IRAN REPLACES DOLLAR WITH EURO IN FX

Expect the a war on Iran soon just as they've been hinting at these last few weeks again. -Craig

Iran replaces Dollar with Euro in FX

Sun, 20 Sep 2009 09:58:03 GMT
http://presstv.com/detail.aspx?id=106669§ionid=351020102


Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has ordered the replacement of the US dollar by the euro in the country's foreign exchange accounts.

The September 12 edict was issued following a decision by the trustees of the country's foreign reserves, Mehr News Agency reported.

Earlier, the Islamic Republic of Iran had announced that the euro would replace the greenback in the country's oil transactions. Iran has called on other OPEC members to ditch the sinking dollar in favor of the more credible euro.

Following the switch, the interest rate for the facilities provided from the Foreign Exchange Reserves will be reduced from12 to 5 percent.

Since being introduced by the European Union, the euro has gained popularity internationally and there are now more euros in circulation than the dollar.

The move will also help decouple Iran from the US banking system.

Right on bloody cue, the propaganda bullshit flys out all because the U.S Dollar is dropped again. Remind you of Saddam Hussein anyone? This all aids in the taking full open control of The Golden Triangle drugs trade. This will gain acceptance via many of the nations until their assets get destroyed. Syria will be bought into the war which will escalate into the final global war to usher in a United Order world peace. Will it be peace? No because your mind will then be ravaged by cult psudeo science dribble like climate based on The Iron Mountain Report. You'll be mind screwed even more in the near future if you can possibly believe we can get even more zombified with tripe already.

Iran 'concealed nuclear facility'

Friday, 25 September 2009 15:22 UKE-mail this to a fr
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/8274903.stm


Iran concealed the building of a second uranium enrichment plant in defiance of calls for transparency over its nuclear plans, US President Barack Obama says.

The leaders of the US, UK and France demanded UN inspectors be given immediate access to the facility.

Iran revealed the existence of the plant to the UN watchdog on Monday, saying it was not yet operational and would only be used for nuclear energy.

Iranian officials in New York and Tehran denied the plant was a secret.

Tehran has previously acknowledged it has one enrichment plant, at Natanz.

Iran's decision to build a secret facility represented a "direct challenge to the basic compact" of the global non-proliferation regime, US President Barack Obama said, making a statement in Pittsburgh, where he is hosting a G20 summit.

Despite Iran's assertions that the facility was for peaceful purposes, the new plant was "not consistent" with that goal, the US president said.

Iran now faces the prospect of tougher international sanctions if it does not satisfy Western calls for full disclosure in the coming months.

'Line in the sand'

Speaking alongside UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Mr Obama said it was time for Iran to begin meeting its international commitments.

"Iran must comply with UN Security Council resolutions and make clear it is prepared to meet its responsibilities as a member of the community of nations," Mr Obama said.

Tehran would be held accountable for any failure to meet these responsibilities, he said.

Speaking after Mr Obama, the French and British leaders used strong language to insist that Iran would now have to disclose full details of its entire nuclear programme or face new and tougher sanctions.

Gordon Brown stressed that the US, France and UK were "at one" on the issue, and accused the Iranians of "serial deception".

There was now "no choice but to draw a line in the sand" over the nuclear issue, he said.

"Iran must abandon any military ambitions for its nuclear programme."

Mr Sarkozy said the situation was a challenge to the entire international community.

"Everything must be put on the table," the French president said, adding that the world needed to see a "step change" from Iran in the coming months.

Underground plant

Iranian officials were quick to deny the latest plant was any kind of clandestine project.

"This installation is not a secret one, which is why we announced its existence to the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency]," Ali Akbar Saleri, head of Iran's nuclear agency, told the AFP news agency.

Iran says it does not need to inform the IAEA of any new site until 180 days before any nuclear material is place in the facility.

The existence of Iran's first enrichment plant, at Natanz, was only confirmed after intelligence emerged from Iranian exile groups several years ago.

Western governments are said to have known of the existence of the new enrichment plant for several months.

It is said to be an underground facility at a mountain on the site of a former missile site belonging to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards north-east of the holy city of Qom.

Construction on the facility started in earnest in mid-2006, diplomatic sources said.

Iran's letter to the UN watchdog, the IAEA, came as the New York Times cited US officials giving the first details of the new plant.

The IAEA confirmed it received a letter from Iran on Monday informing it that "a new pilot fuel enrichment plant is under construction".

Iran told the agency that no nuclear material had been introduced into the plant, and enrichment levels would only be high enough to make nuclear fuel, not a bomb.

In response, the IAEA has requested Iran to "provide specific information and access to the facility as soon as possible", an IAEA statement adds.

The disclosure of the new plant comes one day after world leaders stressed the need for greater co-operation against nuclear proliferation and shortly before Iran is due to resume talks with international powers on the issue.

