Our Blessed Hope

By Bob Maginnis

BobMaginnis.com

President Barack Obama’s new defense strategy is chock full of myths as his soon-to-arrive 2013 budget promises to detail national security changes at this critical “moment of transition.”

Last week Obama spoke from the Pentagon briefing room saying this “moment of transition” is the confluence of ebbing security challenges and the necessity to put our fiscal house in order. He promised his new strategy will “guide our defense priorities” and satisfy Congress’ mandated cuts, while maintaining the “greatest force … ever known,” without repeating past mistakes.

That is a tall order, but for now all we have to judge are statements and the Pentagon’s strategy, “Sustaining U.S. Global Leadership: Priorities for 21st Century Defense.” Those sources espouse at least six myths that should alarm Congress and the American people about the President’s stewardship.

Myth #1: Obama contends “the tide of war is receding.” That is not true.

Obama claims credit for ending our role in Iraq, but that war continues. After the President ordered our withdrawal, Iraq exploded in sectarian violence and political turmoil that threatens to avalanche across the Middle East.

The tide of war isn’t receding in Afghanistan, but Obama intends to abandon that fight too. He is rushing for the exits by negotiating with the Taliban enemy. No wonder neighbor Pakistan is proving uncooperative.

The war on terror is expanding across much of Northern Africa—Nigeria to Somalia. And the year-long Arab Spring keeps the Mideast on edge from Tunisia to Bahrain to Yemen.

But Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta boasts about NATO’s operation against the Libyan dictator. Is the secretary not aware of the raging tribal and militia disputes tearing that country apart? And our longtime ally Egypt will soon be ruled by anti-West Islamists who hate Israel, and Syria is hosting a bloody civil war. Then there is Iran, which is on the precipice of atomic weapons status and threatens to close the oil-strategic Strait of Hormuz.

Myth #2: Obama said, "We can’t afford to repeat the mistakes that have been made in the past." But that is what he is about to do.

The President intends to cut our ground forces by 100,000, and he pretends ships and aircraft can replace those troops in the future high-tech world. That ignores bloody lessons from the times leading up to World War II, Korea, Vietnam and the wars that followed the 9/11 attacks.

We seldom pick our enemies, and those we fight seldom go after our strengths—air and sea power. Inevitably our enemies attack our vulnerabilities, and fielding an undersized ground force means we face more long and bloody ground wars.

Myth #3: The U.S. no longer needs a two-war doctrine. That doctrine dates back to the Cold War, when we were prepared to simultaneously fight North Korea and Soviet forces. Obama’s strategy calls for enough forces to fight a single large-scale war while conducting a holding action in a second region.

What prompted this change? Obama’s 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) states, "U.S. military forces must plan and prepare to prevail in a broad range of operations that occur in multiple theaters in overlapping time frames. This includes maintaining the ability to prevail against two capable nation-state aggressors …”

Perhaps part of the change rationale is the administration’s view that we will no longer conduct stability and counterinsurgency operations such as in Iraq and Afghanistan. But the potential for such operations in a volatile world remains high, and it is naïve to deny otherwise.

Abandoning a two-war doctrine is also dangerous not only because we lack flexibility and a right-sized force for global missions, but also because it sends a bad message that weakens deterrence. The thinking is that once we are decisively engaged, other adversaries will feel relatively free to do mischief.

Myth #4: The strategy is not budget-driven. Panetta argues that we don’t have to “choose between our national security and fiscal responsibility.” But Obama’s strategy insists it is a “national security imperative” to reduce the deficit “through a lower level of defense spending.”

Sen. John McCain (R.-Ariz.) is suspicious. He said the U.S. can’t afford a “budget-driven defense strategy” even though he accepts some defense cuts. But what makes this strategy appear to be budget-driven is the fact that it is so radically different from Obama’s 2010 QDR, which laid out a much more robust force.

