Recent remarks by Sir John Sawers, who heads Britain’s MI6 (the secret intelligence service that is Britain’s CIA counterpart), leave us wondering if Sawers is preparing to “fix” intelligence on Iran, as his immediate predecessor, Sir John Scarlett, did on Iraq....
Netanyahu Refuses Explicit Iran Attack Threat
The perception that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is threatening to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities unless sanctions and diplomacy succeed in shutting them down has been the driving force in the Iran crisis. But although Netanyahu and Defense Minister...
Iran Sanctions: War By Other Means
Now that the talks with Iran on its nuclear program appear to be on the ropes, are we on the road to war? The Israelis threaten it almost weekly, and the Obama administration has reportedly drawn up an attack plan. But in a sense, we are already at war with Iran. Carl...
Wars Have Unpredictable and Dangerous Collateral Effects
The recent bloodless (referring to American blood — the most important to U.S. policymakers) overthrow of Moammar Gadhafi in Libya has been touted as a low-cost model for future U.S. military interventions. The recent Libyan election is said to have vindicated...
Why This Obsession With Iran?
"Iran is not seeking to have the atomic bomb, possession of which is pointless, dangerous, and is a great sin from an intellectual and a religious point of view." Thus did supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei declare in February that Iran's possession of atomic...
Strait History: Iran’s Options
George Santayana wisely said: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Oblivious to history and its lessons, the United States and its Western allies are repeating their actions from the 1950s by imposing an oil embargo on Iran. The U.S.-led...
How a Nonexistent Bomb Cylinder Distorts the Iran Nuclear Issue
For many months, the most dramatic media storyline on Iran's nuclear program has been an explosives-containment cylinder that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) says was installed at Iran's Parchin military base a decade ago to test nuclear weapons. The...
US Hawks Aflutter as Clinton Clears China on Iran Oil Sales
The administration of President Barack Obama is waiving tough financial sanctions that would have taken effect Thursday against both China and Singapore because it said the two countries had made “significant reductions” in their crude oil purchases from Iran. The...


