Iran War Clock Set At Ten Minutes To Midnight 315
Hugh Pickens writes "The Atlantic has assembled a high-profile panel of experts, including a former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Iran, a Senior Vice President at the Council on Foreign Relations, a Deputy Head of the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, and a military correspondent at Haaretz, to periodically estimate the chances of conflict with Iran. The Iran War Clock is not designed to be pro-war or anti-war. Instead, the purpose is to estimate the chances of conflict in the hope of producing a more informed debate. Each panelist makes an individual estimate about the percentage chance of war and we report the average score and based on this number, the Iran War Clock is adjusted so that the hand moves closer to, or further away from, midnight. 'On the one hand, the panelists are highly knowledgeable. On the other hand, there are sufficient members of the panel that any individual error should not have an overly negative effect on the aggregate prediction.' If there is a zero percent chance of war, the clock hand is at 20 minutes to midnight. Each extra 5 percent chance of war moves the hand one minute closer to midnight. 'We're humble about the accuracy of this prediction, which is really a collective "gut-check" feeling. But it may be closer to the truth than the alternative forecasts available.' The panel's first estimate puts the odds of war in the next twelve months at 48 percent, consistent with predictions market Intrade.com, which estimates a 40 percent chance of a U.S./Israeli strike by December 2012."
Schwarzkopf didn't say that. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:That is one hell of a complicated way of saying (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Do *not* follow Israel to Masada (Score:5, Informative)
Odd, I'm an Israeli vet and I've never been to Masada as a soldier. Have been to the wailing wall at my end of bootcamp ceremony though. ;-)
What makes you think we Israelis are so suicidal? we wouldn't have made such progress in mere decades if we didn't value life.
Yes, there is a certain sense of paranoia in us Jews. But you're not paranoid if they are really after you
We have to come up with a credible threat against Iran otherwise no sanctions at all would be placed against Iran's insane regime. Obama was falling all over himself trying to approach them when the forged elections and subsequent slaughter of demonstrators forced him to give up that pipe dream. Do you seriously want them to obtain nuclear weapons? Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt (if they don't all starve by then) have made it clear they will join the nuclear club if that happens. How is that in America's interest?
I think an actual strike on Iran will end badly. Ending that psycho regime via sanctions will be good for everyone.
Re:Ides of March (Score:5, Informative)
they have no desire to get nuked
Fortunately for them Iran doesn't have [nytimes.com] a nuclear weapons program, just a civilian nuclear energy program. Even Israeli intelligence [yahoo.com] feels attacking Iran is a bad idea. Though, it'd be real good for the military industrial complex and the financiers.
I'd like to think we'd go along as a show of support
Really, we should kill people in far off lands who don't threaten us because some war-mongers are creating propaganda about fake weapons of mass destruction? Didn't we just learn this lesson?