McCain should also be suspicious that Obama intends to cut defense in order to protect entitlement programs. Put the issue in historic context. In 1960, defense spending was 47% of all federal spending compared with only 19% today. In 2021, after the planned defense cuts, Pentagon spending will account for 2.7% of the gross domestic product (GDP) compared with 11% for Obama’s entitlement package, and that is before his $2.6 trillion health plan is included.

Myth #5: A smaller nuclear force will provide all the deterrence needed. The President’s strategy calls for further reductions in our nuclear weapons inventory and “their role in the U.S. national security strategy.”

Defense officials decline to elaborate on how the administration will maintain our nuclear deterrence with fewer weapons and a downsized atomic triad of ballistic missiles, bombers and submarines. The key is making certain our force is optimal in size and capability, but that is the catch.

The U.S. has about 5,000 nuclear warheads, and agreed with the Russians via the 2010 New START treaty to reduce the number of deployed weapons to 1,550. Does Obama intend to cut beyond the START numbers, and does he plan to invest in modernization as are the Russians and Chinese? Getting more deterrence from a smaller force in a growing nuclear-threat environment demands a lot more explaining than a sentence in the new strategy.

Myth #6: The U.S. is not at war with China. That’s the administration’s mantra, but its actions say something very different. We are “rebalancing” forces to the Asia-Pacific region, investing in new technologies and platforms to address China’s military threat, and pouring funds into developing stronger Asia-Pacific alliances.

Recently Obama labeled Asia a “critical region,” and insisted any cuts to the military will not come at the expense of an expanding U.S. presence in Asia. His strategy states that the U.S. “must maintain its ability to project power in areas in which our access and freedom to operate are challenged.”

Only China challenges U.S. operations in Asia, which explains the strategy’s promise to implement the new Joint Operation Access Concept, “sustaining our undersea capabilities, developing a new stealth bomber, improving missile defenses, and continuing efforts to enhance the resiliency and effectiveness of critical space-based capabilities.”

The China-focused concept is driving decisions to keep the Navy’s current fleet of 11 aircraft carriers, and develop new bombers and more submarines. Also, expect more troops in Asia like those Obama promised for Darwin, Australia.

The inescapable conclusion is that Obama’s speech at the Pentagon last week was an announcement of his reelection strategy rather than a national defense strategy. The strategy guts our forces and increases risk while maintaining popular entitlement programs at taxpayer expense. Obama is acting more like a corporate CFO rather than the commander-in-chief, his primary duty as the President.

________________________________________________________________________

THE GIFT OF SMELL [Excerpts]

"And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour" (Ephesians 5:2).

The ability to smell is one gift we often take for granted. That's probably because we usually identify things more quickly with one of our other senses. At the same time, Thanksgiving dinner wouldn't be the same without the smells.

Some of the most unlikely creatures have a sense of smell. Believe it or not, even fungi have a sense of smell. Worms have organs on their heads to sense odor. Ticks carry their scent-detecting organs on their feet; this arrangement wouldn't work well for us! Mollusks smell through their gills! The salmon uses smell to find the same brook in which he was spawned. Lizards and snakes use their tongues to detect scents.

The most skilled smellers in the animal world can detect a scent even if there is only one molecule of that scent mixed in with 10 trillion molecules of average air. The modern perfumer's highly trained nose can identify about 10,000 different odors.

Before the days of modern medicine, a doctor's diagnosis would consist in part of sniffing the patient. For example, the plague had the scent of honey. Scarlet fever often gave its presence away by the smell of hot bread, and measles smelled like fresh-plucked feathers.

It takes a keen knowledge of biochemistry to design a system that can detect and identify scents. So next time you smell a wonderful meal or a beautiful flower, you may want to thank your Creator.

http://www.creationmoments.com/radio/transcripts/gift-smell

________________________________________________________________________

NIGERIA DESCENDS INTO HOLY WAR - Christian villagers in the north of the country live in fear of the Boko Haram, an Islamist sect blamed in a string of deadly attacks. [Excerpts]

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria -- Like many other Christian outposts in the spiritual homeland of Nigeria's "Taliban," the Victory Baptist Church in the northern desert city of Maiduguri no longer relies solely on God for protection.

