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Iran's Nuclear Ambitions
selven wrote in with something a bit offtopic for Slashdot, but I figured it's worth a discussion today. He writes "Following Iran's revelation regarding its secret nuclear enrichment plant, western leaders are banding together against it, saying that it violates Articles 2 and 3 of the Non-Proliferation Treaty and suggesting serious sanctions against the country if it refuses to back down on its uranium enrichment program. Iran maintains that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only and that it's not fair for the US to be criticizing them in this way while having thousands of nuclear warheads."
The Inheritance, by David Sanger. A terrific book, I read it from cover to cover in three sittings. It's basically what Obama was sat down and told about the world and global nuclear proliferation and what his options are. It details some fascinating history, esp. around Khan in Pakistan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdul_Qadeer_Khan) that will be making you shake your fist and say "Khaaaaaaaaaannn!". (He gave the Iranians much of what they needed to build a nuclear program).
http://www.amazon.com/Inheritance-World-Confronts-Challenges-American/dp/0307407926
Posturing aside, giving the talking heads and think tankers something to chirp about on CNN - the real threat isn't Iran. Pakistan is the threat. Iran has uranium and reactors. They don't have a warhead. Pakistan has LOTS of warheads, and they MAY or MAY NOT meet your definition of "secure". They could very easily go missing, as the programs in place to account in such matters sort of don't work in Pakistan.
Again - the book lays all this out in exacting detail. I recommend the book to everyone.
I'm a bit confused about the concept of "fairness" in this context. Do we allow anyone who wants to have nuclear weapons the option to acquire them because there's some natural "fairness" law? Only a cretin would say so. The way it works is if you're a threat to us, or a region containing friends of ours, then we don't want you to have them (Iran, Syria). If you're an ally, we'd rather you didn't have them but there's not much we can do to stop you acquiring them (India, Pakistan). If you're already strong and powerful, we assure your destruction if you fire them at us (Russia, China).
You know,
Quadaffi took a different approach and has come out way, way ahead for it. He saw GWB invade Iraq and thought "that nutjob is serious!" Now the libyans have cancelled chemical and nuclear weapons research, stopped funding most terrorists, and are being let into the world community in spite of nutjob's rantings and ravings. Seems that worked pretty well. Iran would be a fucking rich, powerful nation if they gave up on their strategy of funding terrorists everywhere and instead took what the whole rest of the world views as a legitimate approach to becoming a regional and world power.
Go read William Forstchen's book "One Second After" about an EMP attack on the United States, and then ponder on whether you want a country like Iran to have warheads and missiles.
I'm not an expert, but the news reports seem to indicate that this new facility (at a military base) doesn't have the capacity to produce a useful quantity of enriched fuel for a power plant, but could potentially produce enough for 1-2 bombs per year.
Combine that with the fact that Iran flares enough natural gas daily to more than meet its internal energy generation requirements, pardon me for being a bit skeptical about their motives.
Iran has plentiful natural resources but does not have the capacity to refine it and must import gas. Any type of war and they could easily be cut off of that gas.
This facility hasn't been a secret to intelligence agenices for years. They are making this a big deal now only to justify tough sanctions and possible action against Iran.
Sanctions are essentially an act of war. Clinton's sanctions on Iraq during the 1990's killed over 500,000 children, and many elderly. Albright went on 60 minutes and said that half a million childrens death was worth it.
Iran is surrounded by countries with a nuclear capability. Israel, Russia, Pakistan, India all have nukes and a few of those countries aren't too friendly towards Iran. There was similar fear of Pakistan getting nuclear weapons, but after they did we started to subsidize its dictators instead of wanting action against them.
So even if Iran is trying to make nuclear weapons they are doing so for defensive purposes. No matter what Ahmanutjobs rhetoric is he has no power to act without the ruling mullah's of the country. The mullah's are essentially the rich of the country who have no intention of giving up their wealth and power by doing something stupid.
This is a classic case of FUD.
If you have something that you dont want anyone to know, maybe you shouldnt be doing it in the first place -Eric Schmidt
Sparta and Athens were repressive societies, that successfully kept equal rights for women and the liberation of slaves out of the western Aegean for another 200 years.
