This is a germane clip from March 2009 - both Talibaan and Iran related aspects..

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaks on U S Iranian relations and Al-Qaeda.  (CNN, YT/michaelspurling March 2009)

Associated text posted on YouTube clip by Michael Spurling. Not sure where it was originally published, but worth reading.


The Iranian Challenge
- Anthony H. Cordesman

Both the Bush administration and the Obama administration have already made it clear that they oppose any Israeli strike on Iran. Senior U.S. officials, diplomats, and officers have all made it clear that any Israeli strike would seriously affect U.S. strategic interests in the Middle East and the Islamic world. They have given this red light for many reasons—none of which affect any love of Iran or confidence in its future behavior.

The United States has good reasons to oppose an Israeli strike. The first is that a mix of diplomacy, and incentives and disincentives, may still work. The second is that a preventive strike—particularly an Israeli strike—probably will not. Irans facilities are too dispersed, the scale of any parallel or duplicative centrifuge and other production facilities is too unknown, and any single attack would at best set Iran back for a limited period while giving it both the motive and justification to carry out a far more massive and dispersed nuclear-armed missile effort.

It is also one thing to conduct a raid sized to strike at a single Syrian reactor, or carry out a small long-range strike on Osriak, and quite another to carry out the scale of attack needed to do serious damage even to Irans three most critical nuclear facilities. It means a major Israeli air operation through Arab territory on a scale that Israel has never previously carried out. It means attacking an Iran that has a wide range of ways to retaliate: Hezbollah, Hamas, pressure on Iraq or Afghanistan, and asymmetric threats in the Gulf. It also means creating a whole new set of reasons to justify Iranian and jihadist political attacks on Israel and moderate Arab regimes.

The United States also cannot decouple totally from an Israeli action no matter how clearly its leaders send a red light. Many, probably most, Arabs and Iranians will see the United States as having at least covertly given Israeli permission. The United States will become a proxy target for Israel, and for Arab and Iranian anger, without getting strategic benefits. It may also have to clean up in terms of military action in the Gulf, Iraq, and other areas after an Israeli success, and the consequences of dealing with any serious Israeli failures would be far worse.

The United States has not abandoned its own military option, but it would have to be far larger than the one Israeli could mount, involve persistent restrikes as long as Iran continued trying to rebuild its program, and take on the character of a major regional contingency at a time when the United States is already involved in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and Pakistan is seriously threatened. It also is unclear that even if diplomacy does conclusively fail, the United States will not be better off by seeking to contain Iran, provide improved regional missile and air defenses, and provide the same kind of extended deterrence it once provided in the form of a nuclear umbrella over Europe. As we have learned, preemption and prevention are not the solution to every problem.

What President Obama should insist on is that Israel recognize that the United States is sending a red light, and this is an area where the United States needs time and freedom of action. One key step would be for the president to openly declare such U.S. opposition and speak in very broad terms about the damage it would do to the U.S.-Israeli strategic relationship. He could reinforce this with statements by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the secretaries of state and defense, and key intelligence officials.

Perhaps more quietly, however, President Obama needs to be prepared to give Prime Minister Netanyahu the same reassurances that he needs to be prepared to give every state around Iran and our key Arab allies. It should be clear that if diplomacy fails, the United States will provide every possible assistance, it will not react to the improvements in Israel nuclear strike and retaliatory capabilities that may already be taking place, and it is prepared to help all of its allies create far more effective air and missile defenses.

At some point, President Obama should also be prepared to make clear to Iran that it cannot deploy nuclear-armed missiles without having U.S. nuclear forces targeted on Iran; that every step it takes to threaten Israel or any its neighbors will see a far greater increase in the threat to Iran; and that any nuclear strike by Iran on a U.S. ally will lead to retaliation in kind. Diplomacy, dialogue, and friendly relations are the far more preferable options for dealing with Iran, but it should be clear to the world—not just Israel—what the alternative will be.

Anthony H. Cordesman holds the Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategic and the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

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Pakistan Confirms Arrest Of Afghan Taliban's No. 2

Pakistan confirmed for the first time Wednesday that it has the Afghan Taliban's No. 2 leader in custody, and officials said he was providing useful intelligence that was being shared with the United States.

The confirmation came as the Pakistani government defused a political crisis that threatened to distract from the fight against militancy by backing off on judicial appointments opposed by the Supreme Court.

The Afghan Taliban leader, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, was arrested earlier this month in a joint operation by CIA and Pakistani security forces in the southern port city of Karachi, U.S. and Pakistani officials said on condition of anonymity Tuesday. The army on Wednesday gave the first public confirmation of the arrest.

"At the conclusion of detailed identification procedures, it has been confirmed that one of the persons arrested happens to be Mullah Baradar," chief army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said in a written message to reporters. "The place of arrest and operational details cannot be released due to security reasons."

The White House also confirmed the capture for the first time Wednesday. Spokesman Robert Gibbs praised Pakistan and told reporters the arrest "is a big success for our mutual efforts in the region."

Gibbs confirmed Baradar is being interrogated but wouldn't divulge any of the results. Richard Holbrooke, U.S. envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, had earlier acknowledged Baradar was in custody to reporters at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.

Baradar was the second-in-command behind Taliban supreme leader Mullah Mohammad Omar and was said to be in charge of the day-to-day running of the organization's leadership council, which is believed based in Pakistan. He was a founding member of the Taliban and is the most important figure of the hard-line Islamist movement to be arrested since the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

Baradar, who also functioned as the link between Mullah Omar and field commanders, has been in detention for more than 10 days and was talking to interrogators, two Pakistani intelligence officials told The Associated Press on Tuesday.

One said that Baradar had provided "useful information" to them and that Pakistan officials had shared it with their U.S. counterparts. A third official said Wednesday that Baradar was being held at an office of Pakistan's most powerful spy agency, the Directorate of Inter-Services Intelligence, in Karachi.

More . . .

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