According to the diplomatic source quoted by the Times, the Saudis have agreed to let Israel use its air space, and assist an Israeli attack by cooperating on the use of drones, rescue helicopters and tanker planes, if the Geneva talks fail to stop breakout capability by Iran.
“Once the Geneva agreement is signed, the military option will be back on the table. The Saudis are furious and are willing to give Israel all the help it needs,” the Times quoted its source as saying. (The Times of London/Haaretz, 17 November)
Meanwhile, Israeli premier Netanyahu told CNN that Iran’s nuclear program is a direct threat to Israel's survival; he made the comments in an interview that will be broadcast Sunday morning (Haaretz, 17 November)
File photo: King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia (Al Arabiya)
26 comments:
I dont ever see the saudis being so recklessly stupid as to risk a war by antagonising iran,not to mention further alienating their own populace by actively collaborating with israel
Saudi and Israeli are cooperating for iran attack and Ayatollah sistani support this cooperation.
donot be imptessed by paycho war propganda
My goodness!!! This will be a blessing for the entire region..Iran will then have the legal justification to eradicate the region of the two mad dog countries..One, a medieval family-run desert country call Saudi Arabia and another a thieving, lieing, racist parasite that think too highly of themselves and used the legitimate suffering Jews in WW2 to blackmail the entire Western world. Their time's up, anyway!!!
Bring it ON!!!! Iran's been waiting for this opportunity for 30+ years now...
AnonymousNovember 17, 2013 at 1:19 AM,
+1, I think one cannot sum up the situation better. This is not the first time a member of the House of Saud makes such pretty explicit statement during a informal meeting then reported by some unnamed official telling it to the press.
The Syria debacle, plus the acknowledged absence of leverage on the Palestinian issue, and now the unacceptable prospect of seeing what they perceive as the principal regional competitor on the other side of the Persian Gulf's shores get a new kind of relationship with their superpower patron and de-facto wipe away any possibility for them to tangle with it, was a predictable aggregation of factors that led to the ongoing (relative) crisis in their historically very close and functional relationship , as well as their current refusal to endorse their post at the Security Council. And if you ask me, missing such a golden opportunity will prove to be one terrible historic mistake for their geopolitical interests on the long run, and is probably viewed as such already by the most clearheaded members of their political apparatus. And again, anything bad for Saudi Arabia and its worldwide support for backwards fanaticism cannot be so bad for the world. Let them drift away from a position of greater international leverage if they want to, this critical error can only benefit mankind somewhere, somehow, at a given time in the world. Let the make yet another emtpy, pseudo-shady anti-Iran remark regarding a virtual conflict they know their oil & gas infrastructure and thus economy, or the fragile equilibrium of their public opinion already dangerously alienated by their traditionally ultra pro-US positioning on every issue possible over the past century, couldn't decently handle if it ever broke out.
Iran and the P5+1 (read U.S.A. on the nuclear issue) will ultimatly come to terms. It is simply too much at both parties interest to miss. And worst case alternative, war, is a no-brainer, and since both leadership seem to to dominate the issue over their respective, most hardline elements , nothing seems to be in the way of their coming success. As an example among many others, General Motors wants to replace Peugeot. And America wants nothing less than to be able to at least try to resurrect the brand that once stood as the country's motto for economic prosperity, in the words of their most illustrous leader since the 1900s.
The only thing the Saudis, Israelis and French may have in common on that issue, is that they have nothing to lose, everything to gain from an ultimate collapse from the talks (that most probably won't happen). France has pathetically self expelled itself from a very lucrative posture from the Iranian oil and automotive market and industry, thanks to a very powerful Israeli lobby that succeeded in aligning them not with their own national interests, but with Likud's, Congress style. For their part, Saudi Arabia and Israel are inherently unable to have any cordial links with Iran since the latter's expansion is automatically perceived as their own setback in their geopolitical claims, at least in the current tide of middle-eastern powerplay, a picture that is not about to end anytime soon, quite the contrary with the ensuing solidification of the "bloc" game, and the emergence and/accentuation of multiple alliances and sub-alliances through proxies that the Syrian conflict was an unprecedented catalyst for.
-A
agreed. these bunch may be silly. but i would not expect them to be that stupid. they are both threatened by iran's approach to US. their best gift was khomieni, khamenei and that ahmag Ahmadinejad. now they are on defencive.
this also proves that arabs are natural enemies of iran. i could not care less but all these arabs are the same. the best strategy for iran would be to create a state of ongoing skirmish between ardabs and israel. hell let them be on each other throats all day. who cares. the old saying my enemy's enemy is mu friend is so valid!
Iran would get flattened in a real war with Israel.
don't wish for war.
That may be so but, there is no way that the zionist occupation could escape unharmed by the consequences of its own aggression.
