via LobeLog
by Robert E. Hunter
Following the US-Russian agreement, the Syrian government’s chemical weapons must now be destroyed. To do this without putting UN employees at impossible risk, the Syrian civil war must also stop. To do that requires a plan by the Obama administration and others. To do that requires a realistic [...]
via Lobe Log
By Robert Hunter
Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger has written at length (Washington Post, November 18th – Job One Abroad: Iran) on Iran’s progress toward a military nuclear capability and, in brief, on what to do about it. His suggestion is for “a creative diplomacy, allied to [...]
via Lobe Log
By Wayne White
An excellent October 18 article, “The Myth of ‘Surgical Strikes’ on Iran“, by David Isenberg highlighted many of the conclusions of a sobering study by industrialist Khosrow Semnani on the potentially steep human cost of even a relatively selective attack against Iran’s diverse nuclear infrastructure. Semnani maintains that if the most important facilities [...]
via Lobe Log
Back in January, academic Matthew Kroenig claimed the United States could militarily strike Iran without causing havoc and catastrophe in the region. His arguments were widely criticized and supported by the usual suspects. Jamie Fly, the neoconservative executive director of the Foreign Policy Initiative, disagreed with Kroenig, but only because [...]
via Lobe Log
Shadow banks may control about 25 to 30 percent of the word’s financial system. They may be about 50 percent of all banking assets in the world. I say may in both of those sentences because it is hard to tell how big this financial sector is. The United States may [...]
By Eskandar Sadeghi-Boroujerdi
Iran watchers are no doubt aware that recently Iran’s “Shabake-ye Khabar” news network of the Islamic Republic’s official “Seda va Sima” television and radio network, conducted an internet poll regarding Iran’s nuclear programme.
Respondents were asked whether Iran should cease uranium enrichment in exchange for sanctions relief. [...]
By Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich
George Santayana wisely said: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Oblivious to history and its lessons, the United States and its Western allies are repeating their actions from the 1950’s–that of imposing an oil embargo on Iran. The US-led alliance has forgotten [...]
Reprinted by arrangement with Gary Choices
By Gary Sick
Politicians and pundits are curiously schizophrenic when discussing Iran. On one hand, they are prepared to declare, as Mitt Romney did, that the “greatest threat that Israel faces, and frankly the greatest threat the world faces, is a nuclear Iran.” To deal with [...]
In response to a worrying trend in U.S. politics Lobe Log has launched Iran Hawk Watch. Each Friday we will post on notable militaristic commentary about Iran from a variety of sources including news articles, think tanks and pundits.
It’s the holidays and unfortunately not all the hawks took a break from agitating [...]
This graphic by Reuters visually explains the importance of the Strait of Hormuz. Whether or not Iran would actually block this vital oil supply route in response to an oil embargo and crippling sanctions against its Central Bank is debatable, but even talking about it is enough to cause oil prices to rise.
[...]
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