Originally posted by freethinker123
Hats off Wrabbit, you've made a real effort and although I haven't got the chance to read through everything its an interesting thread.

Its so refreshing to see intelligent threads like this one on ATS - its a pity there are not more of them...

Thank you... I really appreciate that and everyone else who has come with words of support. I was real nervous on my first big thread with the Presidents but even with the couple errors I made and notated in the thread, everyone seemed to really like it...so I went ahead and finished this one. Lack of knowing how it might be received is a large part of why it hadn't been finished.

Now? I've found I really enjoy making these. It's time consuming, to be sure...and there aren't a lot of topics that really fit for a framing of 'just the facts' type layouts...but I'm going to make more of these where the topics and subject are friendly for it. Heck, the satisfaction of knowing others found it useful or just interesting is enough to cover the time in putting it together after the practice is figured in. .

(Especially while I'm erroring a bit during my trials..and one step at a time. )

Excellent research and post.

I only see two major faults.

1) You did most of your charting research off 1Megaton or alternatively 200Kilotons. Those are FAR too big for a new nuclear power. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 14kt and 20kt IIRC. Even if Iran can get say 50kt out of an early weapon, that isn't anywhere near your charts. So even with multiple warhead strikes, your fallout patterns and blast radius are greatly overstated.

2) Your assuming the ahtollah ISN't willing to sacrifice fellow Muslims and I say he would. Especially with Iranian's being #es AND Persians vs Sunni and Arabs. Look at the human wave attacks they ordered in the 80-88 war with Iraq was fought. They sent boys with shovel's and axe's to the front. The launched missile's into Baghdad against fellow Muslims. They support and send suicide bombers. They are a culture of death, not life. I think that there are extremist elements that if it meant the destruction of Isreal....a few hundred thousand fellow muslims are an acceptable price.

That being said, doesn't mean they would do that either.

But good presentation none the less.

Originally posted by Jakes51
I am sorry, but their past antics of international terrorism, proxy wars, and blatant hate is the lone reason why I am in no position to give them the benefit of a doubt over this issue.

Problem with people like you who think exactly like our political and banking and military leaders.

Is that you are what I call "half smart", meaning you seem to understand the game superficially but not to the core.

**BlowBack** is the word of the century, US policy is so full of blowback.

And here is your future .......and I for one am glad you will experience it.

Don't cry how Stock Market tumbled, how your entire salary goes for gas money, how price of food has quadrupled, how random terrorism on soft targets went up 3000%

There is an old saying about people who are educated beyond their intelligence. I'll leave the anti-semitism alone because that was a not a part of the OP, but there is plenty in the OP to respond to.
1st, you're thinking like a modern American, not like a Muslim leader that wants to bring about the return of the Mahdi. If you don't understand this and the very real role it plays in Persian expansionism, then you don't understand anything about this subject. Read up on it. It is real.
The OP then goes on to talk about the yield and what that would do to the surrounding areas and people. Again, see the return of the Mahdi.
The OP also glosses over the fact that the Persians are enemies of the House of Saud. Israel is not the only target.
No one in the Arab world cares about the Palestinians, except as a means to wage war against Israel. That's why they are in Israel in the first place.
All in all, the OP and his supporters on this discussion simply show that they lack any real understanding of the Persian mindset, and what it is that they want to accomplish, and at every turn they illustrate this by sounding like the leftist indoctrinated stooges that they really are.
I appreciate the work that OP put into this, but it is based on nothing but false assumptions and a complete lack of understanding of the current geopolitical paradigm.

You need to change the title of this thread, until such time as you can actually prove that Iran has or even wants to be "nuclear armed".

Until then, I'm reporting this thread for propaganda and misleading title.

Originally posted by yourignoranceisbliss
You need to change the title of this thread, until such time as you can actually prove that Iran has or even wants to be "nuclear armed".

Until then, I'm reporting this thread for propaganda and misleading title.

Hmmm. Perhaps you should read my friend Wrabbit's thread in full before reporting anything, as I think you're taken the title out of context.

I'll let his ending sum it up for you:

Is Iran really building nuclear weapons and if so, with intent to use them? I certainly have satisfied myself that it's extremely unlikely. If nothing else, I hope what I share gives everyone else food for thought on the war we all seem headed into.

