FINALLY!

Over a dozen years later, my prediction of a decisive blow by Israel to take out Iran's nuclear capacity has finally come true. DEVELOPING . . .

War Party Headed for Iran?

My abilities to prognosticate the upcoming war with Iran are pretty dismal, as can be ascertained by clicking on the label Iran. But I did top off my fuel tank today, just before the price went up eight per cent. Here's what I'm thinking:

1. Iran already started a hot war by downing an unarmed American aircraft operating in international airspace. That's really all the grounds President Trump needed to shoot back, but he was persuaded not to. The Iranians had to know that if they attacked again, they would almost guarantee a military response, as diplomacy clearly hasn't worked.
2. Do something to America's oil supply, and you've poked her in the eye. American of course doesn't any longer depend on foreign oil herself, but her NATO allies sure do (especially with the North Sea fields drying up), and Iran has just poked NATO in the eye. Retaliation is almost certain.
3. It's a little early for a war to help the Republicans politically, so they may stall it off as long as necessary while frantically gearing up for a major action. But Britain could definitely use a distraction right now. France, Germany, and Greece would probably love an excuse to expel their Iranian guests. So I'm thinking that any  united NATO action would probably come sooner than later.

This wasn't the post I was planning for September, by the way.

The one man behind Israel's triumph over a nuclear Iran

If you browse through my Iran posts, which run a span of 36 months from 2012-2015, you will see repeated mention of Israel, "the Little Satan" which the Islamist regime in Iran is determined to destroy as a Zionist Entity. In a sense these posts were anticlimactic, as almost all the work done behind the scenes to destroy Iran's nuclear capability had already been completed under Mossad director Meir Dagan--and at the same time, the work done by American President Obama to allow Iran to re-arm had not yet come to fruition.  This book gives all sorts of details regarding what are widely recognized as Israeli victories in their undeclared covert war against Iran's nuclear program. If they are even close to being true, it demonstrates that covert warfare can accomplish the same goals as conventional warfare, with far fewer casualties and considerably less collateral damage.

Update: This Video mentions some details on the Mossad's similar campaign against the Iraqi nuclear program.

Turns out we were never at the brink of war with Iran, after all

Taking a break from my coverage of the Indiana Revival, I return to a topic which I covered heavily a few years ago: Iran's impending production of nuclear weapons, and the likelihood that Israel would attack to forestall it. This scenario made it into Joel Rosenburg's thriller The Tehran Initiative. But it turns out to have been largely based on Israeli misinformation: Netanyahu knew that Iran wasn't that close to having The Bomb.

 According to Spy Cables – a cache of hundreds of leaked secret intelligence papers from all over the world, published by Al Jazeera's Investigative Unit in collaboration with the Guardian newspaper – at the time of Netanyahu's statement, Israel's intelligence service concluded that Iran was "not performing the activity necessary to produce weapons," estimating that Iran had 100 kilograms of uranium enriched to a level of 20 percent.

It's a bit ironic, that the Telecommunications Revolution which has made it all the easier for the government to spy upon its citizens, has also made it a lot easier for citizens to spy upon their government.

And thus the History books continue to be rewritten, with yet another version of the story.

UPDATE MAY 2015
Something happened to the cookie settings on my computer, and Google won't let me comment again. This is in response to Marko:
Thanks for joining in. I don't dispute that Al Jazeera has an agenda--but so does every  news outlet. You have to listen to both sides to know what either is being less than truthful about.

Life is pretty frustrating if you're an Iranian nuclear scientist

Another mysterious explosion has leveled a building at an Iranian nuclear research site.
Before and after satellite photos here.

End Game in Iran

Three Ramadans have come and gone since I first started writing about "the impending war with Iran." I'm glad to say that none of my bellicose predictions have yet come true, but at the same time it's clear that war with Iran is at least as immanent as it ever was.

For the last year or so I've let my blogroll link to Joel Rosenberg's blog tell the story, but this time I'm going to comment directly on his latest post.

Denver, Colorado — Evidence is mounting that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is increasingly prepared to order a massive preemptive strike on Iran’s nuclear sites. Here’s why:

1. Iran aggressively pursuing two routes to nuclear weaponry, one via uranium enrichment, the other via plutonium.

2. Thus, Iran is steadily approaching the “red line,” the point at which Netanyahu has said Israel would have no choice but to strike.

