Bomb, bomb. bomb, bomb, bomb Iran

[Cyberyeti]

Ah yes. After careful thought the folks in the EU have realized that they are the good guys and we are the bad guys. I'll take my cyanide later, I'm busy right now.

Actually it appears everybody loves the Canadians.

 

US is certainly very unpopular in the UK atm due to several "We've never set foot in America, committed no crime in the UK, but are being extradited because apparently we've broken some American law with no evidence shown by the Americans" cases where they are being extradited years before they're going to be tried and will be bankrupt whether they win or lose their cases.

[hrothgar]

Actually it appears everybody loves the Canadians.

 

US is certainly very unpopular in the UK atm due to several "We've never set foot in America, committed no crime in the UK, but are being extradited because apparently we've broken some American law with no evidence shown by the Americans" cases where they are being extradited years before they're going to be tried and will be bankrupt whether they win or lose their cases.

 

I found it amusing that Der Spiegel didn't bother to ask how Germany was viewed...

 

To me, the most telling difference was between the US and Canada.

[kenberg]

Actually it appears everybody loves the Canadians.

 

US is certainly very unpopular in the UK atm due to several "We've never set foot in America, committed no crime in the UK, but are being extradited because apparently we've broken some American law with no evidence shown by the Americans" cases where they are being extradited years before they're going to be tried and will be bankrupt whether they win or lose their cases.

 

I'm certainly up for looking at various specific issues. But on the overall picture if I am really expected to try to alter American behavior so that the Europeans might then rank us as superior to North Korea I'm afraid you have to have the discussion without me.

[Cyberyeti]

I'm certainly up for looking at various specific issues. But on the overall picture if I am really expected to try to alter American behavior so that the Europeans might then rank us as superior to North Korea I'm afraid you have to have the discussion without me.

You have an awful lot more effect on our daily lives and culture than North Korea, and for that reason (and ignorance on what goes on in NK) I suspect N Korea didn't get some of the negative votes it deserved.

[mike777]

I am going to guess that North Korea has more effect on Israel than Canada....just my guess.

 

In any event can we agree:

1) North Korea is a true hell hole in every sense of the word

2) Iran is...you fill in the blank.....

 

in any event I still think a tiny a-bomb tiny going off in Israel will end the country as almost every one alive will leave..

 

In effect even a small amount who are elite leave...end of Israel.

 

you dont need bomb..bomb bomb..... only 7 million people in tiny land.....

[onoway]

It always astonishes me how frantic that people get when they talk about Iran having nuclear capabilities..not that this is a good thing but that there isn't any way to stop it. Teenagers in the States have built nuclear devices..the first one I am aware of was some years ago. His wasn't exactly workable but it most certainly was highly radioactive and he hadn't finished with it when he got caught and everything confiscated. Now there is this one http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/01/living/teen-nuclear-scientist/index.html who has had a somewhat more positive reaction ( !! couldn't think of another suitable word :P ) to his endeavors.

 

If civilian teenagers can put together such things then I can't understand how anyone could honestly imagine that a nation would be unable to do so. Scale is certainly an issue but as Mike says, it wouldn't need to be a BIG one to do unimaginable damage. There is a whole lot of plutonium missing and some of that may have ended up in the hands of people who would love to see the US, Israel and Iran duke it out..what better way than to toss a small nuclear bomb somewhere in the mix and let the ASSUMPTION that it came from x take things from there.

 

We really need to start thinking of ways to interact with others which don't rely on threatening to or actually beating them over the head with a stick, possibly encouraging them to stop thinking that having a bigger stick and beating us over the head with it is the only way to deal with us. Can't get anywhere positive long term by playing brinksmanship with war, especially with nuclear capabilities at stake.

 

Nuclear capability is like genetically modified seed..once it's out there in the real world (or in the case of nuclear stuff, the knowlege of how to make it is out there) it cannot any longer be contained or even really controlled entirely effectively. Not a happy thought, but it's reality. We need to find ways to deal with it that don't rely on posturing that worked when people still fought with swords and clubs.

