RKMBs Forums .::Important::. Politics and Current Events Report: Israel Preparing to Strike Iran Without U.S. Consent

Israel is drawing up plans to attack Iran's nuclear facilities and is prepared to launch a strike without backing from the U.S., an Israeli newspaper reported Thursday.

Officials in the Israeli Defence Ministry told The Jerusalem Post that while they prefer to act in consultation with the U.S., they are preparing plans that would allow them to act alone.

"It is always better to coordinate," a senior Defence Ministry official told the newspaper. "But we are also preparing options that do not include coordination."

It would be difficult, but not impossible, to launch a strike against Iran without permission from the U.S., as the American Air Force controls the Iraqi airspace Israel's jets would have to enter on a bombing mission.

"There are a wide range of risks one takes when embarking on such an operation," a senior Israeli official told the Post.

Iran, the world's fourth-largest crude oil producer, maintains that its uranium enrichment activities are aimed at making fuel for a network of planned electricity-generating nuclear power plants and not for developing weapons.

However Israel intelligence sources say Iran has sufficient nuclear material to make an atomic bomb.

Last month, amid mounting fears in Israel that the U.S. was doing nothing to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power, Ehud Olmert, Israel's Prime Minister, warned President Bush the last chance of destroying Tehran’s nuclear bomb-making program was passing.

Iran dismisses the possibility of an Israeli strike.

"We think that regional and international developments and the complicated situation faced by Israel itself will not allow it to launch military strikes against other countries," Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hassan Qashqavi said, according to the Press TV Web site.

"Israel makes threats to promote its psychological and media warfare," Qashqavi said.

A report, published in September in Britain's Guardian newspaper, claimed that Isreali Prime Minister Ehud Olmert requested a green light to attack Iran in May but was refused by Bush.

man, one day cartograhy in the middle east is gonna be really easy. It'll just all be flat and blank.

generic foreign liberal politically correct response.

haven't actually got anything coherent to say response.

Nuking Afganistan wouldn't have done much in the long run. Not when the people you're fighting are happy to die for their cause. Would have just been a good recruiting tool for Al Qaeda, some would ahve taken it as proof that Bin Laden and co were right about the West. I thought Bush initially handled Afganistan very well, which is why I was so dissapointed when we went to Iraq and Afganistan suffered.

G-man, you're a right wing voice that can make a decent case, am i just being a whiney liberal or do i make a fair point?

Nuking Afganistan wouldn't have done much in the long run. Not when the people you're fighting are happy to die for their cause. Would have just been a good recruiting tool for Al Qaeda, some would ahve taken it as proof that Bin Laden and co were right about the West. I thought Bush initially handled Afganistan very well, which is why I was so dissapointed when we went to Iraq and Afganistan suffered.

You seem likable Steve but you talk in circles. Killing Muslims with guns(as we are doing) or with nukes is used equally well as a recruiting tool. The problem is Taliban allowing Al Qaida to train in Afghanistan and not handing them over after 9-11. If we had responded with overwhelming force others(Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia) would have reconsidered giving any support monetarily or physically to these groups.

Remember the guys running the countries whether the Taliban, The Sheiks or whomever aren't the ideological nutcases they are just your typical power guys, the nut jobs are the guys doing the attacks. The reason they allow this stuff to go on is it cements their hold on power, but if their very existence is in question they will change their tune and expel these guys or stop the flow of money.

Yeah, and it was fucked up. What's your point?

mem speak

That's a cheap argument and I could go into the debate about how many lives could have been saved if you hadn't dragged your feet and got into the war in 1939 and blah and blah. It would all be bullshit on both sides. That little small minded nationalistic dick waving serves no useful purpose.

And as to the comparison with WW2, I just don't think it holds, the nature of the situation and the opposition is just different.

G-man, you're a right wing voice that can make a decent case, am i just being a whiney liberal or do i make a fair point?

I agree with Steve. The difference between Japan and Afghanistan is that Japan was a nation where EVERYBODY had been conditioned to be in a war-like mentality. Some historians have described it as shared temporary insanity. The atom bomb showed them the error of that policy.

Has there been anything to suggest that Afghanistan is similar to Japan? From what I am to understand, the area is highly factionalized.

That's a cheap argument and I could go into the debate about how many lives could have been saved if you hadn't dragged your feet and got into the war in 1939 and blah and blah. It would all be bullshit on both sides. That little small minded nationalistic dick waving serves no useful purpose.

And as to the comparison with WW2, I just don't think it holds, the nature of the situation and the opposition is just different.

Yes Snarf, there are not men women and children in Afghanistan that have attacked us. Youre a dipshit.

I think you guys are jumping down Steve's throat without paying attention to what he's saying. I actually agree with him. Sometimes you need to use the sword and hack something to shit, and sometimes you need to just use a scalpel and cut away the small, cancerous piece. Using infantry and air bombings was the best way to go in Afghanistan. Nuking them would have made us look like shit and prevented us from doing any further military work with other countries in the future. As much as we've borne the burden of Iraq, we had help from a handful of allies that would have shied away if we dropped the big bombs. We were on the right path and stopped short. I would have napalmed every mother fucking cave to drive Bin Laden and his goons out. We were having the same success that we're seeing in Iraq because many of the Afghans didn't like the oppressive taliban and remembered that we helped push back the Soviets. A nuke wouldn't have allowed that.

I'm not sure you paid attention to what I was saying. If we nuked we wouldn't need to work with other countries, state support of terrorist would have ended.

From WW2 till 9-11 no one fucked with our homeland because of the threat of overwhelming response. That's been taken off the table. We blinked.

You don't fight equal. No one should be able to attack the US period without facing destruction. It would end this stuff fast.