The Real Consequences of the Korean Missile Launch

There is much about the Korean reportedly successful launch of a three stage ballistic rocket which placed a satellite into orbit that much of the news reporting has been omitting. There has also been a slight misdirection of faint praise lauded on the North Korean rocket scientists for overcoming their previous problems which had caused numerous previous failed launches. I can assure you that as supposedly talented and innovative the North Korean scientists may be, they had another group of rocket scientists whose experience and knowledge they tapped in overcoming their previous shortcomings, the Iranian rocket scientists. What has been not actually a guarded secret, but has been only minimally mentioned, the North Koreans and the Iranians entered an agreement a number of years ago as a response to both countries having similar aims and under similar world sanctions. Since then they have shared jointly all research into building rocketry with an aim at developing a useable ICBM and the nuclear device to place on top of it. Under this agreement each country’s scientists work on a particular problem and then share their results so that both teams can move forward. This has allowed for an accelerated pace of advancing their research and knowledge as this method removes redundancies and allows virtually all research to be accomplished by one team but benefit both programs. From what we have been able to discern the Iranian area of specialty has been the development of rocketry while the North Koreans have spearheaded the nuclear weaponry side of the equation. This may have been partially the reason behind the Parchin Military Base being decommissioned and destroyed and cleansed as the North Koreans had already finished research and designing the necessary explosive charges necessary in a high yield nuclear device.

So, when evaluating the ramifications of the North Korean missile test and its relative success, one has to figure that this was actually a dual success with Iran as a mutual winner besides the North Koreans. The North Koreans gaining the ability to launch a three stage rocket and place a satellite into orbit now an ability which we need to grant to the Iranians. The only solace we can take from this accomplishment is that the satellite the North Koreans placed into orbit was apparently tumbling and as such completely useless and would also not allow for a stable placement of a warhead. Mind you, taking much solace from this fact may prove to be a short lived comfort as this little difficulty will probably not take very long to correct and then the North Koreans and their allies, the Iranians, will have pretty much a fully functioning ICBM. We already know that both countries have fully functioning CBMs with sufficient range to make many countries throughout Asia, the Middle East, North Africa and much of Europe nervous and easily within range of these missiles. The Iranian Shahab series of missiles appear to me mostly exact copies of the North Korean Nodong missiles. So, we can now assess that both Iran and North Korea have the basic plans for ballistic missiles and at least a rudimentary nuclear weapon as well as very possibly a nuclear triggered EMP device. That sure is a comforting set of thoughts for the holidays, well, not exactly.

The most troubling fact about this entire North Korean launch is that the sanctions in place on North Korea, sanctions considered to be even more all-encompassing and strict than those on Iran, has not deterred the North Koreans from moving ahead with their nuclear and rocket programs. With this knowledge, exactly how much faith can anybody be expected to place on President Obama’s statements that we need to give sanctions a chance to work on Iran. Really now, wait for the lesser sanctions on Iran to cripple Iran while more stringent sanctions have had little effect in slowing North Korea from their nuclear or their missile development. The people in Iran are suffering under the sanctions despite efforts by Turkey, India, China and other allies and friends who get exemptions or find other ways around the sanctions and are providing some amount of relief from the sanctions. This has not allowed Iran to completely avoid the restrictions and difficulties sanctions are supposed to apply but these transactions have allowed at least some funds and relief. The most important and critical piece of information from this mostly successful launch by the North Koreans is the nearly total uselessness of sanctions against a dedicated, military, faux-electoral dictatorship at preventing military and WMD development. This is total proof that Israel has been correct all along stating that sanctions will not be sufficient in preventing Iran from attaining nuclear weapons capabilities. Whatever else you take from these pieces of information, the one most important is that United States President Obama is completely in the tank depending on sanctions and will not resort to a military option unless there is no other choice and the American people actually call for such actions universally. President Obama does not realize the full ramifications of the Iranians going nuclear and never will. He has a permanent blind spot that forces him to disregard and oppose anything that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu mentions. Now we just have to figure out how the world can survive and go ahead once Iran has nuclear weapons and can apply nuclear terrorism using Hezballah, Hamas, the IRGC and all the rest of their terror proxies. Such a world will not be a good place, not a good place at all. Sometimes one really wishes they could find a Hobbit hole and settle down to some real peace and comfort.

Beyond the Cusp

Should Pollard Receive Presidential Pardon?