 

I once knew a political science prof who for a number of years annually ran a simulation with students acting as the leaders of countries. Time was of course tightly compressed, so that may have had an effect on the results. But. Every single time without exception it ended up in nuclear war, and often the instigator was not one of the expected countries, although if I remember correctly, retaliation strikes were always automatically launched against those countries. He eventually stopped running simulations as it got to be too depressing and scary.

[mike777]

It always astonishes me how frantic that people get when they talk about Iran having nuclear capabilities..not that this is a good thing but that there isn't any way to stop it. Teenagers in the States have built nuclear devices..the first one I am aware of was some years ago. His wasn't exactly workable but it most certainly was highly radioactive and he hadn't finished with it when he got caught and everything confiscated. Now there is this one http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/01/living/teen-nuclear-scientist/index.html who has had a somewhat more positive reaction ( !! couldn't think of another suitable word :P ) to his endeavors.

 

If civilian teenagers can put together such things then I can't understand how anyone could honestly imagine that a nation would be unable to do so. Scale is certainly an issue but as Mike says, it wouldn't need to be a BIG one to do unimaginable damage. There is a whole lot of plutonium missing and some of that may have ended up in the hands of people who would love to see the US, Israel and Iran duke it out..what better way than to toss a small nuclear bomb somewhere in the mix and let the ASSUMPTION that it came from x take things from there.

 

We really need to start thinking of ways to interact with others which don't rely on threatening to or actually beating them over the head with a stick, possibly encouraging them to stop thinking that having a bigger stick and beating us over the head with it is the only way to deal with us. Can't get anywhere positive long term by playing brinksmanship with war, especially with nuclear capabilities at stake.

 

Nuclear capability is like genetically modified seed..once it's out there in the real world (or in the case of nuclear stuff, the knowlege of how to make it is out there) it cannot any longer be contained or even really controlled entirely effectively. Not a happy thought, but it's reality. We need to find ways to deal with it that don't rely on posturing that worked when people still fought with swords and clubs.

 

I once knew a political science prof who for a number of years annually ran a simulation with students acting as the leaders of countries. Time was of course tightly compressed, so that may have had an effect on the results. But. Every single time without exception it ended up in nuclear war, and often the instigator was not one of the expected countries, although if I remember correctly, retaliation strikes were always automatically launched against those countries. He eventually stopped running simulations as it got to be too depressing and scary.

 

 

 

so what the hell your point is what?

 

you rant and rant and say nothing

 

 

you seem to have no idea what it is to be a leader and make a point.....take a position and say it clear~!

 

 

any idiot can say on the one hand but on the other hand.......

 

any idiot can ask for another study

[luke warm]

Israel has full rights to exist and to live in peace and I would support military action against any country that attacks Israel, but the same is true for Iran and Palestine.

do you not see any difference whatsoever between an attack, and the motive for such an attack, on israel as opposed to, say, iran?

[kenberg]

You have an awful lot more effect on our daily lives and culture than North Korea, and for that reason (and ignorance on what goes on in NK) I suspect N Korea didn't get some of the negative votes it deserved.

 

Sure. Mostly I would hate to see that poll taken seriously. If ever we had a poll in the US that showed that my fellow citizens ranked North Korea and Europe side by side in anything, I would be embarrassed for my country, hope no one ever brought it up, and disavow it if they did.

 

On the issue of extradition I know little. I might well agree, depending on the details, although I don't buy into the idea that never setting foot in the US is the whole issue. One could easily imagine someone in another country controlling criminal interests in tyhe US, or the UK, or wherever. Say that this person orders a hit in the US on some witness. I imagine he could be extradited to stand trial, and similarly of we reverse it so that someone in the US orders a hit on someone in the UK. But the secretive nature of it all, and the possibility of long term detention without a trial, that's something we can agree on as being not acceptable however useful it might be.

[hrothgar]

Sure. Mostly I would hate to see that poll taken seriously. If ever we had a poll in the US that showed that my fellow citizens ranked North Korea and Europe side by side in anything, I would be embarrassed for my country, hope no one ever brought it up, and disavow it if they did.

 

For what its worth, I think that the North Korean regime is horrific

 

It starves and oppresses its own citizens, kidnaps foreign nationals, contributes to nuclear proliferation, counterfitting, any number of horrific crimes

 

With this said and done, its a small poor country and its limited wrt the degree of harm it inflicts on the rest of the world.

