Matthias Küntzel on the Mullah dictatorship

The latest American intelligence estimate on Iran has provoked an emotional response in Europe reminiscent of the euphoria inspired by Chamberlain’s words on Sept. 30, 1938, as he appeared before the throng in front of 10 Downing Street and announced that he had achieved “peace in our time.” Even if many commentators warn not to reduce the pressure on Tehran, the dominant sentiment is a feeling of relief: a sentiment to which the German weekly Die Zeit, for example, gave expression with the headline “Phew! There’ll Be No World War Then!” The focus of the coverage in the media is not on the bitter realization that until 2003 the Iranian military apparatus was explicitly pursuing the development of an atomic weapon, but rather on the “good news” in the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE): namely that this military program “was halted primarily in response to international pressure,” which is supposed to prove that “Iran may be more vulnerable to influence on the issue than we judged previously.” If Iran gave in to international pressure in 2003, the implicit reasoning of the report runs, then it will certainly do so as well in the future. Thus, summarizing the implications of the NIE report, the author of the article in Die Zeit can conclude that “the Iranian regime does not so much conduct its foreign policy according to ideological criteria, but rather according to a lucid cost-benefit analysis.”

In such reflections, wishful-thinking has anesthetized rational thought. The last five years of Iranian diplomacy have demonstrated beyond doubt that the Mullah dictatorship does not work like other states. Tehran has ignored both the “carrots” of economic incentives and the “sticks” of international isolation and has pursued a weapons-related nuclear program at all cost. The intelligence report does not even tangentially touch upon this experience. Instead, it tries to hide the rubble of the failed diplomatic initiatives behind a pleasing new image of Iran: Tehran, the report affirms, “is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005.” The intelligence agencies adduce only a single proof of this supposed new attitude: in fall 2003, Tehran is alleged to have halted its nuclear weapons program “in response to increasing international scrutiny and pressure.” But precisely this assertion — the core finding of the report, from which all its other conclusions follow — is obviously unfounded.

All here.

Suggestions welcome.

Here’s mine. Heston fucking Blumenthal.

Sombrero aloft to the Poot.

One thing leads to another. An item on Five Live news about the Fairytale of New York leads to the BBC1 singles chart and the discovery that Eva Cassidy and Katie Melua (passim here) currently have the best-selling UK single, a disgusting, saccharine puddle of mawk-porn, which will be in use by torturers in sensory-deprivation cells before the second week of January–count on it. While Cassidy is, at least, able to sing, Melua’s voice has the quality of that ambulance or police car siren which goes off two feet behind you in the street without any warning.

‘Oh it’s for charity.’ And? Here’s an idea no one’s ever come up with before today–find your local Red Cross office and hand them a fiver. Cut out the middleman and prevent the senseless waste of polycarbonate, aluminium, shiny CD insert paper and ink.

Here is a version of the same song–which genuinely celebrates life–by a man who was about to die.

Report:

“It is unacceptable that the United States, in charge of monitoring our airspace, authorised Turkey to bomb our villages”

Nechirvan Barzani PM, Kurdish Regional Government

The UN refugee agency, the UNHCR, has said almost 2,000 people in northern Iraq have fled their homes in recent days as a result of the Turkish operations.

“Remember your humanity, and forget the rest” Albert Einstein is supposed to have said.

The Turkish Islamist government and the military impose their arbitrary will - with the guidance and collusion of Yank fuckwits. Back to normal people. Back to the usual.

Islamist-lite nazis — fucking Turkish thugs and bastardised political currents — secular - my fucking arse.

Turkish university students march with a giant national flag in Istanbul, Turkey, during a protest against the separatist Kurdish rebel group, the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK.