Bomb Iran? U.S. Requests Bunker-Buster Bombs

from ABC News:

Bomb Iran? U.S. Requests Bunker-Buster Bombs
White House Bomber Request Leaves Some Wondering if U.S. Is Preparing Action in Iran

By JONATHAN KARL

Oct. 24, 2007 —

Tucked inside the White House's $196 billion emergency funding request for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is an item that has some people wondering whether the administration is preparing for military action against Iran.

The item: $88 million to modify B-2 stealth bombers so they can carry a newly developed 30,000-pound bomb called the massive ordnance penetrator, or, in military-speak, the MOP.

The MOP is the the military's largest conventional bomb, a super "bunker-buster" capable of destroying hardened targets deep underground. The one-line explanation for the request said it is in response to "an urgent operational need from theater commanders."

What urgent need? The Pentagon referred questions on this to Central Command.

ABC News called CENTCOM to ask what the "urgent operational need" is. CENTCOM spokesman Maj. Todd White said he would look into it, but, so far, no answer.

There doesn't appear to be any potential targets for a bomb like that in Iraq. It could potentially be used on Taliban or al Qaeda hideouts in the caves along the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, but there would be no need to use a stealth bomber there.

So where would the military use a stealth bomber armed with a 30,000-pound bomb like this? Defense analysts say the most likely target for this bomb would be Iran's flagship nuclear facility in Natanz, which is both heavily fortified and deeply buried.

"You'd use it on Natanz," said John Pike of GlobalSecurity.org. "And you'd use it on a stealth bomber because you want it to be a surprise. And you put in an emergency funding request because you want to bomb quickly."

"It's kind of strange," Pike said. "It sends a signal that you are preparing to bomb Iran, and if you were actually going to bomb Iran I wouldn't think you would want to announce it like that."

The MOP is a massive bomb -- 20 feet long and encased in 3.5 inch thick high-performance steel. It is designed to penetrate up to 200 feet underground before exploding.

The bomb was developed by Northrop Grumman and Boeing for the Pentagon's Defense Threat Reduction Agency.

In an interview earlier this year with Air Force Times, Bob Hastie, the manager of the MOP program explained its purpose: "We have a mission to defeat ... hard and deeply buried targets where our adversary would have the support structure for WMD-type systems."

Copyright © 2007 ABC News Internet Ventures

Oil and social gains

Oil and social gains
WHY U.S. IS TARGETING IRAN

By Sara Flounders
StopWarOnIran.org

“The forces opposing Washington’s policy of endless war--whether waged through sanctions, coups, invasions, bombings or sabotage--should stand with Iran, recognize its accomplishments, defend its gains and oppose imperialism’s efforts to re-colonize the country.”

Why is Iran increasingly a target of U.S. threats? Who in Iran will be affected if the Pentagon implements plans, already drawn up, to strike more than 10,000 targets in the first hours of a U.S. air barrage on Iran?

What changes in policy is Washington demanding of the Iranian government?

In the face of the debacle U.S. imperialism is facing in Iraq, U.S. threats against Iran are discussed daily. This is not a secret operation. They can't be considered idle threats.

Two aircraft carriers--USS Eisenhower and USS Stennis--are still off the coast of Iran, each one accompanied by a carrier strike group containing Hornet and Superhornet fighter-bombers, electronic warfare aircraft, anti-submarine and refueler planes, and airborne command-and-control planes. Six guided-missile destroyers are also part of the armada.

Besides this vast array of firepower, the Pentagon has bases throughout the Middle East able to attack Iran with cruise missiles and hundreds of warplanes.

In fact, the U.S. is already engaged in a war on Iran. Ever-tightening sanctions, from both the U.S. and U.N., restrict trade and the ordering of equipment, spare parts and supplies.

Seymour Hersh reported in the New Yorker magazine a year ago that U.S. special operations forces were already operating inside Iran in preparation for a possible attack. U.S.-backed covert operatives had entered Iran to organize sabotage, car bombings, kidnappings and attacks on civilians, to collect targeting data and to foment anti-government ethnic-minority groups.

News articles have reported in recent months that the Pentagon has drawn up plans for a military blitz that would strike 10,000 targets in the first day of attacks. The aim is to destroy not just military targets but also airports, rail lines, highways, bridges, ports, communication centers, power grids, industrial centers, hospitals and public buildings.

It is important to understand internal developments in Iran today in order to understand why this country is the focus of such continued hatred by U.S. corporate power.

Every leading U.S. political figure has weighed in on the issue, from George W. Bush, who has the power to order strikes, to Hillary Clinton, who has made her support for an attack on Iran clear, to John McCain, who answered a reporter's question on policy toward Iran by chanting "Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran" to the tune of the Beach Boys' song, "Barbara Ann." The media--from the New York Times to the Washington Post to banner headlines in the tabloid press to right-wing radio talk shows--are playing a role in preparing the public for an attack.

The significance of oil production and oil reserves in Iran is well known. Every news article, analysis or politician's threat makes mention of Iran’s oil. But the impact of Iran’s nationalization of its oil resources is not well known.

The corporate owners in the U.S. want to keep it a secret from the people here. They use all the power of their media to demonize the Iranian leadership and caricature and ridicule the entire population, their culture and religion.

What’s been achieved?

The focus of media coverage here is to describe Iran as medieval, backward and feudal while somehow becoming a nuclear power.

It is never mentioned that more than half the university students in Iran are women, or that more than a third of the doctors, 60 percent of civil servants and 80 percent of all teachers in Iran are women. At the time of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, 90 percent of rural women were illiterate; in towns the figure was over 45 percent.

Also ignored is the stunning achievement of full literacy for Iranian youth.

Even the World Bank, now headed by Bush's neocon appointee Paul Wolfowitz, in its development report on countries admits that Iran has exceeded the social gains of other countries in the Middle East.

According to that report, Iran has made the most progress in eliminating gender disparities in education. Large numbers of increasingly well-educated women have entered the work force.

Iran’s comprehensive social protection system includes the highest level of pensions, disability insurance, job training programs, unemployment insurance and disaster-relief programs. National subsidies make basic food, housing and energy affordable to all.

An extensive national network going from primary health and preventive care to sophisticated hospital care covers the entire population, both urban and rural. More than 16,000 "health houses" are the cornerstone of the health care system. Using simple technology, they provide vaccines, preventive care, care for respiratory infections, diarrheal diseases, family planning and contraceptive information, and pre-natal care. And they monitor children’s nutrition and general health.

Since 1990, Iran nearly halved the infant mortality rate and increased life expectancy by 10 years.

Iran sets record in family planning

A national family planning program, delivered through the primary health care facilities and accompanied by a dramatic increase in contraceptive use, which is approved by Islamic law, has led to a world record demographic change in family size and maternal and child health. All forms of contraception are now available for free.

In addition promoting women’s education and employment, while extending social security and retirement benefits, has alleviated the pressure to have many children to protect security as parents grow older. The fertility rate between 1976 and 2000 declined from 8.1 births per woman to 2.4 births in rural areas and 1.8 births in urban areas.

These social programs, which cover the entire population of almost 70 million people, should be compared to conditions in countries in the region that remain under U.S. military and economic domination.

In Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, only a tiny part of the population has benefited from the vast profits generated by oil and gas resources. In each of these countries the bulk of the people are not even considered citizens. Millions are immigrant workers, usually the overwhelming majority of the population, who have no rights to any representation, participation or any social, health or educational programs or union protection.

Women in these countries face much more than religious restrictions on clothing. They are barred from jobs, equal education and the right to control their own bodies or their own funds. They cannot vote or even drive a car.

In Iraq, which before U.S. attacks began in 1991 had some of the best conditions in the region for women, plus a high level of education, health, nutrition and social services, the conditions of life have now deteriorated to the level of the very poorest countries in the world. Legislation passed by the U.S.-installed puppet government has stripped women of rights that were guaranteed earlier.

Revolution made it all possible

The social gains of millions of Iranians are based on the upsurge of the Iranian masses in the 1979 revolution. The overthrow of the U.S.-backed Shah and the Pahlavi dynasty broke the hold of U.S. corporate power in Iran.

The Iranian Revolution was not a socialist revolution. Bourgeois rights to own businesses, land, wealth and inheritance are still protected by law and by the state apparatus.

But the greatest source of wealth--Iran's oil and gas--was nationalized. Nationalization means the transfer of privately owned assets and operations into public ownership. The exploration, drilling, maintenance, transport, refining and shipping of oil and gas became the national property of the Iranian people. Formerly this entire process was controlled at every step by Western imperialists, particularly U.S. and British corporations.

Most of the administrators, executives, technicians and engineers who controlled the process used to be from the West. Through hundreds of thousands of contracts and sub-contracts, U.S. and British firms extracted a profit not just through the sale of oil on the world markets but at every step of its extraction and refining. The small portion of profit the Shah's government received, as in the Gulf States today, was spent on luxury items imported from Western corporations for the small ruling elite and on infrastructure and weapons systems purchased from U.S. military corporations, again at an enormous profit.

The 1979 Iranian revolution, even though it brought a religious group to power, was a profoundly radical and anti-imperialist revolution. Demonstrations of millions openly confronted the brutally repressive police apparatus called the Savak, who protected the small handful of corrupt U.S. collaborators. Religious fervor, demands for social justice and militant anti-imperialism were bound together in opposition to the U.S.-imposed Shah and the Pahlavi royal family, which was hated for its program of a glitzy modernization of the urban infrastructure alongside the growing impoverishment of both urban and rural workers, farmers and much of the middle class.

All classes of society were profoundly shaken as millions of revolutionary workers took to the streets. This was reflected not only in laws passed in Parliament but in the Iranian constitution itself. The constitution states that the government is required to provide every citizen with access to social security for retirement, unemployment, old age, disability, accidents, health and medical treatment--out of public revenue.

Prior to the revolution Iran had a shortage of medical staff and of trained personnel of every kind. During the upheaval of the revolution and the years of the Iran-Iraq war, many physicians, scientific and skilled personnel emigrated.

Having broken free of U.S. corporate domination and control of its resources, Iran was able to develop education, industry and infrastructure with unprecedented speed. By 2004 the number of university students had increased by six times over 1979. There are currently 2.2 million college students. The largest and most prestigious programs encompass 54 state universities and 42 state medical schools where tuition, room and board are totally free. In addition, 289 major private universities also receive substantial funding.

Millions of scientists, engineers, technicians, administrators, military officers, teachers, civil servants and doctors have been trained.

Today Iran boasts modern cities, a large auto industry, and miles of new roads, railroads and subways. Currently 55 Iranian pharmaceutical companies produce 96 percent of the medicines on the market in Iran. This allows a national insurance system to reimburse drug expenses.

Soon to become operational is the largest pharmaceutical complex in southwest Asia, which will produce compound drugs, making Iran a pioneer in biotechnology.

Years of U.S. sanctions and pressure on international financial institutions have had an unexpected result: Iran is free of the crippling debt that has strangled so many developing countries. According to World Bank figures, Iran’s external debt is one of the lowest for its size: $11.9 billion, or 8.8 percent of the GDP. From the point of view of the imperialist world bankers, this means the loss of many billions each year in interest payments to them.

Different approaches

Since 1979 there have been deep struggles inside Iran over how to deal with the unrelenting pressure of the imperialist powers. There are differing approaches on developments plans and who is favored or benefits most from these plans. But all of the present forces are committed to maintaining Iran's control of its resources.

Iran is not a monolithic state. No state is or could be. There are contending groups even within the Muslim clergy that reflect different economic interests and class forces. This is true also in the Iranian Parliament and among various political parties and leaders.

Under President Mohammed Khatami, from 1997 to 2005, a "Reform Movement" eased religious and social restrictions. But it also allowed the introduction of neo-liberal economic policies, structural reforms and the de-nationalizing or privatizing of some social programs along with the cutting of subsidies. More joint ventures were initiated with European and Japanese capital. Programs that benefited the "private sector" or the wealthy and the middle class grew. This was the core of Khatami’s base.

The current leader, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's first non-cleric president in 24 years, was elected in 2005 in a landslide victory after promising to extend social security and pensions, improve the subsidies for food and housing, deal with rising unemployment and guarantee a monthly stipend.

The Iranian people are determined to protect the substantial gains they have made since the revolution. They are not interested in any effort that turns the clock back.

A Wall Street Journal Commentary by Francis Fukuyama on Feb. 1 was unusually frank in explaining the growing problem faced by U.S. corporate power on a global scale:

“What is it that leaders like Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Hezbollah's Hassan Nasrallah and Venezuela's Hugo Chavez have in common that vastly increases their local appeal? A foreign policy built around anti-Americanism is, of course, a core component. But what has allowed them to win elections and build support in their societies is less their foreign-policy stances than their ability to promise, and to a certain extent deliver on, social policy--things like education, health and other social services, particularly for the poor….

“The U.S. and the political groups that it tends to support around the world, by contrast, have relatively little to offer in this regard.”

Past and new threats

Iran's program for nuclear power was actually initiated by the U.S. when the Shah held dictatorial power. Nuclear energy is an important part of modern industrial development. It is important in science, medicine and research. Only after the overthrow of the Shah was Iran’s continued development of the same program branded a threat by Washington.

The U.S. government has made every effort to sabotage all Iranian infrastructure and industrial development, not only nuclear energy. Modern technology--from elevators to cars, ships, jet aircraft and oil refineries--needs constant upkeep. Parts for the re-supply and maintenance of equipment the Iranians had purchased over decades from U.S. corporations were halted.

The most onerous sanctions were imposed in 1995 during the Clinton administration.

The Iranian people, despite many different political currents, are united in their determination not to lose their national sovereignty again. Washington's past use of sanctions, economic sabotage, political destabilization and regime change is well remembered in Iran today.

Sanctions, the freezing of assets and an embargo on the export of Iranian oil and all trade with Iran were first imposed in March 1951, after Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh nationalized the Anglo-Iranian Oil Co. Iran was the first country in the Middle East to take the bold step of reclaiming its national wealth in the post-colonial era.

In 1953 using internal destabilization and massive external pressure, the CIA orchestrated the overthrow of Mossadegh's popularly elected government and placed the Shah on the Peacock Throne. Oil was back under the control of the U.S. and Britain, and 26 years of brutal repression followed.

Ever since the 1979 revolution and the decisive overthrow of the U.S.-supported military dictatorship, Iran has had not a moment of peace from the Pentagon or Wall Street.

As Iran continues to grow and develop, U.S. imperialism is becoming increasingly desperate to reverse this revolutionary process, whether through sanctions, sabotage or bombing. But today it faces a population that is stronger, more conscious and more skilled. On a world scale U.S. imperialism is more isolated. Its hated occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan has left it overextended.

But the Pentagon is still capable of massive destruction. Its bases surround Iran and it has sent an armada of ships to the Gulf. U.S. government threats against Iran today must be taken as seriously as their devastating occupation of Iraq.

The forces opposing Washington’s policy of endless war--whether waged through sanctions, coups, invasions, bombings or sabotage--should stand with Iran, recognize its accomplishments, defend its gains and oppose imperialism’s efforts to re-colonize the country.



Sources of information about Iran's social development include: "Iran’s Family Planning Program: Responding to a Nation’s Needs," by Farzaneh Roudi-Fahimi, Population Reference Bureau, Washington, D.C., June 2002; "Tehran University Official Describes Iran Health Care System to Harvard School of Public Health," HSPH NOW, Jan. 24, 2003; World Bank.org--Iran--Country Brief; UNICEF--Info by Country; Food & Agriculture Organization of UN--Nutrition--Country Profiles; "Biggest Pharmaceutical Plant to Open Soon," Iran Daily, Feb. 4, 2007.

US imposes harsh new sanctions against Iran

By Matthew Moore

Last Updated: 5:01pm BST 25/10/2007

The US has announced sweeping economic sanctions against Iran designed to punish the regime for its nuclear programme and support for terrorists.

Analysis: Iran reaching the point of no return Iran divided by nuclear policy power struggle News Review: Inside the real Iran The measures are the harshest imposed on Teheran since 1979, and mark a new phase in the international campaign against President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's regime. Henry Paulson, US Treasury Secretary, and Condoleezza Rice, US Secretary of State, announce the sanctions The British Government immediately gave its backing to the US action, and pledged to lead the campaign for new EU and UN sanctions. Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, said the package represented "a comprehensive policy to confront the threatening behaviour of the Iranians". Today's announcement comes after weeks of increasingly pugnacious exchanges between Washington and Teheran. Earlier this month President George W Bush warned of "World War Three" unless Iran's nuclear ambitions were tackled. Iran's Revolutionary Guards, Defence Ministry and a number of banks and companies linked to the ruling regime will be hit by the measures, which effectively cut them off from the international banking system. full article

US announces sanctions against Iran's Revolutionary Guards

Escalating tensions over Iran's nuclear programs culminate in an 'unprecedented package' of economic constraints.

By David Montero

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson announced Thursday morning the harshest set of sanctions against Iran since that country's 1979 revolution, according to the Associated Press.

In the broadest U.S. unilateral penalties on Iran since the takeover ofthe U.S. Embassy in 1979, the administration slapped sanctions onIran's Revolutionary Guard Corps, a main unit of its defense ministry,three of its largest banks and eight people that it said are engaged inmissile trade and back extremist groups throughout the Middle East.

The sanctions target 25 Iranian entities, including individuals and companies owned or controlled by the Revolutionary Guard that play a major role in Iran’s domestic economy and international trade. They are the first of their type taken by the United States specifically against the armed forces of another government

Britain's Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, echoed the US's earlier calls for sanctions on the Iranian government by the United Nations (UN), saying it, too, would push for further sanctions against Iran, NewsDay reports. The Bush administration conceded last month to Chinese and Russian demands that the UN Security Council wait until November before leveling more sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

full article

U.S. Sanctions On Iran Take Crisis To New Level

U.S. Sanctions On Iran Take Crisis To New Level

By Jeffrey Donovan

Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps

(AFP)

October 25, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- With one fell swoop of the U.S. government’s pen, Washington has hit Iran with some of the strongest U.S. unilateral sanctions since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, singling out Iran’s Defense Ministry, Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), and its elite Quds Force in a move that is likely to send the crisis over Tehran’s nuclear program to a new level of tension and uncertainty.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson announced the much-anticipated move at a news conference in Washington today. They said the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush had designated the IRGC as a proliferator of weapons of mass destruction and the Quds Force as a supporter of terrorism. They said the steps aimed to punish Iran for supporting terrorism in Iraq and the Middle East, as well as for its missile sales and nuclear activities.

Rice said Iran “continues to spurn our offer of open negotiations, instead threatening peace and security by pursuing nuclear technologies that can lead to a nuclear weapon, building dangerous ballistic missiles, supporting Shi'ite militants in Iraq, and terrorists in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, and the Palestinian territories." She added that Washington remains open to a “diplomatic solution.”

Financial Pressure

The United States has long labeled Iran as a state supporter of terrorism. But the latest designations appear to be the first ever taken by Washington against a branch of the armed forces of a sovereign nation. The sanctions themselves will target more than 20 Iranian entities, including individuals and firms tied to the IRGC, so that they won’t be able to work within the U.S. banking system. The U.S. Treasury previously had excluded two of Iran’s biggest banks from conducting transactions in U.S. dollars. The new sanctions also will impact the international banking community, some of whose members have also taken steps to financially isolate Iran.

In its role as protector of the revolution, the IRGC has morphed into a huge military and economic conglomerate, heavily involved in Iran’s oil industry, construction, and other key sectors, with personnel in all the major state organizations.

One effect of the moves may be to raise pressure on European countries to take unilateral sanctions of their own against Iran, which would build on recent steps in Germany, for example, to scale back the export credit guarantees it issues for trade with Iran. Britain’s biggest bank, HSBC, said no dollar transactions are being conducted for Iranian clients and that its business links with Tehran are now minimal.

But what the moves might portend more generally -- whether they might hinder or hasten military conflict -- is set to remain at the center of a growing international debate over the coming weeks.

Paulson characterized the new sanctions as a logical step in a series of punitive measures taken recently by the international community to prevent Iran from mastering the techniques of uranium enrichment -- a key step in bomb-making. Iran says its nuclear program is peaceful and within its international rights, but the United States and other Western nations are convinced that it masks a secret drive to develop nuclear weapons.

"Iran exploits its global financial ties to pursue nuclear capabilities, develop ballistic missiles, and fund terrorism,” Paulson said, adding that IRGC economic activities are so extensive that it is hard to know with whom one is doing business in Iran. “Today, we are taking additional steps to combat Iran's dangerous conduct and to engage financial institutions worldwide to make the most informed decisions about those with whom they choose to do business."

A Military-Industrial Conglomerate

The IRGC was founded after the 1979 revolution to protect the new Islamic establishment and prevent a military coup. Today, in its role as protector of the revolution, the IRGC has morphed into a huge military and economic conglomerate, with personnel in all the major state organizations. It is also heavily involved in Iran’s oil industry, construction, and other key sectors.

It also boasts its own military units with ground forces, navy, air force, intelligence, and special forces. The Quds Force is alleged to train and finance Hizballah in Lebanon, Hamas in the Palestinian territories, and Shi’ite militias in Iraq. Many veterans of the organization play a prominent role in government, including President Mahmud Ahmadinejad.

Rasool Nasifi, a Washington-based expert on Iran who has researched the IRGC, believes the new sanctions will be a blow to the organization’s status, prestige, and economic activities.

“The movement of IRGC members abroad would become very, very hard -- especially in neighboring countries. They could easily be detained as terrorists,” Nasifi told Radio Farda recently. “Secondly, because it is a large conglomerate with a tremendous amount of assets and is involved in business, it would not be able to do business with Afghanistan, with Iraq, with neighboring countries; and that's going to be another major issue. Thirdly, if you look at the fact that a large organization like that is put on the [U.S.] list of terrorist organizations and if Interpol accepts that, then it's going to be a major issue for the IRGC, as a legitimate Iranian institution.”

Others, however, are more skeptical of U.S. motives.

Scott Ritter, a former United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq during the 1990s, was a critic of the Bush administration’s pre-war claims about Baghdad’s alleged threat. Ritter now believes that the new moves give Bush a freer hand to eventually take military action against Iran. “It frees the president up to strike the IRGC, and in doing so, to expand the strikes to include the nuclear infrastructure and other forces,” Ritter told RFE/RL in an interview conducted prior to today’s announcement. “Then, the president can claim that he’s not waging war against Iran but only those rogue elements inside Iran.”

In an interview with RFE/RL, Stuart Levey, who has led the Iran sanctions efforts as undersecretary for terrorism at the U.S. Treasury, flatly rejected that view. “We take action based on the evidence, not to somehow lay a pretextual groundwork for anything else,” Levey said at RFE/RL’s Washington headquarters on October 16.

The Iraq Connection

And what is the evidence? The U.S. military in Iraq has repeatedly accused elements connected to the IRGC of training and equipping Shi’ite militia forces in southern Iraq and elsewhere in that country. In particular, the accusations have focused on alleged Quds Forces assistance in training and equipping Shi’ite militias in the fabrication and battlefield use of Explosively Formed Projectiles or EFPs, which rip through tanks and armored cars and reportedly are responsible for most U.S. troop fatalities in Iraq this year.

Most analysts don’t disagree that Shi’ite militants in Iraq have support from within Iran. Rather, the question is more about where that support may be coming from -- whether it can be clearly traced to the Quds Forces -- an organization controlled directly by Iran’s senior political leadership, and which reportedly oversees the country’s nuclear program -- or instead perhaps originates in “rogue elements” tied to the IRGC. Critics say the distinction is vital because it could mean the difference between eventual limited military action aimed at specific targets or a much broader attack perhaps aimed at regime change in Iran.

Speaking on September 27 in Baghdad, U.S. Brigadier General Kevin Bergner said it’s clear who supports the so-called “special groups” -- the splinter Shi’ite militias blamed for many attacks on U.S. forces. The "Quds Force, along with Hizballah instructors, train approximately 20 to 60 Iraqis at a time [in Iran], sending them back to Iraq organized into these special groups.” Bergner said. “They were being taught how to use EFPs, mortars, rockets, as well as intelligence, sniper, and kidnapping operations."

Michael Knights, a British analyst who has spent months studying the Shi’ite special groups in Iraq and their ties to Iran, believes IRGC support for them is obvious. He also believes drawing a fine distinction over whether that support is from Quds or the IRGC in general is beside the point. But he says the Bush administration’s pre-Iraq intelligence record is now coloring perceptions of U.S. policy toward Iran.

“The understanding we have of the Iranian-backed special groups is of an order of magnitude or more beyond what we understood about the internal workings of the [Iraqi] Ba’athist regime,” said Knights, who is the director of risk analysis and assessment at the Olive Group. “But no matter how much evidence you tend to adduce, you hit the credibility barrier. So that’s the ultimate irony, which is that when you didn’t know anything you were believed and wrong, and when you do know quite a lot, you are doubted, even though you are right.”

Shifting Targets - The Administration’s plan for Iran.

by Seymour M. Hersh October 8, 2007

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In a series of public statements in recent months, President Bush and members of his Administration have redefined the war in Iraq, to an increasing degree, as a strategic battle between the United States and Iran. “Shia extremists, backed by Iran, are training Iraqis to carry out attacks on our forces and the Iraqi people,” 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. full article

May 12 Forum : Stopping the War Against Iran

A forum:
Stopping the War Against Iran
What’s behind the U.S. drive for “regime change” in Iran?

Presented by the American-Iranian Friendship Committee (AIFC) & Stop War on Iran Campaign.

Saturday
May12
6:30 pm
Judson Memorial Church Assembly Hall
239 Thompson St.
(Washington Sq. Park South & Thompson)
in Manhattan

Join us for a forum and discussion on the growing threats and ongoing attacks by the U.S. against the people of Iran.

Why has the U.S. targeted Iran for “regime change?” Why is the U.S. backing terrorist attacks inside Iran, including kidnappings, assassinations, and car bombings? What’s behind the massive U.S. military buildup in the Gulf, including 2 aircraft carrier groups and hundreds of attack aircraft? How is the demonization of the people of Iran and their democratically-elected President part of the Bush Administration’s drive to war? What can you do to help the campaign to stop a new war in the Middle East?

Speakers will include:

• Ramsey Clark, former US Attorney General

• Larry Holmes, Troops Out Now Coalition

• Nada Khader, WESPAC Foundation

• Kazem Azin, American-Iranian Friendship Committee

• Larry Everest, World Can't Wait

• Ardeshir Ommani, American-Iranian Friendship Committee

• Sara Flounders, International Action Center

for more information, call 212-633-6646 or 914-273-8852 or see www.StopWaronIran.org or www.progressiveportals.com/aifc

Endorsers include: Artists and Activists United for Peace, WESPAC Foundation, Iranian Society in New York, Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran (CASMII), Harlem Tenants Council, Asia Pacific Action, Stonewall Warriors NY/NJ, Troops Out Now Coalition, International Action Center, FIST - Fight Imperialism Stand Together, Pakistan USA Freedom Forum, Jersey City Peace Movement, BAYAN USA, NJ Action 21, Adalah-NY: The Coalition for Justice in the Middle East, NoWar Westchester

Warships, Warships Everywhere, and Many a Bomb to Drop - Persian Gulf Update

by Michael T. Klare; TomDispatch; May 04, 2007

Looking down from the captain's deck some six stories high, the flight deck of the USS Nimitz is an impressive sight indeed: 80 sleek warplanes armed with bombs and missiles are poised for takeoff at any minute, day or night. The sight of these planes coming and going from that 1,100-foot-long flight deck is almost beyond description. I can attest to this, having sailed on the Nimitz 25 years ago as a reporter for Mother Jones magazine.