Since taking office in January, Mr Obama has told Tehran than he is ready for direct talks on the nuclear issue, but has had no firm response from Iran.

Reports that Western officials have known of the existence of the enrichment plant for several months suggest that Mr Obama's policy was put in place even as he was aware of the new construction near Qom, correspondents note.

Earlier this month, Tehran agreed to "comprehensive" talks on a range of security issues - but made no mention of its own nuclear programme.

The talks are due to be held in Geneva on 1 October with Tehran and the five permanent UN Security Council members - US, UK, Russia, China and France - plus Germany.

Iran now faces the prospect of tougher sanctions if it fails to meet international demands for transparency.

The USS Nimitz carrier has just entered the Persian Gulf replacing the USS Ronanld Reagan.

The USS Nimitz is the oldest operational nuclear carrier at 34 years old, as the Enterprise is currently in maintenance.

So it makes sense that they sent the USS Nimitz in case it is destroyed in a war with Iran.

Interestingly:

The USS Nimitz is featured in the 1980 film The Final Countdown.

In the film, the ship and crew are thrown back in time via a wormhole storm to 6 December 1941 near Hawaii, just hours before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

So can we expect a Pearl Harbour type event with the USS Nimitz?

Hows about even a nuclear detonation in Hawaii? Remember Obama's words (probably Jesuit trained Jon Favreau's) yesterday talking about a nuke in a western city. He's hinting at their near future plans. I believe something went wrong the other day as they were quite possibly about to stage something big. It was almost the exact scenario with Netanyahu as in London on 7/7 but this time on the 22nd of September the day of the Autumnal Equinox. What was worrying about this date was that it came within week 39 of the year and this number is the number for disease (bio-weapon?) Then we had Jesuit trained, Vatican assassin, Shimon Peres, the most powerful Sabbatean Frankist hofjuden of the Latin Kingdom mouthing off. This count dracula double claimed Netanyahu would make Mahmoud Ahmadinejad pay for his past comments. You can bet Netanyahu will do just that! All of course controlled and staged by the Knights of Malta and the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre. The region controlled by the Protector of the Holy Sites of Jersualem, King Juan Carlos of the Knights of Malta (Navigator) and The Order of the Golden Fleece. Incidentally Carlos is a descendant of the Ptolemaic 'grey' Jesuit bloodline of the Arcana Arcanorum, known as Farnese. You can bank on a giant war regardless if the economy is not out right collapsed from October onwards. I suggest people study 'Silent Weapons for Quiet Wars'.



Ref:
http://z10.invisionfree.com/The_Unhived_Mi...showtopic=20540

http://z10.invisionfree.com/The_Unhived_Mi...topic=6929&st=0

I've heard it said that they are waiting till after the German Elections this Sunday, as they want Angela Merkel (who is rumoured to be Hitlers daughter) to remain in Power.

http://troyspace2.wordpress.com/2008/09/12...n-members-list/

G-8: Iran has 3 months to stop uranium enrichment

By JOHN HEILPRIN (AP)
24 Sept 2009
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/articl...FUTfwwD9ATSPH80


UNITED NATIONS — Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said Thursday that the Group of Eight nations is giving Iran until the end of the year to commit to ending uranium enrichment and avoid new sanctions.

Frattini, whose nation holds the rotating chair of the club of wealthy nations known as the G-8, said the member's foreign ministers agreed Wednesday night to give Iran more time.

"It seems to me a reasonable perspective. And after the end of December, I strongly hope we will have at that time practical moves from Iran," Frattini said.

"That's why together we decided while not excluding further measures, as even Russia apparently said, we have to give Iran a serious chance," he said. "If we give a chance, let's give a chance. Don't, I would say, immediately put another option on the table. This would be counterproductive to the eyes of our counterpart. This is our strategy for the moment."

The U.S. has only just won Russian agreement to consider new sanctions against Iran to add pressure on Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who insists Tehran's nuclear program is designed only to generate electricity.

Frattini said that the informal agreement will be re-examined each month until the end of the year.

He said the G-8 could not let the Iranians believe the world's economic powers are "relaxed" and willing to let Iran string them along.

"But we are to make it absolutely clear that our window of opportunity will not remain open indefinitely," Frattini told a group of reporters on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly.

Frattini said G-8 ministers — the U.S., Britain, Italy, France, Germany, Canada, Japan and Russia — also agreed that "concerning links" were emerging between Iran and North Korea.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev opened the door Wednesday to backing potential sanctions. He moved in that direction after President Barack Obama scrapped plans for a U.S. missile shield in Eastern Europe.

While U.S. and Russian officials denied a quid pro quo, Medvedev told the U.N. General Assembly that Obama's roll-back on the missile defense plan "deserves a positive response." Obama himself has said his missile decision may have spurred Russian good will as a "bonus."

