Iran Bulletin

nn

A political alliance between the Libertarian/Neo-Isolationist wing of the Republican Party and the hard Left of the Democrat Party is attempting to prepare America for a nuclear Iran with what can only be described as a snow job.

The meme from these strange bedfellows maintains that an Iran armed with nuclear weapons is no big deal, not any different, but of a lower magnitude, than the Soviet nuclear threat of the Cold War.

In an article published this week in Foreign Policy magazine, Matthew Duss, who works for the Soros-funded, radical Leftist Center for American Progress, tries to articulate this flawed position. But there are key flaws in Duss’s argument.

Duss scoffs at assertions by Newt Gingrich and others that Iran might be willing to sacrifice large numbers of Iranians in a nuclear exchange. In so doing he ignores two important pieces of evidence that contradict his position:

• Iranian leaders themselves have stated outright that in a war with Israel, Iran could absorb a large number of casualties–a number that would virtually wipe out Israel.

• During the Iran-Iraq War, the Iranians sent large numbers of young boys into minefields and ahead of combat formations to clear the way as cannon fodder.

So, despite what Duss may falsely declare, the Iranians do indeed have an extensive, recent history of using martyrdom to fight their enemies.

Duss also points to episodes in which President Ahmadinejad was–or was rumored to have been–rebuked by the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei or other clerics. But what Duss fails to explain is that Ahmadinejad essentially serves as the pleasure of Khamenei. If Khamenei did not want Ahmadinejad  to be president of Iran, he wouldn’t be. So, dismissing Ahmadinejad’s ranting about state martyrdom and the return of the Mahdi is in fact reckless. The inescapable conclusion is that Khamenei must have some level of approval of Ahmadinejad’s philosophy.

As Iran gets closer to achieving nuclear power status, we can expect 5th columnists and useful idiots, such as Matthew Duss, to generate these smoke screens to try to convince us that Iran is nothing to worry about. It is very important that Americans realize that these smoke screens are terribly misguided and harmful.

http://mideast.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/08/23/the_martyr_state_myth

Filed under: Ahmadinejad, Israel, Khamenei, nuclear program |