Military analyst William Arkin on the prospect of the U.S. attacking Iran to stop its assumed nuclear bomb program:
...just because the hip-shooting duo (Cheney and John Bolton) are conveying threats as part of the ongoing diplomatic pressures doesn't mean that the United States is about to strike. It is not.
But also just because an attack on Iran seems so dangerous, and just because the consequences seem so catastrophic, that doesn't mean that if push came to shove, this administration wouldn't take action. ...
Arkin points out that all the media speculation about whether the U.S. (or Israel) will attack Iran threatens to miss the point, the way the pre-war speculation about Iraq missed the mark:
...if the worst came,
The Bush administration would not care about nor seek a "strategic" surprise attack and thus would not be stopped by the lack of surprise of because Iran is presumed to already be making preparations to protect its assets.
The Bush administration would not seek a ground war or regime change, at least not initially or immediately, so the difficulties associated with both tasks and the ongoing operations in Iran or Afghanistan would not stop it from attacking Iraq's weapons of mass destruction infrastructure.
The Bush administration would not be impeded by a lack of knowledge about Iran's weapons of mass destruction or by Iranian deception or by its going underground in terms of targeting. According to the Guardian (UK), Ambassador Bolton told visiting British parliamentarians in New York last week that it was well aware of the expert cautions. "We can hit different points along the line," Bolton said. "You only have to take out one part of their nuclear operation to take the whole thing down."
The Bush administration would not be stopped by the protests and vetoes of the international community nor would it hesitate to use force merely because there were dangers of escalation into a full-scale war.
I've already written about the Bush administration's war plans to pre-empt development of weapons of mass destruction and its specific thinking on Iran -- how the administration has directed the military to prepare a multi-dimentional "global strike" attack on Iran and North Korea's WMD capacity, how it views the task and its difficulties. ...
...It would be better for the news media to stop speculating about an imminent strike and stop providing expert warnings of the difficulties associated with such a strike. It should focus instead on the administration's and the military's thinking on the subject. The reason is because even if the administration's "triggers" appeared tomorrow for "global strike" to be implemented, that is, if Iran announced it possessed a nuclear weapon, it would still a terrible and dangerous course of action for the United States to immediately attack.
Meanwhile, the speculation over the euro-conversion theory of war with Iran gets a sober treatment at Energy Bulletin.
And there's a site, linked here, devoted to Iran "regime change." Among the Wednesday highlights?
Guess who's looking to build a natural gas pipeline with Iran?
Reuters reported tht the White House said on Tuesday it still opposes a proposed natural gas pipeline linking energy-rich Iran with India.
That's right, India. The same India President Bush just gave the green light to, so that they can develop their nuclear program in peace, without the prying eyes of the international community, in exchange for fresh, juicy mangoes.
It gets worse:
Asian Tribune reported that India has made it abundantly clear that it is opposed to any moves for regime change in Tehran.
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%>
Tell a friend
<%
Else
if request.form("done") = "Yes" then
'sets variables
dim email, sendmail
email = request.form("email")
Set sendmail = Server.CreateObject("CDONTS.NewMail")
'put the webmaster address here
sendmail.From = "webmaster@aspbasics.com"
'The mail is sent to the address entered in the previous page.
sendmail.To = email
'Enter the subject of your mail here
sendmail.Subject = "Check out this website"
'send a specific page or send a site url
dim url
'url = Request.ServerVariables("HTTP_REFERER")
url = "http://www.aspbasics.net"
'This is the content of the message.
sendmail.Body = "Site recommendation from a friend!" & _
vbCrlf & vbCrlf & "A friend has sent you this email and thought you would should check out this site." & _
vbCrlf & url & vbCrlf
'this sets mail priority.... 0=low 1=normal 2=high
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sendmail.Send 'Send the email!
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End if
%>
"[T]he practice of arbitrary imprisonments, have been, in all ages, the favorite and most formidable instruments of tyranny.' Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 84, August, 1788
