Quite an interesting read. Looks like our failure to swallow his line of bull has paid off. Sort of.
Shifting Targets: The Administration’s plan for Iran
Bush told the national convention of the American Legion in August, “The attacks on our bases and our troops by Iranian-supplied munitions have increased. . . . The Iranian regime must halt these actions. And, until it does, I will take actions necessary to protect our troops.” He then concluded, to applause, “I have authorized our military commanders in Iraq to confront Tehran’s murderous activities.”
The President’s position, and its corollary—that, if many of America’s problems in Iraq are the responsibility of Tehran, then the solution to them is to confront the Iranians—have taken firm hold in the Administration. This summer, the White House, pushed by the office of Vice-President Dick Cheney, requested that the Joint Chiefs of Staff redraw long-standing plans for a possible attack on Iran, according to former officials and government consultants. The focus of the plans had been a broad bombing attack, with targets including Iran’s known and suspected nuclear facilities and other military and infrastructure sites. Now the emphasis is on “surgical” strikes on Revolutionary Guard Corps facilities in Tehran and elsewhere, which, the Administration claims, have been the source of attacks on Americans in Iraq. What had been presented primarily as a counter-proliferation mission has been reconceived as counterterrorism.
The shift in targeting reflects three developments. First, the President and his senior advisers have concluded that their campaign to convince the American public that Iran poses an imminent nuclear threat has failed (unlike a similar campaign before the Iraq war), and that as a result there is not enough popular support for a major bombing campaign. The second development is that the White House has come to terms, in private, with the general consensus of the American intelligence community that Iran is at least five years away from obtaining a bomb. And, finally, there has been a growing recognition in Washington and throughout the Middle East that Iran is emerging as the geopolitical winner of the war in Iraq.
“…come to terms…” Why listen to experts in the region (including your father) who can tell you exactly what will happen if you do a, b or c when you have dogma and conviction on you’re side? Of course, if he had listened few years ago to what the experts said would happen in Iraq, we never would have gone to war there. What a Presidency!
I have a great deal of respect for Herse.
I don’t have as much confidence in (1) the Killer Klowns in the White House understanding reality; (2) Kongress having the courage to oppose #1; (3) the American people having the understanding and courage to stop the politics of our imperial government.
You can build bomb proof bunkers. Essentially you have to use precision bunker busters to drill a hole through the reenforced concrete and then drop a tactical nuclear device into said hole to wipe out internal blast doors and partitions. Then hope the whole thing will collapse and have minimal fallout. Who in the West is going to sign off on a preemptive nuclear first strike? Long term battery with conventional munitions might throw a cloud of fissionable materials into the air. With good intel and infiltration you might do it, but we all know how well that’s been working. You go after these weapons blood will be shed on all sides. I don’t think the West has any choice. You can’t allow these Islamic Fundamentalists to choke the Middle East.
Oh this is Seymour Hersh? Well we’ll file this under maybe.
So if Iran is five years away, that means they’ll be nuclear while the next President is in office then. Seems like it was just yesterday that the CIA issued a report that Iran is ten years away.
“Of course, if he had listened few years ago to what the experts said would happen in Iraq, we never would have gone to war there.”
I don’t know if this statement is correct.
It sure seems like Bush and Cheney listened to the experts, knew exactly what would happen in Iraq but they did it anyway. After all, it was Cheney himself who advised the first President Bush not to pursue the Iraqis into Iraq because it would be a stupid thing to do.
“But Cheney doesn’t give a rat’s ass about the Republican worries, and neither does the President.”
They’ve finally given up all pretense of representing anyone at all except certain corporations.
Unfortunately, this is a president who doesn’t believe in listening to “us.” He seems to take a lack of popular support as a dare rather than a warning, and way too many influential people in his administration are hot to invade Iran, so in a way this story is really scary… That the guy can still have a “history will prove I was right” perspective is scary…
Funny how the attackers on 9/11 were Saudis, many of the IADs come from Saudi sources, and how the Saudis give money to terrorist groups, and our fearless leader, Chimpy Mc Chucklenuts, plays kissyface with their prince, isn’t it?
This changes nothing. The planned conquest of the middle east, and the terrible consequences of that strategy, shall continue. A change in the convenient excuse is irrelevant.
Now the emphasis is on “surgical” strikes on Revolutionary Guard Corps facilities in Tehran and elsewhere, which, the Administration claims, have been the source of attacks on Americans in Iraq.
and then…???
Isn’t that the consistent failure of this administration: Good at starting wars, but having no clue how to end them??
It would unite the Iranian people against us, because all internal opponents to the current regime will be told:
“Support our troops, or the Crusaders win!”
“Why do you hate Iran?”
Another nail in the coffin of the argument that the US isn’t at war with Islam…
You think Iran is providing IEDs now, wait until every Iranian considers it their patriotic duty to support the production and distribution of them.
This is something I didn’t know – Iranians are not Arabs they are Persians and Persians never liked Arabs. The US is buddy buddy with Saudi Arabia, and Israel – so what’s there not to have a issue with the US?
I do like that old idea of keeping your friends close and your enemies closer. The alienation and threats with Iran is not working so why turn it around and be buddies? If we can be friends with the Saudis why not the Iranians? It’s not naive it makes sense.