Today, the Nimitz is rapidly approaching the Persian Gulf, where it will join two other U.S. aircraft carriers and the French carrier Charles De Gaulle in the largest concentration of naval firepower in the region since the launching of the U.S. invasion of Iraq four years ago.

Why this concentration now? Officially, the Nimitz is on its way to the Gulf to replace the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, which is due to return to the United States for crew leave and ship maintenance after months on station. But the U.S. Central Command (Centcom), which exercises command authority over all U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf area, refuses to say when the Eisenhower will actually depart -- or even when the Nimitz will arrive.

For a time, at least, the United States will have three carrier battle groups in the region. The USS John C. Stennis is the third. Each carrier is accompanied by a small flotilla of cruisers, destroyers, submarines, and support vessels, many equipped with Tomahawk land-attack cruise missiles (TLAMs). Minimally, this gives modern meaning to the classic imperial term "gunboat diplomacy," which makes it all the stranger that the deployment of the Nimitz is covered in our media, if at all, as the most minor of news stories. And when the Nimitz sailed off into the Pacific last month on its way to the Gulf, it simply disappeared off media radar screens like some classic "lost patrol."

Rest assured, unlike us, the Iranians have noticed. After all, with the arrival of the Nimitz battle group, the Bush administration will be -- for an unknown period of time -- in an optimal position to strike Iran with a punishing array of bombs and missiles should the President decide to carry out his oft-repeated threat to eliminate Iran's nuclear program through military action. "All options," as the administration loves to say, remain ominously "on the table."

Meanwhile, negotiations to resolve the impasse with Iran over its pursuit of uranium-enrichment technology -- a possible first step to the manufacture of nuclear weapons -- continue at the United Nations in New York and in various European capitals. So far, the Iranians have refused to give any ground, claiming that their activities are intended for peaceful uses only and so are permitted under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), of which it is a signatory. The United States has made vague promises of improved relations if and when Iran terminates its nuclear program, but the full burden of making initial concessions falls on Tehran.

Just this weekend, a conference in Egypt, called by Iraqi officials to explore regional approaches to stability in the region (with Iranian officials expected to be in attendance), was being viewed in Washington as yet another opportunity to pressure Tehran to be more submissive to the West's demands on a wide range of issues, including Iranian support for Shiite militias in Iraq.

President Bush keeps insisting that he would like to see these "diplomatic" endeavors -- as he describes them -- succeed, but he has yet to bring up a single proposal or incentive that might offer any realistic prospect of eliciting a positive Iranian response.

And so, knowing that his "diplomatic" efforts are almost certain to fail, Bush may simply be waiting for the day when he can announce to the American people that he has "tried everything"; that "his patience has run out"; and that he can "no longer risk the security of the American people" by "indulging in further fruitless negotiations," thereby allowing the Iranians "to proceed farther down the path of nuclear bomb-making," and so has taken the perilous but necessary step of ordering American forces to conduct air and missile strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities. At that point, the 80 planes aboard the Nimitz -- and those on the Eisenhower and the Stennis as well -- will be on their way to targets in Iran, along with hundreds of TLAMs and a host of other weapons now being assembled in the Gulf.

Michael T. Klare is a professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College and author of Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America's Growing Dependency on Imported Petroleum.

[This article first appeared on Tomdispatch.com, a weblog of the Nation Institute, which offers a steady flow of alternate sources, news, and opinion from Tom Engelhardt, long time editor in publishing, co-founder of the American Empire Project and author of Mission Unaccomplished (Nation Books), the first collection of Tomdispatch interviews.]

Bush Holds Iranian Officials as Bargaining Chips

Bush Holds Iranian Officials as Bargaining Chips

Gareth Porter, Electronic Iraq

4 May 2007

WASHINGTON (IPS) - When the Bush administration announced in January that it was targeting Iranian officials in Iraq, it justified the policy as necessary to protect U.S. troops because of their alleged involvement in attacks on U.S. forces.

But recent developments have underlined the reality that those Iranian officials are serving as bargaining chips in the administration's effort to get Iran to use its influence with Iraqi Shiites to help stabilize the situation in Iraq.

The administration's decision to hold on to five Iranians seized by U.S. troops in the Kurdish city of Irbil last January, rather than release them to reciprocate Iran's unconditional release in early April of 15 British sailors and marines captured in the Persian Gulf in March, raises the question of what calculations administration officials have been making in regard to their Iranian prisoners.

The U.S. refusal to reciprocate the Iranian prisoner release was apparently the reason for Iran's refusal to allow its Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki to meet privately with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at the international meeting on Iraq in Egypt Thursday and Friday.

The issue of whether to release the Iranians in light of Iran's release of the British captives was discussed at a meeting of top administration officials on Apr. 10, according to a Washington Post report by Robin Wright.

Rice argued that the administration should release the five Iranian officials, because they were no longer useful. But Wright reported that an unnamed official representing Vice President Dick Cheney had insisted on holding them, arguing that it would convey to Iran that even more Iranian officials in Iraq might be seized, and that Rice had "gone along with the consensus" on the issue.

The report of that discussion suggests that top administration officials are viewing their Iranian prisoners in the context of the broader diplomatic aims of the administration in regard to Iran. For the past few weeks, the Bush administration has been angling for what it calls a "dialogue" with Iran. That dialogue was supposed to have been kicked off with the Rice-Mottaki meeting in Sharm el-Sheikh and to be followed by a series of meetings later on.

In a speech on Mar. 27, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates had previously signaled the administration's desire for such a dialogue in order to get Iran to play a more cooperative role in stabilizing Iraq.

The origins of the administration's desire for such a dialogue, however, appear to lie in its determination last fall to use what it understood to be Iran's dominant influence over Shiite political-military leaders in Iraq to its advantage. In early October, the White House had decided simultaneously on two initiatives related to that aim.

The first was to launch a high-profile campaign of allegations that Iran was sending armour-piercing explosives to Shiite militias in Iraq -- allegations for which administration officials had previously admitted they lacked actual evidence.

The linkage between those charges against Iran and the administration's political aim of exploiting Iran's influence over Shiite leaders was revealed in an unusually candid speech by Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns to the Council on Foreign Relations last Oct. 11. Immediately after repeating previous administration claims that the Iranians were behind the use of sophisticated IED [improvised explosive device] technology by Shi'a groups against U.S. troops, Burns said, "[W]e expect that Iran, given its obvious interest in Iraq, and given the degree of influence that it has over parts of the Shi'a community in Iraq, is going to now decide to act differently."

Burns thus strongly hinted that the Bush strategy was based on the assumption that Iran could coerce its Iraqi allies to do something they did not want to do and would use its political capital with Iraqi Shiite leaders because of pressure from the United States.

The second decision made in early October, as revealed by Rice in an interview with the New York Times on Jan. 12, was to target for capture Iranian officials in Iraq whom the administration would claim were linked to attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq. That meant, in effect, targeting Iranians suspected of being a member of the "Quds Force" of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which the administration blamed for supporting the Shiite militias in Iraq.

In subsequent public appearances, Rice refused to rule out a cross-border military operation to "disrupt activities that are endangering and killing our troops and that are destabilizing Iraq."

The administration announced its targeting strategy on Jan. 10 just as it was seizing the five Iranian officials in Irbil. The same day, NBC's Tim Russert reported that Bush and his top advisers had told a small group of journalists the administration would not sit down with Iran until the United States had gained "leverage".

The linkage of the five Iranian prisoners with a strategy to get Iran to use its influence with the Shiites, the refusal of the administration to release the five, despite Rice's conclusion that they were no longer "useful", and the administration's pursuit of a "dialogue" with Iran and Iraq all suggest that Bush administration hard-liners have regarded the Iranian prisoners from the beginning as hostages to be given up in return for Iranian cooperation on Iraq.

The Iranian rebuff to the U.S. proposal for a Rice-Mottaki meeting makes it clear, however, that Iran will not discuss a deal involving its cooperation on Iraq for the return of its officials. In ruling out the meeting with Rice, Mottaki declared Wednesday, "For the moment the conditions do not exist for such a dialogue."

Iran has always insisted that the United States must signal a change in its policy toward Iran before any direct diplomatic dialogue could begin. That would mean at least reciprocating Iranian gestures of goodwill, if not acknowledging that the United States is prepared to address legitimate Iranian concerns about U.S. policies.

Rice's initial suggestion that the Iranians should be released seems to reflect an awareness on the part of realists within the administration that the United States cannot have a diplomatic dialogue with Iran while holding Iranian hostages as bargaining chips -- and threatening to take even more. But her cave-in to the hardline position suggests that Dick Cheney still has Bush's ear on Iran policy.

All rights reserved, IPS - Inter Press Service (2007). Total or partial publication, retransmission or sale forbidden.

They Wouldn’t Really Attack Iran, Would They?

by Paul Street; April 18, 2007

Remember the old neoconservative half-joke that “sacking Baghdad is fine but real men go to Teheran?” We are moving into the time when many Washington watchers have thought it possible and even likely that George W. Bush and Dick Cheney would order an attack on Iran (1).

They wouldn’t really do it, would they?

God knows there are a large number of reasons for a rational White House NOT to attack. United States and global public opinion is opposed to a U.S. assault on Iran. So are European and other leading and allied governments, the U.S. intelligence community and much of the nation’s military leadership. According to a February 25th London Times report, “most senior [United States] commanders are prepared to resign if the White House orders a strike against Iran” (1.5).

Key sections of the U.S. foreign policy establishment oppose attacking Iran. The Baker-Hamilton Commission’s Iraq Study Group advocated engaging Iran diplomatically to help de-escalate the mess in Iraq and the Middle East.

Expressing concerns that the administration will manufacture false pretexts for attacking Iran, former National Security Advisor Zgbniew Bzrezinski recently told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Bush’s “imperial hubris” is “undermining America’s global legitimacy,” “intensifying regional instability” and putting the U.S on track for a “quagmire lasting 20 years or more and eventually ranging across Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan” (2).

United States troops are overstretched and have been badly bloodied in Iraq. The American Empire’s strung-out, battered and mostly working-class soldiers are increasingly skeptical about Bush’s military adventurism (3).


As Samar Sepehri notes in the latest International Socialist Review, “Iraq is a glaring example for the U.S. (as Hezbollah was for Israel) that superior firepower and the best laid [military] plans are no guarantee of imperial success” (4).

While “Iran cannot [militarily] defend itself against U.S. attack,” Noam Chomsky recently noted, “it can respond in other ways, among them by inciting ever more havoc in Iraq. “Some issue warnings that are more grave,” Chomsky adds, noting British military historian Corelli Barnett’s judgment that “an attack on Iran would effectively launch world war three” (5).

According to ZNet writer Stephen Lendman, citing a CIA assessment, “if the U.S. attacks Iran, South Shia Iraq will light up like a candle and explode uncontrollably throughout the country...expanding the Iraq conflict to a regional one with [unpredictable] consequences that would not be good for U.S. interests. It will inflame the region,” spark “a tsunami of Shia rage” and “unite the Muslim world in fierce opposition to America,” Lendman says (6).

Iran has signaled its readiness to strangle oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz – the crucial and narrow passageway between the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean – and thereby to damage the global economy if the U.S. and/or Israel attack its nuclear facilities.

A military strike against Iran would be thoroughly illegal under international law and the U.S. Constitution. It would evoke horror and condemnation across the world, further tarnishing the United States’ fading “moral credentials” (Bzrezinski), especially if it employs (as it likely would) “low yield” nuclear missiles that would (as a senior U.S. intelligence official told Seymour Hersh) produce “mushroom clouds, radiation, mass casualties and contamination over years”(7).

The administration’s key charges against Iran are without basis. There is little evidence to support U.S. claims that predominantly Shiite Iran has been sparking the Sunni-led Iraq “insurgency” and that Iran poses a reasonably imminent “nuclear danger.”

Also lacking credibility are U.S. claims that Iraq seeks to eliminate Israel – a charge that ignores Iran foreign policy chief Ayatollah Ali Khameni’s repeated statements of support Israel’s continued existence alongside a separate Palestinian state.

As John Pilger notes, “the ‘threat’ from Iran is entirely manufactured, aided and abetted by familiar, compliant media language that refers to Iran’s ‘nuclear ambitions’ just as the vocabulary of Saddam’s non-existent WMD arsenal became common usage”(8).

Another public relations fiasco looms, perhaps, for those who would launch yet another mass-murderous assault on a major Muslim state without credible basis for threat claims concocted to justify the brazen violation of international law and civilized norms.

A U.S. attack would likely unite the factions contesting for power inside Iran, to the detriment of the Bush administration’s declared mission of causing regime change there. That mission could be pursued without resort to massive air assault, through the intensified application of methods already being employed: economic and financial sanctions and the related promotion of ethnic, religious, factional and regional strife inside Iran.

And yet, despite all this and more, we really can’t rule out the possibility of the feared U.S. attack sometime this or next year. Bush has been preparing the ground for such an assault by making repeated, high-profile references to the alleged Iran threat. As presented in his January 23rd State of the Union Address (SOUA), the supposed menace of Iran goes beyond alleged nuclear ambitions and support for the Iraqi resistance. It includes the threat of a rising “Shia crescent” led by Iran in alliance with Hezbollah, Hamas and the Syrian state. Bush raised this specter “despite the fact,” as Tom Englehardt notes, “that the Bush administration is officially at war with Sunni extremism in Iraq (and in the more general War on Terror)”(9).

As Seymour Hersh shows in a recent New Yorker article titled “The Redirection,” the Bush administration’s Middle East policies has undergone a “sea change” as the U.S. seeks to enlist the region’s Arab Sunni people and regimes against Persian Iran and the danger of Shia dominance (10).

The administration’s 2006 National Military Strategy claimed that “we may face no greater challenge from a single country than from Iran.” (11). The U.S. may have supported Israel’s invasion of Lebanon last July partly to destroy Iran-linked Hezbollah’s capacity to deter a U.S.-Israel assault on Iran.

The U.S. “Surge” in Iraq is specifically targeting forces allied with Iran, seeking to reduce Iran’s ability to respond to a U.S. attack by sparking retaliation against the U.S in Iraq. As Sepehri notes, “although the surge in U.S. troops will do little to really secure Iraq (an idea which has been ridiculed even by the administration’s supporters), it is designed to pressure, fragment and break away parts of the forces allied with Iran, pulling away forces which can be acquiesced through military pressure, while isolating and destroying those who will not submit. The aim of this is to remove many of Iran’s options to respond to an attack including retaliation against the U.S. forces in Iraq” (12).

U.S. Air Force Planning Groups have been “drawing up lists of targets” (Hersh) in Iran since at least early 2002. The Joint Chiefs of Staff have recently completed contingency plans that will permit Bush to bomb Iran on 24 hours notice.

U.S. Special Ops and CIA teams have been placed in Iran, marking targets for future air assaults, studying the terrain, and fomenting rebellion among ethnic and religious minorities.

The Pentagon has placed two full carrier groups in the Persian Gulf, giving the U.S. the capacity to sustain a month-long bombing and missile campaign against Iran. Even before the Stennis and Eisenhower groups arrived, the U.S. and the United Kingdom possessed a giant naval presence in the Gulf.

Last December, the Pentagon replaced General John Abizaid with Admiral William Fallon as the head of Centcom, the command authority developed by Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan to “guard oil flows” from the Persian Gulf. Abizaid had supported the ISG’s recommendation of diplomatic engagement with Syria and Iraq. The new Centcom chief is an expert coordinator of the sort of combined air and sea operations that would be involved in a confrontation with Iran.

The U.S. has been illegally sending unmanned aerial surveillance drones into Iranian air space. It recently invaded the Iranian consulate in northern Iraq and seized six Iranian nationals.

The U.S. has been stockpiling oil reserves and has pressured its arch-reactionary oil-rich client state Saudi Arabia to increase petroleum production levels.

Thousands of U.S. troops have been moved to the Iraq-Iran border. In February, the Los Angeles Times reported that U.S. Air Force and Navy planes were going to be used more aggressively along that border – the point being to provoke an Iranian response that could be used (ala the Gulf of Tonkin) as a pretext for a U.S. assault.

The U.S. has installed “defensive” Patriot Missiles in Israel, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the Arab Emirates. This is meant to defend these states against intermediate range (Shihab-3) ballistic missiles that Washington suspects Iran would launch in response to a U.S and/or Israeli attack.

On February 11, the Washington Post reported that Dick Cheney’s new national security advisor John Hanna considers 2007 “the year of Iran.” A central player in the making of the Bush administration’s deceptive case for the invasion of Iraq, Hannah said that a U.S. assault on Iran was “a real possibility” this year (13).

The Bush administration’s recent willingness to accommodate China by cutting a bargain with North Korea may in part reflect a desire to stop China from opposing a U.S. assault on Iran. As David Whitehouse notes, “the North Korea deal raises the stakes for Iran. China has been a potential obstacle to U.S. action against Iran, but progress over North Korea may make the Chinese more willing to accept a military strike…the favor the U.S. is extending to China over North Korea could be returned with Chinese acquiescence to the U.S. police role in the Middle East.”

The Bush administration knows that neither of its two closest military rivals – Russia and China – will back Iran in an armed conflict with the superpower. While they will block a force resolution against Iran at the UN, they will stand clear once U.S. attack becomes imminent (14).

Last December the Bush administration succeeded in persuading the United Nations Security Council to pass a resolution imposing economic sanctions on Iran for supposedly threatening international peace with nuclear activities. This has set the stage for Bush to demand that the Security Council sanction the use of force against Iran. When Security Council members Russia and China (inevitably) reject that demand, Bush may well (on the model of the 2002-2003 run to the invasion of Iraq) cite earlier resolutions to justify direct U.S. military action. “We’ve done all we can through the inadequate channels of international law and the UN,” Bush will claim (in essence) “but now the time has come for us to act” against an Evil State that the UN itself has identified as ‘a danger to world peace’” (14.5)

The assault envisioned, it should be noted, is a “Shock and Awe” air attack, not a ground invasion or prolonged occupation that will cause mass U.S. casualties. The problem of GI burnout and casualties will not deter Washington from undertaking a month-long high-tech air war launched mainly from sea-born vessels. The White House is contemplating the use of nuclear weaponry, something that would involve an especially high ratio of “enemy” devastation to U.S. troop loss. As Alenjandro Nadal notes in La Jornada:

“Many people think that an offensive by Washington would be foolish because the Americans can hardly cope with Iraq. How are they going to attack a country that is twice as big and has double the number of inhabitants? But...Washington’s objective is not to invade and occupy Iran. The central purpose is to eliminate it as an obstacle to controlling the resources of Central Asia and the Persian Gulf. And, to achieve that, it is not necessary to invade the country. It is enough to destroy its military capacity, aerial and naval, something that the armed forces of the United States and its few allies can achieve in some week of selective bombardment...In reply, Iran can unleash a nightmare for the Americans in Iraq. But the sacrifice of additional tens of soldiers in Baghdad is not something that is going to stop the...the Bush-Cheney duo...[and] the American people...will be faced with a fait accompli”(15).

The fact that the world economy could be damaged by the disruption of oil flows from the Middle East is of little concern to Washington. U.S. policymakers are concerned first and foremost that the United States continues to bolster its world domination by controlling the strategically hyper-significant energy resources of the Middle East, not that not that they or the rest of the world enjoy unimpeded access to Middle Eastern oil. Iraq’s oil production has fallen from nearly 3 million barrels to about 1.5 billion barrels since the United States invaded – something that has led the major oil companies to jack up their prices (helping them garner record profits) even as increased Saudi production has helped make up the difference (16).

The White House has made its contempt for the relevance of world and domestic opinion (and even much informed elite opinion) on numerous occasions, including the occupation of Iraq. Indifference to public opinion and law is hardly a “novel” stance on the part of U.S. policymakers, “but the statist reactionaries at the helm in Washington,” Chomsky notes, “have set new records in flaunting their credentials as international outlaws” (17).

Asked about the opposition of the Congress and the American people to the U.S. “Surge” (escalation) in (and beyond) Iraq, Darth Cheney was blunt in his response: “it won’t stop us,” he said, leading one concerned U.S. citizen to write the following to the Editors of the New York Times: “What I want to know is, Who is ‘us’? If it's not the American electorate or the United States Congress, which was elected to represent American citizens, who is it? Or maybe the question should be, Who is this administration and what has it done with my country?"(18).

It doesn’t help that the Democratic Party’s leadership and leading presidential candidates are hawkish on Iran – reflecting deeply shared doctrinal assumptions on the United States’ right and “responsibility” to exercise imperial “leadership” (global dominance) in and beyond Middle East (18.5) – even as they criticize the Bush administration’s sorry performance in Iraq. Or that dominant U.S. war and entertainment media has been willing to play much the same role regarding Iran that it played vis-à-vis Iraq in 2002 and 2003. It is dutifully relaying administration propaganda about the mythical Iran threat.

And then there’s the vicious madness of boy-king George. Bush the Second combines profound mental mediocrity with sloppy, dry-drunk Protestant Fundamentalism, an advanced case of Narcissistic Personality Disorder and a sneering authoritarianism born of an especially vile and aristocratic upbringing. These toxic features and his life history blind him to his own mistakes and crimes and make him susceptible to the influence of powerful and deranged proto-fascists like Dick Cheney. They push him to respond to his Iraq fiasco by doubling down his bets on Iran - convinced that he can still “hit the jackpot” if he just keeps rambling and gambling in the oil-rich Middle East. They tell him he is endlessly free to transgress without consequence and insulate from the counsel of more rational elites within the imperial establishment. According to Bush’s own brother Jeb, as recounted in Ron Suskind’s book The One Percent Doctrine, “Dubya” appears to enjoy compelling other people to “knuckle under” and doesn’t really care about whether he’s right or wrong. He may actually find it more amusing to be wrong and still force everyone to follows his command.

How much do rational warnings of possible or likely disaster matter to George “The Decider” Bush and his dark overlord Cheney? As their “untidy” (in the lovely description of Donald “Shit Happens” Rumsfeld) fiasco deepened in Iraq, it is worth remembering, the White House claimed that neither they nor anyone else had good reasons to anticipate the chaos that lay ahead when they invaded that shattered nation. This was completely false. Beyond technically irrelevant predictions of turmoil from within the Middle East and from the U.S. and global Left, numerous key establishment figures advanced serious “elite” warnings about possibly disastrous consequences after a quick military victory over a weak regime. The agents of advance warning (to name just some of the more prominent voices) included George Bush Senior’s National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, retired Air Force Col. John Warden, Marine Corps consultant Frank Hoffman, National Defense University professor Daniel Kuehl, conservative Congressman Ike Skelton (the senior Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee), and the Committee on International Security Studies at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (19).

All of these and other voices within and beyond the foreign policy establishment issued relevant notes of caution and alarm regarding the difficulties inherent in illegally occupying Mesopotamia.

None of if it was worth a pile of West Texas horseshit. The warnings went unheeded by an administration that clung to the notion of quick and easy “victory” (20).

Four years later, to make things yet more dangerous, Bush, Cheney and others in the White House may be caught up in the “wounded predator” syndrome. Figuratively bloodied by an Iraqi quagmire so obvious and humiliating that even Bush can’t completely miss it, the injured monsters in the White House may be driven to act recklessly out of terrible desperation. As Gilbert Achcar noted in early 2006:

“They want to control the energy resources of the region. The problem is what means can they use to achieve that goal? And...they are in real disarray about what to do. When you follow closely what they do on the ground, you have a sense of shifting policies; they are pragmatically trying to react to adversity but the fact is they have no general long-term strategy. The problem is that all this is truly worrying. The Iraqi vox populi is certainly right to be worried about U.S. plans, because the wounded beast could be truly dangerous” (21).

The Iranian “vox populi” also has reasons to worry. As Chomsky noted last July, “Bush planners have created remarkable catastrophes for themselves in the Middle East. And it is conceivable that they might strike out in desperation, hitting the system with a sledgehammer to see if somehow the results will come out in their favor” (22).

The administration’s desperation could be furthered by its awareness of the remarkable strategic stakes at play in the Middle East. Cheney and Bush have sparked events that could end up significantly damaging the United States’ position in the world system. Their incompetent and delusional actions have enabled a potential decisive separation of largely Shiite-inhabited Middle East oil lands from U.S. control, something that would cost the United States critical leverage over world-capitalist rivals and significantly accelerate its demotion to the position of a “second-rate world power.” Seen from the perspective of the American Empire Project, of course, there is nothing irrational about U.S. policymakers’ longstanding obsession with the control of Middle Eastern oil (23).

Other depressing facts are that Bush and Cheney see the historical window closing on their probably cherished desire to attack Iran and could be motivated by their party’s deepening domestic political crisis to “Wag the Dog” (distract the enraged homeland populace with military actions overseas) on a large scale, looking for a domestic political twist on Chomsky’s “sledgehammer.”

If Bush and Cheney can be convinced that bearing their nuclear tipped teeth is combining with other tactics – the fanning of Sunni-Shiite conflicts, external strangulation, and the cultivation of internal Iranian rebellion, etc. – to effectively show Iran and the Middle East who’s boss, then perhaps Washington will stand down from a full-blown assault. The Godfather doesn’t always have to actually kill; sometimes he can be convinced that the demonstration of his capacity for violence was sufficient to enforce proper obedience.

Will they attack Iran sometime this or next year? If I were a betting man, I’d put my money on Washington standing down. It seems like too crazy a proposition even for Bush and Chenet at this point. But who knows? I didn’t think they’d invade Iraq at first and I’m not into prognostication. It’s not about the crystal ball.

The facts that we have to work like Hell just to form educated guesses about what “our” “leaders” might do in our name – not to mention the name of “democracy” – and that the attack is a possibility are indications show the building of a serious anti-imperialist movement is long overdue inside the United States.

It shouldn’t be like this. U.S. citizens should begin building a serious Left and anti-imperial movement aiming to replace dominant domestic structures of Empire and Inequality with egalitarian institutions of justice, equality and peace. Such “radical reconstruction of society” – Martin Luther King Jr.’s declared objective by 1966 (24) – is required, among other reasons, to eliminate the chance for demented war criminals and authoritarian militarists like Bush and Cheney to become structurally super-empowered predators in the first place.

Veteran radical historian, journalist, and speaker Paul Street (paulstreet99@ yahoo.com) is a Left political commentator in Iowa City, IA. Street is the author of Empire and Inequality: America and the World Since 9/11 (Boulder, CO: Paradigm, 2004), Segregated Schools: Educational Apartheid in the Post-Civil Rights Era (New York, NY: Routledge, 2005), and Still Separate, Unequal: Race, Place, and Policy in Chicago (Chicago, 2005) and The Empire and Inequality Report. Street’s next book Racial Oppression in the Global Metropolis: A Living Black Chicago History (New York, 2007) will be released next June.



NOTES

1 John Pilger, “Iran: the War Begins,” ZNet Sustainer Commentary, February 3, 2007, available online at www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2007-02/03pilger.cfm; Michael T. Klare, “Bush’s Future Iran War Speech,” Tomdispatch, reproduced on ZNet, February 26, 2007, available online at http://www. zmag.org/ content/ showarticle.cfm?itemid=12218.

1.5 Michael Smith and Sarah Baxter, “U.S. Generals ‘Will Quit’ if Bush Orders Iran Attack,” London Times, 25 February 2007, available online at http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/ news/world/iraq/article1434540.ece).

2. Bzrezinski is quoted in Stephen Lendman, “George Bush’s Sampson Option,” ZNet March 8, 2007, available online at http://www.zmag.org/content/ showarticle.cfm? SectionID=67&ItemID=12284).

3. Paul Street, “ ‘ Without Question?’ On Growing Military Opposition to the Invasion of Iraq,” ZNet, January 11, 2007, available online at http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=11825.

