[THS] Fidel Castro: War on Iran Imminent

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http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25928.htm

Castro: War on Iran 'Imminent'

By Tom Melle

July 13, 2010 "Morning Star" -- Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro warned on Monday
that a US-Israeli attack on Iran is "imminent" and predicted that this could trigger a
global nuclear war.

In a special appearance on state-run television for the first time in nearly a year, the
Communist leader described US and Israeli sabre-rattling over Iran's civil nuclear
energy programme as "the most serious crisis" on the international scene because
"the Iranian government will not retreat."

"The Iranians have been preparing themselves for 30 years, and have acquired all
the Russian and Chinese aeroplanes and weapons necessary for their defence," Mr
Castro said.

"They are training all people between the ages of 12 and 60 - just the Guardians of
the Revolution have a million members," he added.

And Mr Castro insisted that the US sank the South Korean Cheonan warship in order
to justify an attack on the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

He said that "in the face of a massive attack against Iran, North Korea will not wait to
be attacked, and a nuclear war will also break out in that zone.

"When they decide to attack Iran, one war after the other will be unleashed," he
declared.

The veteran Communist spoke out at a delicate time politically for Cuba, as it begins
releasing 52 prisoners under a landmark deal brokered with Spanish officials and the
Catholic church last week.

The men were all arrested in a crackdown on US-backed subversion in 2003.

The Origin of Wars

By Fidel Castro Ruz - granma.cu - July 11, 2010

I affirmed on July 4 that neither the United States nor Iran would give in; "one, due
to the pride of the powerful, and the other, out of resistance to the yoke and the
capacity to fight, as has occurred so many times in the history of humanity..."

In almost all wars, one of the parties wishes to avoid them, and sometimes, both. On
this occasion, it would come about even though one of the parties does not wish it,
as happened in the two World Wars in 1914 and 1939, with only 25 years of distance
before the first outbreak and the second.

The slaughters were horrific, they would not have been unleashed without prior
errors of calculation. The two parties were defending imperialist interests and they
believed that they would obtain their objectives without the terrible cost that that
implied.

In the case that concerns us: one of them is defending national, absolutely just
interests. The other is pursuing illegitimate intentions and crude material interests.

If we analyze all the wars that have taken place, starting from the known history of
our species, one of the parties has sought those objectives.

Any illusion that, on this occasion, such objectives will be reached without the most
terrible of all wars is absolutely vain.

In one of the best articles published by the Global Research website on Thursday,
July 1, signed by Rick Rozoff, he provides abundant indisputable arguments on the
United States intentions, of which any well-informed person must be aware.

"... Victory can be attained when an adversary knows it is vulnerable to an
instantaneous and undetectable, overwhelming and devastating attack without the
ability to defend itself or retaliate," is what the United States thinks, according to the
author.

"... A country which aspires to remain the only state in history to wield full spectrum
military dominance on land, in the air, on the seas and in space."

"... To maintain and extend military bases and troops, aircraft carrier battle groups
and strategic bombers on and to most every latitude and longitude. To do so with a
post-World War II record war budget of $708 billion for next year."

It was "... the first country to develop and use nuclear weapons..."

"... the U.S. retains 1,550 deployed nuclear warheads and 2,200 (by some counts
3,500) more in storage and a triad of land, air and submarine delivery vehicles."

"The non-nuclear arsenal used for disabling and destroying the air defenses and
strategic, potentially all major, military forces of other nations will consist of
intercontinental ballistic missiles, adapted submarine-launched ballistic missiles,
hypersonic cruise missiles and bombers, and super stealthy strategic bombers able to
avoid detection by radar and thus evade ground- and air-based defenses."

Rozoff lists the many press conferences, meetings and statements of Joint Chiefs of
Staff and high-ranking members of the government of the United States in the last
few months.

He explains the commitments to NATO and the reinforced cooperation with Near East
allies, primarily, read Israel. He says, "The U.S. is also intensifying space and cyber
warfare programs with the potential to completely shut down other nations' military
surveillance and command, control, communications, computer and intelligence
systems, rendering them defenseless on any but the most basic tactical level."

He speaks of the signing in Prague, on April 8 of this year, of the new START Treaty
between Russia and the United States, which "does not contain any constraints on
current or planned U.S. conventional prompt global strike capability."

