I wanted to introduce you guys to a new blogger. Well he is new to me, but he has been at it for awhile. He is one of the more prolific commenters over at Ace of Spades. He had some very interesting things to say about my posts over there and he is very good at knocking down Trolls. Luckily, I am small enough to not have Trolls…yet…but when I do get them, I hope he has my back.

Introducing Monty who runs Transmissions From The Heliopause.

His post today about Iran and the possibility of Russia doing the uranium enrichment is very insightful and is along the lines of some of the great back and forth at Ace’s the past few days.

The option would only defer action for a time (maybe even to several years), but it won’t solve anything. First, Iran could claim to be ending their enrichment activities but follow the DPRK’s lead and do it anyway. Second, they could use their reactor(s) as a breeder for plutonium and get a bomb that way. This offer by Russia is simply a face-saving measure for all the players involved, not a serious solution to the problem. The regime is still in power, it is the regime that is causing the danger, not the nuclear program per se. Any diplomatic solution that leaves the current Iranian regime in power with an intact nuclear program is no solution at all — it is simply a delaying tactic.

He brings up the wild card in this whole deadly dance, Israel.

What will they do? A lot of this will depend on their assessment of Iran’s progress towards a weapon, and their own chances of success in interdicting it.

My comment to his post partly reads:

One of the wins for Iran if they take this deal will be to help neutralize Israel. It breaks down like this: if Iran continues on its current path, then the world may actually understand why Israel needs to act. BUT. If Iran takes this deal and Israel rightly suspects that the Iranians are still working on a bomb, then the Israelis will attack. But the world will not understand nor back the need for the attack.

“Israel is a war monger, the Iranians are peaceful, and that is why they are letting Russia do the enrichment. They mean no harm”

Then, it will give Iran the cover to toss off previous agreements and work in the open towards a bomb. China and Russia will back them because the Iranians will claim the need for self defense against the Israelis.

But then again, when has Israel cared about world opinion?

This would be a wonderful debating exercise if the stakes were not so high.