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Blunderov
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War With Iran - It's already started
« on: 2007-08-29 12:43:41 » |
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[Blunderov] I notice that the USA refuses to apologise to Iran for the recent arrest of 2 Iranian diplomats (oh, and their briefcases: a desperate bid for any conceivable causus bellum perhaps?)and 5 others saying merely that the incident was regrettable. The spokesman omitted to mention who it was that might actually be doing any of this regretting, but apparently that party would not include the United States in any way shape or form if the diffidence of the spokesman was any witness. Basically "regrettable" is diplomatese for "fuck you anyway". The Iranians speak diplomatese fluently and they will understand this just fine.
Sometimes in my night thoughts I find myself hoping that The Boy General does in fact attack Iran. It will almost certainly spell the end of Israel and also relegate the USA to a secondary role in world affairs for generations to come. I can live with that. I bet most of the rest of the world could too.
In the cold light of day though, the prospect is appalling beyond words.
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=11521
War With Iran - It's already started
by Justin Raimondo
For months we at Antiwar.com have been monitoring the situation between Iran and the United States, parsing the words of administration spokesmen for any hints of when and how hostilities between the two countries might begin. We've been running reports from insiders saying that the Cheney faction is pushing for an attack, that Bush is quite amenable but is biding his time, and that an assault on Tehran is imminent. Now the president has come out openly with his warlike intentions. In a speech delivered Tuesday, he reiterated recent charges by Washington that Iran is arming and training Iraqi Shi'ite groups who are launching attacks on American forces in Iraq, and he announced: "I have authorized our military commanders in Iraq to confront Tehran's murderous activities."
Translation: The bombing begins shortly.
A recent blog item on LewRockwell.com does much to confirm this well-grounded suspicion. In a letter to Rockwell, a former Hillsdale College student describes the celebratory attitude toward war held by Hillsdale lecturer Victor Davis Hanson and his fellow neocons (Bill Kristol, Midge Decter, Harvey Mansfield), adding this chilling anecdote:
"At one point during his class … Hanson related a story where he was in the Oval Office … discussing the matter of Iran [with the president]. Hanson closed his story by saying that Bush vowed to do something about Iran before his term expired."
The invasion and occupation of Iraq has become the intellectual and political touchstone for a whole generation of American politicians and pundits, who either did or did not predict the disastrous outcome and either did or did not sign on to a "patriotic" – and idiotic – cause that was popular at the time. A good number of our laptop bombardiers have since recanted, including Andrew Sullivan, who played the role of drum majorette in the march to war; Francis Fukuyama, who provided the Wagnerian musical score; and William F. Buckley Jr., who allowed his magazine to be used by the neocons as an instrument of lying war propaganda – and libelous smears directed at conservative opponents of the Iraq folly. Buckley shocked his fellows when he admitted "one can't doubt that the American objective in Iraq has failed" and urged on the administration and his fellow conservatives "the acknowledgment of defeat."
Ah, but not VDH and his fellow fantasists, including Buckley's epigones over at National Review, who are stubbornly hewing to the neoconservative line. Immune to evidence, however vivid, that their premises and ideological theories are not only wrong but actively harmful to American interests in the Middle East and worldwide, these people – the neocon "dead-enders," to borrow one of Donald Rumsfeld's favorite phrases – are quite simply crackpots. They are like proponents of the Flat Earth theory, or advocates of phrenology: in the face of all evidence to the contrary – mountains of it – they hold that the "real truth" (about the earth's flatness, the "scientific" validity of phrenology, all the "progress" we're making in Iraq) is being "suppressed." This dogged denial is the virtual definition of crackpottery, and it brings to mind a recent post by Matt Yglesias at The Atlantic wherein he complains that the crackpots (neocon variety) are being mainstreamed by ostensibly "liberal" Washington think-tanks:
"The crux of the matter is that we have here in Washington, D.C., a certain number of institutions working in the national security sphere that are essentially crackpot operations – AEI, The Weekly Standard, the Project for a New American Century, and the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies come to mind. Now one can argue 'till the cows come home whether or not it should have been clear in August 2002 that these were crackpot operations, but over the past five years they've demonstrated themselves to indubitably be crackpot institutions."
Yglesias' beef is with Brookings, whose resident scholar, Michael O'Hanlon – currently playing the "left" wing of the administration's push to legitimize and make permanent the "surge" – is getting up there on the stage with the AEI-PNAC-Weekly Standard peddlers of discredited nostrums. To those of us immersed in the arcana of neoconology, however, the establishment of a neocon-occupied beachhead on the liberal "left" comes as no surprise, since, after all, the left is where neoconservatism first cohered into a distinct political tendency.
What's truly scary, however, is that this cult of snake-oil salesmen, of which Hanson is a prime example, have easy access to the White House, where they are the confidantes of a president who believes he has been chosen by God to carry out a vast and sacred mission of global regime change. Yes, it's distressing that the neocons seem to have infiltrated the core institutions of liberal Washington, but the real danger is that these discredited crackpots are still in command of the White House.
Cheney is wounded but hardly paralyzed, and the cranks who surround him, and who predicted a "cakewalk" in Iraq, are now bawling that we can't back down from confronting Tehran in view of Iran's "provocations" in Iraq and Afghanistan. That none of the allegations against Iran are proven, or even all that credible to begin with, is neither here nor there: our crackpot theorists will take any factoid and readily fit it into the jigsaw puzzle of unsourced accusations, vague "intelligence," and other manufactured "evidence" of Iranian perfidy.
The other day I wrote about a piece that appeared on the Web site of the pro-war Family Security Matters, a front group for the neoconservative Center for Security Policy, in which the author called for Bush to make like Caesar, brush aside the Constitution, and proclaim himself president-for-life, while nuking Iraq (and presumably Iran). This crazed polemic caused a stir of outraged disbelief throughout the blogosphere, and many were and are convinced it was a hoax, a satire, the result of an LSD flashback, or perhaps all of the above. Whatever the truth may be, what one realizes upon reading of the president's future war plans is that he has already made like caesar, thrown Congress aside, and crossed the Rubicon that flows between republic and empire. It is hardly necessary for Bush to formally dissolve Congress, since that body long ago abdicated its constitutional authority and responsibilities. When it comes to the conduct of American foreign policy, George W. Bush already has absolute power, and it is becoming all too apparent that he intends to wield it against Iran.
The Democrats' failure to defund the Iraq occupation has led, inexorably, to the likelihood of a border "incident" with Iran that will – tragically, and almost inevitably – result in a conflict that will draw in every country in the Middle East, roiling the Muslim world. The compromises, the craven capitulations, the excuse-making for Democrats whose hearts were and are supposedly in the right place but who succumbed, in the end, to the lure of pork over principle, have brought us to this – to the prospect of yet another war, albeit a much bigger and potentially more destructive one.