Ahmadinejad has taken a softer tone on many matters since arriving in New York for the U.N. meetings, emphasizing his interest in improving relations with the United States and expressing an openness to include nuclear matters on the negotiations agenda.

He has given no sign, however, that his country is willing to bargain away its nuclear program.

A member of the Russian delegation, speaking on condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the Russians, said Moscow's final position on the question of imposing further sanctions would be determined, to a large extent, by Medvedev's consultations here.

The U.S. and Russia are among six countries that will hold talks in Europe next week with Iran over its nuclear ambitions. Obama wants to reserve the possibility of pursuing tougher sanctions if those meetings lead to no restraint by Iran in the weeks ahead. Russia, which has strong economic ties with Tehran, has stood in the way of stronger action against Iran in the past.

Israel's nuclear programme

Israel built the Dimona plant with help from France

Monday, 22 December, 2003, 17:30 GMT
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3340639.stm


While Israel has never admitted to having nuclear weapons, few international experts question the Jewish state's presence on the world's list of nuclear powers.

Its nuclear capability is arguably the most secretive weapons of mass destruction programme in the world.

Unlike Iran and North Korea - two countries whose alleged nuclear ambitions have recently come to the fore - Israel has never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, designed to prevent the global spread of nuclear weapons.

As a result, it is not subject to inspections and the threat of sanctions by the United Nations nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The extent of Israel's nuclear capability has been the subject of often wildly inaccurate intelligence estimates since the 1960s, when the country's nuclear reactor, at Dimona in the Negev desert, came online.
The suspicion and fog surrounding this question are constructive, because they strengthen our deterrent
Shimon Peres
Former Israeli Prime Minister

The shrouds of secrecy have lifted only once, in the mid-1980s, when a former worker at the plant, Mordechai Vanunu, gave a British newspaper descriptions and photographs of Israeli nuclear warheads.

Vanunu's evidence led to a sharp upwards revision of the number of nuclear warheads Israel was believed to possess - to at least 100 - and possibly as many as 200.

By way of comparison, India and Pakistan - the most recent members of the "nuclear club" - are widely believed to have about 20 warheads each. They successfully carried out nuclear weapons tests in 1998, leading to fears of an escalated conflict between the two rival South Asian powers.

There is no evidence that Israel has ever carried out a nuclear test, but there is speculation that a suspected nuclear explosion in the southern Indian Ocean in 1979 was a joint Israeli-South African test. Post-apartheid South Africa has dismantled its nuclear weapons programme.

Origins

Shortly after its creation as a Jewish homeland in 1948 and following the horrors of the Holocaust, in which six million European Jews were murdered, Israel began showing an interest in acquiring nuclear weapons - the "ultimate deterrent".

In 1952, the Israeli Atomic Energy Commission was formed and began working closely with the Israeli military.

By 1953, a process for extracting uranium found in the Negev desert was perfected and a new method of producing heavy water was developed - providing Israel with its own capability to produce some of the most important nuclear materials.

Mordechai Vanunu: Viewed as a traitor and a spy by most Israelis

For reactor design and construction, Israel sought and received the assistance of France.

According to Washington-based website GlobalSecurity.org, a secret agreement between the two nations saw construction of the Dimona plant begin in the late 1950s.

The complex was variously described as a textile plant, an agricultural station and a metallurgical research facility until 1960, when Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion stated that it was a nuclear research centre built for "peaceful purposes".

From its early suspicions that Israel had nuclear ambitions - overflights by U-2 spy planes revealed Dimona's construction in 1958 - the United States expressed concern.

During the 1960s, US inspectors visited Dimona several times but were unable to obtain an accurate picture of the activities carried out there.

GlobalSecurity.org says the Israelis went so far as to install false control room panels and to brick over elevators and hallways that accessed certain areas of the facility.

The inspectors were able to report that there was no clear scientific research or civilian nuclear power programme justifying such a large reactor - seen as circumstantial evidence of the Israeli bomb programme - but found no evidence of "weapons-related activities".

In 1968, a US Central Intelligence Agency report concluded that Israel had begun to produce nuclear weapons.

Years of speculation about the size of Israel's nuclear arsenal followed.

The Vanunu affair

In 1986, Mordechai Vanunu, who had worked as a technician at the Dimona complex, gave London's Sunday Times newspaper detailed information about Israel's nuclear programme that led observers to declare Israel the world's sixth largest nuclear power.

Before he could reveal more to the media, Vanunu became the victim of a classic "honey trap".

He was lured out of hiding in London by a female Israeli secret agent who persuaded him that she wanted to meet him in Rome. Once there, he was drugged by other Israeli agents and brought home.

