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Tuesday
Sep292009

Worst Facebook Poll Ever: "Should Obama be Assassinated?"

facU.S. officials have stated that they are investigating an online survey posted on Facebook on Saturday that asked whether people thought President Barack Obama should be assassinated.



There were four answer choices: "Yes," "no," "maybe" and "yes, if he cuts my health care".

Darrin Blackford, a Secret Service spokesman said, "We are aware of it and we will take the appropriate investigative steps... We take of these things seriously." Facebook had suspended its "Polls" applications when we tried to look at the survey last night.

A bit of reassurance: before the poll was halted, 90 percent of respondents had voted "No">
Tuesday
Sep292009

What is Iran's Military Capacity?

The Latest from Iran (29 September): The Forthcoming Test?

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IranMissile2As Iran tested long-range missiles on Monday , Reuters considered Tehran's military capacity in the context of a possible war between Iran and Israel.

Amidst talk of an Israeli pre-emptive strike, Tehran issued another defiant statement. "If this [Israeli attack] happens, which of course we do not foresee, its ultimate result would be that it expedites the Zionist regime's last breath," Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi said on state television.

ARMED FORCES: Iran has more than 523,000 personnel in active service. Major General Ataollah Salehi is the armed forces chief.

ARMY: The army comprises about 350,000 men, including 220,000 conscripts. The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, viewed as the most loyal guardian of the ruling system, has another 125,000 men. In 2004 the army was organized in four corps, with four armored divisions and six infantry divisions.

There are 1,600 tanks including some 100 Zulfiqar locally produced main battle tanks. A large number of Iran's tanks are elderly British-made Chieftains and U.S.-made M-60s. Soviet-made T-54 and T-55s, T-59s, T-62s, and T-72s were also part of the inventory, all captured from the Iraqis or acquired from North Korea and China. A report from the International Institute for Strategic Studies says that some of the tanks' serviceability may be in doubt.

There are around 640 armored personnel carriers. There are 8,196 artillery pieces of which 2,010 are towed, and over 310 are self-propelled.

MISSILES: In a 2007 parade to mark the anniversary of 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, Iran unveiled its Shahab 3 missile, saying it could travel 2,000 km, enabling it to hit Israel and U.S. bases in the region. Another missile at the parade, the Ghadr 1, can reach targets 1,800 km (1,100 miles) away. It was believed to be the first time it has been shown publicly. In November 2008, Iran said it test-fired a Sejil missile with a range of close to 2,000 km.

NAVY: There are 18,000 naval personnel. The navy has its headquarters at Bandar-e Abbas. Iran's navy has three Russian Kilo class submarines, three frigates, and two corvettes.

As of 2001 the regular Iranian navy was in a state of overall obsolescence because it had not been equipped with modern ships and weapons. The readiness of the three frigates is doubtful, and the two nearly 40-year-old corvettes do not have sophisticated armaments.

In late 2007 Iran launched a new locally made submarine and a navy frigate Jamaran. Jane's Defense Weekly has reported that Iran was also building missile-launching frigates copied from 275-tonne Kaman fast-attack missile craft originally purchased from France in the late 1970s.

AIR FORCE: The air force has some 30,000 personnel and 319 combat aircraft. There are F-14 and MiG 29 aircraft, Russian-built Sukhoi Su-24s and 25s, and Iran also has transport aircraft and helicopters. There are also some aircraft impounded from Iraq. However, serviceability may be as low as around 60 percent of U.S. aircraft types and 80 percent of Russian aircraft.

In September 2007, Iran said it had tested two new domestically-produced jet fighters. State television said the Saegheh was a new generation of the Azarakhsh (Lightning) fighter. Iran said it was being built on an industrial scale.
Tuesday
Sep292009

Audio: Bin Laden's Latest Message "A Warning to Europe"

untitledOsama bin Laden's new audio message is calling on European countries to end their alliance with the US and withdraw forces from Afghanistan: "An intelligent man doesn't waste his money and sons for a gang of criminals in Washington. If today Europe is suffering the travails of the economic crisis, and the heart of Europe is no longer number one in world exports, and America is reeling from the haemorrhage caused by the economic war, then how do think you will fare after America pulls out?"

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1h2PVDeUlZc[/youtube]
Monday
Sep282009

The Latest from Iran (28 September): Signals of Power

NEW Iran’s Nuclear Programme: Scott Lucas in La Stampa
Non-Proliferation and “Iran’s Nukes”: Chris Emery on Al Jazeera English
Latest Iran Video: The Universities Protest (28 September)
NEW Translating Iran: The New Site for Latest Documents

Iran: English Text of Dastgheib Letter to Assembly of Experts (22 September)
The Latest from Iran (27 September): Is There a Compromise Brewing?