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MoEnzyme
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Re:War With Iran - It's already started
« Reply #1 on: 2007-08-29 18:07:56 » |
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Quote: [Blunderov] I notice that the USA refuses to apologise to Iran for the recent arrest of 2 Iranian diplomats (oh, and their briefcases: a desperate bid for any conceivable causus bellum perhaps?)and 5 others saying merely that the incident was regrettable. The spokesman omitted to mention who it was that might actually be doing any of this regretting, but apparently that party would not include the United States in any way shape or form if the diffidence of the spokesman was any witness. Basically "regrettable" is diplomatese for "fuck you anyway". The Iranians speak diplomatese fluently and they will understand this just fine.
Sometimes in my night thoughts I find myself hoping that The Boy General does in fact attack Iran. It will almost certainly spell the end of Israel and also relegate the USA to a secondary role in world affairs for generations to come. I can live with that. I bet most of the rest of the world could too. |
In my night thoughts, I'm always hoping that current US leadership will gain a clue and not screw things up too badly for the next administration, and future generations of US soldiers and citizens who must live with this. I suppose that just reflects my persistent if critical patriotism, which I wouldn't expect out of a non-US citizen. I've proposed a solution for the Iran/Iraq problem we've gotten ourselves into. I refer to it as the Kurdish solution.
Some have come somewhat close to this, namely Joseph Biden, one of the Democratic senators in the 2008 presidential field. http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/92972/senator_bidens_plan_for_iraq_can_it.html
He calls for three autonomous regions: Sunni; Shiite; and Kurdish
My solution is somwhat simpler, in that it only necessarily calls for concentrating on maintaining only one autonomous region . . . the Kurdish region. A region that is already effectively autonomous, and hence only requires us to protect what is already there instead of trying to build something from scrap. Essentially I advocate not a precipitous withdrawal from Iraq, but only a retreat to the Kurdish region. If needs be we can even consider protecting them with nukes should Iran gain nuclear weapons, sort of like the Cuban missle crisis in reverse.
I've worked out some of the more extreme possibilities in my previous post (link below), but regardless of other surrounding countries and interested parties the US responsibility remains the same, identifiable, and if somewhat variable still within our power to manage as opposed to the mess we currently find ourselves in. The rest of the Iraqis and other concerned parties can take responsibility for working out autonomous regions for the Sunnis and the Shiites, and if it falls into place like Biden hopes for, that's great. He's given some good arguments as to why it is likely in everyone's interest. That's great for optimism sake, and I see how that's important for a politician selling their vision. On a more practical basis I favor us concentrating on those things we have reasonable control over, and to my thinking that is maintaining the autonomous Kurdish region as it was previous to 2003. If the rest of their neighbors can't figure out their differences otherwise, that even goes so far as helping them to proto-nationhood.
Some of my previous thoughts on this in CoV
http://www.churchofvirus.org/bbs/index.php?board=69;action=display;threadid=40747
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I will fight your gods for food,
Mo Enzyme
(consolidation of handles: Jake Sapiens; memelab; logicnazi; Loki; Every1Hz; and Shadow)
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Blunderov
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Re:War With Iran - It's already started
« Reply #2 on: 2007-08-30 02:09:01 » |
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Quote from: Mo on 2007-08-29 18:07:56
...I've proposed a solution for the Iran/Iraq problem we've gotten ourselves into. I refer to it as the Kurdish solution...
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[Blunderov] Hmm. Turkey is a huge complication. If they can be brought on board perhaps the Kurdish solution may fly. The Turks too have their ambitions and these include Northern Iraq and its oil, and admission to the EU. The admission-to-the-EU-carrot was dangled in front of their noses again just yesterday. Perhaps some sort of deal can be brokered. Turkey does have a price but they might consider a Kurdish state too much to pay.
There is the added complication of Turkey's own current internal politics which is by no means unified.
<snip>
"Victory of new Turkish president breaks grip of secularists
By Sebnem Arsu and Sabrina Tavernise Published: August 28, 2007
ANKARA: A former Islamist was voted in as the new president of Turkey on Tuesday, breaking an 84-year grip on power by the secular establishment, and ushering a new Islamic middle class from Turkey's heartland into the center of the staunchly secular state.
Lawmakers approved Abdullah Gul, a 56-year-old economist, with 339 votes, far above the simple majority required in the 550-member Parliament. Two other candidates garnered another 83 votes. The party of the secular establishment boycotted the voting."
..."We are in uncharted waters," said Ozel, the professor of international relations. "We don't know how they will run the country. This is not a party that has articulated its world view very clearly..."</snip>
Here is Stratfor.com on the subject. (Stratfor are a serious minded lot and have not seen fit to comment on the amusing spectacle of Bush wagging his finger in the face of Maliki, the "democratically" elected prime minister of Iraq, and dictating to "his good friend" who he should talk to and who he should not. Oh, how we laughed. Suck it up, Dubya.)
Stratfor.com
Move and Countermove: Ahmadinejad and Bush Duel
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Aug. 28 that U.S. power in Iraq is rapidly being destroyed. Then he said that Iran, with the help of regional friends and the Iraqi nation, is ready to fill the vacuum. Ahmadinejad specifically reached out to Saudi Arabia, saying the Saudis and Iranians could collaborate in managing Iraq. Later in the day, U.S. President George W. Bush responded, saying, "I want our fellow citizens to consider what would happen if these forces of radicalism and extremism are allowed to drive us out of the Middle East. The region would be dramatically transformed in a way that could imperil the civilized world." He specifically mentioned Iran and its threat of nuclear weapons.
On Aug. 27, we argued that, given the United States' limited ability to secure Iraq, the strategic goal must now shift from controlling Iraq to defending the Arabian Peninsula against any potential Iranian ambitions in that direction. "Whatever mistakes might have been made in the past, the current reality is that any withdrawal from Iraq would create a vacuum, which would rapidly be filled by Iran," we wrote.
Ahmadinejad's statements, made at a two-hour press conference, had nothing to do with what we wrote, nor did Bush's response. What these statements do show, though, is how rapidly the thinking in Tehran is evolving in response to Iranian perceptions of a pending U.S. withdrawal and a power vacuum in Iraq -- and how the Bush administration is shifting its focus from the Sunni threat to both the Sunni and Shiite threats.
The most important thing Ahmadinejad discussed at his press conference was not the power vacuum, but Saudi Arabia. He reached out to the Saudis, saying Iran and Saudi Arabia together could fill the vacuum in Iraq and stabilize the country. The subtext was that not only does Iran not pose a threat to Saudi Arabia, it would be prepared to enhance Saudi power by giving it a substantial role in a post-U.S. Iraq.
