Iran vs US/Israel conflict escalating

[Guest Gary C]

Iran won't use nukes against the US, no matter how much they pretend to want to in their rallying chants. Iran want nukes because they've got a pretty tetchy Israel nearby who have got a shitload of American weapons. They're surrounded by American forces and have every right to be paranoid or defensive.

If Iran had nukes they would be treated like North Korea. Shunned and ridiculed, but respected out of fear. Left alone to their own devices and free to deal with China.

 

And since this whole thing is about oil, and the US are effectively building a pipeline around Iran, it makes sense for them to want to use nuclear power for their energy. If they can become self-sufficient then they can sell all that oil (presumably to Russia and China).

 

Of course, the scary thing is that a ground invasion of Iran is nigh impossible so a sustained and devastating missile attack would be the only option.

[chim]

I knew this was going to happen as soon as the US started showing news and 60 minutes stuff on how backwards and dangerous Iran is.

[Guest Gary C]

And since this whole thing is about oil, and the US are effectively building a pipeline around Iran, it makes sense for them to want to use nuclear power for their energy. If they can become self-sufficient then they can sell all that oil (presumably to Russia and China).

 

European Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger said on Tuesday there was consensus among some EU countries to ban imports of Iranian oil and that Europe hoped to bring Russia on board in a global ban.

But the world's biggest crude oil producer, which does not import any Iranian crude, is unlikely to back the plan aimed at piling pressure on Iran to drop its disputed nuclear program.

"It is quite obvious that this decision is based on some political motivation ... In these situations we try to be as neutral as possible," Sergei Shmatko told reporters on the sidelines of theWorld Petroleum Congress.

[tokn]

The fuck! We are 21. century, aren't why? And I think the comparison of Nazi-Germany with the government of US-America is actually not so wrong. If they invade Iran as well I swear I will start to get political. This is way too much. Nuclear weapons up my ass.

[Guest Gary C]

In the 14th century there were two pandemics. One was the Black Death, the other was the commercialisation of warfare. Mercenaries had always existed, but under Edward III they became the mainstay of the English army for the first 20 years of what became the Hundred Years war. Then, when Edward signed the treaty of Brétigny in 1360 and told his soldiers to stop fighting and go home, many of them didn't have any homes to go to. They were used to fighting, and that's how they made their money. So they simply formed themselves into freelance armies, aptly called "free companies", that proceeded around France pillaging, killing and raping.

One of these armies was called the Great Company. It totalled, according to one estimate, 16,000 soldiers, larger than any existing national army. Eventually it descended on the pope, in Avignon, and held him to ransom. The pope made the mistake of paying off the mercenaries with huge amounts of cash, which only encouraged them to carry on marauding. He also suggested that they move on into Italy, where his arch-enemies, the Visconti, ran Milan. This they did, under the banner of the Marquis of Monferrato, again subsidised by the pope.

The nightmare had begun. Huge armies of brigands rampaging through Europe was a disaster second only to the plague. It seemed as if the genie had been let out of the bottle and there was no way of putting him back in. Warfare had suddenly turned into a profitable business; the Italian city states became impoverished as taxpayers' money was used to buy off the free companies. And since those who made money out of the business of war naturally wished to go on making money out of it, warfare had no foreseeable end.

Wind forward 650 years or so. The US, under George W Bush, decided to privatise the invasion of Iraq by employing private "contractors" like the Blackwater company, now renamed Xe Services. In 2003 Blackwater won a $27m no-bid contract for guarding Paul Bremer, then head of the Coalition Provisional Authority. For protecting officials in conflict zones since 2004, the company has received more than $320m. And this year the Obama government contracted to pay Xe Services a quarter of a billion dollars for security work in Afghanistan. This is just one of many companies making its profits out of warfare.

In 2000 the Project for the New American Century published a report,Rebuilding America's Defenses, whose declared aim was to up the spending on defence from 3% to 3.5% or 3.8% of American gross domestic product. In fact it is now running at 4.7% of GDP. In the UK we spend about $57bn a year on defence, or 2.5% of GDP.

Just like the taxpayers of medieval Italian city-states, we are having our money siphoned off into the business of war. Any responsible company needs to make profits for its shareholders. In the 14th century the shareholders in the free companies were the soldiers themselves. If the company wasn't being employed by someone to make war on someone else, the shareholders had to forgo their dividends. So they looked around to create markets for themselves.

