By Stan Goodenough
Jan 27, 2008
While the world, thanks to a US intelligence assessment, is slacking its efforts to pressure Iran into ending its pursuit of nuclear power, Israeli Defense Minister and former Prime Minister Ehud Barak believes that Tehran is "probably already working on nuclear warheads for ground-to-ground missiles" that can reach not only Israeli but also European, and even American, targets.
The Iranian program was "quite advanced, much beyond the level of the Manhattan Project" Barak said in an interview published Saturday in the Washington Post.
Iran's Islamic leadership has repeatedly vowed to destroy Israel even as it has pooh-poohed international efforts aimed at curbing its quest to acquire an A-bomb for Allah.
Unlike the Soviet Union, whose nuclear weapons were largely neutralized by the "Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD)" doctrine that kept the Cold War from turning hot, Iran is led by men who publicly glory in the prospect of being "martyred" in the act of killing Jews and destroying Israel.
While more and more members of the international community are holding Holocaust memorial days and swearing "never again" to permit the attempted extermination of the Jews, the world is demonstrating an abject unwillingness to put its money where its mouth is, precisely as just such a threat is raising its head in the Middle East.
Barak, in his interview, reportedly refused to say whether he believes Israel is able to militarily deal with Iran on its own.
He did, however, wonder aloud about the accuracy of the US intelligence assessment that has pulled the plug on pressure on Iran.
Many Israelis believe that their country has no choice but to confront the Iranian beast on its own if the US and other western nations cannot or will not do so.