Iran is saying that Saudi Arabia does not need to defend itself against Iran, and it certainly does not need the United States to redeploy its forces along the Saudi-Iraqi border in order to defend itself. While dangling the carrot of participation in a post-war Iraq, Iran also is wielding a subtle stick. One of the reasons for al Qaeda's formation was the U.S. presence in Saudi Arabia during the first Gulf War. Radical Islamists in Saudi Arabia regarded the U.S. presence as sacrilege and the willingness of the Saudi regime to permit American troops to be there as blasphemous. After 9/11, the Saudis asked the United States to withdraw its forces, and following the Iraq invasion they fought a fairly intense battle against al Qaeda inside the kingdom. Having U.S. troops defend Saudi Arabia once again -- even if they were stationed outside its borders -- would inflame passions inside the kingdom, and potentially destabilize the regime.
The Saudis are in a difficult position. Since the Iranian Revolution, the Saudi relationship with Iran has ranged from extremely hostile to uneasy. It is not simply a Sunni and Shiite matter. Iran is more than just a theocracy. It arose from a very broad popular uprising against the shah. It linked the idea of a republic to Islam, combining a Western revolutionary tradition with Shiite political philosophy. Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, is a monarchy that draws its authority from traditional clan and tribal structures and Wahhabi Islam in the Arabian Peninsula. The Saudis felt trapped between the pro-Soviet radicalism of the Iraqis and Syrians, and of the various factions of the Palestinian movement on the one side -- and the Islamic Republic in Iran on the other. Isolated, it had only the United States to depend on, and that dependency blew up in its face during the 1990-91 war in Kuwait.
But there also is a fundamental geopolitical problem. Saudi Arabia suffers from a usually fatal disease. It is extraordinarily rich and militarily weak. It has managed to survive and prosper by having foreign states such as the United Kingdom and the United States have a stake in its independence -- and guarantee that independence with their power. If it isn't going to rely on an outside power to protect it, and it has limited military resources of its own, then how will it protect itself against the Iranians? Iran, a country with a large military -- whose senior officers and noncoms were blooded in the Iran-Iraq war -- does not have a great military, merely a much larger and experienced one than the Saudis.
The Saudis have Iran's offer. The problem is that the offer cannot be guaranteed by Saudi power, but depends on Iran's willingness to honor it. Absent the United States, any collaboration with Iran would depend on Iran's will. And the Iranians are profoundly different from the Saudis and, more important, much poorer. Whatever their intentions might be today -- and who can tell what the Iranians intend? -- those intentions might change. If they did, it would leave Saudi Arabia at risk to Iranian power.
Saudi Arabia is caught between a rock and a hard place and it knows it. But there might be the beginnings of a solution in Turkey. Ahmadinejad's offer of collaboration was directed toward regional powers other than Iran. That includes Turkey. Turkey stayed clear of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, refusing to let U.S. troops invade Iraq from there. However, Turkey has some important interests in how the war in Iraq ends. First, it does not want to see any sort of Kurdish state, fearing Kurdish secessionism in Turkey as well. Second, it has an interest in oil in northern Iraq. Both interests could be served by a Turkish occupation of northern Iraq, under the guise of stabilizing Iraq along with Iran and Saudi Arabia.
When we say that Iran is now the dominant regional power, we also should say that is true unless we add Turkey to the mix. Turkey is certainly a military match for Iran, and more than an economic one. Turkey's economy is the 18th largest in the world -- larger than Saudi Arabia's -- and it is growing rapidly. In many ways, Iran needs a good relationship with Turkey, given its power and economy. If Turkey were to take an interest in Iraq, that could curb Iran's appetite. While Turkey could not defend Saudi Arabia, it certainly could threaten Iran's rear if it chose to move south. And with the threat of Turkish intervention, Iran would have to be very careful indeed.
But Turkey has been cautious in its regional involvements. It is not clear whether it will involve itself in Iraq beyond making certain that Kurdish independence does not go too far. Even if it were to move deeper into Iraq, it is not clear whether it would be prepared to fight Iran over Saudi Arabia. On the other hand, Turkey does not want to deal with a powerful Iran -- and if the Iranians did take the Saudi oil fields, they would be more than a match for Turkey. Turkey's regime is very different from those in Saudi Arabia and Iran, but geopolitics make strange bedfellows. Iran could not resist a Turkish intervention in northern Iraq, nor could it be sure what Turkey would do if Iran turned south. That uncertainty might restrain Iran.
And that is the thin reed on which Saudi national security would rest if it rejected an American presence to its north. The United States could impose itself anyway, but being sandwiched between a hostile Iran and hostile Saudi Arabia would not be prudent, to say the least. Therefore, the Saudis could scuttle a U.S. blocking force if they wished. If the Saudis did this and joined the Iranian-led stabilization program in Iraq, they would then be forced to rely on a Turkish presence in northern Iraq to constrain any future Iranian designs on Arabia. That is not necessarily a safe bet as it assumes that the Turks would be interested in balancing Iran at a time when Russian power is returning to the Caucasus, Greek power is growing in the Balkans, and the Turkish economy is requiring ever more attention from Ankara. Put simply, Turkey has a lot of brands in the fire, and the Saudis betting on the Iranian brand having priority is a long shot.
The Iranian position is becoming more complex as Tehran tries to forge a post-war coalition to manage Iraq -- and to assure the coalition that Iran doesn't plan to swallow some of its members. The United States, in the meantime, appears to be trying to simplify its position, by once again focusing on the question of nuclear weapons.
Bush's speech followed this logic. First, according to Bush, the Iranians are now to be seen as a threat equal to the jihadists. In other words, the Iranian clerical regime and al Qaeda are equal threats. That is the reason the administration is signaling that the Iranian Republican Guards are to be named a terrorist group. A withdrawal from Iraq, therefore, would be turning Iraq over to Iran, and that, in turn, would transform the region. But rather than discussing the geopolitical questions we have been grappling with, Bush has focused on Iran's nuclear capability.
Iran is developing nuclear weapons, though we have consistently argued that Tehran does not expect to actually achieve a deliverable nuclear device. In the first place, that is because the process of building a device small enough and rugged enough to be useful is quite complex. There is quite a leap between testing a device and having a workable weapon. Also, and far more important, Iran fully expects the United States or Israel to destroy its nuclear facilities before a weapon is complete. The Iranians are using their nuclear program as a bargaining chip.
The problem is that the negotiations have ended. The prospect of Iran trading its nuclear program for U.S. concessions in Iraq has disappeared along with the negotiations. Bush, therefore, has emphasized that there is no reason for the United States to be restrained about the Iranian nuclear program. Iran might not be close to having a deliverable device, but the risk is too great to let it continue developing one. Therefore, the heart of Bush's speech was that withdrawing would vastly increase Iran's power, and an Iranian nuclear weapon would be catastrophic.
