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Well that didn’t last long “On November 21, Iran conducted its second test of a nuclear-capable ballistic missile in direct contravention of two U.N. Security Council prohibitions, including one that incorporates the current nuclear agreement — which bans such tests for eight years.”
– From National Review.
Another report via Reuters
Can anyone be in serious doubt that the deal between the US/EU and Iran to lift sanctions against the latter over Iran’s supposed co-operation over being good on nuclear tests is a crock? Another blinding result for Mr Obama’s foreign policy. We have another year of this man in the White House.
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Uh oh, you KNOW what happens when someone breaks their probation “vows”?
I’m shocked! Shocked, I tell you!
Watch all of the major US TV news outlets and media streams.
Not.
A.
Word.
Their loyalty to President Obama, and their fealty in supporting whatever he says and does, trumps their purpose of reporting what is actually happening in the world. No clearer example could be adduced than this.
llater,
llamas
Well, if we have another year left, we do…
You have to admire Khamenei’s chutzpah (if I may use that term!). Even while the nuclear agreement was being negotiated he publicly repudiated Obama’s claims about the deal. And after his lieutenants had come back with the best terms they could negotiate he demanded (and got) even more concessions from the US. Yet throughout it all he had absolutely no bargaining leverage. And now, with the ink barely dry and the US still having not released the interdicted Iranian funds, he’s already violating the treaty’s terms. We all know there will be no repercussions.
Clearly, Khamenei has very accurately taken Obama’s measure.
A possible saving grace from the current position with the forces within that (Iranian) society may be the tendencies for frictions and fragmentations of the “elites” within that society (who are usually military or highly organized banditry) as it develops some successes.
It is beginning to appear that the RG types (both levels) are using the “Mullahs” now, more extensively than they are serving the purposes of the “Mullahs.” This continuing development will take longer than another year to provide the RG (upper level) with sufficient power to direct (rather than strongly influence) the actions of that State.
Control of (and favor with) the populace of the lower level RG will become more evident (even if fragile) and that may be where the fractures develop first. However, the economic controls of the upper levels and the drive for expansions of those controls (domestic and foreign) are likely to prevail well into the next 5 years or so. We shall see ( at least y’all shall see).
Most of those effects will be observed in the concentrations of power and wealth in families and clans as has been historic. But, those are somewhat smaller now, and may be less “naturally” (kinship) cohesive. Still, money and power in those family units will serve for cohesion.
Laird: it is true that Khamenei had no leverage to start with, but Obama gave it to him when he committed himself to signing a piece of paper. At that point, Khamenei could ask for whatever concessions seemed desirable, and then some more.
A similar dynamic seems to be at work wrt the Palestinians.
Strange i didn’t not see anything in newspapers, TV etc etc…
The leaders of Iran believe in the concept of “enemies.” They also know that they have enemies, are content to go on having enemies, and are perfectly indifferent to the opinions of their enemies, no matter how harsh those opinions may be. The only relevant consideration in the Iranian leadership’s eyes is the likelihood that their enemies will actually do anything to obstruct Iranian actions or interests. Putin’s Russia and many other governments around this world take the same approach.
None of the above is surprising, complicated or difficult to understand, and yet our leadership is [apparently] befuddled by such attitudes. There was a time that I though the apparent befuddlement was genuine but this is no longer that time.
Yet throughout it all he had absolutely no bargaining leverage.
On the contrary, he had Obama’s ego and desperate search for a legacy. Is there a bigger source of leverage than that?
He promised change (well the first time around, I can’t remember what he promised the second time). You’ve got it. You’ve got a nuclear-armed Iran with ICBMs, that’s a change, isn’t it?
+1 Tim Newman. They played Obama’s ego (and Secretaries Clinton AND Kerry’s as well, if it comes to it) like a $10 fiddle. And because they are all 3 of them acculturated to not, under any circumstances, allow themselves to ever even consider the possibility that the suave Levantine who smiles at them so obligingly, and appears to show them all of the deference that their patrician isolation has taught them to mistake for respect, is, in fact, a lying, cheating, underhanded jackanapes who actually despises them and all they stand for, laughs at them behind his hand, and will cheerfully break any promises and ignore any commitment at any time it suits him
Obama may have fallen for this nonsense, but Israel will not. And Israel will not really feel itself held back too much by a President and an administration which has made it painfully obvious that they don’t give a damn about the Jewish state, really. The fear of Israel (which, unlike Obama, means what it says and back up its opinions with a muscular application of unavoidable persuasion) may be the only thing holding the Iranians in check. I hope it works. If the Iranians are so foolish as to show the world a nuclear capability, I don’t think the Israelis would hesitate for a moment to put a sudden stop to their endeavours, it is an existential threat to them that Obama either doesn’t understand of just doesn’t really care about.
Interesting times.
llater,
llamas
Snorri and Tim make fair points. Iran had no extrinsic leverage, nothing which Obama didn’t willingly hand them (but also which Obama could have withdrawn at any time had he the emotional maturity to do so). This is what comes of electing a President with full-blown Narcissistic Personality Disorder. It wouldn’t have worked on a President with a healthy ego.
