Esquire:The Secret History of the Impending War with Iran That the White House Doesn't Want You to Know

Two former high-ranking policy experts from the Bush Administration say the U.S. has been gearing up for a war with Iran for years, despite claiming otherwise. It'll be Iraq all over again.

By John H. Richardson
Excerpts:

The most ominous new development is the Bush administration's push to name the Iranian Revolutionary Guards a terrorist organization.

"The U.S. has designated any number of states over the years as state sponsors of terrorism," says Leverett. "But here for the first time the U.S. is saying that part of a government is itself a terrorist organization."

This is what Leverett and Mann fear will happen: The diplomatic effort in the United Nations will fail when it becomes clear that Russia's and China's geopolitical ambitions will not accommodate the inconvenience of energy sanctions against Iran. Without any meaningful incentive from the U.S. to be friendly, Iran will keep meddling in Iraq and installing nuclear centrifuges. This will trigger a response from the hard-liners in the White House, who feel that it is their moral duty to deal with Iran before the Democrats take over American foreign policy. "If you get all those elements coming together, say in the first half of '08," says Leverett, "what is this president going to do? I think there is a serious risk he would decide to order an attack on the Iranian nuclear installations and probably a wider target zone."

This would result in a dramatic increase in attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq, attacks by proxy forces like Hezbollah, and an unknown reaction from the wobbly states of Afghanistan and Pakistan, where millions admire Iran's resistance to the Great Satan. "As disastrous as Iraq has been," says Mann, "an attack on Iran could engulf America in a war with the entire Muslim world."

In the spring, Crown Prince Abdullah flew to Texas to meet Bush at his ranch. The way Leverett remembers the story, Abdullah sat down and told Bush he was going to ask a direct question and wanted a direct answer. Are you going to do anything about the Palestinian issue? If you tell me no, if it's too difficult, if you're not going to give it that kind of priority, just tell me. I will understand and I will never say anything critical of you or your leadership in public, but I'm going to need to make my own judgments and my own decisions about Saudi interests.

Bush tried to stall, saying he understood his concerns and would see what he could do.

Abdullah stood up. "That's it. This meeting is over."

No Arab leader had ever spoken to Bush like that before, Leverett says. But Saudi Arabia was a key ally in the war on terror, vital to the continued U.S. oil supply, so Bush and Rice and Powell excused themselves into another room for a quick huddle.

Bush rolled his eyes. "We sure don't want to go through anything like that again."

Then the king of Jordan came to Washington to see Bush. There had to be a road map for peace in Palestine, the king said. Despite the previous experience with Abdullah in Crawford, Bush seemed taken by surprise, Leverett remembers, but he listened and said that the idea of a road map seemed pretty reasonable.

Then came the moment that would lead to an extraordinary battle with the Bush administration. It was an average morning in April, about four weeks into the war. Mann picked up her daily folder and sat down at her desk, glancing at a fax cover page. The fax was from the Swiss ambassador to Iran, which wasn't unusual -- since the U.S. had no formal relationship with Iran, the Swiss ambassador represented American interests there and often faxed over updates on what he was doing. This time he'd met with Sa-deq Kharrazi, a well-connected Iranian who was the nephew of the foreign minister and son-in-law to the supreme leader. Amazingly, Kharrazi had presented the ambassador with a detailed proposal for peace in the Middle East, approved at the highest levels in Tehran.

A two-page summary was attached. Scanning it, Mann was startled by one dramatic concession after another -- "decisive action" against all terrorists in Iran, an end of support for Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, a promise to cease its nuclear program, and also an agreement to recognize Israel.

This was huge. Mann sat down and drafted a quick memo to her boss, Richard Haass. It was important to send a swift and positive response.

Then she heard that the White House had already made up its mind -- it was going to ignore the offer. Its only response was to lodge a formal complaint with the Swiss government about their ambassador's meddling.

A few days after that, a terrorist attack in Saudi Arabia killed thirty-four people, including eight Americans, and an intelligence report said the bombers had been in phone contact with Al Qaeda members in Iran. Although it was unknown whether Tehran had anything to do with the bombing or if the terrorists were hiding out in the lawless areas near the border, Rumsfeld set the tone for the administration's response at his next press conference. "There's no question but that there have been and are today senior Al Qaeda leaders in Iran, and they are busy."

Colin Powell saw Mann's memo. A couple weeks later he approached her at a State Department reception and said, "It was a very good memo. I couldn't sell it at the White House."

In response to questions from Esquire, Colin Powell called Leverett "very able" and confirms much of what he says. Leverett's account of the clash between Bush and Crown Prince Abdullah was accurate, he said. "It was a very serious moment and no one wanted to see if the Saudis were bluffing." The same goes for the story about his speech in Israel in 2002. "I had major problems with the White House on what I wanted to say."

Developments on Iran

Top Advisers to Bush convinced that he will attack Iran

I believe President Bush is going to order airstrikes [on Iran] before he leaves office. Because he has several times said — at least twice to my knowledge — that if we allow Iranians to acquire nuclear capabilities, 50 years from now, people will look back at us the way we look back at Munich and say ‘how could they have let this happen?’

Richard Perle: “Would this president do it? I think that until the day he leaves office, this is a president that, if he is told, ‘Mr. President, you are at the point of no return,’ I have very little doubt that this president would order the necessary military action.” [Link]

A well-placed source in Washington said: “Bush is not going to leave office with Iran still in limbo.” [Link]

Bill Kristol: “We could be in a military confrontation with Iran much sooner than people expect.” [Link]

Israeli Uri Avnery warns,

Whoever pushes for war against Iran will come to regret it.

Some adventures are easy to get into but hard to get out of.

The last one to find this out was Saddam Hussein. He thought that it would be a cakewalk – after all, Khomeini had killed off most of the officers, and especially the pilots, of the shah's military. He believed that one quick Iraqi blow would be enough to bring about the collapse of Iran. He had eight long years of war to regret it.

Both Americans and Israelis may soon be feeling that the Iraqi mud is like whipped cream compared to the Iranian quagmire.