The Saudi air force would easily gain complete air superiority over Iran. In the mid-80s, Iran's phantoms dared challenge Saudi F-15s and got blown out of the sky easily.
You can sit here in the U.S. and lie about Iran's capabilities all you want, but Saudi Arabia's modern and well maintained air force would utterly destroy Iran's air ways.
Before the end of the so-called "zionist occupation" Israel will turn its enemies into glass. Now go and suck up some of your cool aid.
Anonymous November 17, 2013 at 2:54 PM
And irans ballistic missile forces would destroy every airbase,naval base and army base in the ksa before moving on to vital civilian infrastructure like oil loading docks,desalination plants,power plants etc...The saudis may have a lot of western supplied toys but whether they can use them effectively is questionable,the fact that they cant even maintain their military without a huge amount of western help makes one more than a little doubtful of their abilities,and its not the f4s that the saudis would have to worry about its the f14s with their aim54s who in any engagement would get off the first shot,thats assuming there was much left of their airforce after irans ballistic missile forces where finished with it,its pretty hard to launch airstrikes when your runways and taxiways have been cratered and strewn with unexploded submunitions and your surviving aircraft are trapped in their shelters just sitting ducks for a cruise missile or air launched pgms strike.The saudis might be able to launch one airstrike but I seriously doubt they would be in any shape to launch another after iran retaliated
I dont live in the us
All your statements in support of the Zionists and their puppets sound like a logic of a sentence from Sheakspeare - "..lots noise about....nothing".
Some analysts are eager to find more info about the newest Iranian weaponries, so they initiate "specialized" discussion, in their fishing, for those details....;by posing as a well informed "bloggers".
It has been written before here, that replacement of the Islamic System with a western orientation, would translate as a begining of Russia's demise....
Russia has connection with the Islamic Republic by the Caspian Sea and its airspace, in addition to an access from the Persian Gulf.
Recent moves by the Russian military leadership, shouldn't leave any doubts to any person possessing some logic.
A-F
It’s a pity you don’t live in the US; you’d be a very successful PR man!
10:56 sounds like saddam before the first Gulf War (when he had more missiles and jets than iran had now and couldn't do shit to Saudi Arabia's air bases. 30 year old patriot missiles blew those pos ballistic missiles oit of the ske. I think safdam made like 10 hits total).
Anon 9:02 ,
not so fast. I advise you go grab some documentation and figures before posting in such a confident way. Iraq only had a fraction of today's Iran's ballistic missile arsenal, which numbers in close to a thousands to name only longer range assets such as Sejil-2,Shahab-3 and Ghadr MRBMs. Their shorter range SRBMs, the Fateh-110 have an acknowledged and demonstrated precision of around 100 meters. The Shahab's CEP for its part is in the league of the hundreds of meters according to the founder of Israeli Arrow program himself, Uzi Rubin. Such precision allows them to target critical infrastructure rather than the several km of legacy Iraqi scuds being typically used as "city busters" in that regard during its war with Iran and in 91. The Iraqi missile industry was of no compare to Iran's and was barely able to modify a limited number of boosters to extend missile range, which resulted in many breaking up in the terminal phase. Patriots batteries were not able to destroy them considering their subsequent erratic flight patterns and their reported success rate fell to less than 1%. US official sources. So much for the all-out interception prowess you seemed to suggest. Iraq anyway was never able to fire entire salvos of misile because of its limited number of available missiles and launchers. A problem Iran has solved overtime by becoming self-sufficient in producing both TELs and the solid-fuelled missiles over the years , allowing it to prepare and launch dozens at once in half an hour. Iraq was eons away from such capability in 91. Let alone the fact that the USN's "Great Scud Hunt" was absolutely unsuccessful in destroying Iraqi launchers on the ground despite an intense search effort. Imagine that in Iran's vast and diversified terrain as opposed to an essentially flat desert type terrain in smaller Iraq. Nobody knows for sure what would be the real outcome of a detrined Iranian assaults on neighboring interest. But so far it has proved to be an effective detterrent against attacks from close regional competitors such as Israel despite a years old saber rattling from its leaders, let alone second rate, US-dependent armies such as Saud Arabia's. And for me, considering how close negociatios are on finally settling the nuclear dispute, it's great that it remains that way.
Yes I'm sure it's iran's few makes that is scaring Israel. One f15 could precisely and with last guided bombs deliver the payload of six of iran's pos ww2 era ballistic missiles. I'll let you do the math on how many sorties the saudis can fly in an hour.
The only party who backed down on fear was iran who went fron threatening to shut down gulf oil traffic if its oil was sanctioned to begging and supplicating itself for a deal.
But it's talj like this that convinces me that lying delusional iranians need to be beaten down a little more before they truly surrender.
