"...and then concludes . . . that we should bomb Iran."

You don't get it. This is like 2002. People are pre-positioning themselves for what the country and world looks like after the attack. I have been watching the Democrats in the Senate roll over for six months on the Patriot Act, habeus, censure, intelligence, etc.

It isn't necessarily that Gerecht thinks we should bomb Iran. He simply knows it is coming. What Fukuyama was about recently was arguing not about Iraq or general policy, but specifically that we just bomb Iran but avoid the nation-building.

It is going to happen. Nobody can stop it.

"But for the moment I'd refer back to a point I made a couple weeks ago and say that the biggest folly would be to engage the administration on the particulars of their fantasies and delusions about foreign policy in the Middle East." ...Josh Marshall

TPM

Now Marshall thinks maybe we can stop it or limit it. I think we can't, and the discussion should be about punishing them afterwards, if that is even a good idea. Remember, it only takes 20% of the Iraqi people to make that country unmanageable.

You know, it could be that the universe was created by the Flying Spaghetti Monster too.

The notion that the threat of an Iranian bomb is world-changing in a way that the Chinese, Russian, Israeli, South African, Brazilian, French, Pakistani, North Korean, English, German, and Japanese bomb programs were not is a manifestly dumb notion.

If we accept that the threat of an Iranian bomb is actually rationally-scaled, in a way that enables comparison to other threats and prioritization, the case for a unilateral stop-everything war falls apart.

Grow the hell up.

I'd like to issue a reminder that we are not talking about an Iranian bomb.

We are talking about Iran being "nuclear capable" theoretically capable of producing a bomb.

For Iran, being nuclear capable is legal and would provide Iran with more than enough deterrent to be the leading state in its region.

The step from nuclear capable to nuclear armed could not be taken in secret, would be very expensive for Iran in terms of the bad-will and probable blockade and economic consequences it would engender, and again, Iran does not need an actual weapon if it has the legal deterrent of being nuclear capable.

Other than partisans for Israel, nobody argues that preventing Iran from being nuclear capable could even imaginably be worth the definite and huge costs of a military attack.

I just don't think Bush at 35% has the juice to pull this off without an assist from a large contingent of Vichy Democrats.

After the Iraq debacle does anyone really doubt that many Democrats will assist Bush at whatever ill considered military adventure he wants to try? Hillary will use the opportunity to be seen as more manly. Biden will be Biden. Lots more will join with them hoping to stave off defeat in the next election.

Hoppy in Sacramento

Let us imagine a worst-case scenario: Iran with nuclear ICBMs. That this is not going to happen in the near future is irrelevant to Bush et al so what does the scenario imply?

Would Iran nuke Israel? BTD thinks so, explaining that with jihadi attitude. I find this completely implausible, since not even martyrs succeed if their entire culture disappears in the ensuing retaliation. Even a surreptitious bomb is an insane risk to Iran's population because they would be the first suspects. Israel's border security is about as tight as possible, so only an air-delivered nuke would get there, with a return address courtesy radar tracking. If they do anyway, Iran ceases to be a problem because it gets utterly destroyed with enthusiasm.

Would Iran try to control oil? By the time they have useful nukes we could be way past oil, leaving them with no leverage over us. Of course, our current path has us rushing toward the wall of peak oil along with everyone, instead of planning for the future.

It is ironic that while planning future wars we are not planning the obvious ways to avoid those wars, but are living in the past in regards energy sources. To anyone that says we need oil for the immediate future I ask "what about right after that immediate future?" Who will be the energy leader? It won't be the US if we squander our treasure and blood on the remaining oil.

What is truly amazing is how the groundswell has started from places like the Standard and through the conservative blogosphere, that war with Iran is not only feasible, but they believe to be the only option available at this time. They are honestly deluded that this is going to happen and NEEDS to happen.