3. Officials in Jerusalem do not see the Obama administration taking decisive action to prevent Iran from getting The Bomb.

4. To the contrary, Israel sees President Obama and Secretary John Kerry weakening their resolve and opening the door to indefinite negotiations with the new Rouhani administration, which they perceive as “moderate.”

5. Israeli military leaders believe they have the operational capabilities to destroy — or at least seriously damage — Iran’s nuclear program, but they have a shortening window of time, after which the task would be beyond Israel’s capabilities.

Now, the approaching deadline is the activation of the new plutonium-generating reactor in Arak. In the view of the US at least, the environmental damage caused by blowing up a working reactor would be unacceptable.

I'm beginning to doubt that such a threat would be enough to stop Israel at this point. Look at Operation Orchard--where the Israeli air force flew through Turkey to to Syria's norther desert and blew up a nuclear reactor being built by the North Koreans. Look at the numerous nuclear accidents in North Korea itself. It's clear that the aftermath of a nuclear catastrophe is no longer as unthinkable as it once was.

Which brings us to the matter of route and weapons. Israel is reported to have stowed MOABs at an airfield in Azerbaijan, which would allow a total fly-over of Iran without much of any warning. It's also possible that Israel would use low-yield nuclear warheads to permanently disable Iran's underground nuclear facilities, which are also far enough out in the desert to minimise the ecological fallout of such a strike.  I don't see an attack at this stage in the game being desperate enough to resort to that, though.

Yom Kippur War--lessons learned?

By the way, I've just finished extensively editing my Obama Chronology post, with so many details of fraud that I've added deception to the post labels. Both of Barack Obama' parents gave fraudulent dates when filling out government paperwork, and if there's one thing his mother apparently couldn't stand to do, it was to actually live with any man she was married to. Barack never lived in the same home as his mother and father, nor for all but a handful of years of their 15-year marriage, his mother and stepfather. It appears that the vast majority of his childhood was spent in his grandparent's home, usually with his mother present but never her husband.

Now, on to today's topic.

Joel Rosenberg had an article a few days ago about how the Israeli government was blind-sided by their refusal to prepare for the Yom Kippur War of 1973 (by the way, I remember what I was doing on that fateful day. I was sitting in my parents' bedroom staring at the radio as word was relayed that Israel had been attacked--it was the first time I had ever heard the term 'Yom Kippur'). Anyway, heads rolled big time after Israel found itself the closest it had come to annihilation since its initial war of independence.

It's my considered opinion, based on what I have read, that the top echelon of Israel's leadership actually knew the war was coming (even down to the day it would start) but refused to act pre-emptively because they thought it would greatly improve their world standing if they were attacked first.

Apparently,  the powers that be are not about to make the same mistake again--but they do seem to be holding off a pre-emptive strike on Iran until the very last minute, for the same reasons they didn't attack at all before the Yom Kippur War--they harbour a desire, however futile it may be, not to be seen as the bad guys.

Massive mobilization in Jerusalem?

I received a rumour by email today that Israel is gearing up for war in a massive way. The email started out,

"WHILE I'M UNABLE TO VERIFY THIS REPORT. . ."

and continued,

"My friend's brother and his family live in Jerusalem - he is a minister and former Navy SEAL, with an office located close to one of Israel's largest underground military bases. Calling last night, which is very unusual - usually it is email, to say that he is sending his family back to the US immediately due to what he is seeing occur within the last week and what is being inferred by his military contacts in both there and US, noting he is seeing military movements the likes of which he has never seen in his 20+ years in Israel. What he called a massive redeployment and protective tactics of forces is underway."

Okay, folks, we need go no further. This email has all the hallmarks of a hoax:

1. The sender is passing on something he received originating from someone that he doesn't know personally, but is a 'brother' of some 'friend' way up the line.

2. The account can't be verified, but is so urgent as to require immediate action.

3. The source of the report is identified as someone we should be able to trust: a minister; and someone who should know what he's talking about: a former SEAL.

4.No names or dates are mentioned. Were the technology available, this email could have been floating around since 1973 and we'd have no way of knowing it.