Nader Uskowi November 18, 2013 at 2:52 AM
Merely debunking the saudi pr man[November 17, 2013 at 2:54 PM] who thinks that a saudi attack on iran would be some kind of walk over for the saudis,everything I`ve stated is true,iran has the largest and most capable missile force in the region and could do enormous damage to saudi military and civilian infrasructure
AnonymousNovember 18, 2013 at 3:36 PM
Your f15 isnt much good if its runways and taxiways have been cratered and are strewn with unexploded submunitions,you need a functioning airbase to use an f15,if that airbase has been destroyed or put out of action then your f15 is nothing but a sitting duck waiting for a cruise missile or air launched pgm to finish it off.The saudis have lots of toys but cannot even maintain them without a great deal of western help,their ability to use what they have effectively is an open question,one only has to look at recent history to see that none of the arab militaries have performed very well.If you want to believe iran is "surrendering" then why are the americans looking to make a deal that would involve having to accept irans right to enrich something they have utterly opposed until now?,and if the israelis were so confident in their abilities why havent they attacked?,as for closing the gulf,thats something iran could easily do,it has the largest stocks of sea mines and antiship missiles in the region as well as the most capable navy with 29 odd submarines and god knows how many asm armed fast attack craft.You may think iran is no threat,but I dont see its enemies lining up to attack it,what are they waiting for?,iran is only getting militarily stronger as time goes by so the longer they wait the worse their chances get
Yes it does. Because it isn't few. It seems the Israeli top military brass did get scared by stopping two attempts by Netanyahu from going forward with a strike since 2010 already. An Iranian MRBM smashing on the ground at mach 15, through the combined effect of both its huge induced kinetic energy at impact + its 1,5 tons HE payload, would do much area damage than even a fully armed F-15. BMs are designed with massive area effect in mind. Just look at the terribly wide devastation zones occurring at every Syrian neighborhood hit by a SINGLE legacy, liquid fueled, lower-grade Scud missile which are considered obsolete in comparison to Iran's newer, Chinese and Pakistani-derived, solid-fuelled, faster Sejil-2 missile, and against which, I say again since you ignored it, their potential is acknowledged by the Israeli father of the IDF anti-missile program, Uzi Rubin, who openly fears that even the future Arrow-3 anti-missile system won't be able to hold off much.
That F-15 you mentioned would have to travel 1000+ miles before reaching its targets deep into Iranian territory, defended by a large number of the kind of Chinese and Russian-supplied defense systems that Israeli officially fears falling into any of their enemies' hands every time the shadow of such prospect comes to the picture. Israel does not have the projection capacity to send in more than 80 to 100 planes in such an operation, since they lack the needed number of tankers to refuel more than that number. That point is common knowledge accepted by every expert having produced literature on the subject over the years, and there's plenty of such open source documentation that explains it in a pretty solid way, with supporting figures, and a major factor for Israeli hesitancy at finally making a strike a reality. If you haven't been bent on following the subject over the years, I have. Even if they get there all in one piece, those birds would have very little margin for maneuver, F-15Is would have to be escorted by air supremacy configuration F-16Is which would in turn all be at the very limits of their combat radius, and would be attrited very dangerously if they have to face or avoid any kind of Iranian counter action, and believe me there will be plenty down the road, that situation will offset a great part of their technical advantage over IRIAF planes. Your rationale occurs in some sort of a vacuum, where units from both sides would go head on one against the other, and does not take into account the complex strategic context of such intervention and its no-less complex implications for each sides' resources and hence their effectiveness at fighting each other. Iran is not sitting next door unlike Syria or Iraq or Lebanon, and enjoy vastly deeper strategic depth and hardware that will allow it to be alerted of impending strikes significantly prior to their actual occurrence.
And like it or not, Iran's approx. 800-strong long range ballistic arsenal has the ability to devastate every single bit of tiny Israel's critical infrastructure, its firepower represents hundreds of fighter sorties, and the Israelis know it. No matter the outcome of their bombing run, Iran's retaliatory strikes will have a never-seen-before punitive effect on the Israeli home front that half of Netanhyahu's cabinet, including its intelligence chief, have officially stated they don't want to witness.
If the Israeli could go it alone, they would have walked the walk for years like 20 times already, like they always do against they weaker neighbors, namely Syria and Lebanon, or even remote Tunis in the 80s. In the case of Iran, they've been sparing no effort to push the US forward and do the job for them and wouldn't have stopped at empty saber-rattling for so long rather than finally acting on their words.
I'll be fine with a never-coming Israeli strike on Iran and the most probable factors behind it. And a never-coming total dismantlement of the Iranian nuclear program that Bibi keeps asking like an upset child.
Iraq's pos air force bombed iranian cities at will. Please stop deluding and lying to yourself with fantasies of destroying Saudi Arabia's modern air force with pos ww2 ballistic missiles.