From this, one would think the United States is considering attacking Iran. Indeed, the French warning against such an attack indicates that Paris might have picked something up as well. Certainly, Washington is signaling that, given the situation in Iraq and Iran's assertion that it will be filling the vacuum, the United States is being forced to face the possibility of an attack against Iran's nuclear facilities.
There are two problems here. The first is the technical question of whether a conventional strike could take out all of Iran's nuclear facilities. We don't know the answer, but we do know that Iran has been aware of the probability of such an attack and is likely to have taken precautions, from creating uncertainty as to the location of sites to hardening them. The second problem is the more serious one.
Assume that the United States attacked and destroyed Iran's nuclear facilities. The essential geopolitical problem would not change. The U.S. position in Iraq would remain extremely difficult, the three options we discussed Aug. 27 would remain in place, and in due course Iran would fill the vacuum left by the United States. The destruction of Iran's nuclear facilities would not address any of those problems.
Therefore, implicit in Bush's speech is the possibility of broader measures against Iran. These could include a broad air campaign against Iranian infrastructure -- military and economic -- and a blockade of its ports. The measures could not include ground troops because there are no substantial forces available and redeploying all the troops in Iraq to surge into Iran, logistical issues aside, would put 150,000 troops in a very large country.
The United States can certainly conduct an air campaign against Iran, but we are reminded of the oldest lesson of air power -- one learned by the Israeli air force against Hezbollah in the summer of 2006: Air power is enormously successful in concert with a combined arms operation, but has severe limitations when applied on its own. The idea that nations will capitulate because of the pain of an air campaign has little historical basis. It doesn't usually happen. Unlike Hezbollah, however, Iran is a real state with real infrastructure, economic interests, military assets and critical port facilities -- all with known locations that can be pummeled with air power. The United States might not be able to impose its will on the ground, but it can certainly impose a great deal of pain. Of course, an all-out air war would cripple Iran in a way that would send global oil prices through the roof -- since Iran remains the world's fourth-largest oil exporter.
A blockade, however, also would be problematic. It is easy to prevent Iranian ships from moving in and out of port -- and, unlike Iraq, Iran has no simple options to divert its maritime energy trade to land routes -- but what would the United States do if a Russian, Chinese or French vessel sailed in? Would it seize it? Sink it? Obviously either is possible. But just how broad an array of enemies does the United States want to deal with at one time? And remember that, with ports sealed, Iran's land neighbors would have to participate in blocking the movement of goods. We doubt they would be that cooperative.
Finally, and most important, Iran has the ability to counter any U.S. moves. It has assets in Iraq that could surge U.S. casualties dramatically if ordered to do so. Iran also has terrorism capabilities that are not trivial. We would say that Iran's capabilities are substantially greater than al Qaeda's. Under a sustained air campaign, they would use them.
Bush's threat to strike nuclear weapons makes sense only in the context of a broader air and naval campaign against Iran. Leaving aside the domestic political ramifications and the international diplomatic blowback, the fundamental problem is that Iran is a very large country where a lot of targets would have to be hit. That would take many months to achieve, and during that time Iran would likely strike back in Iraq and perhaps in the United States as well. An air campaign would not bring Iran to its knees quickly, unless it was nuclear -- and we simply do not think the United States will break the nuclear taboo first.
The United States is also in a tough place. While it makes sense to make threats in response to Iranian threats -- to keep Tehran off balance -- the real task for the United States is to convince Saudi Arabia to stick to its belief that collaboration with Iran is too dangerous, and convince Turkey to follow its instincts in northern Iraq without collaborating with the Iranians. The Turks are not fools and will not simply play the American game, but the more active Turkey is, the more cautious Iran must be.
The latest statement from Ahmadinejad convinces us that Iran sees its opening. However, the United States, even if it is not bluffing about an attack against Iran, would find such an attack less effective than it might hope. In the end, even after an extended air campaign, it will come down to that. In the end, no matter how many moves are made, the United States is going to have to define a post-Iraq strategy and that strategy must focus on preventing Iran from threatening the Arabian Peninsula. Even after an extended air campaign, it will come down to that. In case of war, the only "safe" location for a U.S. land force to hedge against an Iranian move against the Arabian Peninsula would be Kuwait, a country lacking the strategic depth to serve as an effective counter.
Ahmadinejad has made his rhetorical move. Bush has responded. Now the regional diplomacy intensifies as the report from the top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, is prepared for presentation to Congress on Sept. 15.
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Blunderov
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Re:War With Iran - It's already started
« Reply #3 on: 2007-09-01 04:38:10 » |
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[Blunderov] It is now clear that the Bushevisti do not want Iran to have any access to technology that even just might lead to technology that just might lead to a nuclear weapon. But genies do not take kindly to being stuffed back into lamps especially when that stuffing is accompanied with blatantly unreasonable and racist rhetoric.
Another call to direct action against the Bushevisti this time from Ray Mc Govern.
http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/contributors/1276
Ray McGovern: Do We Have The Courage To Stop War With Iran?
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Fri, 08/31/2007 - 12:43pm. Guest Contribution
A BUZZFLASH GUEST CONTRIBUTION
by Ray McGovern
Why do I feel like the proverbial skunk at a Labor Day picnic? Sorry; but I thought you might want to know that this time next year, there will probably be more skunks than we can handle. I fear our country is likely to be at war with Iran -- and with the thousands of real terrorists Iran can field around the globe.
It is going to happen, folks, unless we put our lawn chairs away on Tuesday, take part in some serious grass-roots organizing, and take action to prevent a wider war -- while we still can.
President George W. Bush's speech Tuesday lays out the Bush/Cheney plan to attack Iran and how the intelligence is being "fixed around the policy," as was the case before the attack on Iraq.
It's not about putative Iranian "weapons of mass destruction" -- not even ostensibly. It is about the requirement for a scapegoat for U.S. reverses in Iraq, and the White House's felt need to create a casus belli by provoking Iran in such a way as to "justify" armed retaliation -- eventually including air strikes on its nuclear-related facilities.
Bush's Aug. 28 speech to the American Legion comes five years after a very similar presentation by Vice President Dick Cheney. Addressing the Veterans of Foreign Wars on Aug. 26, 2002, Cheney set the meretricious terms of reference for war on Iraq.
Sitting on the same stage that evening was former CENTCOM commander Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni, who was being honored at the VFW convention. Zinni later said he was shocked to hear a depiction of intelligence (Iraq has WMD and is amassing them to use against us) that did not square with what he knew. Although Zinni had retired two years before, his role as consultant had enabled him to stay up to date on key intelligence findings.
"There was no solid proof that Saddam had WMD... I heard a case being made to go to war," Zinni told Meet the Press three and a half years later.