A modest whitewashed spire in a skyline dominated by mosques, for the last month it has had a military guard to defend it from Boko Haram, the militant local Islamist sect blamed for a string of attacks nationwide in recent weeks.

The soldiers in the sandbagged machine-gun nest outside the church, though, were unable to save three members of the flock last week.

On [January 4], three days after Boko Haram ordered all Christians to leave Muslim-dominated northern Nigeria, Ousman Adurkwa, a 65-year-old local trader, answered the door of his home near the church to what he thought was an after-hours customer. Instead it was two masked gunmen.

"They shot my father dead, and then came for the rest of the family," Adurkwa's son Hyeladi, 25, told The Sunday Telegraph the following day. "One chased my brother Moussa and killed him, and the other shot at me, but my mother took the bullet in the stomach instead."

Hyeladi spoke as weeping parishioners gathered for an impromptu memorial service in the Adurkwa family compound, where the parlour carpet was still stained with blood from the gunshot wound suffered by Mrs. Aduwurka, 50, who now lies in hospital. But while the sermon from the local pastor, Brother Balani, urged "prayers for those who God has taken away, and comfort for those who remain," it diplomatically avoided the more earthly question of who did it.

For one thing, no one can be sure the killing was not simply the result of a private feud. And for another, Boko Haram, whose name means "Western education is sinful," and which wants hardline Shariah law across the whole of Nigeria, has a track record of killing anyone who points the finger at them publicly.

Yet some of the Adurkwa family's neighbouring Christian households have already made up their mind, fleeing the district for fear they might be next.

(Freeman, "Nigeria descends into holy war," The Montreal Gazette, 1/7/12).

________________________________________________________________________

New Sanctions on Iran

By David Dolan

DDolan.com

The leaders of the 27 countries that belong to the European Union have decided to ban all crude oil imports from the Shiite Muslim country of Iran. However, there is disagreement as to exactly when the ban should take effect. Although EU countries get most of their petroleum supplies from either North Africa, Nigeria or various Arab countries, along with imports from Russia, some have been purchasing significant amounts of Iranian crude over the past few decades. In fact, only China purchases more Iranian oil than the combined European Union countries.

The new EU sanctions follow a decision earlier this month by the Obama administration to sever all contacts between American financial institutions and Iran’s Central Bank. At the time, the State Department urged its European partners and all other countries to follow suit. The sanctions are designed to force the extremist Iranian clerical regime to halt its nuclear weapons development program, which the US says may lead to the production of nuclear weapons within one year’s time. Economic analysts say the sanctions are biting, with the Iranian currency growing ever weaker against the American dollar.

________________________________________________________________________

CHRISTIAN EDITOR RECEIVES DEATH THREATS FROM PAKISTAN ISLAMISTS [Excerpts]

A Pakistani Christian editor has said he receives hate mails and death threats on a daily basis from Pakistan for carrying reports on the persecution of Christians in the South Asian country.

Dr. Nazir S. Bhatti, editor of the Pakistan Christian Post, who doubles as founder of Pakistan Christian Congress, Thursday received one such email, in which Aasia Bibi, who is languishing in jail for alleged blasphemy, and former Punjab governor Salman Taseer and minorities affairs minister Shahbaz Bhatti, who were assassinated last year for crusading to end the blasphemy law, were called harami, or bastards.

A defiant Bhatti said Christians are sons of soil, not descendants of Muslim invaders. Over the centuries, Muslim invaders massacred 80 million Hindus to convert India into Islam.