A mere 59 years before, Cyrus the Great liberated Babylon and released it's captive peoples, encoding this in the law of the Empire.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyrus_cylinder
The Zoroastrian creed of Darius and Xerxes - the Achaemenid line - was that of upholding the precepts: Good Word, Good Thought, Good Deed. This was the core of worship and daily conduct of the devotee to God (Ahura Mazda).
"Darius, the Great King, King of Kings, King of Countries, son of Hystaspes, the Achaemenid. Saith Darius the King: This is the kingdom which I posses from the land of the Sakas on this side of Sogdiana as far as Kush, from India to Sardis. Over this Ahura Mazda has granted me dominion, he who is great above all the Gods. May Ahura Mazda protect me and my Royal House."
At this time, the Spartans were still obsessed with sodomy, and destroyed their girl-babies.
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
That's only because Saddam re-routed the resources to his favored buds. Plenty of resources went into the country, it's just that they were not being distributed evenly. Saddam used the sanctions as an excuse to rid groups he didn't like.
Table-ized A.I.
Because they made the Big Iraqi Gamble and are taking Euros rather than dollars for their oil.
This is an unforgivable affront. Based on the US's debts and balance of trade, the dollar should be junk currency. Its only remaining value is in purchasing oil, and the US cannot allow resource rich countries to wean themselves off of it.
Make no mistake, the US must and will find a casus belli against Iran. The only question (for Iran) is whether they can become a nuclear power before that happens.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Let's hope the Obama Administration is much more skillful than the previous administration.
I think we're already seeing the beginnings of a more deft and subtle foreign policy. I don't believe it's a coincidence that Obama abandoned the idea of European missile defence (which was a serious thorn in the side of the Russians), and we suddenly hear Russia talking about serious sanctions against Iran.
If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
Different strokes. Quadaffi is playing his games in the middle of fucking nowhere. Libya is not in the middle of a global strategic hot spot. If we let Libya have nukes, then the only card he could have usefully played is to try to sell it to other folks, ala North Korea. That's one strategy, sure, but not one that holds a big interest in Iran.
They want to be a big, perhaps THE big, regional player. Capitulating to the Evil Americans is not the way to do it. Of course, time will tell if going head to head with the rest of the world is the right way, but it's worked so far. We'll see what happens when the Israelis get all bent out of shape and have one of their little air raid practices or if Russia decides to play nice with Obama for some reason or another.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
The only country to ever use nuclear weapons against another country is the USA. I don't blame Iran for wishing to defend themselves from war-mongering nations.
If I had mod points, I would mod you up.
G. W. Bush's actions with "axis of evil" rhetoric and threats forced the moderates in Iran to keep their heads down and empowered the radicals. I now suspect that this may have been done purposely.
Sanctions really are a soft act of war and should be viewed thus. Does Congress have to approve sanctions? If not, they should have this power, not the president.
I voted for both G.W. Bush and Obama, and I am very disappointed by both of them. They both seem to beholden to the defense industry and the all too powerful Israeli lobby, instead of doing what is best for *our* country.
I never particularly understood why the Bush administration and NATO were so keen to piss of the Russians. I'll be the first one to admit that Putin is no great democratic champion, and that, from a rights point of view, things have regressed to some degree over the last decade (though I'm sure from a Russian point of view, a fully free press isn't all that comforting when the economy is in the shits and ruble has been devalued to the point of being junk currency).
But the Cold War ended in 1991. Missile Defense would have made sense in 1985, not 2005. It is a solution to a problem that really no longer exists. Even if Russia has slipped into some old habits (and those habits predate the Communists), she is now once again an approachable nation with a leadership that more resembles the old Czarist regime than the Soviet one.
NATO's expansion into Russia's traditional sphere of influence has been nothing more than one big antagonistic gesture. Missile defense was the icing on the cake. All the excuses about how it's really about Iran and other Central Asian instabilities was so obviously crap. Missile defense was very clearly meant to hold Russia back from attempting to seize control of its old Soviet holdings. Now I admit that in the Ukraine and Georgia, at least, there is some risk of Russia underming those governments (both countries have large ethnic Russia minorities), but however real that risk is, I don't think it's worth throwing future relations with the Kremlin out the window over.
I think Obama has shown some real balls in killing the program, and it's clear that behind the scenes there has been some back-and-forthing over Iran. If the Russians are well and truly onboard, then the Iranian regime is going to feel a lot more isolated. Unfortunately, the Iran theocracy has gone through that before, and it hasn't seemed to have weakened them at all. I mean, from an economic point of view, Iran is a total basket case, it's industrial capacity so hampered it cannot even refine sufficient gasoline.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
So... what you are saying is that the UN should threaten IRAN to REMOVE sanctions and encourage trade and offer technology if they dare develop nukes?