4. Saman Sepehri, “The Pressure is On: The U.S. is Gearing Up for a Fight With Iran,” International Socialist Review, (March-April 2007), p. 12.

5. Noam Chomsky, “A Predator Becomes More Dangerous When Wounded,” The Guardian, 9 March 2007, available online at www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/ story/0,,2030015,00.html.

6. Lendman, “George Bush’s Samson Option.”

7. Seymour Hersh, “Annals of National Security: The Iran Plans,” The New Yorker, April 17, 2006, available online at http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/04/ 17/060417fa_fact

8. John Pilger, “Iran: the War Begins,” ZNet Sustainer Commentary, February 3, 2007, available online at www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2007-02/03pilger.cfm.

9. Tom Engelhardt, “The Seymour Hersh Mystery,” TomDispatch, March 13, 2006, available online at http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?pid=174764

10. Seymour Hersh, “The Redirection,” New Yorker, March 3, 2007, available online at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/022507Z.shtml.

11. Quotation in Lendman, “Bush’s Samson Option.”

12. Sepehri, “The Pressure is On,” p.12.

13. Karen De Young, “U.S. Keeps Pressure on Iran,” Washington Post, 11 February 2007, p. A18.

14. David Whitehouse, “Desperate for a Deal,” International Socialist Review (March-April 2007), p.10; Sepehri, “The Pressure is On.” “The Chinese know the U.S. is in a Middle East quagmire,” Whitehouse adds, “and they might not mind handing Bush a shovel to dig even deeper.”

14.5 Klare, “Bush’s Future Iran War Speech.”

15. Alenjandro Nadal, “Blitzkrieg Against Iran: Bush and Cheney’s Twisted Logic,” La Jornada, Mexico, April 4, 2007.

16. Noam Chomsky and Gilbert Achcar, Perilous Power: The Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy (Boulder, CO: Paradigm, 2006], p.58; Mathew Wald, “War and Cheap Oil: A Second Look,” New York Times, 7 January 2007, sec. 4, p. 2.

17. Chomsky and Achcar, Perilous Power, p. 232.

18. Stephanie Nicholas, Letter to the Editor of the New York Times, January 27, 2007.

18.5 On shared doctrinal assumptions, see Tony Smith’s candid commentary, “It’s Uphill for the Democrats: They Need a Global Strategy, Not Just Tactics for Iraq,” Washington Post Sunday, March 11, 2007, p. B1, available online at www.washingtonpost.com/wp- dyn/content/article/2007/03/09/AR2007030901884_pf.html

19. Paul Street, Empire and Inequality: America and the World Since 9/11 (Boulder, CO: Paradigm, 2004), pp. 57-66.

20. Thomas E. Ricks, Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq (New York, 2006), p. 59.

21. Chomsky and Achcar, Perilous Power, p. 114.

22. Chomsky and Achcar, Perilous Power, pp. 230-231. See also Chomsky, “A Predator Becomes More Dangerous When Wounded.” The potential benefits of inflicting chaos through “sledgehammer” assault are suggested by the ironic fact that, as Sepehri notes, “the unfolding disaster in Iraq” has “provided the means for the U.S., Israel and the Arab regimes to combat Iran’s political influence through Sunni/Shiite divisions and sectarianism. While the sectarian violence in Iraq has undermined the U.S. ability to bring security or claim any control over the situation in Iraq,” Sepehri observes, “it has also provided the tool to break apart any united political opposition to the U.S. (and Israel).” See Sepehri, “The Pressure is On,” p. 12.

23. Chomsky and Achcar, Perilous Power, pp. 25-26, 53-55, 57-58, 114, 231.

24. Paul Street, “ ‘ Until We Get a New Social Order:’ Reflections on the Early Radicalism of Martin Luther King, Jr.” ZNet (January 16, 2007), available online at http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=11871; Paul Street, “The Pale Reflection: Barack Obama, Martin Luther King Jr. and the Meaning of the Black Revolution,” Black Agenda Report (March 21, 2007), available online at http://www.blackagendareport.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id= 149&Itemid=34.

No One's Drinking Bush's Kool-Aid on Iran

By Robert Dreyfuss, TomPaine.com
Posted on February 15, 2007, Printed on April 19, 2007


It was, President Bush must have been thinking, a heck of a lot easier five years ago. Back in 2002, the president had a smoothly running lie factory humming along in the Pentagon, producing reams of fake intelligence about Iraq, led by Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Doug Feith and his Office of Special Plans. Back then, he had a tightly knit cabal of neoconservatives, led by I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, based in Vice President Dick Cheney's office, to carry out a coordinated effort to distribute the lies to the media. And he had a chorus of yes-men in the Republican-controlled Congress ready to echo the party line.

In 2007, Bush stands nearly alone, and he never looked lonelier than during a bumbling, awkward news conference on the Iraq-Iran tangle Wednesday.

Feith is long gone, and last week his lie factory was exposed by the Pentagon's own inspector general, who told Congress that Feith had pretty much made up everything that his rogue intelligence unit manufactured. Libby is long gone, apparently about to be sentenced to jail for lying about Cheney's frantic effort to cover up the lie factory's work. And the congressional echo chamber is gone: In six weeks, the Democrats have held more than four dozen hearings to investigate the White House's catastrophic Middle East policy, and even Hillary Clinton is warning that Bush had better keep his hands off Iran, saying: "It would be a mistake of historical proportions if the administration thought that the 2002 resolution authorizing force against Iraq was a blank check for the use of force against Iran."

Without his Orwellian apparatus behind him, the president spent most of his hour-long news conference yesterday shrugging and smirking, jutting his jaw out with false bravado, joshing inappropriately with reporters asking deadly serious questions and stumbling over his words. It was painful to listen to him trying to justify the nonsensical claims that Iran and its paramilitary "Quds Force" are somehow responsible for the chaos in Iraq:

What we do know is that the Quds force was instrumental in providing these deadly IEDs to networks inside of Iraq. We know that. And we also know that the Quds force is a part of the Iranian government. That's a known. What we don't know is whether or not the head leaders of Iran ordered the Quds force to do what they did.

Pressed about what the "head leaders" are doing, he went on:

Either they knew or didn't know, and what matters is, is that they're there. What's worse, that the government knew or that the government didn't know? ... What's worse, them ordering it and it happening, or them not ordering it and it happening?

If that makes no sense to you, well, that's because the whole thing makes no sense. It's a farcical replay of Iraq 2002, when the White House demonized Saddam Hussein with fake intelligence, turning him into a menacing al-Qaida backer armed with weapons of mass destruction. This time, however, the lie factory has been dismantled. All by himself, the president is trying to turn Iran into a scary, al-Qaida-allied, nuke-wielding menace. But he's not fooling anyone. The potent "war president" of 2002-2003 is now an incoherent, mewling Wizard of Oz-like figure, and people are paying attention to the man behind the curtain.

Unlike 2002, when the White House fired salvo after salvo of fake intelligence about Iraq, today it can't even stage its lies properly. Like the incompetents who couldn't organize a two-car funeral, the remaining Iran war hawks in the administration held a briefing in Baghdad on Sunday to present alleged evidence that Iran is masterminding the insurgency in Iraq. But it was a comedy of errors that convinced no one. Twice, at least, the administration had earlier postponed or canceled the much-promoted event, designed to reveal the supposed secrets behind Iran's actions in Iraq. When it was finally held, it was not in Washington, but in Baghdad, with not a single White House official, no U.S. diplomat, no State Department official, no CIA official and no one from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Instead, a couple of anonymous military officers held a background-only briefing, barring cameras and tape recorders, to present some blurry photographs of bomb-looking things -- and not a shred of evidence of Iranian government involvement.

It was as if Adlai Stevenson had gotten up at the United Nations during the missile crisis in Cuba and, rather than showing detailed U-2 photographs of missile emplacements, had simply said, "Ladies and gentleman, some Cuban guy we talked to said the Russians are putting missiles in Cuba."

According to The Washington Times, the effort to blame Iran was directly torpedoed by the U.S. intelligence community, through the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. The ODNI, said the Times, "sought to play down the intelligence on Iranian involvement, fearing that the report will be used as a basis to launch an attack on Iran." Many earlier reports noted that both the State Department and the U.S. intelligence community were strongly opposed to any attempt to demonize Iran. There's nothing like a bureaucracy scorned to conduct passive-aggressive sabotage of misguided policies, and in this case the bureaucracy apparently succeeded. The dog-and-pony show on Iranian meddling in Iraq not only didn't scare anyone, it caused guffaws of laughter and ridicule.

And then there was the hilarious presidential press conference yesterday, to top it off.

There is, of course, no basis for arguing that the civil war in Iraq is caused by Iran. And there is no basis -- "not supported by underlying intelligence," as the Pentagon I.G. said about Doug Feith's 2002 work -- to argue that Iran is responsible for a significant part of American deaths in Iraq. Nearly all of the U.S. casualties in Iraq are caused by the secular-Baathist Sunni-led resistance and religious Sunni extremists fighting the occupation, and none of the forces allied with the resistance have ties to Iran. Even the anonymous briefers at the dog-and-camel show in Baghdad admitted that Iran is helping the Shiite militias, not the Sunnis; in other words, Iran is helping the self-same militias that are being trained and armed by the United States.

And the spurious claim that 170 Americans have died in attacks using Iranian-supplied super-IED's since 2004 can only mean one thing: that the Pentagon is counting the numbers of U.S. soldiers and Marines who died in April and August, 2004. That was when the United States waged two mini-wars against Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army. It was the only time in the past four years when the United States suffered significant casualties fighting the Shiites -- though the administration presented zero evidence that Sadr's Mahdi Army gets weapons from Iran, or needs to. But if they're counting as far back as 2004 -- and, according to the Pentagon, the super-IED's started showing up in 2004 -- then the whole issue is absurd, since what happened three years ago has little or no relevance to current conditions.

Those prone to believe, along with the president, that Iran is fomenting the violence in Iraq have already drunk deep of the neocon Kool-Aid. The rest of us can only shake our heads in wonder that the president thinks he can get away with this.

Robert Dreyfuss is the author of "Devil's Game: How the United States Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam" (Henry Holt/Metropolitan Books).
© 2007 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/48083/

Bush's Iraq Plan - Goading Iran into War

Analysis by Trita Parsi*

WASHINGTON, Jan 12 (IPS) - President George W. Bush's address on Iraq Wednesday night was less about Iraq than about its eastern neighbour, Iran. There was little new about the U.S.'s strategy in Iraq, but on Iran, the president spelled out a plan that appears to be aimed at goading Iran into war with the U.S.

While Washington speculated whether the president would accept or reject the Iraq Study Group's recommendations, few predicted that he would do the opposite of what James Baker and Lee Hamilton advised. Rather than withdrawing troops from Iraq, Bush ordered an augmentation of troop levels. Rather than talking to Iran and Syria, Bush virtually declared war on these states. And rather than pressuring Israel to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the administration is fuelling the factional war in Gaza by arming and training Fatah against Hamas.

Several recent developments and statements indicate that the administration is ever more seriously eyeing war with Iran. On Wednesday, Bush made the starkest accusations yet against the rulers in Tehran, alleging that the clerics were "providing material support for attacks on American troops."

While promising to "disrupt the attacks on our forces" and "seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq," he made no mention of the flow of arms and funds to Sunni insurgents and al Qaeda from Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

Instead, he revealed the deployment of an additional carrier strike group to the Persian Gulf and of the Patriot anti-missile defence system to Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states to protect U.S. allies. The usefulness of this step for resolving the violence in Iraq remains a mystery. Neither the Sunni insurgents nor the Shia militias possess ballistic missiles. And if they did, nothing indicates that they would target the GCC states -- Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

The deployment of the Patriot missiles can be explained, however, in light of a U.S. plan to attack Iran. Last year, Tehran signalled the GCC states in unusually blunt language that it would retaliate against the Arab sheikhdoms if the U.S. attacked Iran using bases in the GCC countries. Mindful of the weakness of Iran's air force, Tehran's most likely weapon would be ballistic missiles -- the very same weapon that the Patriots are designed to provide a shield against. A first step towards going to war with Iran would be to provide the GCC states with protection against potential Iranian retaliation.

Perhaps the starkest indication of an impending war with Iran is Washington's recent arrest of Iranian diplomats in Iraq. Around the time of President Bush's speech, U.S. Special Forces -- in blatant violation of diplomatic regulations reminiscent of the hostage taking of U.S. diplomats in Tehran by Iranian students in 1979 -- stormed the Iranian consulate in Erbil in northern Iraq, arresting five diplomats. Later that day, U.S. forces almost clashed with Kurdish peshmerga militia forces when seeking to arrest more Iranians at Arbil's airport.

These operations incensed the Iraqi government, including its Kurdish components that otherwise are staunchly pro-Washington. "What happened... was very annoying because there has been an Iranian liaison office there for years and it provides services to the citizens," Iraq's Minister of Foreign Affairs Hoshiyar Zebari, who is himself a Kurd, told Al-Arabiya television.

The Bush administration has justified the raids -- including the arrests of several Iranian officials in December last year -- on the grounds that evidence is collected on Iranian involvement in destabilising Iraq. But if the purpose is intelligence gathering, it would make more sense to launch a simultaneous mass raid of Iranian offices rather than the current incremental approach that provides the Iranians forewarning and an opportunity to destroy whatever evidence they may or may not have in their possession.

The incremental raids and arrests may instead be aimed at provoking the Iranians to respond, which in turn would escalate the situation and provide the Bush administration with the casus belli it needs to win Congressional support for war with Iran. Rather than making the case for a pre-emptive war with Iran over weapons of mass destruction -- a strategy the U.S. pursued with Iraq that is unlikely to succeed with Iran -- the sequence of events in the provocation and escalation strategy would make it appear as if war was forced on the U.S.

Prominent Republican and Democratic Senators seem to have picked up on the president's war strategy. At Thursday's hearing in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraska drew parallels with the Richard Nixon administration's strategy of lying to the U.S. people and expanding the Vietnam war into Cambodia. "[W]hen you set in motion the kind of policy that the president is talking about here," he warned Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, "it's very, very dangerous."

Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware added that war with Iran would require congressional authority. Still, Congress is yet to pose a major challenge to Bush's war plan beyond holding hearings with heated exchanges between frustrated Senators and defensive administration officials.

The next move may be Iran's. Tehran has likely sniffed the trap and will sit idly by for now and deprive the Bush administration of a pretext for escalation. But continued provocations from the U.S. through additional raids of Iranian consulates and offices will likely lead to an intentional or unintentional response, after which escalation and war may become reality. Iran has at times failed to exhibit the discipline necessary to refrain from responding to aggressions.

While the administration's calculation may be that lethal pressure on Iran will force Tehran to compromise, faith in Iran that offering concessions will prompt a change in the U.S.'s Iran-policy is next to nonexistent due to the Bush administration's past rejections of Iranian offers.

But Tehran may be able to change the political climate and escape Bush's war trap by reinitiating talks with the European Union to address regional matters as well as the nuclear impasse. Europe's patience and faith in Iran has largely been depleted due to Tehran's failure to fully appreciate efforts by Javier Solana, high representative for the European Union's Common Foreign and Security Policy, to negotiate an agreement on enrichment suspension last fall.

Still, the EU understands that the tidal waves of a regional war in the Middle East will reach Europe much sooner than they reach U.S. shores. Whether Europe will stand up for its own values and security and against Bush's war plans, however, remains to be seen. Here, Tehran's offers are likely not inconsequential.

*Dr. Trita Parsi is the author of "Treacherous Triangle -- The Secret Dealings of Israel, Iran and the United States" (Yale University Press, 2007). (END/2007)

Iran: The Next War

from Rolling Stone magazine

Even before the bombs fell on Baghdad, a group of senior Pentagon officials were plotting to invade another country. Their covert campaign once again relied on false intelligence and shady allies. But this time, the target was Iran. BY JAMES BAMFORD >>read the Rolling Stone story here

McCain Jokes About Bombing Iran

Thursday April 19, 2007 6:16 PM

By LIZ SIDOTI

Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - Republican presidential contender John McCain, known for having a quirky sense of humor, joked about bombing Iran at a campaign appearance this week.

In response to an audience question about military action against Iran, the Arizona senator briefly sang the chorus of the surf-rocker classic ``Barbara Ann.''

``That old, eh, that old Beach Boys song, Bomb Iran,'' he said in jest Wednesday, chuckling with the crowd. Then, he softly sang to the melody: ``Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, anyway, ah ...'' The audience responded with more laughter.

His quip was prompted by a man in the audience who asked: ``How many times do we have to prove that these people are blowing up people now, nevermind if they get a nuclear weapon, when do we send 'em an airmail message to Tehran?''

The campaign stop was in Murrells Inlet, S.C.

After his joke, McCain turned serious and said that he agrees with President Bush that the United States must protect Israel from Iran and work to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. McCain has long said the military option should not be taken off the table but that it should be used only as a last resort.

The episode echoed President Reagan's 1984 quip at the height of the nuclear arms race when he said: ``My fellow Americans, I'm pleased to tell you today that I've signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes.''

Reagan was testing a microphone before his regular Saturday radio address.

^---

WASHINGTON (AP) - Democrat John Edwards is trying to get out of a hairy situation, reimbursing his presidential campaign $800 for two visits with a Beverly Hills stylist.

Two $400 cuts by stylist Joseph Torrenueva, who told The Associated Press that the former North Carolina senator is a longtime client, showed up on Edwards' campaign spending reports filed this weekend. Edwards spokesman Eric Schultz said it never should have been there.

``The bill was sent to the campaign. It was inadvertently paid,'' Schultz said. ``John Edwards will be reimbursing the campaign.''

Edwards is also the subject of a popular YouTube spoof poking fun at his youthful good looks. The video shows the candidate combing his tresses to the dubbed-in tune of ``I Feel Pretty.''

Federal Election Commission records show Edwards' campaign also spent $250 in services from Designworks Salon in Dubuque, Iowa, and $225 in services from the Pink Sapphire in Manchester, N.H.

Schultz said those services were legitimate campaign expenditures to prepare Edwards for media appearances.

Political candidates often have hair and makeup done before media appearances. Edwards rival Hillary Rodham Clinton got some attention last year when her campaign paid $2,500 for two hairstyling sessions that the campaign classified as media production expenses.

^---

WASHINGTON (AP) - Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards has no medical problems, according to a letter from his doctor.

Edwards' doctor, W.L. Wells Edmundson, said the 2004 vice presidential nominee had a physical on April 10 that showed he is in ``excellent health and free of illness.''

``Mr. Edwards was found to be in superb physical shape, reflective of a healthy diet and his habit of a daily four mile run,'' Edmundson said in a statement released by the campaign.

The letter allows Edwards to concentrate his health concerns on his wife, Elizabeth, who is fighting a return of the breast cancer that she thought she had beat but has spread to her bones.

^---

Associated Press Writer Nedra Pickler contributed to this report.

U.S. Support for Terrorism in Iran

U.S. Support for Terrorism in Iran
Ardeshir Ommani, April 7, 2007


Apparently, the U.S. and British authorities have turned so desperate for an alibi that they readily embraced the assertion of an infamous anti-Iranian Mujahedin-e Khalgh (MEK) group, listed as a terrorist organization of bandits by Britain, the U.S., and the European Union. A spokesman of this group, which vegetates in the shadow of the U.S. army in Camp Ashraf in Iraq, said that the British crews’ capture was planned in advance. But David Stringer of the Associated Press immediately realized that he owes it to his readers to mention that the speaker of the MEK offered no evidence to support his claims. This group, along with the old Iranian monarchists, like their financiers in the White House and Downing Street, need no evidence to fabricate stories of any size. It is noteworthy that three years ago, U.S. intelligence circles suggested re-arming MEK and using it to destabilize Iran, a recommendation that has apparently readily been implemented. The undertaking of this plan makes the U.S. government complicit in the terrorist acts that have been carried out inside Iran. The New York Times recently revealed that the camp operates under the protection of the U.S. military and American troops chauffer MEK operatives.

Another organization that carries out cross-border attacks on Iranian villages is the Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan (PJAK), which is supported with equipment and training by Israeli Special Forces. This group receives its “lists of targets inside Iran” from U.S. intelligence services.

A third terrorist organization that operates on the border between Sistan-Baluchistan province of Iran and the countries of Pakistan on the south and Afghanistan on the north is called Jundallah (God’s Brigade), an extremist Sunni tribal faction. This group has been launching armed attacks on the civilian population, planting bombs and kidnapping passengers. The group has its bases in Pakistan and apparently is funded, trained and armed by the U.S. and British armies in Afghanistan and in the Iran-Pakistan border regions. According to Greg Elich of www.GlobalResearch.ca , U.S. and Israeli officials are setting up front companies to help finance the future covert local wars in Iran. An old historical statement comes to mind when thinking about how the CIA armed and financed Osama Bin Laden and the Mujahadeen fundamentalists in Afghanistan during the 1980’s to undermine the Soviet Union - History repeats itself: the first time it’s a tragedy, the second time it’s a farce.

It is now a well-known fact that U.S. special operation forces in Iraq have been given the task of kidnapping Iranian members of the diplomatic corps of individuals in Iraq and the countries where U.S. intelligence agents operate freely. For example, U.S. forces led a commando-type, helicopter-borne raid in Erbil, northern Iaq, and grabbed six Iranian liaison personnel in January 2007. These special units, operating without the permission of the Kurdish authorities, reportedly used stun guns against the men while seizing office computers, ransacking and intentionally destroying the property inside and taking down the Iranian flag from the rooftop of the raided building as a demonstration of the hatred and disrespect toward the Iranian people. The President of Iraq, Mr. Talabani, as well as one of Iraq’s most powerful Shiite leaders, condemned the raid, calling it an attack on Iraq’s sovereignty. Furthermore, the United States refused to allow any communication with the detained officials until the incident with the 15 British sailors and marines was brought into a process of negotiation. Under that condition, the United States was pressured to allow communication by the Iranian government with the Iranian captives, a promise yet to be fulfilled. And worse than that, an Iranian diplomat, Jalal Sharafi, the second secretary in Iran’s embassy in Baghdad who was kidnapped in Iraq by U.S. forces and held for over two months, was released this week. Mr. Sharafi told IRNA (Iran’s State News Agency) he was subjected to torture “day and night”. He said, “I was kidnapped on a Baghdad street while shopping by officials who had Iraqi defense ministry ID cards and were riding in American forces vehicles.” Mr. Sharafi said he was taken to a military base near Baghdad airport, and questioned in Arabic and English. “The CIA officials’ questions focused mainly on Iran’s presence and influence in Iraq. When faced with my responses on Iran’s official ties with the Iraqi government, they increased the torture.” Apparently, this is the customary method that the United States government, which likes to brag about its ‘love of democracy and concern for human rights’ treats foreign detainees and kidnapped individuals. What a respect for human rights! Where are the human rights organizations, such as Amnesty International, to expose and condemn Washington’s routine practice of human rights violations?
Earlier this month, a former Iranian deputy defense minister, Mr. Ali Reza Asgari who was in Turkey to attend a conference, disappeared into thin air, and his family in Tehran has not heard from him since. Iranian officials said Asgari was kidnapped by western agents. These attacks, not highly nor widely publicized in the U.S. press, are part of the covert front of the U.S. and British forces.

Blitzkrieg Against Iran: Bush-Cheney’s Twisted Logic

by Alenjandro Nadal; La Jornada; April 06, 2007

The crisis of 15 British sailors captured by Iran has brought up close the matter of a possible attack by the United States on that country. Very few think it is a logical option for Washington. But wars almost never start with rational analysis. Miscalculations and malignancy are the most common ingredients in the motives for conflicts.

For the White House, the need to attack Iran becomes more urgent every day. The perception is that as the end of the Bush administration approaches, the window of opportunity for an offensive is closing. As such, although it is not very logical to think that a President of the United States could hand over to his successor a recently-started war, that is precisely what is bound to happen in the current situation in the prevailing delirium in the Oval Office. There is no doubt that all the rules have changed after September 11.

The Security Council will not be a brake for Washington. This organisation has been transformed in the most radical way since the end of the Cold War. Nine Eleven delivered a coup de grace to what at some point was the Security Council. The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are almost accepted as normal though these do not have the support of that body.

The pretext in starting the offensive against Iran, its supposed nuclear project, is absurd for many reasons. To start with, there is no incontrovertible proof that Iran has a programme to arm itself with nuclear arms. The debate on this point is not closed. The installations of Natanz (enriching uranium) and Arak (heavy water) could be part of an effort to acquire an indigenous technological capacity in the civil nuclear industry, or could be the start of a military adventure. Even if a nuclear military project exists in Iran, it could not bear fruit in the coming month. Under ideal conditions, it will need at least four years to finish producing and installing 3,000 centrifuges necessary to enrich uranium to military level, start the plant and carry out tests.

It is clear that there are hawks in Teheran very interested in obtaining this type of weaponry. They do not lack incentives and a look at the map gives an understanding of their motivation. To the east, Afghanistan in full-blown conflict, and a little further, Pakistan with its nuclear arms (now de facto legalised by the agreement between Washington and Islamabad). To the west, Iraq in full civil war and, further, Israel with its nuclear arsenal. Towards the north, on the coast of the Caspian Sea, Russia, the other nuclear superpower. Further to the north-east, China. Above all, the incentives of recent realpolitik: if one has nuclear arms, there will be negotiations (North Korea); otherwise there will be war (Iraq).

Many people think that an offensive by Washington would be foolish because the Americans can hardly cope with Iraq. How are they going to attack a country that is twice as big and has double the number of inhabitants?

But here is where it is outside the focus of a good part of the international debate. Washington’s objective is not to invade and occupy Iran. The central purpose is to eliminate it as an obstacle to controlling the resources of Central Asia and the Persian Gulf. And, to achieve that, it is not necessary to invade the country. It is enough to destroy its military capacity, aerial and naval, something that the armed forces of the United States and its few allies can achieve in some week of selective bombardment. We should not forget that Pentagon has been preparing for decades to keep the Strait of Hormuz open to naval movement (and the Europeans, in an emergency, are going to be thankful).

In reply, Iran can unleash a nightmare for the Americans in Iraq. But the sacrifice of additional tens of soldiers in Baghdad is not something that is going to stop the dream of the Bush-Cheney duo. Within a month, the casualty figures of American soldiers in Iraq will exceed 3,300 deaths. The daily average of American casualties is about 2.3 so far in the war. The White House will not feel obliged to retire its troops from Iraq if the figure crosses four or five dead soldiers each day. The American people can react in other ways but by then they will be faced with a fait accompli.

In the twisted logic of Cheney and Bush, chaos and more casualties is what is going to oblige the United States to remain in Iraq. For these two characters, the Europeans, reluctant or otherwise, will have to accept that it is better to control the hydrocarbon riches of Central Asia and the Caspian than to abandon the region in the middle of chaos. The rules have changed, and Bush-Cheney are not prepared to let the opportunity go.

Translated from Spanish by Supriyo Chatterjee



This article was published in La Jornada, Mexico, on April 4, 2007

U.S. Plan for Iran’s Containment

U.S. Plan for Iran’s Containment
Ardeshir Ommani, April 4, 2007

A greater share of the U.S-U.K. aggregate effort against the nation of Iran is heavily focused on a relatively more conspicuous course of action such as the enforcement of the U.N. sanctions, which aim at strangulating the Iranian economy and consequently intensifying social tensions and antagonisms that would ultimately lead into undermining the fabric of the social system and the Iranian society altogether.

To carry out a long-term plan of comprehensive containment, just as it did during the cold-war era against the Soviet Union, the West, headed by the U.S., has to prevent the economic centers of the world, particularly the European Union, from having capital investment, financial and commercial dealings with Iran.

