Iranian nuclear scientists are getting murdered, the latest case being reported today. Glenn Greenwald asks the right question: Why is this not denounced here as terrorism?
Does anyone doubt that some combination of the two nations completely obsessed with Iran’s nuclear program — Israel and the U.S. — are responsible? (U.S. officials deny involvement while pointing the finger at Israel, whose officials will not comment but “smile” when asked; the CIA has “targeted” Iran’s scientists in the past, several of whom have disappeared only to end up in U.S. custody, including one who “resurfaced in the United States after defecting to the CIA in return for a large sum of money”). At the very least, there has been no denunciation from any Obama officials of whoever it might be carrying out such acts.
I guess the logic is that at least when we commit terrorism, we don’t level 2 100 story buildings to kill one person.
Or perhaps we don’t consider it terrorism at all. It’s more like an assassination. Of course, we don’t assassinate anyone either.
It all so confusing. 😉
So does this mean that if/when Iran takes the bait and goes after Israel in some fashion, we’ll have to step in as Israel’s protector, while claiming that our hand was forced? Because that’s totally what I see happening in the near future.
As regretable as this is, I must say that as Iranian, I don’t particularly sympathize with the victim here.
There is no question in my mind that those who throw their scientific expertise behind this murderous theocracy partake of the blame for its crimes. This person and others like him do not seem to understand that the world is dangerously teetering on the brink of an armed conflict with untold human suffering as a result of their actions.
Quite frankly I find this prospect more frightening than death of a handful of the cronies of the clerics.
Well. It is not like the regime of Iran has not been threatening Israel with destruction for decades, or not assisting her mortal enemies.
The simple answer is that it isn’t terrorism, since it doesn’t constitute an attempt to coerce a policy choice by harming innocents (a rough definition, but reasonably consistent with contemporary practice).
As for why our government doesn’t condemn such assassination, that is also pretty obvious: because even if we aren’t involved, it serves our interests. While I would like it if our national policy was driven by humanitarian principles, I don’t see much evidence that is the case.
Actually, this time, the US National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor officially condemned this “act of violence”.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-16519304
The administration refrained from using the word “terrorism”, though.
You are making a lot of assumptions here or perhaps you have evidence that:
1) The victim is actually a nuclear physicist.
2) The victim is involved in producing a nuclear bomb.
3) The victim was killed under the direction of Israel/USA
Also, do you think it is justified to kill Israeli nuclear physicists or American nuclear physicists (hmmm…maybe it’s too late for that seeing as Israel and America already have a nuclear arsenal).
Trouble I have with that is that is sounds exactly the same as the justifications made by Islamic terrorists (replace “murderous theocracy” with “murderous colonial imperialist”) or even the killers of doctors involved in terminating pregnancies (replace “murderous theocracy” with “murdering innocents”).
Killing people that do things you don’t agree with can never be the answer, and it seems to me it is more likely to fan the flames of conflict, rather than reduce the risk of a major war. However much I abhor the Iranian regime and their frankly reckless pursuit of nuclear technology, killing the odd scientist is not going to slow them down, and will probably simply harden their public opinion in favour of their governments policy -- of course if the US were trying to precipitate a conflict…
I smell the smell of Mossad…
Anything to retard & delay the nuclear program of Iran.
Seems it is an ‘extreme prejudicial’ pragmatic move…and probably engineered to draw Iran into conflict and internal destabilization before they gain nuclear muscle to any telling degree.
The UN has been totally hopeless if not useless and in the meantime Iran defies and develops.
Whatever the whole situation is unstable…methinks irrevocably…this is not going to end well!
Bottom line I suppose is would the west…including Israel… be happy sanguine bunnies if Iran had a fully functioning nuclear programme.
Iran are playing the same game as Iraq did before the western invasion including prevarication…delay…deliberate awkwardness and obfuscation, gambling on buying time and presumably gaining the tacit support of other Arab nations to erect a power block and throw the western allies into doubt and political turmoil at home.
It nearly worked for Iraq…and all nations in the west are now reaping the whirlwind of grief and political recriminations…it came to late for Saddam though!
This is a theocratic state playing martyr in front of their own sympathetic neighbours and always deliberately exposing the not so veiled threats against Israel.
At the same time they are playing political games with the west…they are trying to create rifts and disagreement amongst western allies…it is the shell game with a nuclear element.
They are mentally unstable in so far as the theists hold sway, that alone will determine how this plays out…not well methinks…not well at all!
Maybe I’m just naive, but it seems the systematic killing of scientists is exactly terrorism according to your definition. Isn’t this the 4th killing of a scientist or professor in the past two years? It seems the thinking may be, if we kill enough academics then maybe they’ll stop developing their bomb.
I don’t know. Was the goal to inflict fear and dread upon the wider population? Seems too focused and controlled to terrorize the general public.
Was the goal to terrorize nuclear engineers working in the Iranian nuclear program? As part of a pattern it would seem reasonable to assume this but if this is not part of a larger pattern then not so much.
It isn’t entirely clear who benefits from this killing. He was head engineer, and it can be assumed his loss will slow things, but how much and for how long? Iranians are certainly used to decentralizing their research and development so losing one person, even on site, isn’t going to do more than delay their progress.
It was also noted, on NPR, that the man was involved, something of a leader, in the protest movement within Iran. If some subset of Iranians blew him up they remove a protest leader and get to blame it on Israel. There are many competing forces. Lots of groups have reason to fear what might happen if Iran gets nuclear weapons and many of those have long standing issues with Iran. A lot of people are shocked to find out that the Taliban and Iran are often at odds. Without knowing, with some degree of certainty, who did it it is hard to place this killing in proper context.
Of course, as both the Gulf of Tonkin incident and sinking of the USS Main show, reality is seldom allowed to interfere with people making propaganda points or advancing an agenda. People, nations, are going to spin this to advance their own narratives and, in the end, the actual facts of who did it, and why, will scarcely matter at all.
To clear a few things:
This man was not a nuclear scientist. He had a degree in an unrelated field and his involvement with the regime’s uranium enrichment program was purely beaurocratic, likely via cronyism.
And yet he did become one of the big wigs in this. Again I do not condone what happened to him. But I do think the work the regime is pursuing through people like him is extremely dangerous and has to be stopped.
In case you forgot, Iran’s regime is the only state threatening to wipe another country (Israel) off the map. And president Ahmadinejad is a member of an apocalyptic sect believing in bringing about the end times through this act.
And no, the “scientist” was not providing healthcare to anyone and he wasn’t the victim of an attack intended to inflict maximum civilian casualties. So this wasn’t analogous to acts of either muslim or christian terrorists.
And lastly the loss of individuals and cyber attacks has indeed somehow slowed the regime’s program.
How you insult your host with all these comments that demonstrate humility about what can be concluded from news reports!
Get with the program, people! Check any of Mano Singham’s previous posts from the last few years about the Middle East. He sings a song in exactly one key, it’s all Luke vs. Darth — shrill, inflammatory, shallow.