So, there you have it, folks. It's a hoax. Don't believe a word of it. If you want to know what's going on in Jerusalem, ask Google News. Or call the Israeli consulate closest to you and ask if they're accepting any volunteers for a special foreign legion unit in the IDF.

If things really were that desperate, they probably would be.

Added only an hour later:
I may have actually managed to strangle this rumour in the cradle. This post was just viewed by someone at a major international news outlet.

Much ado about Iran

I'm copying here various news articles from the Times of Israel, to give an idea of how the Iranian threat, and the appropriate response to it, are perceived in Israel and the USA: http://israeli-defense-officials-iran-won't-hit-back-at-us-targets-if-israeli-attacks

Tehran is not interested in raising the stakes in its standoff with Israel and would not strike US targets if Israel were to attack its nuclear program, Channel 10 news reported Wednesday, quoting unnamed senior Israeli defense officials. Contrary to previous assessments that Iran would turn an Israeli attack into an all-out regional war — involving the US and its Middle Eastern allies — current wisdom holds that it would avoid drawing the US into battle and settle for retaliating solely against Israel, the report quoted the officials as saying.

i-dont-want-to-be-complicit-in-a-strike-on-iran-says-us-army-chief

The US does not want to be “complicit” in an Israeli strike that “probably” would not only fail to destroy Iran’s nuclear program, but could also undo international diplomatic pressure on Tehran, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staffs General Martin Dempsey said Thursday in London. An attack by Israel would “clearly delay but probably not destroy Iran’s nuclear program,” Dempsey said, adding: ”I don’t want to be complicit if they [Israel] choose to do it.”
The US’s top general – the Guardian reported – said that he could not presume to know Iran’s ultimate intentions in pursuing a nuclear program, as intelligence was inconclusive on that score.
It was clear, however, he maintained, that mounting pressure from the American-led “international coalition…could be undone if [Iran] was attacked prematurely.” Last week, Dempsey said that Israel and the US did not see eye to eye on the Iranian nuclear threat, admitting that Washington and Jerusalem were on “different clocks” regarding Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. He noted, however, that he understood Israel’s urgency in calling for action against Iran’s nuclear program. “They are living with an existential concern that we are not living with,” he acknowledged, according to AFP.

http://www.timesofisrael.com/in-sharp-rebuttal-un-secretary-general-ban-ki-moon-denounces-iranian-threats-to-israel-and-denial-of-the-holocaust

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon delivered a sharp rebuttal to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Thursday, after Khamenei delivered a speech denouncing Israel, the UN and the US at the Non-Aligned Movement summit in Tehran. “I strongly reject any threat by any [UN] member state to destroy another, or outrageous comments to deny historical facts such as the Holocaust,” Ban said. “Claiming another UN member state does not have the right to exist or describe it in racist terms is not only utterly wrong but undermines the very principles we have all promised to uphold,” the UN chief added. Khamenei, who has final say on all state matters in Iran, accused Israel of being made up of “bloodthirsty wolves,” a day after Ban asked the cleric to tone down his rhetoric against Israel.

What? Time for another Iran update already?

Yes, as things heat up toward the end I expect to report every significant piece of news. This one isn't so much news, as speculative editorial, but look at the source--it's not an Obama Administration leak nor an Israeli press interview, but someone currently on the "outside" who ought to know what he's talking about:

F. Michael Maloof, staff writer for WND and G2Bulletin, is a former senior security policy analyst in the office of the secretary of defense.

 Okay, so the gist of his speculation is that evidence points to, on one hand, a sudden "Middle Eastern"  concern about hardening military infrastructure against an Electromagnetic Pulse attack; on the other hand, some cryptic hints from Israel that Iran is entering a "zone of immunity" from military attack.

Given that we were told years ago that Iran would "soon" have both an operational nuclear program and immunity to it being attacked, it's likely that this is a reference to the ability of Israel to shut down Iran's electrical grid. I wrote about this last November, when the weapon of choice was thought to be a drone that would harmlessly shut down power temporarily. Now the thinking is that a high-altitude nuclear explosion would not just shut down the grid, but permanently disable every piece of electronic equipment within 250 miles of Isfahan--preventing a launch order from being able to get through.

Whatever the case, I can't imagine that any attack scenario would be without one or the other element.