Sir John Hawkwood's White Company would offer its services to the pope or to the city of Florence. If either turned his offer down, Hawkwood would simply make an offer to their enemies. As Francis Stonor Saunders writes in her wonderful book, Hawkwood – Diabolical Englishman: "The value of the companies was the purely negative one of maintaining the balance of military power between the cities." Just like the cold war.

Two decades ago I picked up an in-house magazine for the arms industry. Its editorial was headed "Thank God For Saddam". It explained that, since the collapse of communism and end of the cold war, the order books of the arms industry had been empty. But now there was a new enemy, the industry could look forward to a bonanza. The invasion of Iraq was built around a lie: Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction, but the defence industry needed an enemy, and the politicians duly supplied one.

And now the same war drums, encouraged by the storming of the British embassy last week, are beating for an attack on Iran. Seymour Hersh writes in the New Yorker: "All of the low enriched uranium now known to be produced inside Iran is accounted for." The recent IAEA report which provoked such outcry against Iran's nuclear ambitions, he continues, contains nothing that proves that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.

In the 14th century it was the church that lived in symbiosis with the military. Nowadays it is the politicians. The US government spent a staggering $687bn on "defence" in 2010. Think what could be done with that money if it were put into hospitals, schools or to pay off foreclosed mortgages.

The retiring US president, Dwight D Eisenhower, famously took the opportunity of his farewell to the nation address in 1961 to warn his fellow countrymen of the danger in allowing too close a relationship between politicians and the defence industry.

"This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience," he said. "In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist." It exists. The genie is out of the bottle again.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/06/iran-war-drums-terry-jones??

 

The fuck... That's some real shit. I'd never heard about the marauding 14th century army before.

[murve33]

And since this whole thing is about oil, and the US are effectively building a pipeline around Iran, it makes sense for them to want to use nuclear power for their energy. If they can become self-sufficient then they can sell all that oil (presumably to Russia and China).

 

European Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger said on Tuesday there was consensus among some EU countries to ban imports of Iranian oil and that Europe hoped to bring Russia on board in a global ban.

But the world's biggest crude oil producer, which does not import any Iranian crude, is unlikely to back the plan aimed at piling pressure on Iran to drop its disputed nuclear program.

"It is quite obvious that this decision is based on some political motivation ... In these situations we try to be as neutral as possible," Sergei Shmatko told reporters on the sidelines of theWorld Petroleum Congress.

Lol! Russia would never do that. They've been allies with Iran forever, along with China. Russia will not be on "our" side if there is war.

[Guest couch]

Gah, I'm so tired of this country. "We don't have any money, I have an idea, let's start yet another war".

 

And don't try to use the argument "BUT WARS MAKE JOBS!". Shut the fuck up. Who do you know who has a job that helps the war effort? They help select companies become richer.

 

Hopefully this will all blow over.

During WW2 jobs weren't necessarily created but rather converted. People already working one job, say manufacturing some civvie product, were simply told that they now need to make something for the military. WW2 wasn't solely responsible for pulling us out of the depression, it was a number of different things. Some even argue it delayed the recovery. What it did create was this military industrial complex that so many of us now despise.

 

And to play devils advocate...

 

A family member of mine designs and makes specialized equipment for military applications. Works closely with certain types of soldiers who need their gear designed in specific ways. Or proprietary things designed with a fast turnaround time. That's all he's allowed to tell me. And this dude usually tells me everything, we grew up together.

 

There's plenty of other companies making military equipment. Though they have a strong presence on the civilian market as well. If you want to scratch the surface of that, attend the Shot Show convention in Vegas.

[murve33]

Gah, I'm so tired of this country. "We don't have any money, I have an idea, let's start yet another war".

 

And don't try to use the argument "BUT WARS MAKE JOBS!". Shut the fuck up. Who do you know who has a job that helps the war effort? They help select companies become richer.

 

Hopefully this will all blow over.

And to play devils advocate...

 

A family member of mine designs and makes specialized equipment for military applications. Works closely with certain types of soldiers who need their gear designed in specific ways. Or proprietary things designed with a fast turnaround time. That's all he's allowed to tell me. And this dude usually tells me everything, we grew up together.

 

There's plenty of other companies making military equipment. Though they have a strong presence on the civilian market as well. If you want to scratch the surface of that, attend the Shot Show convention in Vegas.

