Bush Will Be Tried: Iran's Khamenei Says

[LoungeMachine]

Iran Leader: Bush Will Be Tried

By NASSER KARIMI
The Associated Press
Friday, September 14, 2007; 10:49 AM

TEHRAN, Iran -- President Bush and other American officials will one day face trial just like deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein for "the catastrophes they caused in Iraq," Iran's supreme leader said Friday.

Speaking to thousands of worshippers during the first Friday prayer of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said that Bush will be called to account for the U.S.-led invasion.



"A day will come that the current U.S. president and officials will be tried in an international supreme court for the catastrophes they caused in Iraq," he said.

"Americans will have to answer for why they don't end occupation of Iraq and why waves of terrorism and insurgency have overwhelmed the country," he added. "It will not be like this forever and some day they will be stopped as happened to Hitler, Saddam and certain other European leaders."

Bush painted quite a different picture Thursday, describing an Iraq on the mend.

"One year ago, much of Baghdad was under siege," Bush said in a televised speech from the Oval Office. "Today, most of Baghdad's neighborhoods are being patrolled by coalition and Iraqi forces who live among the people they protect. ... Sectarian killings are down. And ordinary life is beginning to return."

But Khamenei mocked the U.S., describing the recent congressional testimony of the top American officials in Iraq as a sign of weakness and the failure of American policy in the war torn country.

"More than four years have passed since the occupation of Iraq and today everyone knows that America has failed and is frantically looking for a way out," he said.

In their testimony Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker raised allegations _ denied by Iran _ of Iranian meddling in Iraq by financial and military support of militias and insurgent groups. They warned that the U.S. was already embroiled in a proxy war with the Islamic republic.

Despite U.N. sanctions and efforts to isolate Iran internationally, the country is flourishing, maintained Khamenei.

"Today we are in a better political position compared to four to five years ago," he said. "We have moved forward economically and the spiritual preparedness and happiness of our nation has improved."

"A nation like ours, without an atomic bomb and not as wealthy as these other powerful governments, has foiled a whole series of their conspiracies and forced them to give up and withdraw," he added.

The U.S. accuses Iran of secretly trying to develop nuclear weapons and has called for further international sanctions against the country. Iran denies the charge.

Iran and the U.S. have not had diplomatic relations since Washington cut its ties with Tehran after Iranian students stormed the U.S. embassy there in 1979.

[LoungeMachine]

Report: US to attack Iran in 8-10 months

By JPOST.COM STAFF

Germany's unwillingness to impose further sanctions on Iran has pushed the United States closer towards a decision on a military strike, FOX News reported on Wednesday.

According to the report, Germany's decision has spurred senior US army officials to try and convince US Foreign Secretary Condoleezza Rice to abandon once and for all the diplomatic route of preventing a nuclear Iran. The report further stated that the date of preference for an attack against Iran is in eight to 10 months - after the US presidential candidates for both the Democrats and the Republicans have been chosen, but before the major presidential campaign kicks off.

The report stated that the attack would be comprised of two main strategies: cutting off the Iranian gas supply, which the US hopes would pressure the Iranian people towards action against their government, and an aerial bombing campaign, which would be meant to paralyze Iranian defenses and allow American bombers to destroy the nuclear facilities.

Opponents to a military strike claim that an attack would require at least one week of intense bombing, and that it would only set the Iranian nuclear program back a few years, the report said. Two other claims of the opponents is that an American strike would provoke Iran into attacking Israel, and that abandoning diplomatic action would negatively impact Iraq and the US troops stationed there.

[Unchainme]

Originally posted by LoungeMachine
Report: US to attack Iran in 8-10 months

By JPOST.COM STAFF

Germany's unwillingness to impose further sanctions on Iran has pushed the United States closer towards a decision on a military strike, FOX News reported on Wednesday.

According to the report, Germany's decision has spurred senior US army officials to try and convince US Foreign Secretary Condoleezza Rice to abandon once and for all the diplomatic route of preventing a nuclear Iran. The report further stated that the date of preference for an attack against Iran is in eight to 10 months - after the US presidential candidates for both the Democrats and the Republicans have been chosen, but before the major presidential campaign kicks off.

The report stated that the attack would be comprised of two main strategies: cutting off the Iranian gas supply, which the US hopes would pressure the Iranian people towards action against their government, and an aerial bombing campaign, which would be meant to paralyze Iranian defenses and allow American bombers to destroy the nuclear facilities.

