re: The American Conservative Article

[redqueen]

I would think this has been discussed already, but the search function is not my friend today.

This is supposedly from the August edition of this well known periodical.

"The Pentagon, acting under instructions from Vice President Dick Cheney's office, has tasked the United States Strategic Command (STRATCOM) with drawing up a contingency plan to be employed in response to another 9/11-type terrorist attack on the United States. The plan includes a large-scale air assault on Iran employing both conventional and tactical nuclear weapons. 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. Several senior Air Force officers involved in the planning are reportedly 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."

However, all I can find are mentions on blogs... please, someone tell me this is fake.

Hell, even the thought that it could be real... that's frightening enough.

Since I want to put something worthwhile in here in case that turns out to be fake... I give you this oldie but goodie:

http://www.amconmag.com/03_24_03/cover.html

"This is a time for truth. For America is about to make a momentous decision: whether to launch a series of wars in the Middle East that could ignite the Clash of Civilizations against which Harvard professor Samuel Huntington has warned, a war we believe would be a tragedy and a disaster for this Republic. To avert this war, to answer the neocon smears, we ask that our readers review their agenda as stated in their words. Sunlight is the best disinfectant. As Al Smith used to say, “Nothing un-American can live in the sunlight.”

We charge that a cabal of polemicists and public officials seek to ensnare our country in a series of wars that are not in America’s interests. We charge them with colluding with Israel to ignite those wars and destroy the Oslo Accords. We charge them with deliberately damaging U.S. relations with every state in the Arab world that defies Israel or supports the Palestinian people’s right to a homeland of their own. We charge that they have alienated friends and allies all over the Islamic and Western world through their arrogance, hubris, and bellicosity.

Not in our lifetimes has America been so isolated from old friends. Far worse, President Bush is being lured into a trap baited for him by these neocons that could cost him his office and cause America to forfeit years of peace won for us by the sacrifices of two generations in the Cold War.

They charge us with anti-Semitism—i.e., a hatred of Jews for their faith, heritage, or ancestry. False. The truth is, those hurling these charges harbor a “passionate attachment” to a nation not our own that causes them to subordinate the interests of their own country and to act on an assumption that, somehow, what’s good for Israel is good for America."

[bluestateguy]

1. Good magazine

Even when they post ariticles that I disagree with, which is often, they are intelligently written and argued.

[redqueen]

2. I just want to know if this is for real or just a horrible rumor.

[charlie]

3. Interview with the author

about the story here:

http://www.weekendinterviewshow.com/audio/giraldi.mp3

[redqueen]

4. Thanks!

[tmorelli415]

5. TAC Story in Print Eds Only; The Nation, Scott Ritter Confirm Many Details

Author is Philip Giraldi, and apparently the story appears in the August edition of The American Conservative (print edition only).

A story by Michael Klare in the July 22 edition of The Nation, "The Iran war buildup," generally corroborates much of the story.

Scott Ritter said in June that the operations have already started in Iran (http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m12776&l=i&size=1&hd=0),

[redqueen]

6. Argh!

So... why so little response?!

Have you seen this on DU?

:(

[charlie]

7. We all knew this was coming

The neocon goons are gonna make the most of their window of opportunity, to enmesh us in intractable situations so we'll have to deal with their shit even if they get kicked out of power.

Right after the invasion had reached Baghdad, there were reports that we were recruiting members of the Mukhabarat. I thought WTF, we disband the Baath Party and the army, but we scoop up Saddam's Stasi? Turns out we were interested in the division that ran special ops inside Iran. Bushco was prepping Iraq as a springboard into Iran from the beginning.

10 minutes into the radio interview posted above, Giraldi talks about how these guys are currently on our payroll and enjoy our protection, and the State Dept is trying to get them de-listed as terrorists. Fun fact - they're the main force that attacked the Iranian Embassy and seized hostages in 1979.

And Bushco hasn't forgotten about N Korea. I read about this cute plan, Plan 5030, in 2003:

Within the past two months, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has ordered U.S. military commanders to devise a new war plan for a possible conflict with North Korea. Elements of the draft, known as Operations Plan 5030, are so aggressive that they could provoke a war, some senior Bush administration officials tell U.S. News.
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Adm. Thomas Fargo, head of the U.S. Pacific Command, and senior Pentagon planners are developing the highly classified plan. The administration insiders, who are critical of the plan, say it blurs the line between war and peace. The plan would give commanders in the region authority to conduct maneuvers--before a war has started--to drain North Korea's limited resources, strain its military, and perhaps sow enough confusion that North Korean generals might turn against the country's leader, Kim Jong Il. "Some of the things is being asked to do," says a senior U.S. official, "are, shall we say, provocative.

...

Some officials believe the draft plan amounts to a strategy to topple Kim's regime by destabilizing its military forces. The reason: It is being pushed by many of the same administration hard-liners who advocated regime change in Iraq. The Pentagon only recently began offering details of the plan to top officials at the White House, the State Department, and other agencies. It has not yet been approved. A Pentagon spokesman declined comment.

...

Some administration officials and military experts say they consider these tactics dangerously provocative. What would happen, they ask, if North Korea shot down an RC-135 or lobbed artillery at South Korea? "What the Pentagon is trying to do is balance the risk between ceding the initiative to the enemy or taking steps to influence it," says Andrew Krepinevich of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. "But does war become more likely?"

...

But if the Pentagon gives commanders more authority to take aggressive actions in peacetime, as contemplated in Plan 5030, it risks tripping over the president's--and Congress's--authority to commit the nation to war, says a senior official. "Who decides when to go to war?" the official asks. "Good question."

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/030721/21korea.htm

[The Magistrate]

8. Locking

This article has been discussed exhaustively already, and to little profit, as it mostly speculation by paleo-cons.