Frankly, the UN is impotent to do or enforce anything. That the UN can't even enforce 15 min time limits on speeches to the GA.
What's the goal? No nukes for Iran? Free trade won't stop it. Is the goal a more "democratic" and free Iran? It appears that years of sanctions hasn't stopped the movement in that direction.
I think in the end, Israel will decide it needs to take out Iran's reactors for it's security. They'll take the heat for it, like they did when they blasted Iraq. And the "game" will continue.
Much like in the (somewhat) open stock markets of the world, immediate value is not the only backing for a currency or stock. The largest thing "backing" the value of US currency (and the reason it doesn't collapse like simple analysis would indicate) is the value of American innovation and industry. I know that sounds corny, but it's true. The world puts a lot of value on our future ability to continue being a dominant power in the world through innovation and bleeding-edge industry.
11*43+456^2
You are talking about a country run by people who have repeatedly stated that it is the duty of all muslims to work towards being in a position to start Armageddon (or Ragnarok, basically the apocalyptic battle at the end of the world). In addition to these statements, they have also expressed their own desire to trigger said battle.
What is the source for these statements? Whatever it is, it is not an official position of the Iranian government. Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued a fatwa that the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons are forbidden under Islam and that Iran shall never acquire these weapons.
Exactly how does MAD deter people who wish to start an end of the world battle?
By deterring the majority of rational people who don't wish to start the end days. It should be noted that the same concerns have been expressed about evangelical Christians in the USA who want to bring about the end days. e.g. the Concerned Christians who planned terrorist attacks in Israel to try and start Armageddon. These people believe that they must destroy the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem so that Jesus can return. Some of them finance settlers because they believe this is the quickest way to start a war between the Arabs and Jews that will lead to Jesus returning. Many religions prophesize the End days, and there are a minority of followers in all of those religions who want the war to start so the Saviour will return and take them to Heaven. Hopefully, the rational people will prevail.
On the other hand Israel has a vested interest in having the bomb so they can use it as a threat in the end game scenario where the Arab world actually successfully teams up against them. There is a lot of speculation that the reason the US intervened in '67 and concocted the camp David accords to pay Israel and Egypt annual sums to avoid war was precisely because US intelligence assets saw Israel prep'ing their nukes for delivery to Cairo during the losing portion (for Israel, 12,000+ casualties is near catastrophic for the IDF). It's speculated that the US emergency equipment airlift was a concession to stop Israel from nuking Cairo (and or using the weapons tactically against the Egyptian tank forces) and the successive Accords were to prevent Egypt and Israel from doing the Tango again.
Ironically it's precisely this accord that got Osama and his Egyptian buddies panties in a bunch because they saw the double wammy of supporting Israel (which up until '67 the US didn't do) and supporting the Egyptian dictator who ordered the torture of many of the Al Queda higher level people before they were evicted from Egypt.
Damned if you do damned if you don't. Had we allowed Israel to go forward with the deployment of Nuclear weapons the damage both direct and indirect would have been catastrophic yet we are blamed for stopping something very very bad from happening. Of course Al Queda has demonstrated to the Arab world their willingness to sacrifice innocent Muslims to their cause and probably would have preferred that Israel use the nuclear weapons and the successive generations of damage the fallout would have caused, let alone the direct casualties.
Probably because someone thinks pointing out the double-standard for Israel is un-american or something. Anyway, the idea of sanctions is doomed unless the US can get both Russia and China to go along with them. China because (major reason) it has a permanent seat on the UN security council and can veto any sanction request and (minor reason) they can hit back at the US if they ever wish to by engaging in mildly self-harming trade war with the USA (which they own a lot of thanks to government borrowing and so can dump US dollars). Russia because it has a similar veto right and (especially) because if it wants to it has enough reserve capacity to fuel the whole of Iran and can provide it by (in order of convenience) rail, Caspian sea or road.