He's arguing AGAINST everyone's claims about Iran wanting to attain the bomb, specifically for the fact that he considers it preposterous that they'd actually want to use it against Israel (let alone anyone else) or even get hands on it as a deterrent - which I presently disagree with him on, but I'm open to further consideration there.

Excellent work, Wrabbit - very nicely done.

Originally posted by petertheskinny

Originally posted by Jakes51
I am sorry, but their past antics of international terrorism, proxy wars, and blatant hate is the lone reason why I am in no position to give them the benefit of a doubt over this issue.

Problem with people like you who think exactly like our political and banking and military leaders.

Is that you are what I call "half smart", meaning you seem to understand the game superficially but not to the core.

**BlowBack** is the word of the century, US policy is so full of blowback.

And here is your future .......and I for one am glad you will experience it.

Don't cry how Stock Market tumbled, how your entire salary goes for gas money, how price of food has quadrupled, how random terrorism on soft targets went up 3000%

I agree with what you are saying. Perhaps, I am "half smart?" Don't hold it against me. Just don't want them getting the bomb, and if war can be avoided? Great! Hopefully war does not happen, and everyone can work things out? The prospects look bleak. Iran can still reach out before it is too late. This war has been a long time coming. We did not get here over night.

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000
The case against a Nuclear Armed Iran.

Intolerant fundamentalist Islam.

/trial

I think wrabitt did a VERY good presentation.
The charts and facts presented were done in a clear and well executed manor. Kudos to you.

But I believe you based your initial (IMO) line of thought on Iran and its leaders being honest in their words (or in a great majority), based thinking on their leadership being rational, and that they have (to a major extent) been up front and honest.

While this has lead to a well written piece that has left some key and undeniable facts unmentioned and unanswered.

Let me list a few but by no means the only ones.

1. When they engaged in the Iraq/Iran war they used tactics that showed no concern for their own people, little concern for collateral damage, and even less to their enemies.
They used chemical weapons indescriminately on the battlefield even to the point of dropping them on their own troops who were engaged in battle instead of behind the enemies lines (which is standard battle tactics).
They knew the limitations of their rocket technology and still dropped chemical weapons in what can best be discribed as launch and don't care who gets hurt in the process.

2. The leaders of Iran (as well as alot of the muslim world) have a hatred of israel that most rational people can safely say boarders on the finatical. The hatred of the jews/israel is well known, well documented and has been going on for (imo) hundreds of years.
I do not believe all of a sudden that the leadership of iran has changed this view.

3. It is well known the paistinians are nothing more than a "convient" excuse/pawns to justify attacks and hatred of israel. So saying that they would be a reason not to use nukes against israel (due to collateral damage/death) is not reasonable.
For a interesting factual note the ONLY country in the middle east that gives full citizenship to the palistinans is the state of israel.

4. Nuclear technology is expensive, time consuming and if not done right (or even in the experimental period) VERY DANGEROUS. It is also known the leap from civiian/peaceful nuke energy to a primative but effective nuclear device is not much of a leap. Heck the north koreans did it and they are more backwards than Iran.

5. Don't think for a minute that russia has not helped in the iran program. They already sell just about any military hardware they have the cash for.

6. IMO the most inportant fact is Iran has on multiple verifiable occasions decieved, lied, and even threw out the IAEC. In that time they have made nuclear sites that only in the last few years have come to light. We not only do not know how many more there are underground. So there is no reasonable way to know how much or even what has been made, where it is and to what it has been used for.

7 While nuke technology such as ICBM, Dial a nuke, and small warhead technology is well out of their reach. The technology for a WWII type device is known (so not much R@D) along with an equally deadly dirty bomb. If north korea can do it how much more realistic is a cash flush (due to oil) and determined Iran is.

One or even two of these known facts may be argued as being taken out of context. But given these (and a few more I did not mention due to space limits) facts taken as a whole then a most disturbing situation.

Wrabitt I think you did a great job on the premise of a rational caring for others iran.

But I would like to see what you do adding these facts into your research.

Well your first "fact" is wrong In the Iran /Iraq war it was Iraq who attacked Iran and it was Iraq who used Chemical weapons not Iran.Purchased from America.