I've heard McInerney and it sounds like Iraq all over again. Piece of cake. 28,000# bombs, 4000# bunker busters, special forces, Iranian dissidents, greeted as liberators, we have all heard it before. These people(THe STandard and conservative blogs) are so in a huff to make sure they credit the military with being the end all be all of the human race and stand out to gain the military vote ,they delude themselves to think that of course its possible, the military can do anything, and always do it well.

So we could bomb the hell out of Iran's nuclear capability? Do we have the intelligence apparatus to make it successful? Do we have that apparatus to tell us how successful it was when it's over? To me, anything short of all out invasion stops short of destroying their capabilities and only delays it. Is anybody advocating that? Do we have the manpower? Do we really want to occupy two Middle East nations. Surely, that would put at ease the minds of those in the region who fear imperialistic intentions. I don't see anything viable to suggest that a military option should be the way to go, unless we know that the consequences could be unthinkable. I don't see that scenario playing out either.

J. McCutchen "JmacSF"

San Francisco. CA

We euthanize rabid dogs

Why are TPMers arguing whether Bush will bomb Iran? To see who's prediction is right? Our interest is simply to oppose US attacks on Iran: Hands off Iran! Speculation that Bush will not attack Iran only trivialize a great danger; speculation that Bush will attack Iran is real support for Bush's saber-rattling. Neither speculation is in our interests; both are in
Bush's interests. Hands off Iran! Peter Miller

Tom

One of the odder features of the Bush Administration is their avoidance of simpler answers. The high price of oil has helped Iran fund their nuclear program, and is helping fund Chavez too another problem for Bush, if not the US.

If the United States had successfully gotten Iraq's oil back online a lot of the free cash in Iran would dry up. Similar a conservation program designed for national security would also help reduce the income the Mullahs would have for their nuclear program.

Daniel A. Greenbaum

J. McCutchen "JmacSF"

San Francisco. CA

What is the Weekly Standard but a mouthpiece for the Lobby?

One month after the publication by two of the most influential international relations scholars in the United States of a highly controversial essay on the so-called "Israel Lobby," their thesis that the lobby exercises "unmatched power" in Washington is being tested by rapidly rising tensions with Iran.

Far more visibly than any other domestic constituency, the Israel Lobby, defined by Profs. John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen Walt, academic dean of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, as "the loose coalition of individuals and organizations who actively work to shape U.S. foreign policy in a pro-Israel direction," has pushed the government – both Congress and the George W. Bush administration – toward confrontation with Tehran.

Leading the charge has been a familiar group of neoconservatives, such as former Defense Policy Board (DPB) chairman Richard Perle and former Central Intelligence Agency director James Woolsey, who championed the war in Iraq but who have increasingly focused their energies over the past year on building support for "regime change" and, if necessary, military action against Iran if it does not abandon its nuclear program.

(On Tuesday, Iran announced that it had successfully enriched uranium, which can be used for both nuclear weapons and nuclear power reactors, in defiance of a UN Security Council resolution ordering an end to all enrichment activities by April 28).

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the premier Israel lobby group whose annual convention last year featured a giant, multimedia exhibit on how Iran is "pursuing nuclear weapons and how it can be stopped," has also been pushing hard on Capitol Hill for legislation to promote regime change. Despite White House objections, the group has sought tough sanctions against foreign companies with investments in Iran.

"This bill has been pushed almost entirely by AIPAC," noted Trita Parsi, a Middle East expert at Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies (SAIS) here. "I don't see any other major groups behind this legislation that have had any impact on it."

Similarly, the American Jewish Committee (AJC), whose leadership is considered slightly less hawkish than AIPAC, has taken out full-page ads in influential U.S. newspapers since last week entitled "A Nuclear Iran Threatens All" depicting radiating circles on an Iran-centered map to show where its missiles could strike.

Iran Showdown Tests Power of Israel Lobby

J. McCutchen "JmacSF"

San Francisco. CA

"Showdown"

"The liberation of Iraq was the first great battle for the future of the Middle East. … But the next great battle – not, we hope a military one – will be for Iran," wrote the Weekly Standard's neoconservative editor, William Kristol, in early May 2003.