He refers to countless news items on the subject and illustrates the intentions of the
United States with one overwhelming example.

He notes that "... 'The Department of Defense is currently exploring the full range of
technologies and systems for a Conventional Prompt Global Strike (CPGS) capability
that could provide the President more credible and technically suitable options for
dealing with new and evolving threats."

I maintain the opinion that any president whosoever, not even the most expert
military chief, would not have one minute to know what should be done if it was not
already programmed on computers.

Imperturbably, Rozoff relates what the Global Security Network affirms in an analysis
titled: "'Cost to test U.S. global-strike missile could reach $500 million,'" by Elaine
Grossman.

"'The Obama administration has requested $239.9 million for prompt global strike
research and development across the military services in fiscal 2011... If funding
levels remain as anticipated into the coming years, the Pentagon will have spent
some $2 billion on prompt global strike by the end of fiscal 2015, according to budget
documents submitted last month to Capitol Hill.'"

"A terrifying scenario comparable to the effects of a PGS attack, in this case the sea-
based version, appeared three years ago in Popular Mechanics:

"'In the Pacific, a nuclear-powered Ohio class submarine surfaces, ready for the
president's command to launch. When the order comes, the sub shoots a 65-ton
Trident II ballistic missile into the sky. Within 2 minutes, the missile is traveling at
more than 20,000 ft. per second. Up and over the oceans and out of the atmosphere
it soars for thousands of miles.

"'At the top of its parabola, hanging in space, the Trident's four warheads separate
and begin their screaming descent down toward the planet.

"'Traveling as fast as 13,000 mph, the warheads are filled with scored tungsten rods
with twice the strength of steel.

"'Just above the target, the warheads detonate, showering the area with thousands
of rods-each one up to 12 times as destructive as a .50-caliber bullet. Anything within
3,000 sq. ft. of this whirling, metallic storm is obliterated.'"

Rozoff immediately explains the April 7 statement of General Leonid Ivashov, joint
chief of staff of the Russian armed forces, made in a column entitled "Obama's
nuclear surprise."

In that same column Ivashov, refers to the speech by the U.S. president in Prague
last year: "The existence of thousands of nuclear weapons is the most dangerous
legacy of the Cold War" and his signing of the START II agreement in that same city
on April 8, Rozoff quotes the author, who stated:

"'No examples of sacrificial service of the U.S. elites to mankind or peoples of other
countries can be discovered in the U.S. history over the past century. Would it be
realistic to expect the advent of an African-American president to the White House to
change the country's political philosophy traditionally aimed at achieving global
dominance? Those believing that something like that is possible should try to realize
why the U.S. the country with a military budget already greater than those of all
other countries of the world combined continues spending enormous sums of money
on preparations for war.'"

"... 'The Prompt Global Strike concept envisages a concentrated strike using several
thousand precision conventional weapons in 2-4 hours that would completely destroy
the critical infrastructures of the target country and thus force it to capitulate.'"

"'The Prompt Global Strike concept is meant to sustain the U.S. monopoly in the
military sphere and to widen the gap between it and the rest of the world. Combined
with the deployment of the missile defense supposed to keep the U.S. immune to
retaliatory strikes from Russia and China, the Prompt Global Strike initiative is going to
turn Washington into a modern era global dictator.'"

"'In essence, the new U.S. nuclear doctrine is an element of the novel U.S. security
strategy that would be more adequately described as the strategy of total impunity.
The U.S. is boosting its military budget, unleashing NATO as the global gendarme,
and planning real-life exercise in Iran to test the efficiency of the Prompt Global
Strike initiative in practice. At the same time, Washington is talking about the
completely nuclear-free world.'"

In essence, Obama is trying to deceive the world by talking of a humanity free of
nuclear weapons, which would be replaced by other extremely destructive ones, ideal
for terrorizing state leaders and achieving the new strategy of total impunity.

The yankis believe that Iran's rendition is already close. The European Union is
expected to announce a sanctions package of its own to be signed on July 26.

The last meeting of the 5+1 took place on July 2, after Iranian President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad affirmed that "his country would return to talks at the end of August
with the participation of Brazil and Turkey."