Anyway, the GP is right to bring Israel into this. One of the big pressures on the USA (I suppose THE pressure) is that Israel is threatening to initiate bombing raids on Iran if they aren't satisfied with it reigning in its technological progress. Israel is confident that the US would back it up in any action (indeed, Israeli bombers would need to pass over US controlled airspace to carry out the attacks as I understand it, which would make the US complicit even if it didn't supply military aid beyond the tech and money over previous years).
What the inner government of Iran thinks privately I don't think many people really know. It's quite possible that they think Israel wouldn't be stupid enough to start a war which would drag the whole region down in flames. There has to be some doubt in their minds about that - after all this is Israel - but publically, they're not showing much willingness to roll over for US demands.
At anyrate, the US will have to pay quite the price to Russia to get it to help with sanctions (after all, Russia is fine with Iran, though they probably don't want to see it nuclear-capable). The US has already backed down on Ballistic Missile Defence (alienating Poland and the Czech republic who were supposed to be hosting two of the bases, incidentally), but BMD was an over-priced failing project anyway and Medvedev pretty much said that Russia just considered withdrawing it merely a return to the negotiating table. If the US wants sanctions against Iran, other people will probably be paying the price - that will be the US giving in on pushing for greater control of Georgia and the Ukraine (or from a certain point of view, throwing them to the Bears).
If Iran is a lot closer to creating nukes (it would make sense that they are trying to do so - so would you if you were threatened by two nuclear powers - but nobody's shown any good evidence that they are)... if Iran is a lot closer to creating nukes than we think and US or Russian Intelligence know this then perhaps Russia will be more amenable to sanctions. But if Iran is not near to having nuclear weapons as everyone appears to think, then Russia's only going to help at a big old cost of some kind. After all, they hold a bargaining chip that could stave off US involvement in a long-term and very destructive war.
So that's more or less how I see sanctions and the cost of them if they come about. If we do get sanctions then (a) a lot of Iranian people will probably suffer in the same way that the Iraqi people suffered when that country was put under sanctions during Saddam's regime; (b) moderate elements in Iran (e.g. Moussavi's former supporters) will become hardline elements in droves strengthening Ahmadinijad enormously; (c) Iran will probably mine oil shipping routes causing a massive interruption in international oil supplies.
If we don't get sanctions, then we have to hope that either Iran gets nuclear weapons and everyone has to accept it and play more nicely in future, or that Israel isn't willing to plunge the whole region into a great bloody struggle. If they do, then Russia will probably sell Iran some more modern weaponry (they've been turning Iran down for years) because they see no reason why the US and Israel should be attacking a fairly non-aggressive country next door to them.
I welcome constructive criticism of the above.
Harmony.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
I would suggest that the "world leaders" "band together" against Israel, which:
a. Has nuclear weapons
b. Is not a party to the non-proliferation treaty
c. Has the means of delivery of said nuclear weapons
d. Does not allow IAEA inspectors
e. Is extremely aggressive
Compared to Israel, Iran is in kindergarten. If you're going to apply sanctions to Iran, get rid of the double standard and apply them uniformly to Israel as well.
Many people here are focused on the Iran/Israel connection, but what about our understandings with the Saudis? If I recall correctly, there are agreements with the Saudis (a Sunni majority nation) to "protect" them from Iran (a Shia majority nation), and there is no love lost between them. If Iran attacks Israel using nukes, that is an attack on Jerusalem - an attack anywhere on Israel would have major negative effects on Jerusalem, the second most holy site in Islam after Mecca. The regional power play is mostly between Iran and Saudi Arabia. The Saudis "condemned" the last attack by Israel on Iranian reactor facilities, but apart from that did nothing. Iran uses Hezbollah as a proxy against Israel, to good effect, without nukes. Isn't Saudi Arabia the real strategic target of Iran's nuke program? What say you all?
Boy this is a hard topic to discuss without feeling like you're inadvertently supporting one side or the other.
I'll just preface this by saying this is a topic that has interested me for many years, but especially in light of 9/11, etc. I do not pretend to be any kind of expert on this (who could?)
So:
I was all set to say "how could you have missed all these news quotations saying the he wants to blow up Israel?!?!" But after doing some digging: It turns out that this is the first time I've heard anyone make a genuine distinction between what CNN / FOX / etc. keep quoting and what was actually translated from his original speech:
Source: http://wapedia.mobi/en/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_and_Israel (Oct. 26, 2005)
Now: I am not supporting this guy (I can't overstate this), nor am I in support of Iran's totalitarian government, but it does appear that the press seem to have reinterpreted his speeches in words that will rile up Western populations.
