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Iran’s “Moderates” by Dan Rabkin Friday, March 28, 2008 With US Vice President Dick Cheney wrapping up his 10-day trip to the Middle East, made in part to allay regional fears of a growing Iranian influence, the Iranians themselves are busy preparing for the second round of parliamentary elections to be held in April (the first round was held on March 14th). The results, of course, have been known for a while: the conservatives will continue with their stranglehold on power. But there are still two very important reasons to follow this race. The first is the fact that the...

Russia Says Iran Needs No Uranium Enrichment December 26, 2007 Ron Popeski/ Reuters MOSCOW -- Russia's delivery of nuclear fuel to the Bushehr power station makes it unnecessary for Iran to pursue its enrichment programme, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was quoted as saying on Wednesday. Lavrov, interviewed by the Moscow daily Vremya Novostei, also said any suggestion of "regime change" in Tehran had to be ruled out in discussions on verifying Iran's nuclear programme. "We believe that Iran has no economic need to proceed with its programme of uranium enrichment," Lavrov told the daily. "We are trying to persuade...

Regime Change, Peacefully We must continue to support the Iranian people. October 24, 2007 National Review Online Rick Santorum An effort is underway in Washington to cut the funding for the pro-democracy movement inside Iran authorized last Congress by the Iran Freedom Support Act (IFSA). IFSA authorizes the president to provide financial and political assistance to foreign and domestic individuals, organizations, and entities working for the purpose of supporting and promoting democracy for Iran. In order to receive financial backing, these individuals and groups must support four basic pillars of democracy — freedom of the press, freedom of speech, freedom...

In a green valley nestled between snow-capped peaks in the Kurdish autonomous region of northern Iraq is an armed camp of revolutionaries preparing to overthrow the Islamic Republic of Iran. Men with automatic weapons stand watch on the roofs of the houses. Party flags snap in the wind. Radio and satellite TV stations beam illegal news, commentary, and music into homes and government offices across the border. The compound resembles a small town more than a base, with corner stores, a bakery, and a makeshift hospital stocked with counterfeit medicine. From there the rebels can see for miles around and...

Options on Iran September 05, 2007 The Washington Times Editorial With the Islamist regime in Tehran making clear that it has no intention of complying with U.N. Security Council resolutions on its nuclear weapons program, U.S. policy-makers appear to have yet come up with a clear response (judging from the public record.) Every major American politician, whether Democrat or Republican, says that Iran cannot be allowed to obtain nuclear weapons. President Bush last week stated the case with more urgency than anyone else, describing Iran's actions in Iraq as "murderous" and warning that Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons technology "threatens...

KARACHI - A civilian president with the power to handle national security and foreign affairs and a prime minister as chief executive is the new Washington and London formula for regime change in Pakistan. This has been agreed to in principle by President General Pervez Musharraf and former premier Benazir Bhutto, Asia Times Online has confirmed. The arrangement for the United States' key ally in the "war on terror" is intended to lead to a jacking up of the fight against terror with zero tolerance.

Across the world, a dangerous rumor has spread that could have catastrophic implications. According to legend, Iran's president has threatened to destroy Israel, or, to quote the misquote, "Israel must be wiped off the map." Contrary to popular belief, this statement was never made. On Tuesday, October 25th, 2005 at the Ministry of Interior conference hall in Tehran, newly elected Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad delivered a speech at a program, reportedly attended by thousands, titled "The World Without Zionism." Large posters surrounding him displayed this title prominently in English, obviously for the benefit of the international press. Below the poster's...

The latest Presidential National Security Directive names the Islamic Republic of Iran as the greatest threat to international peace, security and stability. That is principally because permitting the foremost state-sponsor of terrorism to acquire nuclear weapons is unthinkable. What has changed from Herman Kahn’s era is that mutual assured destruction (MAD) worked against a rival that defined its interests in this material world. Messrs. Khamenei, Ahmadinejad and many of their cohorts do not. How can assured destruction deter those who glorify self-destruction and call it martyrdom? Just as suicide bombing has changed domestic security policies, dealing with the nuclearization of...