Opponents to a military strike claim that an attack would require at least one week of intense bombing, and that it would only set the Iranian nuclear program back a few years, the report said. Two other claims of the opponents is that an American strike would provoke Iran into attacking Israel, and that abandoning diplomatic action would negatively impact Iraq and the US troops stationed there.

weee! The Army should be soooo much more funner than college

Yeah...I'm fucking screwed..

[LoungeMachine]

Yes, Grasshopper, you are.

Be sure to write.

[LoungeMachine]

The plot thickens....


IRAN, China in energy deal, annual trade to hit US$20 billion (€14.4 billion), minister says

The Associated PressPublished: September 14, 2007


BEIJING: Iran's interior minister said Friday his country has finalized oil and gas projects with China, adding that two-way trade was on target to hit US$20 billion (€14.4 billion) this year among robust commercial ties.

Speaking to reporters after meetings in Beijing, Mostafa Pour Mohammadi gave few details but indicated progress had been made. "We have many big projects on the table," Pour Mohammadi said.

"And in my talks and sessions we finalized our parts and projects in oil fields, gas fields and investing and transporting of fuel between the two countries," the minister said.

Economic ties covered areas ranging from power station construction and mining to the building of subways and automobile plants.

"This year, trade will hit US$20 billion (€14.4 billion) and will develop in other fields," Pour Mohammadi said.

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Despite the minister's comments, energy deals between Iran and China have repeatedly been held up over price and revenue sharing.

China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., best known as Sinopec, said in April it does not plan to buy liquefied natural gas from Iran because the price is too high, but that it was discussing other cooperation.

China is scrambling to meet its growing energy needs, and Sinopec had earlier held talks about purchasing LNG from Iran, which has the world's second largest natural gas reserves.

Tehran has also been at odds with China's Sinopec over the development of the Yadavaran oil field because the company wanted a 15 percent return, and Iran something lower, the managing director of the National Iranian Oil Company, Gholam Hussein Nozari, told the official IRNA news agency in January.

While the United States is on a concerted campaign to discourage foreign energy companies from doing business in Iran, analysts say Iran's investment woes are its own fault because it fails to offer enticing deals.

[LoungeMachine]

But wait, it gets better.......




Afghanistan: U.S. Worried Iran Sending Chinese Weapons To Taliban
By Ron Synovitz

Authorities in Herat found a 10-ton cache of weapons marked with Chinese, Russian, and Persian


September 14, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte says Washington has complained to Beijing about Chinese weapons shipments to Iran that appear to be turning up in the hands of Taliban fighters in Afghanistan.


Negroponte confirmed the U.S. concerns over China's weapons deals with Tehran after a 10-ton weapons cache was discovered in the western Afghan province of Herat.

The cache found in Ghurian district, near the border with Iran, included artillery shells, land mines, and rocket-propelled grenade launchers with Chinese, Russian, and Persian markings on them.

Britain's Foreign Office has also confirmed that it has complained to Beijing about Chinese-made HN-5 antiaircraft missiles confiscated from Taliban fighters who were captured or killed by British Royal Marines in Helmand Province. Beijing has said that it would investigate allegations that the weapons were forwarded to the Taliban through Iran.



When asked in Kabul on September 11 about the Taliban's use of sophisticated new Chinese weapons, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte also suggested that Iran has been a transit point for Chinese arms deliveries to the Taliban.

"A subject that I have discussed with the Chinese in the past is the fact of their weapons sales to the country of Iran and our concern," Negroponte said. "We have tried to discourage the Chinese from signing any new weapons contracts with Iran. We are concerned by reports -- which we consider to be reliable -- of explosively formed projectiles and other kinds of military equipment coming from Iran across the border and coming into the hands of the Taliban."

"I have no doubt that Iran has been involved in channeling money and arms to various elements in Afghanistan, including the Taliban, for the last few years... There are Pashtuns and non-Pashtuns who are being funded by Iran." -- Pakistani journalist Ahmed RashidIn June, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said Washington had no evidence proving a direct role by the Iranian government in smuggling weapons to the Taliban. But Gates said Washington suspects Tehran is involved.

"I haven't seen any intelligence specifically to this effect, but I would say, given the quantities we are seeing, it is difficult to believe that it is associated with smuggling or the drug business or that it is taking place without the knowledge of the Iranian government," Gates said.

Not Without Tehran's Knowledge?

Alex Vatanka is the Washington-based Iran analyst for Jane's Information Group, which publishes "Jane's Defence Weekly" and other journals about the weapons industry and global security issues. Vatanka says it will remain unclear whether the Ghurian weapons cache is linked to the Taliban until Afghan or U.S. authorities announce details of their joint investigation.