Bhatti posted the hate email on his Facebook page Thursday:

"I have read some of your media and it disturbs me very greatly that your media is responsible for sympathizing with the criminal, dirty harami woman Aasia Bibi, who insulted our beloved Prophet (Peace be upon him).... Furthermore, your media has been portraying such haramis like Salman Taseer and Shahbaz Bhatti as "shaheeds" (martyrs), they are both haramis and jahannamis (destined for hell) and gustakh e Rasool (blasphemer of prophet)."

The writer told Bhatti, "I would like to remind you of one very important fact. Pakistan is an Islamic nation. It is a nation for Muslims, by Muslims, of Muslims."

Pakistan, like neighboring Iran and Saudi Arabia, is officially an Islamic republic where only a Muslim can become the head of state or government.

"Now you people are not Muslims, and you are not Pakistanis, but you are only guests who happen to live in Pakistan. Truth be told, we do not like you people, and would rather you leave our beautiful country. You can go to Europe or America, but we do not like you to live in Pakistan, the land which is Paak (pure).

"All of Pakistan is behind Hazrat Ghazi e Millat, Mumtaz Hussain Qadri...we will make life for you in Pakistan a living hell, I swear to God so don't forget it."

(Ahmar Mustikhan, "Christian Editor Receives Death Threats from Pakistan Islamists," Baltimore Examiner, January 6, 2012).

________________________________________________________________________

Libyan Weapons Flowing to Terrorists: Israeli Prime Minister Warns About Missile Threat

By Aaron Klein

Klein Online

Libyan weapons are being smuggled into the Gaza Strip through the Egyptian Sinai Peninsula, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned yesterday.

Addressing the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Netanyahu warned “Libyan arms continue to flow into Gaza through Sinai.” He indicated that there were “more than 10,000 missiles” in Gaza, some of which had a range “surpassing 40 kilometers (24 miles).”

Just last week, KleinOnline was first to report Libyan rebels are selling large quantities of weaponry to Palestinian terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip, according to Israeli security sources.

The sources noted the weapons were seized after the regime of late Libyan leader Moammar Qaddafi was toppled by rebel fighters with help from the U.S-led NATO bombing campaign.

The weapons include French and Saudi munitions and equipment seized by the rebel gangs, the sources said.

The weapons are being sold to the Gazan groups Hamas, the Iranian-backed Islamic Jihad, the Popular Resistance Committees and the al-Qaida-affiliated Jihadiya Salafia, said the sources.

The Israeli security sources said there is information that Islamic Jihad used Iranian funds to purchase rockets from Libyan rebels that can travel farther than Tel Aviv if the projectiles are fired from the Gaza Strip.

These are not the first reports of Libyan weapons making it to Gaza.

In October, KleinOnline quoted Islamic Jihad sources saying a missile launcher capable of firing up to five projectiles at once that originated in Libya was smuggled into the Gaza Strip.

Abu Mussaab, a senior member of Islamic Jihad’s Al-Quds military wing, told KleinOnline at the time that such launchers were recently smuggled into Gaza.

“This is not the only surprise,” added Mussab.

He promised an improved missile and rocket arsenal to be used against Israel “in the very near future.”

Mossaab hinted the launcher originated in Libya.

Other Islamic Jihad sources told KleinOnline the launcher indeed originated in Libya.

Also, the information of Libyan weapons sales came after KleinOnline reported two weeks earlier Iran had been funneling weapons to Islamic Jihad at a time when Hamas has been debating scaling back its affiliation with its Iranian backers.

According to well-placed sources within Hamas speaking to KleinOnline, the jihadist group has been asked by the Egyptian military to stay out of any future confrontation between Israel and Iran.

For the first time in recent years, Hamas, feeling confident from major Muslim Brotherhood gains in the region, is considering distancing itself somewhat from Iran, the sources said.

The group may even remain largely neutral if Israel strikes Iran’s suspected nuclear sites, the sources said. The sources added, however, that no decision has been made.

Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood belong to the Sunni stream of Islam while Iran’s leadership espouses fundamentalist Shiite Islam. While Iran has long supported Sunni groups like Hamas, the major differences in Islamic ideology and practice have always caused some unease.

Indeed, one of the most senior Hamas officials, speaking previously to KleinOnline on condition of anonymity, once said he would ultimately be pleased if Israel strikes Iran’s nuclear sites even if it means scaled-back Iranian funding to his group. The Hamas official said he fears Iran would use a nuclear umbrella to enforce a Shiite superpower in the Middle East at the expense of Sunni ideology.

According to several Hamas sources, there has been tension between the jihad group and Iran over Hamas’ decision to not aid Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in fighting an insurgency targeting Assad’s regime.

That uprising has been supported by the Muslim Brotherhood. Syria is a major Iranian partner in the region.

Some Hamas leaders even speculated the group may move their political headquarters from Syria. Hamas chieftain Khaled Meshaal currently resides in Damascus.

According to recent Arabic-language news media reports, Hamas has been quietly scaling back its Damascus headquarters.

Speaking last month to KleinOnline, Ahmed Yousef, chief political adviser to Hamas’ de facto prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh, confirmed reports his group is looking to move the headquarters of its top leadership from Syria.

“There are many places in the Arab world [that would welcome the] Hamas politburo,” Yousef said.

Asked specifically where Hamas headquarters can move, Yousef replied:

“There are many other countries. Jordan is there. Sounds like they are trying to open dialogue with Hamas. They might offer a place. Turkey, Egypt, Qatar; there are many places where [Hamas leaders] can find a safe haven to work and try to help their people in Gaza and the West Bank.”

While Hamas might not come to Iran’s aid in the event of an Israeli strike, sources in the Islamist group told KleinOnline the Iranian-backed Islamic Jihad terror organization in the Gaza Strip is still firmly in Tehran’s camp.

The Hamas sources said Islamic Jihad has very similar weaponry to Hamas, including a massive rocket arsenal capable of causing much damage to Israel.

KleinOnline reported in October on Iran’s missile training in Gaza. Egyptian security officials said Iran has been preparing Palestinian terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon to retaliate in the event of Israeli strikes against Tehran’s nuclear sites.

The chatter about Hamas’ allegiances come after the Muslim Brotherhood and the Islamist Salafi movement’s Al-Nour Party saw considerable gains in Egypt’s recent parliamentary votes.

________________________________________________________________________

Israeli Hackers: We Are Defending the Nation

By Ryan Jones

Israel Today

The Internet-based war between Israeli and Arab hackers heated up this week, solidifying the online space as the newest battlefield in the regional conflict.

As they proceeded to take down the Saudi Stock Exchange and other Arab financial websites, Israeli hackers declared themselves the new front-line warriors in defense of the Jewish state.

"They brought war, but we are better at this," one of the members of the Israeli hacker team known as "idf team" told Yediot Ahronot. Referencing Israel's prowess in various hi-tech fields, he noted that "Israel's largest export sector is made up of hackers."

Just hours earlier, idf team had managed to make good on its promise to black out the websites of the Saudi Stock Exchange and the Saudi foreign currency exchange market. The hackers said the move was a warning, and that the Saudi websites would only be brought down for one day. They also grabbed the credit card numbers and personal details of 5,000 Saudi citizens, but said they would not leak them at this time.

"We have no desire to hurt innocent people, so we see no reason to leak this information at this time," said one of the idf team members. "We are only trying to deter additional attacks against Israeli websites."

On Monday, a group of pro-Palestinian hackers known as "Nightmare" managed to bring down the websites of the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, El Al and First International Bank of Israel. Earlier this month, a Saudi hacker using the handle "0xOmar" stole the credit card information of thousands of Israelis and leaked the details on the Internet, creating a brief panic in the Israeli financial sector.

