Who Wants War With Iran?

By William Boardman, Reader Supported News

22 February 13

Major powers meet with Iran on February 26 - with war on their minds?

here are those who would have bombed or invaded Iran years ago to make sure there would be no Iranian Bomb, and their voices are getting louder again as another day of high level talks approaches. Even though Iran's Supreme Leader has spent years forswearing nuclear weapons, which he calls a "crime against humanity," skeptics demand proof that there's nothing to worry about.

The Iranian nuclear program, whatever it may be, is the only item on the agenda for the seven-nation discussion in Almaty, Kazakhstan, on February 26, and cautious optimism has been expressed by participants, including the United States, Russia, and Iran. Known as the P5+1 because the group includes the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, United States) plus Germany, the group is called the E3+3 in Europe.

Perhaps the clearest framework for understanding what the Iranian nuclear development program might or might not be is to keep in mind that the most intense claims that Iran is building nuclear weapons come from the region's undisputed nuclear-armed state, Israel. Much like Iraq's Saddam Hussein playing cat-and-mouse with WMDs he didn't have, Iran has cooperated with weapons inspectors only to a point of uncertainty as to whether the program is or is not military.

Iran is one of the 190 countries that have signed the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, which allows for non-military development of nuclear power, nuclear medicine, and other nuclear applications. Iran claims it has the legal right to enrich uranium as part of its civilian nuclear energy program.

Iran also claims that it has met its obligations to the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), although in 2005 the IAEA, in a vote with 12 abstentions, found Iran in non-compliance over its enrichment program (but even the Congressional Research Service was uncertain whether "non-compliance" constituted a "violation" of the treaty). The dispute had continued ever since, with IAEA inspectors getting inconsistent access to Iran's nuclear infrastructure. During 2012, four IAEA reports continued to provide inconclusive indications of a possible Iranian nuclear weapons program.

Israel Rejects Nuclear Transparency

Israel has not signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty and is a presumed nuclear power, along with other non-signatories who have nuclear weapons: India, Pakistan, and North Korea. In 2010, the IAEA sought to bring Israeli nuclear facilities within the safeguards of the IAEA, with only limited success, as Israel did not reveal all its facilities and has not yet done so. Estimates of the Israeli nuclear stockpile vary from 75 to 400 warheads, with 200 thought most likely, which Israel could deliver by missile, aircraft, or submarine.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has suggested more than once that Israel might act alone against the perceived Iranian nuclear threat, telling the New York Times in November:

"If someone sits here as the prime minister of Israel and he can’t take action on matters that are cardinal to the existence of this country, its future and its security, and he is totally dependent on receiving approval from others, then he is not worthy of leading.…

"I am not eager to go to war…. I have been creating very heavy pressure, and part of this pressure comes from the knowledge some of the most powerful nations in the world have that we are serious. This isn't a show, this is not false."

Netanyahu first called for an attack on Iran at least as early as 1992, when he said the Iranians were only three to five years from producing a nuclear weapon. But warnings like that are much older, going back to the 1970s and concerns that the Shah of Iran might arm his police state with nuclear weapons.

In Jerusalem on February 12, Netanyahu again threatened Iran:

"They have to know that if the sanctions and diplomacy fail, they will face a credible military threat. That is essential, and nothing else will do the job, and it is getting closer…. This has to be stopped for the interest of peace and security for the entire world."

Iran Denies Nuclear Weapons, Rejects Transparency

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has often denied the existence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program, as he did in 2008 during an interview with NBC anchor Brian Williams, when he also questioned the utility of nuclear weapons as a source of security:

"Again, did nuclear arms help the Soviet Union from falling and disintegrating? For that matter, did a nuclear bomb help the U.S. to prevail inside Iraq or Afghanistan, for that matter? Nuclear bombs belong to the 20th century. We are living in a new century ... Nuclear energy must not be equaled to a nuclear bomb. This is a disservice to the society of man…."

On February 10, Ahmadinejad, whose term as president ends in a few months, indicated Iran's willingness to discuss its nuclear program in bi-lateral talks with the U.S., adding, "You pull away the gun from the face of the Iranian nation, and I myself will enter the talks with you."

