Military Escalation Around Iran Possible - Russian General

RIA Novosti:

Russia's most senior military officer said Thursday that a military escalation of the situation around Iran's controversial nuclear program was a possibility. "I do not rule [it] out, but military action is not the best option," Chief of the General Staff Yury Baluyevsky said.

Baluyevsky urged Iran, which the United States and some European countries fear is seeking to build nuclear weapons, to be sensible.

"The real military capabilities of Iran and the United States cannot be compared," he said. READ MORE

He added that a U.S. aggression against Iran could cause unpredictable reaction in the Muslim world.

"It is hard to predict what the reaction ... could be like but such a development of events may inflame the entire world, and this is something that must not be allowed to happen," Baluyevsky said.

U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said earlier the military option of the standoff was still on the table.

The European Parliament proposed Wednesday to establish a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East, including Israel, and admitted the possibility of a military resolution of the conflict.

Unlike Iraq, Iran has nuclear facilities all over the country located underground, including facilities near the town of Natanz about 1,700 kilometers (1,000 miles) from the border with Israel, which has a fleet of F-15I warplanes capable of flying about 4,500km without refueling. In 1981, Israel destroyed suspected nuclear facilities in Iraq in an air strike.