How many here genuinely believe that Iran is a threat to humanity?

[devilgrrl]

Poll question: How many here genuinely believe that Iran is a threat to humanity?

I ask because I just saw Richard Haass on the replay of 'Real Time with Bill Maher' - his arguments for the "war on terrorism" and Afghanistan IMHO fall flat and wondered what everyone else thought about it.

[kestrel91316]

1. They are a grave threat to Israel, and they would surely love to wipe the US

out, too (though they cannot). But "humanity"? Nah. They're penny-ante, bush-league PITA's.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

16. That is certainly correct.

[IndianaGreen]

23. The sky is falling! More neocon channeling!

The only threat are nuclear weapons themselves, of which the USA holds the largest stockpile of all, with no signs of getting rid of it.

[JTFrog]

30. So producing no new weapons and dramatically and permanently reducing US arsenals is no sign?

Obama's new strategy will also annul or reverse several initiatives by the Bush administration.

Nope no signs here. :eyes:

This administration can't even take a first step on anything without being slammed for not delivering utopia on a stick.

[IndianaGreen]

60. Obama is keeping Bush's first strike nuke doctrine

Bad doctrine under Bush. Bad doctrine under Obama.

[KharmaTrain]

31. Honestly...How Much Of A Threat???

I keep hearing about how Iran wants to wipe Israel off the map, just like Eygypt and Syria and Iraq and so on. One thing to say it, another to have the capability to do it. A nuke would do more damage to Iran than good. Firstly, they'd need to amass an arsenal of dozens of warheads to do significant damage and then the blowback across the borders into surrounding countries would kill more "fellow" Arabs than Israelis and Jews. And then that would mean all the missiles hitting all at once and hope to catch the Israelis by total surprise...cause if not, the second a missile shows up on Israeli radars, a bomb with "to Teheran with love" will be on the way. In many ways, the Nuke game in the Middle East is like the stalemate between the US and USSR...Israel would prefer to remain the only nuclear state in the region, but to think that Iran would launch missiles at Israel if they had the chance flies in the face of reality in the region.

Much of the Likud sabre rattling is to keep the money and weapons pipeline open...whip up fear here that makes their lobbying efforts more effective.

They can surely "Love" to wipe out Israel and the US, but to do it would require a nuclear arsenal beyond their reach for a long time. There's a long way from enriching uranium and putting it into a bomb, then put it on a warhead with the capability of hitting 5,000 miles away.

[invictus]

35. Bull shit! Iran is not a threat to anyone.

[ThomWV]

39. What a preposterous assertion

[Flaneur]

48. Is that you, Tzipi? Please come to Britain and tell us about it.

[EFerrari]

49. How do you figure that?

The US and Israel are the ones with the nukes and with the history of aggression. :wtf:

[closeupready]

53. Ding, ding, ding!!! We have a winner, folks!

n/t

[Forkboy]

2. Not as big as us.

[Libertas1776]

3. At the way things are going...

humanity is a threat to humanity.

[RKP5637]

7. Is that ever true! For a supposedly intelligent species, mankind is pretty damn dumb in my book. n/t

[varelse]

4. If Iran is a threat to humanity

what would that make us? :shrug:

[tularetom]

5. From 1989 to 2005 we never heard jack shit about Iran

Now they stand for everything that's wrong in the world.

We can no longer demonize Iraq. We need a boogeyman.

Viola! Now Iran is a threat to humanity.

We're so good at this. All the yahoos fall for it every time.

Side comment: I did think the old "Bomb Iran" song was funny back in the 80's.

[Psephos]

20. Ahmadinejad took office as President on August 3 2005.

Which is probably more than a coincidence regarding your observation.

[DefenseLawyer]

33. He's not in charge.

At all.

[Psephos]

38. So? n/t

[DURHAM D]

6. The biggest threat is to their own people. ..

similar to this country's government

[2Design]

8. we just keep giving weapons to people and making them our friend and then turn on them

when we are done with them - look at what we did to sadaam and stuff we have done in central and south american and we have military all over the world and that is what our economy is made of and what we spend our money on. Seems we like bombs, bullets, and killing people or training others to do it.

[PerfectSage]

9. Nope, but Iran is a threat to a privately owed Fed.

Iran has been selling oil for other currencies besides the US dollar since Dec 2007. Which is a threat to the US dollar as reseserve currency of the world. Which is a direct threat to the Wall Street banks who own the Fed.