(Zinni is a straight shooter with considerable courage, and so the question lingers: why did he not go public? It is all too familiar a conundrum at senior levels; top officials can seldom find their voices. My hunch is that Zinni regrets letting himself be guided by a misplaced professional courtesy and/or slavish adherence to classification restrictions, when he might have prevented our country from starting the kind of war of aggression branded at Nuremberg the "supreme international crime.")
Cheney: Dean of Preemption
Zinni was not the only one taken aback by Cheney's words. Then-CIA director George Tenet says Cheney's speech took him completely by surprise. In his memoir, Tenet wrote, "I had the impression that the president wasn't any more aware than we were of what his number-two was going to say to the VFW until he said it."
Yet, it could have been anticipated. Just five weeks before, Tenet himself had told his British counterpart that the president had decided to make war on Iraq for regime change and that "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."
When Bush's senior advisers came back to town after Labor Day, 2002, the next five weeks (and by now, the next five years) were devoted to selling a new product -- war on Iraq. The actual decision to attack Iraq, we now know, was made several months earlier but, as then-White House chief of staff Andy Card explained, no sensible salesperson would launch a major new product during the month of August -- Cheney's preemptive strike notwithstanding. Yes, that's what Card called the coming war; a "new product."
After assuring themselves that Tenet was a reliable salesman, Cheney and then-defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld dispatched him and the pliant Powell at State to play supporting roles in the advertising campaign: bogus yellowcake uranium from Niger, aluminum tubes for uranium enrichment, and mobile trailers for manufacturing biological warfare agent -- the whole nine yards. The objective was to scare or intimidate Congress into voting for war, and, thanks largely to a robust cheering section in the corporate-controlled media, Congress did so on October 10 and 11, 2002.
This past week saw the president himself, with that same kind of support, pushing a new product -- war with Iran. And in the process, he made clear how intelligence is being fixed to "justify" war this time around. The case is too clever by half, but it will be hard for Americans to understand that. Indeed, the Bush/Cheney team expects that the product will sell easily -- the more so, since the administration has been able once again to enlist the usual cheerleaders in the media to "catapult the propaganda," as Bush once put it.
Iran's Nuclear Plans
It has been like waiting for Godot... the endless wait for the latest National Intelligence Estimate on Iran's nuclear plans. That NIE turns out to be the quintessential dog that didn't bark. The most recent published NIE on the subject was issued two and a half years ago and concluded that Iran could not have a nuclear weapon until "early- to mid-next decade." That estimate followed a string of NIEs dating back to 1995, which kept predicting, with embarrassing consistency, that Iran was "within five years" of having a nuclear weapon.
The most recent NIE, published in early 2005, extended the timeline and provided still more margin for error. Basically, the timeline was moved 10 years out to 2015 but, in a fit of caution, the drafters settled on the words "early-to-mid next decade." On Feb. 27, 2007 at his confirmation hearings to be Director of National Intelligence, Michael McConnell repeated that formula verbatim.
A "final" draft of the follow-up NIE mentioned above had been completed in Feb. 2007, and McConnell no doubt was briefed on its findings prior to his testimony. The fact that this draft has been sent back for revision every other month since February speaks volumes. Judging from McConnell's testimony, the conclusions of the NIE draft of February are probably not alarmist enough for Vice President Dick Cheney. (Shades of Iraq.)
According to one recent report, the target date for publication has now slipped to late fall. How these endless delays can be tolerated is testimony to the fecklessness of the "watchdog" intelligence committees in House and Senate.
As for Iran’s motivation if it plans to go down the path of producing nuclear weapons, newly appointed defense secretary Robert Gates was asked about that at his confirmation hearing in December. Just called from the wings to replace Donald Rumsfeld, Gates apparently had not yet read the relevant memo from Cheney’s office. It is a safe bet that the avuncular Cheney took Gates to the woodshed, after the nominee suggested that Iran’s motivation could be, "in the first instance, deterrence":
"While they [the Iranians] are certainly pressing, in my opinion, for a nuclear capability, I think they would see it in the first instance as a deterrent. They are surrounded by powers with nuclear weapons -- Pakistan to the east, the Russians to the north, the Israelis to the west, and us in the Persian Gulf."
Unwelcome News (to the White House)
There they go again -- those bureaucrats at the International Atomic Energy Agency. On August 28, the very day Bush was playing up the dangers from Iran, the IAEA released a note of understanding between the IAEA and Iran on the key issue of inspection. The IAEA announced:
"The agency has been able to verify the non-diversion of the declared nuclear materials at the enrichment facilities in Iran and has therefore concluded that it remains in peaceful use."
The IAEA deputy director said the plan just agreed to by the IAEA and Iran will enable the two to reach closure by December on the nuclear issues that the IAEA began investigating in 2003. Other IAEA officials now express confidence that they will be able to detect any military diversion or any uranium enrichment above a low grade, as long as the Iran-IAEA safeguard agreement remains intact.
Shades of the preliminary findings of the U.N. inspections -- unprecedented in their intrusiveness -- that were conducted in Iraq in early 2003 before the U.S. abruptly warned the U.N. in mid-March to pull out its inspectors, lest they find themselves among those to be shocked-and-awed.
Vice President Cheney can claim, as he did three days before the attack on Iraq, that the IAEA is simply "wrong." But Cheney's credibility has sunk to prehistoric levels; witness the fact that the president was told that this time he would have to take the lead in playing up various threats from Iran. And they gave him new words.
The President's New Formulation
As I watched the president speak on Aug. 28, I was struck by the care he took in reading the exact words of a new, subjunctive-mood formulation regarding Iran’s nuclear intentions. He never looked up; this is what he said:
"Iran's active pursuit of technology that could lead to nuclear weapons threatens to put a region already known for instability and violence under the shadow of a nuclear holocaust."
The cautious wording suggests to me that the White House finally has concluded that the "nuclear threat"from Iran is "a dog that won't hunt," as Lyndon Johnson would have put it. While, initial press reporting focused on the "nuclear holocaust" rhetorical flourish, the earlier part of the sentence is more significant, in my view. It is quite different from earlier Bush rhetoric charging categorically that Iran is "pursuing nuclear weapons," including the following (erroneous) comment at a joint press conference with Afghan President Hamid Karzai in early August:
"This [Iran] is a government that has proclaimed its desire to build a nuclear weapon."
The latest news from the IAEA is, for the White House, an unwelcome extra hurdle. And the president's advisers presumably were aware of it well before Bush's speech was finalized; it will be hard to spin. Administration officials would also worry about the possibility that some patriotic truth teller might make the press aware of the key judgments of the languishing draft of the latest NIE on Iran's nuclear capability -- or that a courageous officer or official of Gen. Anthony Zinni's stature might feel conscience bound to try to head off another unnecessary war, by providing a more accurate, less alarmist assessment of the nuclear threat from Iran.
