No Room At The Adults Table

While Tehran may be accurate in some respects, it's possible that Russia and China don't really want details of their uni-lateral discussions with Iran being released via Tehran. And Russia and China can oppose all they want and still abstain from a vote. Particularly if in the final analysis it won't make a difference to the US and could only hasten the decision to pursue a military option of some kind because broad sanctions come off the table.

Israel absolutely will not allow Iran to have nukes. A confrontation of some kind is inevitable so long as Iran persists on its nuclear course. And Israel acting alone could easily cause more trouble in the region than if the US acted while getting co-operation from certain Arab states who would never co-operate with Israel for political reasons.

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's foreign minister was quoted on Tuesday as saying that Russia and China had officially informed Tehran they would not support sanctions or military action over the Islamic Republic's nuclear program.

U.N. ambassadors from the United States, Britain and France are expected to introduce a resolution this week to legally oblige Iran to comply with U.N. Security Council demands it halt all uranium enrichment work.

When asked how far Russia and China, veto-wielding permanent members of the council, would support Washington, Manouchehr Mottaki told the Kayhan newspaper:

"The thing these two countries have officially told us and expressed in diplomatic negotiations is their opposition to sanctions and military attacks."

"At the current juncture, I personally believe no sanctions or anything like that will be on the agenda of the Security Council," he said in the interview.

Comments

[rwilymz]

Iran stated two days ago that if the US took any actions against them, they'd strike Israel. The common perception in the middle east, figurative if not occassionally literal, is that Israel is the 51st state of the union. The US is called "crusader" and "zionist"; Israel is called "crusader" and "zionist". There's no real difference to them.

That's why, when terrorism targets another Tel Aviv bar mitzvah, we here at our Starbucks out to tremble: the only reason we aren't being bombed is because there's an ocean in between.