Raw Storyt reports the Air Force creates an Iranian strike wing.

Kevin Drum opines about to supposed military opposition,

A couple of things. First, my semi-understanding of the state of play here is that opposition to bombing Iran comes at the Joint Chiefs and theater command levels, not at the individual service level. Second, a lot of this surely depends on what kind of bombing mission we're talking about. A massive two-week effort deep into the heart of Iran to destroy their nuclear infrastructure is one thing, and that seems to be the mission the Chiefs have a problem with. (Assuming scuttlebutt is right and they have a problem in the first place.) But if Sy Hersh is right and Dick Cheney's latest gambit is to turn Iran into a 21st century Cambodia complete with "limited" bombing raids along the border, that's another thing entirely. I'd be surprised if anyone in the E Ring had a serious problem with that.

The Nation also reports on the matter,

And there are reports from the UK that the US is training Gulf states for war with Iran,

The American air force is working with military leaders from the Gulf to train and prepare Arab air forces for a possible war with Iran, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal.

Chris Weigant speculates on what happens after the bombs drop,

The very first thing the Iranians would do is bomb the MEK camps in Iraq. This would be on a "tit-for-tat" level and they could make a good case before the world for doing so. The MEK ("Mujahedeen-e-Khalq") is an Iranian dissident group who have been trying to overthrow the government of Iran for quite some time now. They used to operate out of Saddam's Iraq, in cross-border raids into Iran. When we invaded, we kind of institutionalized a stalemate with them -- we accepted their surrender, told them we would protect the safety of their camps, but we allowed them to stay. The only problem is, they're a terrorist group. Which we're protecting with the American military.

If America kept attacking Iran, the options get much grimmer much quicker. Iranian missiles may start targeting the Green Zone in Baghdad with a passion. They may start targeting those sprawling US bases out in the desert in Iraq. Remember the Kuwaiti war with Saddam? America kept saying "oh, we've taken care of all of Saddam's missiles" while the SCUDs kept raining down, proving us wrong. Imagine that scenario coming from Iran.

Iran may also unleash the terrorists it sponsors. Hezbollah, in particular, may begin spectacular terrorist attacks within Europe. They could even conceivably (unlike Bush's bugaboo "Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia") successfully attack the United States mainland. So not only are missiles raining down on the Green Zone, but shopping malls and train stations and power plants are getting blown up all over Europe and the United States, or (failing to reach America) U.S. Embassies worldwide.

But these nightmare scenarios aren't the worst weapon. Iran's real leverage comes from sitting on top of the Straits of Hormuz (some use the singular Strait of Hormuz). Check out a map of it on Wikipedia, and notice that Iran surrounds this tight bottleneck on three sides. Twenty percent of the world's oil moves through these straits every day, on supertankers. Imagine Iranian mines, torpedoes and missiles taking out oil tankers here. They'd really just have to successfully take out one, or maybe two to prove they could do it whenever they felt like.

What would happen after the first of these successful attacks would be oil trading at astronomical highs: $150 to $200 a barrel. Or roughly two to three times what is has been trading at during the Iraq war. Six to nine dollars a gallon at your local pump.

If this went on for a short period of time, it could cause a devastating recession on the American economy. If it went on for a long period of time, it could cause a worldwide economic depression.

If the American economy crumbles, it's going to be harder and harder to find the money to continue three wars at once. Remember, we essentially outspent the Soviet Union in the arms race. It'd be awfully ironic if it happened to us, since it would be almost impossible to pour the amount of money we have been into the Middle East if our economy was on its knees.

This would quickly lead to World War III speculates former CIA officer Philip Giraldi,

It might start with a minor incident, possibly involving an American Marine patrol operating out of the new base at Badrah near the Iranian border. The Marines are surrounded by superior Iranian forces claiming that the Americans have strayed inside Iranian territory. The Marines refuse to surrender their weapons and instead open fire. The Iranians respond. Helicopter gunships are called in to support the Marines, and artillery fire is directed against Iranian military targets close to the border. President Bush calls the incident an act of war and, in an emotional speech to the nation, orders U.S. forces to attack. A hastily called meeting of the UN Security Council results in a 17-1 vote urging the United States to exercise restraint, with only Washington voting "no." In the UN General Assembly, only the U.S., Israel, Micronesia, and Costa Rica support the military action. The U.S. is effectively alone.

In the first few days, overwhelming American air and naval superiority destroy Iran's principal air, naval, and army bases. Iranian Revolutionary Guard facilities are particularly targeted and are obliterated, as are the known Iranian nuclear research and development sites. Population centers are avoided, though smart weapons destroy communications centers and command and control facilities. There are nevertheless large numbers of civilian casualties and widespread radioactive contamination as many of the targeted sites are in or near cities. Infrastructure is also hit, particularly bridges, roads, and power generation stations close to known nuclear research centers and military sites. The U.S. media, which had supported the administration's plans to engage Iran, rallies around the flag, praising the surgical attacks designed to cripple Tehran's nuclear weapons program. Congress supports the bombing, with leaders from both parties praising the president and commenting that Iran had it coming.

The Pentagon and White House call the attacks a complete success, but Iran strikes back. With five years to prepare, Iran has successfully hidden and hardened many of its military and nuclear facilities, a large percentage of which are undamaged. The aircraft carrier USS Eisenhower operating in the Persian Gulf is hit by a Chinese Silkworm cruise missile and grounds itself in shallow water to avoid sinking. Three other support vessels are also hit and severely damaged when they are attacked by small craft manned by suicide bombers. Pro-Iranian riots break out in Beirut, where the government is forced to call in soldiers to shoot at the crowds. In the south of Lebanon, Hezbollah fires salvoes of rockets into Israel. Israel responds by bombing Lebanon and Syria, which it blames for the attacks. Iranian Shahab-3 missiles also strike Israel, killing a number of civilians. The Israeli Defense Forces are mobilized, and troops are sent to the northern border. Syria and Lebanon also mobilize their forces. Rioters in Baghdad attack US. .troops and the American embassy and are driven back only after the soldiers open fire and call in helicopter gunships. Snipers attack American soldiers all over Iraq. Shi'ites sympathetic to Iran sabotage Saudi Arabia's eastern oil fields. The Saudi fields suffer some damage, and hundreds of alleged saboteurs are shot dead by Saudi security forces. An oil tanker out of Kuwait is hit by a Silkworm close to the Straits of Hormuz and runs aground. Another hits a mine planted by Iran. Insurers in London refuse to cover any tankers transiting the Persian Gulf. Oil shipments from the region, one quarter of the world supply, stop completely, and oil goes up to $200 a barrel. Wall Street suffers its biggest loss in 20 years, with the Dow Jones index plummeting by more than 800 points.