Later that year, he was jailed for 18 years after a trial for treason that was held in secret. Viewed as a traitor and a spy by most Israelis, Vanunu remains in prison to this day and has spent most of his sentence in solitary confinement.

Israel's former Prime Minister Shimon Peres, widely regarded as the architect of Israel's nuclear weapons programme, testified at the trial that Vanunu had done serious damage to Israel's security.

Mr Peres subsequently said: "A certain amount of secrecy must be maintained in some fields. The suspicion and fog surrounding this question are constructive, because they strengthen our deterrent."

Arab anger

Other states in the Middle East, many of them strong supporters of the Palestinian cause, have expressed deep concern about the existence of an Israeli nuclear weapons programme.

They also accuse the US of operating a regional policy of double-standards, ignoring Israel's weapons programmes while insisting that others - notably pre-war Iraq, Iran and Syria - are a threat to peace because of their alleged weapons of mass destruction.

The head of the IAEA, an Egyptian, is regarded with suspicion in Israel

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency recently urged Israel to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and surrender its nuclear weapons in order to further peace in the Middle East.

Mohamed ElBaradei told an Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, that the IAEA operated under the assumption that Israel had nuclear weapons despite the fact that it had never officially confirmed this.

He warned that Israel's belief that it was safer because it possessed such weapons was false, as other Middle Eastern countries felt threatened by their presence.

And he urged Israel and its neighbours to begin talks on halting the spread of nuclear weapons in the Middle East.

"My fear is that, without such a dialogue, there will be continued incentive for the region's countries to develop weapons of mass destruction to match the Israeli arsenal," he said.

Iran loses its only AWACS as Ahmadinejad threatens the world

Iran's AWACS destroyed in parade collision

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report
September 23, 2009, 12:20 PM (GMT+02:00)


Up above a big military parade in Tehran on Tuesday, Sept. 22, as Iranian president declared Iran's armed forces would "chop off the hands" of any power daring to attack his country, two air force jets collided in mid-air. One was Iran's only airborne warning and control system (AWACS) for coordinating long-distance aerial operations, DEBKAfile's military and Iranian sources disclose.

The proud military parade, which included a march-past, a line of Shehab-3 missiles and an air force fly-past, was planned to give Ahmadinejad a dazzling send-off for New York and add steel to his UN Assembly speech Wednesday.

Dubbed "Simorgh" (a flying creature of Iranian fable which performs wonders in mid-flight), the AWACS' appearance, escorted by fighter jets, was to have been the climax for the Iranian Air force's fly-past over the parade. Instead, it collided with one of escorting planes, a US-made F-5E, and both crashed to the ground in flames. All seven crewmen were killed.

Eye witnesses reported that the flaming planes landed on the mausoleum burial site of the Islamic revolution's founder Ruhollah Khomeini, a national shrine. According to Western observers, no distress signals came from either cockpit indicating that the collision and explosions were sudden and fast.

DEBKAfile's military sources say the disaster was a serious blow to the Iranian Air Force not long after its first and only AWACS went into service in April 2008. It was a renovated version of the Russian Ilyushin 76, part of Saddam Hussein's air force before it was transferred to Iran in 1991 during the first Gulf War.

Tehran hired Russian technicians to carry out renovations and install up-to-date radar. At the launching ceremony of the upgraded AWACS, Air Force commander Brig. Gen. Ahmad Miqani boasted its new radar systems were made in Iran and able to spot any airplane or missile at a distance of 1,000 kilometers from Iran's borders.

The loss of this airborne control system has left Iran's air force and air and missile defenses without "electronic eyes" for surveillance of the skies around its borders.

craig, you need to do a new audio recordings of your thoughts on this iran situation.

Looks great!

You are right on target again. Ajab was told to make the switch so as to
further justify the pope's American crusaders in their attack against the
"infidel" Shia Moslems so hated by the Sunni.Wahhabis financing the crusade.

Too late to stop Tehran, Obama aims to stifle an Israeli attack

DEBKAfile Special Analysis

September 26, 2009
http://www2.debka.com/article.php?aid=1405


Maestro Barack Obama's histrionics in New York and Pittsburgh Thursday and Friday, Sept. 24-25 - and his threat of "confrontation" for Iran's concealment of its nuclear capabilities - were water off a duck's back for Tehran, whose nuclear weapons program has gone too far to stop by words or even sanctions.

The Islamic regime only responded with more defiance, announcing that its second uranium enrichment plant near Qom would become operational soon.

The US president's tough words and willingness to step out of his axiomatic insistence on dialogue and turn to economic warfare against Iran may be impressive but it is no longer effective. Tehran is too close to its goal of a nuclear weapons capability to be deterred by offers of engagement or economic penalties.

Obama certainly knows this. He also understands that Iran is now unstoppable except by force. His performance was therefore directed at another target: Israel, whom he is determined to dissuade from resorting to military action against Iran's nuclear installations.