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TEHRAN UNI PROTEST1940 GMT: Pedestrian offers some additional information on the events at the University of Tehran today. Contrary to our earlier report (0940 GMT), Minister of Science and Technology Kamran Daneshjoo was present. However, as Pedestrian notes from photos of the gathering, the crowd was sparse with almost no students in the audience.

1640 GMT: Getting Serious with Law-Breakers. Two stories showing the Government's firm and not-in-any-way-nervous response to protest. Drivers who honk their car horns during protests have been warned that they may be summoned to court. Fans attending the biggest match in Iranian league football, the Tehran derby between Esteglhal and Persepolis, should expect special security measures (which, of course, are in no way connected with recent Green Wave protests at football matches).

1635 GMT: Credit to the BBC. Earlier today we were less than charitable about "mainstream" media who did not seem to notice that demonstrations were occurring at Tehran University. The BBC's main site has posted a story with video.

1630 GMT: HomyLafayette has published an excellent overview of the sell-off of the Iranian state telecommunications company, in which a consortium linked to the Revolutionary Guard took a 51 percent stake.

1620 GMT: The Facebook site connected with Mir Hossein Mousavi has posted an extract from his statement today: "Ironically those who feel defeated in this year’s Qods day events were those who benefited the most from it. They found out in the most obvious way that three months of unprecedented violence not only did not have slightest effect on people’s presence, but rather made it more extensive."

Mousavi also made an indirect response to those who questioned his appearance at the rally amidst "pro-Government" demonstrators: "In the last Friday of this year’s Ramadan, I was present among those who some of them were welcoming me with their fists and were wishing my death. I was reviewing their faces as we were participating in the rally and I saw that l love them and that our victory is not something that anyone would be defeated in it."

1610 GMT: The BBC Persian report on the Assembly of Experts plan (1545 GMT) may not mention details but another account does allege that three conditions have been attached to the proposal: 1) no mention of "velvet revolution"; 2) no condemnation of street protests; and 3) no statement of support for the Ahmadinejad Government.

1555 GMT: Excuse of the Day. As long-time readers might recall, Enduring America has a special Swine Flu crisis team. So we were impressed to see the Iranian Government suddenly invoke the virus to close down universities for a week. We are certain that this is an imminent threat, even more imminent than Iran's nuclear programme, so that the closure has nothing to do with today's demonstrations. After all, Government ministers said in July that swine flu might delay the start of the academic year, a statement which was entirely unconnected with the political protests that were occurring at the time.

1545 GMT: The Rafsanjani Plan? BBC Persian reports the statement of Hashemi Rafsanjani that he brought ideas from the Expediency Council to last week's Assembly of Experts meeting for a resolution of the political crisis. Details of the plan were not given.

1525 GMT: It appears that all websites connected with Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi are now down.

1405 GMT: Mehdi Karroubi has written another letter to Hashemi Rafsanjani, pressing the former President on how far he and the Assembly of Experts will seek to change the system and its handling of issues including the abuse of detainees (the subject of Karroubi's first letter to Rafsanjani in late July) but also privatisations benefitting the Revolutionary Guards, social questions, and the propaganda of State media.

1350 GMT: Mir Hossein Mousavi has issued a new statement on the "turning point" of the Qods Day demonstrations. He has also argued against further sanctions on Iran, for example, over its nuclear programmes, as the Iranian people have suffered enough under their "coup government".

1225 GMT: Latest news is dominated by what is coming out of Iran on the university protests. Not that anyone in the "mainstream" media is taking a bit of notice.

Indeed, there is a de facto alliance between Iranian state media and its "Western" counterparts to ignore the demonstrations in favour of narrow attention to Missiles, Missiles, Missiles. Fars News' triumphalism or Press TV's headline, "IRGC: We test fired upgraded missile models", can be swapped with CNN's lead story, "Iran fires off long-range missiles in latest test" or the BBC's "Iran tests longest range missiles" or Al Jazeera English's "Iran tests Shahab 3 missile".

0940 GMT: Universities Open, Protests Begin. As one of our readers has noted in Comments, reports are coming in of protests at universities as they begin the new academic year. An account of the demonstrations at the University of Tehran with chants of "Death to the Dictator!" is on-line, and video of the protest at  has been posted. There is a claim of more than 1000 students demonstrating at Daneshkadeh-ye Khabar (News College).