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A piece on pre-empting the next war,

Convincing them to switch course and reassert their right to make such a fundamental decision as whether to go to war with Iran will require a major popular outcry: petitions--from groups like MoveOn, TrueMajority, Working Assets, and Democracy for America--that aren't just mailed in, but publicly delivered by the basket. It means marches, rallies and endless phone calls and visits to Congressional offices. It probably means people sitting in some of these same offices (and I bet similar efforts around Iraq convinced my own Senator, Washington State's Maria Cantwell, to vote the right way in this case). We can say these kinds of efforts have so far failed to halt the Iraq war, but they've certainly fed the Congressional resistance, and it's always easier to stop wars before they start. We're also demanding a far more modest initial goal of Congress and the Senate simply reaffirming their constitutional right to make fundamental war-and-peace decisions in the first place. So it should be an easier sell.

UPDATE
senators Clinton and Webb introduce legislation prohibiting funding for war with Iran

BarbinMD writes,

And would the President consult Congress before attacking Iran?

Q Did he consult -- would he tell Congress before attacking Iran -- before he attacks Iran?

MS. PERINO: Helen, we are pursuing a diplomatic solution with Iran.

Q I'm asking you does he feel committed to ask Congress for permission?

MS. PERINO: We are pursuing a diplomatic solution in Iran.

Draw your own conclusions.

Seymour Hersh on Countdown (video).

Shifting Targets

Seymor Hersh of the New Yorker reports,

During a secure videoconference that took place early this summer, the President told Ryan Crocker, the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, that he was thinking of hitting Iranian targets across the border and that the British “were on board.” At that point, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice interjected that there was a need to proceed carefully, because of the ongoing diplomatic track. Bush ended by instructing Crocker to tell Iran to stop interfering in Iraq or it would face American retribution.

At a White House meeting with Cheney this summer, according to a former senior intelligence official, it was agreed that, if limited strikes on Iran were carried out, the Administration could fend off criticism by arguing that they were a defensive action to save soldiers in Iraq. If Democrats objected, the Administration could say, “Bill Clinton did the same thing; he conducted limited strikes in Afghanistan, the Sudan, and in Baghdad to protect American lives.” The former intelligence official added, “There is a desperate effort by Cheney et al. to bring military action to Iran as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the politicians are saying, ‘You can’t do it, because every Republican is going to be defeated, and we’re only one fact from going over the cliff in Iraq.’ But Cheney doesn’t give a rat’s ass about the Republican worries, and neither does the President.”

They’re moving everybody to the Iran desk,” one recently retired C.I.A. official said. “They’re dragging in a lot of analysts and ramping up everything. It’s just like the fall of 2002”—the months before the invasion of Iraq, when the Iraqi Operations Group became the most important in the agency. He added, “The guys now running the Iranian program have limited direct experience with Iran. In the event of an attack, how will the Iranians react? They will react, and the Administration has not thought it all the way through.”

The revised bombing plan for a possible attack, with its tightened focus on counterterrorism, is gathering support among generals and admirals in the Pentagon. The strategy calls for the use of sea-launched cruise missiles and more precisely targeted ground attacks and bombing strikes, including plans to destroy the most important Revolutionary Guard training camps, supply depots, and command and control facilities.

“Cheney’s option is now for a fast in and out—for surgical strikes,” the former senior American intelligence official told me. The Joint Chiefs have turned to the Navy, he said, which had been chafing over its role in the Air Force-dominated air war in Iraq. “The Navy’s planes, ships, and cruise missiles are in place in the Gulf and operating daily. They’ve got everything they need—even AWACS are in place and the targets in Iran have been programmed. The Navy is flying FA-18 missions every day in the Gulf.” There are also plans to hit Iran’s anti-aircraft surface-to-air missile sites. “We’ve got to get a path in and a path out,” the former official said.

A Pentagon consultant on counterterrorism told me that, if the bombing campaign took place, it would be accompanied by a series of what he called “short, sharp incursions” by American Special Forces units into suspected Iranian training sites. He said, “Cheney is devoted to this, no question.

The adviser said that he had heard from a source in Iran that the Revolutionary Guards have been telling religious leaders that they can stand up to an American attack. “The Guards are claiming that they can infiltrate American security,” the adviser said. “They are bragging that they have spray-painted an American warship—to signal the Americans that they can get close to them.” (I was told by the former senior intelligence official that there was an unexplained incident, this spring, in which an American warship was spray-painted with a bull’s-eye while docked in Qatar, which may have been the source of the boasts.)

“Do you think those crazies in Tehran are going to say, ‘Uncle Sam is here! We’d better stand down’? ” the former senior intelligence official said. “The reality is an attack will make things ten times warmer."

Daily Reads

Jordanian Prince El Hassan warns against military action in Iran.

Spineless Democrats call out their own to defend AIPAC.

Daily Reads

The Guardian warns that the proxy core between the US and Iran might turn "hot" soon.

The growing US focus on confronting Iran in a proxy war inside Iraq risks triggering a direct conflict in the next few months, regional analysts are warning.

"The proxy war that has been going on in Iraq may now cross the border. This is a very dangerous period," Patrick Cronin, the director of studies at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said.