The propaganda about an Iranian "nuclear weapons program" is 99% guaranteed BS. The real intent is to scare the crap out of Americans to support a war to punish Iran for messing with Wall Street's privately owed Fed's money printing gravey train.

The only threat to humanity comes from humanity's capacity for infinite stupidity.
I've reached the conclusion that humanity would be better off if homo sapiens became extinct.

[SDuderstadt]

13. Jesus...

the Fed is not privately owned, nor do the "Wall Street Banks" own the Fed. Where do you get this bullshit?

[cutlassmama]

25. interesting. Where does Goldman Sachs play into this?

[mitchtv]

10. As a Gay, They are a threat to some of us

NO MORE SO HOWEVER than Christians in Africa (numerous nations)

[Cirque du So-What]

11. I don't even believe Iran is a threat to Israel

Ahmadinnerjacket & the mullahs may be many things, but they're not suicidal. They know the answer to the rhetorical question, 'what's burnt to a crisp & glows in the dark in the Middle East?' that would be asked if they were to consider military action against Israel.

[Ozymanithrax]

12. Not even with a nucler bomb are they a threat to humanity...

though they would be a threat to everyone else in the region. Regional nuclear superiority would follow very soon, with the U.S. aiding the house of Saud to get their own bomb. And if they had the bomb, it would continue to destablize the region. But all of humanity, no.

[madrchsod]

14. no..but drop the big one on them anyway

[customerserviceguy]

15. They certainly are a threat to Israel

and whether Israel acts either pre-emptively, or launches a devastating nuclear counter-attack after Tel Aviv is wiped off the map, it does present some nuclear fallout problems for the rest of us.

[Psephos]

17. Iran isn't the threat. Well-armed, millenarian theocrats are the threat.

Wherever in the world they might be.

[countmyvote4real]

18. Does Iran threaten me or my humanity? No... but

The Iranian government goes beyond threatening to murdering Iranians. So, that would be a yes.

[countmyvote4real]

19. Does Iran threaten me or my humanity? No... but

The Iranian government goes beyond threatening to murdering Iranians. So, that would be a yes.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

21. They are a serious threat to Israel. A conflict would have disastrous results for the region.

[EFerrari]

52. We shouldn't allow any other nation create disasters in that region.

That's our job.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

61. Somehow I think Israel dropping a nuke on Iran would be more disastrous.

[applegrove]

22. I do agree with Hillary Clinton that they are a dictatorship. They do export

terrorism. I believe they are a danger if they are making a bomb. I just don't think bombing them would stop them in the end. We need regime change. Hillary should harp on them being dictators and get support for that around the world and the middle east.

[whatchamacallit]

24. not moi n/t

[upi402]

26. Religious nuts (BushCo too) in charge of military power

is a concern. Yes. Islam does have a lot of extreme radicals too.

[JohnyCanuck]

27. Economic collapse and a new cold war.

The mystery of the Afghanistan war

By Christopher King

1 March 2010

Christopher King argues that “a situation exists in which it may be in the interests of the United States to seek a ‘cold war’ situation with Russia and China as a pretext for defaulting on its external debt, attacking Iran, taking direct control of all Middle Eastern oilfields and effective control of Europe”.

snip

Iran and Iraq – the real targets of the Afghan war

I have said previously that the US cannot leave Iraq. A constant stream of excuses for staying are now emerging, such as this one by Thomas E. Ricks in the New York Times, who with others, presses the US’s concern for stability and the welfare of the Iraqi people. Saudi Arabia is already in America’s pocket, part of its new “sphere of influence” or “area of special strategic importance”. Only being bogged down in Afghanistan appears to prevent the US from attacking Iran and seizing its oilfields as it obviously wishes to do. From this viewpoint, the attack on Afghanistan would have been useful if it could have been done quickly and finally. It might then have been used as a base. When US planners thought that this had in fact been accomplished they moved on to Iraq as the next publicly acceptable target. The Taliban resurgence has caused a delay in (what we may assume to be) this plan.

In the meantime, Iran has been alerted. The US covets its oil reserves but Iran has strong conventional armed forces. They would be difficult to defeat as Saddam Hussein found. Worse, although the US intelligence services themselves report that it does not have a nuclear weapons programme, Iran’s growing U235 enrichment capability might give it the ability to create nuclear weapons in a relatively short time. This could be the explanation why the US is at pains to discover what knowledge of nuclear weapons construction Iran possesses and the importance it places on past research which, with current International Atomic Energy Agency inspections, would seem to be irrelevant.

