U.S. Still Short in Iran Security Council Push ("pushing since 2004)

[UpInArms]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/21/AR2006012101083.html

PARIS, Jan. 21 -- The United States has been unable to win international support to officially report Iran to the U.N. Security Council, despite two years of diplomatic efforts and defiant new actions by the country to resume uranium enrichment research, according to European diplomats involved in negotiations.

With the International Atomic Energy Agency scheduled to discuss the crisis on Feb. 2, U.S. and European officials are considering delaying a direct confrontation with Iran in return for greater pressure from its allies to halt its enrichment research, the European diplomats said. Some forms of enriched uranium can be used to make nuclear weapons, though Iran maintains its research will be used only to produce electrical power.

Russia is concerned that a referral of Iran to the Security Council would result in international sanctions against one of its major trading partners. It has proposed a less formal approach that would allow the Security Council to discuss Iran's case and provide guidelines for compliance with international demands, the diplomats said. European diplomats discussed the negotiations on the condition they not be identified because of the sensitivity and volatility of the ongoing talks.

<snip>

The Bush administration's primary goal is to report Iran to the Security Council, where the United States has more clout than it does inside the IAEA and where Iran can be threatened with sanctions. With stronger support from the Europeans in recent weeks, the White House appears closer to reaching the Security Council than at any time in the two years since it began the push.

...more...

[teryang]

1. The diplomatic push against Iran is bound to fail

The relative balance of power in the world has changed dramatically. US economic power on a relative basis is quite diminished. Other powers are now gifted with the manufacturing prowess or natural resources which we have either exported or consumed in the sixty years since WWII.

The international economic system and balance of power must make adjustments to accommodate these changes. Rather than acceding to change and adapting to it intelligently, American corporate elites get out the gun. Radical changes are in store for us. There are going to be major disruptions in our economy or greater unwarranted conflicts abroad, perhaps both.

The Europeans are making the biggest mistakes. They should have thrown in with Russia and China and forced Bush to back down. They could be the biggest beneficiaries of the radical shift in the balance of power but their fear of the Russian bear and Bush's radical inflexibility reminds them of the prior prologues to world war.

Perhaps the Russians want to see bush impaled on his diastrous mideast policies. Another US war would accelerate our decline to a precipitous fall. To coin a phrase, revenge is a dish best served hot.

[bemildred]

2. Yep, I reckon Tehraningrad would be just the ticket ...

I have been wondering what the EU is thinking.
I suppose old habits die hard.

[teryang]

4. LOL! n/t

[Demeter]

16. Europe Is Right to Fear the Russian Bear

Pretty soon the whole world will consist of non-aligned secular states and those banded together on religious affinities. What a pretty pass we've come to. What a recipe for disaster.

[acmavm]

3. Russia and China are playing the bush** administration like a fish on

the line.

Let me ask, when has either country given in to what the bush** administration wants? I don't mean some empty pandering rhetoric to pacify and appease for the short term. I mean when have they given him anything that he's either asked for or demanded.

And now many times have they embarrassed him and Condi, might I ask. They have calmly rebuked them on stupid demands that they've made more than once.

They are not, I am sure of this, not going to allow Iran to be taken in front of the Security Council.

The US is not the powerhouse it once was. Thanks to this administration. All they've sucessfully done is line the pockets of a few individuals in this country at the expense of the all of us. And turned us into basically a third world debtor nation with no economy, no manufacturing, no raw materials, nothing.

[VegasWolf]

5. So true, maam! In the meantime incidents like Friday's stock market

crash happen because who in the hell knows what that crazy person Bush will do next!

:toast:

[acmavm]

6. Other than an over-inflated housing boom, what else has there been

here since bush** took over but the stock market? And it's been pretty spooky. Apparently a lucky few with money to burn and senators with day traders in their offices are gonna end up to be the only winners.

Remember the stock market crash of 1929? Strange thing about that crash is that the extremely rich and well connected ended up even richer after that unhappy and unfortunate event. The rest of the country ended up in bread lines.

Well when the market tanks (like it will eventually), I wonder if it will be the same. I mean these people invest in foreign currency. They have inside info as to what's going to happen. Face it, the market is not on the up-and-up. And george's little social security ponzi scheme was just a way to give his friends our old age money directly, not have to raid the fund bit by bit.

You cannot have an economy based on the housing industry and the market alone.

Greenspan should be strung up by his shriveled old gonads.

[VegasWolf]

8. Exactly, nor can you have an economy based on a service industry alone

where you wash my pants and I wash your shirt. Japan proved that in the late '80s when they
decided that they were the intellectuals and outsourced their manufacturing to Korea. Guess what, Japan still has not recovered and Korea became a powerhouse. A country needs a strong manufacturing base to survive. In addition, Bush has an active policy of devaluing the US dollar. Snow has said that we own the printing presses and we will print as much money as we need. In the entire history of bad ideas, this is perhaps king.

I day-trade, so Friday was a great day for me personally, but for average Americans their 401Ks took a real beating. We day-traders love volatility, and no one has ever exceeded in scaring the shit out of the market better than GWB. A crazy person at the wheel does that. Good for my business though.

[ConcernedCanuk]

7. USA lost its remaining world respect after 911 - Osama wins!!

.
.
.

If indeed Afghanistan was harbouring Osama and his men, the USA quickly deflected their military might to Iraq, which had nothing to do with 911

AND

A tiny point that the World has not missed, except the brain-dead USA electorate, is that the Mighty WarMachine hasn't even found the ONE man yet!!

And turned a quiet, prosporous country into one rife with killing, and a prescence of terrotists that never existed before - polluted it with their Depleted Uranium munitions, and bombed cities into ruins . . .

And they think the world doesn't notice ???

We do

And as a Canuk, I will vote against ANY of our parties that even remotely suggest that we should be like the USA

And I ain't alone . . .

not by a long shot

[HuffleClaw]

9. the UN and the IAEA

both KNOW that bush is hoping only for the TEENSIEST of excuses to 'justify' military action. even the most mild of language in ANY security council resolution would let bush replay a 'the un is irrelevent and won't do its job' game.

[NYC]

10. Is it necessary to go to the Security Council

before bombing Iran? Couldn't Bush make up an excuse for bombing anyway?

[struggle4progress]

11. He has to make a political case that he's not full of s#!t

The Security Council was used before to provide cover for "Operation Iraqi Liberation."

And the Security Council got screwed: promises were made and not kept about how the US would interpret the resolution, and the US confiscated and censored the weapons declaration Saddam provided to the UN.

Congress got screwed, too: they voted on a "last resort" resolution and King George promptly used it as authorization to wage the war he wanted.

He's got to have something INCREDIBLY convincing before anybody cuts him any slack. Of course, real diplomats don't speak so crudely ...

[NYC]

12. Suppose they don't cut him any slack?

Will that stop him?

[KDLarsen]

13. Seriously doubt it

As we saw with "Operation Iraqi Freedom" (Forgot its current name), he's only interested in UN support if they support his agenda.

[NYC]

14. Could the world (or parts of it) stop him

from bombing Iran?

[KDLarsen]

15. In theory, yes..

.. however, I doubt that anyone would have the gonads to do so. I mean, the only tool that exists as a mean to deter the US from going in on its own, would be trade blockades or economic sanctions. And no matter what, that would hurt the blockers as much as the US.

EDIT: Of course, there's the EXTREMELY slim chance of China pointing to the money that the US owe them (bonds or something like that - can't remember exactly what it was). China's industry is growing rapidly these years, and they need the oil coming out of Iran to keep up the pace.