But the presence of Chinese weapons so close to the Iranian border is the strongest evidence to date suggesting Tehran has had at least an indirect role in arms shipments to Afghanistan, Vatanka said. "Whether the government or somebody in Iran could be buying arms from China and, without Tehran's knowledge, ship it over to Afghanistan -- on that volume of weapons -- I find that extremely unlikely," he said. "I can only see that happening if somebody pretty senior and in an influential political position in Iran decided to facilitate that without letting everybody in the system know about it. But they still had to be involved somewhere in the state machinery. We're not talking about rogue elements [in Iran]. Baluchi drug traffickers can't pull that kind of thing off."

Many analysts have noted that Shi'ite Iran and the Sunni Taliban had been firm enemies since 1998, when the Taliban regime controlled most of Afghanistan and executed nine Iranian diplomats in Mazar-e Sharif.

But Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid, an expert on Islamic militancy in the region and author of the book "Taliban," told RFE/RL that times appear to have changed. Now, with U.S. forces deployed some 60 kilometers from the Iranian border at Shindad Airfield in Herat Province, Rashid says Tehran and the Taliban have a common enemy.

"I have no doubt that Iran has been involved in channeling money and arms to various elements in Afghanistan, including the Taliban, for the last few years. They have long-running relations with many of the commanders and small-time warlords in western Afghanistan," Rashid said. He continued: "I think Iran is playing all sides in the Afghan conflict. And there are Pashtuns and non-Pashtuns who are being funded by Iran who are active in western Afghanistan. If the Iranians are convinced that the Americans are undermining them through western Afghanistan, then it is very likely that these agents of theirs have been activated."

Political Backlash

Still, Vatanka says it would be "almost irrational behavior" for Tehran to supply the Taliban with weapons. He says such a move would almost certainly lead to a negative domestic political backlash for Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad's government.

For that reason, Vatanka says he is eagerly awaiting the assessment of Afghan and U.S. investigators about whether the arms in the Ghurian cache were stashed away by the Taliban or by one of several rival militia factions in Herat Province.

"The question is, what would get even a faction within Iran to make that type of a decision? Maybe you have excellent business ties between the Iranians and the Afghans on the other side -- not necesarily the central government in Kabul -- but local leaders in Herat who turn around saying, 'You Iranians are building roads and infrastructure here. You are setting up shops and factories. But for us to be able to guarantee that we can protect your business interests, we'll need to receive some arms.' That's an argument that one could put out: that the Iranians are essentially supplying not the Taliban, but Afghan partners to secure Iranian businesses and interests in western Afghanistan," Vatanka said.

To date, Afghan President Hamid Karzai has refused to publicly support allegations of a direct link between Tehran and weapons shipments to the Taliban.

"We don't have any such evidence so far of the involvement of the Iranian government in supplying the Taliban. We have a very good relationship with the Iranian government. Iran and Afghanistan have never been as friendly as they are today," Karzai said.

Vatanka says that as long as Karzai maintains that position, skeptics around the world will dismiss suggestions from Washington that Tehran is supplying Taliban fighters in Afghanistan.

"From a U.S. point of view, if the insurgency in Afghanistan is essentially escalating based on Iranian assistance, then what Washington really needs to do is to provide far more evidence that points to that -- and get Mr. Hamid Karzai in Kabul and the regional governments in Afghanistan to back the U.S. up when it makes these claims against Iran," Vatanka said.

After the U.S. military failed to find the weapons of mass destruction allegedly being stockpiled in Iraq, Vatanka said, "the skeptics out there are saying 'These [new allegations] are being made up by the U.S. to justify another war with Iran' -- which might not actually be the case. Iran might be involved. But because of the lack of evidence, the Iranians are saying, 'Who else is backing up the U.S. allegations?'"

[Warham]

I'm totally against us going into Iran. Enough's enough. If we could talk North Korea out of nukes, then we should also try to talk Iran out of nukes.

[LoungeMachine]

Originally posted by WAR
I'm totally against us going into Iran. Enough's enough. If we could talk North Korea out of nukes, then we should also try to talk Iran out of nukes.

PRAISE BE TO JESUS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!



I wish the old-guard Neo Con Shitbags were here to witness this.