Ha, I was waiting for someone to disprove that. I realize now that I worded my post wrong, and now agree with it (wars do indeed make jobs). What I should have argued is that Wars will not help this economy or deficit. It will continue to hurt international relations and will keep our military budget ridiculously high.

[goDel]

Funny how Pakistan already has nukes, and Iran still hasn't. But Iran somehow is the more dangerous of the two?

 

The only thing Iran will use their nukes for, is political power. As long as they have unused nukes, they have international leverage. Actually using nukes is completely bonkers. Even Iran would understand.

[SR4]

Eisenhower was probably the last half-decent American president. His resignation speech is chillingly prophetic....he knew what was happening.

[Hautlle]

JFK knew man. The video title is misleading. This is a speech he made at Columbia University 3 weeks before he was murdered.

 

[youtubehd]DxnpujfanUM[/youtubehd]

[eugene]

Eisenhower was probably the last half-decent American president. His resignation speech is chillingly prophetic....he knew what was happening.

 

what's happening exactly ?

[SR4]

[youtubehd]CWiIYW_fBfY[/youtubehd]

 

JFK knew man. The video title is misleading. This is a speech he made at Columbia University 3 weeks before he was murdered.

 

[youtubehd]DxnpujfanUM[/youtubehd]

 

i still cant forgive JFK for his hesitancy on civil rights bills and kowtowing to McNamara. Eisenhower warned Kennedy about Vietnam before he left office.

 

Im serious, Eisenhower man. Eisenhower.

[chenGOD]

America is like a starved, diseased, batshit-insane Grizzly bear. The implications of this simile are up to you.

 

Hey? Why the Grizzly Bear hate? Surely it's more like a starved, diseased, batshit-insane, Skrillex.

 

And since this whole thing is about oil, and the US are effectively building a pipeline around Iran, it makes sense for them to want to use nuclear power for their energy. If they can become self-sufficient then they can sell all that oil (presumably to Russia and China).

 

European Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger said on Tuesday there was consensus among some EU countries to ban imports of Iranian oil and that Europe hoped to bring Russia on board in a global ban.

But the world's biggest crude oil producer, which does not import any Iranian crude, is unlikely to back the plan aimed at piling pressure on Iran to drop its disputed nuclear program.

"It is quite obvious that this decision is based on some political motivation ... In these situations we try to be as neutral as possible," Sergei Shmatko told reporters on the sidelines of theWorld Petroleum Congress.

Lol! Russia would never do that. They've been allies with Iran forever, along with China. Russia will not be on "our" side if there is war.

While I agree with you that Russia would not be on "our" side, you can't think in terms of the cold war anymore. There is the American superpower (militarily - no one else is even close), and then lots of other states. The situation is much more like the classic structural realism - it's a multistate anarchic system. Russia and China haven't been true allies for a long time. Iran serves strategic value, but Russia wouldn't go to war over them.

 

 

Gah, I'm so tired of this country. "We don't have any money, I have an idea, let's start yet another war".

 

And don't try to use the argument "BUT WARS MAKE JOBS!". Shut the fuck up. Who do you know who has a job that helps the war effort? They help select companies become richer.

 

Hopefully this will all blow over.

And to play devils advocate...

 

A family member of mine designs and makes specialized equipment for military applications. Works closely with certain types of soldiers who need their gear designed in specific ways. Or proprietary things designed with a fast turnaround time. That's all he's allowed to tell me. And this dude usually tells me everything, we grew up together.

 

There's plenty of other companies making military equipment. Though they have a strong presence on the civilian market as well. If you want to scratch the surface of that, attend the Shot Show convention in Vegas.

Ha, I was waiting for someone to disprove that. I realize now that I worded my post wrong, and now agree with it (wars do indeed make jobs). What I should have argued is that Wars will not help this economy or deficit. It will continue to hurt international relations and will keep our military budget ridiculously high.

You're right. Nations profit off of other nations' wars, not their own. Japan made a killing in the Korean War, Korea made a killing in the Vietnam War. The US made huge bank off WW1 and 2. It will hurt international relations, but it won't be the straw that breaks the camel's back. I don't think war is likely because the US government simply doesn't have the resources - either financially or in terms of troops.

 

Funny how Pakistan already has nukes, and Iran still hasn't. But Iran somehow is the more dangerous of the two?

