that allowing Iran to acquire nuclear weapons capabilities is preferable to the consequences of a military strike, or one could accept at face value President Obama’s statements that the prospect of Iran acquiring a nuclear arsenal is unacceptable (which implies a willingness to use military force to prevent it). But the debate must take place on the basis of a reality not skewed to support one or another policy option.

Those who oppose military action against Iran under any circumstances must say so, and must accept the consequences of that statement. Those who advocate military action must also accept and consider the consequences—regional and possibly global conflict and all of the associated perils of war. But neither American nor Israeli nor any Western interest is served by lying to ourselves and pretending the predicament will go away.

Next, the very purveyors the skewed realities Kagan and Zarif mention above:

Wishing Upon Iran

U.S. spies hold out hope the mullahs won’t build a bomb.

 

What will it take to persuade the U.S. intelligence community that Tehran’s nuclear intentions aren’t exactly peaceful? Perhaps nothing short of an explosion.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released its latest report on Iran on Friday, this time with the cheerful news that the regime has sharply increased its production of 20%-enriched uranium and in much greater quantities than it can possibly need for civilian use. More than a third of the new enrichment is taking place at its Fordow installation, which is inside a heavily fortified bunker carved into a mountain.

Stockpiling 20% uranium (reactor-grade is 5%) gives Iran the option to further enrich the fuel to bomb-grade level quickly and with relative ease. And speaking of a bomb, the regime last week forbade IAEA inspectors from visiting a weapons-facility at Parchin, which the Agency suspects has conducted nuclear-weapons design work.

If that sounds grim, America’s spooks see a silver lining: Tehran may be doing what it can to manufacture the various components of a nuclear weapon, but it has yet to decide to assemble them into an explosive device. That’s the public assessment of James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence, seconded by CIA Director David Petraeus and Joint Chiefs Chairman Martin Dempsey.

Some anonymous intelligence sources go even further: According to a weekend story in the New York Times, they still believe the conclusions of a 2007 National Intelligence Estimate, which argued that Iran put its nuclear weapons-work on the shelf in 2003.

Mr. Clapper and friends are drawing a narrow distinction between having the ability to build a nuke and actually building one. In this ever-hopeful analysis, Iran might decide that it is better served possessing enough nuclear capability to keep its options open and its enemies on guard, without having to incur the risks of building and maintaining an actual arsenal. The model here is Japan, another country that could easily build nuclear weapons but chooses not to out of strategic, moral and political considerations.

There’s a problem with this logic: Japan is not Iran. Democratic Tokyo threatens nobody. Theocratic Tehran never ceases making threats. The idea that Japan could, in theory, field a nuclear arsenal might serve as a deterrent against Chinese military planners, but it doesn’t keep ordinary people in Seoul, Taipei or Manila awake at night.

By contrast, if the mullahs can readily acquire nuclear weapons, they will instantly change calculations in the Middle East and beyond. That event would broaden Iran’s strategic and tactical options while complicating those for Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Gulf states and the U.S.

It would lead almost inevitably to a policy of seeking to placate Tehran at the expense of U.S. allies—lest, for example, some “provocative” Israeli action tempt Iran into building the bomb it nearly possesses anyway. The Obama Administration is already moving in that direction with its campaign, first private and increasingly public, to put a higher priority on deterring an Israeli attack on Iran than on preventing a nuclear Iran.

But what about those anonymous spooks whispering that the conclusions of the 2007 NIE are still good? We wonder if they’ve talked to the famous neocons at the IAEA, whose November report on Iran’s nuclear programs noted “indications that some activities relevant to the development of a nuclear explosive device continued after 2003.”

And that’s the ultra-cautious view. Iran was already known to possess blueprints for a nuclear bomb. The really key aspects of a militarized nuclear program—uranium enrichment and the development of long-range ballistic missiles—are hiding in plain sight. If Tehran’s intentions were truly peaceful, why would it refuse to negotiate seriously for so many years and in the face of increasingly tough sanctions that are making the regime even more unpopular?

The nonsecret evidence is overwhelming that Iran is driving headlong to get the capacity to build a bomb, whether or not it chooses to stage a test.

So why are our spooks so reluctant to say so? Part of it may be the lingering damage from the WMD mistakes over Iraq. No one in government wants to be blamed again for overestimating an enemy’s capability, even if the history of intelligence has more episodes when America underestimated an adversary. Recall North Korea’s invasion of the South, Saddam Hussein before the invasion of Kuwait, or the threat of terrorism on U.S. soil before 9/11.