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000

The entire premise of Iran building Nuclear Weapons requires that they have someone to use those weapons on.

There is only one realistic possibility in any scenario that makes sense in the real world. Israel. Without a target to actually use them on and make the threat in a credible way, there is no point to making the weapons. The resources as well as cost would be patently insane.

Iran has FAR too much to lose in simply building them as a deterrent as others have before. SO....It's with the Target I'll focus this.

The idea Iran would use a nuclear weapon on Israel is absolutely, certifiably insane.

I started reading your post, but found your foundational arguments terribly flawed, so that I didn't even get to your technical analysis. Let me address the issues I have, taking each of your quoted paragraphs, one by one.

By your logic any nuclear-armed country has a clear target for their weapons, which is not the case. Yes there are likely targets, but no definite ones. A country can have nuclear weapons for purely defensive/deterrent reasons. It could be argued that the country(ies) they are meant to deter is(are) the targets, but then this could be said of any nuclear armed country, including the US and Israel.

The fact that under the Bush II administration the Pentagon played around with the notion of pre-emptive use of nuclear weapons (which, is, of course against current nuclear weapons treaties, but when did that stop the US from breaking international law?) would seem to give Iran every reason in the world to develop nuclear weapons as a deterrent. The fact that Iran is surrounded by hostile US forces in neighboring countries and has a bellicose regional adversary, Israel, gives it even more reason to want a deterrent against these more powerful enemies threatening it.

And make no mistake about, these countries are threatening Iran. The US and Israel are supporting terrorist groups hostile to Iran, sending drones into Iranian airspace and perhaps even sending soldiers covertly to recon Iranian facilities. Iranian scientists are also being killed and industrial sabotage is being committed against Iran, and this been admitted to, although officially retracted since. If a foreign country were doing this to Israel or the US, you can bet they would be carpet bombing said belligerent.

Also keep in mind that the US and Iran have a bad history. The US overthrew a democratically elected government and installed the despotic Shah and helped him retain power through oppression and violence until the Iranian revolution. The US has also shot down a civilian Iranian airliner, killing hundreds. This was done just off the Iranian coast. Imagine if a foreign power shot down an airliner of ours just out of LA or NYC that was flying over the ocean. We would surely declare war on such a country.

My point is Iran has every right to fear the US and Israel to to protect itself the best it can. The fact that N. Korea, a US adversary, acquired nuclear weapons and is no longer threatened militarily by the US shows just how powerful a small nuclear deterrent can be against a major or super power.

You say there is no other target besides Israel to use Iranian nuclear weapons on. How about the US 5th fleet, which sails around in the Persian Gulf and is based in Bahrain, a country unfriendly to Iran? How about major US military bases in Iraq, Afghanistan and Kuwait?

You claim the cost of such an attack is too much for Iran to do so. Well one can also argue that the cost of the US or Israel trying to attack a nuclear-armed Iran might then be too costly for them to do so, fearing such nuclear retaliation.

Israel is a small country. It would be easy with a relatively small number of atomic bombs to destroy most of it. Sure, Israel could then lob a lot of nukes back and the US may do so as well, but Iran is larger and more spread out; more of its people will survive a nuclear exchange than will Israel's.

Would there be collateral damage to Palestinians and other Arabs/Islamic peoples? Sure. But the US intended for decades to defend western Europe with tactical nukes. You don't think this would have caused massive collateral nuclear death?

Although I don't think you mean to, your argument seems to have a cultural bias to it, which disregards the fact that other countries have nuclear deterrence strategies that wouldn't work out any better or worse than Iran's. Iran's possible desire to have nuclear weapons for national defense is no more insane than the US's or Israel's. And given the record of what the US and Israel have done to other countries in the Middle East, a sensible person can not blame Iran for wanting a nuclear deterrent to keep the US out. Just look at the bloodshed and destruction wreaked on Iraq and Afghanistan by the US, and upon the Palestinian territories and Lebanon by Israel.