It is just too much of a stretch to suggest that Iran could be a nuclear threat to the United States within the next 17 months, and that's all the time Bush and Cheney have got to honor their open pledge to our "ally" Israel to eliminate Iran's nuclear potential. Besides, some American Jewish groups have become increasingly concerned over the likelihood of serious backlash if young Americans are seen to be fighting and dying to eliminate perceived threats to Israel (but not to the U.S.). Some of these groups have been quietly urging the White House to back off the nuclear-threat rationale for war on Iran.
The (Very) Bad News
Bush and Cheney have clearly decided to use alleged Iranian interference in Iraq as the preferred casus belli. And the charges, whether they have merit or not, have become much more bellicose. Thus, Bush on Aug. 28:
"Iran's leaders... cannot escape responsibility for aiding attacks against coalition forces... The Iranian regime must halt these actions. And until it does, I will take actions necessary to protect our troops. I have authorized our military commanders in Iraq to confront Tehran’s murderous activities."
How convenient: two birds with one stone. Someone to blame for U.S. reverses in Iraq, and "justification" to confront the ostensible source of the problem -- "deadeners" having been changed to Iran. Vice President Cheney has reportedly been pushing for military retaliation against Iran if the U.S. finds hard evidence of Iranian complicity in supporting the "insurgents" in Iraq.
President Bush obliged on Aug. 28:
"Recently, coalition forces seized 240-millimeter rockets that had been manufactured in Iran this year and that had been provided to Iraqi extremist groups by Iranian agents. The attacks on our bases and our troops by Iranian-supplied munitions have increased in the last few months..."
QED
Recent U.S. actions, such as arresting Iranian officials in Iraq -- eight were abruptly kidnapped and held briefly in Baghdad on Aug. 28, the day Bush addressed the American Legion -- suggest an intention to provoke Iran into some kind of action that would justify U.S. "retaliation." The evolving rhetoric suggests that the most likely immediate targets at this point would be training facilities inside Iran -- some 20 targets that are within range of U.S. cruise missiles already in place.
Iranian retaliation would be inevitable, and escalation very likely. It strikes me as shamelessly ironic that the likes of our current ambassador at the U.N., Zalmay Khalilizad, one of the architects of U.S. policy toward the area, are now warning publicly that the current upheaval in the Middle East could bring another world war.
The Public Buildup
Col. Pat Lang (USA, ret.), as usual, puts it succinctly:
"Careful attention to the content of the chatter on the 24/7 news channels reveals a willingness to accept the idea that it is not possible to resolve differences with Iran through diplomacy. Network anchors are increasingly accepting or voicing such views. Are we supposed to believe that this is serendipitous?"
And not only that. It is as if Scooter Libby were back writing lead editorials for the Washington Post, the Pravda of this administration. The Post's lead editorial on Aug. 21 regurgitated the allegations that Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps is "supplying the weapons that are killing a growing number of American soldiers in Iraq;" that it is "waging war against the United States and trying to kill as many American soldiers as possible." Designating Iran a "specially designated global terrorist" organization, said the Post, "seems to be the least the United States should be doing, giving the soaring number of Iranian-sponsored bomb attacks in Iraq."
As for the news side of the Post, which is widely perceived as a bit freer from White House influence, its writers are hardly immune. For example, they know how many times the draft National Intelligence Estimate on Iran's nuclear program has been sent back for redrafting... and they know why. Have they been told not to write the story?
For good measure, the indomitable arch-neocon James Woolsey has again entered the fray. He was trotted out on August 14 to tell Lou Dobbs that the U.S. may have no choice but to bomb Iran in order to halt its nuclear weapons program. Woolsey, who has described himself as the "anchor of the Presbyterian wing of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs," knows what will scare. To Dobbs: "I'm afraid within, well, at worst, a few months; at best, a few years; they [Iran] could have the bomb."
As for what Bush is telling his counterparts among our allies, reporting on his recent meeting with French President Nicolas Sarkozy are disquieting, to say the least. Reports circulating in European foreign ministries indicate that Sarkozy came away convinced that Bush "is serious about bombing Iran's secret nuclear facilities," according to well-connected journalist Arnauld De Borchgrave.
It Is Up To US
Air strikes on Iran seem inevitable, unless grassroots America can arrange a backbone transplant for Congress. The House needs to begin impeachment proceedings without delay. Why? Well, there's the Constitution of the United States, for one thing. For another, the initiation of impeachment proceedings might well give our senior military leaders pause. Do they really want to precipitate a wider war and risk destroying much of what is left of our armed forces for the likes of Bush and Cheney? Is another star on the shoulder worth THAT?
The deterioration of the U.S. position in Iraq; the perceived need for a scapegoat; the knee-jerk deference given to Israel's myopic and ultimately self-defeating security policy; and the fact that time is running out for the Bush/Cheney administration to end Iran's nuclear program -- together make for a very volatile mix.
So, on Tuesday, let's put away the lawn chairs and roll up our sleeves. Let's remember all that has already happened since Labor Day five years ago.
There is very little time to exercise our rights as citizens and stop this madness. At a similarly critical juncture, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was typically direct. I find his words a challenge to us today:
"There is such a thing as being too late.... Life often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with lost opportunity.... Over the bleached bones of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words: 'Too late.'"
Ray McGovern, a member of the American Legion, was an Army infantry/intelligence officer in the sixties. He then served for 27 years as an analyst with CIA and is now on the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity. He currently works with Tell the Word, the publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in Washington, DC. A shorter version of this article appeared originally on Consortiumnews.com.
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Blunderov
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Re:War With Iran - It's already started
« Reply #4 on: 2007-09-04 03:15:01 » |
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[Blunderov] Does anyone know of any technical reason why Dick Cheney could not be the next president ? Or vice president - again ? Just wondering.
Thesis: Round hole.
Antithesis: Square peg.
Synthesis: Square peg is a "specially designated" round peg.
(Signing statement: this "specially designated round peg" bears no resemblance to the round peg which we have right here in the house but which is intended exclusively for use in square holes. You have our word on that.)
(The bullshit is mounting up fast. Explosively formed projectiles are very easy to make. Detailed information is readily available on the internet and it is a common military technology. RPG7's use this technology. At least they're not loaded with depleted uranium. Aluminium tubes anyone?)
http://www.antiwar.com/bock/?articleid=11549
September 4, 2007
War With Iran Looks
More Likely
by Alan Bock
For months – perhaps even a couple of years – I have been downplaying the likelihood that Bush would be so foolish as to start a war with Iran, especially in light of how much more difficult such a war would be than the war on Iraq and how thinly the military is stretched. It's not that I don't think the neocons want such a war or that Bush isn't just irresponsible enough to do it. I have figured that the military would point out the logistical problems and simply let him know in no uncertain terms that it can't be done. And I still think that's a possibility, perhaps even likelihood.