Defense secretary Robert Gates hit the nail on the head when he said Friday: "The reality is there is no military option that does anything more than buy time. The estimates are one to three years or so."

Iran was allowed to reach the point defined by Gates thanks to the permissiveness of two US presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton and two Israeli prime ministers, Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert. They had no illusions about the deterrent value of the three sets of UN Security sanctions imposed to punish Iran, but held back from pre-emptive action on the pretext that there was still plenty of time before Iran was in a position to destroy Israel.

In any case, Israeli leaders argued, Iran's nuclear ambitions were a threat to the whole world and it was therefore incumbent on the "international community" to take care of them.

This of course did not happen. Iran carried on exploiting international inaction, finally capitalizing on Obama's foot-dragging in his first nine months in office.

By now, Iran has used the gift of time to process enough enriched uranium to fuel two nuclear bombs and is able to produce another two per year.

Its advanced medium-range missiles will be ready to deliver nuclear warheads by next year.

Detonators for nuclear bombs are in production at two secret sites.

And finally, a second secret uranium enrichment plant - subject of the stern warning issued collectively in Pittsburgh Friday by Obama, French president Nicolas Sarkozy and British premier Gordon Brown - has come to light, buried under a mountain near Qom. Its discovery doubles - at least - all previous estimates of Iran's nuclear capabilities.

Caught red-handed yet again in massive deceit, the Iranian president Mahdmoud Ahmadinejad had only more defiance to offer. America owes his government an apology, he told interviewers in New York Friday, because the new plant would not be operational for 18 months, and Tehran had therefore not violated International Atomic Energy Agency rules requiring notification.

He was soon caught in another lie.

Saturday, the Iranian news agency was informed by an aide of supreme leader Ali Khamenei that "the new plant would become operational soon."

Iran's published concealments and deceptions are disquieting enough. But a whole lot more are undoubtedly buried in fat intelligence dossiers on Iran's nuclear program - plutonium production, for instance. The progress made in its plutonium-based weapons program was never mentioned in the stern condemnations of the last few days, except indirectly in a quiet comment from an anonymous Israeli official Friday night.

He said Iran operates on two hourglasses and both were running out fast. He was referring obliquely to the enriched uranium and the plutonium tracks.

Sarkozy was clearly thinking about those undiscovered Iranian secrets and evasions when he declared in Pittsburgh:

"Everything - everything must be put on the table now" (at the October 1 meeting of the Six Powers with Iranian negotiators). Obama too urged Iran "to come clean."

All the powers concerned - the US, Russia, France, Germany the UK and even China - have the same information as Israel and are fully aware that Iran has already crossed a number of red lines this year and will cross more in 2010. The more time allowed for diplomacy and engagement, the greater Tehran's defiance. Meanwhile, world powers will argue - not over futile sanctions, but on how to stop Israel, so wasting several more months.

DEBKAfile's sources note that the Gates assessment and the cooling note he injected into the US president's oratory came after Israeli defense minister Ehud Barak visited the Pentagon. The visit clearly did not change Gates' view that the Iranian nuclear program was now too advanced to stop, while the use of force would only gain an interval of up to three years, after which Tehran would pick itself up and start again. Therefore, according to Gates, diplomacy remained the only viable option.

The answer to this argument is simple: It is exactly this approach which gave Iran 11 quiet years to develop its weapons capacity. For Israel and Middle East, a three-year setback is a very long time, a security boon worth great risk, because a) It would be a happy respite from the dark clouds hanging over the country from Iran and also cut back Hamas and Hizballah terrorist capabilities, and In the volatile Middle East anything can happen in 36 months.

But the US defense secretary believes Israel, like the rest of the world, must accept life under the shadow of a nuclear-armed Iran and make the best of it.

This view is shared by the Kremlin. It was advanced by prime minister Vladimir Putin to Binyamin Netanyahu during his secret trip to Moscow on Sept. 7.

According to DEBKAfile's Russian sources, when the Israeli prime minister tried to counter Putin's thesis and explain what restraint meant for Israel, the Russian prime minster became impatient and told his guest to leave.

After that interview, the Israeli government can no longer avoid appreciating that Gates and Putin talk the real talk for Washington and Moscow, while their leaders' moralistic condemnations of Iran are mainly hot air for public consumption and for maneuvering Israel into a position where a military strike would be hard to conceive.

Netanyahu's Sphinx-like silence on the nuclear to-do in the US this week was apt. But it is hard to tell what he is hiding. Will he succumb to the world powers' pressure to sit tight while Iran goes all the way to a military nuclear capability - or face up to it and act?

This is the most important decision of Netanyahu's political life as two-time prime minister of Israel. It will also determine Israel's future.