Originally posted by scrounger

But I believe you based your initial (IMO) line of thought on Iran and its leaders being honest in their words (or in a great majority), based thinking on their leadership being rational, and that they have (to a major extent) been up front and honest.
...
1. When they engaged in the Iraq/Iran war they used tactics that showed no concern for their own people, little concern for collateral damage, and even less to their enemies.
They used chemical weapons indescriminately on the battlefield even to the point of dropping them on their own troops who were engaged in battle instead of behind the enemies lines (which is standard battle tactics).

2. The leaders of Iran (as well as alot of the muslim world) have a hatred of israel that most rational people can safely say boarders on the finatical.

3. It is well known the paistinians are nothing more than a "convient" excuse/pawns to justify attacks and hatred of israel.
For a interesting factual note the ONLY country in the middle east that gives full citizenship to the palistinans is the state of israel.

4. Nuclear technology is expensive, time consuming and if not done right (or even in the experimental period) VERY DANGEROUS.

5. Don't think for a minute that russia has not helped in the iran program. They already sell just about any military hardware they have the cash for.

6. IMO the most inportant fact is Iran has on multiple verifiable occasions decieved, lied, and even threw out the IAEC. In that time they have made nuclear sites that only in the last few years have come to light. We not only do not know how many more there are underground. So there is no reasonable way to know how much or even what has been made, where it is and to what it has been used for.

7 While nuke technology such as ICBM, Dial a nuke, and small warhead technology is well out of their reach. The technology for a WWII type device is known (so not much R@D) along with an equally deadly dirty bomb. If north korea can do it how much more realistic is a cash flush (due to oil) and determined Iran is.

Very biased and or completely wrong points.

First, you claim the Iranian government is not honest. What about the US and Israeli governments????? We attacked Iraq to get rid of their WMDs, which were a "slam dunk" that they were there. Paul Wolfowitz has since admitted that that was just the convenient reason (read "lie") given to go to war. I don't care how honest or dishonest the Iranian government is. It has a legitimate reason to fear the US and Israel, and hence to want a nuclear deterrent.

As to your enumerated points:

1) Iraq started the Iraq/Iran war and was the one that used chemical weapons. Not Iran.

2) How do you know Iran has a hatred of Israel? Because Israeli and US neocons tell you so? Isn't there a certain hatred and fear of Iran perpetuated by these governments and their lackey news media? Who's doing the most hating? Listen to how Americans talk about what we should do to Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as to Iran. Way more hate coming from the US than from Iran.

3) Sure, Iran uses Palestinians as pawns -- just as we have used the Iraqi people and Afghan women as pawns for excuses for are wars there. But NO, Palestinians are not given full citizenship. They do not have all the rights of Jewish Israelis and the majority Jewish government is trying to disenfranchise them even more, including kicking out Arab Kenesset members because they are "unpatriotic".

4) Sure, nuclear power and/or weapons are expensive and dangerous. So why aren't you campaigning for Israel and the US to give of their peaceful and military nuclear programs? Oh yeah, it's ok for Americans and Israelis but not for Persians or Muslims.

5) I don't doubt that Russia and even possibly China has helped Iran with its nuclear program. So what? We and France helped Israel with its. We also helped England and France with theirs and we are now helping India with its. Again you got severe double standards going. You criticize Russia for selling military hardware, but the US is the world's largest arms dealer.

6) Perhaps Iran has lied and deceived the IAEC. So has the US when it abused its authority when the IAEC was checking Iraq. Israel won't even acknowledge that it has nuclear weapons and has refused to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, so Israel is an even bigger rogue nuclear state. Why don't we attack them, rather than giving them $3 billion in military aid each year?

7) You seem to be saying Iran doesn't have a right to a nuclear deterrent against its nuclear armed enemies, the US and Israel. Guess you like to stack the deck against people you hate and/or fear.

You have no legitimate arguments unless you think double standards are ok. BTW, Iran/Persia has not attacked a country in three hundred years. Any idea how many the US and Israel have? SCORES.

Cudos for putting this together, I wish that all the puppet politicians at some point get to read this and start thinking for themselves.
We need not involve ourselves in the petty things of Israel. They have done enough to bury themselves, let them do it. I just hope that not too many innocent men, women and children amongst jews and muslims alike are not destroyed because psychopaths like Netanyahu are allowed to have a say at anything.