Iranian Discontent May Well Bring Regime Change by Larry Kelley 04/23/2007 News coming from Iran these days runs the gamut from the specter of the terrorist/rogue state poised to acquire nuclear weapons to the hopeful defection and disappearance of one of its top military men, Gen. Ashgari. [See “Defector Could Be Key to Regime Change in Iran,” by Lt. Gen. Tom McInerney] The media seem to be overwhelmed by this 1938-like moment and not up to the task of reporting a story so multifaceted and so frightening. Perhaps this is because the events assume a fiction-like aura. Missing is one...

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's hard-line president proposed Monday to hold public talks with President Bush on a wide range of issues, without saying whether that included international suspicions of the Iranian nuclear program or allegations of Iranian meddling in Iraq. "Last year, I announced readiness for a televised debate over global issues with his excellency Mr. Bush. And now we announce that I am ready to negotiate with him about bilateral issues as well as regional and international issues," Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying on the Web site of Al-Alam, Iran's state-run Arabic satellite television channel. The Iranian leader...

Regime Change or Behavior Change: A false choice. Ladies and gentlemen, distinguished guests good afternoon. Allow me to express my gratitude for the invitation to be with you today. To many of you whom I know personally, I extend my admiration and respect for the great work you have done over the years. To those I meet for the first time, thank you for letting me have the privilege of getting to know you. The Hudson Institute’s proud tradition of service to world peace includes the great work of those, like Herman Kahn, who dared to “think the unthinkable.” You...

The Way We Dealt with the Soviets Is the Way To Deal with Iran By Michael A. Ledeen Posted: Monday, March 12, 2007 ARTICLES Parliamentary Brief (March 2007) Publication Date: March 9, 2007 Of the many errors committed by Western governments and their intelligence services in the run-up to Operation Iraqi Freedom, none was so grave as a fundamental error of strategic vision: the failure to recognize we would automatically be involved in a regional war, not simply a battle against the regime of Saddam Hussein. We imagined that Afghanistan was secure and that we could deal with Iraq all...

The Wider War MICHAEL LEDEEN March 3, 2007 (excerpt) "We have decided to fight in one place at a time, secure that area, and then move on. That isn't good enough, because it gives our enemies the luxury of attacking us where, when and how they choose. Neither Iraq nor Afghanistan will ever have decent security so long as we only play defense; we have to attack our enemies when we wish, not respond to their initiatives, and their most important operational bases are outside Iraq and Afghanistan." (excerpt) "It doesn't require more boots on the ground or bombing raids....

For now, the nutty recommendation of the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group that the United States should engage in direct talks with Syria and Iran appears to have been mooted by events on the ground. U.S. military forces have caught Iran red-handed – twice – over the past few weeks in Iraq, No one can possibly doubt any longer what I and many others have been saying for some time: that Iran is involved on the ground in Iraq and is aiding both Sunni and Shia insurgents in an effort to blow that country apart.  But like all bad ideas in...

Covert US group plots to isolate 'rising' Iran Farah Stockman, Washington January 3, 2007 A SELECT group of US officials has been quietly co-ordinating actions for nearly a year to counter the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran, including increasing the military capabilities of Arab allies such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. The group, known as the Iran Syria Policy and Operations Group, is also giving covert help to Iranian dissidents and building international outrage towards Iran by publicising its alleged role in a 1994 terrorist attack in Argentina. Pentagon officials involved with the group intend to...

The first step toward understanding the Iranian “elections” is that they weren’t. Elections, that is, at least in our common understanding of the term, namely the people vote and the counters count those votes and so we find out what the people want. That’s not what happens in Iran, where both the candidates and the results are determined well in advance of the casting of ballots. Yes, people get mobilized and go to the polls and mark their ballots and put them in the ballot box. But then Groucho comes into play: “I’ve got ballots. And if you don’t like...

