Big Lizards:Blog:Entry “Putin Wants Nuclear Armed Iran; Sanity Questioned”

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February 7, 2007

Putin Wants Nuclear Armed Iran; Sanity Questioned

Hatched by Dafydd

In another bizarre and unfathomable maneuver, Soviet Communist Party Chairman Vladimir Putin -- I'm sorry, I meant Russian President Vladimir Putin, of course -- has completed the delivery to Iran of 29 advanced TOR-M1 air-defense missile systems, despite American and even U.N. protest; and now the Iranians have tested them and integrated them into their air-defense strategy:

Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards have successfully test-fired a new Russian-made air defence missile system, whose delivery last month sparked bitter US criticism....

"We have successfully test-fired the new modern TOR-M1 defence system, within the framework of the Revolutionary Guards defence doctrine based on a military strategy of deterrence," Revolutionary Guards air force commander Hossein Salami was quoted as telling the ISNA news agency.

"The Iranian armed forces have added the new missile system to its defences to consolidate its defence capabilities," he said.

Why would Russia carge full-steam ahead with this very aggressive delivery, knowing that in the end, taking out Iran's nuclear weapons factories may be the sole viable alternative to nuclear mullahs? The only plausible explanation is that Russia wants to remove the capability of either Israel or the United States to extirpate Iran's budding nuclear arsenal.

Thus, President Putin wants Moslem extremist, terror-supporting Iran to go nuclear.

The odd thing is that Russia has a much more serious Islamism problem than does the West; Russia a pair of horrific, bloody wars with violent jihadists in Chechnya, with attendant violence that has dragged on now for a dozen years and resulted in likely tens of thousands of Russian deaths (including movie patrons in Moscow and shoolchildren in Beslan).

In 2000, Russia reinstalled a puppet government in Grozny; but there is no guarantee that the separatist war won't start up again -- especially if Iran begins funding that terrorist movement, as they fund Hezbollah, Hamas, and many others.

Does Russia think that by selling Iran an air-defense system, they will innoculate themselves against Iranian imperial and jihadist ambitions? If so, then Putin has utterly lost his mind.

Under President Bill Clinton, the United States actually went to war on behalf of Moslem groups against Christians -- twice, once in Bosnia and again in Kosovo. No good deed goes unpunished: Two years later, jihadists struck us on 9/11. Osama bin Laden, in a rambling, anti-American jeremiad, made no reference to our help to the Moslem separatist cause in the former Yugoslavia. (He did, however, castigate us for defending Saudi Arabia and Kuwait against the secular Saddam Hussein.)

The truly interesting question is whether Russians will actually be manning the missile batteries. The deal includes a "service contract," which presumably means spare parts and repairs; but does it also include trained Russian soldiers to operate the system?

If so, then Russia is truly aligning itself against America. But is it aligning itself with Europe? Perhaps the European Union has quietly signalled Russia that it would appreciate them continuing to upgrade Iran's air defenses, so as deliberately to make it more dangerous for the United States to attack Iranian nuclear sites -- a policy that frightens the EU, which prefers the strategy of bribing the Islamists not to attack -- a policy Europe in which Europeans have much more practice.

That would be a sad, shortsighted, and extremely foolish strategy: Not just Russia but the European continent as well has much more to fear from an ascendant, nuclear Iran than do we. (I wonder how much personal animosity between French President Jacques Chirac and President George W. Bush plays into this?)

I doubt the new air defenses will make any difference. If we decide to strike Iran, we may lose a couple more planes; but I don't believe that an extra 29 TOR-M1 batteries can slow us down, let alone stop us. (We would likely take them out with B-2 stealth bombers before even sending in the other planes.) But it does signal that Russia, at least, and probably the rest of Europe, are even less reliable than we imagined in the war on global jihadism.

I think Bush needs to relook Putin in the eyes and update his judgment.

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, February 7, 2007, at the time of 8:26 PM

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Comments

The following hissed in response by: charlotte

So excuse me forgetting, but these things I do
You see I've forgotten, if they're green or they're blue
Anyway, the thing is, what I really mean
Yours are the sweetest eyes, I've ever seen.

President Bush, Vlad’s eyes are Russian frozen sky/ KGB uniform/ and military-industrial steely blue. Does that help?

The above hissed in response by: charlotte at February 7, 2007 9:40 PM

The following hissed in response by: DrMalaka

I think you might be looking too deep into this one D. Bottom line is the the Russians are wh*res and will do anything for money. They could care less what they are selling and to who.

All the Russians saw here was a contract to sell product A to Country B, with the required funds going from Country B to Russia.

This is no different from what Europe does. All these economies are so screwed up and most of their products can't compete with real capitalists' products. All that is left for them is to sell to clients who the US and its allies will not sell to. That way they have a captive market that must buy their inferior products.

Why do you think we are having such a problem with these countries? Sure we have different opinions about politics, but the bottom line with respect to the Islamic Revolution should be one that we are all on board with. The reason that they don't help us is that these same problem countries are Europe and Russia's trading partners, without them think of the effect it would have on their economy. And they like the US not trading with these countries because that makes it so that Europe & Russia can sell technology that would not compete with our technology on the open market.

Just out of curiosity, how does the TOR-M1 compare in quality and price to the America's top technology in that field? If you went shopping on the open market which one would you pick?

The above hissed in response by: DrMalaka at February 8, 2007 8:32 AM

The following hissed in response by: nk

I agree with Dafydd's conclusions and his advice to the President.
Speculation: Russia's historical desire for buffer states on its borders, especially now with our inroads in the ____stans on her southeastern border and EU/NATO's on her western and southwestern borders? Russia recovering from the passing away of her Bolsheviks, and the neo-Coms trying to re-establish her hegemony? I remember my Solzenitsyn dimly, but he made the point one time that Mother Russia is a treacherous "mother", to her people as well as to her allies.

The above hissed in response by: nk at February 8, 2007 9:20 AM