Shortly thereafter, neoconservatives and other hawks led by Vice President Dick Cheney succeeded in cutting off ongoing U.S.-Iranian talks on Afghanistan and Iran and killing an offer by Tehran to engage in a broader negotiation on all outstanding differences.

What makes the growing confrontation with Iran so remarkable is that the Israel Lobby appears to be the only major organized force here that is actively pushing it toward crisis.

Listen up - Last year, I worked for a major defence contractor. At the annual meeting, we were told that the defense budget was going to decrease in 2006 and there would be some belt-tightening.

The 2006 defense budget was increased, not decreased.

The deputy secretary of defense is a former executive of this company so you know I was getting good information. And no, the information was not secret or even confidential. Anyone could have walked into the hotel, sat down in the meeting room and listened to the speeech.

Save your breath. We are going to war with Iran. It's in the defense budget.

I know I am saying the freaking obvious, but this is all about the easy manipulation of Bush’s intellectual and character defects. Approving a plan to bomb takes 5 minutes out of his busy Texas ranch/sleep/ mountain biking schedule.

Working through complex analysis with nuance and options, and challenging coalition building, strategic analysis, multi- phase’s diplomatic maneuvers, execution, calls to allies, discussions with intelligence and military experts…. NOT THIS PRESIDENT…and why the leadership in the military and intelligence is making their views clear: NO CONFIDENCE.

The American public is not as easily fooled as this President.

Can I just point out that the notion of bombing Iran could be all the things listed above, but still worth doing, if the consequences of an Iranian bomb were deemed so serious that it was worth paying that high a price.

No it couldn't:

 (f) not really resolve the issue

 refers to the possibility that Iran will quite likely eventually get a bomb anyway; bombing would only slow them down. So those "consequences" are not evaded.

Happy talk is not the way to gain the confidence of the people. - Zalmay Khalilzad, US Ambassador to Iraq

(That God may be named Edgar Bergan)

heh.... 

Neoboho

This oil and gas isn't destined for the West, IMO. The forming Asian market is predicted to be 10 times as large as Europe & USA. This isn't long range strategic planning stuff - it's a rush to get the goods to the new market in order to cash in on the treasure.

Central Asian oil and gas production is stunted because there limited ways to get it to the markets. The Black Sea is capped by the Bhosphorus, which only medium tankers can navigate, and Turkey is jumping through the roof because existing Tanker traffic is a marine disaster waiting to happen. The existing pipelines can only handle a limited amount of Central Asian O&G - the new lines being built on the Silk Road and Afghanistan are also limited. The most efficient way to get the product to market is through Iran. Look at a Caspian basin map - it's obvious.

Because of the existing sanctions against Iran, we can't put the pipes down there.

Neoboho

J. McCutchen "JmacSF"

San Francisco. CA

About 1 week ago, I cautioned "Watch the Lobby" Sure enough

 Hail! Hail! The Gang's All Here - in the Lobby

 

Led by a familiar clutch of neoconservative hawks, major right-wing publications are calling on the administration of President George W. Bush to urgently plan for military strikes – and possibly a wider war – against Iran in the wake of its announcement this week that it has successfully enriched uranium to a purity necessary to fuel nuclear reactors.

In a veritable blitz of editorials and opinion pieces published Wednesday and Thursday, the Wall Street Journal, the Weekly Standard, and National Review warned that Tehran had passed a significant benchmark in what they declared was its quest for nuclear weapons and that the administration must now plan in earnest to destroy Iran's known nuclear facilities, as well as possible military targets, to prevent it from retaliating.

  Neocons Turn Up Heat for Iran Attack

It's irrelevant if you secure the fields, you have to secure the 600 miles of pipeline - which is impossible.

You also cannot secure the ports as long as you have civilian workers who are members of the insurgency.

There was NEVER any way Iraq was going to ship enough oil to pay for the war or the reconstruction, because SOME level of insurgency would have existed - undoubtedly enough to prevent the oil from flowing.

Richard Steven Hack

www.computerproblemssolvedcheap.com