“They were there for Norway⦔
“They” are nine Norwegian commandos cross-country skiing through deeply wooded, mountainous terrain in 1943, then trudging through deep snow to reach the Vemork hydroelectric power plant in the town of Rjukan, high above a waterfall and as formidable an edifice as one can imagine from that era.
Vemork was also site of the worlds only plant for mass production of “heavy water,” on which the Nazis had placed their primary bet to produce atomic weapons during World War II. After the invasion and occupation of Norway in April 1940, the Reichs munitions research team soon figured out that Vemork was critical to their plans.
Physicist Werner Heisenberg was one of the key leaders of the Nazi nuclear program, and in 1942 he had promised all of the Nazi and Wehrmacht leadership a bomb “the size of a pineapple” that could destroy cities.
The key to that bomb was the heavy water produced at Vemork, so the Nazis hardened the defenses around the plant and kept increasing them as the Allies interest in destroying the plant became obvious.
The tale of the race between the Nazis and the Allies for nuclear weapons and the specific drama surrounding Vemork is recounted in the bestseller of a decade ago: “The Winter Fortress: The Epic Mission to Sabotage Hitler’s ” by Neal Bascomb. Director and producer Michael Bay optioned the rights to make the movie based on the riveting account by Bascomb, but it has not yet been made.
It is a shame that Bay hasnt made the movie yet, as such a film would be a short-cut for those who dont understand why President is singularly focused on ensuring the Islamic Republic of Iran cannot make or buy a nuclear weapon.
Trump is motivated by the same conviction that drove British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and American President Franklin Roosevelt to throw everything into the Manhattan Project while also doing everything to disrupt Hitlers bid for nukes. The leaders of the United Kingdom and United States knew that German dictator Adolf Hitler would use any weapon he could obtain, even as Trump and Israeli Prime Minister know the fanatics atop the rump regime in Iran would use any weapon they could build or buy.
The conviction that your enemy cannot be deterred by any ordinary means but is in fact a theocracy run by fanatics who believe they can usher in the end of times and the return of the “Twelfth Imam” focuses the mind. Or ought to.
“Twelver” beliefs â the anchor religious convictions of the regime established by the Ayatollah Khomeini when he led the Iranian Revolution of 1979 â astonish the secular West, especially its progressive activists. The left in the West dismiss the Iranian theocratic convictions as absurd fantasies that surely no government could embrace.
They ought to watch 16 minutes of the recent episode of in which Mark quickly traces the core ideology of the remaining “leadership” in Iran with the help of the writings of late scholar of Islam Bernard Lewis and of the deceased Khomeini himself.Â
Trump and Netanyahu have directed the destruction of the physical plant of Irans nuclear program though not the new facility under construction in the deep caverns being dug at Pickaxe Mountain in Iran. Fanatics dont stop even when they are set back. The religious extremists of Iran are certain to try again to build â or buy â the nuclear weapons they will use.
The German National Socialists â the Nazis â were of course led by Hitler who had no scruples about burning everything down even as his Reich collapsed in on every front. The same is true of Irans religious fascists who have been led by Ayatollahs Khomeini and Khamenei from 1979 to February 28 of this year. These Islamist fascists murdered tens of thousands of their own people over two days in January. They have no limits when it comes to violence.
It may be Khameneis son now calling the shots in the wounded and reeling Iran
