Epicenter 2.0
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Upon taking office, Ahmadinejad undertook a series of moves that sent shock waves through world capitals, rattled global markets, and drove up the international price of oil. He told associates that he believed the end of the world was just two or three years away. He said he believed he had been chosen by Allah to become Iran’s leader at this critical hour to hasten the coming of the Islamic messiah known as the Twelfth Imam or the Mahdi by launching a final holy war against Christians and Jews. He publicly vowed to annihilate the United States. He vowed to wipe Israel “off the map.” He also dramatically accelerated Iran’s effort to build, buy, or steal the nuclear weapons necessary to bring about the end of days, in accordance with his Shiite Muslim theology.
The first public hint of just how central Islamic eschatology would be to Ahmadinejad’s foreign policy came during his first address to the United Nations General Assembly in New York in September 2005. Ahmadinejad stunned the audience of world leaders and diplomats by ending his speech with this prayer: “O mighty Lord, I pray to you to hasten the emergence of your last repository, the Promised One, that perfect and pure human being, the One that will fill this world with justice and peace.”9
Back in Iran, Ahmadinejad then stunned a group of Islamic clerics by claiming that during his UN speech he was “surrounded by a light until the end” and that “all of a sudden the atmosphere changed there, and for 27 or 28 minutes all the leaders [in the audience] did not blink. . . . I am not exaggerating when I say they did not blink; it’s not an exaggeration, because I was looking. They were astonished, as if a hand held them there and made them sit. It had opened their eyes and ears for the message of the Islamic Republic.”10
The following month, Ahmadinejad gave a speech in Tehran in which he further clarified his objectives. “Is it possible for us to witness a world without America and Zionism?” he asked a gathering of terrorist leaders from such groups as Hamas and Islamic Jihad. “You had best know that this slogan and this goal are attainable, and surely can be achieved.” He then urged Muslims around the world to prepare for the day when “our holy hatred expands” and “strikes like a wave.”11
Six months later, Ahmadinejad upped the ante yet again, declaring in a nationally televised address that Iran had successfully enriched uranium and joined the “nuclear club,” leading a number of Western intelligence agencies and experts to predict that Iran could have operational nuclear weapons in the next two or three years—just in time for the Bush administration to leave office and, presumably, for the end of the world to begin.12
“TIME IS NOT ON OUR SIDE”
With Iran’s countdown to the apocalypse running, the stakes could not be higher.
Were Iran to smuggle nuclear bombs into the United States (across the Mexican border, for instance), entire American cities would be vulnerable to cataclysmic terrorist attacks with little or no warning. Experts say the blast from a single ten-kiloton nuclear bomb in Washington, DC, for example, would destroy everything within a half mile of ground zero, contaminate 3,000 to 5,000 square miles with toxic levels of radiation, and kill 300,000 people within a matter of minutes.13
Were a similar bomb detonated in the heart of Times Square in New York City, a leading expert on nuclear terrorism says, “The blast would generate temperatures reaching into the tens of millions of degrees Fahrenheit. The resulting fireball and blast wave would instantaneously destroy the theater district, the New York Times building, Grand Central Terminal, and every other structure within a third of a mile of the point of detonation. . . . On a normal workday, more than half a million people crowd the area within a half-mile radius of Times Square. A noon detonation in midtown Manhattan could kill them all. Hundreds of thousands of others would die from collapsing buildings, fire, and fallout in the ensuing hours. The electromagnetic pulse generated by the blast would fry cell phones, radios, and other electronic communications. Hospitals, doctors, and emergency services would be overwhelmed by the wounded. Firefighters would be battling an uncontrolled ring of fires for many days thereafter.”14
Israel is even more vulnerable, given its small size and closer proximity to Iran. Were Iran, for example, able to equip high-speed ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would suddenly be in position to accomplish in about six minutes what it took Adolf Hitler nearly six years to do—kill more than 6 million Jews. This appears to be just what Ahmadinejad has in mind when he says that Israel is “heading toward annihilation” and “one day will vanish.”15
President Bush has warned that Iran is part of an “axis of evil” whose weapons of mass destruction pose “a grave and growing danger” to world peace and security. He cautions that the mullahs, or religious leaders, “could provide these arms to terrorists, giving them the means to match their hatred. They could attack our allies or attempt to blackmail the United States. In any of these cases, the price of indifference would be catastrophic. . . . Time is not on our side.”16 The president insists that the U.S. will defend Israel militarily should an Iranian attack come.17 What’s more, he has pointedly refused to rule out preemptive nuclear strikes, insisting that in a worst-case scenario, “all options are on the table.”18
Nor is President Bush alone in his concern over this gathering storm. Leading Democrats have also expressed grave concerns about the emerging Iranian nuclear threat, despite their misgivings about the administration’s handling of the Iraq war.19 New York Democratic senator Hillary Rodham Clinton has warned that “a nuclear-armed Iran would shake the foundation of global security to its very core.”20
Americans increasingly agree. Two out of three American adults view Iran as a security threat to the United States. Nearly nine out of ten Americans view Iran as a threat to Israel, while six in ten see the regime in Tehran as a threat to Europe. Moreover, nearly six in ten Americans believe it is inevitable that “Iran will use nuclear weapons against its enemies if it acquires the technology.”21
“I THINK WE COULD HAVE ARMAGEDDON”
Stopping Iran from fulfilling its cataclysmic plans will not be easy.