 

Within the last decade, the United States invaded the wrong country and directly / indirectly contributed to the deaths of hundreds of thousands if not millions of innocent civilians

The same group of yahoos who made the case for war against Iraq are now trying to justify a military attack against Iran...

 

I don't find it surprising that the USA reputation in the world has suffered as a result.

[Cyberyeti]

On the issue of extradition I know little. I might well agree, depending on the details, although I don't buy into the idea that never setting foot in the US is the whole issue. One could easily imagine someone in another country controlling criminal interests in tyhe US, or the UK, or wherever. Say that this person orders a hit in the US on some witness. I imagine he could be extradited to stand trial, and similarly of we reverse it so that someone in the US orders a hit on someone in the UK. But the secretive nature of it all, and the possibility of long term detention without a trial, that's something we can agree on as being not acceptable however useful it might be.

Some of the cases in point:

 

Christopher Tappin: http://friends-extradited.org/citizens/christopher_tappin

 

Gary McKinnon: http://www.friends-extradited.org/citizens/gary_mckinnon

 

Natwest 3: http://www.friends-extradited.org/citizens/the_natwest_three

 

Richard O'Dwyer: http://www.friends-extradited.org/citizens/richard_odwyer

 

The point of all these (and another one involving internet gambling) is that all these cases could have been tried in Britain and most were investigated and it was decided there was no case to answer. The case of ordering a hit abroad, might well be extradited, or if the legal system of the foreign country wasn't trusted, be tried here.

 

The point was that Tony Blair passed this extradition treaty only avoiding a revolt in our parliament by saying this would only be used for terrorism stuff. It has then been used for everything else.

 

Also because these people have the temerity to legally contest their extradition, they are automatically held in custody and not bailed in the US as "flight risks". Tappin was so much of a flight risk he actually drove himself to Heathrow unescorted. Frequently they are held in solitary for months->years before trial. Also they get no help with legal costs and tend to be bankrupted whether they win or lose. In the UK, unlike the US, you lose everything including your house if you go bankrupt. Hence what normally happens is they plead guilty at a very early stage to something they didn't do, get a sentence lower than the time already served and the US sends them home saying it's a triumph for American justice.

[onoway]

so what the hell your point is what?

 

you rant and rant and say nothing

 

 

you seem to have no idea what it is to be a leader and make a point.....take a position and say it clear~!

 

 

any idiot can say on the one hand but on the other hand.......

 

any idiot can ask for another study

It'd be nice if you actually read something before complaining about it. Nothing was said even remotely about the one hand or the other hand, and a simulation is hardly a study though you seem to be confused about that. They are called simulations ie not the real thing because they involve pretense, studies hopefully do not but deal in fact. In any case no suggestion was made about another one of either.

 

I suppose if you know before you start you are going to whine it saves time to just get on with it, even if without actually having a clue what you are whining about.

[kenberg]

Some of the cases in point:

 

Christopher Tappin: http://friends-extra...istopher_tappin

 

Gary McKinnon: http://www.friends-e...s/gary_mckinnon

 

Natwest 3: http://www.friends-e...e_natwest_three

 

Richard O'Dwyer: http://www.friends-e.../richard_odwyer

 

The point of all these (and another one involving internet gambling) is that all these cases could have been tried in Britain and most were investigated and it was decided there was no case to answer. The case of ordering a hit abroad, might well be extradited, or if the legal system of the foreign country wasn't trusted, be tried here.

 

The point was that Tony Blair passed this extradition treaty only avoiding a revolt in our parliament by saying this would only be used for terrorism stuff. It has then been used for everything else.

 

Also because these people have the temerity to legally contest their extradition, they are automatically held in custody and not bailed in the US as "flight risks". Tappin was so much of a flight risk he actually drove himself to Heathrow unescorted. Frequently they are held in solitary for months->years before trial. Also they get no help with legal costs and tend to be bankrupted whether they win or lose. In the UK, unlike the US, you lose everything including your house if you go bankrupt. Hence what normally happens is they plead guilty at a very early stage to something they didn't do, get a sentence lower than the time already served and the US sends them home saying it's a triumph for American justice.

