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Iran Threatens to Defend Itself

Israel does military excersizes to threaten Iran...the world says nothing.

That is a possible reason that Israel did those exercises. But it is not the stated reason, and Israel issued no threats to Iran as part of that exercize. In matters of diplomacy, those sort of distinctions matter.

Iran does military exersizes to tell Israel "dont attack or we will fight back" and the world goes ape.

Goes ape? You've got a funny definition of that term.

Is there something wrong with this picture?

Yes: it's not an accurate representation of what actually happened.
 
Iran, in a bold and defiant act of arrogance and saber rattling, tested several missiles today, saying to the world that if they dare to attack it over a nuclear program that has no evidence to be producing nothing but low level enriched uranium, they will retaliate with force.

Top officials in the USA say that Iran's threat to defend itself shows that they are indeed a threat.

How dare they!! How dare Iran threaten to defend itself and respond to illegal and unneccessary attacks!! Who do they think they are?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080709/ts_nm/iran_nuclear_dc;_ylt=AtFTPfJyZZEiB2i9wwHInNdZ.3QA

Well, the leadership is clearly a pile of recalcitrant feces. Beyond that I have heard rumors they have reasonably intelligent people around - who could do much worse for themselves than cleaning up and throwing out that weird pile of recalcitrant feces blocking their path to a more pleasant world. But, hey, their choice.:)
 
the OP is meant to be a joke. only a neo-con warmmonger would be alarmed that Iran has shown the world that they will defend themselves if they are attacked for no good reason.
Actually, I suspect they have given the world - the part that wants them ................to not be a threat, let's say - much more info on aspects of the offensive set up they have. Should be a milk-run to take them out any way, but.

By the by parky, the joke was that you used the word gaul (Asterix and the Gauls, etc.) rather the the word gall - and it was not noted by you even after it was used as a joke by others:D
 
Let's see...By all accounts, Iran is years from fielding a nuclear weapon, which means they could launch a missile with a high-explosive warhead which might be able to hit Israel.... While Israel has, by most thinking, some hundreds of nukes themselves....

But does Israel have the capabability to deliver those nukes to Iran?
 
Well, the leadership is clearly a pile of recalcitrant feces. Beyond that I have heard rumors they have reasonably intelligent people around - who could do much worse for themselves than cleaning up and throwing out that weird pile of recalcitrant feces blocking their path to a more pleasant world. But, hey, their choice.:)

You can call the leadership in Iran a lot of things, but I think it's a mistake to suggest that they lack intelligence. Personally, I think they've clearly outmaneuvered the West in the post-invasion Middle East so far.
 
Israel has a potent air force, and certainly could air-deliver these weapons. I imagine they could overcome Iran's air defenses rather easily.
 
Israel does military excersizes to threaten Iran...the world says nothing.

Iran does military exersizes to tell Israel "dont attack or we will fight back" and the world goes ape.

Is there something wrong with this picture?
Yes, but only the fact that the artist drew it to be the exact opposite of reality.
 
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Israel has a potent air force, and certainly could air-deliver these weapons. I imagine they could overcome Iran's air defenses rather easily.


The Israelis don't imagine that. In fact, they're quite worried about losing a substantial proportions of planes taking part in such an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities.
 
Are you saying thugs in a bank don't have a right to defend themselves?

Correct. I suppose if a T-Rex came along to try to eat them, or an even bigger gang of thugs came in to kill them and take the bank money themselves, you might have an argument.

But to defend themselves against the police, or any other free person for that matter, who's trying to take 'em out for being evil, no, they do not.

There is no such thing as the right to commit evil.

Two wrongs don't make a right.

Correct. Which would apply if the hostage taker's opponents were the other group of thugs, but not the police.

Having said that, if some other thugs happened to take 'em out, I wouldn't shed a tear, although the situation might end up even worse.

Bad things happening to a bad person is still bad, and therefore self-defense (in so far as self-defense is ever justified) is justified even for evil people.

Against other evil people. Not people who aren't evil. Attacking to free the hostages, or attacking to destroy the gun of those threatening you with it, is not evil, assuming you yourself are not evil.

And anyway, it's not like they're talking about defending themselves from punishments for being a vicious and murderous dictatorship, which is the obvious analogy for thugs in a bank (although I'm sure if they were to be attacked on that grounds they would defend themselves), but for attacks committed on the basis of something for which there is a reasonable argument to be made that they are not even doing it.

This would speak to the propriety of the free people in making sure the argument they are using is accurate. The hostage takers have no right in and of itself. Free people are always within their rights in attempting to free other people, or at least keeping the hostage takers contained in their threat. Their choice.

Additionally, with thugs in a bank there are a lot of legal safeguards to ensure that the thugs are apprehended in a fair and just way and given due proccess.

Only because there are practical difficulties with sniping all of them at the same instance. They have 0% right to stay alive as long as they hold the hostages. The safety of the hostages claims 100% of the rights in this situation. Not 50% Not 98%. Not 99%. 100% If the safest and most likely to succeed method of freeing them involves killing the hostage takers, well, sucks to be them.

International conflicts are a lot more fast and loose, to contrast, which makes it harder (although not impossible) for any side to claim moral authority.

As practical matters, yes, the free side should judge it's own competency in carrying out its actions. It should also be introspective to make sure the leaders aren't also stirring things up "as an unfortunate side effect" to raise prices in the bubble gum market by attacking a dictatorship and producer of bubble gum, oh, coincidently.
 