A high-ranking E.U. official "stated that neither Brazil nor Turkey will be invited to
take part in talks, at least not at this level."

"Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki stated that he was in favor of defying
international sanctions and continuing with the enriched uranium program."

From Tuesday, July 5, in the face of the European reiteration that they are to
promote additional measures against Iran, this country has responded that it will not
negotiate until September.

Every day the possibilities of overcoming the insurmountable obstacle are reducing
further.

What is going to happen is so evident that it can be foreseen in an almost exact
form.

For my part, I must make a self-criticism; I committed an error in affirming in the
June 27 Reflection that the conflict would break out on the Thursday, Friday or at the
latest Saturday. It was already known that Israeli warships were navigating toward
that objective together with the yanki naval forces. The order to search Iranian
merchant ships was already given.

However, I did not realize that there was a prior step: confirmation of the negation of
permission for the inspection of its mercantile fleet on the part of Iran. In analyzing
the torturous language of the Security Council imposing sanctions on that country, I
did not notice that detail to give the inspection order full effect. It was the only thing
missing.

The 60-day period given by the Security Council on June 9 to receive information on
compliance with the Resolution expires on August 8.

But something really most lamentable happened. I was working on the latest material
on the delicate issue drafted by the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the said
document did not contain two key paragraphs the last two of the abovementioned
resolution which textually state:

"Requests within 90 days a report from the Director General of the IAEA on whether
Iran has established full and sustained suspension of all activities mentioned in
resolution 1737 (2006), as well as on the process of Iranian compliance with all the
steps required by the IAEA Board of Governors and with other provisions of
resolutions 1737 (2006), 1747 (2007), 1803 (2008) and of this resolution, to the IAEA
Board of Governors and in parallel to the Security Council for its consideration;

"Affirms that it shall review Irans actions in light of the report referred to in
paragraph 36 above, to be submitted within 90 days, and:

(a) that it shall suspend the implementation of measures if and for so long as Iran
suspends all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities, including research and
development, as verified by the IAEA, to allow for negotiations in good faith in order
to reach an early and mutually acceptable outcome;

(b) that it shall terminate the measures specified in paragraphs 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 12 of
resolution 1737 (2006), as well as in paragraphs 2, 4, 5, 6 and 7 of resolution 1747
(2007), paragraphs 3, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11 of resolution 1803 (2008), and in
paragraphs 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 21, 22, 23 and 24 above,
as soon as it determines, following receipt of the report referred to in the paragraph
above, that Iran has fully complied with its obligations under the relevant resolutions
of the Security Council and met the requirements of the IAEA Board of Governors, as
confirmed by the IAEA Board of Governors;

(c) that it shall, in the event that the report shows that Iran has not complied with
resolutions 1737 (2006), 1747 (2007), 1803 (2008) and this resolution, adopt further
appropriate measures under Article 41 of Chapter VII of the Charter of the United
Nations to persuade Iran to comply with these resolutions and the requirements of
the IAEA, and underlines that further decisions will be required should such
additional measures be necessary..."

A compañero from the Ministry, after the exhausting work of many hours at the
machine making photocopies of all the documents, fell asleep. My eagerness in
seeking out information and exchanging points of view on these delicate issues,
made it possible for me to discover this omission.

From my point of view, the United States and its NATO allies have said their last
word. Two powerful states with authority and prestige did not exercise their right to
veto the perfidious U.N. resolution.

It was the only possibility of gaining time to seek some formula for saving the peace,
an objective that would have afforded them greater authority to continue fighting for
it.

Today, everything is hanging from a tenuous thread.

My principal intention was to advise international public opinion of what was
occurring.

I have in part achieved that by observing what was taking place, as a political leader
who, for many years, has been confronting the empire, its blockades and its
indescribable crimes. But I am not doing it out of revenge.

I am not hesitating to run the risks of compromising my modest moral authority.

I shall continue writing Reflections on the subject. There will be a number more after
this one in order to continue going more profoundly into it in July and August, unless
some incident occurs to trigger the deadly weapons currently pointed at each other.

I have very much enjoyed the final games of the World Cup and the volleyball
games, in which our valiant team is marching at the head of its group in the World
League of that sport.

Fidel Castro Ruz - July 11, 2010 - 8:14 p.m.

Translated by Granma International