0xOmar and Nightmare are now working together, and are determined to do as much harm to Israel as possible. "I'll keep attacking and publishing everything related to military or credit cards of normal people," 0xOmar said in an email to Israeli media. "I want to hurt Israel in any way possible."

A Jewish hacker known as "Hannibal" has warned that if 0xOmar and his cohorts do not back off, there will be painful reprisals. Already Hannibal has leaked the email details of thousand of Saudi citizens. "I am preparing huge surprises for the Arabs that are attacking Israel," Hannibal told Israeli media.

Israeli hacker "Prx3RO" and a team known as "Anonymous972" have also leaked the email and credit card details of thousands of Saudi and United Arab Emirates citizens in response to the attacks on Israeli websites.

In addition to expanding the Israeli-Arab conflict to an entirely new battlefield (previous hacker incidents had been few and far between), the current hacker war also represents a shift in the defensive and offensive mechanisms of both sides. The hacker war is being carried out by regular citizens, not soldiers or security professionals, and they are doing it solely out of national pride and a desire to defend their nation.

If it continues, the hacker war could transform the Israeli-Arab conflict into something that a much broader cross-section of society is actively involved in and which has a far greater impact on the day-to-day lives of the entire population.

________________________________________________________________________

ISLAMIC MAJORITY COUNTRIES TOP 2012 WORLD WATCH LIST OF PERSECUTORS [Excerpts]

The Open Doors 2012 World Watch List has a familiar look to it. North Korea tops the list for the 10th straight time as the country where Christians face the most severe persecution, while Islamic-majority countries represent nine of the top 10 and 38 of the 50 countries on the annual ranking.

Afghanistan (2), Saudi Arabia (3), Somalia (4), Iran (5) and the Maldives (6) form a bloc where indigenous Christians have almost no freedom to openly worship. For the first time Pakistan (10) entered the top 10, after a tumultuous year during which the nation's highest-ranking Christian politician, Cabinet Minister Shahbaz Bhatti, was assassinated for his attempts to change the blasphemy law.

The rest of the top 10 is composed of Uzbekistan (7), Yemen (8) and Iraq (9). Laos was the lone country to drop from the top 10 list, falling to No. 12 from No. 10.

While persecution has worsened due to persecution by Muslim extremists, without question North Korea once again deserves its No. 1 ranking. Defiantly Communist, North Korea has built a bizarre quasi-religion around the founder of the country, Kim Il-Sung. Anyone with "another god" is automatically persecuted. The estimated 200,000 to 400,000 Christians in this country must remain deeply underground. An estimated 50,000 to 70,000 Christians are held in ghastly prison camps.

"How the death of Kim Jong-Il last month and the coming to power of his son Kim Jong-Un will affect the status of Christians in North Korea is hard to determine at this early stage," Open Doors USA President/CEO Dr. Carl Moeller said. "Certainly the situation for believers remains perilous. Please pray that the Lord will open up North Korea and there will be religious freedom to worship the One, true God, not the gods of Kim Jong-Il and Kim Il-Sung."

http://www.christiannewswire.com/news/9368118564.html

________________________________________________________________________

Day After Iran Tests the Bomb

By Bob Maginnis

BobMaginnis.com

Iran will become an atomic weapons state because it already has the raw materials, technology, the ambition, and no single or group of nations is willing to do what is necessary to deny that outcome.

Atomic weapons in the hands of the radical Islamic Republic of Iran has been “unacceptable” to both the Bush and Obama Administrations and most of our allies, especially Israel which considers the proposition an existential threat.

Our “unacceptable” policy translated into half measures—weak sanctions, covert action, and military threats—to persuade Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions. But only two alternatives will stop Iran’s atomic weapons program: a popular uprising that installs a government which abandons atomic arms and foreign invasion. Neither alternative is likely which is why it is time to prepare for the day after Iran tests the bomb.

Before considering the “day after” it is helpful to appreciate Tehran’s bizarre motivation for atomic weapons, its hurried-up nuclear arms program, and why our half measures will inevitably fail.