A Nuclear Iran only six weeks away--unless Israel stops it

I could be commenting on a daily basis on the buildup of the Persio-Israeli war, but I hate to overstate the obvious: unless Iran stops working on a nuclear weapon with which to target Israel, it will be attacked before the year is out. Period.

Regardless of how the National Election goes in the United States--helped by the fact that Romney is leading both in fundraising and at the poll, and that the next cover of Newsweek will contain a death knell for a Second Obama Administration--Israel is prepared to go it alone in defence of its national existence. And DEBKAfile has reported that Iran is within about six weeks of having 250 kilograms of 20-percent grade uranium, exactly enough to build its first nuclear bomb.

That deadline prompted Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s comment Sunday, Aug. 12: “All threats against the home front are dwarfed by one – Iran must not be allowed to have nuclear arms!” Hence the leak by an unnamed Israeli security source Sunday, Aug. 12, disclosing Iran’s progress in developing the detonator and fuses for a nuclear warhead ready for the Shehab-3 ballistic missiles capable of reaching Israel.

The Obama administration continues to waffle about its willingness to stand by Israel when the preemptive attack occurs; apparently they think they have the Jewish Vote sewed up, or that by such posturing they can postpone any such attack until after the November Elections. But Israel is not going to wait; November may well be to late.

So, we have three forces at work:
1) In Iran, government forces are feverishly working to have an operational nuclear-tipped missile capable of striking Dimona as soon as possible. The sooner they can launch it, the less Israel will be prepared.
 2) In Israel, government forces are feverishly preparing for long-distance strikes against Bushehr, Natanz, and/or Fordo, and the retaliatory strikes sure to come from Iran, Lebanon, and possibly Syria and even Egypt. The sooner they can launch them, the less likelihood of Iran having a nuclear weapon to with which to shoot back.
3) In America, government forces are simultaneously:
a) working to undermine Iran's capability for a nuclear first strike
b) working to undermine Israel's ability to launch a surprise preemptive strike
c) working to arm Israel against the Iranian attack which is sure to come, whether or not Israel strikes first.

The war only awaits a convergence of All Systems Are Go signals from Israel and at least one of the other two countries. Should the US and Israel agree on an attack, it will commence forthwith. Should Iran reach the level of preparedness that Israel is at, the preemptive strike will be launched unilaterally. The only other possibility is that Iran is further ahead than anyone knows, and will preemptively launch the first nuclear-tipped missile ever to be used in warfare.

If that does happen, it's going to be in the next few weeks.

Iran: all systems are go

With the release of $70 million in funds to strengthen the Iron Dome (like most of America's moves lately, accomplished by executive fiat rather than congressional vote) all systems are now go for the attack--with the glaring exception of the recent breakup of Likud, easily reversible once the war actually starts.

New computer virus hits Iran?

This may be true, or may be a hoax. We shall see.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- Iran's nuclear facilities have suffered a cyber attack that shut down computers and played music from the rock band AC/DC, the F-Secure Security Labs website says.
A new worm targeted Iran's nuclear program, closing down the "automation network" at the Natanz and Fordo facilities, the Internet security site reported, citing an email it said was sent by a scientist inside Iran's Atomic Energy Organization.
Mikko Hypponen, chief security officer at F-Secure Security Labs and the person involved in the correspondence, said he received three emails on July 22 from an individual with an aeoi.org.ir e-mail address, receiving replies after he responded. After researching the person's name on the Internet, Hypponen said he found "plenty of nuclear science papers and articles published by someone with this name."

A replay of Judges chapter seven--or First Samuel thirteen?

(Virginia Beach, June 19, 2012) -- "Iran, Russia, China and Syria will hold the Middle East's largest ever war game, Iranian news outlets reported quoting unnamed sources," reports the Jerusalem Post. "According to the report, 90,000 troops, 400 warplanes and 1,000 tanks from the four countries will take part in land and sea exercises. The war games will feature Russian atomic submarines, according to Iranian media, as well as warships, aircraft carriers and mine-clearing destroyers. Semi-official Iranian FARS news agency stated that the exercise was being planned in coordination with Egypt, which recently acceded to grant the passage of 12 Chinese warships through the Suez Canal. The report stated that the Chinese naval convoy is due to dock in Syrian harbors within the next two weeks. Regarding the timing of the planned exercise, FARS quoted unnamed Syrian officials as saying the war game would be held 'soon'."

