Blockades and the danger of disaster By Juan Cole

[xchrom]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/ND14Ak05.html

t's a policy fierce enough to cause great suffering among Iranians - and possibly in the long run among Americans, too. It might, in the end, even deeply harm the global economy and yet, history tells us, it will fail on its own. Economic war led by Washington (and encouraged by Israel) will not take down the Iranian government or bring it to the bargaining table on its knees ready to surrender its nuclear program. It might, however, lead to actual armed conflict with incalculable consequences.

The United States is already effectively embroiled in an economic war against Iran. The Barack Obama administration has subjected the Islamic Republic to the most crippling economic sanctions applied to any country since Iraq was reduced to fourth-world status in the 1990s. And worse is on the horizon. A financial blockade is being imposed that seeks to prevent Tehran from selling petroleum, its most valuable commodity, as a way of dissuading the regime from pursuing its nuclear enrichment program.

Historical memory has never been an American strong point and few today remember that a global embargo on Iranian petroleum is hardly a new tactic in Western geopolitics; nor do many recall that the last time it was applied with such stringency, in the 1950s, it led to the overthrow of the government with disastrous long-term blowback on the United States. The tactic is just as dangerous today.

Iran's supreme theocrat, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has repeatedly condemned the atom bomb and nuclear weapons of all sorts as tools of the devil, weaponry that cannot be used without killing massive numbers of civilian noncombatants. In the most emphatic terms, he has, in fact, pronounced them forbidden according to Islamic law.

[bananas]

1. Iran is creating this problem by not complying with the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

If the Supreme Theocrat is so convinced that nuclear weapons are evil,
why is he violating the non-proliferation treaty which he voluntarily agreed to?
Why is the Supreme Theocrat going back on his word?
Why should we trust him when he's already gone back on his word?

Oh, he's a Supreme Theocrat, we can trust him!
Just like we can trust the Pope and Pat Robertson!

[bananas]

2. The Supreme Theocrats of South Korea didn't even know about their own nuclear weapon program

The scientists kept it hidden from the theocrats:
"The South Korean government claimed that this research was conducted without its knowledge"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Korean_nuclear_research_programs

[polly7]

3. Good article xchrom. nt.