Vincent Cannistraro, a former CIA counter-terrorism chief who is now a security analyst, said: "The decision to attack was made some time ago. It will be in two stages. If a smoking gun is found in terms of Iranian interference in Iraq, the US will retaliate on a tactical level, and they will strike against military targets. The second part of this is: Bush has made the decision to launch a strategic attack against Iranian nuclear facilities, although not before next year. He has been lining up some Sunni countries for tacit support for his actions."

Lt. Col. Robert Bowman directs fellow soldiers to disobey orders to attack Iran with nuclear weapons.

Our oath of office is to “protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” Might I suggest that this includes a rogue president and vice-president? Certainly we are bound to carry out the legal orders of our superiors. But the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) which binds all of us enshrines the Nuremberg Principles which this country established after World War II (which you are too young to remember). One of those Nuremberg Principles says that we in the military have not only the right, but also the DUTY to refuse an illegal order. It was on this basis that we executed Nazi officers who were “only carrying out their orders.”

The Constitution which we are sworn to uphold says that treaties entered into by the United States are the “highest law of the land,” equivalent to the Constitution itself. Accordingly, we in the military are sworn to uphold treaty law, including the United Nations charter and the Geneva Convention.

Based on the above, I contend that should some civilian order you to initiate a nuclear attack on Iran (for example), you are duty-bound to refuse that order. I might also suggest that you should consider whether the circumstances demand that you arrest whoever gave the order as a war criminal.

The head of the IAEA warns that the US rhetoric on the Iran sounds a lot like "prewar Iraq"

One million Iraqi dead-- Go Democracy! Hooray for Freedom!

We are no longer in nation of laws, of checks and balances, but of The Executive, The Imperial President, according to Yale law professor Jack Balkan.

We are moving, or more correctly, we have already moved, toward a system of one person rule on matters of war and peace. It is a very dangerous tendency in American constitutionalism. If you think that the Iraq episode has been a disaster, imagine an even more foolhardy and reckless President taking even greater and more dangerous risks. The Iraq war demonstrates that, in the context of modern politics and contemporary security threats, the framers' original system of checks and balances has utterly failed us.

If we put aside the din over the Petraeus testimony before Congress, it should be apparent by now (indeed it was apparent long ago) that the United States will not be ending its involvement in Iraq while George W. Bush is in office. Democrats are divided among themselves about how to proceed and they lack veto-proof majorities even if they were not divided. President Bush will pass the problem of Iraq on to his successor. He does this hoping that he will be vindicated, because, he hopes his successor (and the successor after that) will follow his policies which Bush is convinced will ultimately succeed, If the next President changes course, and withdraws, President Bush believes that he or she, and not Bush, will be blamed for the problems that result. That may seem like wishful thinking, but the American public has a short memory and there are any number of political entrepreneurs that hope to gain an advantage from blaming the next President for the consequences of the mistakes of the previous one.

Of Course, there is a remedy to this madness, but it will not happened as long as the left-wing up the War Party is in power.

Then, there are always chickenhawks who have no problem sending other people to die for their ambitions, what Hannah Arendt called a "desk murderer."

My talk with Senator Patty Murray

Recently I was able to meet with Senator Patty Murray on-campus as she came by to do a press conference and incidentally happened to talk to a few of us there.

I introduced myself as a student senator and I said that many students were growing concerned about the increasing sabre rattling towards Iran and what seems to be preparations for an attack. I told her it that's why we in the ASUW Senate passed a resolution -- R-13-22 -- opposing such a war and I was able to hand it to her, which she seemed interested to take.

While I was trying to convey my feelings that Bush and Cheney could and would indeed attack Iran, I urged the Senator to make a public statement akin to the one that Senator Obama recently made in Clinton Ohio:

We hear eerie echoes of the run-up to the war in Iraq in the way that the President and Vice President talk about Iran. They conflate Iran and al Qaeda. They issue veiled threats. They suggest that the time for diplomacy and pressure is running out when we haven't even tried direct diplomacy. Well George Bush and Dick Cheney must hear - loud and clear - from the American people and the Congress: you don't have our support, and you don't have our authorization for another war.

This is the first speech I have heard any of the Democratic front runners unequivocally state that the president doesn't have the authorization for a strike on Iran. I would imagine does not sit well with AIPAC and the other Likud oriented lobbying groups, very powerful entities who "hope and pray" that George Bush attacks Iran, as one commentator put it.

Senator Murray quickly and confidently assured me that the president would have to come back to Congress for another resolution before an attack, adding that the Congress has grown increasingly “cynical towards this administration” and their assertions of power.

We should remember that Senator Murray initially voted against the war, an action that certainly took courage, given the atmosphere at the time.

I then pressed further and said that according to professor Barnett Rubin and other respected Middle East specialists, under the Cheney-Addington interpretation of the Constitution, the administration would not need to come back to Congress before an attack.

Such an attack, if the State Dept were to designate the Revolutionary Guard of Iran a "terrorist organization" formally, would fall under the original Authorization for Use of Military Force of 2001, which gave the president authority to attack to not only terrorist organizations themselves, but “those who harbor terrorists.”

Senator Murray responded to me, "we won't let that happen."

You will have to forgive me if her sentiment is not entirely convincing.

The Senator might very well be sincere in her opposition to an attack on Iran. But words alone without actions will not prevent said attack.

Some of Senator Murray's colleagues have indeed put forward such actions. Senator Jim Webb tried to insert language in a war supplemental that would've prohibited funding for an attack on Iran without congressional approval, with exceptions for emergencies.

But due to lobbying pressure from the aforementioned groups, the language was removed by leadership, leaving the president a carte blanche for an attack.

Compounding those facts, recent developments are even more worrying.

In a report titled "US Officials Began Crafting Iran Bombing Plan," James Rosen reports that, “… according to a well-placed Bush administration source, ‘everyone in town’ is now participating in a broad discussion about the costs and benefits of military action against Iran, with the likely timeframe for any such course of action being over the next eight to 10 months…”

Unfortunately I was not able to finish my conversation with her. Senator Murray politely wrapped up our conversation and proceeded with the press conference. Afterwards, she took a few moments to shake all of our hands and thank us for coming and when it came to my turn, she said "thank you and I'll remember what you said."

