08/04 "VS plannen aanval met nucleair wapen tegen Iran"

De regering van George W. Bush is begonnen met de gedetailleerde voorbereiding van een aanval tegen Iran, inclusief het gebruik van nucleaire wapens.
Daarbij worden nucleaire sites geviseerd, zoals de ondergrondse site voor de verrijking van uranium in Natanz, zo schrijft het magazine New Yorker in de editie die op 17 april verschijnt.

De auteur van het bericht is Seymour Hersh. Hij maakte naam als onderzoeksjournalist tijdens het conflict in Irak, toen hij als eerste journalist schreef over de wantoestanden in de gevangenis van Abou Ghraib.
Volgens het artikel bestempelen Bush en andere topmensen binnen het Witte Huis de Iraanse president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad als een potentiële Adolf Hitler. "Dat is de naam die ze gebruiken", schrijft Hersch op basis van een gewezen hoge verantwoordelijke van de inlichtingendiensten.
De Amerikaanse president zou hopen dat aanhoudende bombardementen de religieuze leiding zouden vernederen en een opstand uitlokken. "Ik was geschokt en vroeg me af wat zij gerookt hadden", stelt een niet bij naam genoemde voormalige expert die in het bericht wordt geciteerd.
"Bij leden van het Amerikaanse leger en binnen de internationale gemeenschap groeit de overtuiging dat het ultieme doel van Bush in de nucleaire confrontatie met Iran erin bestaat een regimewissel te bewerkstelligen", luidt het. De VS-president zou de laatste weken een aantal geheime gesprekken over de kwestie hebben gevoerd met sleutelleden van het Congres en de Senaat, onder wie minstens één Democraat.

Een andere bron meldde dat de Verenigde Staten al undercover eenheden in Iran hebben ingeschakeld om "etnische spanningen aan te moedigen". Die zouden erop gericht zijn de regering in Teheran uit evenwicht te brengen.
Een regimewissel in Iran is niet de enige optie die voor ogen wordt gehouden. Een bron binnen het Pentagon stelde dat het gebruik van nucleaire wapens werd aangehaald als een mogelijk middel om Iran's eigen nucleaire infrastructuur te vernietigen. Dezelfde bron wees er evenwel op dat het VS-leger gekant was tegen deze optie en sommige hogere officieren zouden overwegen ontslag te nemen over de kwestie

09/04, GvA

10/04 VS-plannen voor Iranoorlog: Bush spreekt van "wilde speculaties"

De Amerikaanse regering en de Europese Unie hebben in het conflict om de Iraanse nucleaire plannen opnieuw de diplomatieke weg ingeslagen.

De Amerikaanse president George W. Bush omschreef maandag in Washington de persberichten over de kennelijk grootschalige plannen van de Verenigde Staten om Iran militair aan te vallen als "wilde speculaties". De Verenigde Staten zijn het verplicht om diplomatieke oplossingen te zoeken", zei Bush. In Luxemburg schreef de Hoge Vertegenwoordiger Javier Solana de houding van de Europese Unie nader toe: "Elk militair ingrijpen is voor ons uitgesloten. De zaken liggen nu in handen van de VN-Veiligheidsraad", zei Solana voorts. "En mogelijk worden onderhandelingen heropgenomen".

De Amerikaanse media hadden afgelopen weekeinde over naar verluidt reeds zeer concrete plannen van Washington over een militaire interventie in Iran bericht. Onderzoeksjournalist Seymour Hersh had in het tijdschrift The New Yorker geschreven dat ook de inzet van zogenaamde tactische kernwapens tegen de onderaardse atoominstallaties in Iran wordt overwogen. Maar er bestaat in elk geval ook belangrijke tegenstand bij de Amerikaanse militaire top zelf tegen dergelijke plannen.

Bush heeft weliswaar steeds opnieuw beklemtoond dat hij een "militaire optie" niet uitsluit, maar dit moet verstaan worden als een standaardformulering van de Amerikaanse buitenlandse politiek bij dergelijke conflicten. "Wie uit de gebruikelijk plannen van Defensie en de geheime dienst tot duidelijk afgelijnde conclusies komt, is fout ingelicht en weet niets over de denkwijze van deze regering", zei een hoge, maar niet nader genoemde regeringsambtenaar aan de Washington Post.