The problem I see with threating Iran with war over the nuclear issue is that Iran is a sovereign country and has the right to have nuclear power, If they want – Russia does not seem to have a problem with this. Pakistan has ‘the bomb’ – so why didn’t the US bomb them before they did? What about Israel…they also have ‘the bomb’. They never said they did but never denied it either as I recall. China does too…
If Iran has ‘the bomb’ and used it on Israel do they think for one second that the entire world would do nothing? That would be ‘it’ for Iran – finished. So what is the benefit for Iran? All this rhetoric from Iran about Israel is just that…
That’s my take.
Cheers
#8 – Chimpy Mc Chucklenuts
🙂
#10 – Another nail in the coffin of the argument that the US isn’t at war with Islam…
Is there seriously some debate on that point? I couldn’t imagine trying to make it with a straight face.
The clearer way to view this news is that the Bush/Cheney administration has found what they consider an easier ‘sell’ to the American people, for their goal to start another war with yet another oil producing country that no longer will use the dollar for it’s oil sales. That’s what all this has been about from the beginning.
In 2000, Saddam said he was going to sell all his oil in Euros. Three years later we invade. About 2 years ago Iran made the same statement, with the addendum that they were going to set up there own oil bourse – an oil futures market – separate from the one run by the ‘West’, and it too would conduct business entirely in Euros – not dollars. Ever since the US government has been trying to convince the rest of the world that ‘Iran must be stopped’; first b/c of the WMD non-threat, and now with the terrorism trump card.
A simple change in governments isn’t enough – new bosses can’t be counted on to stay with the dollar either (too much money to be made or lost). So the only option is to take control and/or destroy their ability to sell oil at all. Iraq was the former, Iran will be the latter.
Oh, and there was one other country that dropped the dollar as it’s exclusive oil-selling currency – Venezuela. Chavez made that announcement not too long after he got elected the first time, and not too long after he was almost overthrown by a coup engineered by his own oil industry (dominated as it was by western corporations). The CIA even had a white Lear Jet waiting to whisk him away (ala Bertrand Aristide in Haiti about a year earlier – a practice run?). However the Venezuelan military decided that, for once, they weren’t gonna knuckle under to Uncle Sugar and put Chavez back in power. Probably the only reason we didn’t invade was because they still do some oil dealings in dollars, and they’re only ranked 6th in the world for crude production anyway (Iraq & Iran are like 2-3 respectively).
This is all about keeping the value of the dollar from collapsing entirely. Which is why the establishment Dems won’t come out and say THEY won’t attack Iran either! Ever since Nixon, we’ve built this financial house of cards based on a dollar backed by oil (instead of gold), hollowing out our manufacturing base just so we can supply the world with dollars so they can buy oil with them too, and ignoring all consequences. We’re in so deep now that invasion & war actually seem like rational solutions to keep the system going.
We will wind up attacking Iran, and their ability to pump & refine oil will be targeted regardless of whether we do it to get their fictional WMDs or to get their terrorists or whatever else we can think up. Count on it.
“The attacks on our bases and our troops by Iranian-supplied munitions have increased. . . . ”
Hmm, so much for the ‘violence is on the decline’ line.
Pick a story, dumbass.
#15 – Well ain’t that a hoot. I agree with Pedro. How often does that happen?
How many times will Seymour Hersh predict an attack on Iran? This is a cool gig. Claim credit if it happens, or forget all about. Kind of like how Paul Krugman predicts a recession annually.
Ya want a prediction?…
here it is.
With this “declaration”, Chucklenuts has just declared war on Iran.
That way, he can keep troops in Iraq (as he has already “decided” to do) until the end of his term, and the yakking-heads on the “news”-services will ask NOTHING about bin-Laden.
The cost will continue to balloon (and the U.S. is getting close to bankruptcy), the death-toll, both armed forces AND civilians will continue to rise drastically (in a country that had NOTHING to do with 9/11), and the ass-hole-in-chief will claim more “victory” in taxes and the economy.
Then, before he leaves the mess to a successor, he’ll declare a war on China, so he can be the last President, as his religous beliefs require him to be (don’t have the link, didn’t save the page RSS had an article about Bush at church).
AND NOBODY WILL START ACTION FOR IMPEACHMENT AND TREASON AGAINST BUSH/CHENEY.
13 Is there seriously some debate on that point? I couldn’t imagine trying to make it with a straight face.
Neither could I… but you know they would have to try to get that lead-balloon to float.
Here’s a question you can be sure that Bush and Cheney have not carefully thought through:
How is Iran going to hit us back?
TIHZ, I do think the world will do nothing but make denunciations at the UN. What happened in Rwanda, or Darfur? What happened when these countries have been launching rockets at Israel on a regular basis? They denounced Israel of course. For Iran to be finished, there would have to be countries that attacked it. The rest of the Arab states would be happy to see Israel nuked. I don’t see Russia or China moving to attack Iran, or India and Pakistan. So you are left with Britain, France, and America. Britain and France will want to go through the UN, plus those countries have large Muslim populations. Throw in the usual suspects complaining about war is not the answer, two wrongs don’t make a right, etc. I think the end result would be sanctions on Iran for a little while.
What? No speculation about how Iran will strike back at us?
Isn’t this a MAJOR consideration before we bomb Iran?
I honestly believe that Bush & Co. won’t give this any serious consideration — so we, the public, need to.
I can think of at least two likely scenarios:
One is to cripple the oil flow out of the Persian Gulf — $100 a barrel oil would be a tremendous blow to American’s economy.
This other is to collapse the government of Iraq and unleash holy hell in sectarian violence until the Americans can’t stand being there any more.
Can anyone else think of other possible counter attacks?