Later I was able to give her aide Francis a copy of the Rosen article and urged her to take a look at it. As to what happens now, I guess we all just keep working at it. This brings to mind an appropriate quote by Danillo Dolci,

It’s senseless to speak of optimism or
pessimism. The only important thing is to know that if one
works well in a potato field, the potatoes will grow. If one
works well among men, they will grow—that’s reality. The rest is smoke. It’s important to know that words don’t move mountains. Work, exacting work, moves mountains.

Daily Reads

Fox noise reports US Officials Began Crafting Iran Bombing Plan.

Consequently, according to a well-placed Bush administration source, "everyone in town" is now participating in a broad discussion about the costs and benefits of military action against Iran, with the likely timeframe for any such course of action being over the next eight to 10 months, after the presidential primaries have probably been decided, but well before the November 2008 elections

The Jerusalem Post reports about a possible attack next summer.

US General thinks Iran bombing will be 'easy.'

Forty-eight hours duration, hitting 2500 aimed points to take out their [Iranian] nuclear facilities, their air defense facilities, their air force, their navy, their Shahab-3 retaliatory missiles, and finally their command and control. And then let the Iranian people take their country back," the general said describing the campaign, adding it would be "easy."

The McInerney statement was made following a Fox News report that U.S. "officials are making plans to attack Iran as early as next summer," since Washington believes diplomatic efforts have failed.

Senator Obama goes on the record to unequivocally oppose an attack on Iran,

We hear eerie echoes of the run-up to the war in Iraq in the way that the President and Vice President talk about Iran. They conflate Iran and al Qaeda. They issue veiled threats. They suggest that the time for diplomacy and pressure is running out when we haven't even tried direct diplomacy. Well George Bush and Dick Cheney must hear - loud and clear - from the American people and the Congress: you don't have our support, and you don't have our authorization for another war.

Fox noise the continuing the drum beating towards war.

Foreign Policy rights about the Epidemic of Denial.

Next thing you know, you'll start hearing folks at AEI saying that Iran was responsible for 9/11. Wait a minute, that's already happening, as Peter Beinart pointed out in Sunday's New York Times. "It's the 2007 equivalent of the claims made in 2002 and 2003 about Iraq," Beinart noted. "The years between 9/11 and the Iraq war gave rise to a cottage industry ... charging that Saddam Hussein was the hidden mastermind behind a decade of jihadist terror. While refuted by the 9/11 Commission and mainstream terror experts, these claims had a political effect."

Looks like it's time to stop the epidemic of denial that has the foreign-policy community convinced that an attack on Iran is out of the question. Before it's too late.

Crooks and Liars puts out and action alert on Iran (it's about time! let's hope it's the first of many!).

For some lighter reading, there is always the topic of loose nukes.

Chomsky on 9/11, Mike Scheuer, Iran attack plans,

Chomsky gives an interview on 9/11.

Q: How do you observe the influence of the 9-11 terrorist attack on the international community now? Is that influence stronger or weaker than right after the attack?

A: The first thing I said [right after 9-11] was that it is obvious that every government in the world is going to use this as an excuse to intensify its own repression and often violence. [And governments] would use it to control their own citizens with things called protection against terrorism acts, increasing governmental control over citizens. So it was predictable that every power system would exploit it as an excuse. Of course it (the invasion of Iraq) had a major impact on world affairs [It] has also significantly increased the threat of terror.

It did happen, far beyond what was anticipated. In fact, in the latest estimate I have seen, the official statistic is that terror increased by a factor of 7 as a result of the invasion in Iraq.

That's why many specialists like Michael Scheuer (Head of the Osama Bin Laden sector of the CIA under Clinton) describe (US President George W) Bush as Bin Laden's main ally. He says he is doing whatever he wants to do, so acted in such a way as to justify his appeal to the Islamic world and increased the threat of terror.

Listen to an interview with Scheuer here.

British Academics warn that US is prepare Shock & Awe on Iran.

And Chris Floyd on the new base the Pentagon is building on the Iranian border.

Iran developments, various reading on 9/11, bin Laden,the draft, racism, and more.

The Agonist shows how to plan in insane war in three fun filled steps, including more on building of base on the Iranian border. Hmmmm I wonder how we would react if China built the base in Toronto or Vancouver BC?

In what I see as some good news, there is some dissent going on in the military with CENTCOM Commander Admiral William Fallon at odds with his subordinate and BushCo affiliate General David Petraeus. FYI, Fallon is in charge of CENTCOM which mean central command, which includes Afghanistan, Iraq, and... Iran. Luckily for everyone he has said that an attack on Iran "on his watch." He is also threatened to resign and go public if ordered to do so. He is not alone thankfully, joined by unanimous support among the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Now for the not so great news. Michael Salla writes some very interesting article about the recent B-52 nuclear weapons fiasco and some really fishy insider-trading.

On August 30, a B-52 bomber armed with five nuclear-tipped Advanced Cruise missiles traveled from Minot Air Force base, North Dakota, to Barksdale Air Force base, Louisiana. Each missile had an adjustable yield between five and 150 kilotons of TNT which is at the lower end of the destructive capacities of U.S. nuclear weapons. For example, the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima had a yield of 13 kilotons, while the Bravo Hydrogen bomb test of 1954 had a yield of 15,000 kilotons. The B-52 story was first covered in the Army Times on September 5 after the nuclear armed aircraft was discovered by Airmen (see: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/09/marine_nuclear_B52_070904w/ ). What made this a very significant event was that it was a violation of U.S. Air Force regulations concerning the transportation of nuclear weapons by air. Nuclear weapons are normally transported by air in specially constructed planes designed to prevent radioactive pollution in case of a crash. Such transport planes are not equipped to launch the nuclear weapons they routinely carry around the U.S. and the world for servicing or positioning.