Editor, the Tribune: Please read "Overthrow" by Stephen Kinzer. Most Americans think we are the good guys. We know we provide aid to other countries and send millions of dollars when there is a tsunami, volcanic eruption, famine and other catastrophes. We do, but what else have we done to other nations? The book "Overthrow" reports on 14 regime changes the United States has forced on other nations. George W. Bush isn’t the first to overthrow the leader of a sovereign country. Kinzer starts with Hawaii in 1893, when we ousted Queen Liliuokalani so American sugar growers could expand. We...

HAVANA (Reuters) - Two senior Cuban officials charged on Wednesday that a report on the communist nation delivered to the Bush administration's National Security Council amounted to a blueprint for an Iraq-style regime change in the Caribbean. "We are facing a real threat of aggression," National Assembly President Ricardo Alarcon said of the Commission for Assistance to a Free Cuba's report, flashing a draft he said had appeared briefly on the U.S. State Department's web page, to a national television and radio audience. The report, ordered by President George W. Bush and delivered but not made public on Wednesday, focuses...

The grandson of Ayatollah Khomeini, the inspiration of Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution, has broken a three-year silence to back the United States military to overthrow the country's clerical regime. Hossein Khomeini's call is all the more startling as he made it from Qom, the spiritual home of Iran's Shia strand of Islam, during an interview to mark the 17th anniversary of the ayatollah's death. "My grandfather's revolution has devoured its children and has strayed from its course," he told Al-Arabiya, an Arabic-language television station. "I lived through the revolution and it called for freedom and democracy - but it has...

Was trolling through truthout for a laugh and came across this analysis by one of their brilliant scholars. Even though I know my history, to have it put down in such a concise manner, I couldn't help but appreciate how the right has always done what is right, even though it wasn't popular. Always thanks to the men and women who serve our country. Please note the comment about the current Iraq situation. Notice he didn't call it regime change. They can't stand the truth at truthout. (1) Regime Change in Iran (1953) the Shah replacing democratically elected Mossadegh; Eisenhower...

POTOMAC, Maryland (Reuters) - The exiled son of Iran's late shah on Monday called on the Bush administration to put action before rhetoric in ousting Tehran's Islamic regime, which he said has long been the source of global instability. Reza Pahlavi, 45, the eldest son of the late Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, said Iranians are ready to actively oppose the Islamic regime of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but need more than pro-democratic utterances from world leaders like U.S. President George W. Bush. "Fantastic, we love to hear that, motherhood and apple pie," Pahlavi said of Bush's statements that the United States...

Reza Pahlavi, son of the late Shah of Iran, told the editors of HUMAN EVENTS last week that in the next two to three months he hopes to finalize the organization of a movement aimed at overthrowing the Islamic regime in Tehran and replacing it with a democratic government. He believes the cause is urgent because of the prospect that Iran may soon develop a nuclear weapon or the U.S. may use military force to preempt that. He hopes to offer a way out of this dilemma: a revolution sparked by massive civil disobedience in which the masses in the...

US and UK Develop Democracy Strategy for Iran April 21, 2006 The Financial Times Guy Dinmore The US and UK are working on a strategy to promote democratic change in Iran, according to officials who see the joint effort as the start of a new phase in the diplomatic campaign to counter the Islamic republic’s nuclear programme without resorting to military intervention. A newly created Iran Syria Operations Group inside the State Department is co-ordinating the work and reporting to Elizabeth Cheney, the senior US official leading democracy promotion in the broader Middle East. “Democracy promotion is a rubric to...

U.S. Seeks a 'Change' in Tehran April 15, 2006 The New York Times Steven R. Weisman WASHINGTON -- As the Bush administration confronts the Tehran government over its suspected nuclear weapons program and its alleged support for terrorism, a newly created office of Iranian affairs in the State Department is poring over applications for a rapidly expanding program to change the political process inside Iran. The project, which is slated to spend $7 million in the current fiscal year, would become many times larger next year if Congress approves a broad request for $85 million that the Bush administration wants...

Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam, has called for regime change in the United States. Speaking on Monday, he denounced US policies as wicked because they turned the world against America. "We need a new government, we need regime change in America," he said at the end of a visit to Cuba. Farrakhan, who led the Million Man March on the Washington Mall in 1995 to promote black self-reliance, said the Bush administration's domestic policies were "sucking the blood of the poor and the weak". The controversial African American leader defended Iran's right to develop a nuclear...

A direct appeal by President George W. Bush to the Iranian people to “win your own freedom” was a barely disguised call for regime change in Iran, raising the question of whether the US will turn to covert action to support internal opposition, analysts said on Wednesday. In his State of the Union address on Tuesday night, Mr Bush saved his toughest remarks for Iran, calling it “a nation now held hostage by a small clerical elite that is isolating and repressing its people”. “Let me speak directly to the citizens of Iran: America respects you, and we respect your...

If an air and missile strike could destroy Iran's nuclear weapons program, it might seem the best of many bad options. But the likely costs outweigh the benefits.

No one would argue that Stephen Harper, leader of Canada's Conservative party, is charismatic or telegenic. Indeed, even the newly elected prime-minister-designate acknowledged as much in the last party leaders' debate, telling viewers in his typically understated manner that his strengths weren't "spin and passion." But he does have other qualities. First and foremost: The man is gutsy. Taking the biggest political risk of his career, Stephen Harper forced an election in early December when he trailed the most successful political party in the Western world by more than seven percent in some polls. On Monday Canadians voted, handing a...

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a potential 2008 Republican presidential candidate, says Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is as great a threat today as German dictator Adolf Hitler was in 1935, and the United States should not wait to help bring about a regime change in Iran. "If we don’t have a very serious systematic program to replace the government of Iran, we’re going to live in an unbelievably dangerous world," Gingrich said during an exclusive interview with HUMAN EVENTS. "This is 1935 and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is as close to Adolf Hitler as we’ve seen. We now know who they are;...

U.S. Think Tank calls for "Regime Change" in Iran January 24, 2006 Iran va Jahan US think tank "The Committee on the Present Danger" (CPD) has called for "Regime Change in Iran". "Nearly a century ago, Iran adopted a constitution that established freedoms for its citizens - that have been lost. The Ruling regime sponsors terrorism, represses human rights, jails dissidents, oppresses women, and is determined to have nuclear weopons. We believe the United States's policy objective must be regime change in Iran..." Committee on the Present Danger's New Iran Policy Paper http://www.fightingterror.org/pdfs/IranPaperJan23.pdf This organization, based in Washington, DC, has...

Regime Change, the only solution for a peaceful middle east? On Tuesday January 11, the IRI removed U.N. seals at uranium enrichment research facilities and announced it would resume "research and development” indifferent to the international objection particularly coming from the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, and France. While most of the international community seems to be in frenzy about this development, certain countries such as China has remained silent, while Russia has been publicly defending the IRI’s right to uranium enrichment, supposedly for civilian use as was stated in a recent article published in RIA Novosti. The major issue...

Damascus Daggerfest - Friday, January 13, 2006 @ 3:08:28 PM Syria fratricide update from trusted source. London and MI6 have hold of General Ali Dubah of the Syrian Air Force, who defected last week to give up the secrets of the al-Assads and to pose a deal for the regime change in Damascus. Ali Dubah offers Rifaat al-Assad, exiled brother of the dead king Hafez al-Assad. London favors this choice because it would team a restored Alawite regime with elements of the Sunni urban elite and also with the Druze of Lebanon and Syria -- the one constituency that London...

By stating his wish to see Ariel Sharon, “the criminal of Sabra and Shatilla dead and joining his ancestors”, the news Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad demonstrated that not only he is genuinely anti-Semite, but he has not the slightest human compassion and feeling. "Hopefully, the news that the criminal of Sabra and Chatilla has joined his ancestors is final", the extravagant, islamo-populist Ahmadinejad told hard line religious students in the holy city of Qom, known as the “cradle” of militant Shi’ism, where he took his cabinet for meeting on Thursday. His remark were so shocking that most of Iranian press,...

