On “The New York Times and the drive to war against Iran”

Thank you for your excellent analysis of the Sunday New York Times article. I respectfully submit that much of the current main stream media analysis of a potential conflict between Israel and Iran misses an important point. The ultimate issue is not whether Iran will attack Israel with a nuclear device. The history of deterrence in the nuclear arms field clearly rules this out; the Iranian government, no matter how militant (or irrational depending on one’s viewpoint) its current leaders sound, will not commit national suicide.

The underling issue is: if Iran successfully tests a nuclear device and then goes on to build a substantial nuclear arsenal (equal to Israel’s) then at some point in the future an Israeli government could be compelled both diplomatically and militarily to accept a “one-state solution” to the Jewish/Palestinian conflict along the lines of post-Apartheid South Africa. Conceivably such a solution might also resemble what happened in Portugal during the Carnation Revolution when that country’s government chose to relinquish its African colonies.

I suspect avoiding this outcome is the motivation of the current Israeli government’s policy toward Iran. Significantly, a large part of the Israeli voting public does not support its government’s policy. The Times might serve its readers better by focusing on the democratic Israeli opposition.

Sincerely,

Peter L
Connecticut, USA
31 January 2012

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I read this NYT story, and I saw it for what it was: preparing the public for another war started by America. It totally resembles the methods the NYT used prior to our invasion of Iraq.

However, the readers of the NYT are now a more skeptical bunch. While comments are no longer being accepted by the NYT, 299 of them are posted. If one re-orders them by “Readers Picks” (those comments with which they agreed), a vast, overwhelming majority of people is against any pre-emptive attack by Israel and/or the USA.

It will be an important indicator of how little care or attention is given to the American public’s opinion when this attack takes place. We count for nothing in this oligarchy.

Furthermore, our masters assume success of this dubious attack, despite decades of evidence that air power is rarely successful by itself.

I was an officer in a Navy Attack Squadron which attacked North Vietnam 1966-67. Iran is bigger than Afghanistan, Iraq, and both Vietnams. Good luck with that!

Rich H
Arizona, USA
31 January 2012

On “The capitalist crisis and the radicalization of the working class in 2012”

Very nice summary on the political and economic degeneration of Russia and its interrelation with the capitalist bloc.

The betrayal of the Russian revolution was carried out by striking deals with the imperialist world powers. The very Stalinists who played this game finally succumbed to the powers with which they sought some accommodation.

Socialism cannot be confined to one country for the same objective reasons that capitalism cannot. Capitalism survives by expanding its labor pool across nations. A socialist state is not immune to this unless it has already advanced its economy further than the capitalist economy. In which case the expansion happens in the other direction.

This is not to say that the Russian revolution was a mistake; Russia happened to be the weakest link in the capitalist chain with a few great socialist leaders. Unfortunately the situation was different in Germany and the revolution remained confined to Russia.

Thushara
31 January 2012