Robert Parry: The U.S.-Iran-Iraq-Israeli-Syrian War

[seafan]

The U.S.-Iran-Iraq-Israeli-Syrian War

By Robert Parry
January 12, 2007

At a not-for-quotation pre-speech briefing on Jan. 10, George W. Bush and his top national security aides unnerved network anchors and other senior news executives with suggestions that a major confrontation with Iran is looming.
Commenting about the briefing on MSNBC after Bush’s nationwide address, NBC’s Washington bureau chief Tim Russert said “there’s a strong sense in the upper echelons of the White House that Iran is going to surface relatively quickly as a major issue – in the country and the world – in a very acute way.”
Russert and NBC anchor Brian Williams depicted this White House emphasis on Iran as the biggest surprise from the briefing as Bush stepped into the meeting to speak passionately about why he is determined to prevail in the Middle East.


“The President’s inference was this: that an entire region would blow up from the inside, the core being Iraq, from the inside out,” Williams said, paraphrasing Bush.
Despite the already high cost of the Iraq War, Bush also defended his decision to invade Iraq and to eliminate Saddam Hussein by arguing that otherwise “he and Iran would be in a race to acquire a nuclear bomb and if we didn’t stop him, Iran would be going to Pakistan or to China and things would be much worse,” Russert said.
If Russert’s account is correct, there could be questions raised about whether Bush has lost touch with reality and may be slipping back into the false pre-invasion intelligence claims about Hussein threatening the United States with “a mushroom cloud.”

.....


In his prime-time speech, Bush injected other reasons to anticipate a wider war. He used language that suggested U.S. or allied forces might launch attacks inside Iran and Syria to “disrupt the attacks on our forces” in Iraq.
“We will interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria,” Bush said. “And we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq.”
Bush announced other steps that could be interpreted as building a military infrastructure for a regional war or at least for air strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities.
“I recently ordered the deployment of an additional carrier strike group to the region,” Bush said. “We will expand intelligence sharing and deploy Patriot air defense systems to reassure our friends and allies.”
Though most news accounts of Bush’s speech focused on his decision to send about 21,500 additional U.S. troops to Iraq – on top of the 132,000 already there – Bush’s comments about his regional strategy could ultimately prove more significant.

.....


The Sunday Times of London reported on Jan. 7 that two Israeli air squadrons are training for the mission and “if things go according to plan, a pilot will first launch a conventional laser-guided bomb to blow a shaft down through the layers of hardened concrete . Other pilots will then be ready to drop low-yield one kiloton nuclear weapons into the hole.”
The Sunday Times wrote that Israel also would hit two other facilities – at Isfahan and Arak – with conventional bombs. But the possible use of a nuclear bomb at Natanz would represent the first nuclear attack since the United States destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan at the end of World War II six decades ago.


After the Sunday Times article appeared, an Israeli government spokesman denied that Israel has drawn up secret plans to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities. For its part, Iran claims it only wants a nuclear program for producing energy.
While some observers believe Israel or the Bush administration may be leaking details of the plans as a way to frighten Iran into accepting international controls on its nuclear program, other sources indicate that the preparations for a wider Middle Eastern war are very serious and moving very quickly.


Without doubt, Bush’s actions in the past two months – reaffirming his determination to succeed in Iraq and warning about a possible regional explosion if he fails – suggest that his future course is an escalation of the conflict, not some “graceful exit.”

[Parisle]

1. Since Bush's first day in office......

--- ...the underlying PNAC rationale has been that, by the time anyone realizes what they've done,... it will be too late. The US will have NO CHOICE but to fight. The "Dr. Strangelove" strategy. And Bush still works for the PNAC, have no fear. They launched their gambit to conquer the mideast oil resources, and it seems doubtful they'll give up now. One big attack on Iran is all they need.

[seafan]

3. And don't forget that a signer of the PNAC Statement of Principles is Jeb Bush.

http://www.newamericancentury.org/statementofprinciples.htm

[Parisle]

6. Oh, I know all too well who is on that list

--- Half the goddamned administration,... that's who. Why can't the democrats bring themselves to say the initials "P N A C ?" This subversive organization should have been a central theme of political reporting the MSM for the last six years,....... but NO.

[Broadslidin]

2. Time Honoured U.S. government foreign policy: "Murder"

:nuke:

[Dhalgren]

4. This has to be stopped.

This is one of the scariest analyzes of the current situation that I have seen. I think that this writer has hit upon the actual truth behind Bush’s seemingly illogical and incongruous moves over the past few weeks. This is going to be a horrible, horrible unfolding of events. If this madman and his junta cannot be stopped, then we are dead, ladies and gentlemen, dead...

[BeHereNow]

7. They don't care if we are "dead" when all is said and done.

And that is the point Americans don't yet comprehend.

Americans, for the most part, are completely in the dark as
far as the reality of how the current "powers that be" regard them.
The still harbor the delusion that they "matter" to these people.
They don't.

BHN

[pberq]

5. The "surge" is merely a tactic to buy time for the war against Iran and Syria

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x256308