 

 

I read the first case, the one about Tappin, and I guess my reaction is one of uncertainty. A couple of preliminary points. While not being any sort of legal expert, I believe that , contrary to what was said/implied, there are restrictions on entrapment in the US. Details might differ. I am pretty sure a law officer cannot suggest stealing something and then arrest the thief. Otoh, there are stings where, for example, a used auto parts store is opened up and perhaps there is some chat about how they don't much care where then parts came from. Not being in either the law business or the thieving business I am not clear about where the line is. Approximately this maybe: If there already are shops out there buying stolen auto parts, law enforcement is allowed to pose as one of them. Or batteries, I suppose.

 

There are a number of irrelevancies in the article. He is retired (although wasn't at the time of the charge). He is a big shot in the golf association. Great. When I have served on cheating cases at the U we would usually hear from a minister that the alleged cheater had been in church every Sunday. That's nice.

 

I suppose that these batteries, for which an export license would not be granted, are not exactly the sort of batteries I put in my flashlight.

 

The case might well be bogus. It's possible. It would seem like a terrible squandering of resources and of international goodwill to pursue a bogus case such as this, but yes I acknowledge it could be. But if so, the UK can deal with it. Tell the US to shape up if we want to preserve the current extradition arrangement. My guess is that the case is not nearly as bogus as Tappin's supporters make out, but I don't know. How could I? I observe that usually people, when accused of a crime, say that they did nothing wrong. Sometimes that is true. Sometimes it isn't.

 

This issue of inadvertently breaking a law is a serious issue. We invite foreign scientists to come to the University. In math it is not too much pf a problem but the phyicists have to be careful. Inviting a nuclear physicist from Iran to visit for a semester would probably be a serious blunder. I haven't had the need to learn about such things but if I were a nuclear physicist planning on inviting folks from Iran, I would carefully check (and get the answer in writing) before going forward.

 

 

Somehow I think a businessman who is sophisticated enough to arrange, from his home in the UK, for military use batteries in the US to be shipped to a third country, probably knows something about the licensing procedures involved. Just a guess.

 

I will read the other examples, just not right now.

[Cyberyeti]

I read the first case, the one about Tappin, and I guess my reaction is one of uncertainty. A couple of preliminary points. While not being any sort of legal expert, I believe that , contrary to what was said/implied, there are restrictions on entrapment in the US. Details might differ. I am pretty sure a law officer cannot suggest stealing something and then arrest the thief. Otoh, there are stings where, for example, a used auto parts store is opened up and perhaps there is some chat about how they don't much care where then parts came from. Not being in either the law business or the thieving business I am not clear about where the line is. Approximately this maybe: If there already are shops out there buying stolen auto parts, law enforcement is allowed to pose as one of them. Or batteries, I suppose.

 

There are a number of irrelevancies in the article. He is retired (although wasn't at the time of the charge). He is a big shot in the golf association. Great. When I have served on cheating cases at the U we would usually hear from a minister that the alleged cheater had been in church every Sunday. That's nice.

 

I suppose that these batteries, for which an export license would not be granted, are not exactly the sort of batteries I put in my flashlight.

 

The case might well be bogus. It's possible. It would seem like a terrible squandering of resources and of international goodwill to pursue a bogus case such as this, but yes I acknowledge it could be. But if so, the UK can deal with it. Tell the US to shape up if we want to preserve the current extradition arrangement. My guess is that the case is not nearly as bogus as Tappin's supporters make out, but I don't know. How could I? I observe that usually people, when accused of a crime, say that they did nothing wrong. Sometimes that is true. Sometimes it isn't.

 

This issue of inadvertently breaking a law is a serious issue. We invite foreign scientists to come to the University. In math it is not too much pf a problem but the phyicists have to be careful. Inviting a nuclear physicist from Iran to visit for a semester would probably be a serious blunder. I haven't had the need to learn about such things but if I were a nuclear physicist planning on inviting folks from Iran, I would carefully check (and get the answer in writing) before going forward.

 

 

Somehow I think a businessman who is sophisticated enough to arrange, from his home in the UK, for military use batteries in the US to be shipped to a third country, probably knows something about the licensing procedures involved. Just a guess.

