What do you suppose Iran is up to?

[Bekster]

Up to no good.

[CaptainNJ]

Originally Posted by banjomike

The United States is the largest energy producer in the world.

The fact is the demand for oil is world wide and steadily growing. Oil is a commodity, and who ever offers the most for a barrel gets the barrel. Simple as that.

We are as independent now as we will ever be in the future, as national energy independence is a thing of the past, at least when it comes to the price of oil.

i suppose we will always be concerned about any price jumps but if we produce enough here; we would have less concerns over supply issues.

[Exitus Acta Probat]

Originally Posted by DauntlessDan

Israeli intel: Iran has deployed 50,000 troops in Syria | World Tribune

Doing this?

As a general rule, I assume any information coming from Israel is disingenuous, given Israel's record of trying to lure the U.S. into its wars (USS Liberty attack, The Lavon Afair) and PNAC's drawing the US into a war with Iraq using the 9/11 attacks as a pretext.

So what are the Iranians really up to? Probably just trying to live, as are we.

[stevej64]

They want what Israel has nucelar weapons

[fandango9]

Iran is furiously enriching uranium/plutonium to weapons grade with hundreds of centrifuges.
They have almost 400 missiles waiting for nuclear/HE warheads.
The range on these missiles is short to medium.
It's obvious their intended target is Israel.
They were laughing their way through the last summit with no results on curbing their nuclear program, they are masters at buying time.
The window for diplomacy & sanctions is almost closed.

[banjomike]

Originally Posted by CaptainNJ

i suppose we will always be concerned about any price jumps but if we produce enough here; we would have less concerns over supply issues.

True enough. But Americans are changing their driving habits; we aren't driving as much as we once did, and we're buying more fuel efficient vehicles. Both are driving the demand down from what it was in 2007 when we had the last huge price jump.

I believe this trend will continue. One thing I think we will see soon are the high efficiency small diesel engines being increasing used in new trucks. Europe has been going to diesel increasingly for a long time, and those engines have a lot more torque than gas engines. I think the days of the big V-8 are rapidly coming to an end.

[banjomike]

Originally Posted by fandango9

Iran is furiously enriching uranium/plutonium to weapons grade with hundreds of centrifuges.
They have almost 400 missiles waiting for nuclear/HE warheads.
The range on these missiles is short to medium.
It's obvious their intended target is Israel.
They were laughing their way through the last summit with no results on curbing their nuclear program, they are masters at buying time.
The window for diplomacy & sanctions is almost closed.

The world isn't coming to an end all that soon. N. Korea is much more advanced in nuclear technology than Iran, but only because N. Korea has been at it for over 20 years. It's going to take Iran about the same amount of time, give or take 5 years, to design and build breeder reactors. Right now, they don't have enough nuclear fuel to get a breeder up and running, and it takes a breeder reactor to make enough plutonium to produce nuclear weaponry.

The centrifuges are making reactor fuel not material for warheads. Once a breeder is on operation, they can make all the plutonium bombs they want while using the reactor for electric power generation. A reactor will also make Iran self sufficient in fresh water, another critical necessity for them.

As to whether Israel is their prime target remains to be seen. It is certainly possible that Iran wants nuclear equality with Israel, but things are in great flux in the Middle East. By the time Iran actually has nuclear weapons, Israel may not be as big a possible threat is it is now to them. Turkey could be a bigger threat, or another Islamic state.

Iran does not start wars readily. All of the wars Iran has had after WWII were either civil wars or a defensive war that was started by Iraq. That conflict lasted 8 years, and Iraq used chemical weapons against Iran. Their government has been overturned in 1925, 1935, 1940's, 1953, and 1979.

As Persians, Iran has no love for the Arabs. Iran was called Persia from ancient times until 1935, and once ruled all the modern Arab states at one time or another.

Iran has never gone to war with Israel.

Iraq joined the Arab nations in the 6 Day War of 1967, not Iran.

Iraq was the only Persian nation to join the Arab states of Jordan, Egypt, and Syria. Iraq also joined those nations in the Yom Kippur War of 1973.