The Iran Attack Plan

Iran's acknowledgment that it is developing a second uranium-enrichment facility does little to dispel the view that the regime is developing a weapons program. Israel must consider not just whether to proceed with a strike against Iran—but how. By Anthony H. Cordesman

SEPTEMBER 26, 2009
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405...3806271306.html


When the Israeli army’sthen-Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Halutz was asked in 2004 how far Israel would go to stop Iran's nuclear program, he replied: "2,000 kilometers," roughly the distance been the two countries.

Israel's political and military leaders have long made it clear that they are considering taking decisive military action if Iran continues to develop its nuclear program. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned at the United Nations this week that "the most urgent challenge facing this body is to prevent the tyrants of Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons."

Reporting by the International Atomic Energy Agency and other sources has made it clear that whether or not Iran ties all of its efforts into a formal nuclear weapons program, it has acquired all of the elements necessary to make and deliver such weapons. Just Friday, Iran confirmed that it has been developing a second uranium-enrichment facility on a military base near Qom, doing little to dispel the long-standing concerns of Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia, and the U.S. that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.

Iran has acquired North Korean and other nuclear weapons design data through sources like the sales network once led by the former head of Pakistan's nuclear program, A. Q. Khan. Iran has all of the technology and production and manufacturing capabilities needed for fission weapons. It has acquired the technology to make the explosives needed for a gun or implosion device, the triggering components, and the neutron initiator and reflectors. It has experimented with machine uranium and plutonium processing. It has put massive resources into a medium-range missile program that has the range payload to carry nuclear weapons and that makes no sense with conventional warheads. It has also worked on nuclear weapons designs for missile warheads. These capabilities are dispersed in many facilities in many cities and remote areas, and often into many buildings in each facility—each of which would have to be a target in an Israeli military strike.

It is far from certain that such action would be met with success. An Israeli strike on Iran would be far more challenging than the Israeli strike that destroyed Iraq's Osirak reactor in 1981. An effective Israeli nuclear strike may not be possible, yet a regional nuclear arms race is a game that Iran can start, but cannot possibly win. Anyone who meets regularly with senior Israeli officials, officers and experts knows that Israel is considering military options, but considering them carefully and with an understanding that they pose serious problems and risks.

One of the fundamental problems dogging Israel, especially concerning short-ranged fighters and fighter-bombers, is distance. Iran's potential targets are between 950 and 1,400 miles from Israel, the far margin of the ranges Israeli fighters can reach, even with aerial refueling. Israel would be hard-pressed to destroy all of Iran's best-known targets. What's more, Iran has had years in which to build up covert facilities, disperse elements of its nuclear and missile programs, and develop options for recovering from such an attack.

At best, such action would delay Iran's nuclear buildup. It is more likely to provoke the country into accelerating its plans. Either way, Israel would have to contend with the fact that it has consistently had a "red light" from both the Bush and Obama administrations opposing such strikes. Any strike that overflew Arab territory or attacked a fellow Islamic state would stir the ire of neighboring Arab states, as well as Russia, China and several European states.

This might not stop Israel. Hardly a week goes by without another warning from senior Israeli officials that a military strike is possible, and that Israel cannot tolerate a nuclear-armed Iran, even though no nation has indicated it would support such action. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad continues to threaten Israel and to deny its right to exist. At the same time, President Barack Obama is clearly committed to pursuing diplomatic options, his new initiatives and a U.N. resolution on nuclear arms control and counterproliferation, and working with our European allies, China and Russia to impose sanctions as a substitute for the use of force.

Mr. Ahmadinejad keeps denying that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons, and tries to defend Iran from both support for sanctions and any form of attack by saying that Iran will negotiate over its peaceful use of nuclear power. He offered some form of dialogue with the U.S. during his visit to the U.N. this week. While French President Nicolas Sarkozy denounced Iran's continued lack of response to the Security Council this week, and said its statements would "wipe a U.N. member state off the map," no nation has yet indicated it would support Israeli military action.

Most analyses of a possible Israeli attack focus on only three of Iran's most visible facilities: its centrifuge facilities at Natanz, its light water nuclear power reactor near Bushehr, and a heavy water reactor at Arak it could use to produce plutonium. They are all some 950 to 1,000 miles from Israel. Each of these three targets differs sharply in terms of the near-term risk it poses to Israel and its vulnerability.

The Arak facility is partially sheltered, but it does not yet have a reactor vessel and evidently will not have one until 2011. Arak will not pose a tangible threat for at least several years. The key problem Israel would face is that it would virtually have to strike it as part of any strike on the other targets, because it cannot risk waiting and being unable to carry out another set of strikes for political reasons. It also could then face an Iran with much better air defenses, much better long-range missile forces, and at least some uranium weapons.

