Iran Receives Nuclear Fuel

Iran Receives Nuclear Fuel in Blow to U.S.

“WASHINGTON — The United States lost a long battle when Russia, as it announced on Monday, delivered nuclear fuel to an Iranian power plant that is at the center of an international dispute over its nuclear program.”

                                                                     NY Times, December 18, 2007

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/18/world/middleeast/18diplo.html?_r=2&hp&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

Russia Ships First Lot of Nuclear Fuel to Iran

MOSCOW, Dec. 17 --Russia announced Monday that it has delivered an initial shipment of nuclear fuel to the Bushehr nuclear power plant in Iran, a step that officials in Moscow and Washington said removes any need for Tehran to pursue a widely opposed uranium enrichment program.

                                                                Washington Post, December 18, 2007

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/17/AR2007121700220.html?hpid=moreheadlines

After long delays that Russian officials made in delivering Bushehr’s nuclear fuel, this week on Monday finally the first shipment of “enriched-uranium fuel rods” was delivered. On his recent trip to Iran, President Putin stated that the promise would be fulfilled and the first part of the fuel would be delivered soon. Unfortunately for American officials who tried their hardest to prevent it from happening, it happened only weeks after the release of the National Intelligence estimate. It was thus more painful to them because they think that estimate has decreased the pressure on Russia to do so.

As you see, the New York Times calls it a “blow to U.S.” while Washington Post begins its report on the event emphasizing that it is still an obstacle in the way of Iranians to continue enriching, because now “there is no need for them to learn how to enrich uranium.” Besides, it aims to show a consensus between Russian and American officials over the issue. This is so cunning! While they know that delivering fuel to Iran will encourage it further they are still making benefit out of it for themselves. For them one thing that is very important, and worrisome as well, is Russia’s relations with Iran. They don’t want to lose Russia on their side so they can’t oppose its decisions forcefully. In this case President Bush even claims that he “supports” Russia’s decision! Despite America’s speaking of there being no need for Iranians any more to learn how to enrich uranium, Iranians confirmed they are going to build a second power plant in Darkhovin, a city north of Bushehr. This actually shows that the American propaganda is becoming weaker and weaker and that today, counties of the world see it less necessary to consult with America about their decisions.

White House Is Confident of Broad Support on Iran

"WASHINGTON — A week after American intelligence agencies reported that Iran halted work on a covert nuclear weapons program in 2003, the Bush administration expressed confidence on Tuesday that it had rallied international support to intensify diplomatic and economic pressure on Iran’s government.

““We believe Iran had a secret military weapons program,” Mr. Bush said at the White House. “And Iran must explain to the world why they had a program.””

                                                            NEW YORK TIMES, December 12, 2007

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/12/washington/12prexy.html?ref=world

The surprising news that was released recently, the National Intelligence estimate, is now taking new forms to itself. Little by little more light is being casted on its dark angles and ambiguous parts that have raised many questions so far. It was really strange why America that had been for a long time accusing Iran of pursuing nuclear weapon program, had just disclosed a document reporting that Iran had ceased its attempts to reach nuclear weapons since 2003.

American officials, now in their recent speeches, are explaining the intentions behind this action. They did not want it to result in such an implication. They actually wanted the other part of the estimate to become the focus of attentions. They wanted those who hear the report to think to themselves:” so America was right in saying that Iran had vicious intentions!”But the opposite came true because many people were saying:” so Iran is not pursuing nuclear weapon program now. So, America was wrong!” that’s why this time American officials were those who were surprised! Now they are compensating for it by giving explanation about what they meant by that report to their European allies. They want to show the situation completely in favor of them saying that they surely would succeed in imposing the third round of sanctions on Iran. But I think it is more a propaganda than a reality. this time European countries would be less willing to support America in this issue because people of the world unfortunately(!) have got the wrong implication and don’t trust America , at least on its claims against Iran’s nuclear program , for soon. But is this all there is? Passage of the time will answer this question.

Book Review-American Studies

Book Review: American Studies

By M.Motahhari & R.Sarikhani

 

American studies by Louise Menand

Farrar, Straus, & Giroux

Hardcover (alk. paper)

New York 2002 (p.ix, 306. $ 25.00)

ISBN 0-374-10434-4

American Studies is written by Louis Menand, the author of the so-called “Metaphysical Club”, who is distinguished professor of the English and a writer at the New Yorker. It is a collection of essays each seemingly separate from the other. The essays have been published in different places before and are brought together in this book to make a whole. The topics of this group of essays run from Oliver Wendell Holmes to Larry Flynt and Jerry Falwell. He also says some thing about William James, T.S.Eliot, The New Yorker, Bill Paley of CBS, Pauline Keal, Christopher Lasch, Maya Lin, and “the mind” of Al Gore. The book is a reprint of essays that were written in The New Yorker, The New Yorker Review of Books, and the new republic. As the title of book suggests, it is a suitable book for those who are interested in American Studies, but it shouldn’t be first book they read in this area because in that case they will get confused and can not understand the indication in the text. Therefore it is better to have some prior knowledge of American Studies and then try to read this book because it is not as simple as the title.

The cover photo presents the complexity of the book, by depcting a lady who is reading a book intensively or she is pretending to reading, and a man who is curious to know what she is reading. Actually the photo tells us about that, things have a surface that can be seen and depth that is sometime unknown to us.

In the preface that author gives a description of the view from his office, which he points to the tall buildings being demolished every day so that even taller ones could be constructed and in a matter of days, new ones replace them. By bringing such descriptions he wants to tell us that:” History is the same”. He argues that while we live in a time, we are not aware of the current trends and tendencies, but when time passes, we suddenly understand that new trends have replaced old ones. That is when we try to still hold to old trends or at least fit them in to new conditions.

But as the author claims “the only way to make the past usable, is to “misinterpret it” or in another words, “to lose it”. That is what exist in American culture that praises those who are “ahead of their times” and not those who stick to the past.

The essays are mainly biographical, stretching from 1901 to 2001, and in this way showing some outstanding events of American culture of nearly a century. By referring to those events he wants to show how they were perceived differently in their own time. From present time, he brings the example of TV shows, saying that once they were looked upon with praise but nowadays they are being criticized.

Lack of coherence and continuity between essays reminds us of the main feature of modernity, that is lack of certainty and continuity, so we can say that, the author has astutely enforcing his idea even in the structure of his book, so he has been successful in conveying his message indirectly to the audience.

One of the major shortcomings of the book can be its inability to discuss the issues independently from outside knowledge. In other words, the reader can not get the implication the author wants unless he has a structured knowledge of it before hand.

That is because he is not after a kind of closed look at the events or persons that he gives information about in his boo, instead he analyzes the context of in which the person has lived or the event has taken place.

May be in this way the author wants to challenge the reader to do further researches and to take what he is for granted.

Comparing this book to other books in this field, we can say it is more specific and is not intended to give the reader general knowledge about the subject. Works by other New Yorker, this book is a rather spiritless work. Other books about written in this subject are basically given introductory knowledge.

One thing is for sure, that this book can play a complementary role but the major role should be played by other books.