Conclusion: Exposing those Responsible for the B-52 Incident

Consequently, there is considerable circumstantial evidence to argue that the nuclear armed B-52 was part of a covert operation, outside the regular chain of military command. The most plausible authority responsible for this was Vice President Cheney. He very likely used the Secret Service to take charge of a contrived National Special Security Event involving a nuclear armed B-52 that would be flown from Minot AFB. The B-52 was directed to Barksdale Air Force base where it would have conducted a covert mission to the Middle East involving the detonation of one or more nuclear weapons most likely in or in the vicinity of Iran. This could either have occurred during a conventional military strike against Iran, or a False Flag operation in the Persian Gulf region.

The leaking and discovery of the nuclear armed B-52 at Barksdale was not part of the script. According to a confidential source of Larry Johnson, a former counter-terrorism official from the State Department and CIA, the discovery of the nuclear armed B-52 was leaked. Johnson concludes: “Did someone at Barksdale try to indirectly warn the American people that the Bush Administration is staging nukes for Iran? I don’t know, but it is a question worth asking.” http://tpmcafe.com/blog/coffeehouse/2007/sep/05/staging_nuke_for_iran

NewsHoggers reports that there is a growing effort to oust Mohammed El Baradei.

By Cernig

The Bush administration are mounting another major attempt, behind the scenes, to oust Mohammed El Baradei. Bush and his supporters have had the knives out for the IAEA's director ever since he said prior to the invasion that Iraq had no WMD's and was proven right.

Now, they are annoyed that he has done what the UNSC told him to do - work to clear up outstanding issues regarding Iran's nuclear program. With a whiff of dirty tricks just to add some sleaze to stupidity. Thus proving that they never really cared about solving disputes over Iran's nuclear program or making the world a safer place - they just wanted the IAEA - and thus the UNSC - to rubberstamp their push for war.

Senator Mike Gravel on the lessons of 9/11. Huffpost

Troops are growing increasingly critical and resentful of the occupation. (ht C&L)

“President Eisenhower warned of the growing military industrial complex in his farewell address. Since Dick Cheney can now afford solid gold oil derricks, it’s safe to say we failed Ike miserably. After losing two friends and over a dozen comrades, I have this to say: Do not wage war unless it is absolutely, positively the last ditch effort for survival,” wrote Spc. Alex Horton, 22, of the 3rd Stryker Brigade in Army of Dude. “In the future, I want my children to grow up with the belief that what I did here was wrong, in a society that doesn’t deem that idea unpatriotic,” he blogged.

Professor Juan Cole questions the authenticity of the recent bin Laden video.

the LA Times reports understudy confirming the differences between liberals and conservatives' brain functioning.

Here is interesting article about warfare and the draft.

And no folks, racism is not a thing of the past, it's very much institutionalized and a way of life in some parts of America.

Iran Attack Summary

Professor Barnett Rubin concludes,

The alternative of war will have terrible effects including:

• No support for the U.S. from any country but Israel (though Saudi Arabia and other Arab states may not be too unhappy) and the demolition of whatever still remains of the U.S.’s international standing except as a warmaking power; that reputation will also quickly dissipate as this war, too, fails to achieve its objectives.
  
• Rapid deterioration of security in (at least) Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan; note that much of the support for Benazir Bhutto, whom the U.S. hopes will help shepherd a political transition in Pakistan, comes from Pakistani Shi’a, who will turn violently anti-American in the event of an attack on Iran; northern Afghanistan is also under the de facto control of groups supported by Iran against the Taliban; the government of Iraq in Baghdad will oppose an attack on Iran, but our new friends in Anbar province, whom President Bush visited on Labor Day and who fought Iran for Saddam Hussein, will support it and maybe even volunteer to fight.
• Gasoline prices may reach $7/gallon within a week and probably go higher rapidly, especially if Iran makes even partially successful attempts to block the Strait of Hormuz.
• Either there will be a movement of national solidarity against invasion in Iran from across the entire Iranian political spectrum, or (less likely) Iran will collapse into some kind of civil disorder, with nuclear materials littered about.
• Hizbullah and Hamas will unleash missile attacks and perhaps suicide bombings on Israel, and Israel will respond harshly in Lebanon and Gaza (at least).
• Such an attack will also have other unpredictable consequences, which I will therefore not try to predict.

What course of action do I suggest?

The immediate goal for Democratic presidential candidates and the Democrats (and sensible Republicans) in Congress should be to use the power of the legislative branch to prevent the administration from launching a war. I can think of two possible ways to do this:

• Pass an Act of Congress stating that the 2001 AUMF does not authorize a preemptive strike against Iran (or a strike in response to an alleged provocation – recall Tonkin Gulf). In this case, Congress would claim that war with Iran requires new authorization.
• Cut off funding for any war with Iran not specifically authorized by Congress in accordance with the law after September 30, when spending starts out of next year’s budget. Presumably they won’t be able to start the war by then and rely on the “support the troops” argument.

Iran Developments...

UPI is on target with a good summary on the War Rollout,

By DAVID ISENBERG
UPI Outside View Commentator
WASHINGTON, Sept. 5 (UPI) -- White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card once famously said of the administration’s 2002 campaign to get support for the invasion of Iraq, ''From a marketing point of view, you don't introduce new products in August.''

Now August is behind us, and -- right on schedule -- marketers both in the White House and among their supporters outside are rolling out their newest product, a public relations blitz urging a U.S. military adventure in Iran.

Michael Scheuer, Former head of the bin Laden unit at the CIA writes about the "threat" Iran poses:

And then there is Iran. How does one explain the U.S. governing elite's fear of Iran? Here we have a country that admittedly is led by one of the world's more histrionic politicians, but one that also is ringed by U.S. military bases and surrounded by an overwhelmingly more numerous Sunni world that hates Shi'ites far more than it hates Westerners. Iran‘s Islamic regime, moreover, is helplessly watching the final stages of the march of its energy resources toward oblivion, and preparing for the impoverishment and resulting internal political instability that event will usher in.

So where in this portrait is the threat to the United States? While Iran is a threat to Israel, there is surely no threat to America in Iran's less-than-impressive military forces, nuclear development program, or unattractive public diplomacy. No, the threat to the United States comes from two sources. First, the relentless "Iran is the new Nazi Germany" propaganda pushed by Israel and the American citizen Israel-firsters, and, second, the multi-decade failure of the U.S. Congress to seriously address the national-security issues of energy, borders, and immigration.

