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Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
No its not. The world can't attack Iran because doing so would galvanize its populus - which we've worked so hard for so long to massage into an adversarial position against the ruling mullahs - behind its religious leaders.

Duh.

Iran will eventually turn into a modernized govt. The trick we're trying to work here is to allow it to do so while also preventing it from getting nukes.

Too late.

Cheney's "threats" are bluffs, and I'm not sure their good ones. The rest of the world is smartly assuring Iran that it need not worry about the crap Dick is saying to avoid Dick's statement providing a rallying cry for support for the religious leaders.

The Iranians aren't worried about Dick's threats because they don't believe we have the capability or the stomach for another Mideast adventure.

We're not going to kill a revolution over there. Why do you think we've stopped Israel from bombing Iran for the past two years? You think the Israelis don't already know eactly where each piece of Iran's nuke program is located? They could blow Iran's nuke program back to 1970, but we won't let them.

Put the Tom Clancy novel down, and back away slowly.

• But senior officers warned that attacking targets in Iran would be much more difficult than the air campaign against Iraq in 2003. Iran's air defenses are more formidable. Many nuclear-related targets are dispersed across the country or buried deep underground. And United States intelligence analysts acknowledge that they do not know where all of Iran's secret nuclear-related activities are situated.
  
  "Iran poses a very difficult target set," said one former top officer who was involved in target planning. "It's a bigger country, with more rugged terrain. It would be very difficult to take down."

Are the US and Britain playing good cop, bad cop her? I don't know.

Well, if the UK was ever trying to be the good cop, they just changed their tune.