His argument seems to be a common one from that region:
- Israel is a state and government which he and many others do not recognize, but which Western governments do.
- Israel as a state was created by Western governments following WWII and placed in what used to be known as Palestine, thus his (and many others) continuous reference to "occupied Palestine."
- He considers the state to be a fiction, and wants the Islamic world to work together to remove that state from the region, essentially returning it to the Palestinians.
I could only find this translation regarding his statements about the Holocaust:
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_and_Israel#Statement_on_Holocaust_Remembrance_Day
So again: I don't see in that quote that he's "denying" the holocaust. (And yes: I know it's out of context, and it's from Wikipedia) He's saying that an "outcome of the Holocaust" was that they made these claims for reparation and compensation, and that they achieved this (the creation of Israel within Palestinian land) via less-than-acceptable means.
The fact that you clarified this particular oft-misquoted statemen
Because I can! [Brainrub.com]
Forget your fantasy world; there is no "fairness scheme" in international politics. There is your National Interest, whoever you are, period. Your National Interest includes being able to defend yourself, deter aggressors and leverage the policies of other countries to your advantage. Your "group hug" theory fails as soon as a bunch of lunatics comes to power in whichever state has a bomb. That we already have one (North Korea) and possibly another on the way (Pakistan) does not make me sleep easier at night. Again, where we can act to prevent proliferation, we should.
What is the source for these statements? Whatever it is, it is not an official position of the Iranian government. Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued a fatwa that the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons are forbidden under Islam and that Iran shall never acquire these weapons.
To be precise, he issued a fatwa which has been stated to say that the production, stockpiling, and use of nuclear weapons are forbidden under Islam and that Iran shall never acquire these weapons, but nobody outside of Iran has actually seen this fatwa so we don't really know what it says.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Because pissing off the Russians isn't that big of a deal. The country has so many internal problems that complaining about missile defense systems is about the best they can manage. If you agree with a burly foreign policy, putting anti-missile systems in their back yard with little consequence is a good move.
Obama is, I suspect, having to think about scaling back our military expenditures. Not because he particularly wants to, as defense spending is a great way to buy support in Congress, but because he's going to have to. The US just can't afford to have the largest military budget in the world. Other countries are going to have to foot their own bills. There's upsides and downsides to this, but reality is setting in.
Potato chips are a by-yourself food.
Israel got their nukes from the US. The material was siphoned off a bit at a time, every time nuclear material was moved from one location in the US to another. The record-keeping system was designed to automatically experience some "shrinkage" every time material was moved. This came out when someone noted that just moving material from one side of a storage are to another changed its' reported quantity in inventory. Look through Scientific American's archives from (iirc) the early 80s (but it could be the '70s).
As far as the "Christian" right being every bit as terrifying as Muslims, when was the last time someone from the "christian" right sawed off someone's head...or flew an airliner into a building...or encouraged a teenager to blow themselves up?
While I can cite none of those particular crimes, there are several instances (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion-related_violence#United_States) of violence directed towards abortion clinics by the Christian right. If Islam must claim bin Laden, then Christianity must claim Paul Hill and others like him. And for the record, I am a professing Christian.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not entirely sure about the universe - Einstein
That reminds me of something my father once told me /stands on soapbox with hat over heart and rebel flag flying patriotically/ he said "Son, there ain't no point in being a racist. Most folks are total assholes and will gladly give you a reason to hate them personally!"
But I have to wonder how much of the middle east bullshit is either directly on indirectly caused by Israel knowing they have so much power in the US congress thanks to right wing bible thumpers that don't give a crap what Israel does as long as it stands so "Jebus can come back! ALL PRAISE JEBUS!". It is pretty fucking sad to have a superpower's mideast policy based on whether or not a guy that has been dead a couple of thousand years can float down upon his fluffy white cloud, but sadly talking to many of the most pro Israel right wingers at the local college that is pretty much what it comes down to. And sadly these nutballs will end up in the halls of power, as we are talking old money multi-generation power brokers.
I have NO problem with folks believing in whatever deity they want, be it Jesus, Buddha or the FSM. But basing a countries foreign policy on 2000+ year old scribblings on goat skins is more than a little nuts. Is it any wonder the Arabs act like we are still doing the crusades when Israel can do pretty much anything it wants and the right wingers will jump on board to keep from pissing off the "Praise Jebus!" brigade? I don't know how many sermons over the years I have heard here in the south that say no matter what we have to stand with Israel so that Jesus can come back. Like anybody that could rise from the grave after 2000+ years is gonna need the US Military to cover their ass.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Let me add to your comments by saying that the elephant in the room is that the non-proliferation treaty is basically a joke.
The idea was, get all the non-nuclear powers (or most anyway) agree not to develop nuclear weapons. In exchange, the "big 5" will help them with the very much non-trivial engineering challenges of getting nuclear power up and running. And the nuclear powers agree to give up their nukes.
It simply isn't possible to have a "grown-up conversation" about nukes while the 'big 5' are implicitly advocating one set of rules for them and one set of rules for the rest of the world.
It's better for all to have a non-nuclear-armed world. But if nukes are in play, then the rational strategy for any given state is to maintain "minimum deterrence" - just barely enough nukes to make it undesirable for somebody else to nuke us, and not a single dollar more.
Charles de Gaulle had a line about "no country without nuclear weapons could ever be considered to be fully independent."
The traditional strategy of the great powers of the day was to either bribe or coerce countries to sticking to their NPT obligations.
But you can't do either with Iran. They have oil, so they have enough money. They can close the straight of Hormuz, so you can't treat them like Iraq.
So, there's only one way to get Iran to not work on nukes - you have to actually convince them using, wait for it, rational arguments.
I realize this is a new one for great powers. Using force is attractive because it works. But it's not viable here.
So if the argument they wanna use on Iran is "we get to have nukes and you don't, because, um, because we're special or something" that's not gonna fly.
The only way to convince non-nuclear powers to stay that way is for nuclear powers to become non-nuclear powers.
The plural form of "anecdote" is "anecdotes", not "evidence".
There is not a single human who has "been religious for thousands of years" ... and anyone else, maybe when they're staring death in the face, they'll realize that life is too short for that shit.
Or they'll kill each other off, and solve the problem that way.
If they want to fight so bad, let's give them a territory to fight in, nothing but their bare fists, and let them go at it. They want to behave like animals, let them.
"only IMHO Israel has gotten extra assholey thanks to having big daddy USA backing them up and selling them really nice hardware"
This is part of the problem in any debate, when someone stops thinking because they believe what they've said applying true to the thing they hate or dislike thus proves their rightness.
Given the state of worldwide conflicts, in particular certain African countries, South American conflicts, etc., do you honestly believe that removal of US backing of Israel means that the Israelis are so stupid and lacking of cash that they couldn't purchase damn good equipment elsewhere?
That the Israelis would not find other means of backing their efforts, other allies in the world?
From what I've read, Israel has developed their own weapons, purchased foreign weapons of all makes (they usually pick what is available and best, like any country), and developed badass tech themselves, particular to urban warfare (such is internal building movement detection and weapon locators). They usually come out with this stuff several years before the US does, and in fact it seems the US picks up on some of their tech after Israel has developed it.
The fact is, without US backing, Israel would have simply used the entire available worldwide weapons market instead of one source. The weapons market is similar to the drug trade; it doesn't disappear if you get rid of major sources, it simply comes back stronger. The need and economics (buyer, seller relationship) are just too strong. My bet is that without the US, Israel would have less discriminating weaponry, and I mean that in both quality and effect.
I read US involvement meaning that Israel is more isolated, as they don't have to forge other relationships because they don't have to, making them actually kinder. It's not as if there isn't some African company not putting out AKs that would love a new buyer, which in effect would expand operations to side business on that continent to ill effect.
Your thinking on this on blaming the US is just so...limited. Go ahead, remove the US as a supplier. Someone else will step in, or Israel will come up with an alternative. This isn't picking on Israel; any country will, as Iran has shown with their nuclear ambitions.
(In these days, nuclear ambitions simply screw the country over anyways. I say let Iran have the nukes; they'll find themselves more isolated, more hated, more economically burdened, and one of theirs gets loose, less likely a stable state. Unfortunately, as in all worldwide conflicts, innocent people will get hurt/killed. If we were honest about it, this isn't about Iran's right to have nukes, it's about the inevitable (and I mean that) future conflict to come when Iran goes crazy and uses one, gets obliterated by force or destabilized because of them, and thus people die.)