At the center of the containment lies blocking foreign capital investment, particularly in Iranian oil and gas sectors, forcing foreign banks not to issue commercial and government-backed credit guarantees, denying export licenses to companies that have dealings with those around the world who have capital investment in Iran’s oil and gas industries, preventing Iranian import-export banks from having financial transactions with foreign banks and lastly carrying out physical inspections of ships entering or leaving Iranian ports in the Persian Gulf.

The U.S. goal is to be able to impose penalties on the foreign companies that have investments in Iran’s oil and natural gas sectors. Without a doubt this is a brazen case of extra-territoriality, by which one nation imposes its domestic laws on foreign companies and sovereign nations. The U.S. government with the help of the democratic majority in the Congress is tempted to invoke a statute enacted in 1996 that permits the U.S. government to punish any foreign energy company doing business with Iran. To pull this off, the U.S. government has to go against such energy companies as Shell, Repsol, and SKS, the Malaysian oil company, as well as the governments of China, India, Pakistan and Malaysia.

There are several big gas and oil projects on the planning board that include a $10 billion investment by Royal Dutch Shell and the Spanish oil company Repsol YFP to develop Iran’s South Pars field, one of the world’s biggest natural gas deposits, and a $20 billion investment by SKS Ventures of Malaysia to produce natural gas in Iran’s Golshan and Ferdows fields. Should these projects come to fruition in the next several years, Iran will be able to expand its productive and export capacities by many folds and far into the future. But the U.S. and the U.K., not seeing themselves in the driver’s seat, plan to spoil both developments, in the nuclear and hyrdo-carbon energy sectors.

But could the U.S., being in such hot waters as Iraq, Afghanistan, Venezuela and many other places, afford to provoke a possible fight with Europe and Asia? There is a very low probability for such an adventure. What is obvious is that Washington has been careful not to advocate any kind of boycott that might send a barrel of oil to $100, and sink the frail U.S. economy into deep recession.

So far the U.S. has been able to use an earlier United Nations Security Council resolution to pressure some European banks from having dealings with 10 Iranian companies and a dozen individuals in high places. What the U.S. wishes to do is to dictate to all of the world’s banks and businesses to boycott all of the Iranian financial and economic entities. Iran has commercial dealings with more than 70 countries in 6 continents that contain thousands of corporations. Therefore, the U.S. plans remain simply wishful thinking.
But no sanctions are complete without halting and inspecting the ships and aircrafts in their way to and from the targeted country. Being overwhelmed by the formidable challenges of the peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States had assigned the task of violating the territorial waters, and inspecting the ships approaching Iran or departing its ports to its junior partner, Britain.

Both, the U.S. with the presences of its threatening aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf, the biggest concentration of weaponry in the region since the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and the U.K., had decided to test the will power of the government of Iran. In turn Tehran was also aware of the historical challenge to its honor and legitimacy. It deliberately took the bull by the horns and broke the myth of the invincibility of the big powers under the cover of the United Nations mandate. The fact is that this is not the first time that Britain waves a mandate issued by an international organization as a ticket of policing Iraq and its territorial waters. Once before, in 1920 the League of Nations not only gave Britain a mandate over entire Iraq, but also made sure that Britain would hold the mandate over that country for another 25 years. Such has been the nature of the international organizations set up by the imperialist powers to be used as a tool of oppression against the third world countries. This time it didn’t work.

The Botched Raid on Arbil: US's Bungled Plan to Kidnap Iran's Top Spook Prompted Hostage Taking

April 3, 2007
CounterPunch Special Report
The Botched Raid on Arbil
US's Bungled Plan to Kidnap Iran's Top Spook Prompted Hostage Taking

By PATRICK COCKBURN

Arbil, Iraq.

A failed US attempt to abduct two senior Iranian security officers on an official visit to northern Iraq was the starting pistol for a crisis that ten weeks later led to Iranians seizing 15 British sailors and marines.

Early in the morning of 11 January helicopter-born US forces launched a surprise raid on a long-established Iranian liaison office in the city of Arbil in Iraqi Kurdistan. They captured five relatively junior Iranian officials whom the US accuses of being intelligence agents and still holds.

In reality the US attack had a far more ambitious objective The Independent has learned. The aim of the raid, launched without informing the Kurdish authorities, was to seize two men at the very heart of the Iranian security establishment.

Better understanding of the seriousness of the US action in Arbil -- and the angry Iranian response to it -- should have led Downing Street and the Ministry of Defence to realise that Iran was likely to retaliate against American or British forces such as highly vulnerable navy search parties in the Gulf.

The two senior Iranian officers the US sought to capture were Mohammed Jafari, the powerful deputy head of the Iranian National Security Council, and General Minojahar Frouzanda, the chief of intelligence of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, according to Kurdish officials.

The two men were in Kurdistan on an official visit during which they met the Iraqi President Jalal Talabani at his house beside Dokan lake and later saw Massoud Barzani, the president of the Kurdistan Regional Government, at his mountain headquarters at Salahudin overlooking Arbil.

"They were after Jafari," Fuad Hussein, the chief of staff of Massoud Barzani, told The Independent. He confirmed that the Iranian office had been established in Arbil for a long time and was often visited by Kurds obtaining documents to visit Iran. "The Americans thought he (Jafari) was there," said Mr Hussein.

Mr Jafari was accompanied by a second very senior Iranian official. "His name was General Minojahar Frouzanda, the head of intelligence of the Pasdaran (Iranian Revolutionary Guard)," said Sadi Ahmed Pire, now head of the Diwan (office) of President Talabani in Baghdad, in a separate interview. Mr Pire previously lived in Arbil where he headed the Patriotic Union of Kurdisan (PUK), Mr Talabani's political party.

The attempt by the US to seize two senior Iranian security officers openly meeting with Iraqi leaders is somewhat as if Iran had tried to kidnap the heads of the CIA and MI6 while they were on an official visit to a country neighbouring Iran such as Pakistan or Afghanistan.

There is no doubt that Iran believes that Mr Jafari and Mr Frouzanda were targeted by the Americans. Mr Jafari confirmed to the official Iranian newsagency IRNA that he was in Arbil at the time of the raid. In a little noticed remark Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki told the agency: "The objective of the Americans was to arrest Iranian security officials who had gone to Iraq to develop cooperation in the area of bilateral security."

US officials in Washington subsequently claimed that the five Iranian officials they did seize, and have not been seen since, were "suspected of being closely tied to activities targeting Iraq and coalition forces." This explanation never made much sense. No member of the US-led coalition has been killed in Arbil and there vare no Sunni Arab insurgents or Shia militiamen there.

The raid on Arbil took place within hours of President Bush making an Address to the Nation on 10 January in which he claimed: "Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops." He identified Iran and Syria as America's main enemies in Iraq though the four-year old guerrilla war against US-led forces is being conducted by the strongly anti-Iranian Sunni Arab community. Mr Jafari himself later complained about US allegations asking: "So far has there been a single Iranian among suicide bombers in the war-battered country? Almost all who involved in the suicide attacks are from Arab countries in the region."

It seemed strange at the time that the US would so openly flaunt the authority of both the Iraqi President Mr Talabani and the head of the KRG Mr Barzani simply to raid an Iranian liaison office that was being upgraded to a consulate, though this had not yet happened on 11 January. US officials, who must have been privy to the White House's new anti-Iranian stance, may have thought that bruised Kurdish pride was a small price to pay if the US could grab such senior Iranian officials as Mr Jafari and Gen Frouzanda.

For over a year the US and its allies have been trying to put pressure on Iran. Security sources in Iraqi Kurdistan have long said that the US is backing Iranian Kurdish guerrillas in Iran. The US is also reportedly backing Sunni Arab dissidents in Khuzestan in southern Iran who are opposed to the government in Tehran. On 4 February soldiers from the Iraqi army 36th Commando battalion in Baghdad, considered to be under American control, seized Jalal Sharafi, an Iranian diplomat.

But the raid on Arbil and the attempt to capture two such senior Iranian officials was a far more serious and aggressive act by the US than in any of these cases. Unlike them it was not carried out by proxies but by US forces directly. The abortive raid Arbil raid provokd a dangerous escalation in the confrontation between US and Iran which ultimately led to the capture of the 15 British sailors and marines.

Patrick Cockburn is the author of 'The Occupation: War, resistance and daily life in Iraq', a finalist for the National Book Critics' Circle Award for best non-fiction book of 2006.

The Long History of British and American Covert Provocation and Action in Iran

By Steve Watson

Global Research, April 3, 2007

The US and Britain are already at war with Iran, have been at war with Iran for a number of years now and are funding anti-Iranian terrorist groups inside Iran in preparation for the fallout that will occur after overt military action is commenced.

Not my words, the words of high ranking CIA officials, Defense department officials, former UN officials and retired US air force Colonels.

Iran's state news agency, IRNA today listed five previous violations of Iranian territory by British armed forces:

June 2004: An unmanned reconnaissance plane violated Iranian airspace in northeastern Abadan and was hit by Iranian anti-aircraft guns.

June 22, 2004: Eight navy personnel in three speed boats entered Iranian territorial waters and were arrested by Iranian coast guards; the arrested were released after three days.

November 1, 2006: Two helicopters, hovering at a height of 150 meters (492 feet), violated Iranian airspace for a total of 10 minutes.

January 27, 2007: A helicopter violated Iranian airspace over the mouth of the Arvand river and left the area after a warning from Iranian coast guards.

February 28, 2007: Three navy boats entered Iranian territorial waters in the mouth of Khor Mousa.

Can we believe Iranian state news? Is Britain and/or the US engaging in covert intelligence gathering in Iran? The answer is we don't have to believe Iranian state news because it is a well established fact that a covert intelligence war is already being waged with Iran and has been ongoing for many years now.

In an article entitled The US war with Iran has already begun [1], written back in June 2005, former UN weapons inspector in Iraq, Scott Ritter, addressed this very issue and described how intelligence gathering, direct action and the mobilizing of indigenous opposition is all being carried out already by CIA backed US special forces.

Ritter stated: "As with Iraq, the president has paved the way for the conditioning of the American public and an all-too-compliant media to accept at face value the merits of a regime change policy regarding Iran, linking the regime of the Mullah's to an "axis of evil" (together with the newly "liberated" Iraq and North Korea), and speaking of the absolute requirement for the spread of "democracy" to the Iranian people.

But Americans, and indeed much of the rest of the world, continue to be lulled into a false sense of complacency by the fact that overt conventional military operations have not yet commenced between the United States and Iran.

As such, many hold out the false hope that an extension of the current insanity in Iraq can be postponed or prevented in the case of Iran. But this is a fool's dream.

The reality is that the US war with Iran has already begun. As we speak, American over flights of Iranian soil are taking place, using pilotless drones and other, more sophisticated, capabilities.

The violation of a sovereign nation's airspace is an act of war in and of itself. But the war with Iran has gone far beyond the intelligence-gathering phase. President Bush has taken advantage of the sweeping powers granted to him in the aftermath of 11 September 2001, to wage a global war against terror and to initiate several covert offensive operations inside Iran."

Ritter goes on to describe how Iranian opposition groups, including the well known right-wing terrorist organization known as Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK), once run by Saddam Hussein's dreaded intelligence services, but now working exclusively for the CIA's Directorate of Operations, are carrying out remote bombings in Iran of the sort that the Bush administration condemns on a daily basis inside Iraq.

He also describes how to the north, in neighbouring Azerbaijan, the US military is preparing a base of operations for a massive military presence that will foretell a major land-based campaign designed to capture Tehran.

Ritter is not alone in his assertions.

During an interview on CNN a year ago, retired U.S. Air Force Colonel Sam Gardiner claimed that U.S. military operations were already 'underway' inside Iran.

"I would say -- and this may shock some -- I think the decision has been made and military operations are under way," Col. Gardiner told CNN International anchor Jim Clancy.

"The secretary point is, the Iranians have been saying American military troops are in there, have been saying it for almost a year," Gardiner said. "I was in Berlin two weeks ago, sat next to the ambassador, the Iranian ambassador to the IAEA. And I said, 'Hey, I hear you're accusing Americans of being in there operating with some of the units that have shot up revolution guard units.' He said, quite frankly, 'Yes, we know they are. We've captured some of the units, and they've confessed to working with the Americans,'" said the retired Air Force colonel.

Around the same time that Gardiner revealed this, RAW story ran an exclusive [2] , which also revealed that, according to counterintelligence officials, covert operations were underway that included CIA co-option and use of right wing terror groups:

"We disarmed [the MEK] of major weapons but not small arms. [Secretary of Defense Donald] Rumsfeld was pushing to use them as a military special ops team, but policy infighting between their camp and Condi, but she was able to fight them off for a while," said the intelligence official. According to still another intelligence source, the policy infighting ended last year when Donald Rumsfeld, under pressure from Vice President Cheney, came up with a plan to "convert" the MEK by having them simply quit their organization.

"These guys are nuts," this intelligence source said. "Cambone and those guys made MEK members swear an oath to Democracy and resign from the MEK and then our guys incorporated them into their unit and trained them."

The MEK were notorious in Iraq, indeed, Saddam Hussein himself had used the MEK for acts of terror against non-Sunni Muslims and had assigned domestic security detail to the MEK as a way of policing dissent among his own people. It was under the guidance of MEK 'policing' that Iraqi citizens who were not Sunni were routinely tortured, attacked and arrested.

Just last month after a bombing inside Iran, the London Telegraph also reported [3]on how a high ranking CIA official has blown the whistle on the fact that America is secretly funding terrorist groups in Iran in an attempt to pile pressure on the Islamic regime to give up its nuclear programme.

The claims were backed by Fred Burton, a former US state department counter-terrorism agent, who said: "The latest attacks inside Iran fall in line with US efforts to supply and train Iran's ethnic minorities to destabilise the Iranian regime."

John Pike, the head of the influential Global Security think tank in Washington, said: "The activities of the ethnic groups have hotted up over the last two years and it would be a scandal if that was not at least in part the result of CIA activity."

If this all sounds a little familiar, it's because it is. The fact is that the US has a long history of provocation and covert action inside Iran.

In 1953 the CIA and MI6 carried out Operation Ajax (officially TP-AJAX), a covert operation by the United Kingdom and the United States to remove the democratically elected nationalist cabinet of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh from power, to support the Pahlavi dynasty and consolidate the power of Mohammed Reza Pahlavi in order to preserve the Western control of Iran's hugely lucrative oil infrastructure.

In planning the operation, the CIA organized a guerrilla force incase the communist Tudeh Party seized power as a result of the chaos created by Operation Ajax. According to formerly "Top Secret" documents released by the National Security Archive, Undersecretary of State Walter Bedell Smith reported that the CIA had reached an agreement with Qashqai tribal leaders in southern Iran to establish a clandestine safe haven from which U.S.-funded guerrillas and intelligence agents could operate.

The conspiracy centered around having the increasingly impotent Shah dismiss the powerful Prime Minister Mossadegh and replace him with General Fazlollah Zahedi, a choice agreed on by the British and Americans after careful examination for his likeliness to be pro-British.

Zahedi was installed to succeed Prime Minister Mossadegh. The deposed Mossadegh was arrested, given a show trial, and condemned to death. The Shah commuted this sentence to solitary confinement for three years in a military prison, followed by house arrest for life.

"If there had not been a military coup, there would not have been 25 years of the Shah's brutal regime, there would not have been a revolution in 1979 and a government of clerics," Ibrahim Yazdi, a former foreign minister and leading member of a political party that traces its origins to Mossadegh's National Front, told the Christian Science Monitor on the 50th anniversary of the coup and installation of the Shah. "Now it seems that the Americans are pushing towards the same direction again. That shows they have not learned anything from history."

"For many Iranians, the coup was a tragedy from which their country has never recovered. Perhaps because Mossadegh represents a future denied, his memory has approached myth," Dan De Luce writes for the Guardian. "Beyond Iran, America remains deeply resented for siding with authoritarian rule in the region."

Alex Jones's latest film Terrorstorm [5] covers the ousting of Mossadegh in depth.

After the Iranian revolution in 1979, the US again found itself sparring with Iran. Again we find a history of provocation and aggression. In particular, a fierce assault known as Operation Praying Mantis, is renowned. The operation began after a US warship had entered mined Iranian territorial waters in the Persian Gulf.

From Wikipedia [6] : "On April 14 1988, the guided missile frigate USS Samuel B. Roberts struck a mine while sailing in the Persian Gulf as part of Operation Earnest Will, the 1987-88 convoy missions in which U.S. warships escorted reflagged Kuwaiti oil tankers to protect them from Iranian attacks. The explosion put a 25-foot hole in the Roberts' hull and nearly sank it. But the crew saved their ship with no loss of life, and Roberts was towed to Dubai on April 16.

After the mining, U.S. Navy divers recovered other mines in the area. When the serial numbers were found to match those of mines seized along with the Iran Ajr the previous September, U.S. military officials planned a retaliatory operation against Iranian targets in the Gulf.

The battle, the largest for American surface forces since World War II,[1] sank two Iranian warships and as many as six armed speedboats. It also marked the first surface-to-surface missile engagement in U.S. Navy history."

The US also attacked and destroyed several Iranian oil platforms in a full out military assault. At the time the Chicago Sun Times [7] reported:

"U.S. naval forces on Monday attacked Iranian targets in the Persian Gulf to show the Iranians that "if they threaten us, they'll pay a price," President Reagan said.

In fighting conducted over nine hours, the U.S. forces knocked out two Iranian oil platforms, and then sank or disabled a fast-attack missile patrol boat, two frigates, and three speedboats when Iran attempted to fight back. [8]"

Note Reagan's comments. Hence the name 'Operation Praying Mantis' was a reference to the fanning of the wings used to make the mantis seem larger and to scare the opponent.

On November 6, 2003 the International Court of Justice dismissed Iran's claim for reparation against the United States for breach of the 1955 Treaty of Amity between the two countries. The court also dismissed a counter-claim by the United States, also for reparation for breach of the same treaty. As part of its finding the court did note that "the actions of the United States of America against Iranian oil platforms on 19 October 1987 (Operation Nimble Archer) and 18 April 1988 (Operation Praying Mantis) cannot be justified as measures necessary to protect the essential security interests of the United States of America."

The fallout of Praying Mantis also resulted in the U.S. Navy guided missile cruiser USS Vincennes shooting down an Iranian civilian commercial airliner, Iran air flight 665 , between Bandar Abbas and Dubai, killing all 290 passengers and crew aboard, including 38 non-Iranians and 66 children. The Vincennes was inside Iranian territorial waters at the time of the shoot-down.

On the morning of July 3, the Vincennes crossed into Iranian territorial waters during clashes with Iranian gunboats. Earlier in the day, the Vincennes - along with Iranian gunboats - had similarly violated Omani waters until challenged by an Omani warship.

According to the U.S. government, the Iranian aircraft was mistakenly identified as an attacking military fighter. The Iranian government, however, maintains that the Vincennes knowingly shot down a civilian aircraft.

According to the Iranian government, the shooting down of IR 655 by the Vincennes was an intentionally performed and unlawful act. Even if there was a mistaken identification, which Iran has not accepted, it argues that this constituted gross negligence and recklessness amounting to an international crime, not an accident.

Newsweek reporters John Barry and Roger Charles wrote that Rogers acted recklessly and without due care. Their report accused the U.S. government of a cover-up. An analysis of the events by the International Strategic Studies Association described the deployment of an Aegis cruiser in the zone as irresponsible and felt that the expense of the ship had played a major part in the setting of a low threshold for opening fire.

George H.W. Bush, at the time Vice President said "I will never apologize for the United States of America — I don't care what the facts are" in reference to the incident.

The BBC later reported [9]: It took four years for the US administration to admit officially that the USS Vincennes was in Iranian waters when the skirmish took place with the Iranian gunboats. Subsequent investigations have accused the US military of waging a covert war against Iran in support of Iraq. In February 1996 the US agreed to pay Iran $61.8 million in compensation for the 248 Iranians killed, plus the cost of the aircraft and legal expenses.

So we see that Britain and the US have a long history of covert action against and provocation of Iran in their bid to aggressively control the region. Nothing has changed. These facts and past precedents are exactly the reason why we should be questioning our own governments on the authenticity of the current seizure of the British marines [10] by Iran.

Our governments have continually violated Iranian territory covertly for decades and then covered up the fact.

In January Republican Congressman and 2008 Presidential candidate Ron Paul stated [11] that he feared a staged Gulf of Tonkin [12] style incident may be used to provoke air strikes on Iran as numerous factors collide to heighten expectations that America may soon be embroiled in its third war in six years.

Just last month former National Security Advisor and founding member of the Trilateral Commission Zbigniew Brzezinski also tacitly warned [13] that an attack on Iran could be launched following a staged provocation.

During a BBC Newsnight feature story this week, it was demonstrated that the Iranian footage of the capture of the British sailors was in large part likely faked and the commentators all but suggested the entire incident was staged or at least constituted "gross negligence" on behalf of the British.

Former British Ambassador Craig Murray and others are highlighting the fact that the maritime border between Iraq and Iran is contested, and the British have essentially manufactured a border to make it appear as if HMS Cornwall was within Iraqi territorial waters. The mainstream media has uniformly failed to address this issue.

It seems that we are once again witnessing the unfolding of ongoing covert military action by our governments against (whether you agree with it or not) a democratically elected foreign government in Iran.

References:

[1]
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/june2005/200605alreadybegun.htm

[2]
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/US_outsourcing_special_operations_intelligence_gathering_0413.html

[3]
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/core/Content/displayPrintable.jhtml;jsessionid=VBV4JSLSWH1VBQFIQMGSFFWAVCBQWIV0?xml=/news/2007/02/25/wiran25.xml&site=5&page=0

[4] http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,4736736-111322,00.html

[5] http://infowars-shop.stores.yahoo.net/teascsyed.html

[6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Praying_Mantis

[7] http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-3881010.html

[8] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655

[9]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/july/3/newsid_4678000/4678707.stm

[10]
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/march2007/300307bordermap.htm

[11]
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/january2007/150107gulfoftonkin.htm

[12] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_Incident

[13]
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/february2007/060207falseflag.htm
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UK TESTS IRANIAN RESOLVE

UK TESTS IRANIAN RESOLVE
Ardeshir Ommani, April 3, 2007

Iranian armed forces arrested 15 British marines and sailors, including a 26-year-old Leading Seaman, Faye Turney, on March 23 after they illegally entered Iran’s territorial waters in the northern Persian Gulf, as was reported by Mehr News Agency.

If today the Iranian navy did not take the risk of arresting the British sailors and marines from halting the merchant ships, climbing on board and at gun point searching the crew, the contents and the passengers, tomorrow, under another British mandate, extracted from the 1920’s League of Nations or today’s United Nations, as usual, they will be in Tehran kicking the doors down and at the point of bayonets arresting the Iranian young men and women, searching their homes for illegal literature and asking them who they are, what they are doing in their homes and where are the cells of the resistance fighters, as the U.S.-U.K. invading forces have done to the people of Iraq for more than 4 years.

The British authorities, mainly represented by Prime Minister Tony Blair and Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett, immediately claimed that their naval forces were in Iraq’s waterways engaged in searching an Indian-flagged merchant ship under the power of the British mandate authorized by the United Nations.

There are many indisputable facts, maps and testimonies of the sailors themselves that attest to the actual truth that the present rulers of Britain, just like in the old times, are in absolute denial and willfully distort the reality of their violation of Iran’s territorial sovereignty.

In order to force Iran to agree to forfeit its right of defending the integrity of its territorial waters and hence accept the violations as a “routine” and normal big-power practice, the British authorities began trying to isolate Iran through aggressive world-wide propaganda and bringing pressure on other countries, particularly the European Union, Turkey and Saudi Arabia, to break their trade and economic relations with Iran. In this regard they were unsuccessful, because the major European countries have vested interests in Iran’s oil and gas reserves, not to mention the auto industry and other industrial sectors. To orchestrate an anti-Iranian front, the U.S. and Britain urged other countries to persuade Iran to release the British sailors. But such “ganging up” tactics resulted in the hardening of the Iranian position as to the legality of the British demands. As if inattentive to the consequences of his antagonizing assertions, Tony Blair warned Iran that Britain’s campaign to free its troops would move to a “different phase” if the sailors and marines were not released immediately. Certainly, Mr. Blair was raising the risk level by issuing big-sounding bluffs.

To raise the tension with the aim of isolating Iran among the imperialist cohorts, Britain on March 28 decided to take the issue to the U.N., hoping that the international organization would issue a letter condemning Iran by restating London’s claim that the Britons were in Iraqi waters, and the sailor’s detention by the Iranians is considered to be “abhorrent”. However, the representative of Russia did not accept the British assumption that the navy vessels were in Iraqi waterways and on that basis the sailor’s detention should be characterized as “abhorrent”. All these attempts infuriated the Iranian government, solidifying their stance and leading to a hardening of their position, raising the possibility that the Iranian government would refer the British sailors/marines to their courts and pursue the issue through Iran’s legal system.

BBC News reported that the “U.K. failed to win support for a strong statement” deploring Iran’s action. To inform the British authorities about their hazardous attempt to involve a third party in the dispute, the Iranian U.N. mission issued a statement to the effect that “This case can and should be settled through bilateral channels. The British government attempt to engage third parties, including the Security Council…is not helpful,” said Iran’s United Nations representative. The lack of sophistication and far-sightedness on Blair’s part, who has been so used to acting illegally, being a number one partner of Bush’s “coalition of the willing” that he ignored the fact that the British government has been under pressure as a result of keeping British troops for more than four years in theaters of already lost wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The British hoped by mobilizing their allies in Europe, the U.N. and the U.S. to express their outrage at the seizure of the 15 soldiers, they could isolate Iran and force it into submission and legitimize Britain (and the U.S.) naval presence in the mouth of Arvand River, the Iranian name for the Shatt-Al-Arab.

Amongst all the nations and parties on earth, the U.S. government, as usual, stuck its nose deeply into the dispute and used it to denigrate the Iranian government. To cover up its own miserable rate of popularity and opposition to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, out of sheer malevolence, Washington declared that the Iranian government and people do not share the same views on nuclear rights. A former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, acting in his usual arrogant manner, went even further by saying “We need to accelerate a lot of things that are already underway: keeping Iran out of the international financial markets more fully, denying them materials and technology they need to complete their effort to gain mastery over the nuclear fuel cycle. But I think, ultimately, the only thing that will stop Iran….is regime change in Tehran.”

Meanwhile at least two of the detained British sailors and marines had admitted that they illegally entered Iranian waters. Two days following their arrest, Leading Seaman Faye Turney confessed that “Obviously we trespassed into their waters. They were very friendly and very hospitable, very thoughtful, nice people. They explained to us why we’ve been arrested. There was no harm, no aggression.” A day later this 26-year-old mother of a young child asked why Britain is not withdrawing its troops out of Iraq. Her statements were video-broadcast Wednesday on Iran’s Arab-language satellite channel. British Seaman Turney also urged Britain’s MP’s to challenge the government as to why its presence in the Persian Gulf has led to another diplomatic conflict with Iran. Turney wrote in a letter delivered to the British Parliament on March 29: “I ask the representatives of the House of Commons after the government had promised that this type of incident would not happen again, why have they let this occur and why has the government not been questioned over this?” “Isn’t it time for us to start withdrawing our forces from Iraq and let them determine their own future?”

A day later, on Friday, March 30th, a second member of the British crew detained by Iran apologized for “trespassing” in the Iranian waters in the Persian Gulf. Seaman Nathan Thomas Summers stated, “I would like to apologize for entering your waters without permission. And that happened back in 2004, and the government promised that it wouldn't happen again. Again, I deeply apologize for entering your waters.”