As in the case of Syria – although for fewer years because Iran's previous tyrant was on America's side until the Mullahs seized power in 1979 – most American adults have grown up with the idea that Iran is a dire threat to U.S. national security. Sparked mainly by memories of the U.S. embassy hostages held for 400-plus days while President Carter diddled, Americans have been ripe for the delusions induced by the periodic visits of Binyamin Netanyahu and other Israeli politicians, and their well-staged rants that equate the creaky, mostly foreign-purchased, and slightly more than tin-pot military machine of the Ayatollahs with Hitler's Wehrmacht, the product of an extremely modern industrial economy, a united populace ready for revenge against its conquerors, and the Germans' apparently genetic talent and taste for war. To say that Netanyahu, other Israeli politicians, and their American Israel-first supporters are being disingenuous in pushing the Iranian threat would be incorrect. They are consistently and blatantly lying.

No, the threat to the United States from Iran is not military, it is rather from America‘s most dangerous home-grown terrorists – the U.S. Congress. Iran threatens America economically because it has the capability to disrupt oil production in Saudi Arabia's Eastern province. Such an Iranian effort would be a casus belli for the United States only because the U.S. Congress has done nothing more substantial than advance Daylight Savings Time by three weeks since the Saudi-led embargoes of the 1970s. Thirty-five years of the Congress' utter failure to address energy security as a top priority national interest has made Iran a threat to America that it otherwise could not be.

MSNBC spewing more Propaganda,

Digby follows up on the Nuclear weapons story,

Nukes for Iran

Former CIA Officer Larry Johnson writes at No Quarter,

Why the hubbub over a B-52 taking off from a B-52 base in Minot, North Dakota and subsequently landing at a B-52 base in Barksdale, Louisiana? That’s like getting excited if you see a postal worker in uniform walking out of a post office. And how does someone watching a B-52 land identify the cruise missiles as nukes? It just does not make sense.

So I called a old friend and retired B-52 pilot and asked him. What he told me offers one compelling case of circumstantial evidence. My buddy, let’s call him Jack D. Ripper, reminded me that the only times you put weapons on a plane is when they are on alert or if you are tasked to move the weapons to a specific site.

Then he told me something I had not heard before.

Barksdale Air Force Base is being used as a jumping off point for Middle East operations. Gee, why would we want cruise missile nukes at Barksdale Air Force Base. Can’t imagine we would need to use them in Iraq. Why would we want to preposition nuclear weapons at a base conducting Middle East operations?

His final point was to observe that someone on the inside obviously leaked the info that the planes were carrying nukes. A B-52 landing at Barksdale is a non-event. A B-52 landing with nukes. That is something else.

Propaganda on Iran, why Bush will get away with it

Glenn Greenwald provides an excellent analysis of the starting media propaganda campaign for war.

Rolling out the New Product over at No Quarter, discussing some of the "coincidental" propaganda that is coming out indicting Iran.

News Hounds documents the warmongering Michael Ledeen as he sprouts out various lies and propaganda while Hannity salivates at the thought of another illegal war of aggression, which by the way, is what we hung the Nazis for... I'm just saying. ( with video)

The De.cider on Iran over at The Next Hurrah discussing some of the finer intellectual points coming out of The Commander Guys'.

Jean Bricmont makes an argument on why he thinks Bush will get away with an attack on Iran.

Various Reads

Scott Horton of Harper's on why Bush is going to war with Iran in the significance of his recent photo op,

Still, why the unannounced sudden stop in Iraq? A few explanations. One, Bush announced what the so-called Petraeus Report will tell us. Evidently, the Surge is a success and this will justify a draw-down before the end of the year. So no need for General Petraeus to finish up that report; we know what it will say.

But here’s the news that may be lurking just behind the news. Military commanders urged a draw-down to occur before the commencement of military operations against Iran. Bush is accepting this recommendation only because he has mentally committed to an aerial campaign against Iran. He will therefore follow the general’s advice to get soldiers out of harm’s way, off to positions which are more secure in the event of an Iranian counterattack.

Throughout the Gulf area, moves are underway at this moment which are consistent with preparation for an aerial assault on Iran.

And how will the Bush appearance in Anbar be understood inside of the region? Bush aligns himself with Iraq’s Sunni minority, against the Shi’a Government in Baghdad, and in preparation for a massive attack on Shi’a Iran. We’re witnessing the latest dramatic summersault in U.S. policy on Iraq, and most of our brain dead punditry on the Potomac hardly even seem to notice.

Bush and his core White House team have come to a key conclusion. The Iraq War is going very poorly. Time for a new war.

Obama adds fuel to the Bush fire,

the Washington Times reports on the Sarkozy visit to the Bush compound and what it means for Iran,

then, Barrett Rubin follows up on his lead uncovering the propaganda push for war,

Various Reads on Iran

Gareth Porter on Israel urging an attack on Iran not Iraq in the Asia Times,

Israel urged US to attack Iran - not Iraq

By Gareth Porter
WASHINGTON - Israeli officials warned the George W Bush administration that an invasion of Iraq would be destabilizing to the region and urged the United States instead to target Iran as the primary enemy, according to former Bush administration official Lawrence Wilkerson.

Wilkerson, then a member of the US State Department's policy planning staff and later chief of staff for secretary of state Colin Powell, recalled in an interview that the Israelis reacted
immediately to indications that the Bush administration was thinking of war against Iraq. After the Israeli government picked up the first signs of that intention, said Wilkerson, "The Israelis were telling us Iraq is not the enemy - Iran is the enemy."

Wilkerson describes the Israeli message to the Bush administration in early 2002 as being, "If you are going to destabilize the balance of power, do it against the main enemy."

