Mount Merapi and other explosive things

May 9 - Volcanoes fascinate me, and there's one on the Ring of Fire that seems likely to erupt - Mount Merapi. Lava began flowing down the slopes at 2 a.m. their time and residents have been urged to leave.

It last erupted in 1994, sending out a searing cloud of gas that burned 60 people to death. About 1,300 people were killed when it erupted in 1930.

Volcanoes are one of those nasty things that may give hints of restlessness -- but after they blow, it's often too late to respond.

I recently watched a documentary - probably on the Discovery Civilization channel - that pointed out that, as Mt. Vesuvius had not erupted for centuries, those in Pompeii and Herculaneum had no oral tradition or stories about the mountain that would have helped them understand the magnitude of the danger. They were used to earthquakes and behaved as though this was just another in a series of tremors, so went about their business rather than run for their lives. As history records, they waited too late and died horribly trying to flee Pompeii or while waiting for help on the beaches and, for those from Herculaneum, huddled in caves as they waited for it to "blow over." It did blow over - an intense pyroclastic wave with heat so intense their brains literally boiled away.

As many have pointed out in discussions of the nuclear threat from Iran's mullahs, it is instructive to remember that an earlier European response to Hitler would have averted not only much of the devastation of World War II but also the Holocaust. We have well-studied history and oral tradition but too many of us behave as though the undeniable threat is unprecedented.

Iran's mullahs, as was Hitler, have been very clear about their aims. When the worst happens, we will not be able to pretend that we were blindsided and it will be useless at that point to admit we were stupid.

That letter from Iran is not an overture to resolution of the problem -- it doesn't even address the problem -- but the appeasers among us are likely to use it to justify their weak-kneed response to the threat. See! They wrote a letter! This is an opening! It's not an opening -- it's a diversion. It's a token bereft of meaning but one intended to lull the foolish into a false sense of renewed hope that we can talk (Taheri writes a great dismissal of the Cheap Talk Approach here.)

At the very least, the measures the U.N. has approved are naive:

Representatives of the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France as well as Germany made the decision to tell Iran the pluses and minuses of its refusal to halt its uranium enrichment program at a meeting after more than three hours of talks by their foreign ministers Monday did not produce an agreement on the resolution.

As a result of Tuesday's decision, representatives from the three European countries that had been spearheading negotiations with Iran will spend the next few days preparing a package of incentives and sanctions, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because there has been no official announcement.

The European Union was eager to become Syria's bestest new friend after the U.S. applied sanctions, and our experience with the U.N. Oil-for-Food program for Iraq demonstrates how many in the "world community" are willing to do business with rogues.

Besides, would Iran be in a better bargaining position with nuclear weaponry or without? Need I ask?

I remember how sharply President Bush was criticized when he included Iran in the Axis of Evil ... I haven't heard that particular one lately.

Vulcanologists stationed at Mt. Merapi have learned from it's history and that of other volcanoes. We should emulate them rather than the conventional wisdom of those who lived and miserably died when Mt. Vesuvius blew.

May 10 18:49 - Deborah Orin's column on the letter is titled Tyrant's Letter Lunacy. Heh.

Posted by: Debbye at 04:58 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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