The West starts beating its war drums once again
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Iraq was allegedly working on nuclear weapons, too: former U.S. President George Bush's famous "smoking gun," which also subsequently went missing. And on the basis of this "intelligence" about Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction," the United States and its more gullible allies invaded the country. Hundreds of thousands died, no weapons were found, and nothing was learned. Here we go again.
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But how many citizens of the U.S. or Britain know that Iran has 10 times as many people as Libya? Maybe one in 10, maybe one in 20. How many know that Iran is a partially democratic, technologically proficient state with no history of attacking its neighbors, not a tin-pot dictatorship run by a vicious loon? About the same number. How many realize that the war would not end with a few days of air strikes? Practically none.
The interesting exception to all this is Israel, where people do know those things, and where there is a vigorous debate about whether attacking Iran is a good idea. A lot think it is not, and that also goes for both of Israel's intelligence agencies, Mossad and Shin Bet. Meir Dagan, the recently retired head of Mossad, said last January that an attack on Iran was "the stupidest idea" he had ever heard.
So Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who do both want to attack Iran (or rather, have the U.S. do it for them), have gone public. If the Western powers don't act at once, they warn, then Iran will get nuclear weapons and Armageddon will be just around the corner.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/eo20111116gd.html