 

I will read the other examples, just not right now.

It requires an export license if anything, the crime surely is exporting them from the US without a license not importing them into the EU. As far as he was concerned, they were civilian batteries for use in the automotive industry in Holland. He is a businessman that gets stuff from A to B in my understanding of the case, and he may not know at a technical level exactly what he's importing, he was assured by the US fake company that no export license was required. Unfortunately the extradition treaty we have with the US allows the US to request extradition without a shred of evidence, so we can't test this case at all before extraditing. He's already been cleared of any wrongdoing in the UK (I believe the police looked at it and determined there was no case to answer).

[kenberg]

It requires an export license if anything, the crime surely is exporting them from the US without a license not importing them into the EU. As far as he was concerned, they were civilian batteries for use in the automotive industry in Holland. He is a businessman that gets stuff from A to B in my understanding of the case, and he may not know at a technical level exactly what he's importing, he was assured by the US fake company that no export license was required. Unfortunately the extradition treaty we have with the US allows the US to request extradition without a shred of evidence, so we can't test this case at all before extraditing. He's already been cleared of any wrongdoing in the UK (I believe the police looked at it and determined there was no case to answer).

 

Does the government in the UK defend this course of action? If so, what is their defense? You say that the US can request extradition. I can request a million dollars but I doubt that you would give it to me. If the case is really as outrageous as you make it out to be then it seems that you have a quarrel to make with your own government.

 

I truly don't wish to judge the case. Lawyers, judges and juries will do that. But if the UK government has reviewed the case and has come to the conclusion that there is no case, why would they go along with this?

 

We actually do not need more prisoners over here. It seems implausible that the FBI, or whoever, decided to invest resources in tricking a law abiding Brit so that they could pull him over here, give him room and board in our crowded prison system and create international strife. What would be the pay-off? The prosecution has to prove its case, of course I am not sating otherwise. But to believe the stated scenario, I have to believe that the US invented a pointless trap, an experienced businessman behaved very carelessly, and the British government went along with the gag. That's a lot of believing.

 

The story, as stated, is a presentation as someone wishes us to see it. There is a Minnesota saying "Wuz you there, Charlie?". I wuzn't, and I have trouble taking it as the straight stuff.

[Cyberyeti]

Does the government in the UK defend this course of action? If so, what is their defense? You say that the US can request extradition. I can request a million dollars but I doubt that you would give it to me. If the case is really as outrageous as you make it out to be then it seems that you have a quarrel to make with your own government.

 

I truly don't wish to judge the case. Lawyers, judges and juries will do that. But if the UK government has reviewed the case and has come to the conclusion that there is no case, why would they go along with this?

 

We actually do not need more prisoners over here. It seems implausible that the FBI, or whoever, decided to invest resources in tricking a law abiding Brit so that they could pull him over here, give him room and board in our crowded prison system and create international strife. What would be the pay-off? The prosecution has to prove its case, of course I am not sating otherwise. But to believe the stated scenario, I have to believe that the US invented a pointless trap, an experienced businessman behaved very carelessly, and the British government went along with the gag. That's a lot of believing.

 

The story, as stated, is a presentation as someone wishes us to see it. There is a Minnesota saying "Wuz you there, Charlie?". I wuzn't, and I have trouble taking it as the straight stuff.

 

No, Blair signed a treaty (probably while his head was up Bush's backside) that allowed the US to extradite from Britain anybody they wanted without presenting any evidence, and this treaty is watertight. The British courts cannot intervene however ridiculous the case is (we have similar problems with the within EU arrest warrants). Look at the Gary McKinnon case, he embarrassed the Pentagon due to their lax security procedures, not sure that justifies allegedly spending a load of completely unnecessary money (I've heard many experts in the field say that this spend was unnecessary) overreacting, then using this bogus cost to extradite a mentally ill man.

 

Edit: I believe the purpose of this was to allow the US to use wiretap evidence in terrorism cases which is inadmissible here, and we were assured the Americans would only use this treaty to fight terrorism.