Ahmadinejad's superior, Iran's clerical Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, gave a foreign policy speech in February 2012 in which he said much the same thing about nuclear weapons as he had said before:

"The Iranian nation has never pursued and will never pursue nuclear weapons. There is no doubt that the decision makers in the countries opposing us know well that Iran is not after nuclear weapons because the Islamic Republic, logically, religiously and theoretically, considers the possession of nuclear weapons a grave sin and believes the proliferation of such weapons is senseless, destructive and dangerous."

Not being able to confirm reality, in either Israel or Iran, American and European policy makers tend, unquestioningly in public, to trust the former and demonize the latter. And now as the world enters the fourth decade of fear-mongering about Iran's "nuclear weapons program," some are ratcheting it up again in advance of the Kazakhstan meeting, with front page stories that start like this from the February 13 Washington Post:

"Iran recently sought to acquire tens of thousands of highly specialized magnets used in centrifuge machines, according to experts and diplomats, a sign that the country may be planning a major expansion of its nuclear program that could shorten the path to an atomic weapons capability."

If that assertion seems to have a familiar ring, perhaps it's because it's so similar in structure and content to what then-President Bush falsely stated, in his 2003 State of the Union address, now known as the infamous "Sixteen Words":

"The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

Washington Post Works to Create Crisis

On February 14, under a headline about "the Iranian nuclear crisis," the Post re-hyped the apparent 2011 order of "ring-shaped magnets" from China as a setback to the "Western-led effort to slow or halt Iran's nuclear development" - even though the Post had no idea if the magnets were ever delivered or whether they were actually for centrifuges with a benign purpose.

Taking the Post reports apart on Consortiumnews.com, Robert Parry drew attention to details buried in the story that contradicted the breathless lead - that the centrifuges were old, that Iran had long since told the IAEA of its plans to build 50,000 of them, and that they were not some "major expansion of nuclear capacity."

Parry notes that the sole source for the magnet story was a private entity called the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), whose head is David Albright, and that

"Though Albright insists that he is an objective professional, ISIS has published hundreds of articles about Iran, which has not produced a single nuclear bomb, while barely mentioning Israel's rogue nuclear arsenal….

"The articles not only hype developments in Iran but also attack U.S. media critics who question the fear-mongering about Iran."

Albright has hyped the threat of weapons of mass destruction before: in 2002, when the Bush administration was lying the country into a war against Iraq, claiming that Iraq had "a clandestine nuclear weapons effort" as well as "chemical and biological weapons" - none of which was true. As Parry sums it up:

"A decade ago, Albright and the ISIS were key figures in stoking the hysteria for invading Iraq around the false allegations of its WMD program. In recent years, Albright and his institute have adopted a similar role regarding Iran and its purported pursuit of a nuclear weapon, even though U.S. intelligence agencies say Iran terminated that weapons project in 2003."

And Who Decides What Is Necessary?

In his 2013 State of the Union address, President Obama dealt with Iran in a single, misleading, and threatening sentence:

"Likewise, the leaders of Iran must recognize that now is the time for a diplomatic solution, because a coalition stands united in demanding that they meet their obligations, and we will do what is necessary to prevent them from getting a nuclear weapon."

Since 1979, the United States has waged a long twilight war against its former puppet state with no apparent understanding of why Iran may still resent the U.S. for overthrowing Iran's elected government in 1953 and imposing one of the world's nastier police states on 70 million people. There is credible evidence that the U.S. has not only imposed economic sanctions that are tantamount to acts of war on Iran, but has also colluded in assassinations of at least five Iranian nuclear scientists as well as in cyber attacks on the country's infrastructure.

Secretary of State John Kerry suggested on Valentine's Day that if Iran's nuclear program is peaceful, Iran should have no trouble proving it. He urged the Iranians to make "real offers and engage in real dialogue."

Both the president and the secretary of state are lawyers, and are aware, most likely, that they don't have enough evidence of Iran's "nuclear weapons program" to show probable cause to obtain a search warrant from any fair court, never mind an indictment.