Americans are deeply divided over whether the U.S. should take preemptive military action against Iran. What’s more, even if the American president was to do so, Iranian leaders say “any invader will find Iran to be a burning Hell for them.”22
If attacked, Iran has vowed to retaliate by unleashing a wave of 40,000 suicide bombers against American, Israeli, and European targets and into Iraq. The plan, which includes activating some fifty terrorist sleeper cells allegedly pre-positioned in the U.S., Canada, and Europe to use chemical and biological warfare against civilian and industrial targets, is ominously code-named Judgment Day.23
Also increasingly worrisome is the fact that Iran is steadily building an alliance with another nuclear power: Russia. Despite Ahmadinejad’s incendiary rhetoric and provocative actions, Russian president Vladimir Putin has done little to stop Iran from going nuclear. To the contrary, Moscow has aggressively pursued ever-closer political, economic, and military ties to Tehran, in defiance of U.S. and European protests. Putin and his team have systematically stymied international efforts to sanction the radical Islamic regime. They have also authorized the sale of nuclear technology to Iran, permitted the training of more than 1,000 Iranian nuclear scientists, and approved a billion-dollar arms deal to provide Ahmadinejad and the mullahs with the latest high-tech weaponry and air-defense systems, making the prospects for a preemptive attack by the West far more difficult.24
In light of such developments, a number of world leaders are talking about the Iranian nuclear crisis in increasingly apocalyptic language.
British prime minister Tony Blair says he has been both stunned and sickened by the unprecedented nature of the threats emanating from Tehran. He has also strongly hinted that the West may eventually have to resort to the use of military force against Iran if diplomacy fails. Blair told leaders of a European summit that he felt a “real sense of revulsion” from Ahmadinejad’s rhetoric and said, �
��I have never come across a situation of the president of a country saying they want to wipe out—not that they’ve got a problem with, or an issue with, but want to wipe out another country. . . . Can you imagine a state like that with an attitude like that having nuclear weapons?”25
Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert has been more specific, saying Ahmadinejad “talks like Hitler” and is “a psychopath of the worst kind.” Olmert and his advisors are believed to be drawing up plans for a possible preemptive strike against Iran, saying, “God forbid that this man ever gets his hands on nuclear weapons.”26
Israeli vice premier Shimon Peres, winner of the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize, has ratcheted up the rhetoric even further, saying that not only does Iran represent “the greatest danger” to world peace and security since the Nazis, but that “Ahmadinejad represents Satan” himself.27
Still, it was Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican widely touted as a possible future president of the United States, who may have been the most blunt about the implications of the developing crisis in the Middle East. Appearing on NBC’s Meet the Press in April of 2006, McCain warned that “there’s only one thing worse than using the option of military action, and that is the Iranians acquiring nuclear weapons.” If Iran gets the bomb, he says, “I think we could have Armageddon.”28
WHAT DOES THE FUTURE HOLD?
Senator McCain is well-known for straight talk and is highly respected for his experience on national-security and foreign-policy issues. He is not, however, known for alluding to the book of Revelation on national television, much less linking Middle East crises to biblical end-times prophecies. So when he did, heads naturally began to turn, and questions began to mount.
Soon after McCain’s comments, I happened to have dinner with a high-ranking Arab government official visiting Washington. He knew I had worked for a number of U.S. and Israeli political leaders over the years. He also knew that I had written a series of political thrillers about the Middle East whose plotlines have had an eerie way of coming true. Someone had recently given him a copy of my book The Ezekiel Option, in which a dictator rises to power in Russia, Iran builds nuclear weapons, and then Russia and Iran form a military alliance—a nuclear alliance—vowing that Israel will be “wiped off the face of the map forever.”
“You wrote this all before Ahmadinejad came to power?” he asked me.
“Yes, sir.”
“And you based all this on a Bible prophecy?” he pressed, knowing, too, that I am an evangelical Christian from an Orthodox Jewish heritage.
“Yes, sir.”
“Which one?” he asked.
“It comes from the Jewish Scriptures, the book of Ezekiel, chapters 38 and 39,” I replied. “It’s what many refer to as the War of Gog and Magog.”
“And this prophecy says that in the end times, Russia and Iran will attack Israel?”
“Among other things, yes, it does,” I confirmed.
The leader, a Sunni Muslim, sat back and sighed. “Our world is threatening to destroy itself,” he said, openly worrying about the apocalyptic language of the Shiites coming out of Tehran. “Perhaps God has given you the key to understanding what the future holds.” And then, to my surprise, he asked me to explain the story behind my novels, the prophecies that informed them, and the biblical view of what will happen in the Middle East in the last days.