If--and it's a big if--if Israel decides to go it alone without backing from the US--OR if the US is only posturing about not letting Israel attack Iran--this would be a good time to do it. Military operations turn out to be most effective when they are carried out right when the enemy is most strenuously preparing for them by carrying out a full-scale simulation. Then it becomes almost impossible to tell simulation from reality, or opfor from enemy. If any shots end up being fired at the Israelis, some of them will most certainly end up hitting either the Russians or the Chinese. And vice versa.

Just saying. Because I do have some readers in ha-eretz.

This just in . . . MOSCOW (Reuters) - World powers and Iran failed to secure a breakthrough at talks on Tehran's nuclear program on Tuesday and set no date for more political negotiations, despite the threat of a new Middle East conflict if diplomacy collapses.

So, maybe it's not such a big 'if' after all.

The Persio-American War: Yet another report on not much to report

Now that June is half over and nothing much is happening, I thought I'd weigh in on the Iran war issue. DEBKA keeps telling us two things: One, that the Iranian government continues to stop short of launching a full-fledged weapons development program--although they have enriched enough uranium by now (up to 27%, far above the 3-4% needed for fuel grade) that when they do, it will be more like six to eight weapons being developed simultaneously; second, that it is primarily heavy pressure from President Obama that has held them back as Iran continues to pass the various milestones on its way to launching a weapons program.

Now, to its embarrassment, the Obama administration has admitted its role in the Stuxnet virus. Just how close this secretive account is to the truth we can't be sure, but since Israel all along has been hinting at its role, we now know our suspicions to be more or less correct.

Given that the US and Israel have been working together on the cyberwarfare front, it's clear that they have a united agenda in physically taking out Iran's nuclear capability, and any assault on that front will be a joint effort.

One last note: the success of Stuxnet on the one hand, and targeted assassinations on the other, show that the Israeli/American axis has an incredible intelligence reach. When an Iranian nuclear scientist sneezes, they know whether or not it's because he has a cold. It's unlikely, especially given the wide success of Flame, that there is any development in the Iranian nuclear program which the axis doesn't know in enough detail to guide the deadline for moving this war from the virtual to the actual.

And by the way: determining just when Flame intel started to pour into Ft. Meade should be pretty easy: just look for a big uptick in enrollment at the Basic Farsi programs of the Defense Foreign Language Institute.

First Stuxnet, then DuQu, now Flame.

Another virus has been found to be targeting Iran's computers. This one, Flame, isn't so much taking over or damaging, but simply spying.

Israel lines up landing sites for upcoming Iran raid

The irresistible force draws ever nearer to the immovable object. Woe to him who stands between.

UPDATE APRIL 27 from DEBKAFile
Israel’s Defense Minister Ehud Barak arrived in Washington Thursday, April 19 with tough questions for US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta about the administration’s dialogue with Iran, on the lines of, “What’s going on? Is there a deal? Don’t tell me what you have settled with the Iranians, just your minimal demands, your bottom line.” The questions reflected Israel’s concern at being kept in the dark about US-Iranian back-track negotiations and American concessions, including President Barak Obama’s willingness to yield on full transparency and international nuclear watchdog inspections at Iran’s nuclear sites. According to our sources, they focused on the fresh intelligence reaching the US and the International Atomic Energy Agency that Iran has begun moving military nuclear facilities to secret locations not covered in the confidential deal evolving between the Obama administration and Tehran.

UPDATE AUGUST 6 2012
Now reports indicate that the existence of backup landing sites in Azerbaijan was leaked by the Obama administration in an attempt to head off any Israeli use of these sites.

USA trained Iranian assasins at secret camp in Nevada

The story is all on this blog.

Persio-Israeli war update

I try not to overburden my readers with the latest updates on the impending Persio-American war (now in its third year of immanency), but there's another twist to the situation that isn't being talked about much: the proxy nature of the Syrian Civil War. With offensive weapons from Iran and a Russian missile shield, Bashir al Assad had nearly succeeded in wiping out his opposition. But then the Saudis stepped in, with more arms trucked in across Jordan.

