Snap posted by Richard Seymour

The IAEA says that the findings of the US intelligence review on Iran's nuclear capacities are consistent with their own, adding to the propaganda woes for the Bush administration. Obviously, Bush is extremely pissed off. "Iran is still a threat", he hoots, refusing to rule out air strikes. The neocons are thunderous - another Munich, Podhoretz says. And look who else is floundering. "None of us is advocating a rush to war," a flustered Clinton says. Really?

Labels: air strikes, iran, nuclear energy, US imperialism

US intelligence shafts neocons posted by Richard Seymour

This is good news: American intelligence admits that Iran isn't trying to build a nuclear weapon, and it doesn't even know if there are plans to start trying. I'm not sure exactly why intelligence would undermine Bush in this way, but that is certainly what has happened. Possibly, this reflects divisions in the American state over how to deal with Iran. Of course, the administration has the chutzpah to claim that the report shows they were right all along and must continue their current policies, but they know it's a harder propaganda battle now. It's also important to recognise that this specifically undermines the virulently hawkish propaganda put out by Hillary Clinton in her campaign, an issue that has been costing her votes. Bear in mind, this woman actually accused the Bush administration of playing down the threat from Iran. You have to be far to the right to outflank the psychotics in the current US government, but she fucking managed it. Even with a report like this, the Bush administration's so-what attitude and the fact that it's time is running out suggests that there may after all be an airstrike - don't forget that the big casus belli, the one that is being prepared far more assiduously than the noocular threat is the claim that Iran is helping kill US soldiers in Iraq. And you can expect some preemptive strikes on Iran's human rights record (from the Bush administration, of all people) in preparation for any attack - not because it would make any attack literally comprehensible, but as an attempt to confuse and to some extent defuse opposition. If I were an Iranian, I would keep watching those skies.

Labels: iran, nuclear energy, US imperialism

We create our own reality. posted by Richard Seymour

(And this is what it looks like). The neoconservative boast gains yet more corroboration from the response to the IAEA's report [PDF] on Iran's nuclear energy programme. The report says Iran cooperated with inspectors, and has enriched uranium to about 4%, which is well below the 90% required to achieve weapons-grade material. Now, the Fars news agency reports that the US has been pressuring the IAEA to alter the report, which is not only probable but close to certainty. However, it transpires that this is unnecessary. The US has simply re-imagined the report to conform with its existing policy:

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said Tehran was guilty of "selective cooperation."

"This report sadly makes clear that Iran seems uninterested in working with the rest of the world," she said.

"The United States will work with our partners on the UN Security Council and Germany as we move towards a third set of Security Council sanctions," Perino said.

The report is partially about compliance with provisions of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, and partially about compliance with UN resolutions. It is not a secret - though it doesn't do to mention - that the US has openly spurned the former, while Iran's development of nuclear energy falls within its rights under the NPT, and that the US routinely ignores UN resolutions and uses its veto to block Security Council resolutions it doesn't like, (such is the imperial structure of the United Nations, lest we forget). However, imperial epistemology being what it is, you don't really know that. That's something you opinionate about, or give off in boilerplate rhetorical spasms about, if you happen to be a recalcitrant ideologue. True knowledge is attained through a sort of tantric abstraction, in which the vivid reality of Islamofascist nuclear destruction bearing down on the free world is imparted. Every New York Times columnist and wire service reporter meditates yogically on White House press releases until the vision of a radically Mahdically sporadically fervid Iranian president discharging eschatologically-guided missiles into American buildings is irreversibly instilled into the old intelligence simulation unit. So, as Iranian airspace is routinely violated, sanctions are prepared for non-threatening and otherwise permitted conduct, and a casus belli is prepared by the, er, robust interrogation of Iraqi prisoners, the next reality that every neoconservative dreams of moves closer. Whether the next President sparkles or scowls, Tehran will burn.

Labels: iaea, iran, nuclear energy, US imperialism