I must confess I was hesitant at first. I certainly did not want to offend my new Muslim friend or the regime he so ably serves. But when he persisted, I proceeded to give him an executive summary of the book you now hold in your hands. He was not, after all, the only one who has raised questions about current events in the Middle East and how, if at all, they may relate to biblical prophecy. Indeed, in recent years, I have been invited to speak about such matters at the White House, on Capitol Hill, with U.S. and foreign ambassadors, and with high-ranking military and intelligence officials in the U.S. government and in a number of Middle Eastern governments, in addition to numerous media interviews.
My intent with Epicenter is not to persuade anyone of what is coming. Rather it is to explain how I came to write The Last Jihad, The Last Days, The Ezekiel Option, and The Copper Scroll and to answer the questions that have flowed from the novels and the prophecies upon which they were based.
Among them:
Just how serious is the current nuclear crisis with Iran? Is there any way to avoid a direct military confrontation? Or is another cataclysmic Middle East war just around the corner? And if so, how will such a war change our world?
Why is Russia selling arms and nuclear technology to Iran, given the seriousness of the present situation? Is there any way to encourage Moscow to use its influence to move Iran back from the brink? Have Russian leaders in the post-Soviet era given up their dreams of dominating the world, thus ensuring that the twenty-first century will be a time of global stability and security? Or is the Kremlin destined to lurch back to totalitarianism, rebuild its military, and once again set its eye on the oil-rich nations of the Middle East, as it has so many times in the past?
What is the future of the Arab-Israeli conflict in the post-Arafat world? What should we make of recent Israeli efforts to withdraw from Gaza and the West Bank? What effect will the rise of Hamas have on the peace process? Is there any hope for real peace and reconciliation between Israel and her neighbors in our lifetime?
What is the future of Iraq in the post-Saddam world? Will the violence there simply go from bad to worse? Will our troops be bogged down there forever? Will Americans continue to sacrifice their lives there? Will regional instabilities continue to drive up the price of oil, threatening both the health and vitality of our own economy as well as the global economy? Or is there any real hope for peace and prosperity in Iraq, where the West has invested so much blood, sweat, and financial resources?
Will a resurgent and increasingly radicalized Islamic movement establish the worldwide caliphate, or global empire, of which its leaders dream and for which they pray and fight? Is Islam really the world’s fastest-growing religion, and will it soon overcome Christianity as the world’s largest religion? Or can Christianity make a comeback, particularly in the Middle East—the land of its birth?
In the pages ahead, you will find answers to these and similar questions. Indeed, it is the premise of this book that the earthshaking events that lie ahead can actually be forecast with a surprising degree of accuracy.
In writing Epicenter, I have pored over previously classified intelligence documents, internal White House and State Department memos, thousands of U.S. and foreign news articles, scores of books and research studies by a wide array of government officials and private citizens, and the sacred writings of Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the ancient Middle East. I have traveled to Israel, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, Morocco, and Russia. I have also interviewed political, military, intelligence, business, and religious leaders who live and work in the epicenter and are helping shape its future, including
Benjamin Netanyahu, former Israeli prime minister
Shimon Peres, former Israeli prime minister
Natan Sharansky, former Israeli deputy prime minister
Ali Abdul Ameer Alawi, Iraqi minister of finance
Sinan Al-Shabibi, governor of Iraq’s Central Bank
General Georges Sada, senior advisor to Iraqi president Jalal Talabani and former senior military advisor to Saddam Hussein
Saeb Erekat, chief Palestinian negotiator and senior advisor to Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas
General Nasser Youssef, national security advisor to Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas
Abdul Salam al-Majali, former Jordanian prime minister
Ahmed Abaddi, advisor to Morocco’s King Mohammed VI
Serge Berdugo, advisor to Morocco’s King Mohammed VI
Alexei Mitrofanov, member of the Russian State Duma and chief political strategist for Russian ultranationalist leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky
Caspar Weinberger, forme
r secretary of defense under President Reagan
Western and Middle Eastern intelligence officials, active and retired
Western and Middle Eastern diplomats, active and retired
Western oil executives working in the Middle East
Russian government officials and political analysts
Arab and Iranian political dissidents
Arab and Iranian Christian leaders
Messianic Jewish leaders in the U.S. and Israel.
Some of these spoke to me specifically for this book. Others spoke to me for other books and articles I have written over the years. Such sources will not all agree with the analysis found in these pages, but I am exceedingly grateful for their valuable time and helpful insights. I have no doubt this book is richer for the assistance they provided.
Robert Kennedy was right. Like it or not, we live in interesting times. May you find this book as interesting to read as I have found to research and write.
Joel C. Rosenberg
WASHINGTON, DC
JUNE 2006
CHAPTER ONE
PREDICTING THE FUTURE
Few Americans will ever forget what they were doing on September 11, 2001, when they first heard the news that the United States was under attack by radical Islamic jihadists using jet planes on kamikaze missions. I certainly never will.
On that beautiful, sunny, crystal clear Tuesday morning, I was putting the finishing touches on my first novel, a political thriller called The Last Jihad, which opens with radical Islamic terrorists hijacking a jet plane and flying an attack mission into an American city. What’s more, I was doing so in a town house barely fifteen minutes away from Washington Dulles International Airport, where American Airlines Flight 77 had just taken off. At that very moment, the plane was being seized and flown right over our home toward the Pentagon.