 

Exporting stuff from US to Holland shouldn't be a problem, surely it's the Dutch authorities job to prevent the stuff being exported to Iran, and the exporter that does that that needs to answer questions.

[mgoetze]

Sure. Mostly I would hate to see that poll taken seriously. If ever we had a poll in the US that showed that my fellow citizens ranked North Korea and Europe side by side in anything, I would be embarrassed for my country, hope no one ever brought it up, and disavow it if they did.

I'm sure the USA has a lot of wonderful citizens. Unfortunately, they don't seem to be running the country, and this poll is about foreign policy, not whether a country has wonderful citizens.

 

In recent decades, the US administration has wreaked havoc and destruction in Iraq, Afghanistan, Cuba, Mexico, Chile, and so on and so forth. The North Korean administration has wreaked havoc and destruction in, well, North Korea. Do they deserve to be ranked side by side? Definitely not.

 

By the way, I'm sure North Korea also has some wonderful citizens. It strikes me that they are in a much worse position to do anything about their administration's foreign policy than their American counterparts.

[Gerben42]

do you not see any difference whatsoever between an attack, and the motive for such an attack, on israel as opposed to, say, iran?

 

Israel has no right to attack Iran, and Iran has no right to attack Israel. End of story.

 

The United Nations were founded to avoid such conflicts. It is not an ideal instrument, as can be seen in Syria at the moment, but it is the only acceptable instrument.

[blackshoe]

Israel has no right to attack Iran, and Iran has no right to attack Israel. End of story.

 

The United Nations were founded to avoid such conflicts. It is not an ideal instrument, as can be seen in Syria at the moment, but it is the only acceptable instrument.

So a nation which has solid evidence that another nation is about to attack them can do nothing until actually attacked? Interesting viewpoint.

 

If two nations can resolve their dispute(s) without war, and without the intervention of the UN, this is "unacceptable"? I don't think so. (I do recognize this is unlikely in the current situation between Israel and Iran, but we're talking about principles here).

[kenberg]

Tp add a little to Blackie's comment:

 

Roughly speaking, Iran

a. Is pursuing nuclear material capability

b. Has repeatedly called for teh destruction of Israel

 

Now I understand that politicians everywhere say all sorts of stupid things so one should not take all their utterances as gospel.But at what point is a nation allowed to act in self-defense based on clear indications of future intent?That is, where a nation announces its intent and carries out preparations to act on announced intentions. Does a country always have to allow the other side the first blow? We managed to survive the balance of terror with the Soviet Union. I wouldn't trust that things will always work out that way.

 

I am not endorsing an Israeli military strike, with or without US support. I would say though that we must do absolutely everything possible to avert a situation where there seems to be no other option. It is just not realistic to think that Israel will agree to wait until Tel Aviv is nuked before they attack. These thing have a life of their own and often cannot be derailed. That's why we have wars.

[hrothgar]

 

Roughly speaking, Iran

 

a. Is pursuing nuclear material capability

b. Has repeatedly called for teh destruction of Israel

 

 

There is a lot of debate about your second point

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_and_Israel

[mgoetze]

Roughly speaking, Iran

a. Is pursuing nuclear material capability

I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Officially Iran wants to build nuclear power plants. Are you or are you not accusing them of secretly working on nuclear weapons?

[Cyberyeti]

I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Officially Iran wants to build nuclear power plants. Are you or are you not accusing them of secretly working on nuclear weapons?

Well they seem to want uranium enriched to a level that is not needed for civilian purposes, so I think most people assume they're developing a weapons program.

[hrothgar]

Well they seem to want uranium enriched to a level that is not needed for civilian purposes, so I think most people assume they're developing a weapons program.

 

Most of the analysts that I've heard are suggesting that Iran is proceeding towards a point where they could produce a nuclear weapon relatively quickly (say, within a year).

 

It's unclear whether they plan to move all the way towards building / testing such a weapon.

 

It's kinda hard to blame them...

[ArtK78]

 

 

Roughly speaking, Iran

a. Is pursuing nuclear material capability

b. Has repeatedly called for the destruction of Israel

 

 

There is a lot of debate about your second point

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_and_Israel

 

Really? Is the debate a question of now or next week? Otherwise, I don't see what the debate is.