That suggests, to use Obama's words, that perhaps "what is necessary to prevent them from getting a nuclear weapon" might be to stop attacking them.

William M. Boardman has over 40 years experience in theatre, radio, TV, print journalism, and non-fiction, including 20 years in the Vermont judiciary. He has received honors from Writers Guild of America, Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Vermont Life magazine, and an Emmy Award nomination from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.

Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader Supported News.

Connecting Entitlement Reform to Immigration Reform

By Robert Reich, Robert Reich's Blog

21 February 13

was born in 1946, just when the boomer wave began. Bill Clinton was born that year, too. So was George W. Bush, as was Laura Bush. And Ken Starr (remember him?) And then, the next year, Hillary Rodham was born. And soon Newt Gingrich (known as "Newty" as a boy). And Cher (Every time I begin feeling old I remind myself she's not that much younger.)

Why did so many of us begin coming into the world in 1946? Demographers have given this question a great deal of attention.

My father, for example, was in World War II - as were the fathers of many other early boomers. Ed Reich came home from the war, as did they. My mother was waiting for him, as were their mothers.

When it comes down to it, demographics is not all that complicated.

Fast-forward. Most of us early boomers had planned to retire around now. Those born a few years later had planned to retire in a few years.

But these plans have gone awry. First, boomer wages didn't rise as fast as we expected they would. In fact, over the last thirty years the median wage has barely budged, adjusted for inflation.

As a result, most of us haven't saved as much as we'd hoped.

Then employers scaled back our pensions. Instead of the predictable monthly benefits many of our parents got when they retired, we received "defined contribution" plans - basically, do-it-yourself pensions. Some employers initially offered to match what we socked away, but those employer matches often shrank to the vanishing point.

We nonetheless took comfort from the rising prices of our homes, and assumed they'd become modest nest eggs when we sold them and bought smaller places for retirement.

But then the housing bubble burst.

Meanwhile, whatever we'd managed to sock away in the stock market lost years of value.

We assumed we'd at least have Social Security and Medicare. After all, we've been paying into both programs for years.

Yet both are now being eyed by deficit hawks who say the only way to avoid large and unsustainable budget deficits in future years is to limit these programs.

For example, Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson have just offered another of their deficit-cutting plans - paring back Social Security's annual cost-of-living adjustment and reducing Medicare by squeezing suppliers and cutting benefits for higher-income retirees.

So are the boomers doomed?

Not necessarily. One possible response to the aging of America, not yet on the table: Expand the number legal immigrants coming to America.

As I've noted before, the biggest reason Social Security and Medicare are projected to cost so much in future years is because America is aging so fast.

It's not just that so many boomers are planning to retire, and their bodies will wear out. It's also that seniors are living longer. And families are having fewer children.

Add it all up and the number of Americans who are working relative to the number who are retired keeps shrinking.

Forty years ago there were five workers for every retiree. Now there are just over three. By 2025, if present trends continue, there will be only two workers per retiree. There's no way just two workers will be able or willing to pay enough payroll taxes to keep benefits flowing to every retiree.

This is where immigration comes in. Most immigrants are young because the poor countries they come from are demographically the opposite of rich countries. Rather than aging populations, their populations are bursting with young people.

Yes, I know: There aren't enough jobs right now even for Americans who want and need them. But once the American economy recovers, there will be. Take a long-term view and most new immigrants to the U.S. will be working for many decades.

Foreign-born workers are now 15 percent of the nation's workforce. At the present rate of immigration, between now and 2050 immigrants and their children are projected to account for nearly all the growth of the American population under the age of 65.

Immigration reform is already on the national agenda, but we've been focusing on only one aspect of it - how to deal with undocumented workers.

We need to think more broadly, and connect the dots. One logical way to help deal with the crisis of funding Social Security and Medicare is to have more workers per retiree. And the simplest way to do that is to allow more immigrants into the United States.

Immigration reform and entitlement reform have a lot to do with one another.

Robert B. Reich, Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley, was Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration. Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the last century. He has written thirteen books, including the best sellers "Aftershock" and "The Work of Nations." His latest is an e-book, "Beyond Outrage." He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine and chairman of Common Cause.