[knuckleboner]

Originally posted by WAR
I'm totally against us going into Iran. Enough's enough. If we could talk North Korea out of nukes, then we should also try to talk Iran out of nukes.

we're not attacking iran.

it's posturing.

we don't have the operational capacity for anything other than limited airstrikes on a few targets. and regardless of the rhetoric, we're not reinstituting a draft.

we blew our wad in iraq and iran knows this. we're trying to dissuade them of it by looking like we could attack. you know, carrot and the stick. but in the end, there's no way we're putting groundtroops in iran for at least a decade. at least.

[LoungeMachine]

I'd like to think kb is right here, but...

I can no longer put ANYTHING past this administration.

Go back 6 years, kb.

I wouldnt have believed half of what's happened.

I don't think Amhadinnerjacket is the type to be disuaded [sp?] by rhetoric and posturing either.

Ground troops? nope.

Air strikes on "nuclear targets" and "insurgent training grounds" yep.

They're probably just waiting for more blow-back from the cooked up intel stories they're leaking.

[LoungeMachine]

Good old NYT, never fails to help their friends in BushCO get the word out



Debate in Bush Administration Over Iran Strategy


By HELENE COOPER
Published: September 16, 2007

WASHINGTON, Sept. 15 ¡ª A debate within the Bush administration is delaying a decision on how aggressively to confront Iran, even as President Bush, in defending his strategy in Iraq, has begun more explicitly to describe the American military presence there as part of a broader effort to counter Iran¡¯s influence.

Mr. Bush¡¯s language has turned up by another notch the administration¡¯s continuing proxy war with Tehran for supremacy in the Middle East. But in the administration, some of Mr. Bush¡¯s top deputies are still wrangling over whether a diplomatic strategy on Iran that is advocated by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and her top aides has any hope of reining in Iran¡¯s nuclear program or prompting a change in Iranian behavior.

With regard to Iraq in particular, Ms. Rice¡¯s decision that the United States would take part in talks with Iranian officials about Iraq prompted second-guessing from more hawkish officials in Vice President Dick Cheney¡¯s office, who pushed for further isolation of Iran. Ryan C. Crocker, the American ambassador to Iraq, acknowledged in his testimony to Congress this week that the talks had done little to restrain what he called Iran¡¯s ¡°malign¡± influence.

Bush officials said a disagreement in the administration had delayed a decision over whether to declare Iran¡¯s Revolutionary Guard Corps, or a unit of it, a terrorist organization and subject to increased financial sanctions.

While White House officials and members of the vice president¡¯s staff have been pushing to blacklist the entire Revolutionary Guard, the officials said, officials at the State and Treasury Departments are pushing for a narrower approach that would list only the Revolutionary Guard¡¯s elite Quds Force as well as companies and organizations with financial ties to that group. The designation would set into motion a series of automatic sanctions that would make it easier for the United States to block financial accounts and other assets controlled by the group.

Administration officials had signaled last month that a measure aimed at the Revolutionary Guard would be announced soon, but with the two camps now at odds in the administration, the designation no longer seems assured.

During his Iraq speech on Thursday, President Bush cast Iran as a major antagonist of American policy goals in Iraq.

¡°If we were to be driven out of Iraq, extremists of all strains would be emboldened,¡± Mr. Bush said. ¡°Iran would benefit from the chaos and would be encouraged in its efforts to gain nuclear weapons and dominate the region.¡±

The administration is still pressing ahead with other efforts to turn up the pressure on Iran. The State Department has asked top officials from the five other world powers seeking to rein in Tehran¡¯s nuclear ambitions to come to Washington on Sept. 21 for a meeting in which R. Nicholas Burns, under secretary of state for political affairs, will press for stronger United Nations sanctions against Iran.

On Sept. 28, Ms. Rice will meet with her counterparts from Europe, Russia and China to press the Iran sanctions issue.

Beyond its nuclear program, Iran has emerged as an increasing source of trouble for the Bush administration, American officials say, by inflaming the insurgencies in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon and Gaza, where it has provided military and financial support to the militant Islamic group Hamas, which now controls the Gaza Strip.

In its report to Congress on Friday, the administration accused Iran of continuing to provide Shiite militias with training, money and weapons, including rockets, mortars and explosively formed projectile devices, which the administration said accounted for an increased percentage of American combat deaths. The report said that ¡°coalition and Iraqi operations against these groups, combined with a growing rejection of Shia violence by top Government of Iraq officials, has led to some progress in reducing violent attacks from Shia extremists.¡±

The American military in Iraq still has custody of several Iranian officials who were detained there on suspicion of involvement in providing aid to Shiite militias.