On the subject of Jonathan Pollard spying for Israel and handing them classified photographs presumably of the Iraqi Osirak nuclear complex and reactor, it would have been easier to write of if he will be pardoned by United States President Obama at the behest of Israeli President Peres; very likely not. Instead, let’s look at the somewhat more controversial subject of if Jonathan Pollard should receive a pardon and be released. There are more sides, opinions, complications, over-simplifications, added-complications, theories, conspiracies, excuses, explanations, and lastly, accusations that to fully examine this subject and take in every obtuse angle which are splattered throughout the blogosphere and try to make heads or tails of it will drive one’s sanity right over the proverbial cliff. So, rather than actually go to a place more insane than where I am accused of residing, I figured I would simply try to write using things from my Swiss cheese memory. So, off we go into one more romp through blunderland.

The most important controversy about the entire Jonathan Pollard affair refers to exactly what he was guilty of. This is not what he was charged with or what he pleaded guilty to or even what the agreement was, we can go there in good time. The problem is there are many who claim that the judge broke the plea agreement when he received confidential, classified information which revealed the true extent to Pollard’s perfidy. I thought I might address what is likely the most serious of the supposed secret told to the judge right before sentencing. It was claimed that Pollard had sold the Russians the complete list of all our agents in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union which cost us both numerous agents’ lives and years of careful placement of placing people in the sensitive positions where they could best complete their missions. Here is the singular problem with this scenario. Jonathan Pollard worked as a Navy intelligence worker who handled photo reconnaissance and other related data and information. As such, guess what, Pollard had absolutely no access to the lists of our operatives, especially Central Intelligence Agency operatives, behind the Iran curtain. The real problem with Pollard revealing such information was simply impossible. Another claim from those on the opposite end of the spectrum is that Pollard was set up by being accused for all the misdeeds performed by master spy Aldrich Ames in order to divert the investigations by providing a believable suspect, though eventually Ames was caught. This is difficult to believe as I would hope any Judge worthy of trying such an important espionage case would be sufficiently knowledgeable to realize the limitations of Pollard’s security access dismissed much of what such claims would have entailed.

So, perhaps we should proceed under the premise that Pollard was charged with the same charges as were included in his plea deal and there were no other extraneous factors. Jonathan Pollard pleaded to the charge of passing sensitive classified information to an allied power. One has to remember that Pollard was nothing more than the person passing on information he came across in the performance of his Navy Department employ. He was not planted in the United States by a foreign country and actually passed on information that might have technically been covered under an agreement the United States has with Israel to provide them with intelligence information and satellite pictures pertaining to areas of what is referred to as special and mutual interests. One might have thought that satellite high-resolution pictures of the Iraqi Osirak Nuclear Power Plant would have fallen under such a classification. The problem was that the State Department did not consider that such intelligence was of any relative importance which Israel should be privileged to acquire. Since these items were classified, considered sensitive information, and determined of no interest to the Israelis, Jonathan Pollard had committed an act of espionage.

The passing of classified information, even to an ally, is very serious and very illegal and anybody caught and convicted of doing so, plea deal or not, deserves serious sentencing. The standard sentence has been reported to be an average of two to four years for passing such to an ally and as much as eight, though usually just four or five, for passing such information to an enemy state. Most often, somebody who is found guilty of passing sensitive information, which is not as secretive or as serious as classified items, to an enemy country is most often exchanged for whoever is found guilty of spying in said country in order to have a warm body to offer for trade long before they finish serving their sentence. My most unimpressive memory tells me that often they serve only two to four years despite what the sentence passed down.

So, what are we to believe should be done with Jonathan Pollard who has now languished for over a quarter of a century? One of the problems is that Pollard was spying for Israel who the United States would never stoop to spying against. Partially this is due to the fact that Israel very often informs the United States through one of the varied channels available of their military operational intentions, shares a fair amount of their intelligence information, and has agreements through which many of their military research is conducted in a shared manner jointly with American companies and appropriate American interests, and generally works willingly with the United States in many other areas. The truth of the matter is that Jonathan Pollard may very well be being held to the end of his life sentence simply as to be used as an example of the United States not operating under the direction and influence of Israel or their overly exaggerated influence reputably held by AIPAC. Releasing Pollard would cause a situation where somebody from the State Department would need to explain how releasing an Israeli master super spy, Pollard’s deeds have been inflated to the standard of rivaling the likes of Bond, James Bond, rather than leaving him to rot till death in some long forgotten dungeon, or if we have to be civil, a nice prison cell. Plainly put, releasing Pollard would mean admitting that some people went to great lengths to go overboard over the “Pollard Affair” and that perhaps he was given somewhat longer sentence than was rational, let alone believable. There will be no admission of such. The State Department and others in the seats of power will never ever admit to having been ham handed and blowing this case way out of proportions, thus Jonathan Pollard, the greatest spy since Mata Hari, will forever rot in prison and never be a free man. If some are feeling particularly generous, maybe they will allow Jonathan Pollard to travel to Israel to be buried, but maybe not.