On Sunday, April 01, 2007, two more Royal Naval personnel confessions on Iranian television in front of a map further strengthened the stance of the Iranian government that the British sailors and marines were seized in Iranian waters. “At approximately about 10 o’clock in the morning we were seized, apparently at this point here from their maps and the GPS they showed us, which is inside Iranian territorial waters,” Captain Chris Ayre said in the video released to international broadcasters. The second Briton said: “My name is Lieutenant Felix Carmen…Yes, I’d like to say to the Iranian people, I can understand why you were so angry about our intrusion into your waters…”

By April 2, 2007, according to a report in the semi-official news agency ISNA, all 15 U.K. sailors confessed to illegally entering Iranian waters and their confessions were videotaped. However, a government spokesman went on to say, “But due to the positive changes in the past two days by the British government, the television will not broadcast the interviews.”

In an attempt to prove the position of the British boats before their arrest, Downing Street provided a rough sketch of the northern part of the Persian Gulf, where the Arvand River empties into the Gulf at Abadan, Iran. The map included the demarcation line between Iraq and Iran’s territorial waters. London pretended that the map was already at hand in the naval offices of Britain before the incident. But the balloon of the British Empire was punctured further when the former head of the Foreign Office’s maritime section, Craig Murray, wrote that “The Iran/Iraq maritime boundary shown on the British government map does not exist. It has been drawn up by the British government,” following the arrest of the seamen. “This published boundary is a fake with no legal force,” he said.

The truth is that the British have violated Iranian territorial waters many times before. The following is a short list of the violations of Iranian territory by the British armed forces, as reported on www.Irna.ir Thursday, March 29, 2007:

Let's have a brief look at violations of Iranian territory by the British armed forces:

1. British unmanned reconnaissance plane RPV violated Iranian airspace in northeastern Abadan in June 2004 and was hit by Iranian anti-aircraft guns. RPV debris is available.
2. At 11 O'clock local time on June 22, 2004, three British speed boats with eight navy personnel on board trespassed Iranian borders and were arrested by Iranian coast guards.
3. At 21:30 local time on November 1, 2006, two British Black awks (choppers) from Royal Navy hovered at the height of 150 meters at 47,700-17,400 coordinates on Khorramshahr map (Pole-No: new bridge) violating Iranian airspace and they entered Iraqi territory through 62,500-15,500 coordinates after 10 minutes.
4. On January 27, 2007 a British helicopter flew over mouth of Arvandrud (Arvand river) and violated Iran's airspace and they left the area after a warning from Iranian coast guards.
5. Three British Navy boats entered Khor Mousa mouth in Iranian territorial waters on February 28, 2007.
The sixth was trespass of two British Navy boats with 15 marines on board into Iranian territorial waters at Arvandrud which led to their arrest by Iranian coast guards.

If George W. Bush and Tony Blair truly believe in the peaceful resolution of their differences with Iran, Washington and London must stop kidnapping Iranian officials and diplomats working in Iraq and elsewhere. Secondly, as a good will gesture they must agree to exchange the Iranian diplomats held captive by the U.S. military for the release of the British seamen and woman held by the Iranian government. This is not a tit-for-tat or quid pro quo, but a gesture of reciprocity, a step toward peace in the Middle East. By the time this article was receiving its finishing touches, Mehr News Agency announced that the second secretary at the Iranian Embassy in Baghdad, Jalal Sharafi, who was kidnapped in Baghdad on February 4, was freed and returned to Iran on Tuesday, April 3, 2007. Sharafi was kidnapped by a group connected to the Defense Ministry which operates under the supervision of the U.S. military intelligence forces in Iraq.

Say 'no' before Bush says 'yes'

By Robert Bowman


Is the Bush administration planning to attack Iran? There are several indicators saying "yes":

1. Numerous reports of covert intelligence and acts of terror in Iran by Israel's Mossad and U.S. Special Forces; U.S. support for secessionist movements such as the PJAK (Kurds within Iran), and unofficial U.S. support for the Pakistani militant group Jundullah.

2. Recent U.S. Naval operations in the northern Persian Gulf.

3. Warnings of impending war with Iran by former CIA intelligence analyst Ray McGovern and former UN weapons inspection chief in Iraq Scott Ritter.

4. The recent crisis over captured British sailors by Iranians and (happily) their subsequent release in exchange for an Iranian diplomat being held by the U.S. in Iraq.

5. Detentions of Iranian diplomats in Iraq.

6. The Project for the New American Century's report "Rebuilding America's Defenses" (September 2000) advocating U.S. control of the Gulf region whether or not Saddam Hussein was in power (and specifically including Iran).

The reasons for avoiding war with Iran are numerous:

1. British military historian Corelli Barnett warns that "an attack on Iran would effectively launch World War III."

2. If tactical nuclear weapons are used (which the U.S. has reserved as an option) and nuclear sites are hit, the resulting fallout would devastate the immediate area and could conceivably reach Europe and the U.S.

3. Ritter predicts that an immediate consequence of such an attack will be a worldwide oil shortage of crisis proportions.

4. Our military is already overextended.

What can be done to stop this madness?

1. Urge Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to implement suggestions by Navy commanders with the Fifth Fleet in Bahrain to set up a "naval hot line" between British/ U.S. and Iranian forces to help avert an accidental war.

2. Urge Congressional representatives to insist that Bush come to Congress before initiating any overt military action against Iran.

3. Also, encourage members of Congress to continue recent fact-finding and diplomatic visits to Syria, Iran and other Middle Eastern countries. The Iraq study group advocated such efforts.

4. Contact the president and say "no" to war in Iran.

5. Urge the president and Congress to work toward a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East.

6. Work with citizens of all political viewpoints to engage in respectful dialogue about the direction our country should take.

Subverting Iran: Washington’s Covert War inside Iran

Subverting Iran
Washington’s Covert War inside Iran
by Gregory Elich; Centre for Research for Globalization; March 25, 2007

Much attention has been given to the Bush Administration’s preparations for possible war against Iran as well as its drive to impose sanctions. Meanwhile, a less noticed policy has been unfolding, one that may in time prove to have grave consequences for the region. There is a covert war underway in Iran, still in its infancy, but with disturbing signs of impending escalation. In the shadowy world of guerrilla operations, the full extent of involvement by the Bush Administration has yet to be revealed, but enough is known to paint a disturbing picture.

The provision of aid to anti-government forces offers certain advantages to the Bush Administration. No effort needs to be expended in winning support for the policy. Operations can be conducted away from the public eye during a time of growing domestic opposition to the war in Iraq, and international opinion is simply irrelevant where the facts are not well known. In terms of expenditures, covert operations are a cost-effective means for destabilizing a nation, relative to waging war.

There is nothing new in the technique, and it has proven an effective means for toppling foreign governments in the past, as was the case with socialist Afghanistan and Nicaragua. In Yugoslavia, U.S. and British military training and arms shipments helped to build up the secessionist Kosovo Liberation Army from a small force of 300 soldiers into a sizable guerrilla army that made the province of Kosovo ungovernable. The very chaos that the West did so much to create was then used as the pretext for bombing Yugoslavia.

According to a former CIA official, funding for armed separatist groups operating in Iran is paid from the CIA’s classified budget. The aim, claims Fred Burton, an ex-State Department counter-terrorism agent, is “to supply and train” these groups “to destabilize the Iranian regime.” (1)

The largest and most well known of the anti-government organizations is Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), operating out of Iraq. For years MEQ had launched cross-border attacks and terrorist acts against Iran with the support of Saddam Hussein. Officially designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department in 1997, and disarmed of heavy weaponry by the U.S. military six years later, Washington has since come to view MEK in a different light. Three years ago, U.S. intelligence officials suggested looking the other way as the MEK rearmed and to use the organization to destabilize Iran, a recommendation that clearly has been accepted. (2)

Accusing MEK of past involvement in repressive measures by former president Saddam Hussein, the current Iraqi government wants to close down Camp Ashraf, located well outside of Baghdad, where many of the MEK fighters are stationed. But the camp operates under the protection of the U.S. military, and American soldiers chauffeur MEK leaders. The Iraqi government is unlikely to get its way, as the MEK claims to be the primary U.S. source for intelligence on Iran. (3)

U.S. officials “made MEK members swear an oath to democracy and resign from the MEK,” reveals an intelligence source, “and then our guys incorporated them into their unit and trained them.” Reliance on the MEK began under Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld with the direction of Vice President Dick Cheney, and soon MEK soldiers were being used in special operations missions in Iran. “They are doing whatever they want, no oversight at all,” said one intelligence official of the MEK’s American handlers. (4)

The Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan (PJAK), is another organization that conducts cross-border raids into Iran. Israel provides the group with “equipment and training,” claims a consultant to the U.S. Defense Department, while the U.S. gave it “a list of targets inside Iran of interest to the U.S.” Aid to guerrilla groups, the consultant reports, is “part of an effort to explore alternative means of applying pressure on Iran.” (5) It has been noted that PJAK has recently shown an impressive gain in capability during its operations, both in terms of size and armament, a fact that can surely be attributed to Western support. (6)

Jundallah (God’s Brigade) is an extremist Sunni organization operating in Sistan-Balochistan province that has been launching armed attacks, planting explosives, setting off car bombs, and kidnapping. Based in Pakistan, it is unclear if this group is connected with the Pakistani organization of the same name, which has ties with Al-Qaeda. (7) Jundallah denies that it has any links to either Al-Qaeda or to the U.S. But Iranian officials claim that a recently arrested Jundallah guerrilla has confessed that he was trained by U.S. and British intelligence officers. There is no way to verify that such a confession has actually taken place, nor its reliability as it may have come as a result of coercion, but the claim would not be inconsistent with U.S. policy elsewhere in Iran. (8)

It is probable that in the coming months the Bush Administration will expand support for anti-government forces in order to more effectively destabilize Iran and gather intelligence. Already U.S. Special Forces are operating in Iran collecting data, planting nuclear sensors, and electronically marking targets. Separatist forces have cooperated in those efforts. “This looks to be turning into a pretty large-scale covert operation,” comments a former CIA official. U.S. and Israeli officials are establishing front companies to help finance that covert war. (9) To fully capitalize on ethnic discontent along Iran’s periphery, the U.S. Marine Corps has commissioned a study from defense contractor Hicks and Associates on Iran and Iraq’s ethnic groups and their grievances. (10)

That these separatist organizations clearly engage in terrorism hasn’t deterred the Bush Administration from backing them. The potential for baneful consequences is considerable. CIA support for the anti-Soviet and anti-socialist Mujahedin in Afghanistan spawned a worldwide movement of Islamic extremism. Western support for ethnic secessionists shattered Yugoslavia and the invasion of Iraq fired the flames of ethnic discord and made a shared life impossible. It remains to be seen if the Bush Administration can succeed in achieving its goal of effecting regime change in Iran. That process could have devastating consequences for the people of Iran. Those officials in the Bush Administration who advocated and implemented covert operations “think in Iran you can just go in and hit the facilities and destabilize the government,” explains a former CIA official. “They believe they can get rid of a few crazy mullahs and bring in the young guys who like Gap jeans, [and] all the world’s problems are solved. I think it’s delusional.” (11)

Gregory Elich is the author of Strange Liberators: Militarism, Mayhem, and the Pursuit of Profit.

http://www.amazon.com/Strange-Liberators-Militarism-Mayhem-Pursuit/dp/1595265708


NOTES

(1) William Lowther and Colin Freeman, “US Funds Terror Groups to Sow Chaos in Iran,” Sunday Telegraph (London), February 25, 2007.

(2) “Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK or MKO), Global Security.org

Syed Saleem Shahzad, “Sleeping Forces Stir in Iran,” Asia Times, June 26, 2003.

Gian Marco Chiocci and Alessia Marani, “Iranian Mujaheddin Gather Funds in Italy,” Il Giornale (Milan), October 2, 2006.

(3) Ernesto Londono and Saad al-Izzi, “Iraq Intensifies Efforts to Expel Iranian Group,” Washington Post, March 14, 2007.

(4) Larisa Alexandrovna, “On Cheney, Rumsfeld Order, US Outsourcing Special Ops, Intelligence to Iraq Terror Group, Intelligence Officials Say,” The Raw Story, April 13, 2006.

(5) Seymour Hersh, “The Next Act,” New Yorker, November 27, 2006.

(6) James Brandon, “PJAK Claims Fresh Attacks in Iran,” Global Terrorism Analysis, March 6, 2007.

(7) Ali Akbar Dareini, “Explosion Kills 11 Members of Iran’s Elite Revolutionary Guards,” Associated Press, February 14, 2007.

(8) Broadcast, Islamic Republic of Iran News Network (Teheran), February 17, 2007.

(9) Richard Sale, “Cat and Mouse Game Over Iran,” UPI, January 26, 2005.

(10) Guy Dinmore, “US Marines Probe Tensions Among Iran’s Minorities,” Financial Times (London), February 23, 2006.

(11) Julian Borger and Ian Traynor, “Now US Ponders Attack on Iran,” The Guardian (London), January 18, 2005.

US Nuclear Hypocrisy and Iran: The New Nuclear Arsenal: Costly and Illegal

March 5, 2007
The New Nuclear Arsenal: Costly and Illegal
US Nuclear Hypocrisy and Iran

By FRIDA BERRIGAN

The Bush administration is very focused these days on Iran's nuclear program. This focus has only sharpened in the aftermath of the International Atomic Energy Agency's recent report that Iran continues to enrich uranium in defiance of a UN Security Council demand.

"A nuclear-armed Iran is not a very pleasant prospect for anybody to think about," Vice President Dick Cheney told ABC News' Jonathan Karl in Australia. "It clearly could do significant damage. And so I think we need to continue to do everything we can to make certain they don't achieve that objective." Asked if the administration would continue to pursue diplomacy, the vice president responded that while "we've been working with the EU and going through the United Nations with sanctions the President has also made it clear that we haven't taken any options off the table."

In the White House, "options on the table" is code for military action. There have been many media reports of U.S. preparations to attack Iran. But the primary rationale for such an attack--to prevent Iran from going nuclear--is deeply problematic. Not only is the United States beefing up its military in general, it is even planning a modernization of its nuclear arsenal. The nuclear hypocrisy of the Bush administration makes any resolution of the conflict with Iran all the more difficult.


U.S. Military Spending

The new round of hand-wringing and saber-rattling about Iran's nascent but worrisome nuclear program comes just a few weeks after the Bush administration announced its new budget, which included billions for nuclear weapons development. The Department of Energy's "weapons activities" budget request totals $6.4 billion, a drop in the bucket compared to the Pentagon's $481.4 billion proposed budget. But the budget for new nukes is large and growing -- even in comparison to Cold War figures.

During the Cold War, spending on nuclear weapons averaged $4.2 billion a year (in current dollars). Almost two decades after the nuclear animosity between the two great superpowers ended, the United States is spending one-and-a-half times the Cold War average on nuclear weapons.

In 2001, the weapons-activities budget of the Department of Energy (DOE), which oversees the nuclear weapons complex through the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), totaled $5.19 billion. Since President Bush's January 2002 "Nuclear Posture Review" asserted the urgent need for a "revitalized nuclear weapons complex" -- "to design, develop, manufacture, and certify new warheads in response to new national requirements; and maintain readiness to resume underground testing" -- there has been more than a billion-dollar jump in nuclear spending. Included in the $6.4 billion 2008 request is money for "design concept testing" of two new nuclear warhead designs that officials hope will be deployed on submarine-launched intercontinental ballistic missiles-- even as U.S. warships set their helms towards the Strait of Hormuz to menace Iran back from the nuclear brink.


Costly, Illegal, and Dangerous

Key to revitalizing nuclear weapons is Complex 2030, the NNSA'a "infrastructure planning scenario for a nuclear weapons complex able to meet the threats of the 21st century." It is a costly, illegal, and dangerous program aimed at rebuilding the 50-year-old nuclear facilities where the weapons are both assembled and disassembled.

How Costly? The DOE estimates that Complex 2030 would require a capital investment of $150 billion. But the Government Accountability Office says that is way too low to fund even the basic maintenance of the eight nuclear facilities currently operational throughout the country.

Why Illegal? Complex 2030 promises a return to the Cold War cycle of design, development, and production of nuclear weapons, runs the risk of a return to underground nuclear testing, and could require the annual manufacture of hundreds of new plutonium pits -- the fissile "heart" of a nuclear weapon. These plans directly contradict U.S. treaty promises in 1968 "to negotiate toward general and complete disarmament."

How Dangerous? Every step the United States takes away from the international consensus on the illegality and immorality of nuclear weapons is a new incentive and justification for other nations to pursue and brandish nuclear weapons. In a 2006 report, the independent "Weapons of Mass Destruction" Commission estimated the dark likelihood of ten new nuclear powers within a decade. At the end of January, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists advanced the hand of its Doomsday clock to five minutes to nuclear midnight, in part as a result of "renewed U.S. emphasis on the military utility of nuclear weapons."

As the United States surges forward in its nuclear renaissance, the threat of nuclear terrorism and accidental nuclear strikes remains a grave yet under-funded priority. The administration occasionally raises the specter of nuclear-armed terrorists. In February 2004, for example, President Bush warned, "In the hands of terrorists, weapons of mass destruction would be a first resort." Despite its rhetoric, however, the administration has done nothing to accelerate efforts to destroy and safeguard loose nuclear weapons and bomb-making materials, allocating about $1 billion a year to these crucial non-proliferation efforts (roughly the same amount that the Bush administration has been burning through each day in Iraq). At this rate, it will be 13 years before Russian nuclear material is secured.

The contradictions between what the administration is demanding of Tehran and other powers, and the capabilities it is pursuing for its own arsenal, are provocative and dangerous -- a pernicious form of nuclear hypocrisy.

Dick Cheney is right -- a nuclear-armed Iran is not a pleasant prospect, and we have to do something. But the most effective option is the hardest to swallow. Under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the United States agreed to an "unequivocal undertaking" to "eliminate" its nuclear weapons arsenal. Honoring that commitment -- and encouraging other declared and undeclared nuclear states to do the same -- would undercut Tehran's arguments about why nuclear firepower is necessary. Oh, and by the way, it would also make the world feel a whole lot safer.

Frida Berrigan is a columnist for Foreign Policy in Focus and Senior Research Associate at the World Policy Institute's Arms Trade Resource Center. Her primary research areas with the project include nuclear-weapons policy, war profiteering and corporate crimes, weapons sales to areas of conflict, and military-training programs. She is the author of a number of Institute reports, most recently Weapons at War 2005: Promoting Freedom or Fueling Conflict. She can be reached at: berrigaf@newschool.edu

Bush Administration lies about Iran exposed

Today's Must Read
By Paul Kiel - February 27, 2007, 9:17 AM

Two weeks ago, the Bush administration organized an intelligence briefing for journalists in Iraq to demonstrate that Iran was providing weapons to Iraqi insurgents. According to the anonymous briefers, the weapons -- particularly explosively formed penetrators or E.F.P.s -- were manufactured in Iran and provided to insurgents by the Quds Force -- a fact that meant direction for the operation was “coming from the highest levels of the Iranian government.”

Well. A raid in southern Iraq on Saturday seems to have complicated the case. There, The Wall Street Journal reports (sub. req.), troops "uncovered a makeshift factory used to construct advanced roadside bombs that the U.S. had thought were made only in Iran." The main feature of the find were several copper liners that are the main component of EFPs. But, The New York Times reports, "while the find gave experts much more information on the makings of the E.F.P.’s, which the American military has repeatedly argued must originate in Iran, the cache also included items that appeared to cloud the issue."

>>read more

Hersh: Bush Funneling Money to al Qaeda-Related Groups

Hersh: Bush Funneling Money to al Qaeda-Related Groups
ThinkProgress.com

Sunday 25 February 2007

New Yorker columnist Sy Hersh says the "single most explosive" element of his latest article involves an effort by the Bush administration to stem the growth of Shiite influence in the Middle East (specifically the Iranian government and Hezbollah in Lebanon) by funding violent Sunni groups.

Hersh says the U.S. has been "pumping money, a great deal of money, without congressional authority, without any congressional oversight" for covert operations in the Middle East where it wants to "stop the Shiite spread or the Shiite influence." Hersh says these funds have ended up in the hands of "three Sunni jihadist groups" who are "connected to al Qaeda" but "want to take on Hezbollah."

Hersh summed up his scoop in stark terms: "We are simply in a situation where this president is really taking his notion of executive privilege to the absolute limit here, running covert operations, using money that was not authorized by Congress, supporting groups indirectly that are involved with the same people that did 9/11." Watch it:

Hersh added, "All of this should be investigated by Congress, by the way, and I trust it will be. In my talking to membership - members there, they are very upset that they know nothing about this. And they have great many suspicions."

Transcript:

Blitzer: Near the end of your article, you have this explosive point in there about John Negroponte, who is now going to be the deputy secretary of state, as opposed to the head of U.S. intelligence.

You write this: "I was subsequently told by the two government consultants and the former senior intelligence officials that the echoes of Iran-Contra were a factor in Negroponte's decision to resign from the National Intelligence directorship and accept the position of deputy secretary of state."

Explain what you were hearing, because that is obviously a very explosive charge.

Hersh: Yes. It is probably the single most explosive, if you will, or depressing - or distressing sort of thing I discovered in the last few months, which is simply this. This administration has made a policy change, a decision that they are going to put all of the pressure they can on the Shiites, that is the Shiite regime in Iran, the Shiite - and they are also doing everything they can to stop Hezbollah - which is Shiite, the Hezbollah organization from getting any control or any more of a political foothold in Lebanon.

So they essentially, I quote the - I saw Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah, and he described it this way, as "fitna (ph)," the Arab word for "civil war." As far as he is concerned, we are interested in recreating what is happening in Iraq in Lebanon, that is Sunni versus Shia. And in looking into that story, and I saw him in December, I found this. That we have been pumping money, a great deal of money, without congressional authority, without any congressional oversight, Prince Bandar of Saudi Arabia is putting up some of this money, for covert operations in many areas of the Middle East where we think that the - we want to stop the Shiite spread or the Shiite influence.

They call it the "Shiite Crescent." And a lot of this money, and I can't tell you with absolute certainty how - exactly when and how, but this money has gotten into the hands - among other places, in Lebanon, into the hands of three - at least three jihadist groups. There are three Sunni jihadist groups whose main claim to fame inside Lebanon right now is that they are very tough. These are people connected to al Qaeda who want to take on Hezbollah. So this government, at the minimum, we may not directly be funneling money to them, but we certainly know that these groups exist.

My government, which arrests al Qaeda every place it can find them and send - some of them are n Guantanamo and other places, is sitting back while the Lebanese government we support, the government of Prime Minister Siniora, is providing arms and sustenance to three jihadist groups whose sole function, seems to me and to the people that talk to me in our government, to be there in case there is a real shoot-'em-up with Hezbollah and we really get into some sort of serious major conflict between the Sunni government and Hezbollah, which is largely Shia, who are basically - or as you know, there is a coalition headed by Hezbollah that is challenging the government right now, demonstrations, sit-ins.

There has been some violence. So America, my country, without telling Congress, using funds not appropriated, I don't know where, by my sources believe much of the money obviously came from Iraq where there is all kinds of piles of loose money, pools of cash that could be used for covert operations.

All of this should be investigated by Congress, by the way, and I trust it will be. In my talking to membership - members there, they are very upset that they know nothing about this. And they have great many suspicions.

We are simply in a situation where this president is really taking his notion of executive privilege to the absolute limit here, running covert operations, using money that was not authorized by Congress, supporting groups indirectly that are involved with the same people that did 9/11, and we should be arresting these people rather than looking the other way...

Blitzer: And your bottom line, Sy...

Hersh: ... and could lead to a real mess...

Blitzer: Your bottom line is that Negroponte was aware of this, obviously, and he wanted to distance himself from it? That is why he decided to give up that position and take the number two job at the State Department?

Hersh: He - that is one of the reasons, I was told. Negroponte also was not in tune with Cheney. There was a lot of complaints about him because he was seen as much of a stickler, too ethical for some of the operations the Pentagon wants to run.

UN Calls US Data on Iran's Nuclear Aims Unreliable

UN Calls US Data on Iran's Nuclear Aims Unreliable Tips about supposed secret weapons sites and documents with missile designs haven't panned out, diplomats say.

by Bob Drogin and Kim Murphy

VIENNA — Although international concern is growing about Iran's nuclear program and its regional ambitions, diplomats here say most U.S. intelligence shared with the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency has proved inaccurate and none has led to significant discoveries inside Iran. Iranian diplomat Ali Asghar Soltanieh speaks at a security conference in Moscow on Friday. He said Iran would never give up its nuclear program. (SERGEI L. LOIKO / LAT) The officials said the CIA and other Western spy services had provided sensitive information to the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency at least since 2002, when Iran's long-secret nuclear program was exposed. But none of the tips about supposed secret weapons sites provided clear evidence that the Islamic Republic was developing illicit weapons. "Since 2002, pretty much all the intelligence that's come to us has proved to be wrong," a senior diplomat at the IAEA said. Another official here described the agency's intelligence stream as "very cold now" because "so little panned out." The reliability of U.S. information and assessments on Iran is increasingly at issue as the Bush administration confronts the emerging regional power on several fronts: its expanding nuclear effort, its alleged support for insurgents in Iraq and its backing of Middle East militant groups. The CIA still faces harsh criticism for its prewar intelligence errors on Iraq. No one here argues that U.S. intelligence officials have fallen this time for crudely forged documents or pushed shoddy analysis. IAEA officials, who openly challenged U.S. assessments that Saddam Hussein was developing a nuclear bomb, say the Americans are much more cautious in assessing Iran. read more

US generals ‘will quit’ if Bush orders Iran attack

From The Sunday Times
February 25, 2007

US generals ‘will quit’ if Bush orders Iran attack
Michael Smith and Sarah Baxter, Washington

SOME of America’s most senior military commanders are prepared to resign if the White House orders a military strike against Iran, according to highly placed defence and intelligence sources.

Tension in the Gulf region has raised fears that an attack on Iran is becoming increasingly likely before President George Bush leaves office. The Sunday Times has learnt that up to five generals and admirals are willing to resign rather than approve what they consider would be a reckless attack.

“There are four or five generals and admirals we know of who would resign if Bush ordered an attack on Iran,” a source with close ties to British intelligence said. “There is simply no stomach for it in the Pentagon, and a lot of people question whether such an attack would be effective or even possible.”

A British defence source confirmed that there were deep misgivings inside the Pentagon about a military strike. “All the generals are perfectly clear that they don’t have the military capacity to take Iran on in any meaningful fashion. Nobody wants to do it and it would be a matter of conscience for them.

“There are enough people who feel this would be an error of judgment too far for there to be resignations.”

A generals’ revolt on such a scale would be unprecedented. “American generals usually stay and fight until they get fired,” said a Pentagon source. Robert Gates, the defence secretary, has repeatedly warned against striking Iran and is believed to represent the view of his senior commanders.

The threat of a wave of resignations coincided with a warning by Vice-President Dick Cheney that all options, including military action, remained on the table. He was responding to a comment by Tony Blair that it would not “be right to take military action against Iran”.

Iran ignored a United Nations deadline to suspend its uranium enrichment programme last week. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad insisted that his country “will not withdraw from its nuclear stances even one single step”.

The International Atomic Energy Agency reported that Iran could soon produce enough enriched uranium for two nuclear bombs a year, although Tehran claims its programme is purely for civilian energy purposes.

Nicholas Burns, the top US negotiator, is to meet British, French, German, Chinese and Russian officials in London tomorrow to discuss additional penalties against Iran. But UN diplomats cautioned that further measures would take weeks to agree and would be mild at best.