First, the Islamic Republic of Iran is ruled by clerics and devout Shi’ites who hate the West and is driven by an apocalyptic branch of Islam that believes its duty is to begin world war that brings the return of their Mahdi (messiah)—an Imam so powerful he will bring the world under Islamic rule. An atomic bomb is Iran’s war trigger.

Second, the regime is making rapid progress acquiring an atomic weapons capability. Last fall the United Nation’s nuclear watchdog agency, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), announced evidence of Iran’s accelerating atomic weapons program. The agency’s report states Iran created computer models of nuclear explosions, conducted experiments on triggering a fissile reaction and completed advanced research on a miniaturized nuclear warhead that could be delivered by a medium-range missile.

Last week the IAEA confirmed Iran’s nuclear material enrichment program took a dangerous turn. The regime shifted its 20% uranium enrichment activities to the underground site at Fordow near the holy city of Qom, which offers protection against air strikes. By the end of this year Iran is expected to have more than enough 20% enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb which could quickly be turned into weapons-grade material (90%) in a month or less.

Finally, the West’s efforts to deny Tehran atomic weapons are doomed. Tehran’s opponents have been attempting for years to use a combination of diplomacy, sanctions, and covert action to persuade the mullahs to abandon the bomb. And now there is talk of limited military action which will also fail.

Years of increasingly tough economic sanctions failed to persuade Iran to abandon its atomic weapons program. Now the Obama administration is hosting the strongest sanctions yet which target the Central Bank of Iran, the main conduit of oil revenues. Those sanctions also target companies like China-based Zhuhai Zhenrong Co., the largest supplier of refined petroleum products to Iran.

But these sanctions which enjoy international support are doomed because Russia and China refuse to fully cooperate. Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov accused the West of imposing sanctions “which go far beyond the boundaries of achieving nonproliferation objectives.” China, a major consumer of Iranian oil, threw cold water on the tougher sanctions as well.

A Chinese ministry of commerce spokesman said China will not heed the U.S.’s request to sanction Iran because it “will do serious damage to China’s domestic economy.” Iran is China’s third-biggest source of oil, supplying more than 5% of total needs.

Covert operations are part of the West’s failing campaign to persuade Iran to abandon atomic arms as well. An American diplomatic cable disclosed by WikiLeaks listed “covert measure” as one of the pillars of Israel’s approach to Iran.

Iran alleges foreign covert operatives are responsible for assassinating five Iranian nuclear scientists, planting the Stuxnet computer worm to destroy enrichment centrifuges, and sabotaging a missile-testing site, near the nuclear facility at Isfahan. But such covert activities are not enough to stop Iran’s atomic program because it includes hundreds of people across many widely scattered facilities.

Military options are gaining attention especially now that Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta said in mid-December that Iran can assemble a bomb within or year or even less. But those options are ultimately doomed as well.

Three military options are likely under consideration: target Iran’s nuclear weapons facilities; target the weapons facilities and regime assets; and launch a 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq-like operation. We should immediately disabuse ourselves of the third option because the U.S. has no appetite for another land war in the Mideast.

A limited strike option to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities could have unintended consequences and only stall, not end, the Iranian nuclear drive. After all, America’s bombing effectiveness, the best in the world, is rapidly deteriorating because Iran is burying its atomic facilities out of reach for even our biggest conventional bombs like Boeing’s 30,000-pound Massive Ordnance Penetrator.

The second option would also target regime assets such as command centers to reduce Iran’s ability to retaliate. The goal would be to trigger an uprising that would topple the regime, an unlikely outcome.

But both options will earn quick retaliation. The mullahs will close the Strait of Hormuz through which 35% of the world’s seaborne oil passes daily, launch ballistic missiles at allied strategic facilities, conduct preplanned covert actions, and unleash its terrorist proxies like Hezbollah.