De Iraanse president Mahmoed Ahmadinejad zei maandag in Meshed in het noordoosten van het land dat Iran niet zal zwichten om zijn nucleaire plannen ondanks de internationale druk voort te zetten. Iran zal binnenkort "goede berichten" over zijn kernprogramma bekendmaken, zei de president zonder bijzonderheden te noemen. De secretaris van de nationale Iraanse veiligheidsraad, Ali Larijani, omschreef de berichten over de Amerikaanse bedreigingen tegen zijn land als "psychologische oorlogsvoering".

In Straatsburg waarschuwde een Iraanse politica uit de oppositie de westerse landen voor een 'appeasementpolitiek' tegenover de regering in Teheran. De internationale gemeenschap moet "snel en beslist handelen", zei de leidster van de Iraanse oppositie in ballingschap, Maryam Rajavi. De VN-Veiligheidsraad moet Iran sancties opleggen. De voorzitster van het Nationaal Verzet roept de democratieën op tot ondersteuning van de Iraanse oppositie.

In Islamabad bekrachtigde de Pakistaanse regering dat ze in het nucleair conflict tussen de Verenigde Staten en Iran het gebruik van militair geweld strikt afwijst. "Wij willen niet dat dit gebied gedestabiliseerd wordt en zijn daarom tegen elke vorm van geweld of militaire maatregelen tegen Iran", verklaarde de woordvoerster van Buitenlandse Zaken, Tasneem Aslam op een persconferentie.

GvA

Doubts About Taking On Tehran

By Doyle McManus


04/13/06 "Los Angeles Times" -- - WASHINGTON — Americans are divided over the prospect of U.S. military action against Iran if the government in Tehran continues to pursue nuclear technology — and a majority do not trust President Bush to make the "right decision" on that issue, a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found.


Asked whether they would support military action if Iran continued to produce material that could be used to develop nuclear weapons, 48% of the poll's respondents, or almost half, said yes; 40% said no.

If Bush were to order military action, most respondents said they would support airstrikes against Iranian targets, and about one in four said they would support the use of American ground troops in Iran.

The findings of the poll, conducted largely before the Tehran government announced Monday that it had enriched uranium for civilian energy generation, reflected public concern about Iran's acquisition of nuclear technology — but public division over the best U.S. response.

A majority of respondents, 61%, said they believed that Iran would eventually get nuclear weapons. Fifteen percent said they believed that Iran would be prevented from developing nuclear weapons through diplomatic negotiations, and 12% said they thought Iran would be stopped through military action.

Iran says it is not seeking nuclear weapons, but Western governments say they do not believe the Tehran government's denials.


Slip in the public's trust

In a telling reflection of Bush's erosion in public support, 54% said they did not trust him to "make the right decision about whether we should go to war with Iran," while 42% of respondents said they trusted him to do so.

That was a reversal of public sentiment since 2003, on the eve of Bush's decision to invade Iraq, when 55% of respondents said they trusted him to make the right decision over whether to go to war.

The poll results and interviews with individual respondents made it clear that the experience of Iraq — both the discovery that U.S. intelligence was wrong to declare that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction and the costly continuing conflict against Iraqi insurgents — have persuaded many Americans to be cautious about going to war against neighboring Iran.

"I think our intelligence really stinks," said Marilyn Wisniewski, 65, of Crestwood, Ill. She said she initially supported the war in Iraq, but was unsure of the proper course in Iran.

"How do we know what they have?" she asked. "We can't trust [the Iranians]. We have to protect ourselves. But how are we going to do that? I wouldn't send troops in there. I suppose I might support airstrikes."

Others echoed her sentiments. "You can't make the same mistake twice," said Gene Gentrup, 42, of Liberty, Mo. "Don't tell me they have WMD if they're saying they don't…. We have damaged our credibility on that in Iraq.

"If we do anything in Iran, it's important that we do it with support from other countries," he added.

The poll contacted 1,357 adults nationwide by telephone Saturday through Tuesday. The margin of error is plus or minus 3 percentage points for the entire sample.

Americans' support for military action against Iran has fluctuated in recent years. In a Times/Bloomberg poll in January, 57% said they would support military action if Iran continued to produce material that could be used to develop nuclear weapons. But in a Fox News poll in January 2005, 41% of respondents said they believed the United States should "take military action to keep Iran from … trying to develop a nuclear weapons program."