The First Rule of Negotiating is that he who cares the least, wins. Reagan was prepared to (and did) walk away from the negotiating table in Reykjavík, and Gorbachev untimately caved. Obama was so desperate for a deal, any deal, that Khamenei knew he could get anything he wanted, and he had no need to concede any points or even show the least bit of respect for his opponent. As I said earlier, he has very accurately taken Obama’s measure.
Whatever his other flaws, I have absolute confidence that a President Trump would not make that mistake.
A proposal for a new world order:
* The emerging alliance between India, Japan, and Australia, to be extended to Israel and Poland.
* Poland to get its own nuclear weapons asap, on submarines. Japan can get them too, if they like.
It’s my understanding that neither side signed this deal.
http://www.jewishpress.com/news/breaking-news/the-iran-deal-was-not-signed-by-iran-or-anyone-else/2015/09/19/
By far the best book on this issue is Elan Journo’s Winning the Unwinnable War – read 64 pages for free via the Ayn Rand Institute…and weep.
If the Iranians are so foolish as to show the world a nuclear capability, I don’t think the Israelis would hesitate for a moment to put a sudden stop to their endeavours, it is an existential threat to them that Obama either doesn’t understand of just doesn’t really care about.
What are they going to do? Iran has been pretty smart about this – its nuclear program is spread over thousands of sites, many of them dug in and/or hardened. Iran is also relatively far from Israel, and Israeli jets would have to cross Iraqi airspace to get there. Israel isn’t going to nuke Iran because Iran is developing nuclear capability, and anything less than that isn’t going to be enough. Bombing Iran and still failing to stop Iran’s nuclear program is the worst outcome from Israel’s perspective.
@ Eric – I don’t know what Israel might do. But years of observing them has taught me that the one thing you don’t do is tell them ‘Oh, yeah? Well, what are you going to do about it?’. Because they may show you just what they intend to do about it.
FWIW, I doubt they would bomb Iran, with any kind of bomb. I suspect there’s much more effective ways to derail a nuclear missile program. Since Iran is completely dependent upon imported technology for programs like this, I suspect that ways will be found to import theur response. Stuxnet showed the way. There’s no need to fly bombs all that way when one carefully-placed thumb drive can do 1,000x the damage.
llater,
llanas
The story was, basically, ignored by the BBC – and by most of the American media.
Anything that might cast doubt on the wisdom of Mr Obama’s agreement with the Iranian “Hastener” regime (the regime he saved in 2009 against a popular uprising) must be covered up.
Mr Obama must be shown as a nice man who goes for walks with a British celeb to see the wonders of nature.
Mr Obama must not be shown as what he actually is – someone who is allowing the Iranian regime to develop missiles and nuclear weapons so they can “hasten” the coming of the “Hidden One”, by covering the world with fire and blood.
No Mr Obama is not a Muslim – but his Marxist background leads him to think that religious people are either phonies who are faking it (as he did all those years at Holy Trinity Liberation Theology “Church” in Chicago) or are idiots.
If the Iranian regime are idiots they need not be feared, and if they are phonies who are only pretending to be religious, they will not lay down their lives by launching a nuclear attack on Israel or anywhere else.
This is how Comrade Barack’s Marxist mind works – and he is mistaken.
The Iranian regime are neither idiots or faking religious belief – they are highly intelligent and really-do-believe.
They would be happy to die as long as they could take “the Zionist enity” into death with them – and take lots of Christian “infidels” into death also.
For then the “Hidden One” will appear on his White Horse and create the Islamic end-of-days (a sort of Book of Revelations with the Anti Christ as the hero).
They may be insane, but they are also highly intelligent.
And Comrade Barack, with his materialist view of things, is incapable of understanding them.
Stephen Coughlin is a lawyer and former Joint Chiefs of Staff intelligence analyst who was in effect fired by the Pentagon at the request of Hesham Islam who has since been suspected of being an Islamic terrorist sympathizer.
Subsequently, the Joint Chiefs of Staff did not renew Coughlin’s contract as an intelligence analyst.
Instead, the Pentagon turned a deliberate blind eye to the reality of Islamic terrorism, banned his 10-part YouTube presentation to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and removed his book from all civilian and military intelligence and threat-analysis programs.
THIS IS EVASION not ignorance.
Watch the whole series here before it gets blocked.
People tend to achieve what they want to achieve – ?
Well there is a small glimmer of détente in the Middle East, the Lebanon has released a vulture accussed of spying for Israel after it crossed the border.
The Griffon Vulture, which in Levantine terms is Sephardic*, was considered a spy due to its tracking device. Perhaps it was on the way to Syria, looking for what vultures look for.
* it was hatched in Spain.
Oh fuck. Iran is doing the dirty work fighting ISIS with Iranian Army boots on the ground — with the support of USAF Airstrikes and special forces spotters. Keeping that going is pretty good leverage. The Iranian President and the RG don’t like the detente, the Iranian PM and Army (and most of the city people) think it’s great – and Obama isn’t going to send in the GIs — so yeah, he wants to keep Iran sweep.