Military Action Against Iran

[Jack]

Reports claim that Iranian operatives are endangering American soldiers and Iraqi civilians. They allegedly were behind the deaths of American soldiers in at least one case. There supposedly are "mountains of evidence" (you'll hear that often) that support these claims. Will (or should) there be military action against Iran?

[tyrannos]

That action reminded me of "Battle of Bulge" . When SS soldiers infiltrated American and British lines dressed as Allies and had allied equipment,and even disguised some of their own Panther tanks as Shermans.

I dont buy Bush administration lies anymore(*not that I ever did mind you). But it wouldnt surprise me if the Russians were involved in that action there. I remember Soldier of Fortune magazine ran some good articles on the Russians right before the American invasion ,they were taking weapons out've Iraq,and still were even afterwards . Also that Bush stopped Osama from being captured in Pakistan,when the Delta Force had him in their sites.

[Bilaad Binti]

jack said:

Reports claim that Iranian operatives are endangering American soldiers and Iraqi civilians. They allegedly were behind the deaths of American soldiers in at least one case. There supposedly are "mountains of evidence" (you'll hear that often) that support these claims. Will (or should) there be military action against Iran?

Ha! The US has already lost the war against Iran (Shi'ism), believe me.

[tyrannos]

The war is smoke and mirrors,we havent lost nor won.

[Bilaad Binti]

You havent lost in Iraq? LMAO

www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11880954/

that $1 trillion + imagine how much more schools, and tax cuts it could have provided for you guys. I think by the end of it, when it easily approaches $1.5-$2 trillion pointlessly wasted in Iraq, this will bite the US in the ass generations to come.

[Jack]

I just saw several side-by-side comparisons of past and present statements made by the president. The program showed a past statement made before the action in Iraq followed by a present statement made about his feelings on Iran. The comments were almost identical. Waadad, Amerians want to destroy heretical terrorists, not peaceful Shias.

[drooperdoo]

Jack,
On the Daily Show they compared clips of Donald Rumsfeld claiming that Iranians were in Iraq, giving weapons to the Iraqis; and, from that same day, General Casey was asked about proof of Iranians in Iraq, to which he replied, "I'm unaware of any such evidence".

So who is one to believe: the discredited Rumsfeld, or the apolitical General?

I'll go with the General in this case.

Now Bush and the Administration--in the run-up to invade Iran are peddling the same bogus argument, the same phony pretext. With the same non-existent evidence.

Their mantra is "Trust us".

Problem with that is that we trusted them before--and they embarrassed us all. Thinking men and women no longer believe the cant about "secret evidence that they're only keeping back so as not to compromise sources and methods".

All this great "secret evidence". So "secret" not even the Generals know about it.

God, help us all!

* Footnote: What need would Iraqis have for Iranian explosives to make I.E.D.'s [improvised explosive devices]? According to every early news report, the US left Iraqi stockpiles unguarded, and, within weeks, the insurgents had taken them all--using the very weapons that we neglected to later kill American soldiers. No, the Bush Administration assertion doesn't hold water. The Iranians aren't providing munitions and explosives to Iraqi insurgents--because the Bush Administration has already provided them with years'-worth of stockpiles while they diverted our troops to defend Halliburton oil convoys, leaving Saddam's munitions plants unguarded.

[Jack]

Droop, I knew that they would find a reason to attack or invade Iran. They still follow the Gospel of Fukuyama after Fukuyama said that it's a false gospel. They also follow the Book of PNAC, written by the prophet, Kristol. "Yea, verily, we will remake the Middle East in our own image." Bush and the other neoconservative disciples are zealots on a "divine" mission. All of their interventionist policies were preordained, and reality is unimportant because they'll distort events to gain converts to their cause. They don't care what any Constitution-worshipping, diplomacy-seeking, isolationist heathens think. The gods of globalism demand the sacrifice of war.

[drooperdoo]

Zbigniew Brzezinski is considered by most of the insiders of Washington to be the intellectual godfather behind those factions who want to take over the Middle East oil fields so that the U.S. can have leverage over the European Union, Russia and China. He famously said, "He who controls Central Asia controls the world". He called for a take-over of Afghanistan and its oil fields years ago--as well as for a military presence in the Middle East, in order to bully Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran.

Which is why it's disturbing that Brzezinski said this recently to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee:

"It is time for the White House to come to terms with two central realities:

1. The war in Iraq is a historic, strategic, and moral calamity. Undertaken under false assumptions, it is undermining America's global legitimacy. Its collateral civilian casualties as well as some abuses are tarnishing America's moral credentials. Driven by Manichean impulses and imperial hubris, it is intensifying regional instability.

2. Only a political strategy that is historically relevant rather than reminiscent of colonial tutelage can provide the needed framework for a tolerable resolution of both the war in Iraq and the intensifying regional tensions.

If the United States continues to be bogged down in a protracted bloody involvement in Iraq, the final destination on this downhill track is likely to be a head-on conflict with Iran and with much of the world of Islam at large. A plausible scenario for a military collision with Iran involves Iraqi failure to meet the benchmarks; followed by accusations of Iranian responsibility for the failure; then by some provocation in Iraq or a terrorist act in the U.S. blamed on Iran; culminating in a "defensive" U.S. military action against Iran that plunges a lonely America into a spreading and deepening quagmire eventually ranging across Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan."

* Footnote: It should disturb all of us that even this Brzezinski is saying that "a plausible scenario" is that the U.S. will blame Iran for America's own failures in Iraq and then "by some terrorism act in the U.S. blamed on Iran" will use it as a pretext to widen this war. He even places in ironic quotation marks the term "defensive" action on the part of the United States--because he is implying that Iran won't really be behind any attack on America.
This is no longer the province of "conspiracy theorists". Even mainstream, credible people like Brzezinski see a "false flag operation" coming.
Be on guard.