Over the last few weeks, however, I have to admit I've become a bit less certain. The leaking of a tentative decision to declare Iran's Revolutionary Guard, the country's 125,000-strong elite military branch, as a "specially designated global terrorist" group is an important indicator. It turns out that like China's army, the IRGC has business interests, some of them overseas, and so such a designation could have an impact on them. The step, if taken, would be the first time an official arm of a standing government has been labeled a terrorist group by the U.S., so it is purposely provocative.
Robert Baer, the former CIA operative, writes, "Officials I talk to in Washington vote for a hit on the IRGC, maybe within the next six months. And they think that as long as we have bombers and missiles in the air, we will hit Iran's nuclear facilities. An awe and shock campaign lite, if you will. But frankly, they're guessing; after Iraq, the White House trusts no one, especially the bureaucracy." Baer notes that "the military suspects but cannot prove that the IRGC is the main supplier of sophisticated improvised explosive devices killing our forces ion Iraq and Afghanistan." But the case is still circumstantial. However, the case that Iraq had WMD before the U.S. invaded was less than circumstantial.
Baer also thinks that various neocons in and out of the White House believe that the Revolutionary Guard is the only institution keeping the mullahs in power, and that if it is seriously weakened the regime will fall of its own weight. That is undoubtedly fantasy, but anyone who doubts the capacity of neocons and the president to convince themselves of what they prefer to believe may also be living in a fantasy world. After all, these people still seem to believe that the Iraq war is, if not a roaring success just yet, right on the verge of being one.
Then there's Arnaud de Borchgrave, former editor of the Washington Times, now editor at large for UPI and a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. I know he works part of the time for the Moonies, but I've met him, talked extensively with him on several occasions, and believe he's more independent than you might think. The fact that I like and respect him may skew my judgment, but I do know he has good contacts and sources around the world. So when he reports that French president Nicholas Sarkozy "came away [from the visit at Kennebunkport] convinced his U.S. counterpart is serious about bombing Iran's secret nuclear facilities. That's the reading as it filtered back to Europe's foreign ministries," I take it somewhat seriously.
If you want a really frightening scenario laid out and have the patience to read a fairly long and involved post, check this out at Arthur Silber's Once Upon a Time. He points out that "The Senate approved – by a vote of 97 to nothing – an amendment that accuses Iran of committing acts of war against the United States. Thus, if we were to attack Iran, we would purportedly only be acting defensively, and in response to what Iran has already done." Both the 2001 post-9/11 congressional authorization to go after terrorists and the 2002 authorization to attack Iraq could thus be stretched to cover an attack on Iran. Silber thinks that if Congress is serious about deterring a war on Iran it should rescind both resolutions. But that's unlikely to happen. Every Democrat in the Senate voted for the provocative Lieberman-led resolution, so "when the wider war begins, they will have no serious basis on which to object."
Silber complains:
"Democrats don't object and they completely fail to mount serious opposition to our inevitable course toward widening war and an attack on Iran, not because they are cowards, not because they're afraid of being portrayed as 'weak' in the fight against terrorism, and not because of any of the other excuses that are regularly offered by their defenders. They don't object because – they don't object. That is: they agree – they agree that the United States is the 'indispensable' nation, that we have the 'right' to tell every other country how it is 'permitted' to act, that we must pursuer a policy of aggressive interventionism [see Barack Obama on Pakistan] supported by an empire of military bases. They agree about all of it; moreover, in most critical respects, they devised these policies in the first instance, and they implemented and defended them more vigorously and more consistently than Republicans, with the exception of the criminal now residing in the White House."
Then there's Sarkozy saying he's not quite for a military attack but France won't stand for Iran getting a bomb. De Borchgrave writes that "a ranking Swiss official, speaking privately, said 'Anyone with a modicum of experience in the Middle East knows that any bombing of Iran would touch off at the very least regional instability and what could be an unmitigated disaster for Western interests.'" But given the way they've cherry-picked the evidence on Iraq post-invasion, Bush and the neocons would undoubtedly interpret the worst imaginable disaster as a solid step toward freedom and democracy.
It would be almost clinically insane to start a war with Iran, but I'm more worried than I have been that it could happen.
The circumstances militating against it still obtain. Iran is bigger than Iraq and has a better military. It could blockade the Strait of Hormuz and otherwise disrupt oil shipping through the Persian Gulf. It could easily come to dominate the Shia portion of Iraq, at least. It could finance and help more attacks against Israel by Hamas, Hezbollah, and other forces arrayed against Israel and Lebanon. It has the capacity, more than Iraq ever did, to train, finance, and equip people to carry out terrorist attacks in Europe and the United States. It's doubtful that it has nuclear-weapons capability, but it could launch rockets and missiles that just might reach Israel. Chaos and war could spread across the globe and leave the United States even more isolated than it is now.
But superficial military thinkers have been thinking ever since Gen. Billy Mitchell, despite all the experience militating against the notion, that air power alone can bring a nation to its knees. I have little doubt that people are filling Bush's ears even now with scenarios in which aerial bombing and naval bombardment bring the mullahs' regime down and lead to the triumph of democracy and enlightenment, not to mention more oil. I'm afraid he might believe it.
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Blunderov
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Re:War With Iran - It's already started
« Reply #5 on: 2007-09-05 14:24:20 » |
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[Blunderov] An appraisal of the likely consequences of an attack by the USA on Iran is appended. Contemplating such a venture would be clinically insane. This is what makes me so afraid.
http://www.straight.com/article-106714/bushs-hawks-size-up-iran
Bush's hawks size up Iran
Commentary By Gwynne Dyer
Publish Date: August 23, 2007
It's impossible to say whether or not the United States will attack Iran before President George W. Bush leaves office in 17 months' time, because nobody in the White House knows yet. It is easy to predict what would happen if the U.S. did attack Iran, however, and the signs are that the hawks in the White House are winning that argument.
The most alarming sign is the news that the Bush administration is about to brand Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organization. This is a highly provocative step, for the IRGC is not a bunch of fanatical freelances. It is a 125,000-strong official arm of the Iranian state, parallel to the regular armed forces but more ideologically motivated and presumably more loyal to the ruling clerics.
Declaring the Revolutionary Guards a terrorist organization is not just a way for the U.S. government to vilify Iran as a terrorist state. It is one of the key policy disputes between those in the administration who think an attack on Iran would be unwise (notably Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defence Secretary Robert Gates), and those around the vice-president, who think it is essential.