No one from President Ahmadinejad's office was present at the opening ceremony at the University of Tehran, and the Minister of Science was also absent.

0720 GMT: Missile Games. Iranian state media has published the next part of its script, Iran Is Really, Really Tough:
The Islamic Republic of Iran has successfully tested long-range Shahab-3 missile in a military drill dubbed The Great Prophet IV in a bid to bolster its defense capabilities, Press TV has learned....Shahab-3 missiles are said to have a range of 1,300 to 2,000 kilometers.

"Western" media will now take the stage to say, "Iran is Going to Kill Israel" (filling in the name of the country, which is not mentioned in the Press TV newsflash). Israeli leaders will hint darkly that they may now have to pursue military action,  and everybody will be very, very flustered as the 1 October talks in Geneva turn from engagement into showdown.

0635 GMT: Academic Fact of the Day. Yesterday we noted the allegation of the French newspaper Liberation that the Iranian Minister of Transport, Hamid Behbahani, plagiarised from French, Canadian, and Chinese scholars in a 2006 article. An EA reader adds, from the same article, that Behbahani was the Ph.D. thesis director of....Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

0615 GMT: And let's also pay tribute to Pedestrian for this item about Hojatoleslam Dehnavi on Iranian state television on the threat of “prank calls”, warning “housewives not to get emotionally attached to the callers":
Married women shouldn’t start talking, because before long, a longing develops. One housewife told me how she gets flustered if the caller does not call for one day. One other told me to find a way to pull her from this sinkhole of corruption she’s gotten herself into. These are married women after all, with husbands. Save yourselves from this sinkhole of corruption. What will you do with your conscience?

So, to elevate this serious discussion readers, what's your favourite prank call that, of course, does not threaten innoncent housewives? (I favour, "Do you keep Prince Albert in a can?", but I don't think that translates into Farsi.)

0600 GMT: Pedestrian has more --- much more --- on Javad Larijani's assault on the Green movement (0445 GMT).

Larijani not only linked the opposition to the Muhajedin-e-Khalq (MKO), with its 30-year campaign to overthrow the Iranian Government, he directly equated Mir Hossein Mousavi with Masoud Rajavi, the long-time head of the MKO: “Mousavi lost a good future in politics. He could have remained a great figure, but...[his] betrayal of the revolution is at one with Rajavi’s.” Larijani also launched a furious verbal assault on Seyed Hassan Khomenei, the grandson of Ayatollah Khomenei: “It is very inappropriate for the Imam’s family to support a certain political faction that is being applauded by traitors and zionists.”

Perhaps most intriguing, however, is an apparent attempt by Larijani to split the opposition by refraining from an attack on Mehdi Karroubi: “Karoubi is a pleasant man and considering his influential role in the revolution, we shouldn’t be too hard on him.”

0445 GMT: While international attention is almost exclusively on the Iranian nuclear programme, with the construction of the second enrichment facility near Qom, the internal power politics are far more significant for the fate of the Ahmadinejad Government.

We've published the text of a letter by Ayatollah Dastgheib, which highlights the intense debate within the Assembly of Experts over the future of the Islamic Republic and the space that should be given to the Green opposition. Meanwhile, Mohammad Javad Larijani, the head of the Judiciary's Human Rights Division (and the brother of the Speaker of the Parliament and the head of Judiciary), has tied the Green Wave not only to Israel but to the Mujahedin-e-Khalq, which has challenged the Islamic Republic for 30 years with assassinations, bombings, and sabotage: "“Mousavi was guilty of a great sin after the revolution and launched the reformist faction in the direction of protesting the system....If they had kept themselves from being angry after the elections, they would have seen that many of the Hypocrites [People's Mujahideen Organisation of Iran, the political wing of Mujahedin-e-Khalq] and Zionists were applauding their activities.”

Fars News chooses, however, to avoid the internal disputes in favour of the Iranian challenge to the world on its military programmes. It upholds the Revolutionary Guard's praise for the "very high precision" of the missiles that Iran has test-fired in military exercises.
Monday
Sep282009

Non-Proliferation and "Iran's Nukes": Chris Emery on Al Jazeera English

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Enduring America's Chris Emery on Al Jazeera's Inside Story with Stephen Zunes and Andy Martin about President Obama's nuclear non-proliferation initiative and the US approach to Iran's nuclear programme:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJX8hkqAaaU&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]
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