[Jack]

An incident here would create cognitive dissonance in my mind because three competing thoughts would be stuck in my head in an endless cycle. Was the incident committed by Iranian operatives or false-flag operatives? Was the incident committed by Iranian operatives but used by the neoconservatives, who didn't commit the incident, to further their goals in the Middle East? A case could be made for each scenario after such an incident because both groups have a history that would justify such assumptions.

[drooperdoo]

U.S. can't prove Iran link to Iraq strife
Despite pledges to show evidence, officials have repeatedly put off presenting their case.

Maura Reynolds
LA Times
Saturday, February 3, 2007

WASHINGTON — Bush administration officials acknowledged Friday that they had yet to compile evidence strong enough to back up publicly their claims that Iran is fomenting violence against U.S. troops in Iraq.

Administration officials have long complained that Iran was supplying Shiite Muslim militants with lethal explosives and other materiel used to kill U.S. military personnel. But despite several pledges to make the evidence public, the administration has twice postponed the release — most recently, a briefing by military officials scheduled for last Tuesday in Baghdad.

"The truth is, quite frankly, we thought the briefing overstated, and we sent it back to get it narrowed and focused on the facts," national security advisor Stephen J. Hadley said Friday.

The acknowledgment comes amid shifting administration messages on Iran. After several weeks of saber rattling that included a stiff warning by President Bush and the dispatch of two aircraft carrier strike groups to the Persian Gulf, near Iran, the administration has insisted in recent days that it does not want to escalate tensions or to invade Iran.

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates seemed to concede Friday that U.S. officials can't say for sure whether the Iranian government is involved in assisting the attacks on U.S. personnel in Iraq.

"I don't know that we know the answer to that question," Gates said.

Earlier this week, U.S. officials acknowledged that they were uncertain about the strength of their evidence and were reluctant to issue potentially questionable data in the wake of the intelligence failures and erroneous assessments that preceded the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

In particular, officials worried about a repetition of former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell's February 2003 U.N. appearance to present the U.S. case against Iraq. In that speech, Powell cited evidence that was later discredited.

In rejecting the case compiled against Iran, senior U.S. officials, including Hadley, Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, confirmed Friday that they were concerned about possible inaccuracies.

"I and Secretary Rice and the national security advisor want to make sure that the briefing that is provided is absolutely accurate and is dominated by facts — serial numbers, technology and so on," Gates told reporters at the Pentagon.

Another reason for the delay, as is often the case when releasing intelligence, was that officials were concerned about inadvertently helping adversaries identify the agents or sources that provided the intelligence, Hadley said.

Hadley also said that the administration sought to delay the release of evidence until after a key intelligence report on Iraq was unveiled, so that Americans could place the evidence in the context of the broader conflict.

That report, called a National Intelligence Estimate, was issued Friday, concluding that Iraq was deteriorating and faces a bleak future that U.S. efforts may do little to avert.

However, the report tends to downplay the role of Iran and Syria, another target of U.S. criticism, in fomenting sectarian violence, while acknowledging that Iranian involvement "intensifies" the conflict.

"The involvement of these outside actors is not likely to be a major driver of violence or the prospects for stability because of the self-sustaining character of Iraq's internal sectarian dynamics," says the report, compiled by experts from the nation's 16 intelligence agencies.

Few doubt that Iran is working to increase its influence inside Iraq, but many of its beneficiaries have been political groups that also are allied with the United States.

So far, the U.S. government has provided scant evidence that the government of Iran is directly supporting militant Shiite groups.

U.S. military leaders in Iraq have said they have evidence that Iran is behind the supply network of explosives. Military officials have blamed Iran for the increasing casualties caused by the use of "shaped charge" explosive devices that can penetrate armored vehicles.

"What we are trying to do is … counter what the Iranians are doing to our soldiers, their involvement in activities, particularly these explosively formed projectiles that are killing our troops, and we are trying to get them to stop their nuclear enrichment," Gates said.

U.S. officials detained five Iranians in a raid in the northern Iraqi city of Irbil last month, accusing them of planning attacks on Americans.

Gates also acknowledged Friday that there was "a lot of speculation" about involvement by Iranians in the abduction and killings of five U.S. servicemen in Karbala last month. But he refused to say whether an investigation had turned up any evidence that Iranians took part.

"I would just tell you flatly that the investigation is still going on, and the information that I've seen is ambiguous," Gates said. "It's not clear yet."

In a major speech on Iraq last month, Bush accused Iran of "providing material support for attacks on American troops" and vowed to "seek out and destroy" weapon transport networks.

Since then, Air Force officials have said they are planning new missions that could include flights along the Iran-Iraq border aimed at disrupting weapons shipments.

Iranian officials challenged the Americans to produce evidence of their charges, and Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, pledged last week to do so.

The increasingly harsh words from the Bush administration stoked fears of a possible U.S. attack on Iran. In recent days, the White House and top U.S. officials have sought to counter the concern. Gates became the latest administration official to offer such reassurances.

"The president has made clear, the secretary of State has made clear, I've made clear … we are not planning for a war with Iran," Gates said Friday.

[Jack]

In a letter to the U.K.'s Sunday Times, three former high-ranking U.S. military officers pleaded with President Bush to start diplomatic talks, with no preconditions, with the Iranian government. They also asked Tony Blair's government to help defuse the tensions over Iran's nuclear program. The officers said that military action would have "disastrous consequences" for coalition forces *and* the region as well as worsen global and regional tensions. In a separate letter, religious leaders, representing the world's top three monotheistic religions, called for a peaceful solution to the problem.
www.msnbc.com/id/16964430/