When did Russia become diplomats while America just became dipwads?

posted by Bill Arnett @ 9:44 AM Permalink

From an article in the NYT regarding the utterly inane imposition, unilaterally, of course, of singularly insipid sanctions designed to provoke Iran into war while simultaneously showing the world that Americans are too cowardly to negotiate with Iran unless Iran knuckles under and gives America everything it wants before negotiations start (My god, are we fifth graders again?). The ludicrousness of all this has not escaped our Russian friends:

In announcing sweeping new sanctions against an elite unit of the Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran, Bush administration officials took pains to offer assurances on Thursday that at least for now, the United States is not going to war with Iran. […]

The shift represents a tacit acknowledgment that the diplomatic strategy pressed most vigorously by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has been ineffective, and it prompted fresh criticism on Thursday from Russia: “Why make the situation worse, bring it to a dead end, threaten sanctions or even military action?” President Vladimir V. Putin asked, in a report by Agence France-Presse.

The administration clearly hopes to enlist allies around the world in its new, tougher stance — in part because the United States, having maintained its own stiff sanctions against Iran since the Islamic revolution in 1979, does not have much leverage left itself. […]

Yet officials acknowledged that past attempts to enlist allies in limiting their business ties to Iran have come up short. In each instance, they acknowledged, some other countries have partly offset the sanctions.

China, for instance, has increased trade with Iran in the past year, Mr. Burns said. And analysts pointed out that Russian, Indian, European and even Canadian companies continued to do business with many different sectors of the Iranian economy, particularly its all important oil and natural gas industries. […]

In Tehran, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, Mohammad Ali Hosseini, shrugged off Washington’s announcement, saying America’s hostile policies ran counter to international regulations and were “doomed to fail,” the official news agency IRNA reported.

Mr. Hosseini said the United States produced nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and had supported what he called terrorist groups. He called the Bush administration’s accusation that Iran was arming Shiite militias in Iraq “ridiculous.”

Given the terms of the Non-Proliferation Treaty spokesman Hosseini is absolutely correct where he says, "America’s hostile policies ran counter to international regulations and [are] 'doomed to fail,'…".

The treaty is quite specific and has a clear mandate:

Article IV: 1. Nothing in this Treaty shall be interpreted as affecting the inalienable right of all the Parties to the Treaty to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination and in conformity with Articles I and II of this Treaty.

2. All the Parties to the Treaty undertake to facilitate, and have the right to participate in, the fullest possible exchange of equipment, materials and scientific and technological information for the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. Parties to the Treaty in a position to do so shall also co-operate in contributing alone or together with other States or international organizations to the further development of the applications of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, especially in the territories of non-nuclear-weapon States Party to the Treaty, with due consideration for the needs of the developing areas of the world.

Greater clarity would be impossible and it is clear that Iran, rather than being the great threat the bush maladministration claims it to be, is in total treaty compliance in seeking nuclear power for itself.

In view of the many violations of law, and the treaties the Great Liar bush has broken, the unilateral wars of aggression to steal Middle East oil, the systematic genocide he is conducting against Muslims, and his adamant refusal to negotiate with a country willing to negotiate with us, as long as there are no pre-conditions that must be satisfied beforehand, it is becoming clear that American bellicosity does pose the greatest threat to world peace.

Why else is bush preparing to go to war with a peaceful nation pursuing nuclear power in full accord with the NPT?

Labels: Bush, condi, Conservatives, conspiracy, corruption, diplomacy, disinformation, GOP, hypocrisy, iran war prep, propaganda