So what is shaping up is a Shia-Sunni struggle for the control of the Caliphate, with the Shia forces of Iran and Syria on one side, and the Sunni-ruled states of the Gulf Coast Cooperative on the other. And this is already a hot war, even without Israel and America joining the Sunni side. But things are looking better and better for a Saudi air corridor opening up for Israeli jets to fly unimpeded to within a few minutes flight of Iran's nuclear reactor.

One other twist: it's in Russia's best interests, as an oil exporting nation, for turmoil in the Mideast to cut off the flow of oil through the Straits of Hormuz and thus drive up the price of crude. The present conflict plays right into their hands, so now we have an erstwhile Superpower interested in keeping up the conflict with or without the involvement of their erstwhile rival, the United States.

GabeToday has gone dark, so I'm passing on his last 2 posts here, until such a time as he comes back up.

MONDAY, MARCH 5, 2012

SECONDS BEFORE MIDNIGHT

Despite all the pre-election talk, Barack Hussein Obama will not lift a finger to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power. 

Beyond getting re-elected, he is not interested in listening to anything that anyone is saying- from any side. 

He will not do anything tangible to cut off the head of the Iranian snake.

Notwithstanding the AIPAC pronouncements and the subsequent White House meetings, the net sum of the outcome will be, that Iran will possess the bomb and unlike the Koreans who can temporarily be bought with food aid to keep their bomb in the basement, the Iranians can and will use theirs in some form, to ensure the survival of their regime.

And therein lays the Gordian knot. 

Due to complete military and political impotency, America and the West are unable to effect a regime change in Teheran- the only hope of stopping the Islamic nuclear train. 

If you have doubts about it, just look at the net results of all the recent talk and no tangible action in Syria. 

When everything is said and done, Bashar Assad will stay in power because the West became a toothless, impotent paper tiger. Vladimir Putin knows it, the Chinese know it and the Islamo-Fascists in Teheran know it.

While all the talk was focused on whether or not Obama will or will not help Israel launch a pre-emptive attack on Iran, it seems that most parties forgot the sad truth: that since the end of WWII, with all its might, the United States consistently failed to successfully bring to conclusion a single military action that would have resulted in a meaningful regime change anywhere on the Globe.

The still divided and problematic Korea frozen in the 1950s impasse, the utter US fiasco in Viet Nam that resulted in 58,151 American dead, the mess in Afghanistan, the Islamic bomb in Pakistan and the shameful failures in even over-turning the regime of the nuisance that is Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, (not to mention the irritating longevity of the Communist regime of dictator Fidel Castro) should be reason enough for the Jews to understand, that asking America’s protection for a false sense of security is a hopeless pipedream.

While the “war on terror”, the hanging of Saddam, the lynching of Qaddafi the secret elimination of Bin Laden, the jailing of Mubarak, the betrayal of Hariri and the beefing up the stature of the megalomaniac Turkish clown Erdogan generally played well in the media, in the eyes of the world America allowed itself to be tragically marginalized to the point of no return.

With Putin and his KGB ideology and oil wealth intact- now back in the saddle, the iron-willed Chinese ambitions going unchecked- and a rotting and scared Saudi regime sitting on the oil tap, with a second unpredictable Islamic nuclear power about to enter the scene, no Western nation can safely sit on its laurels, no matter who is elected in November in Washington.

Israel’s leaders would be well advised to take their destiny into their own hands and do whatever is necessary on their own to ensure the survival of their state. 

Those who ask why, should remember, that a short few decades ago US-led Allies refused to bomb the rail lines leading to Auschwitz as it was not in their strategic interest at the time.

And we all know the results.

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2012

The time has come to act!

With a de facto nuclear Iran promising to make Israel disappear from the map, and the US administration way too preoccupied with getting re-elected while naively still talking embargoes, it looks like Israel will have to go it alone.

To be sure, no one wants to see this happen.

Back in 2004 when I told Presidential hopeful Howard Dean about Iran posing an “existential threat” to Israel, even some Jewish leaders present in the room referred to me as “unrealistic”.

The same year during the preparation of the approaching 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz where my entire family was murdered, I repeated my prediction of an “existential threat” from a fundamentalist Iran to Slava Kantor the president of the European Jewish Congress, and he too at first dismissed my opinion.

