Mixed Signals Confuse US-Iran Confrontation – Dangerous

• Pentagon chief: U.S. no closer to Iran confrontation
• Pentagon: Iran’s Missile Tests Prove Threat
• Shelby:Missile defense work must continue
• Gates: US-Iranian confrontation not likely
• Rice: We Will Defend Israel From Iran
• Are Iran and Israel on a collision course?
• Iran fires missiles but rejects talk of war
• Gates: Iran’s missile test shows need for missile defense system in Europe
• Iran ready to retaliate?
• Iran test-fires more missiles
• US Officials React To Iranian Missile Test
• We will paralyse Persian Gulf if attacked: Iran
• U.S., Israel Condemn Iran Missile Tests
• Missile Tests Hint New US Iran Policy
  

WASHINGTON, July 9–Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said Wednesday that Iran’s missile tests highlight the need for direct diplomacy as well as tougher threats of economic sanctions and strong incentives to persuade Tehran to change its behaviour.

US-Iran ‘not on brink of war’

• Total freezes Iran investments

• US condemns Iran missile tests

• Iran atomic bomb ‘within years’

• Timeline: Iran’s nuclear programme

Ahmadinejad rules out war against the U.S. or Israel

US ‘escalates covert Iran missions’

US congressional leaders have agreed to a presidential request for up to $400 million in funding for covert operations against Iran, according to a report in the New Yorker magazine.

Preparing the Battlefield

The Bush Administration steps up its secret moves against Iran.

Late last year, Congress agreed to a request from President Bush to fund a major escalation of covert operations against Iran, according to current and former military, intelligence, and congressional sources. These operations, for which the President sought up to four hundred million dollars, were described in a Presidential Finding signed by Bush, and are designed to destabilize the country’s religious leadership. The covert activities involve support of the minority Ahwazi Arab and Baluchi groups and other dissident organizations. They also include gathering intelligence about Iran’s suspected nuclear-weapons program.

Clandestine operations against Iran are not new. United States Special Operations Forces have been conducting cross-border operations from southern Iraq, with Presidential authorization, since last year. These have included seizing members of Al Quds, the commando arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and taking them to Iraq for interrogation, and the pursuit of “high-value targets” in the President’s war on terror, who may be captured or

State Department’s Iran Democracy Fund Shrouded in Secrecy

US Increases Security in Persian Gulf as Iran Tests More Missiles

‘Iran is a challenge to the whole world’

… US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice warned Iran that Washington will not back down in the face of threats against Israel. “We are sending a message to Iran that we will defend American interests and the interests of our allies,” Rice said Thursday in Georgia at the close of a three-day Eastern European trip.

What you see here are multiple interpretations for the ongoing confrontation among the Iranians, Israelis, United States and the whole Middle East. Depending on the part of the world you reside, the ongoing escalation of demonstration and rhetoric surrounding the Middle East are serious threats to the future condition of the entire world. Forward thinkers can depict the consequences of the final breakdown. People living in the region are too aware of these consequences, because they feel the results in their daily lives … and deaths. The Western world is being dragged from the bleachers by an economic crisis exacerbated by the unstable US dollar and oil prices. Food is the casualty of sabre rattling. Food is everyone’s problem. Food availability and affordability is proportional to the fuel for transport. Rethinking and reconfiguring has been allocated to the last minute … so, we suffer. The world has wasted the opportunity to prepare for this storm. As individuals, we must do what we can to play catch up. Unfortunately, the infrastructure we operate in has restricted our ability to survive. Governments are slow on the uptake and hinder individual survival by placing restrictions on how we operate our transportation. Pulling the plug on alternative energy suppression is too late to saturate the market with viable transportation. The rich can gobble up electric vehicles, wind and solar energy. But, you and I must try to survive with what we have until these trickle down to us and become affordable. The crime wave has already begun. This is the consequence of too many people left to their own devices to survive.