Almost everybody in the Bush administration believes that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons in order to dominate the region and to attack Israel. (Others are less certain.) The war party, led by Dick Cheney, also believes that the clerical regime in Iran would collapse at the first hard push, since ordinary Iranians thirst for U.S.–style democracy–and that the attack must be made while President Bush is still in office, since no successor will have the guts to do it. Even after all this time, the administration's old machismo survives: "The boys go to Baghdad; the real men go to Tehran."
So what will happen if Cheney & co. get their way? The Iranian regime will not collapse: President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is now unpopular due to his mishandling of the economy, but patriotic Iranians would rally around even him if they were attacked by foreigners. What will collapse, instead, is the world's oil supply and the global economy.
Maj.-Gen. Yahya Rahim Safavi, commander-in-chief of the Revolutionary Guards, explained how that would be accomplished in a speech on August 15, though he made no direct reference to the U.S. threat. "Our coast-to-sea missile systems can now reach the length and breadth of the Gulf and the Sea of Oman," he said, "and no warships can pass in the Gulf without being in range of our coast-to-sea missiles." In other words, Iran can close the whole of the gulf and its approaches to oil tanker traffic, and if the U.S. navy dares to fight in these waters it will lose.
Despite the huge disparity in military power between the United States and Iran, this is probably true. Overcommitted in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States cannot come up with the huge number of extra troops that would be needed to invade and occupya mountainous country of over 65 million people. The U.S. can bomb Iran to its heart's content, hitting all those real and alleged nuclear facilities, but then it runs out of options–whereas Iran's options remain very broad.
It could just stop exporting oil. Pulling only Iran's three-and-a- half million barrels per day off the market, in its present state, would send oil prices shooting up into the stratosphere. Or it could get tough and close down all oil-tanker traffic that comes within range of those missiles–which would mean little or no oil from Iraq, Saudi Arabia, or the smaller Gulf states either. That would mean global oil rationing, industrial shutdowns, and the end of the present economic era.
It's very doubtful that U.S. air strikes could find and destroy all the missile launchers–consider how badly the Israeli air force did in south Lebanon last summer–so Iran wins. After a few months, the other great powers would find some way for the United States to back away from the confrontation and let the oil start flowing again, but the U.S. would suffer a far greater humiliation than it did in Vietnam, while Iran would emerge as the undisputed arbiter of the region.
Many, perhaps most, senior American generals and admirals know this, and are privately opposed to a doomed attack on Iran, but in the end they will do as ordered. Vice-President Cheney and his coterie don't know it, preferring to believe that Iranians would welcome their American attackers with glad cries and open arms. You know, like the Iraqis did. And Cheney seems to be winning the argument in the White House.
[Blunderov] Vector: Bellaciao
The source, www.chycho.com
had this to add:
What an attack on Iran really means: Gwynne Dyer’s Secret
Gwynne Dyer is probably one of the most respected military analysts in the world. His book “War” and the accompanying TV series solidified his place in history as a prolific writer and communicator. He can state the obvious insanity of the proliferation of the war in a manner that can be understood even by the least among us.
One of his recent pieces, Bush's hawks size up Iran, outlines a scenario of possible events that will transpire if the United States attacks Iran. I can only assume that since Mr. Dyer’s commentaries are syndicated to so many newspapers around the world, he is restricted by space, and limited to a certain number of words. This allows him to describe only the minimum consequences of certain conflicts. In this article especially, he happens to describe the best case scenario that one could envision: A catastrophic global economic collapse that will force the United States to halt its bombardment of Iran. The end result of which would be that the “US would suffer a far greater humiliation than it did in Vietnam, while Iran would emerge as the undisputed arbiter of the region”.
To meet his editorial guidelines and save space, what Mr. Dyer must have left on the cutting room floor are the following:
The boundaries that we see on world maps marking the territories of countries are just what we see: lines on a piece of paper. Iranians are not confined to lines drawn by European powers decades ago. Iranians live not only in Iran but also, en masse, in all the countries in the region. Certain parts of Iran’s neighbors even speak dialects of Farsi. So if the United States bombs Iran, since there is no way they have any intentions of invading, they would be declaring war on parts of every country surrounding Iran. This would mean that the United States would be at war with every country in the region since civil war would breakout in all the US installed puppet regimes. This could explain why the United States has created a a new map of the Middle East.
Not only are Iranians spread out in the region, they are also living, en masse, in the rest of the world. The Iranian Diaspora Population map shows that approximately 2.5 million live in the US alone, 700,000 in the Canada, 300,000 in the UK, and 2 million in India. If a war breakouts between the US and Iran then what transpired with the internment of Japanese Americans and Canadians during World War II will become a distant memory and a travesty that will be repeated. Unfortunately it appears that the United States is prepared for this scenario, since it has already built 800 FEMA prison camps which are fully operational and ready to receive prisoners.
Mr. Dyer goes on to state that Iran could stop exporting oil and/or “get tough and close down all oil-tanker traffic that comes within range of (its) missiles–which would mean little or no oil from Iraq, Saudi Arabia, or the smaller Gulf states”. This is a very likely scenario, but what exactly does this “global oil rationing, industrial shutdowns, and the end of the present economic era” mean? One way to fully understand the impact of such an event is to look at Africa. The population of Africa at the present is approximately 1 billion. According to a recent presentation at a United Nations conference, it is estimated that “nearly 75% of the continent could come to rely on some sort of food aid by 2025”. If there is “global oil rationing” then it is safe to assume that feeding Africans would become a low priority operation for the rest of the world. This would mean that 750 million people could starve to death in Africa.
Just to put things into perspective, making sure that it is fully understood what the impact of an attack on Iran really means, consider this. The United States has already stated that they will use nuclear weapons in an aerial bombardment campaign against Iran. Since the creation of the atomic bomb, it has been accepted that once nuclear weapons are used again in any war, then they will continue to be used until there is no one left to kill. As the saying goes, you do not bring a knife to a gunfight, so once a nuclear weapon has been used on any country then that country and its people have a right to use unclear weapons in retaliation. Albert Einstein once said, “I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones”. I personally hope that we will not fulfil Einstein’s prophecy.
After reading countless articles by Mr. Dyer, I now finally understand how he has been able to educate so many people over the years. He presents an optimistic point of view, making his work accessible to the majority.
Gwynne Dyer’s commentary on Iran was not meant to let us know how many people would die if the US attacked Iran, it was meant to let us know who would win. He predicts that Iran would end up being the victor. However, considering that hundreds of millions of people would actually die if the US starts a war with Iran, my conclusion is that no one would be the winner of such a conflict.
So even though Mr. Dyer’s secret appears to be his optimistic analysis of the final outcome of conflicts between warring nations, I do not believe hoping for the best case scenario will manifest the least amount of death and destruction.
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