 

The only thing Iran will use their nukes for, is political power. As long as they have unused nukes, they have international leverage. Actually using nukes is completely bonkers. Even Iran would understand.

 

Not only that, Pakistan has openly admitted to supporting the Taliban in Afghanistan.

[awepittance]

Eisenhower was probably the last half-decent American president. His resignation speech is chillingly prophetic....he knew what was happening.

 

especially for a president who epitomized the WWII propaganda and heroism that still indoctrinate or brainwash (depending on your level of cynically)

[SR4]

Eisenhower was probably the last half-decent American president. His resignation speech is chillingly prophetic....he knew what was happening.

 

especially for a president who epitomized the WWII propaganda and heroism that still indoctrinate or brainwash (depending on your level of cynically)

 

are you being sarcastic? i cant quite tell.

 

 

I do fault him for being the first pres to start pushing the CIA in Latin America and the Middle East though. But hes the only US leader ive seen that basically says "we have made a deal with the devil to stay on top...this is dangerous territory"

[awepittance]

has anybody actually watched Press TV or Russia Today? hese state run 24 hour news channels are designed to destroy or combat the American/western world narrative about things. I just find it really interesting that clearly Russia wants to impede America's efforts in the PR/information war and if they continue i don't doubt it will be effective.

[SR4]

Russia Today has nothing to do anymore with the russian govt, i thought?

[awepittance]

 

are you being sarcastic? i cant quite tell.

 

no, his military industrial complex speech is one of the most honest and revelatory speeches a president has ever made post WWII, and its even more impressive given that Eisenhower basically was elected because of his fame from WWII.

[chenGOD]

I'll take actual research over both of those thanks.

[awepittance]

Russia Today has nothing to do anymore with the russian govt, i thought?

as far as i know it is 100% state funded, i could be wrong about it though it would be interesting to find out. Whatever the case is Russia Today 24/7 attempts to chip away at american propaganda, even compared to networks like Al Jazeera its quite 'extreme'

 

I'll take actual research over both of those thanks.

 

both of what, the TV networks i talked about? im sure any critically thinking individual would rather do his or her own research over absorbing a 24 hour news feed, i just think they are fascinating channels for what they represent.

[chenGOD]

Russia Today has nothing to do anymore with the russian govt, i thought?

as far as i know it is 100% state funded, i could be wrong about it though it would be interesting to find out. Whatever the case is Russia Today 24/7 attempts to chip away at american propaganda, even compared to networks like Al Jazeera its quite 'extreme'

 

I'll take actual research over both of those thanks.

 

both of what, the TV networks i talked about? im sure any critically thinking individual would rather do his or her own research over absorbing a 24 hour news feed, i just think they are fascinating channels for what they represent.

 

Yeah they certainly are amazing. I mean I get all my Fox news coverage out of context cause I only see it on the daily show, but his bit about their war on christmas yesterday was fucking amazing.

Yes RT is still funded by the state, 100%.

 

Al Jazeera is pretty interesting, usually the quality of their reporting is pretty decent. They do have a fairly obvious anti-American bias, but that's to be expected.

[essines]

America is like a starved, diseased, batshit-insane Grizzly bear. The implications of this simile are up to you.

 

Hey? Why the Grizzly Bear hate? Surely it's more like a starved, diseased, batshit-insane, Skrillex.

 

 

Grammy Nominated Recording Artist Skrillex.

[Audioblysk]

America is like a starved, diseased, batshit-insane Grizzly bear. The implications of this simile are up to you.

 

Hey? Why the Grizzly Bear hate? Surely it's more like a starved, diseased, batshit-insane, Skrillex.

 

 

Grammy Nominated Recording Artist Skrillex.

 

Real awards ceremonies are great.

 

The USA is a twisted momma, and its going to burn like Rome eventually.

[delet...]

Al Jazeera is pretty interesting, usually the quality of their reporting is pretty decent. They do have a fairly obvious anti-American bias, but that's to be expected.

 

Lol it is based in a repressive US client state and is 100% in the pocket of the US. The fact that they say anti-US things is to garner credibility. So that they can release dodgy alQ tapes, or support the war in lybia and have the arab street believe the bullshit.

 

RT is essential these days. Sure they don't knock russia, and they want to take down europe. But thanks be to god for max keiser's 3 weekly programs.