A second US navy aircraft carrier strike group led by the USS John C Stennis arrived in the Gulf last week, doubling the US presence there. Vice Admiral Patrick Walsh, the commander of the US Fifth Fleet, warned: “The US will take military action if ships are attacked or if countries in the region are targeted or US troops come under direct attack.”

But General Peter Pace, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said recently there was “zero chance” of a war with Iran. He played down claims by US intelligence that the Iranian government was responsible for supplying insurgents in Iraq, forcing Bush on the defensive.

Pace’s view was backed up by British intelligence officials who said the extent of the Iranian government’s involvement in activities inside Iraq by a small number of Revolutionary Guards was “far from clear”.

Hillary Mann, the National Security Council’s main Iran expert until 2004, said Pace’s repudiation of the administration’s claims was a sign of grave discontent at the top.

“He is a very serious and a very loyal soldier,” she said. “It is extraordinary for him to have made these comments publicly, and it suggests there are serious problems between the White House, the National Security Council and the Pentagon.”

Mann fears the administration is seeking to provoke Iran into a reaction that could be used as an excuse for an attack. A British official said the US navy was well aware of the risks of confrontation and was being “seriously careful” in the Gulf.

The US air force is regarded as being more willing to attack Iran. General Michael Moseley, the head of the air force, cited Iran as the main likely target for American aircraft at a military conference earlier this month.

According to a report in The New Yorker magazine, the Pentagon has already set up a working group to plan airstrikes on Iran. The panel initially focused on destroying Iran’s nuclear facilities and on regime change but has more recently been instructed to identify targets in Iran that may be involved in supplying or aiding militants in Iraq.

However, army chiefs fear an attack on Iran would backfire on American troops in Iraq and lead to more terrorist attacks, a rise in oil prices and the threat of a regional war.

Britain is concerned that its own troops in Iraq might be drawn into any American conflict with Iran, regardless of whether the government takes part in the attack.

One retired general who participated in the “generals’ revolt” against Donald Rumsfeld’s handling of the Iraq war said he hoped his former colleagues would resign in the event of an order to attack. “We don’t want to take another initiative unless we’ve really thought through the consequences of our strategy,” he warned.

Speculation Rages: Is Iran Bush's Next Target?

Published on Friday, February 23, 2007 by McClatchy Newspapers

by Ron Hutcheson and Warren P. Strobel

President Bush says he isn't looking for a fight, but the question won't go away: Is the United States headed for war with Iran's Islamic rulers?

Increasing tensions with Iran over its nuclear program and actions in Iraq have fueled speculation that Bush may be paving the way for military action. With U.S. forces tied down in Iraq and Afghanistan, no one expects a ground invasion, but analysts at both ends of the political spectrum put little stock in Bush's insistence that he's focused only on diplomacy.

"I still believe, at the end of the day, that he will bomb the Iranian (nuclear) facilities," said Joshua Muravchik, a neoconservative scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, a think tank with close ties to the Bush administration. Muravchik, who favors military action, sees Bush's current focus on diplomacy as a prelude to attack.

"When he does it - if he does it - it will be wildly unpopular. He certainly at least wants to be able to say convincingly, `I tried everything else,'" Muravchik said.

Bush bristles at suggestions that he wants a confrontation. He and his advisers describe U.S. policy as a carrot-and-stick approach that uses the threat of military action to create diplomatic leverage. The goal is to encourage internal dissent in Iran and force the government to take a more moderate approach.

"Our policies are all aimed at convincing the Iranian people there's a better way forward, and I hope their government hears that message," Bush said at a Feb. 14 news conference. "We'll continue to try to solve the issue peacefully."

The next day, a frustrated Defense Secretary Robert Gates declared, "For the umpteenth time, we are not looking for an excuse to go to war with Iran."

The strategy could backfire, however, if U.S. pressure prompts Iranians to coalesce behind their leaders instead of encouraging dissent. Moreover, Iran has signaled that it has tools of its own, such as planning war games in the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint for half the world's oil; improving relations with Russia and China; and stepping up support for militant Shiite Muslims in Iraq, Lebanon, Afghanistan and elsewhere.

Skeptics note that Bush also stressed diplomacy in the run-up to the Iraq war, declaring his peaceful intentions even as he prepared for the 2003 invasion.

"I don't have any war plans on my desk," he told reporters during a visit to France on May 26, 2002. While that may have been technically correct, Bush already had received a series of briefings on invasion plans, including one about two weeks before his European trip.

In recent months, the Bush administration has ratcheted up pressure against Iran. It has:

* Dispatched a second aircraft carrier strike group to patrol the Persian Gulf and sent Patriot anti-missile missiles to Arab allies bordering the Gulf.
* Expanded operations against alleged Iranian networks operating in Iraq, conducting two raids, one involving U.S. soldiers snatching Iranians said to be members of the al Quds paramilitary force.
* Accused Iran of supplying roadside bombs to Iraqi insurgents and vowed to stop the shipments.
* Moved to bolster the government of Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora with money and military supplies in a proxy struggle with the Iranian-backed Hezbollah terrorist group.
* Launched an aggressive financial campaign against Iran to curb its access to the international financial system, freezing bank funds and barring U.S. transactions with various entities. This week the Treasury Department added Hezbollah's construction arm, Jihad al Bina, to a roster of blacklisted banks.

A senior U.S. official said in an interview that Bush is seeking to increase pressure on Iran to change its behavior, but isn't trying to spark a military confrontation.

European and Arab diplomats say they've sought and received assurances that the United States isn't planning war against Iran.

"They have told us there are no plans to attack Iran," said Nabil Fahmy, Egypt's ambassador in Washington. Fahmy said that while Iran must address concerns about its nuclear program, the Middle East needs less conflict, not more.

U.S. officials from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on down say the pressure on Iran is producing results. They cite a growing debate in Iran over President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's performance, the country's economic doldrums and the poor showing of Ahmadinejad's supporters in December's local elections.

Still, Ahmadinejad has remained defiant on the nuclear issue, ignoring a Feb. 21 U.N. deadline to halt uranium enrichment. He says Iran is interested only in nuclear power generation. U.S. officials believe Iran is using its civilian nuclear industry as cover for a weapons program.

"The free world is sending the regime in Tehran a clear message: We're not going to allow Iran to have nuclear weapons,"' Bush told an American Legion convention last February.

So what happens if threats and diplomacy fail? It's a question that administration officials don't want to answer. Iran isn't believed to be on the verge of obtaining nuclear weapons, but some analysts - and Israelis - worry that it could soon reach a point where its program will be hard to stop without military strikes.

"We have got time," Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns, the No. 3 State Department official, said at a recent forum. "There is no one arguing, that I know of, inside the administration or outside, to the effect that we have to exhaust diplomacy in the next few months."

But Bush has two more years in the White House, and he may not want to leave the Iranian problem to the next president.

"We may be talking about decisions the president has not yet made, but may yet make before his two years are up," said Paul Pillar, a retired senior CIA analyst who's now a Georgetown University professor.

"In military terms, in political terms, the stage is being set," said retired Air Force Col. Sam Gardiner, a frequent administration critic. "The path is toward the military option, although a decision, I don't think, has been made."

Some analysts fear that heightened tensions could lead to military action whether Bush wants it or not. In 1988, during a tense period of the Iran-Iraq War, the guided-missile cruiser USS Vincennes mistakenly shot down an Iranian civilian airliner, killing all 290 people aboard.

"In the current climate, there's a substantial risk of things escalating out of control," Pillar said.

© 2007 McClatchy Washington Bureau and wire service sources

Video: Seymour Hersh on planned invasion of Iran

Bush Iran War Agenda: Trigger an "Accidental Conflict," as a pretext to justify "Limited Strikes"

By Deniz Yeter

Global Research, February 13, 2007

Hillary Mann, the former National Security Council Director for Iranian and Persian Gulf Affairs under the Bush Administration from 2001 to 2004, has issued a sober warning to the public today concerning the Bush Administration's intentions with Iran.

In an interview this morning on CNN(1), she accused the Bush Administration of "trying to push a provocative, accidental conflict," as a pretext to justify "limited strikes" on crucial nuclear and military infrastructures, as opposed to a large ground war as is the case with Iraq.

When asked why the Bush Administration was seeking to do this, she responded that it is a part of Bush's broader agenda for the Middle East to bring about a "democratization... peace and stability", to the region.

Of course, one only has to look back to history to see the Bush Administration's real agenda behind confronting Iran. Iran is only one piece of the puzzle in a broader, century long struggle by the US, Britain, and it's Western allies to secure the Middle East’s oil reserves.

1951: Dr. Mohammed Mossadegh succeeds in leading an Iranian movement to nationalize the countries' oil industry, becoming Iran's first democratically elected leader when he becomes Prime Minister as a result from this central issue. This ends the immensely profitable monopoly that Britain controlled through the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company since 1909, eventually becoming British Petroleum Company in 1954, or more commonly known as BP.

1953: The CIA conducts a series of covert actions under the name "Operation Ajax" (TP-AJAX), aimed at overthrowing Mossadegh to replace him with a friendlier US dictator. The tactics employed by the CIA include controlling the countries national newspapers to mislead the public with false propaganda, bribing government and military officials to gain allies against Mossadegh, funding opposition parties with money and weapons, controlling and organizing mobs and protests, and also distributing fake flyers made by the CIA that people thought were made by Mossadegh's government which said things like "UP WITH COMMUNISM" and "DOWN WITH ISLAM". After an initial failed coup attempt, a mob organized by the CIA is successful in ousting Mossadegh.

1953 to 1979: After their successful coup, the CIA re-installs Iran's exiled Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who is very friendly to the West and it's allies, once again ensuring a monopoly over Iran's oil fields for the West. Under the Shah's bloody reign, thousands of political opponents and innocent people suspected of being dissidents were rounded up by the Shah's CIA trained secret police, SAVAK, and put into their secret prison to be extensively tortures. SAVAK also assassinated countless political opponents and government officials to ensure the Shah's and the West's control over Iran.

1979 to Present: The CIA and their puppet government in Iran is thrown off by the Islamic Revolution that envelopes Iran, leading to the overthrow of the Shah and his government. This allowed Ayatollah Khomeini to return to Iran after years of exile, who would lead the Islamic Revolution of Iran that resulted in him becoming Supreme Leader of Iran. This once again ends the West's control over Iranian oil fields, and also their access to Iran's oil since they now refuse to do business or cooperate with the West.

Hillary Mann joins the ranks of a growing consensus of both former and current officials in various government, military, and intelligence agencies, who all agree that the US is actively involved in attempting to lure Iran into launching an attack on US forces, or worse.

Jim Webb, the freshman from Virginia who’s election day victory tipped the Senate in the Democrats favor, appeared on “Hardball with Chris Matthews”(2) five days ago echoing the same warning given by Hillary Mann.

“If you look at the framers of the constitution, they wanted to give the president as commander in chief the authority to repel sudden attacks. That is totally different than conducting a preemptive war.

“And you know one thing, if you look at where we are in the Persian Gulf right now, when I was secretary of the Navy and until very recently, we never operated aircraft carriers inside the Persian Gulf because, number one, the turning radius is pretty close, and number two, the chance of accidentally bumping into something that would start a diplomatic situation was pretty high.

“We now have been doing that, and with the tensions as high as they are, I‘m very worried that we might accidentally set something off in there and we need, as a Congress, to get ahead of the ball game here.”

Zbigniew Brzezinski, the former National Security Adviser under the Carter Administration from 1977 to 1981, came out on February 1st to testify before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee(3), blasting the Bush Administration’s handling of the war.

He called the War on Terror a “mythical historical narrative” used to justify a “protracted and potentially expanding war,” and accused them of trying to spread the conflict in Iraq to other parts of the Middle East by “deepening quagmire eventually ranging across Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.”

“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…”

“To argue that America is already at war in the region with a wider Islamic threat, of which Iran is the epicenter, is to promote a self-fulfilling prophecy,”

He also made note of the Bush Administrations ludicrous cronyism, saying, “I am perplexed by the fact that major strategic decisions seem to be made within a very narrow circle of individuals—just a few, probably a handful, perhaps not more than the fingers on my hand. And these are the individuals, all of whom but one, who made the original decision to go to war, and used the original justifications to go to war.”

Texas House Republican Ron Paul also had harsh words for the Bush Administration and Congress, giving an alarming speech before the House of Representatives(4) on January 11. He accused them both of using “the talk of a troop surge and jobs program in Iraq” to “distract Americans from the very real possibility of an attack on Iran.”

“Our growing naval presence in the region and our harsh rhetoric toward Iran are unsettling. Securing the Horn of Africa and sending Ethiopian troops into Somalia do not bode well for world peace. Yet these developments are almost totally ignored by Congress.

“Rumors are flying about when, not if, Iran will be bombed by either Israel or the U.S.-- possibly with nuclear weapons. Our CIA says Iran is ten years away from producing a nuclear bomb and has no delivery system, but this does not impede our plans to keep ‘everything on the table’ when dealing with Iran.

“We should remember that Iran, like Iraq, is a third-world nation without a significant military. Nothing in history hints that she is likely to invade a neighboring country, let alone do anything to America or Israel. I am concerned, however, that a contrived Gulf of Tonkin- type incident may occur to gain popular support for an attack on Iran.

“Even if such an attack is carried out by Israel over U.S. objections, we will be politically and morally culpable since we provided the weapons and dollars to make it possible.

“Mr. Speaker, let’s hope I’m wrong about this one."

The “contrived Gulf of Tonkin- type incident” that Congressman Paul mentioned is his speech is one of many modern historical examples of false flag terrorism used by governments around the world to justify an illegitimate war to a terrified public, willing to accept whatever in the name of security.

Here’s a list of a few historically accepted examples of false flag terrorism, showing that the Bush Administration’s plans to provoke an attack from Iran is nothing new, but a common occurrence with a lot of precedent(5).

1846: Mexican-American War: President James K. Polk sends General Zachary Taylor and 1,500 American troops to the Mexican border along the Nueces River, where he is ordered by the President to cross over into disputed territory to bait Mexico into attacking. They quickly fell for the bait and were easily repelled by US forces. Polk took advantage of this single, miniscule conflict to get Congress to declare war on Mexico and to mobilize public support for the war.

1898 - Spanish-American War: The US sinks it's own battleship, the USS Maine, in a harbor in Havana and blames it on Cuba. Newspapers, under the guise of the US government, help sensationalize the story to bolster public support for war against Cuba.

1915 - Sinking of the Lusitania: German submarines are blamed for sinking the RMS Lusitania, a British ocean liner. What the public wasn't told is that all the passengers on board the Lusitania were merely human shields to protect a shipment of US ammunition headed towards Great Britain during WWI, which is why the German's sank the ship. Many historians believe that Britain meant for the Lusitania to be attacked to get the US on their side in WWI by baiting Germans into sinking it, or that they might of sunk the ship themselves, seeing US involvement in WWI detrimental for not losing.

1931 - Mukden incident: Japanese officers fabricate a pretext for annexing Manchuria, which was under Chinese control at the time, by blowing up a section of their own railway and blaming it on the Chinese.

1939 - Gleiwitz incident: The Nazi's fabricate evidence of a Polish attack to mobilize German public opinion, and to fabricate a false justification for a war with Poland.

1939 - Shelling of Mainila: The Soviet Union shells it's own village of Mainila on the Finnish border, faking casualties, and blames the attack on Finland to justify a war.

1941 - Pearl Harbor: The US military decodes a message they intercepted from the Japanese outlining the attacks of Pearl Harbor weeks before the attacks. The message was a response to an insulting ultimatum that the US sent Japan that got the US the response they wanted, and attack on Pearl Harbor. "The question was: how we should maneuver [the Japanese] into the position of firing the first shot.” - Secretary of War Henry Stimson

1962 - Operation Northwoods: A plot authored by the Joints Chief of Staff, the top brass of the Pentagon, that involved scenarios such as hijacking a passenger plane and other staged terror attacks and campaigns that would be used to blame Cuba to mobilize public support for a war. It was never carried out since Kennedy refused to authorize the operation, and was later declassified under the Freedom of Information Act.

1964 - Gulf of Tonkin: President Johnson accuses North Vietnamese PT boats of attacking strike carries in the gulf, the USS Maddox and the USS Turner Joy. Documents and tapes released due to the Freedom of Information Act shows that President Johnson knew that there were no PT boats and no attacks, but still went ahead with lying to the American public on national TV to garner support for escalating the war in Vietnam.

1970's - Operation Gladio: Italian secret service agencies, under the training and direction of CIA and NATO forces, launch countless staged terror attacks that kills thousands and are used to blame leftist opposition groups and scare the public into supporting the right wing government.

Sources:

1.
“Defense Department Offers Evidence High-Level Iranian Leader Is Supplying Arms to Shiite Insurgents in Iraq.” American Morning. CNN. Feb 12, 2007
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0702/12/ltm.03.html

2.
Hardball with Chris Matthews. MSNBC. Feb 7, 2007
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17049478/

3.
United States. Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “SFRC Testimony - Zbigniew Brzezinski” Washington. 1 Feb, 2007
http://www.senate.gov/~foreign/testimony/2007/BrzezinskiTestimony070201.pdf

4.
United States. House of Representatives. “Escalation is Hardly the Answer” Washington: Ron Paul, 11 Jan 2007
http://www.house.gov/paul/congrec/congrec2007/cr011107.htm
5.
Sanders, Richard. “Going to War: Unraveling the Tangled Web of American Pretext Stratagems (1846-1989).” Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade. May 2002

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

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Bush Targets Iran

Bush Targets Iran
by Marjorie Cohn; February 03, 2007

As Congress and the American people protest the travesty Bush created in Iraq, our President is gunning for a confrontation with Iran. Bush is rattling the sabers and opting for gunboat diplomacy by pledging to "seek out and destroy" Iranian networks "providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies" in Iraq. But he has produced no hard evidence that Iran is supplying forces in Iraq with such weapons or manufacturing their own nuclear weapons.

When I say "gunboat diplomacy," I mean that literally. Bush recently sent US warships and Patriot missile batteries to the Persian Gulf and moved US attack aircraft to Turkey and other countries on Iran's borders. US forces stormed the Iranian consulate in northern Iraq and captured six Iranian nationals, and Bush announced he will go after any Iranians he considers a threat. There are also indications the Bush administration would support military action by Israel against Iran.

On Tuesday, the administration stepped up its inflammatory rhetoric. US officials said Iranians may have trained attackers who killed five Americans in Karbala on January 20. They also implicated the Mahdi Army, the militia controlled by Moktada al-Sadr. It's very interesting that the New York Times characterized the focus on Iran and the Mahdi Army as "convenient from the point of view of the Bush administration."

Investigators were stumped at how the attackers, who wore American-style uniforms, secured forged US identity cards and American-style M-4 rifles, and used stun grenades like those used only by US forces. They are also confounded at the way the attackers' convoy of S.U.V.'s gave the impression that it was American and slipped through Iraqi checkpoints. Wednesday's article in the Times cites a theory that "a Western mercenary group" may have been involved. In the past the US government used the CIA to covertly overthrow governments, such as Iran's in 1953 and Chile's in 1973. Could mercenaries now be doing the Bush administration's dirty work?

The plan to attack Iran has been in the works since Bush inaugurated that country into his "axis of evil" in January 2002. Bush's 2006 National Military Strategy says, "We may face no greater challenge from a single country than from Iran." In April 2006, Seymour Hersh revealed the US military was making preparations for an invasion of Iran. "Air Force planning groups are drawing up lists of targets, and teams of American combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups," Hersh learned from current and former American military intelligence officials.

One of the military proposals calls for the use of bunker-buster tactical nuclear weapons against underground nuclear sites in Iran. That would mean "mushroom clouds, radiation, mass casualties, and contamination over years," a former senior intelligence official told Hersh. A Pentagon adviser said the Air Force would strike many hundreds of targets in Iran, 99 percent of which have nothing to do with nuclear proliferation.

A former defense official who still advises the Bush administration informed Hersh the military planning was grounded in the belief that "a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government." That's the same faulty logic the US government has used to justify its cruel embargo and blockade of Cuba since Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution.

Congress has the responsibility to prevent Bush from attacking Iran. In view of congressional opposition to his war in Iraq, Bush will not likely ask permission to make war on Iran. We can expect Bush to provoke - or even fabricate a la Tonkin Gulf - an incident with Iran and then claim he's responding to Iranian aggression. Senior Pentagon officials reported in Wednesday's Los Angeles Times that Air Force and Navy fighter planes along the Iran-Iraq border may be used more aggressively. Bush will then try to bootstrap the September 2001 and October 2002 congressional authorizations for force in Afghanistan and Iraq respectively into consent to attack Iran.

Offensive military action against Iran would be illegal under the United Nations Charter, which requires that members settle international disputes by peaceful means. The UN Charter is a treaty ratified by the US and thus part of American law under the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution. Under the Charter, a country can attack another only in self-defense or with the blessing of the Security Council. Moreover, the use of nuclear weapons would violate our obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Congress should immediately pass a binding resolution reaffirming the United States' legal obligations and informing the Bush administration that it will not concur in any invasion or military action against Iran, would refuse to approve any funding for it, and would consider actions taken in contravention of the resolution as impeachable offenses.



Marjorie Cohn is a professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, president of the National Lawyers Guild, and US representative to the executive committee of the American Association of Jurists. Her new book, Cowboy Republic: Six Ways the Bush Gang Has Defied the Law, will be published in June.

The danger of Bush's anti-Iran fatwa

The president's decision to use force against Iranian "agents" inside Iraq could snare innocent pilgrims, and raises the risk of open warfare.

By Juan Cole

Jan. 30, 2007 | George W. Bush last week announced that American troops in Iraq were henceforth authorized to "kill or capture" any Iranian intelligence agents they discovered in Iraq. The announcement came on the heels of his pledge in the State of the Union address to bring another aircraft carrier into the Persian Gulf, a move that clearly targeted Iran. A prominent Iranian parliamentarian responded to Bush's threat by saying, "Such an order is a clear terrorist act and against all internationally acknowledged norms." Iraq's deputy prime minister, meanwhile, put a pox on both Iran and the U.S. for conducting their geopolitical battle on Iraqi soil.

The danger of Bush's approach may be realized in short order. Tuesday, Jan. 30, marks the 10th day of Muharram, and is the Islamic holy day known as Ashura. Iraq is the Shiite holy land, the site of the passion and martyrdom of revered figures such as Ali, the son-in-law of the Prophet Mohammed, and al-Husayn, the Prophet's grandson. Thousands of Iranians come on pilgrimage to the Shiite shrine cities of Najaf and Karbala in Iraq every year, and the flow of pilgrims peaks at Ashura, which commemorates the martyrdom of al-Husayn. Ashura is an especially important holiday to Shiites, drawing up to 1 million pilgrims to Karbala, 60 miles southwest of Baghdad. In 2004 Sunni insurgents exploited the presence of so many Shiite pilgrims by setting off massive explosions that killed more than 100 people.

Given Bush's new directive, how will U.S. troops distinguish between innocent Iranian devotees and spies? What if U.S. troops kill pilgrims in a mistaken belief that they are covert operatives? Leaving aside whether U.S. law authorizes such a broad, vague use of deadly force against foreign nationals, which is unclear, Shiite religious sensibilities would be inflamed in both Iraq and Iran, furthering the potential for a widening conflict.

>>read full article

Bush 'is planning nuclear strikes on Iran's secret sites'

Philip Sherwell in Washington
Last Updated: 1:44am BST 11/04/2006


The Bush administration is planning to use nuclear weapons against Iran, to prevent it acquiring its own atomic warheads, claims an investigative writer with high-level Pentagon and intelligence contacts.

President George W Bush is said to be so alarmed by the threat of Iran's hard-line leader, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, that privately he refers to him as "the new Hitler", says Seymour Hersh, who broke the story of the Abu Ghraib Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal.

Some US military chiefs have unsuccessfully urged the White House to drop the nuclear option from its war plans, Hersh writes in The New Yorker magazine. The conviction that Mr Ahmedinejad would attack Israel or US forces in the Middle East, if Iran obtains atomic weapons, is what drives American planning for the destruction of Teheran's nuclear programme.

Hersh claims that one of the plans, presented to the White House by the Pentagon, entails the use of a bunker-buster tactical nuclear weapon, such as the B61-11, against underground nuclear sites. One alleged target is Iran's main centrifuge plant, at Natanz, 200 miles south of Teheran.

Although Iran claims that its nuclear programme is peaceful, US and European intelligence agencies are certain that Teheran is trying to develop atomic weapons. In contrast to the run-up to the Iraq invasion, there are no disagreements within Western intelligence about Iran's plans.

This newspaper disclosed recently that senior Pentagon strategists are updating plans to strike Iran's nuclear sites with long-distance B2 bombers and submarine-launched missiles. And last week, the Sunday Telegraph reported a secret meeting at the Ministry of Defence where military chiefs and officials from Downing Street and the Foreign Office discussed the consequences of an American-led attack on Iran, and Britain's role in any such action.

The military option is opposed by London and other European capitals. But there are growing fears in No 10 and the Foreign Office that the British-led push for a diplomatic solution to the Iranian nuclear stand-off, will be swept aside by hawks in Washington. Hersh says that within the Bush administration, there are concerns that even a pummelling by conventional strikes, may not sufficiently damage Iran's buried nuclear plants.

Iran has been developing a series of bunkers and facilities to provide hidden command centres for its leaders and to protect its nuclear infrastructure. The lack of reliable intelligence about these subterranean facilities, is fuelling pressure for tactical nuclear weapons to be included in the strike plans as the only guaranteed means to destroy all the sites simultaneously.

The attention given to the nuclear option has created serious misgivings among the joint chiefs of staff, and some officers have talked about resigning, Hersh has been told. The military chiefs sought to remove the nuclear option from the evolving war plans for Iran, without success, a former senior intelligence officer said.

The Pentagon consultant on the war on terror confirmed that some in the administration were looking seriously at this option, which he linked to a resurgence of interest in tactical nuclear weapons among defence department political appointees.

The election of Mr Ahmedinejad last year, has hardened attitudes within the Bush Administration. The Iranian president has said that Israel should be "wiped off the map". He has drafted in former fellow Revolutionary Guards commanders to run the nuclear programme, in further signs that he is preparing to back his threats with action.
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Mr Bush and others in the White House view him as a potential Adolf Hitler, a former senior intelligence official told Hersh. "That's the name they're using. They say, 'Will Iran get a strategic weapon and threaten another world war?' "

Despite America's public commitment to diplomacy, there is a growing belief in Washington that the only solution to the crisis is regime change. A senior Pentagon consultant said that Mr Bush believes that he must do "what no Democrat or Republican, if elected in the future, would have the courage to do," and "that saving Iran is going to be his legacy".

Publicly, the US insists it remains committed to diplomacy to solve the crisis. But with Russia apparently intent on vetoing any threat of punitive action at the UN, the Bush administration is also planning for unilateral military action. Hersh repeated his claims that the US has intensified clandestine activities inside Iran, using special forces to identify targets and establish contact with anti-Teheran ethnic-minority groups.

The senior defence officials said that Mr Bush is "determined to deny Iran the opportunity to begin a pilot programme, planned for this spring, to enrich uranium".

Information appearing on telegraph.co.uk is the copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited and must not be reproduced in any medium without licence.


© Copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited 2007.

Does Bush Think War with Iran Is Preordained?