Iran¡¯s government has denied the American charges. Its supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Friday in a speech at Tehran University that Mr. Bush¡¯s Middle East policies had failed and that Mr. Bush would one day be put on trial for ¡°the tragedies they have created in Iraq.¡±

But a belief has been growing in Iran, which administration officials have pointedly not tried to stem, that the Bush administration is considering military strikes against Iran. An Israeli airstrike in Syria last week kicked up a flurry of speculation in the Iranian press that Israel, in alliance with the United States, was really trying to send a message to Iran that it could strike Iranian nuclear facilities if it chose to.

The Israeli government¡¯s official silence about the Syrian airstrike has further fueled those fears in Iran, American, Israeli and European officials said.

¡°If I were the Iranians, what I¡¯d be freaked out about is that the other Arab states didn¡¯t protest¡± the Israeli airstrike in Syria, said George Perkovich, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. ¡°The Arab world nonreaction is a signal to Iran, that Arabs aren¡¯t happy with Iran¡¯s power and influence, so if the Israelis want to go and intimidate and violate the airspace of another Arab state that¡¯s an ally of Iran, the other Arab states aren¡¯t going to do anything.¡±

During the nuclear talks next week, the United States, France and Britain will try to get Russia, China, and to a lesser extent, Germany to sign on to a stronger set of United Nations Security Council sanctions against members of Iran¡¯s government, including an extensive travel ban and further moves to restrict the ability of Iran¡¯s financial institutions to do business abroad.

The sanctions are aimed at getting Tehran to suspend its enrichment of uranium. The international efforts to rein in Iran¡¯s nuclear ambitions have been complicated by America¡¯s proxy war with Iran in Iraq, which Russia and some European countries argue should take a back seat to the nuclear issue.

Further complicating things has been a dispute over a pact reached last month between Iran and the international nuclear watchdog agency for Tehran to answer questions about an array of suspicious past nuclear activities. Gregory L. Schulte, the American delegate to the watchdog group, the International Atomic Energy Agency, raised questions at a meeting this week over whether Iran really intended to answer those questions. He suggested that Tehran ¡°has no intention of coming clean.¡±

[LoungeMachine]

Originally posted by LoungeMachine
Gregory L. Schulte, the American delegate to the watchdog group, the International Atomic Energy Agency, raised questions at a meeting this week over whether Iran really intended to answer those questions. He suggested that Tehran ¡°has no intention of coming clean.¡±

Gee, where have we heard this before...

[knuckleboner]

Originally posted by LoungeMachine
Go back 6 years, kb.

I wouldnt have believed half of what's happened.

eh, i would've. we've been gunning for iraq for years. why? because we wanted a stable oil producing regime in that region. and while iran produces more oil, iraq has shown itself to be more of a threat to the region (kuwait and threatening saudi arabia.) so when we had the opportunity to take out saddam, we did. i can easily believe that. (though, i totally disagree that it was the right thing to do at the time.)

and i do believe it's an overly arrogant, short-sighted, narrow-focused administration. so i can DEFINITELY believe that this administration was then unprepared to deal with the "what-next" phase after saddam's regime fell.

I don't think Amhadinnerjacket is the type to be disuaded [sp?] by rhetoric and posturing either.

i agree. (though not about your caring about spelling...) in fact, i think you can see since iraq has worn on, iran has definitely gotten more verbally beligerant. (sp?) so, thanks to the bush administration, one could say, we DO have a hostile regime with nuclear weapons (north korea) and one in the middle east actively pursuing them.

Ground troops? nope.

Air strikes on "nuclear targets" and "insurgent training grounds" yep.

They're probably just waiting for more blow-back from the cooked up intel stories they're leaking.

well, yeah, we MIGHT do limited airstrikes, though i think it's MUCH MORE likely if something happens, it'll be israel that launches the airstrike. just a guess...

[Baby's On Fire]

Let's make it easy:

HE'S GUILTY.

String him up and let's be done with it........

[Hyman Roth]

Those articles posted paint a very scary picture. I don't have the
answers and I really haven't even though enough about it to form an
opinion. Yet if we don't (or if "Israel" doesn't, as suggested) consider
air strikes to prevent or delay Iran from developing nuclear weapons, and I am assuming our dipolmatic efforts are going to fail in this respect, aren't we looking at a nuclear capable regime that has the sincere desire to use these weapons against us trading intimately with
a country that has the means of delivery?

I am no hawk, not by a long shot, but Iran just scares the bejesus out
of me and I am not sure how to feel about China either. The latter
cetainly seems to be aiming toward a world where they are negotiating
with us from a position of strength.

I'm also concerned about a possible scenario in the near future that
might make a first strike seem like our best option.