Therefore, because sanctions, covert action, and limited military options are likely to fail we must prepare for the inevitable atomic Iran.

So what should we do? Last week, the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS), an Israeli think-tank that enjoys a particularly close relationship with the top echelons in Israel, conducted a simulation exercise to consider the “day after” scenario. It concludes that an Iranian nuclear test would radically shift the whole power balance of the Middle East. The INSS outlined what might occur the “day after.”

The US would try to restrain Israel from military retaliation by proposing a formal defense pact, according to the INSS report. Then Russia would propose a defense pact with the U.S. to arrest regional nuclear proliferation in part to try specifically to prevent the Saudis from developing their own atomic arsenal. Meanwhile, the newly minted atomic Iran will demand new borders with Iraq and sovereignty over Bahrain.

But in an interesting twist, even though the simulation showed that Iran will not forgo nuclear weapons, Tehran “will attempt to use them to reach an agreement with the major powers that will improve its position.” That conclusion parallels an emerging perspective shared by some Israeli elite.

Last year, Meir Dagan, the former head of Mossad (Israel’s intelligence organization), objected to an Israeli strike on Iran because it would engulf the region in war. Then last month he added that a nuclear Iran “did not necessarily threaten Israel.”

Two things are becoming obvious regarding Iran’s atomic quest. The U.S. has neither the will nor the international support to topple the regime and an Arab Spring-like Iranian revolution doesn’t appear likely either. What does appear likely is the grudging acceptance of an atomic armed Tehran, and a radically changed Middle East.

________________________________________________________________________

OLDEST TEMPLE TOPPLES EVOLUTIONISTS' HISTORY OF RELIGION [Excerpts]

"Anthropologists have assumed that organized religion began as a way of salving the tensions that inevitably arose when hunter-gatherers settled down, became farmers, and developed large societies," according to a National Geographic feature in June 2011.1 But the exquisitely carved pillars of the world's oldest known temple, Gobekli Tepe, contradict that evolutionary version of ancient human history.2

Standard evolutionary anthropology -- the study of ancient man -- insists that humans invented religious worship as they emerged from an ape-like ancestry. Religion supposedly emerged after the development of agriculture provided people with enough free time and close proximity to bicker, thus also providing them with an incentive to invent God and religion.

Evolutionary storytellers such as H. G. Wells provided possible reasons why early humans developed religion.3

Similarly speculative, the National Geographic's report on Gobekli Tepe asserted that "those who rose to power were seen as having a special connection with the gods."2 But the idea that agricultural amenities spawned religion is making an about-face in light of the fully constructed temple complexes discovered at Gobekli Tepe (pronounced Guh-behk-lee Teh-peh and roughly translated "potbelly hill") in southern Turkey. The remarkable findings there show that mankind was able to worship from the beginning of the human race.

Many mysteries surround the temple site. Nobody knows why the pillars at the complex were buried on purpose, perhaps centuries after their careful construction, or why they depict stylized ornamental patterns, as well as images of birds, snakes, a scorpion, bulls, foxes, reptiles, a man, and even possibly dinosaurs. And no one knows why the pillars were arranged in the four stone circles that excavators have uncovered so far, or why they were built at all. "In fact, nobody really knows how Neolithic man managed to hew these pillars," according to Elif Batuman, who described his visit to Gobekli Tepe in the December 2011 issue of The New Yorker.4

These general questions may never find answers, but these fascinating ruins have clearly rebutted certain evolution-inspired claims about ancient humans. Batuman wrote, "The idea of a religious monument built by hunter-gatherers contradicts most of what we thought we knew about religious monuments and about hunter-gatherers."4

Archaeologist Klaus Schmidt, lead researcher of the excavations, has suggested that perhaps religious worship evolved first, and this development triggered the need for agriculture. But this reversal of the standard evolutionary story only shows that man-made histories are subjective, plastic, and unreliable.

http://www.icr.org/article/6582/