This, therefore, is a plausible reason for the otherwise inexplicable virulence of US anti-Iran propaganda and sanctions. The US makes unprovable accusations of Iran’s intention to create nuclear weapons and, in the face of all evidence to the contrary, makes irrational demands to stop Iran’s uranium enrichment. Its insistence on a harsh sanctions regime follows the same path as it followed before attacking Iraq. If anything, it is giving Iran good reasons to develop a weapons programme.

It is not, we might conjecture, merely that the US wishes to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Afghan resistance and the Washington’s failure to quickly invade and control Iran prevents the US from controlling the entire Middle East and world oil exports. Meanwhile, Iran’s continued independence allows it to further develop its potential for nuclear weapons production as well as maintaining its potential for acting as a focus of resistance in the Middle East. If Iran were to have nuclear weapons it might justifiably use them against Israel or the US bases in Iraq and Afghanistan in the event of an attack against it.

http://www.redress.cc/global/cking20100301

[old mark]

28. Yes, they are. I don't want to bomb them but I'd love to help over throw their government,

or at least support the Israelis in their efforts to do so.


mark

[hunter]

29. Iran will probably stuff their religious fundamentalists back into the box before we do.

I hardly trust our own U.S. Air Force with nuclear weapons.

[conscious evolution]

32. There are fucking idiots here who think iran is a threat to humanity?

BWahahahahahahahahahahaahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahqhahahahahahahahahqhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahqhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahayhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah

Jim needs to make another batch of koolaide.

[Echo In Light]

34. Not even close to threat the US empire poses to the world

[invictus]

36. Israel is a threat to America since their lobby tries to drag us into one war after another.

[cali]

37. Do you actually believe that the Israel lobby is responsible

for getting the U.S. into Iraq or Afghanistan?

[invictus]

40. Do you honestly think Lieberman supports the Iraq war because it's good for America?

Or any neo-con for that matter? Of course you don't, but you will claim that you do anyway.

[cali]

44. huh? what the fuck, sweetiepie, does that have to do with your claim?

I asked you a question, honey. try answering it.
Do you believe that the U.S. went to war in Iraq for Israel?

Do enlighten me.

[Subdivisions]

41. Are you studied in AIPAC's actions in this regard? If so, please enlighten us. n/t

[wuushew]

46. yes

n/t

[Sebastian Doyle]

62. Iraq, definitely.

It was the first target mentioned in the PNAC manifesto, which was based on an Israeli document prepared for the first NuttyYahoo regime in 1995. The Israeli document was called "A Clean Break:A New Strategy for Securing the Realm" and it's authors included future PNAC'ers Richard Perle and Douglas Feith among others. This document also specifically mentioned Iraq and Iran as targets for Israel, as well as Syria. You may remember the neocons were insistent that Saddam had moved his (non-existent) WMD's to Syria for several years after the Iraq invasion/occupation began.

Read it at ----> http://www.iasps.org/strat1.htm

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

42. No. But, it makes another handy bogeyman for politicians and the Pentagon to scare people with. K&R

[Echo In Light]

47. Gotta keep em dumb to keep the WAR GODS lucrative

[Jim__]

43. I believe that nuclear weapons are a threat to humanity.

Iran is incidental to that threat. If we don't get rid of nuclear weapons, we (humanity) will use them.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

45. kick

[closeupready]

50. Don't now, never did.

n/t

[county worker]

51. I think the current regime is a threat to Iran's humanity. Do you remember the killings after the

elections? If they care so little about their own citizens who's to say if they care about anything?

[EFerrari]

54. It's ironic that the US worries so much about the citizens of Iran

and turns around and supports a similar government that is even more deadly to its citizens in Honduras because that repressive murderous government plays ball with us.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

55. Not so much ironic as predictable.

:hi:

[EFerrari]

56. Precisamente.

:hi:

[Macoy]

57. Any Nation with Nukes is a Threat

A threat? Yes, any nation with nuclear weapons is a possible threat. A threat to America? Not so much..but a threat to humanity? No way. They are still a fairly small country. Iran having nukes just means we can not invade them......I can live with that.

Macoy

[EFerrari]

58. Welcome to DU, Macoy.

:)

[ChickMagic]

59. They are a threat to Israel

but Israel has the big boom necessary to deal with it.
Why is Washington pretending that Israel can not defend
itself?

[Edweird]

63. It's funny how we are always so concerned about 'bad guys' that happen to be near oil...

other bad guys, not so much.....