Ironically, in later years he based his entire public career on the foundation of my theory.

Subsequently, based on my urging, Kantor became President of the International Luxembourg Forum on Preventing Nuclear Catastrophe.

Later in 2004 I recall, that over a friendly lunch hosted in a private home in New York to welcome Austrian Presidential hopeful Benita Ferrero-Waldner who served as the European Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighborhood Policy, I got into a heated argument with the naïve European politician.

I made the point, that the Holocaust could happen due to the existence two basic components: an ideology (as spelled out in Hitler’s “Mein Kampf”) and Nazi Germany’s latest technology at the time-pressed into service to carry out the resulting “Final Solution”.

I pointed it out to the polite but tragically naive European leader, that Ahmadinejad’s genocidal fundamentalist threat to wipe Israel off the map, is only awaiting the second necessary component: the technology to carry it out.

At the time, I was nearly asked by my clearly embarrassed hosts to leave the table for my remarks.

On October 26, 2005 Mahmud Ahmadinejad at he infamous "World Without Zionism"conference in Asia, delivered his “Israel must be wiped off the map” speech, he finally spelled it out for the world to hear: “Our dear Imam (referring to Ayatollah Khomeini) said that the occupying regime must be wiped off the map and this was a very wise statement. Is it possible to create a new front in the heart of an old front. This would be a defeat and whoever accepts the legitimacy of this regime has in fact, signed the defeat of the Islamic world. Our dear Imam targeted the heart of the world oppressor in his struggle, meaning the occupying regime. I have no doubt that the new wave that has started in Palestine, and we witness it in the Islamic world too, will eliminate this disgraceful stain from the Islamic world.”

Suddenly my earlier predictions took on a new meaning.

Which brings us back to today’s situation.

While busily screwing up the entire Middle East with the idiotically false promises of the “Arab Spring”, the sad fact is that Barack Hussein Obama never had the testicular fortitude to rein in the real enemies of freedom: the fundamentalist nut jobs in Iran and their cheering section in Venezuela and other places.

Even when presented with hard evidence of Iranian missiles with unconventional payloads being readied to be lobbed at the American heartland, the White House is pretending that it is not happening.

The net result of US impotence: Israel now finds itself having to face a looming existential threat alone.

Every time Israel’s leaders approach the point of decision, Barack Obama promptly dispatches his most senior military and intelligence chiefs to jerk Israel’s chain, as to not upset his seemingly singular priority: his re-election aspirations.

Over recent months I had several first hand opportunities to speak with the most senior levels of military, intelligence and political leaders in Israel and the more I spoke with them, the more concerned I grew.

Diplomatic efforts, sanctions and public pronouncements aside, something concrete needs to be done soon.

In the meantime, Israel must get ready to face the inevitable.

This weekend, the Jewish nation took an important step in that direction by appointing a very capable and charismatic leader as the new commander of the Israel Air Force.

The appointment of a new air force chief traditionally makes headlines in Israel, but this time the appointment is particularly compelling, due to the very real and imminent possibility that this commander will be ordered by the government to oversee a preventive strike on Iran’s well-protected and distant nuclear infrastructure.

A seasoned military officer, 53 year old Major General Amir Eshel is the right man to be at the controls in facing a nuclear Iran. Eshel is a capable military leader with an impressive record as a professional soldier.

If his name sounds familiar, it is; because General Eshel was the leader of the memorable Israel Air Force flyover in the gray skies over the Auschwitz concentration camp in 2003.

His words broadcast over the radio of his F-16 aircraft emblazoned with the blue Star of David - flying over the ashes of his ancestors incinerated by hatred - now take on an ominous new meaning in today’s Israel threatened by nuclear annihilation at the hands of the Islamo-Faschist madmen of Teheran.

As his plane ducked in low over the infamous Nazi death camp, Eshel, the son of Holocaust survivors, read out the following statement which was broadcast on the ground: “We pilots of the Air Force, flying in the skies above the camp of horrors, arose from the ashes of the millions of victims and shoulder their silent cries, salute their courage and promise to be the shield of the Jewish people and its nation Israel."

Powerful words.

Powerful emotions.

Powerful motivation.