Bushehr is a nuclear power reactor along Iran's southwestern coast in the Gulf. It is not yet operational, although it may be fueled late this year. It would take some time before it could be used to produce plutonium, and any Iranian effort to use its fuel rods for such a purpose would be easy to detect and lead Iran into an immediate political confrontation with the United Nations and other states. Bushehr also is being built and fueled by Russia—which so far has been anything but supportive of an Israeli strike and which might react to any attack by making major new arms shipments to Iran.

The centrifuge facility at Natanz is a different story. It is underground and deeply sheltered, and is defended by modern short-range Russian TOR-M surface-to-air missiles. It also, however, is the most important target Israel can fully characterize. Both Israeli and outside experts estimate that it will produce enough low enriched uranium for Iran to be able to be used in building two fission nuclear weapons by some point in 2010—although such material would have to be enriched far more to provide weapons-grade U-235.

Israel has fighters, refueling tankers and precision-guided air-to-ground weapons to strike at all of these targets—even if it flies the long-distance routes needed to avoid the most critical air defenses in neighboring Arab states. It is also far from clear that any Arab air force would risk engaging Israeli fighters. Syria, after all, did not attempt to engage Israeli fighters when they attacked the reactor being built in Syria.

In August 2003, the Israeli Air Force demonstrated the strategic capability to strike far-off targets such as Iran by flying three F-15 jets to Poland, 1,600 nautical miles away. Israel can launch and refuel two to three full squadrons of combat aircraft for a single set of strikes against Iran, and provide suitable refueling. Israel could also provide fighter escorts and has considerable electronic-warfare capability to suppress Iran's aging air defenses. It might take losses to Iran's fighters and surface-to-air missiles, but such losses would probably be limited.

Israel would, however, still face two critical problems. The first would be whether it can destroy a hardened underground facility like Natanz. The second is that a truly successful strike might have to hit far more targets over a much larger area than the three best-known sites. Iran has had years to build up covert and dispersed facilities, and is known to have dozens of other facilities associated with some aspect of its nuclear programs. Moreover, Israel would have to successfully strike at dozens of additional targets to do substantial damage to another key Iranian threat: its long-range missiles.

Experts sharply disagree as to whether the Israeli air force could do more than limited damage to the key Iranian facility at Natanz. Some feel it is too deeply underground and too hardened for Israel to have much impact. Others believe that it is more vulnerable than conventional wisdom has it, and Israel could use weapons like the GBU-28 earth-penetrating bombs it has received from the U.S. or its own penetrators, which may include a nuclear-armed variant, to permanently collapse the underground chambers.

No one knows what specialized weapons Israel may have developed on its own, but Israeli intelligence has probably given Israel good access to U.S., European, and Russian designs for more advanced weapons than the GBU-28. Therefore, the odds are that Israel can have a serious impact on Iran's three most visible nuclear targets and possibly delay Iran's efforts for several years.

The story is very different, however, when it comes to destroying the full range of Iranian capabilities. There are no meaningful unclassified estimates of Iran's total mix of nuclear facilities, but known unclassified research, reactor, and centrifuge facilities number in the dozens. It became clear just this week that Iran managed to conceal the fact it was building a second underground facility for uranium enrichment near Qom, 100 miles southwest of Tehran, and that was designed to hold 3,000 centrifuges. Iran is developing at least four variants of its centrifuges, and the more recent designs have far more capacity than most of the ones installed at Natanz.

This makes it easier to conceal chains of centrifuges in a number of small, dispersed facilities and move material from one facility to another. Iran's known centrifuge production facilities are scattered over large areas of Iran, and at least some are in Mashad in the far northeast of the country—far harder to reach than Arak, Bushehr and Natanz.

Many of Iran's known facilities present the added problem that they are located among civilian facilities and peaceful nuclear-research activities—although Israel's precision-strike capabilities may well be good enough to allow it to limit damage to nearby civilian facilities.

It is not clear that Israel can win this kind of "shell game." It is doubtful that even the U.S. knows all the potential targets, and even more doubtful that any outside power can know what each detected Iranian facility currently does—and the extent to which each can hold dispersed centrifuge facilities that Iran could use instead of Natanz to produce weapons-grade uranium. As for the other elements of Iran's nuclear programs, it has scattered throughout the country the technical and industrial facilities it could use to make the rest of fission nuclear weapons. The facilities can now be in too many places for an Israeli strike to destroy Iran's capabilities.

Israel also faces limits on its military capabilities. Strong as Israeli forces are, they lack the scale, range and other capabilities to carry out the kind of massive strike the U.S. could launch. Israel does not have the density and quality of intelligence assets necessary to reliably assess the damage done to a wide range of small and disperse targets and to detect new Iranian efforts.