Beyond the Cusp

How Much Longer Will the World Postpone Seriously Addressing Iran?

It has been known since the mid-1970s that Iran had begun its quest for nuclear weaponry while the Shah was still in power and that by the mid-1980s when the Ayatollahs took over after the Iranian revolution. It has even been made clear that the 2003 NIE (National Intelligence Estimate) which put forth the claim that the Iranians had halted their research towards becoming the next nuclear power was totally false. And now, with last week’s IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) report making it abundantly certified that the worst predictions on the Iranian drive to nuclear arms are valid, what steps will the Security Council of the United Nations and the leaders of the top countries of the world take to prevent Iran attaining nuclear military capabilities. Whether anybody takes action or decides no action is necessary will boil down to the single question; would Iran be using nuclear weapons freely as just another weapon in their arsenal or could they be deterred or relied upon to use discretion and restrain from unleashing such unthinkable devastation with the accompanying lingering consequences that go with a nuclear attack. A miscalculation here could very well lead to unthinkable horrors for the world, and not just Israel as many so-called experts have claimed.

What has become evident is that the old Cold War rivalry that was pronounced dead with the falling of the Berlin Wall has been resurrected placing both Russia and China in the contrarian position of opposing any and everything proposed by the West, Israel, or against the Arab and Muslim world which they have chosen to back with arms sales and nuclear technological. Such aid has taken the form of assistance with building nuclear reactors, advanced missile technology and assistance in their nuclear efforts. This renewed rivalry guarantees inaction by the Security Council or any other arm of the United Nations. It was this opposition to meaningful sanctions from round one through every set of sanctions that had to be watered down to the point of being meaningless and little more than an inconvenience rather than a prevention of the Iranian nuclear program. With the United Nations and related institutions and agencies out of the picture due to the guaranteed veto in the Security Council and the Socialist and Muslim mutual support faction controlling the General Assembly, solutions are going to have to come from somewhere else. This leads either a NATO operation or an alliance of Western Nations to take definitive action. This would beg an initial question of what form such action should take that would have a definitive possibility of success.

The preferential route would be straight forward negotiations. Unfortunately, Iran has already displayed that they simply use negotiations as a means of stalling other potentially more effective actions from being implemented. Any seeming agreement for negotiations should be seen as a stalling maneuver and not an honest desire for reaching an accord. The next slightly more assertive alternative which has been explored in a limited manner would be sanctions. The limited sanctions which were allowable by Russian and Chinese opposition to stricter restrictions have proven not only inadequate but borderline useless. Even the more strident sanctions put in place by most of the NATO nations have not been as effective as intended mostly due to the combination of some countries disregarding their promises to restrict their trade relations with Iran and the number of countries who refused to even sign on to punishing Iran for their continued nuclear program. The probability of assembling sufficient countries to apply the extremely restrictive sanctions necessitated to actually affect the Iranian nuclear program at its current advanced state is actionably impossible.

Before considering the next more active alternative, namely military strikes to delay or destroy the Iranian nuclear program, it is necessary to honestly assess the Iranian intent in attaining nuclear armaments. Some have made the claim that Iran would be deterred from ever deploying or using nuclear weapons once they attain such a capability simply by the same MAD (mutually assured destruction) policies which thankfully prevented a nuclear exchange during the many years of the Cold War. But, is that a valid point or are their reasons to doubt the ability of MAD to be an effective deterrent. Iranian leadership has been quoted as saying that, “Israel is a one bomb nation.” This is only a valid point if one is planning on using a thermonuclear warhead or a multiple warhead missile with simple atomic bombs. The Iranian leadership has often made references to using any means at their disposal to eradicate Israel and the United States even should it bring devastation upon Iran and the Iranian people. All of these types of comments are indications that Iran is developing nuclear weapons with the intent to actually use them. Even if there is the chance that such statements are simple bluster meant for internal consumption, except that many of these statements have been repeated outside of Iran and in broadcasts which were guaranteed to be heard and reported outside of Iran. Can anybody truly be completely assured that this is the case and not actual statements of intent? One must assume the worst when the ramifications of an action are as destructively devastating as a nuclear attack on any major city in any country. As such, all steps must be implemented in order to prevent those currently ruling in Iran from attaining nuclear weapons as it must be assumed by their own words that once they have some number of warheads, they will begin to use them.

