Iranian Missile Test

Time for another round of chest-thumping in the run-up to the Iranian Presidential Election (on June 12th, 2009)...

The Iranians cranked off the latest version of their IRBM.

The claim is that this one was solid-fueled, which would be a major improvement (if true).

All manner of U.S. government officials have issued statements, mostly of the 'it is a bad thing' sort, but one statement in particular stood out:

In a breakfast meeting with reporters, Undersecretary of Defense Michele Flournoy said she could not confirm reports of a launch but spoke in general about Iran's missile program.

"There are U.N. Security Council resolutions in place that ... thwart that kind of activity," Flournoy said. "So I do think that it poses a security threat to the region and that we will have to, probably, to deal with it."

Madame Undersecretary, if that was "thwarted", I'd hate to see what "not thwarted" looks like. They got the missile up, fired, and tested. The Iranian thinking at this point has to be "Deal with *that*".

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Follow-up:

You want to see "thwarting"? *This* is just one of the choices, and M. Flournoy's name came up in the decision to continue funding this project as well. No mention is made in the report as to if she recommended spending the money elsewhere.