Israel has enough strike-attack aircraft and fighters in inventory to carry out a series of restrikes if Iran persisted in rebuilding, but it could not refuel a large-enough force, or provide enough intelligence and electronic warfare capabilities, to keep striking Iran at anything like the necessary scale. Moreover, Israel does not have enough forces to carry out a series of restrikes if Iran persisted in creating and rebuilding new facilities, and Arab states could not repeatedly standby and let Israel penetrate their air space. Israel might also have to deal with a Russia that would be far more willing to sell Iran advanced fighters and surface-to-air missiles if Israel attacked the Russian-built reactor at Bushehr.

These problems are why a number of senior Israeli intelligence experts and military officers feel that Israel should not strike Iran, although few would recommend that Israel avoid using the threat of such strikes to help U.S. and other diplomatic efforts to persuade Iran to halt. For example, retired Brigadier General Shlomo Brom advocates, like a number of other Israeli experts, reliance on deterrence and Israel's steadily improving missile defenses.

Any Israeli attack on an Iranian nuclear target would be a very complex operation in which a relatively large number of attack aircraft and support aircraft would participate. The conclusion is that Israel could attack only a few Iranian targets—not as part of a sustainable operation over time, but as a one-time surprise operation.

The alternatives, however, are not good for Israel, the U.S., Iran's neighbors or Arab neighbors. Of course being attacked is not good for Iran. Israel could still strike, if only to try to buy a few added years of time. Iranian persistence in developing nuclear weapons could push the U.S. into launching its own strike on Iran—although either an Israeli or U.S. strike might be used by Iran's hardliners to justify an all-out nuclear arms race. Further, it is far from clear that friendly Arab Gulf states would allow the U.S. to use bases on their soil for the kind of massive strike and follow-on restrikes that the U.S. would need to suppress Iran's efforts on a lasting basis.

The broader problem for Iran, however, is that Israel will not wait passively as Iran develops a nuclear capability. Like several Arab states, Israel already is developing better missile and air defenses, and more-advanced forms of its Arrow ballistic missile defenses. There are reports that Israel is increasing the range-payload of its nuclear-armed missiles and is developing sea-based nuclear-armed cruise missiles for its submarines.

While Iran is larger than Israel, its population centers are so vulnerable to Israeli thermonuclear weapons that Israel already is a major "existential" threat to Iran. Moreover, provoking its Arab neighbors and Turkey into developing their nuclear capabilities, or the U.S. into offering them a nuclear umbrella targeted on Iran, could create additional threats, as well as make Iran's neighbors even more dependent on the U.S. for their security. Iran's search for nuclear-armed missiles may well unite its neighbors against it as well as create a major new nuclear threat to its survival.

The broader problem for Iran, however, is that Israel will not wait passively as Iran develops a nuclear capability. Like several Arab states, Israel already is developing better missile and air defenses, and more-advanced forms of its Arrow ballistic missile defenses. There are reports that Israel is increasing the range-payload of its nuclear-armed missiles and is developing sea-based nuclear-armed cruise missiles for its submarines.

While Iran is larger than Israel, its population centers are so vulnerable to Israeli thermonuclear weapons that Israel already is a major "existential" threat to Iran. Moreover, provoking its Arab neighbors and Turkey into developing their nuclear capabilities, or the U.S. into offering them a nuclear umbrella targeted on Iran, could create additional threats, as well as make Iran's neighbors even more dependent on the U.S. for their security. Iran's search for nuclear-armed missiles may well unite its neighbors against it as well as create a major new nuclear threat to its survival.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/09/27/...=rss_topstories

(CNN) -- Iran tested a missile-launching system and two types of missiles Sunday, the state-run Press TV said. The missile tests come amid tension over the Islamic republic's nuclear program.
Iran test-fired a missile in May that was believed to be able to reach parts of Europe.

Iran test-fired a missile in May that was believed to be able to reach parts of Europe.

The missiles, fired at targets around the country Sunday, included the Fateh-110, a short-range ground-to-ground missile, and Tondar-69, a short-range naval missile, the station said. Iran plans to test the long-range Shahab missile on Monday.

The tests, which are expected to go on for the next 10 to 11 days, are codenamed "Payghambar-e Azam 4" or "The Great Messenger 4," Press TV said.

Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps had said it would stage missile exercises to promote the armed forces' defense capabilities.

The tests come after Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's disclosure Friday that Iran was building a second uranium enrichment facility.

The United States and Israel believe that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons under the guise of a civilian nuclear energy program. Iran has denied the allegation.

In May, Iran said it tested a surface-to-surface missile that is capable of reaching parts of Europe.
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At the time, a White House official said the test was noteworthy.

"Of course, this is just a test, and obviously there is much work to be done before it can be built and deployed. But I see it as a significant step forward in terms of Iran's capacity to deliver weapons," said Gary Samore, special assistant to the president on nonproliferation