When will we take our enemies seriously?

Allen West on the latest from Iran:

As reported by Fox News, “Iran is preparing to launch a new long-range rocket into outer space as soon as this weekend, U.S. officials told Fox News. 

The missile is known as a Simorgh, and officials are watching the missile on the launch pad as it is 

being fueled at an undisclosed location inside Iran. 

Officials told Fox they have not seen this specific type of rocket launched in the past. 

Iran has conducted four previous space launches. Any test of a new ballistic missile would be an apparent violation of a UN resolution forbidding Iran from working on its rocket program.

A Simorgh rocket is designed to carry a satellite into space. Officials are concerned that any space launch uses the same technology needed to launch a nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missile or ICBM.
The Simorgh rocket was first unveiled by then-Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2010. Allthingsnuclear.org first reported the Iranian Simorgh missile was being prepared for launch last month and says it is capable of sending a heavier satellite into space at a higher orbit, showing greater capability then previous launches.
Iran has successfully placed four satellites into orbit beginning in 2009 the last occurring in 2015. Iran’s earlier space launches used a smaller rocket, a variant of the Shahab-3, according to allthingsnuckear.com This week, Iran launched multiple ballistic missiles on one day for the first time since 2012, according to defense officials. UN Security Council Resolution 2231 says Iran is “not to undertake any activity related to ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons, including launches using such ballistic missile technology.”I don’t want to get into another discussion about the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the Iranian nuclear deal; no such document exists. The “agreement” has been violated continuously by Iran, along with other UN Resolutions so let’s agree to that understanding.
What I really want to discuss with you is my assessment of what Iran may be after in the long run.
A story from a year ago last March in the Washington Examiner lays out my concern: “Suspected for years of plotting to dismantle the U.S. electric grid, American officials have confirmed that Iranian military brass have endorsed a nuclear electromagnetic pulse explosion that would attack the country’s power system.American defense experts made the discovery while translating a secret Iranian military handbook, raising new concerns about Tehran’s recent nuclear talks with the administration.
“Iranian military documents describe such a scenario — including a recently translated Iranian military textbook that endorses nuclear EMP attack against the United States,” he wrote.
A knowledgeable source said that the textbook discusses an EMP attack on America in 20 different places. Arizona Republican Rep. Trent Franks, who is leading an effort to protect the U.S. electric grid from an EMP attack, has recently made similar claims based on the document translated by military authorities. Once sneered at by critics, recent moves by Iran and North Korea have given credibility to the potential EMP threat from an atmospheric nuclear explosion over the U.S.”During my last visit to Washington D.C. and Capitol Hill I met with Rep. Franks (R-Ariz) and we discussed the EMP threat. In my capacity at the National Center for Policy Analysis, I’ve written on the potential for an EMP attack in America. I am especially concerned that the State of Texas has its own independent electric grid and it needs to be hardened. Consider what would happen if the twelfth largest economy in the world, the Texas economy, was shut down due to an EMP attack.
What if these missile launches into space by Iran were a predecessor for a potential high altitude nuclear detonation that would have as its objective to “fry” the American electric grid? This isn’t some “Star Trek” scenario, as the Iranians addressed this means of attack some twenty times in translated documents.

But here is a greater concern: why in God’s name would the Obama administration go into agreement with a nation that has an objective to attack and destroy your electric grid? Why would the Obama administration at this point in time, not vehemently reject all aspects of the JCPOA and do everything in its power to deter the military goals of the militant Islamic theocracy which is the number one state sponsor of Islamic terrorism in the world?  

Bill Gertz at the Washington  Free Beacon on the latest from North Korea:

Escalating threats from North Korea’s communist regime are indicators of a future military attack or another nuclear test in the coming days, according to a recent U.S. intelligence assessment.

Intelligence agencies issued the assessment last week warning that threatening rhetoric from Pyongyang in response to large-scale U.S.-South Korean military exercises and new U.N. sanctions had reached the highest level in years.

The unclassified assessment circulated within government states that the intense language suggests North Korea is preparing for a surprise military strike or a demonstration of strategic capability, such as a new long-range missile test or underground nuclear blast, according to U.S. officials familiar with the report.

On Sunday, North Korean state news media warned its missiles could destroy New York City in a thermonuclear attack.

“Our hydrogen bomb is much bigger than the one developed by the Soviet Union,” the outlet DPRK Today stated.

“If this H-bomb were to be mounted on an inter-continental ballistic missile and fall on Manhattan in New York City, all the people there would be killed immediately and the city would burn down to ashes,” the report said.

Such threatening rhetoric from Pyongyang is typical of the communist regime’s propaganda. However, in the past several weeks the tone and level of threats has been unusually harsh, according to the officials, and that is increasing fears among intelligence analysts that the stepped-up threats are a prelude to military action or nuclear and long-range missile tests.

Official North Korean statements issued March 4 in response to U.N. sanctions said nuclear forces will be bolstered, but gave no specifics. Other references to possible “incidents” on the peninsula were interpreted as North Korea considering military action.

Do you trust anybody in our executive branch to muster the requisite sene of urgency about these developments?