Vineyardsaker reports on the 200,000+ US hostages Iran will take soon,

David Bromwich in an intelligent essay on Israel and Iran, here is a snippet but I do reccomend reading it all,

But now the American war with Iran they originally wanted is coming closer. Last Tuesday, when the mass media were crammed to distraction with the behavior of a senator in an airport washroom, few could be troubled to notice an important speech by President Bush. If Iran is allowed to persist in its present state, the president told the American Legion convention in Reno, it threatens "to put a region already known for instability and violence under the shadow of a nuclear holocaust." He said he had no intention of allowing that; and so he has "authorized our military commanders in Iraq to confront Tehran's murderous activities." Those words come close to saying not that a war is coming but that it is already here. No lawmaker who reads them can affect the slightest shock at any action the president takes against Iran.

George Packer of the New Yorker, confirming the propaganda push,

Postscript: Barnett Rubin just called me. His source spoke with a neocon think-tanker who corroborated the story of the propaganda campaign and had this to say about it: “I am a Republican. I am a conservative. But I’m not a raging lunatic. This is lunatic."

Todd Gitlin of TPM Cafe with similar discussion,

Alan Bock of Antiwar.com, once a skeptic who downplayed the likelyhood of an attack on Iran, now a "little less certain."

Howard A. Rodman of Huffington Post, also once a skeptic, now describes how he stopped worrying and learned to love the bombing of Iran. Plus, he throws in this gem,

As Bush this weekend was disclosed to have said to his biographer, "I made a decision to lead... One, it makes you unpopular; two, it makes people accuse you of unilateral arrogance, and that may be true. But the fundamental question is, is the world better off as a result of your leadership?"

Iranian-Americian Reza Aslan describes the attitude of Iranians inside Iran (looking up in the sky waiting for the bombs to drop),

And finally US Navy Commander Jeff Huber analyzes the latest bellicose rhetoric at his blog.

Chris Hedges explores the coming confrontation

via Truthdig,

But then what? We don’t have the troops to invade. And we don’t have anyone minding the helm who knows the slightest thing about Persian culture or the Middle East. There is no one in power in Washington with the empathy to get it. We will lurch blindly into a catastrophe of our own creation.

It is not hard to imagine what will happen. Iranian Shabab-3 and Shabab-4 missiles, which cannot reach the United States, will be launched at Israel, as well as American military bases and the Green Zone in Baghdad. Expect massive American casualties, especially in Iraq, where Iranian agents and their Iraqi allies will be able to call in precise coordinates. The Strait of Hormuz, which is the corridor for 20 percent of the world’s oil supply, will be shut down. Chinese-supplied C-801 and C-802 anti-shipping missiles, mines and coastal artillery will target U.S. shipping, along with Saudi oil production and oil export centers. Oil prices will skyrocket to well over $4 a gallon. The dollar will tumble against the euro. Hezbollah forces in southern Lebanon, interpreting the war as an attack on all Shiites, will fire rockets into northern Israel. Israel, already struck by missiles from Tehran, will begin retaliatory raids on Lebanon and Iran. Pakistan, with a huge Shiite minority, will reach greater levels of instability. The unrest could result in the overthrow of the weakened American ally President Pervez Musharraf and usher into power Islamic radicals. Pakistan could become the first radical Islamic state to possess a nuclear weapon. The neat little war with Iran, which few Democrats oppose, has the potential to ignite a regional inferno.

We have rendered the nation deaf and dumb. We no longer have the capacity for empathy. We prefer to amuse ourselves with trivia and gossip that pass for news rather than understand. We are blinded by our military prowess. We believe that huge explosions and death are an effective form of communication. And the rest of the world is learning to speak our language.

great article on the morality of an American attack

Steve D writes a concise yet eloquent essay covering the morality of a US attack on Iran. topics such as Just War Theory and the Athenians bellicose war on the Melians are covered.

Bush planning war on Iran

Marjorie Cohn concludes (from Commondreams),

It’s up to the people. As Noam Chomsky said, “The most effective barrier to a White House decision to launch a war [on Iran] is the kind of organized popular opposition that frightened the political-military leadership enough in 1968 that they were reluctant to send more troops to Vietnam.”

read whole article.

Barnett R. Rubin with more on Iran

Administration's Iran, drug policies endanger Afghanistan

The Sunday Times of London reports from Washington a story I have not seen in any U.S. media: that "the Pentagon has drawn up plans for massive air strikes against 1,200 targets in Iran, designed to annihilate the Iranians’ military capability in three days." This report, attributed to Alexis Debat, director of terrorism and national security at the Nixon Center, is consistent with the diary on DailyKos that I cited yesterday reporting that a Naval Officer on an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf warned that all operational planning for such a strike had been completed.

According to Debat, speaking at a meeting sponsored by the journal National Interest, edited by Irving Kristol, father of Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol:

US military planners were not preparing for “pinprick strikes” against Iran’s nuclear facilities. “They’re about taking out the entire Iranian military,” he said.

As in the run-up to the war in Iraq, President Bush is maintaining the fiction that he is "committed for now to the diplomatic route," but many signs indicate that the decision to attack has been taken as irrevocably as the decision to attack Iraq in the fall of 2002.

The legal argument to bypass the U.S. Congress has already been floated. As I noted in my DailyKos post:

The U.S. cannot mount a ground invasion or occupation of Iran, but it might be capable of an air attack and sea embargo. The administration has prepared a legal justification by floating its plan to designate the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization. Since the IRGC is under the command of the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, the administration, with its usual legal acuity, could claim legal authority for an attack on Iran under Senate Joint Resolution 23 of September 18, 2001,which authorized the use of military force against "those who plan, authorize, commit, or aid terrorist attacks against the United States and its interests -- including those who harbor terrorists."

Will President Bush bomb Iran?

via the Telegraph.

On Tuesday, President Bush dramatically stepped up his war of words with the Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whom the US government accuses of overseeing a covert programme to develop nuclear weapons. In a speech to war veterans, Mr Bush 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."

He went on to condemn Iranian meddling in Iraq, where America increasingly blames the deaths of its soldiers on Iranian bombs and missiles. Mr Bush made clear that he had authorised military commanders to confront "Iran's murderous activities".