A former vice president of Syria called from exile for the overthrow of the regime he served for decades, saying Friday that "a shameless mafia" is running the country and that its president surrounds himself with sycophantic advisers and is unfit to rule. Abdul-Halim Khaddam, now accused by Syria of treason, stopped just short of accusing President Bashar Assad of involvement in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Khaddam told The Associated Press in an interview that Hariri was "threatened in a crystal-clear way on numerous occasions" before his death in a truck bombing last year _...

Pity the United Nations and the European Union. The militant theocrats running Iran have ignored their pleas, protests, promises of aid and finger-wagging threats of economic sanction. Tehran's mullahs want nuclear weapons. Money, media appeals and political yammering — the arsenal of so-called "soft power" — have so far failed to curtail Iran's nuclear ambitions. As 2006 begins, it appears Iran's decade of atomic fan dancing with "the international community" is approaching a dangerous finale. One hopes the latest gesture doesn't prove to be another hollow jest. Moscow has offered to enrich Iranian uranium in Russian facilities. It's an interesting...

The New York Sun reports that Democrats blocked the adoption of a resolution denouncing Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for his anti-Semitic remaeks and Holocaust denial until a demand for an Iranian plebescite and self-determination free of the Guardian Council had been removed. The objection officially came from Senator Wyden (D-OR), who then told the Senate that, uh, he didn't have a problem with the resolutuion, but that his colleagues did -- who displayed their intestinal fortitude by hiding behind Wyden's skirts: When Mr. Santorum moved to introduce the resolution last Friday, Senator Wyden, a Democrat of Oregon, registered an unusual...

James Jesus Angleton explains it all. "Oh, come on! You expect me to believe that?" I was recently back at the ouija board with my old friend, the late James Jesus Angleton, once upon a time the head of CIA Counterintelligence. I had wanted to talk to him about the latest warnings from the interminable 9/11 Commission, a.k.a. The Monologue That Will Not Die, that we hadn't done enough with homeland security. I knew his view of the commission was much like mine — namely that these guys need a day job. Or maybe a Caribbean cruise. Or maybe a...

Don't get us mixed up Ahmadinejad is not, REPEAT not, the epitome of Iranian people's aspiration and their logic December 16, 2005 iranian.com There are countries of the world about which the world cannot afford to be ignorant. Iran is one such country and though the International community is slow in realising, it will have to be as informed and uncluttered in the their judgement about Iran as they are about France say. They would have to because Iran matters a lot and I am not saying that as an Iranian patriot but as an informed observer. It is precisely...

WASHINGTON — A report published by the U.S. Army War College ruled out a U.S. military or diplomatic option to stop Iran's nuclear weapons program. Instead, the report, entitled "Getting Ready for a Nuclear-Ready Iran," said the dismantling of Israel's purported nuclear weapons program could be the only way to prevent a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. The report, entitled "Getting Ready for a Nuclear-Ready Iran," was edited by Henry Sokolski, executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, and Patrick Clawson, deputy director at the Washington Institute. "You have a whole neighborhood of folks posed, at any...

Dear Freeper Friends: As many of you are aware, Doctor Zin has dedicated thousands of hours to provide information on his web site "Regime Change in Iran".  When the students were protesting in Iran, Doctor Zin had the latest up to date information.  He always does when it comes to Iran.  He has done a very nice job over the years and is now poised to have his site recognized for it's top notch quality.  That is of course, if he can get enough votes. Free Republic encourages each of us to become involved.  Doctor Zin has taken that...

Former justice department prosecutor and intelligence expert John Loftus says that Israel is unable to thwart Iran's nuclear projects through military action – but that there is an alternative. "Israel only has a few option and striking back is not one of 'em," Loftus told Israel National Radio's Tovia Singer. "The F-16-IL version that Israel possesses only has a combat radius of about 2,200 kilometers and you would need about 3,000 to hit the hard targets in Iran. Iran saw what [Israel] did to the Osarik reactor in Iraq and have spread their nuclear development stuff all over the country...