Iranians never hesitate to amaze me with their dishonesty and exaggerations.
How come Israeli planes bomb lebanon and Syria whenever they want without ever losing one plane? Oh right because you're full of s.
AnonymousNovember 18, 2013 at 10:17 PM
Thats the best you can come up with?,you really need to pay attention,this is about irans current capabilities not what iran or iraq could or couldnt do a quarter century ago,back then iran had only a tiny arsenal numbering in the tens of foreign supplied scuds not the arsenal of hundreds to a couple of thousand indigenously produced missiles that it currently possesses.Theres little comparison between ww2 era missiles with a range of a few hundred kilometers and a cep measured in miles and irans force that can hit any target within 2000kms of irans borders and have ceps measured in tens of meters
Please make sure you enlist in the glorious iranian air force so you can partake of the sweet smell of victory when your squadron of f4 phantoms decimated alk of istael and saidi arabia!
And thank you for reminding me why the West should not compromise with Iran until after it has been utterly beaten down. There still remains a delusional steak in iranian culture that must be eradicated with brute physical pain whether it's hunger from sanctions or pain from bombs before iran will get in line with reality.
AnonymousNovember 18, 2013 at 10:17 PM,
And here we go again with the stupid Iraqi argument, cassette 1, side A, rewind, ww2 edition. Talk about a broken record man ! But let's go your way : Iraq's air force bombed Iranian cities at will, yes... but AT THE VERY END OF THE WAR IN 88, when the ENTIRE world was keeping its support for the Iraqi army at its maximum while a quasi-total shortage of spare parts was having its heaviest toll on every mechanized Iranian units possible, would they be air or ground based. When they still had something to fight with despite the ongoing international embargo in 82, they repelled the invading Iraqi forces in a swift and destructive way, reducing 55% of their air-force's effectiveness and sunk 90% of its navy, both in SINGLE SHOT operations, namely "Kaman 99" and "Morvarid", or the attack on Saddam's H3 airbase. They tore the Iraqi armed branched a new one on every occasion. I suggest you back to school and learn a bit of history classes you missed, and educate yourself at least a bit on issues before you allow yourself to take such confident positions based on nothing more than a couple of truncated, wholly uncredible and biased observations as the core of your propaganda.
Either you address at least one of the many counter-arguments people take the care of making to address your looping 2-line, inaccurate and undocumented anti-Iran bullshit you spit out every-time you touch your keyboard, or you keep it to yourself in your dreamworld of Israel attacking and succeeding in "flattening" its Iranian enemy without losing a plane (lol at that !), for the sake of your credibility here, as anything other than a pro-Israel/Saudi PR man of course. Countries aren't powerless and unable to defend themselves or fight back, nor every of their capabilities fake just because you don't like them.
Saudi Arabia is mostly a paper tiger with most of their expensive hardware either sleeping in storage or operated exclusively by US personnel, or foreign mercenary pilots. They cannot handle a full-fledged war with Iran on their own even if they were crazy enough to try it alone since their two main airbases, and a great part of their vital oil & gas infrastructure are sitting range not only of Iran's MRBMs, but also shorter range missile arsenal. No wonder your oil pimp idols were so fast at running to the media and bluntly denying that report, going as far as pathetically shouting that they have "no links whatsoever with Israel" in the process. Yeah right we believe you guys ;-)
And please, comparing 2000km+ range, solid-fueled, hypersonic, modern laser gyroscope INS-guided, Minuteman-class missiles with metric precision, to antiquated 1940s, unguided, supersonic, 300km range V2s with kilometric precision, I mean seriously...
Now, where is the IDF or the Great Saudi Air Force hiding ? isn't that time to bomb the hell out of Iran aka "WW2 empty piece of cake" together ? why do I wanna bet something big it won't happen anymore today or tomorrow than it has during the past 10 years, that's a mystery to me :-)
About AnonymousNovember 19, 2013 at 5:25 AM,
What the hell is wrong with that racist hater openly calling for people's starvation and death ? is there any way someone can report that god damn retard and his filthy mouth ? there is nothing in his interventions remaining on, or contributing to the topic discussed whatsoever , on top of the fact that his bullshit is nor argumented or justified by any references other than his own arbitrary and ultra dumbed down, racially-motivated ideology rather than anything close to mature thinking. To make things worse, he absolutely does not take into consideration other readers' replies sticking to the subject of the posted article ! Mr. Uskowi, can you please look into the issue ? I find his hate and rage painfully ludicrous and unwelcome on a professionnal blog.
You are unable to deny the fact stated by Anon 2:05 PM.
Anon 11:03 AM, that is not surprising. That is the typical attitude of anti-Iran people, especially of hasbara shills. They have nothing more than burning, racial hatred in their lives. That is exactly the kind of people that are against Iran.
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