London – UK FM: Attack On Iran Has ‘Enormous Downsides’

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    London – An attack on Iran would carry huge costs, Britain’s foreign minister warned Saturday.

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    British Foreign Secretary William Hague said in a newspaper interview that while Iran’s suspected drive for atomic weapons could lead to a dangerous nuclear standoff in the Middle East, he favored more time to let diplomacy and economic pressure run its course.

    Hague told the right-leaning The Daily Telegraph that striking at Iran’s disputed nuclear program would have “enormous downsides.”

    “We are very clear to all concerned that we are not advocating military action,” he said.

    Tensions over Iran’s nuclear program are running high. Israel, the U.S., Britain and others suspect that the Islamic Republic is using the program as cover for the manufacture of atomic weapons and observers fear that a pre-emptive strike may be in the works. Recent attacks on Israeli diplomats in Thailand, Georgia and India have increased the pressure, with Israel accusing Iran of being behind the assaults.

    Hague said that allowing Iran to proceed with its nuclear program unchecked would lead to a Cold War-style arms race in the Middle East, with neighboring countries rushing to match what Hague said would be an Iranian arsenal.

    “And so, the most serious round of nuclear proliferation since nuclear weapons were invented would have begun with all the destabilizing effects in the Middle East,” he said. “That would be a disaster for world affairs.”

    Still, Hague endorsed European efforts to head off any nuclear weapons program through economic and diplomatic pressure.

    “We support a twin-track strategy of sanctions and pressure and negotiations on the other hand,” he said. “We are not favoring the idea of anybody attacking Iran at the moment.”

    Hague didn’t spell out what the downsides to an attack would be, but former British ambassador to Tehran Richard Dalton told BBC television that they would likely include a drawn-out conflict, retaliatory strikes against U.S. facilities, terrorist attacks and serious disruption to world energy supplies.

    “We couldn’t assume that a strike would be over quickly,” Dalton said Saturday. There would be large scale and long-lasting repercussions.”


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    13 Comments
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    Pipk11
    Pipk11
    12 years ago

    Oif yenems cheshbon its easy to sit back and twiddle your fingers

    eighthcomment
    eighthcomment
    12 years ago

    Not attacking has even bigger downsideS

    5TResident
    Noble Member
    5TResident
    12 years ago

    Attacking any country has tremendous downsides. Innocent people die, property gets destroyed, lives are shattered.

    Yaakov2
    Yaakov2
    12 years ago

    The more anyone talks about “how scared they are”, of a preemptive military strike against Iran, the more power and resolve they give to Iran to be confidant in their ability to be in defiance of any and all demands, that they stop their Nuke quest.

    As long as Obama and the Uk show, that they are “shivering in their pants” to strike Iran, they know they can continue Playing Games and continue building their Nukes while everyone is too terrified to really do anything to stop them, by force.

    Israel is also being foolish by “talking” more than they are “doing”.

    The more Israel, foolishly “talks” about their willingness to attack and the longer they wait, the more pressure Israel brings on against them, to attempt to stop them from Striking Iran.

    If Israel had any brains or Guts, they would, first of all just Shut Up about their plans and then proceed to just do it. Just Strike Iran, as quickly as possible, before additional pressure builds up to try to stop them.

    12 years ago

    Iran is a disease that has to be cut out, the surgery is painful, but doing nothing will be more painful.

    VeyIzMir
    VeyIzMir
    12 years ago

    He should also realize that doing nothing carries tremendous downsides as well….

    kligermentch
    kligermentch
    12 years ago

    israel should not wait for anybody to save them they are being threatened by the iranian regime, they should just do whatever they can and need to protect themselves, againts those evil fanatics, who beleive in the prophet mohamad that also was trying to conquer the world in his time, the facts are available, but the naive world doesn want to beleive the facts that were and the facts that are here now, just blow all the iranian nuclear plants into peices and rubble and let them start all over again from scratch, like that they will spend all their petro money on their stupidity and wont have much money left to build so many speed boats, the sanctions will also help but first thing first, blow all of their nuclear accomplishment to date into peices then sit down to negotiate with them, they will only urderstand this type of language

    ari
    ari
    12 years ago

    You mean like say er IRAQ or LIBYA

    marcia
    marcia
    12 years ago

    Israel can not strike Iran by herself. The world awaits tiny Israel to hit huge Iran just so they can point a crooked finger of blame once again as they grin as a Cheshire cat. Let Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey, Qatar, Kuwait and Iraq forcefully deal w/Iran, they too are targets of Iran.