In this month's Times/Bloomberg poll, when respondents were asked what kind of military action against Iran they would support if President Bush chose to act, 44% said they would support airstrikes but oppose the use of ground troops; 19% said they would support both airstrikes and ground troops; and 6% said they would support the use of ground troops alone.


The Iraq factor

The poll found that two in five Americans, or 40%, said the war in Iraq had made them less supportive of military action against Iran; about the same proportion, 38%, said the experience of Iraq had no influence on their views of Iran. By a ratio of more than 3-to-1, Democrats were more likely than Republicans to say that Iraq had made them less supportive of action in Iran.

On Iraq, the poll found that Americans had become markedly more pessimistic about the chances of success in the war since the beginning of this year.

About one in four respondents, or 23%, said they expected the situation in Iraq to "get better" over the coming year. In the Times/Bloomberg poll conducted in January, 34% said they expected the situation to improve.

Most of that decline in overall confidence came from respondents who described themselves as Democrats; 6% in this month's poll said they expected things to improve over the coming year, down from 24% in January. But Republicans' optimism also dropped, to 44% this month from 55% in January.

That sentiment may rest in part on the growing view that Iraq is now in a de facto state of civil war, a characterization the Bush administration has contested. The poll in January was taken a month after Iraq's successful parliamentary election, when sectarian violence was at a lower level.

A majority of respondents, 56%, said they believed Iraq was "currently engaged in a civil war." And a record high number for the Times poll, 58%, said they believed it was not worth going to war in Iraq. Until the spring of 2004, a majority of poll respondents said it was worth going to war, but since 2004 the number disagreeing has gradually risen.


No rush to withdraw

Almost half, 45%, of those polled this month said they believed Bush should set a date for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq by the end of his term in 2009. That is a significant increase since October 2004, when a similar question was asked and 28% said Bush should set a definite date for withdrawal.

Nevertheless, most Americans do not support an immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq — not even if a full-scale civil war breaks out, the poll found.

When asked what the United States should do if the violence in Iraq turned into "a nationwide civil war," about one-third, or 32%, said all American troops should be withdrawn. About the same proportion, 33%, said U.S. troops should remain neutral and attempt to mediate. One-fourth, or 25%, said U.S. troops should intervene in the violence — either to stop the fighting or to help one side win (the latter a minority opinion that measured at 6%).

"If we're there to do a job, we should finish the job," said Wisniewski, a moderate Democrat who works at an insurance agency in a Chicago suburb. "But if it gets to the point where the Shiites and the Sunnis are just fighting each other, it seems self-defeating. If our people are getting killed because of that, what's the reasoning?"

But asked if she favored an immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops under those circumstances, she paused.

"I don't know," she said.


Options in Iran

Q: Do you think Iran will be stopped from getting nuclear weapons through diplomatic solutions, or only through military action, or will it eventually get nuclear weapons?

Will eventually get nuclear weapons: 61%

Diplomatic solutions: 15%

Military action: 12%

Don't know: 12%

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Q: Suppose George W. Bush decides to order military action against Iran, which action would you support:

Airstrikes/no ground troops: 44%

No military action: 20%

Combination of airstrikes and ground troops: 19%

Ground troops: 6%

Don't know: 11%

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Q: If Iran continued to produce material that can be used to develop nuclear weapons, would you support or oppose military action?

Support : 48%

Oppose : 40%

Don't know: 12%

--

Q: Would you trust George W. Bush to make the right decision about whether we should go to war with Iran?

Yes: 42%

No: 54%

Don't know: 4%
--

Note:

All questions are summarized. For full/exact wording of questions along with poll results and analysis, go to: http://www.latimes.com/timespoll
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How the poll was conducted

The Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll contacted 1,357 adults nationwide by telephone Saturday through Tuesday. Telephone numbers were chosen from a list of all exchanges in the nation, and random digit dialing techniques allowed listed and unlisted numbers to be contacted. Multiple attempts were made to contact each number. Adults were weighted slightly to conform with their respective census figures for sex, race, age, education and region. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3 percentage points. For certain subgroups, the error margin may be somewhat higher. Poll results may also be affected by factors such as question wording and the order in which questions are presented.
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Source: Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll, 13-04-2006

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