By Chris Hedges, Truthdig
Posted on October 10, 2006, Printed on April 19, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/42774/

The aircraft carrier Eisenhower, accompanied by the guided-missile cruiser USS Anzio, guided-missile destroyer USS Ramage, guided-missile destroyer USS Mason and the fast-attack submarine USS Newport News, is, as I write, making its way to the Straits of Hormuz off Iran. The ships will be in place to strike Iran by the end of the month. It may be a bluff. It may be a feint. It may be a simple show of American power. But I doubt it.

War with Iran -- a war that would unleash an apocalyptic scenario in the Middle East -- is probable by the end of the Bush administration. It could begin in as little as three weeks. This administration, claiming to be anointed by a Christian God to reshape the world, and especially the Middle East, defined three states at the start of its reign as "the Axis of Evil." They were Iraq, now occupied; North Korea, which, because it has nuclear weapons, is untouchable; and Iran. Those who do not take this apocalyptic rhetoric seriously have ignored the twisted pathology of men like Elliott Abrams, who helped orchestrate the disastrous and illegal contra war in Nicaragua, and who now handles the Middle East for the National Security Council. He knew nothing about Central America. He knows nothing about the Middle East. He sees the world through the childish, binary lens of good and evil, us and them, the forces of darkness and the forces of light. And it is this strange, twilight mentality that now grips most of the civilian planners who are barreling us towards a crisis of epic proportions.

These men advocate a doctrine of permanent war, a doctrine which, as William R. Polk points out, is a slight corruption of Leon Trotsky's doctrine of permanent revolution. These two revolutionary doctrines serve the same function, to intimidate and destroy all those classified as foreign opponents, to create permanent instability and fear and to silence domestic critics who challenge leaders in a time of national crisis. It works. The citizens of the United States, slowly being stripped of their civil liberties, are being herded sheep-like, once again, over a cliff.

But this war will be different. It will be catastrophic. It will usher in the apocalyptic nightmares spun out in the dark, fantastic visions of the Christian right. And there are those around the president who see this vision as preordained by God; indeed, the president himself may hold such a vision.

The hypocrisy of this vaunted moral crusade is not lost on those in the Middle East. Iran actually signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It has violated a codicil of that treaty written by European foreign ministers, but this codicil was never ratified by the Iranian parliament. I do not dispute Iran's intentions to acquire nuclear weapons nor do I minimize the danger should it acquire them in the estimated five to 10 years. But contrast Iran with Pakistan, India and Israel. These three countries refused to sign the treaty and developed nuclear weapons programs in secret. Israel now has an estimated 400 to 600 nuclear weapons. The word "Dimona," the name of the city where the nuclear facilities are located in Israel, is shorthand in the Muslim world for the deadly Israeli threat to Muslims' existence. What lessons did the Iranians learn from our Israeli, Pakistani and Indian allies?

Given that we are actively engaged in an effort to destabilize the Iranian regime by recruiting tribal groups and ethnic minorities inside Iran to rebel, given that we use apocalyptic rhetoric to describe what must be done to the Iranian regime, given that other countries in the Middle East such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia are making noises about developing a nuclear capacity, and given that, with the touch of a button Israel could obliterate Iran, what do we expect from the Iranians? On top of this, the Iranian regime grasps that the doctrine of permanent war entails making "preemptive" and unprovoked strikes.

Those in Washington who advocate this war, knowing as little about the limitations and chaos of war as they do about the Middle East, believe they can hit about 1,000 sites inside Iran to wipe out nuclear production and cripple the 850,000-man Iranian army. The disaster in southern Lebanon, where the Israeli air campaign not only failed to break Hezbollah but united most Lebanese behind the militant group, is dismissed. These ideologues, after all, do not live in a reality-based universe. The massive Israeli bombing of Lebanon failed to pacify 4 million Lebanese. What will happen when we begin to pound a country of 70 million people? As retired General Wesley K. Clark and others have pointed out, once you begin an air campaign it is only a matter of time before you have to put troops on the ground or accept defeat, as the Israelis had to do in Lebanon. And if we begin dropping bunker busters, cruise missiles and iron fragmentation bombs on Iran this is the choice that must be faced -- either sending American forces into Iran to fight a protracted and futile guerrilla war or walking away in humiliation.

"As a people we are enormously forgetful," Dr. Polk, one of the country's leading scholars on the Middle East, told an Oct. 13 gathering of the Foreign Policy Association in New York. "We should have learned from history that foreign powers can't win guerrilla wars. The British learned this from our ancestors in the American Revolution and re-learned it in Ireland. Napoleon learned it in Spain. The Germans learned it in Yugoslavia. We should have learned it in Vietnam and the Russians learned it in Afghanistan and are learning it all over again in Chechnya and we are learning it, of course, in Iraq. Guerrilla wars are almost unwinnable. As a people we are also very vain. Our way of life is the only way. We should have learned that the rich and powerful can't always succeed against the poor and less powerful."

An attack on Iran will ignite the Middle East. The loss of Iranian oil, coupled with Silkworm missile attacks by Iran on oil tankers in the Persian Gulf, could send oil soaring to well over $110 a barrel. The effect on the domestic and world economy will be devastating, very possibly triggering a huge, global depression. The 2 million Shiites in Saudi Arabia, the Shiite majority in Iraq and the Shiite communities in Bahrain, Pakistan and Turkey will turn in rage on us and our dwindling allies. We will see a combination of increased terrorist attacks, including on American soil, and the widespread sabotage of oil production in the Gulf. Iraq, as bad as it looks now, will become a death pit for American troops as Shiites and Sunnis, for the first time, unite against their foreign occupiers.

The country, however, that will pay the biggest price will be Israel. And the sad irony is that those planning this war think of themselves as allies of the Jewish state. A conflagration of this magnitude could see Israel drawn back in Lebanon and sucked into a regional war, one that would over time spell the final chapter in the Zionist experiment in the Middle East. The Israelis aptly call their nuclear program "the Samson option." The Biblical Samson ripped down the pillars of the temple and killed everyone around him, along with himself.

If you are sure you will be raptured into heaven, your clothes left behind with the nonbelievers, then this news should cheer you up. If you are rational, however, these may be some of the last few weeks or months in which to enjoy what is left of our beleaguered, dying republic and way of life.

Chris Hedges is the former Middle East bureau chief for The New York Times and the author of "War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning."

© 2007 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/42774/

MSNBC: Valerie Plame Was Working on Iran WMD's When Outed

The revelation that Iran was the focal point of Plame's work raises new questions as to possible other motivating factors in the White House's decision to reveal the identity of a CIA officer working on tracking a WMD supply network to Iran, particularly when the very topic of Iran's possible WMD capability is of such concern to the Administration. >>read more

The Iran Plans: Would President Bush go to war to stop Tehran from getting the bomb?

The Bush Administration, while publicly advocating diplomacy in order to stop Iran from pursuing a nuclear weapon, has increased clandestine activities inside Iran and intensified planning for a possible major air attack. Current and former American military and intelligence officials said that Air Force planning groups are drawing up lists of targets, and teams of American combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups. The officials say that President Bush is determined to deny the Iranian regime the opportunity to begin a pilot program, planned for this spring, to enrich uranium.

American and European intelligence agencies, and the International Atomic Energy Agency (I.A.E.A.), agree that Iran is intent on developing the capability to produce nuclear weapons. But there are widely differing estimates of how long that will take, and whether diplomacy, sanctions, or military action is the best way to prevent it. Iran insists that its research is for peaceful use only, in keeping with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and that it will not be delayed or deterred.

There is a growing conviction among members of the United States military, and in the international community, that President Bush’s ultimate goal in the nuclear confrontation with Iran is regime change. >>read more

Attacking Iran: Hersh vs. Bush: Who Would You Believe?

April 14, 2006


By KEVIN ZEESE

Seymour Hersh's extensive article describing plans to attack Iran, including the use of tactical nuclear weapons, has forced President Bush to respond. Two days after Hersh's article appeared, President Bush came forward to deny any intent to attack Iran--calling such claims 'wild speculation.'

Hersh begins his article in the New Yorker explaining the real purpose of attack on Iran: "There is a growing conviction among members of the United States military, and in the international community, that President Bush's ultimate goal in the nuclear confrontation with Iran is regime change."

In response, President Bush said allegations that he plans to use force to halt Iran's nuclear program are "wild speculation." He went on to say that his focus is on diplomacy: "I know here in Washington prevention means force. It doesn't mean force necessarily. In this case it means diplomacy." When Donald Rumsfeld, the embattled Secretary of State, was asked about planning for Iran he was evasive saying "The last thing I'm going to do is to start telling you or anyone else in the press or the world at what point we refresh a plan or don't refresh a plan and why."

Hersh seemed to expect this response writing before Bush spoke:

"The Bush Administration, while publicly advocating diplomacy in order to stop Iran from pursuing a nuclear weapon, has increased clandestine activities inside Iran and intensified planning for a possible major air attack. Current and former American military and intelligence officials said that Air Force planning groups are drawing up lists of targets, and teams of American combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups."

And when asked about Bush's comments, Hersh told Amy Goodman on Democracy Now: "It's simply a fact that the planning has gone beyond the contingency stage, and it's gone into what they call the operational stage, sort of an increment higher. And it's very serious planning, of course. And it's all being directed at the wish of the President of the United States. And I can understand why they don't want to talk about it, but that's just the reality."


Pressure is Mounting to Attack Iran--a Long-Term Target of the Bush Administration

Adding credibility to Hersh's claims is that removing those in power in Iran has been supported by many neo-cons since before Bush took office. It is consistent with the re-making of the Middle East, called for by the Project for a New American Century, as part of ensuring U.S. military and economic dominance of the world.

In addition, a paper published by an Israeli think tank, the Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies in 1996 entitled "A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm," written for Benjamin Netanyahu, set out a plan for Israel to "shape its strategic environment," beginning with the removal of Saddam Hussein and restoration of the Hashemites in Iraq. With Iraq transformed, they describe a strategic axis of Iraq, Jordan and Turkey that would weaken and "roll back" Syria and divide the Shia'a in Iraq with those in Iran and Syria.

The Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA), another hard-line advocacy group, has advocated "regime change" by any means necessary in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority. JINSA's board of advisers has included many Bush administration leaders: Dick Cheney, John Bolton, Richard Perle, James Woolsey and Douglas Feith. JINSA now sees Iran as THE security threat saying in an April 12 JINSA Report entitled "Iran, Iran, Iran and Iran:"

"Whatever we do in Iraq and whatever Iraqi politicians do; whatever we do to Hamas; however hard we look for Bin Laden or al-Zawahiri; whoever runs our port terminals; whatever the price of gasoline; however we secure our borders; whoever leaked Valerie Plame's name - under the shadow of a nuclear-capable Iran, American and allied options are reduced."

Iran, they say, is "the whole list of national security priorities."

The current pressure to attack Iran is building. The hard right Israeli lobby in the United States is advocating attacking Iran to stop the development of nuclear weapons. A full page advertisement in The New York Times on April 4 on page A-15 sponsored by the American Jewish Committee urged an attack on Iran drawing a map with Iran in the center showing how far it is from various countries in Asia, Europe and African asking: "Can anyone within range of Iran's missiles feel safe?"

Just as the pro-Israel lobby beat the war drums for the invasion of Iraq, they are doing the same for Iran. AIPAC, the powerful pro-Israeli lobby has a special page on Iran's escalating threat. The concern of many has been heightened by reported comments by Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad challenging the reality of the Holocaust and that Israel must be "wiped off the map."

The recent announcement by Ahmadinejad that Iran has enriched uranium in a 164-centrifuge network to 3.5% has heightened the conflict further. Ahmadinejad says Iran must now be treated as a nuclear country and that it plans to continue to develop nuclear power. This is far from the level of enrichment needed for a nuclear weapon--requiring at least 80% enrichment and thousands of centrifuges. Iran says it plans to go ahead and construct a 3,000 centrifuge network at the Natanz facility within a year and eventually expand to 54,000 centrifuges. Developing enriched uranium for nuclear power is legal under the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty but the UN Security Council has given Iran until April 28 to suspend uranium enrichment.

Further, much to the chagrin of the Bush administration, the Iraq invasion has strengthened Iran. Noted Middle East commentator, Juan Cole, has described Iran as the real victor in the Iraq War. Iran has been able to establish warm relations with the government in Iraq. To have a member of the axis of evil strengthened as result of U.S. policy is an unintended consequence the U.S cannot let stand.

Problems mounting in Iraq are a two-edged sword. On one side the U.S. military is stretched thin and exhausted and opening another front in the Middle East--with a country four times the size of Iraq--would seem to be physically impossible. And, an air campaign would be a challenge with an estimated 400 sites that would need to be targeted. In addition, there are concerns about an alliance between the Shia community in Iraq and Shia dominated Iran making the difficult Iraq situation even more challenging. Then, there are the unpredictable economic impacts--oil prices, already high could jump higher and the reaction of Wall Street and the markets could also be

But, the other edge of the Iraq-quagmire sword increases the chance of an attack on Iran. Certainly, the administration would prefer to have discussion of war strategy instead of the fighting in Iraq. And video of precision air attacks bombing alleged nuclear facilities in Iran will be preferred to civilian deaths in Iraq. As former national security adviser Norman Birnbaum recently said "I fear what the French term a fuite en avance, a flight in advance, and an attack on Iran."

Is Diplomacy Possible? Is it Really Being Pursued?

Pursuing diplomacy is complicated by President Bush's rhetoric. Four years ago Iran was labeled by President Bush as part of the "axis of evil." Since then the United States has surrounded the country with troops in Afghanistan on its western border, Iraq on its eastern border and the Persian Gulf in the south. And, the rhetoric is escalating.

Since the Iranian Revolution the US has had no formal diplomatic ties with Iran. According to a report in the New York Times, in the lead-up to the 2003 Iraq War, Iran reportedly made an overture to U.S. officials to begin what former U.S. policymaker Flynt Leverett, a former national security adviser, State Department and CIA official says there was 'a diplomatic process intended to resolve on a comprehensive basis all the bilateral differences between the United States and Iran.' The United States did not take up the offer. Leverett says that Bush "is, on this issue, very, very resistant to the idea of doing a deal, even a deal that would solve the nuclear problem." So, is the administration serious about diplomacy?

Leverett's view is consistent with one stated by Javad Zarif, the Iranian ambassador to the United Nations, in a NY Times op-ed on April 6. Zarif made the point that "A solution to the situation is possible and eminently within reach." And, he emphasized that Iran has complied with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, indeed, would like to see it strengthened and enhanced. Further, "Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the leader of the Islamic Republic, has issued a decree against the development, production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons."

Further, he points out that Iran wants "stability" and "never initiated the use of force or resorted to the threat of force against a fellow member of the United Nations. Although chemical weapons have been used on us, we have never used them in retaliation - as United Nations reports have made clear. We have not invaded another country in 250 years." The article also highlights how Iran has gone above and beyond the inspection requirements of the UN. Zarif concludes saying: "Finding solutions requires political will and a readiness to engage in serious negotiations. Iran is ready."

Not only is the President's rhetoric and record a problem for diplomacy, but so is modern U.S. history with Iran. In 1953, the Eisenhower administration engaged in public rhetorical attacks on Iran when they nationalized the oil industry, seizing a British oil company. The CIA overthrew the democratic government of Mohammed Mossadegh working with Great Britain and installed the Shah of Iran.

The most recent Democratic Secretary of State, Madeline Albright, excused the U.S. overthrow of Mossadegh saying in 2000 that: "The Eisenhower administration believed its actions were justified for strategic reasons. But the coup was clearly a setback for Iran's political development and it is easy to see now why many Iranians continue to resent this intervention by America."

Just as Albright excused the overthrow by a Republican president, there is essential silence by the Democrats in response to the Bush administration's talk of bombing Iran. While some Democrats have opposed the use of nuclear weapons, they have not opposed the idea of attacking Iran with non-nuclear weapons. Senator Hilary Clinton has said that a nuclear-armed Iran would be "unacceptable." Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader in the House describes Iran as "the greatest threat to Israel's right to exist." Senator John Kerry, told Meet the Press on April 10, that he favored keeping the option of air strikes against Iran on the table. The strongest opposition to attacking Iran has come from Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) who notes there is little resistance in Congress and it appears we have not learned anything from three years in Iraq.

Hersh reports on a Member of the House of Representatives describing meetings where carefully selected Members have been briefed on Iran, he writes: "'There's no pressure from Congress' not to take military action, the House member added. 'The only political pressure is from the guys who want to do it.' Speaking of President Bush, the House member said, 'The most worrisome thing is that this guy has a messianic vision.'"

If diplomacy means gaining international support then the Bush administration has problems. There is opposition to an attack on Iran around the world. The U.S. may only have Israel as a serious ally in a military attack. The Washington Post reports that the Russians and Chinese won't even go along with economic sanctions. And in the recent security council resolution Russia and China edited out the threat of sanctions if Iran did not stop its enrichment of uranium. Further, Saudi Arabia has asked Russia to use its position on the Security Council to prevent a U.S. military attack on Iran. Even Great Britain is unlikely to participate in an Iran attack.

The consensus seems to be that while many would prefer Iran not to have a nuclear weapon, Iran is certainly not an immediate threat to the U.S. or surrounding countries. U.S. intelligence agencies and Hans Blix, chief UN weapons inspector have reported that Iran having a bomb is five to ten years away. As author Mike Whitney point out, "IAEA chief Mohammed Elbaradei has repeatedly stated that his team of inspectors, who've had the opportunity to "go anywhere and see anything," has found nothing to corroborate the assertions of the US or Israel."

Further, would Iran use a nuclear weapon offensively? Iran does not have any modern history of attacking other countries. Certainly, with Israel having 250 nuclear bombs and the U.S. with its large arsenal, would leave Iran to recognize that the use of the bomb would result in the destruction of Iran. A nuclear response would be something that Israel and the U.S. could easily justify and the world would accept.


Hersh is Not Alone Reporting on Iran Attack Planning, Including Nuclear Weapons

Sy Hersh is not the only one reporting on military plans being developed. According to Philip Giraldi, writing in the American Conservative, last year Vice President Cheney ordered the Strategic Command to develop plans to attack Iran if there is another 9-11 type attack on the United States. These plans include a large-scale air assault on Iran employing both conventional and tactical nuclear weapons.

Giraldi points out that within Iran there are more than 450 major strategic targets, including numerous suspected nuclear-weapons-program development sites. Many of the targets are hardened or are deep underground and could not be taken out by conventional weapons, hence the nuclear option. As in the case of Iraq, the response is not conditional on Iran actually being involved in the act of terrorism directed against the United States. Giraldi reports that several senior Air Force officers involved in the planning are appalled at the implications of what they are doing--that Iran is being set up for an unprovoked nuclear attack--but no one is prepared to damage his career by posing any objections.

Further, the Washington Post also wrote that intense planning was underway including the nuclear option in an article published on April 9. The Post reports that while U.S. officials continue to pursue the diplomatic course they privately are increasingly skeptical that it will succeed. And, that last month the White House's new National Security Strategy labeled Iran the most serious challenge to the United States posed by any country. They described two levels of air attack--a quick and limited strike against nuclear-related facilities and a more ambitious campaign of bombing and cruise missiles leveling targets well beyond nuclear facilities. The White House is also considering 'nuclear penetrator munitions' to take out buried labs.

Hersh describes specific plans using tactical nuclear weapons stating:

"One of the military's initial option plans, as presented to the White House by the Pentagon this winter, calls for the use of a bunker-buster tactical nuclear weapon, such as the B61-11, against underground nuclear sites. One target is Iran's main centrifuge plant, at Natanz, nearly two hundred miles south of Tehran. Natanz, which is no longer under I.A.E.A. safeguards, reportedly has underground floor space to hold fifty thousand centrifuges, and laboratories and workspaces buried approximately seventy-five feet beneath the surface. That number of centrifuges could provide enough enriched uranium for about twenty nuclear warheads a year. (Iran has acknowledged that it initially kept the existence of its enrichment program hidden from I.A.E.A. inspectors, but claims that none of its current activity is barred by the Non-Proliferation Treaty.) The elimination of Natanz would be a major setback for Iran's nuclear ambitions, but the conventional weapons in the American arsenal could not insure the destruction of facilities under seventy-five feet of earth and rock, especially if they are reinforced with concrete."

Hersh describes the nuclear option as creating "serious misgivings inside the offices of the Joint Chiefs of Staff," with "some officers have talked about resigning. Late this winter, the Joint Chiefs of Staff sought to remove the nuclear option from the evolving war plans for Iran-without success . . ." Further "some senior officers and officials were considering resigning over the issue" and "the Joint Chiefs had agreed to give President Bush a formal recommendation stating that they are strongly opposed to considering the nuclear option for Iran."

Hersh also comments that the Defense Science board, chaired by William Schneider, Jr., an Under-Secretary of State in the Reagan Administration, which has urged the development of tactical nuclear weapons. Schneider served on an ad-hoc panel on nuclear forces sponsored by the National Institute for Public Policy, a conservative think tank in January 2001. Hersh states: "The panel's report recommended treating tactical nuclear weapons as an essential part of the U.S. arsenal and noted their suitability 'for those occasions when the certain and prompt destruction of high priority targets is essential and beyond the promise of conventional weapons.' Several signers of the report are now prominent members of the Bush Administration, including Stephen Hadley, the national-security adviser; Stephen Cambone, the Under-Secretary of Defense for Intelligence; and Robert Joseph, the Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security."

While seeking to stop Iran, the Bush Administration has made upgrading US nuclear weapons a key goal. The Los Angles Times reported on April 6 that "The administration . . . wants the capability to turn out 125 new nuclear bombs per year by 2022, as the Pentagon retires older bombs that it claims will no longer be reliable or safe." The last nuclear bomb was built in 1989 but the Bush plan also "calls for a modern complex to design a new nuclear bomb and have it ready in less than four years, allowing the nation to respond to changing military requirements."

Thus, the Bush administration is moving to upgrade U.S. nuclear weapons, develop tactical nuclear weapons and even use nuclear weapons against Iran--in an effort to stop Iran from developing a nuclear weapon. The irony (or is it irany) of this hypocrisy will not be lost on the world and it is likely to further weaken U.S. alliances around the world.

Who to Trust Hersh or Bush?

So, back to the original question--who to believe the commander in chief or the investigative reporter. Sy Hersh is a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter who gained international fame for exposing the My Lai massacre in Vietnam and more recently the Abu Ghraib prison scandal.

President Bush has most recently been tied to the leak of a CIA agents name in retaliation of her husband's report criticizing claims related to nuclear weapons in Iraq. He has been widely criticized for exaggerating the threat of Iraq regarding weapons of mass destruction. And he has claimed that the United States does not torture people it detains, when photographs and other evidence indicate that it does.

Right now the U.S. public is divided on attacking Iran. The Los Angeles Times reports that 48% would support an attack if Iran continued to develop nuclear weapons, while 40% opposed. In January a Times/Bloomberg poll found 57% support so support is dropping. But, there is loss of trust in Bush, with 54% saying they do not expect him to make the right decision. Bloomberg reports that only 37% of Americans believe Bush when he claims progress is being made on Iraq. And, according to a Washington Post poll, 55% of Americans do not find Bush to be "honest and trustworthy." So, Bush has a lot to overcome to convince the public to believe him on Iraq.

Hersh obviously struck a cord deep enough that the president felt he had to respond. Hopefully, shining the light on the plans to go to war will result in a more informed electorate and opposition in Congress that stops the expansion of the war in the Middle East.

Join CounterPunch, Democracy Rising, Gold Star Families for Peace, CODE PINK, Progressive Democrats of America, Democrats.com, Traprock Peace Center, Global Exchange, Velvet Revolution, Truthout, OpEdNews, Backbone Campaign, Consumers For Peace, Campus Antiwar Network, and The Young Turks in signing a petition to Bush and Cheney opposing the launching of a war of aggression against Iran. The petition, with all the signatures and comments you add, will be delivered to the White House by Cindy Sheehan and many other activists.http://www.dontattackiran.org

Help build a voting bloc to prevent future wars of aggression--sign the voters pledge at www.VotersForPeace.US.

Kevin Zeese is director of Democracy Rising (DemocracyRising.US) and a candidate for U.S. Senate (see ZeeseForSeate.org)

Seymour Hersh: Bush Administration Planning Possible Major Air Attack on Iran

Seymour Hersh: Bush Administration Planning Possible Major Air Attack on Iran

listen here:

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/04/12/1359254

Bush ‘calling for Iran regime change’

Bush ‘calling for Iran regime change’

By Guy Dinmore in Washington

Published: February 1 2006 19:40 | Last updated: February 1 2006 23:44
Iran nuclear

A direct appeal by President George W. Bush to the Iranian people to “win your own freedom” was a barely disguised call for regime change in Iran, raising the question of whether the US will turn to covert action to support internal opposition, analysts said on Wednesday.

In his State of the Union address on Tuesday night, Mr Bush saved his toughest remarks for Iran, calling it “a nation now held hostage by a small clerical elite that is isolating and repressing its people”.

“Let me speak directly to the citizens of Iran: America respects you, and we respect your country. We respect your right to choose your own future and win your own freedom.”

Mr Bush condemned Iran’s alleged pursuit of nuclear weapons and support for terrorist groups in the Palestinian territories and Lebanon. The State Department provided audio in Farsi of the speech that was beamed by exiled networks from the US into Iran. Voice of America radio also broadcast simultaneous translation.

Nathan Brown of the Carnegie Endowment think-tank called Mr Bush’s rhetoric a “barely hidden call for regime change, fairly dramatic”.

In an interview with Reuters news agency on Wednesday, Mr Bush denied he was calling for an overthrow in Tehran.

“What I am saying is that .?.?. the United States is very aware of their [the Iranian people’s] conditions, and we recognise that liberty is universal and that we hope some day they will be in a position to have a democracy based upon Iranian customs and Iranian traditions,” the president was quoted as saying.

Danielle Pletka, senior analyst with the conservative American Enterprise Institute, expects the president to give a more detailed Iran policy speech later. She hopes there will be overt support for the democratic opposition as well as “a robust covert element.?.?. but that does not mean cloak and dagger”.

Last year, the State Department awarded $3m to non-governmental organisations working on Iran but did not reveal their identities. A spokeswoman said the money was “classified” but not “covert”.

Similar funding of $6.5m is available for Iran and Syria this year, although bills proposed in Congress would raise that sum significantly.

Mr Nathan said the US and Europe had an accomplished “democracy industry” that was able to help countries in transition, but the US had virtually excluded the possibility of overt assistance in Iran by openly pursuing a policy that amounted to regime change.

A government adviser, who asked not to be named, said the Bush administration was closing its policy options with Iran, partly due to what he called an intense hatred of its new president, Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad. He believed covert action was inevitable – and said it would probably be disastrous.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007

Buying the Bush Line on Iran Nukes: Despite uncertainty, U.S. journalists take sides

from:
Extra! September/October 2005

Buying the Bush Line on Iran Nukes
Despite uncertainty, U.S. journalists take sides

By Steve Rendall

How should U.S. journalists treat charges that Iran has a secret nuclear weapons program? On the one hand, the track record of White House allegations about the weapons programs of the “axis of evil” is decidedly poor. On the other hand, Iranian officials who claim their country has only a peaceful nuclear energy program have their own history of deceptions and evasions.

With a story marked by uncertainty, the journalist’s job is to puncture official misinformation all around while digging for more solid information. Unfortunately, U.S. news media outlets have instead largely decided to echo White House charges despite the shortage of facts.