ISRAEL urged the world to "open its eyes" to the Iranian regime and its nuclear programme after its outspoken president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad described the Holocaust as a "myth". Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's spokesman pledged that Israel had the means to defend itself and would not allow for a second genocide of Jews. "Thank God, Israel has the means at its disposal to bring about the downfall of this extremist regime in Iran. There will be no second 'final solution'," Sharon's spokesman Raanan Gissin said. "We hope that these extremist declarations will make the world wake up to the nature of...

Weblog Awards Update: [http://weblogawards.org/2005/12/best_middle_east_or_africa_blo.php] We have gone from 300 votes behind the leader to 125 (as of this writing). A first place finish will expose our work to a much larger audience. Vote now and vote every 24 hours. Voting Ends December 15th. It takes just a few seconds. Click the link below: Click here!

CAIRO, Egypt -- In the aftermath of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's ascendancy to the presidency of Iran, the country's opposition is beginning to show signs of unifying as the clerical regime wages a war against internal dissent. Yesterday, the regime closed all schools in Tehran, citing poor air quality, after word leaked of the first major demonstrations since the summer. Nonetheless, a rally at Tehran University attracted 300 demonstrators amid a heavy police presence on campus. Of note is that before the rally against the new president, a coalition of Kurdish students also signed on to the call. In Brussels on Monday,...

A conversation with Amir Abbas Fakhravar. Iranian Amir Abbas Fakhravar is a hunted man. A former medical student and journalist for the now-banned reform newspapers Moshareka and Khordad, Fakhravar came to prominence with the publication of his book This Place Is Not a Ditch, in which he criticized Iran’s rulers and called on the Iranian people to reject the mullahs’ regime. For doing so, he was sentenced in 2002 to eight years in prison. His status as a political prisoner and his mistreatment while incarcerated — he was reportedly denied medical care, and suffered frequent physical attacks — brought international...

The following is an an unofficial and abridged translation Of a statement dated November 2005 signed by 674 personalities including former Members of the Iranian Majles (parliament); well know academics, political and cultural personalities as well as student activists. In the Name of God The eight year struggle for the promotion of political reforms initiated internally at the behest of the regime has finally come to a halt having been directed towards fundamentalism by way of an organized election, leaving the aged Iranian nation in the grip of a serious socio-political crisis with its ensuing worries for Iranian society and...

<p>When Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called last month for Israel to be wiped off the map of the world, he displayed a disregard for the international community that proved he is a genuine disciple of the late Ayatollah Khomeini. But his proposal also showed that he hasn't learned any lessons from recent Iranian history. In a country where public opinion takes shape in direct opposition to the regime, the objects of hostile statements like Ahmadinejad's almost always win friends among young Iranians.</p>

http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraq-20040623.htm "The [Bush] Administration did not hesitate to heighten and distort public fear of terrorism after September 11th, to create a political case for attacking Iraq." -- Former Vice President Al Gore, February 5, 2004The Clinton Administration's Public Case Against Saddam Hussein In June of 1997, Iraq officials had ratcheted up their obstruction of UNSCOM inspection efforts. They interfered with UNSCOM air operations and denied and delayed access of inspectors to sites. In September, they burned documents at sites while inspectors watched outside the front entrance. By mid-November, Saddam Hussein had demanded an end to U-2 surveillance flights over Iraq...

Just how big a threat was Saddam Hussein? Let’s reprise what our leaders had to say on the subject. First, here’s the president: “If he refuses or continues to evade his obligations through more tactics of delay and deception, he and he alone will be to blame for the consequences. ... Now, let’s imagine the future. What if he fails to comply, and we fail to act, or we take some ambiguous third route which gives him yet more opportunities to develop this program of weapons of mass destruction...? “Well, he will conclude that the international community has lost its...

Hindsight usually follows failure. As I write, things looked bad in Iraq. At regular intervals over the last two years I have asked the same question of former colleagues in the British and American governments: in Iraq, is the glass half-empty or is it half-full? With one exception the answer has been "half-full". The exception was a trusted American friend and government official, who, after paying a recent visit to Iraq, returned to tell the White House: "We're fucked." Even if the most optimistic predictions are finally realised for Iraq, the question will still be asked: why did the Americans...