The Neocons want War On Iran. They want to destabilise Iran, sow chaos amongst its people, control its oil and reduce Iran to the shattered state status now suffered by the people of Iraq.
BushCo. say they want peace with Iran, but refuse to rule out military action. But both the US and Israel have laid out their chief reason why they will attack Iran : they cannot allow Iran to get nuclear weapons.
The International Atomic Energy Agency says Iran isn't pursuing nuclear weapons. Iran says it isn't pursuing nuclear weapons. But the Neocon think tanks and media allies continually state that Iran wants nuclear weapons and it is so close to developing them that the world cannot wait.
But what you don't hear so much in the Western media is the reaction from China and Russia. Both China and Russia are now key financial, business and energy allies with Iran. And both China and Russia have clearly stated over the past two years, repeatedly that Iran does not pose a threat and that they will not tolerate attacks on Iran from either Israel or the United States.
From Reuters :
China is opposed to threatening Iran with war over its nuclear program and stands for a diplomatic solution, a government spokeswoman said on Tuesday.The United States, Germany, France, Britain, Russia and China have backed two rounds of U.N. sanctions against Iran over its refusal to halt uranium enrichment and other sensitive work that could be used to make nuclear weapons.
"We believe the best option is to peacefully resolve the Iranian nuclear issue through diplomatic negotiations, which is in the common interests of the international community," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said at a regular briefing.
"We do not approve of easily resorting to threatening use of force in international affairs," Jiang said when asked to comment on remarks by French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner raising the prospect of war with Iran.
Kouchner said on Sunday that Paris must prepare for the possibility of war with Tehran, although it was not an immediate danger.Washington is leading a drive in the Security Council for a third sanctions resolution to punish Iran for enrichment, and White House spokesman Dana Perino said the United States was looking for a diplomatic solution.
China is one of five veto-wielding permanent members of the Security Council.
From the UK Guardian :
Russia today joined the chorus of concern at the possibility of war in Iran while conflicts continued in Iraq and Afghanistan.
At a news briefing in Moscow, the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said: "We are worried by reports that there is serious consideration being given to military action in Iran. That is a threat to a region where there are already grave problems in Iraq and Afghanistan."
His comments, after a meeting with his French counterpart, Bernard Kouchner, followed a stark warning yesterday from the UN's chief nuclear weapons inspector aimed at the US.
"I would not talk about any use of force," Mohamed ElBaradei told reporters at the International Atomic Energy Agency headquarters in Vienna. "There are rules on how to use force, and I would hope that everybody would have gotten the lesson after the Iraq situation, where 700,000 innocent civilians have lost their lives on the suspicion that a country has nuclear weapons."
Fears of a military conflict with Iran rose a notch after comments on Sunday night by Mr Kouchner, who said: "We have to prepare for the worst ... the worst is war."
In addition, reports from Washington indicate that administration hawks led by the vice-president, Dick Cheney, are winning the argument for tough action against Tehran.
The US has accused Iran of supplying Shia extremists in Iraq with explosive devices that are taking a deadly toll on American troops.
France, under its new president, Nicolas Sarkozy, has adopted a much tougher line on Iran, saying that a nuclear-armed Iran poses a dangerous threat to the west.
Mr Sarkozy last month called the Iranian stand-off "the greatest crisis" of current times, saying the world faced "a catastrophic alternative: an Iranian bomb or the bombing of Iran".
Mr Kouchner told reporters in Moscow that the world should not shy away from sanctions to put pressure on Iran.
"The worst thing to happen would be a war, and in order to avoid it we need to continue talks and be firm enough regarding sanctions," he said. "We have to work on precise sanctions that would demonstrate the world community's serious approach to this problem."
But Russia is trying to cool down the situation. In an interview published in the Russian magazine Vremya Novostei, the deputy foreign minister, Alexander Losyukov, said any military intervention in Iran would be a "political error" with catastrophic results.
"We are convinced that there is no military solution to the Iranian problem ... besides, it is quite clear that there is no military solution to the Iraqi problem either," he said.