News articles in the New York Times, which often sets the tone for other news outlets, repeatedly treat the alleged Iranian nuclear weapons program as a matter of fact. A front-page Times story by reporter Patrick Tyler (6/27/05) mentioned that China might block “efforts to bring the issue of Iran’s nuclear weapons program before the United Nations Security Council.” Another Times front-pager by Michael Gordon (10/19/04) suggested that a U.S.-friendly regime in Iraq might pressure “Iran to halt its nuclear weapons program.” And a Times article by Scott Shane (3/26/05), reporting on how U.S. intelligence on Iran is lacking, nevertheless took the administration’s view when it referred to “Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons.”

The paper also tips its hand toward the White House by emphasizing official charges about Iran, while downplaying conflicting information. For instance, a front-page Times report (3/15/04) quoted George W. Bush suggesting Iran was violating the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) by developing a nuclear weapons program: “We cannot allow rogue states that violate their commitments and defy the international community to undermine the NPT’s fundamental role in strengthening international security.” Bush cited no evidence that Iran was violating the NPT; neither did his National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley, who appeared in the article echoing his boss’s views.

One had to look further down in the article—between parentheses, at the end of a paragraph—to learn that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the U.N. organization responsible for inspecting and monitoring NPT compliance, had found “no compelling evidence” of an Iranian weapons program.

Exaggerated certainty

The New York Times isn’t the only news outlet confusing White House charges with what is actually known about Iran’s nuclear program. An article in Newsweek’s July 11 edition, headlined “Iran’s Nuclear Lies,” parroted the White House line on Iran, stressing Iran’s spotty history of compliance with the IAEA while failing to tell readers about the IAEA’s cautiously positive assessment of Iran’s current compliance.

On a European trip, Bush explained to reporters in Germany how Iran was violating the NPT (AP, 2/23/05): “The reason we’re having these discussions is because they were caught enriching uranium after they had signed a treaty saying they wouldn’t enrich uranium. . . . They’re the party that needs to be held into account, not any of us.’’

Despite the fact that Iran’s right to openly enrich uranium for non-military purposes is protected by the NPT, Bush’s false charges were reported unchallenged in many outlets (e.g., AP, 2/23/05; All Things Considered, 2/23/05). In this case, the New York Times was an exception: “In his public comments about Iran’s uranium enrichment,” the paper reported (2/24/05), “Mr. Bush appeared to have misspoken, because the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty permits uranium enrichment for commercial purposes as long as a country declares the activity and allows inspections.” The Times did, however, fail to mention that Iran’s enrichment program had been suspended for three months at the time of Bush’s statement.

Justifiable suspicions

There are good reasons to be suspicious of Iran’s nuclear intentions. The country hid its uranium enrichment program for years and, following its discovery, officials stalled IAEA inspectors and obfuscated details of the program. These facts have not been lost on U.S. journalists, who have routinely covered them.

More recently, the IAEA has found Iran to be more or less in compliance. A Christian Science Monitor story (3/31/05) citing Iran’s past record of secrecy and delayed inspections reported that Iran “has been relatively cooperative” and that the IAEA “says its inspectors have found no evidence of a weapons program.”

According to the IAEA, Iran’s enrichment program had only produced a small amount of non-weapons-grade uranium before Iran voluntarily suspended it in November 2004 as a result of negotiations with France, Germany and Britain. On June 13, IAEA chief Mohammed ElBaradei declared that Iran has “respected its commitment with regard to suspension of the fuel-cycle activities” (Agence France Presse, 6/13/05).

Under the NPT, non-nuclear-weapons countries agree not to pursue or possess nuclear weapons, while nuclear-armed countries agree to pursue disarmament and to share nuclear energy technology with the non-nuclear countries. (See Extra!, 7–8/05.) Under the agreement, non-nuclear-weapons states may develop nuclear programs, enrich uranium, etc., as long the programs are for non-military purposes and they are disclosed to the IAEA.

Lacking context

When pointing out Iran’s deceptions and evasions, evenhandedness would require reporters to provide context regarding Iran’s situation. A fair analysis would acknowledge that, whatever its sins, Iran has not been particularly well-served by the current nonproliferation regime. To its east, Pakistani and Indian nuclear arsenals have thrived outside the NPT regime; and to its west, Israel, another non-NPT state, receives a wink from the U.S. for its undeclared nuclear arsenal.

Nor do White House rhetoric and threats exactly encourage Iran to remain nuke-free. Besides dubbing it part of an “axis of evil,” the White House has spoken flippantly about possible attacks on Iran.

On February 22, reacting to a reporter’s question about whether the U.S. is considering attacking Iran, George W. Bush drew laughter from journalists when he dismissed the notion as “simply ridiculous” and then immediately added: “And having said that, all options are on the table” (Public Papers of the Presidents, 2/28/05).

And in an interview on MSNBC’s Don Imus Show in January (cited in New York Sun, 2/18/05), Dick Cheney glibly referred to a potential Israeli attack on Iran in what some saw as a green light:

If, in fact, the Israelis became convinced the Iranians had a significant nuclear capability, given the fact that Iran has a stated policy that their objective is the destruction of Israel, the Israelis might well decide to act first, and let the rest of the world worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterwards.


Independent reporting

Washington Post journalist Dafna Linzer, one of few mainstream journalists to consistently challenge White House claims about Iran’s nuclear program, reported (8/2/05) on a major new intelligence review that, while cautious about Iran’s intentions, clearly undermines White House charges:

The carefully hedged assessments, which represent consensus among U.S. intelligence agencies, contrast with forceful public statements by the White House. Administration officials have asserted, but have not offered proof, that Tehran is moving determinedly toward a nuclear arsenal. . . . The new National Intelligence Estimate includes what the intelligence community views as credible indicators that Iran’s military is conducting clandestine work. But the sources said there is no information linking those projects directly to a nuclear weapons program.


According to Linzer, the intelligence review says Iran is about a decade away (twice as long as the White House has claimed) from having the fissile material needed for a nuclear bomb, but does not say if it would have the additional technology needed to complete a bomb at that time. While Linzer questions the White House line—“Administration officials have asserted, but have not offered proof, that Tehran is moving determinedly toward a nuclear arsenal”—she also includes more dire assessments of Iran’s intentions, for instance, quoting a “senior intelligence official” remarking that the consensus view of the intelligence community is that “Iran is determined to build nuclear weapons.”

Linzer has questioned other official claims as well. For instance, many news outlets have recited without challenge the White House argument that Iran, with its large oil and gas reserves, has no need for nuclear energy; thus its nuclear energy program must be a front for a nuclear weapons program (New York Times, 6/13/04; AP, 10/26/03). In a March 27 Post report, Linzer quoted Dick Cheney making the case: “They’re already sitting on an awful lot of oil and gas. No one can figure out why they need nuclear as well to generate energy.” Then she challenged the White House logic by pointing out that Cheney and other top Bush White House officials were highly placed in the Ford White House 30 years ago when it pledged to help Iran (then possessing even larger fuel reserves) develop a network of nuclear power plants.

But Linzer’s independent reporting is the exception rather than the rule. While it is proper for journalists to report official charges and suspicions regarding Iran’s nuclear program, it’s quite another thing for them to confirm or adopt those suspicions without hard facts. This should be especially clear in the wake of the catastrophic failure of American journalism to challenge White House claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.

The US War with Iran has Already Begun

Published on Monday, June 20, 2005 by AlJazeera
by Scott Ritter

Americans, along with the rest of the world, are starting to wake up to the uncomfortable fact that President George Bush not only lied to them about the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq (the ostensible excuse for the March 2003 invasion and occupation of that country by US forces), but also about the very process that led to war.

On 16 October 2002, President Bush told the American people that "I have not ordered the use of force. I hope that the use of force will not become necessary."

We know now that this statement was itself a lie, that the president, by late August 2002, had, in fact, signed off on the 'execute' orders authorising the US military to begin active military operations inside Iraq, and that these orders were being implemented as early as September 2002, when the US Air Force, assisted by the British Royal Air Force, began expanding its bombardment of targets inside and outside the so-called no-fly zone in Iraq.

These operations were designed to degrade Iraqi air defence and command and control capabilities. They also paved the way for the insertion of US Special Operations units, who were conducting strategic reconnaissance, and later direct action, operations against specific targets inside Iraq, prior to the 19 March 2003 commencement of hostilities.

President Bush had signed a covert finding in late spring 2002, which authorised the CIA and US Special Operations forces to dispatch clandestine units into Iraq for the purpose of removing Saddam Hussein from power.

The fact is that the Iraq war had begun by the beginning of summer 2002, if not earlier.

The violation of a sovereign nation's airspace is an act of war in and of itself. But the war with Iran has gone far beyond the intelligence gathering phase. This timeline of events has ramifications that go beyond historical trivia or political investigation into the events of the past.

It represents a record of precedent on the part of the Bush administration which must be acknowledged when considering the ongoing events regarding US-Iran relations. As was the case with Iraq pre-March 2003, the Bush administration today speaks of "diplomacy" and a desire for a "peaceful" resolution to the Iranian question.

But the facts speak of another agenda, that of war and the forceful removal of the theocratic regime, currently wielding the reigns of power in Tehran.

As with Iraq, the president has paved the way for the conditioning of the American public and an all-too-compliant media to accept at face value the merits of a regime change policy regarding Iran, linking the regime of the Mullah's to an "axis of evil" (together with the newly "liberated" Iraq and North Korea), and speaking of the absolute requirement for the spread of "democracy" to the Iranian people.

"Liberation" and the spread of "democracy" have become none-too-subtle code words within the neo-conservative cabal that formulates and executes American foreign policy today for militarism and war.

By the intensity of the "liberation/democracy" rhetoric alone, Americans should be put on notice that Iran is well-fixed in the cross-hairs as the next target for the illegal policy of regime change being implemented by the Bush administration.

But Americans, and indeed much of the rest of the world, continue to be lulled into a false sense of complacency by the fact that overt conventional military operations have not yet commenced between the United States and Iran.

As such, many hold out the false hope that an extension of the current insanity in Iraq can be postponed or prevented in the case of Iran. But this is a fool's dream.

The reality is that the US war with Iran has already begun. As we speak, American over flights of Iranian soil are taking place, using pilotless drones and other, more sophisticated, capabilities.

The violation of a sovereign nation's airspace is an act of war in and of itself. But the war with Iran has gone far beyond the intelligence-gathering phase.

President Bush has taken advantage of the sweeping powers granted to him in the aftermath of 11 September 2001, to wage a global war against terror and to initiate several covert offensive operations inside Iran.

The most visible of these is the CIA-backed actions recently undertaken by the Mujahadeen el-Khalq, or MEK, an Iranian opposition group, once run by Saddam Hussein's dreaded intelligence services, but now working exclusively for the CIA's Directorate of Operations.

It is bitter irony that the CIA is using a group still labelled as a terrorist organisation, a group trained in the art of explosive assassination by the same intelligence units of the former regime of Saddam Hussein, who are slaughtering American soldiers in Iraq today, to carry out remote bombings in Iran of the sort that the Bush administration condemns on a daily basis inside Iraq.

Perhaps the adage of "one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist" has finally been embraced by the White House, exposing as utter hypocrisy the entire underlying notions governing the ongoing global war on terror.

But the CIA-backed campaign of MEK terror bombings in Iran are not the only action ongoing against Iran.

To the north, in neighbouring Azerbaijan, the US military is preparing a base of operations for a massive military presence that will foretell a major land-based campaign designed to capture Tehran.

Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld's interest in Azerbaijan may have escaped the blinkered Western media, but Russia and the Caucasus nations understand only too well that the die has been cast regarding Azerbaijan's role in the upcoming war with Iran.

The ethnic links between the Azeri of northern Iran and Azerbaijan were long exploited by the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and this vehicle for internal manipulation has been seized upon by CIA paramilitary operatives and US Special Operations units who are training with Azerbaijan forces to form special units capable of operating inside Iran for the purpose of intelligence gathering, direct action, and mobilising indigenous opposition to the Mullahs in Tehran.

But this is only one use the US has planned for Azerbaijan. American military aircraft, operating from forward bases in Azerbaijan, will have a much shorter distance to fly when striking targets in and around Tehran.

In fact, US air power should be able to maintain a nearly 24-hour a day presence over Tehran airspace once military hostilities commence.

No longer will the United States need to consider employment of Cold War-dated plans which called for moving on Tehran from the Arab Gulf cities of Chah Bahar and Bandar Abbas. US Marine Corps units will be able to secure these towns in order to protect the vital Straits of Hormuz, but the need to advance inland has been eliminated.

A much shorter route to Tehran now exists - the coastal highway running along the Caspian Sea from Azerbaijan to Tehran.

US military planners have already begun war games calling for the deployment of multi-divisional forces into Azerbaijan.

Logistical planning is well advanced concerning the basing of US air and ground power in Azerbaijan.

Given the fact that the bulk of the logistical support and command and control capability required to wage a war with Iran is already forward deployed in the region thanks to the massive US presence in Iraq, the build-up time for a war with Iran will be significantly reduced compared to even the accelerated time tables witnessed with Iraq in 2002-2003.

America and the Western nations continue to be fixated on the ongoing tragedy and debacle that is Iraq. Much needed debate on the reasoning behind the war with Iraq and the failed post-war occupation of Iraq is finally starting to spring up in the United States and elsewhere.

Normally, this would represent a good turn of events. But with everyone's heads rooted in the events of the past, many are missing out on the crime that is about to be repeated by the Bush administration in Iran - an illegal war of aggression, based on false premise, carried out with little regard to either the people of Iran or the United States.

Most Americans, together with the mainstream American media, are blind to the tell-tale signs of war, waiting, instead, for some formal declaration of hostility, a made-for-TV moment such as was witnessed on 19 March 2003.

We now know that the war had started much earlier. Likewise, history will show that the US-led war with Iran will not have begun once a similar formal statement is offered by the Bush administration, but, rather, had already been under way since June 2005, when the CIA began its programme of MEK-executed terror bombings in Iran.

Scott Ritter is a former UN weapons inspector in Iraq, 1991-1998, and author of Iraq Confidential: The Untold Story of America's Intelligence Conspiracy, to be published by I B Tauris in October 2005.

© 2005 Al Jazeera

Bush shouldn't point fingers on terror

Iran: Bush shouldn't point fingers on terror

Monday, February 28, 2005 Posted: 2:00 PM EST (1900 GMT)

TEHRAN, Iran (CNN) -- President Bush has no authority to accuse Iran of sponsoring terrorism while the U.S. supports "Zionist terrorists" and runs military prisons that use "torture," Tehran's Foreign Ministry spokesman said on Sunday.

Spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi's comments responded to last week's State of the Union address by Bush, when he said: "Today, Iran remains the world's primary state sponsor of terror -- pursuing nuclear weapons while depriving its people of the freedom they seek and deserve." (Full story)

Asefi shot back accusations toward Washington, referring to Israel, alleged prisoner abuse at a U.S.-run prison in Iraq and treatment of detainees held as enemy combatants at the U.S. base in Cuba.

"The United States is supporting a Zionist terrorist group, but in order to combat terrorism, the United States must start within itself," Asefi said. "The issues of the Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay prisons is a shame for the United States which will not be wiped out anytime soon."

"Those who support terrorism cannot talk about combating terrorism," Asefi said.

Bush also said in his address Wednesday that, "to promote peace in the broader Middle East, we must confront regimes that continue to harbor terrorists."

A U.S. State Department annual terrorism report released in April of 2004 said Iran "remained the most active state sponsor of terrorism" during the previous year.

It cited Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard and Ministry of Intelligence as being "involved in the planning of and support for terrorist acts," and said Iran continued to support Palestinian terror groups.

It also suggested that Iran pursued policies in Iraq that "ran counter" to U.S.-led military coalition interests, including providing safe haven for terrorists, advocating attacks against coalition forces and helping people with ties to the Revolutionary Guard infiltrate southern Iraq.
'Support for terror'

On Wednesday, Bush said the United States is working with European allies to convince Iran to give up its alleged nuclear ambitions and "end its support for terror."

For months, Britain, France and Germany have been negotiating directly with Iran to freeze its suspected nuclear weapons program. Iran insists its nuclear facilities are for peaceful purposes only.

Recently, Iran agreed to temporarily suspend enrichment of uranium -- which can be used to develop to nuclear weapons -- while talks continue with Europe about possible trade deals.

The Europeans have tried to persuade the United States to take a more active role in the talks, convinced that a U.S. offer to lift sanctions on Iran would be key to a permanent deal.

Asefi accused the United States of attempting to force an Iranian "crisis" and to disable talks with the Europeans to "humiliate" them and send them a message "that they don't have the power to resolve matters," The Associated Press reported.
'No longer without attention'

In his speech, Bush said, "there are still regimes seeking weapons of mass destruction -- but no longer without attention and without consequence."

However, on Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said an attack on Iran over its alleged nuclear program is "not on the agenda at this point."

"We have many diplomatic tools still at our disposal and we intend to pursue them fully," Rice said after a London meeting with British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw.

Rice warned that Iran must not "use the cover" of civilian nuclear power development "to sustain a program that can lead to a nuclear weapon." (Full story)

Asefi said, "such threats will not have much effect on the Islamic Republic and we will continue our path of sovereignty, independence and saying no to hegemony," Reuters reported.

Asefi said a new round of nuclear talks with the Europeans was set to begin Monday, AP reported, and Reuters quoted him as saying that negotiations were not deadlocked.
'America stands with you'

Also during Bush's address, the president spoke of expanding democracy in Iran. "As you stand for your own liberty, America stands with you," Bush said.

During a tour of European and Middle East nations this weekend, Rice continued that theme saying: "The Iranian people should have a chance to determine their own future." (Full story)

Asefi said the Bush administration's suggestion that the people of Iran do not enjoy human rights and don't support their government will be proven wrong this week when millions of Iranians will take to the streets in marches celebrating the anniversary of Iran's 1979 revolution that overthrew the ruling shah.

Asefi suggested the United States remains bitter about the revolution, which resulted in Iranian student militants taking 52 Americans hostage at Tehran's U.S. Embassy. Iran held the captives for 444 days, until they were released and returned to the United States.

Journalist Shirzad Bozorgmehr in Iraq contributed to this report.

The Coming Wars: What the Pentagon can now do in secret.

The Coming Wars
What the Pentagon can now do in secret.
by Seymour M. Hersh January 24, 2005

George W. Bush’s reëlection was not his only victory last fall. The President and his national-security advisers have consolidated control over the military and intelligence communities’ strategic analyses and covert operations to a degree unmatched since the rise of the post-Second World War national-security state. Bush has an aggressive and ambitious agenda for using that control—against the mullahs in Iran and against targets in the ongoing war on terrorism—during his second term. The C.I.A. will continue to be downgraded, and the agency will increasingly serve, as one government consultant with close ties to the Pentagon put it, as “facilitators” of policy emanating from President Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney. This process is well under way.

Despite the deteriorating security situation in Iraq, the Bush Administration has not reconsidered its basic long-range policy goal in the Middle East: the establishment of democracy throughout the region. Bush’s reëlection is regarded within the Administration as evidence of America’s support for his decision to go to war. It has reaffirmed the position of the neoconservatives in the Pentagon’s civilian leadership who advocated the invasion, including Paul Wolfowitz, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, and Douglas Feith, the Under-secretary for Policy. According to a former high-level intelligence official, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld met with the Joint Chiefs of Staff shortly after the election and told them, in essence, that the naysayers had been heard and the American people did not accept their message. Rumsfeld added that America was committed to staying in Iraq and that there would be no second-guessing.

“This is a war against terrorism, and Iraq is just one campaign. The Bush Administration is looking at this as a huge war zone,” the former high-level intelligence official told me. “Next, we’re going to have the Iranian campaign. We’ve declared war and the bad guys, wherever they are, are the enemy. This is the last hurrah—we’ve got four years, and want to come out of this saying we won the war on terrorism.”

Bush and Cheney may have set the policy, but it is Rumsfeld who has directed its implementation and has absorbed much of the public criticism when things went wrong—whether it was prisoner abuse in Abu Ghraib or lack of sufficient armor plating for G.I.s’ vehicles in Iraq. Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers have called for Rumsfeld’s dismissal, and he is not widely admired inside the military. Nonetheless, his reappointment as Defense Secretary was never in doubt.

Rumsfeld will become even more important during the second term. In interviews with past and present intelligence and military officials, I was told that the agenda had been determined before the Presidential election, and much of it would be Rumsfeld’s responsibility. The war on terrorism would be expanded, and effectively placed under the Pentagon’s control. The President has signed a series of findings and executive orders authorizing secret commando groups and other Special Forces units to conduct covert operations against suspected terrorist targets in as many as ten nations in the Middle East and South Asia.

The President’s decision enables Rumsfeld to run the operations off the books—free from legal restrictions imposed on the C.I.A. Under current law, all C.I.A. covert activities overseas must be authorized by a Presidential finding and reported to the Senate and House intelligence committees. (The laws were enacted after a series of scandals in the nineteen-seventies involving C.I.A. domestic spying and attempted assassinations of foreign leaders.) “The Pentagon doesn’t feel obligated to report any of this to Congress,” the former high-level intelligence official said. “They don’t even call it ‘covert ops’—it’s too close to the C.I.A. phrase. In their view, it’s ‘black reconnaissance.’ They’re not even going to tell the cincs”—the regional American military commanders-in-chief. (The Defense Department and the White House did not respond to requests for comment on this story.)

In my interviews, I was repeatedly told that the next strategic target was Iran. “Everyone is saying, ‘You can’t be serious about targeting Iran. Look at Iraq,’ ” the former intelligence official told me. “But they say, ‘We’ve got some lessons learned—not militarily, but how we did it politically. We’re not going to rely on agency pissants.’ No loose ends, and that’s why the C.I.A. is out of there.”

full article at http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2005/01/24/050124fa_fact

Iran as Bush's nuclear bogeyman

William O. Beeman, Donald A. Weadon

Thursday, September 30, 2004

The Bush administration continues an escalating spiral toward conflict with Iran, using Iran's nuclear policy as its primary focus. At the same time, the administration is reducing restrictions on other emerging nuclear states that pose a far more serious and immediate threat to world peace.

The consequence of this badly inconsistent policy is increased nuclear danger for the entire world. Since the end of the Cold War and collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States has lacked convenient villains to be "against, " and the essential mechanics of American foreign policy seems to lose focus and founder.

Iran has become an on-again, off-again focus of American international discomfiture. It is a purported linchpin in international terrorism, a defiant nation who refuses to submit to years of U.S. economic warfare, a state run by theocratic functionaries, and now a nuclear felon. In short, Iran is a perfect villain, just what America needs, and the nuclear issue is a perfect pretext for this hostile behavior -- one that plays well to a nervous American public.

What the Bush administration is not telling Americans is that while it is directing attacks and calling for sanctions against Iran, it is touting meaningless nuclear containment efforts on the one hand and is consciously ignoring illegal and far more dangerous nuclear weapons development on the other. None of this is being done to guarantee public safety, but rather for partisan political reasons.

The silliest example of "progress" in nuclear containment is that of Libya. On Sept. 20, just after removing them from the list of terrorist nations, President Bush revoked a number of restrictive executive orders against Libya in part for Libya's abandonment of its nuclear ambitions. The Bush administration claims this as a diplomatic success. In fact, the Libyans gave up a fledgling and inconsequential program in exchange for political acceptance by the Western world and decreased trade restrictions.

The U.S. invasion of Iraq also did nothing to contain nuclear weapons development, since Saddam Hussein's progress on this front was negligible. Nevertheless, Iraq's "nuclear threat" was one of the reasons given by President Bush to justify the Iraq invasion. These examples of "noncontainment" containment are the purest political spin. The choice of the United States to ignore real and significant weapons development elsewhere for equally political reasons has far more serious consequences.

The United States also recently removed nuclear restrictions imposed upon India for their thinly disguised nuclear weapons program. Much of the impetus for this reportedly came from the head of the export licensing arm of the Commerce Department, who is lobbying for a job as ambassador to India and who has a very cozy relationship with the Defense Department's neoconservative leadership.

And then there is North Korea. Washington continues to huff and puff at Pyongyang, but mindful of the intelligence community's long-held determination that we have no real strategic options, we continue to appease North Korea's frankly aggressive nuclear weapons ambitions.

The United States imposed no real sanctions upon Pakistan even though their none-too-secret proliferation, "Dr. A.Q. Khan's Road Show," spanned from South Africa to Taiwan and was responsible for a frightening East Asian nuclear race with India. But Pakistani assistance in the war on terrorism has been so essential as a point of political spin for the Bush administration that the Pakistan government has been granted a pass on their nuclear weapons program.

What about Taiwan? Their decades-old nuclear program included not only weapons development at the Chung Shan Institute, but also production of American Society for Mechanical Engineering Code Part III nuclear components - - the international standard -- at Kaioshung for nuclear programs throughout the world. The open-market availability of these parts through Taiwan is a key element of the world proliferation problem. Sanctions? Absolutely not.

Brazil is now defying the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) regarding questions over its nuclear program, which is not benign. This would violate the long-standing U.S. determination to keep South America nuclear- free. And the U.S. response? No seismic rumbles of the kind directed toward Iran are apparent here. And forget South Korean enrichment efforts -- clearly they were "just a mistake."

Finally, Israel has a robust nuclear weapons arsenal and is not a signatory to the Nuclear Nonproliferation treaty, with nary a word of disapproval from Washington.

But, oh, those mad mullahs in Iran! From the rhetoric pouring out of the Bush administration, one would think that they constitute the greatest nuclear threat on the planet.

The Iranian program, in comparison to so many others, is less developed and less dangerous. It is ironic that the United States propelled Iran on a nuclear course years ago, urging them to sink billions into a handful of energy-producing reactors which we now demand they dismantle. Iran has specifically renounced the development of nuclear weapons, and is a signatory to the most stringent nuclear nonproliferation agreements. Even if Iran wanted to develop nuclear weaponry, the CIA estimates that it would take years before anything of any significance could be produced.

Yet speculation is widespread that a military strike by the United States or Israel against Iran's reactors is a possibility, despite the fact that such a strike is fraught with great risk. The U.S. intelligence community was reported in the Sept. 27 issue of Newsweek to have concluded, after months of "war-gaming," that no military strategy exists that would keep a strike on Iran from escalating.

The Bush administration has so mishandled matters that it has now touched the most powerful symbolic nerve for Iran -- national "face." The United States has pushed Iran so hard and with such discriminatory prejudice that the leadership of the Islamic Republic has shown itself willing to partially act against their own interests to rescue Iran's national honor. Threats from the United States, or from its surrogate in this struggle, Israel, are met with escalating defiance by Iran. The Reuters disclosure on Sept. 21 that the United States has agreed to send 500 "bunker buster" BLU-109 bombs, presumably to attack Iranian nuclear facilities has only served to further infuriate the Iranians.

Iranian President Khatami said on Sept. 20, "They [the International Atomic Energy Agency and the United States] have to explicitly recognize our natural and legal right [to peaceful nuclear energy] to open the way for greater understanding and cooperation." He added, "We've made our choice. Now it is up to others to make their choice." Iran then resumed its nuclear enrichment program.

The Bush administration's pursuit of Iran on this issue is counter- productive, and may become deadly dangerous. Through its exclusive targeting of Iran, leading perhaps to an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities, the Bush administration is not making the world a safer place. They are giving a pass to powers far more dangerous than Iran, and goading Iran to retaliate for any violence directed against it. If Iran chooses to answer these attacks, it is not likely to be in a way that will improve prospects for peace in the Middle East, or in the rest of the world.

William O. Beeman is professor of anthropology and director of Middle East Studies at Brown University. Donald A. Weadon, a former naval officer, is a Washington-based international lawyer specializing in technology, defense, and trade sanctions.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/chronicle/archive/2004/09/30/EDGB790KB01.DTL

This article appeared on page B - 9 of the San Francisco Chronicle