Israel has a potent air force, and certainly could air-deliver these weapons. I imagine they could overcome Iran's air defenses rather easily.
And what Israeli bombers can fly 1,000 miles loaded with bombs and return that same 1,000 miles without refueling?
 
Israel does military excersizes to threaten Iran...the world says nothing.
Falsehood, and argument from ignorance. You just didn't bother to look it up. Parky, how did "the world" say nothing when this exercise was reported in the news, and the usual speculation then began as to its intended message/purpose?
Iran does military exersizes to tell Israel "dont attack or we will fight back" and the world goes ape.
Please define "the world" in this context.
Is there something wrong with this picture?
Yes, your thumb having covered the lens when you took the picture.

DR
 
And what Israeli bombers can fly 1,000 miles loaded with bombs and return that same 1,000 miles without refueling?
Israel has seven Boeing 707 tankers and three Lockheed C-130 tankers, both with multi-thousand-mile ranges, so they wouldn't need to do it withuot refueling. However, bombers generally don't do that anyway, since they're normally big long-range planes themselves, like cargo planes and high-capacity commercial passenger planes.

I'm not sure what kind of plane would carry the nukes because they don't seem to have a dedicated bomber, but I figure they'd probably use one of their "transport" planes with a bit of modification. They have 26 of those, including seventeen C-130s, six 707s, and three Gulfstream G550s, all with plenty of range for this without even refueling. (They also have nine Aravas but those have shorter ranges and would need to refuel; their advantage is short take-off, which doesn't matter in this case.) Nukes are rather large and heavy (the "suitcase" type being a myth), so fighters can't carry them (and if they could then it would limit how much other stuff they could carry, such as fuel and other weapons), and fighters have shorter ranges and would thus need refueling along the way there or back. Of course, if you send bombers/transports, they'll need fighter escort for protection anyway, but you're better off arming those fighters with conventional air-to-air weapons.

Israel has 97 Eagles, 345 Falcons, and 50 Phantoms (total 492). Iran has 20 Tomcats, 4 of which are thought to still be flyable, and 24 French Mirages, 42 Chinese J-6s & J-7s, about 10 to a couple dozen homemade HESA fighters, 44 Phantoms, 40 MiG-29s, 75 Tigers, and 3-10 Russian Sukhoi-25s (total at least 242, in the 280s at most). Refuel Israel's fighters in flight or let them use an American airfield that's closer on the way there or back or both (in Iraq, Kuwait, or maybe Qatar), and it's no contest, in either numbers or the quality of the planes, even leaving some behind to prevent other local crazies from trying to take advantage of the situation. They'd certainly get through and hit their targets and mostly get back. The question is how many losses they'd have while they were at it. I'd guess in the dozens, maybe even close to a hundred, if Iran's pilots fought to the very last one.

If Israel wanted to use nukes, it would be simpler, cheaper, quicker, and safer to launch them on Jericho II or Jericho III ballistic missiles. These can't reach all the way around the planet, but they can more than cover Iran. There could be some risk of having the missiles shot down before they hit their targets, but Iran probably can't do that.

Of course, Israel wouldn't need to use nukes to strike certain targets in Iran, and their recent exercises are probably intended to prepare for non-nuclear missions aimed at Iran's own nukes. That means actually going to a lot of trouble and sacrifice to AVOID using their own nukes even when it would be simpler, cheaper, quicker, and safer for them.
 
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Israel has seven Boeing 707 tankers and three Lockheed C-130 tankers, both with multi-thousand-mile ranges, so they wouldn't need to do it withuot refueling. However, bombers generally don't do that anyway, since they're normally big long-range planes themselves, like cargo planes and high-capacity commercial passenger planes.
Not likely that there's a country between Israel and Iran that would allow a staging area for Israeli refueling tankers, nor flyovers. And what long-range bombers does Israel have? They'd have to do it with F-16's and other fighter-bombers.
 
Not likely that there's a country between Israel and Iran that would allow a staging area for Israeli refueling tankers
Tankers wouldn't need a staging area between the mission launch site and the target; they have long ranges by themselves (and wouldn't even need to go all the way there anyway, giving them a shorter flight path than the fighters or bombers).

And what long-range bombers does Israel have? They'd have to do it with F-16's and other fighter-bombers.
They have no dedicated bombers; the closest they could get would be by cutting some bomb doors into a cargo transport and installing bomb racks inside the cargo area. (But I don't know what technical challenges that might present and there are no reports that it's been done yet in this case.) Otherwise, yes, they'd have to do the ground attack from fighters, which eliminates the use of nukes unless they modify some fighters to carry nukes at the sacrifice of some air-to-air weapons (probably Phantoms and Eagles, not Falcons, due to the heavier payload capacity they have to start with). And that cuts into the overall strike force's air-to-air effectiveness or requires a larger force to go, which is one reason why a nuclear strike would probably not be done from airplanes at all.

BTW, in comparing their Air Forces before, I forgot to mention something rather important. The attacker can send as many planes as it wants to, but the defender just can not have all of its planes ready at once. At any given time, it has some waiting to launch on a moment's notice, a backup group on some short notice such as 15 minutes, and others just nowhere near usable at all, because some are undergoing mechanical work and most of the pilots and crucial ground personnel are off duty at any given time. The attacker can arrange those internal schedules ahead of time to coincide with the time of the strike, but the defender can't just decide to have everything ready at once and then a period in which nothing's ready. Thus, Iran not only has a weaker Air Force to start with, but also would be fielding a smaller fraction of it than Israel at the time of strike.
 

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