What is depressing is that it just simply does not seem that any country is willing to take the Iran threat sufficiently seriously to take the needed action. France declared this past week that any military action against Iran was not an option that they would consider. President Obama has spoken and acted as if the United States was willing to take economic and political actions but are extremely reluctant to take any stronger measures and seems convinced that the MAD theory is applicable. Such lack of leadership by the United States would pretty much rule out any actions by the other NATO member countries as their militaries are pretty much dependent upon American assistance. This basically leaves Israel alone to possibly take the needed measures should Iran’s nuclear program reach such a critical and verifiable point. That begs the question that even should Israel take such a risk, would it be effective and how severe would be the reactions that most assuredly would result. It is a given fact that upon the first signs that the Iranian places of nuclear research, missile locations, military installations, communications centers, or ruling hierarchy had come under identifiable external military strikes, then Hezballah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, and probably Syria would all begin launching missiles and rockets of all sizes, ranges and types of warheads into Israel with Tel Aviv being one of the main targets. There is the additional threat of having the Palestinian Authority joining the action as well as either Egypt or Turkey or both. No matter what combination of these forces which would begin hostilities against Israel, be Iran attacked by Israeli or United States forces, Israel would have to then divert every military capability they possess in order to prevent being overrun. This would not only make any Israeli strike on Iran a one shot deal before every military aircraft would be forced into defense of the home-front and targeting the launching points of the larger and most destructive missiles. Iran also would be using their longest range missiles to hit Israel as best they could. This has been an Iranian promise (threat) from day one if they were attacked by anybody. One could safely bet that even should Saudi Arabia attack Iran, Iran would first strike Israel before turning on Saudi Arabia. With the only Israeli option a one-time flight of, at most, half of their air force upon the Iranian nuclear weapons research centers and any other targets of particular interest, the larger part of Iranian facilities would not be able to even be struck successfully, let alone damaged. An Israeli attack would set Iran back probably less than two years, if that much, and would fill them with a deep resolve to finish their research and build the weapons needed to hit Israel with a devastating blow.

So, even an Israeli attack using a fair portion of their air force and a number of their long range missiles would leave Iran still pretty much in business nuclear speaking. The only form of attack from Israel that would guarantee an end to the Iranian missile and nuclear development and armament would have to include Israeli nuclear weapons, something Israel has sworn they would never use as a first strike weapon. The Israeli policy stands that if they have nuclear weapons, something assumed but never verified or admitted, that they would never be the first to use any weapons of mass destruction but reserved the right to use such weapons as an answer to being attacked by any country using weapons of mass destruction. Many hold that this threat is what prevented Saddam Hussein from using nerve agents on Israel when he launched scud missiles towards Tel Aviv during the Gulf War. This policy, which I have absolute faith would not be broken (Yes, even by Bibi Netanyahu or Avigdor Lieberman), precludes an Israeli attack on Iranian targets that would have sufficient impact to do enough damage to warrant even attempting the attack. So, an Israeli overt military attack is of doubtful, if any, effect and would not be sufficient a delay or deterrent to be worth the effort. Where does that leave the world?

We are right back where we started with an United Nations that has been castrated by those who are supporting Iran and working against the West and Israel, and with a NATO force without any support from the United States for as long as President Obama is in office (and very likely through whoever is elected in 2012 as the economy will be job one and only initially), and a United States concentrating laser-like on economic problems both at home and throughout the world (all of which promise to get a lot worse before they improve sufficiently to allow a broadened view of the world), and an Arab and Muslim world that is in flux and very unstable with Iran very likely to gain more allies as the new governments decide to turn towards Islamic Sharia as their base for governing. So, unless somebody steps into the breach in a Churchillian manner and boldly addresses the Iranian nuclear issue, it appears that very soon Iran will join the club of nuclear armed nations. Should such come to pass we can expect a flood of other countries to go nuclear within the following three to five years and a very unstable and unknowable future after that. Allowing Iran to go nuclear will usher in a whole new world which will likely not be a better place but rather a far more dangerous place that quickly dives right off the charts into unknowable and dangerous potentials. The one thing I can guarantee about such a world, no matter where you live outside Madagascar, your safety will be greatly decreased.

Beyond the Cusp