President Obama has misjudged Iran at every turn—starting with his assumption that the mullahs would negotiate with him because he wasn’t George W. Bush, that he would engender goodwill by downplaying Iran’s stolen election in 2009, and that sanctions would make them bend. Wishful intelligence thinking won’t deter Israeli leaders from defending their interests any more than it will stop Iran from obtaining weapons of mass destruction.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, as Erika Johnsen reports in Townhall.com, The Obamao’s misguided Muslim outreach policies continue to increase Americans’ pain at the pump:

Winter Gas Prices Hit Record High

 

As Victor Davis Hanson recently wrote in National Review Online:

“….As gas nears $5-a-gallon out west, the president, who has cancelled a key pipeline and frozen federal leases from Alaska to the East Coast, teaches us about American algae potential, in the way he used to emphasize the importance of tire pressure and “tune-ups.” He castigates the opposition for making political hay out of bad news, in the way he routinely did as a senator in compiling the most partisan voting record in the Senate. Energy Secretary Chu cannot and will not say a word about soaring gas prices, since he is on record not so long ago hoping that they might double—that is, get to $8- to 10-a-gallon as they are in Europe. The Energy Department can do almost everything Americans don’t want, but not the single thing they do want.

And since we’re on the subject of things American’s don’t want, here’s Nancy the Red’s latest explanation for rising oil prices:

Pelosi Statement on Rising Gas Prices

 

“Independent reports confirm that speculators are driving up the cost of oil, hurting consumers and potentially damaging the economic recovery. Wall Street profiteering, not oil shortages, is the cause of the price spike. In fact, U.S. oil production is at its highest level since 2003, and millions of acres have been cleared for additional development.

We need to take strong action to protect consumers from this speculation. Unfortunately, Republicans have chosen to protect the interests of Wall Street speculators and oil companies instead of the interests of working Americans by obstructing the agencies with the responsibility of enforcing consumer protection laws. They have also repeatedly opposed our efforts to end billions of dollars in outdated taxpayer subsidies for oil companies enjoying record profits.

We support efforts by the Obama Administration to expand domestic energy resources, including natural gas and renewable sources like wind and solar that create jobs in America and will end our dangerous dependence on foreign energy supplies. This can be achieved because today, the United States currently has more oil and gas rigs at work than the rest of the world combined, and imports of foreign oil have decreased.

We call on the Republican leadership to act on behalf of American consumers and join our efforts to crack down on speculators who care more about their profits than the price at the pump even if these spikes harm the American consumer and our economy.”

Ahhh!  Evil, no-good and (conveniently!) nameless speculators, irresponsible Republicans and Big Oil!  The triumvirate of Progressive bogeymen.  But note Pelosi’s energy menu, like Tick-Tock’s, glaringly omits increasing domestic access to the one fuel source America needs most: OIL!

Next up, as today’s installment of Tales From the Darkside, courtesy of Townhall.com‘s Katie Pavlich and the admitted agents for social change at Time, relates, the moment we feared has finally come:

Are the Navy SEALs Too…White?

 

In nature, most seals are black, with relatively few white ones. The Navy’s SEALs have exactly the opposite problem — they’re overwhelmingly white, with hardly any blacks. So they’re trying to do something about it.

It’s a fundamental challenge in a democracy with an all-volunteer force: recruits may be drawn from all segments of society, but elite military units — and none is more elite these days than the SEALs, following their dispatch of Osama bin Laden last May — tend to draw from small pools of talent. For the SEALs, that includes athletic young men who are smart and good in the water. For whatever reason, that has led to an overwhelmingly white SEAL force. (We’ll go all in and bet Time has never questioned the overwhelmingly black appearance of the NBA.)

The SEALs are considering hiring help to attract thousands of “minority males in the 16–24 year-old target age range” to become SEALs. “This contract will create a mechanism to enhance Naval Special Warfare’s ability to conduct outreach, raise awareness, mentor, and increase self-selection to a career as a SEAL within minority communities,” a recently-posted draft contract solicitation says.

U.S. special operators have long acknowledged they face challenges mixing in with foreign populations because they look so American. The SEALs acknowledge as much: “Traditional SEAL Team demographics will not support some of the emerging mission elements that will be required,” it says.

Soooo….while these guys stick out like a sore thumb….

….according to Time and the increasingly PC Navy Brass, these homeboys will….what?….

….blend right in?!?

On the Lighter Side….

Finally, we’ll call it a day with the Muslim Minute, and yet another sign, courtesy of Carl Polizzi, the apocalypse is upon us:

PA Judge: Muslims Allowed to Attack People for Insulting Mohammad

 

We’ve no idea how Mark “Mohammad” Martin got on the Pennsylvania bench, but one thing is certain: his departure is long overdue.  So Judge Martin….

….along with the idiot defense counsel who, along with the judge, doesn’t know his ass from his elbow when it comes to either the law or the Constitution.

Magoo



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