Gulp!

William Rivers Pitt is scaring me. The thing is, he always nails it ...

I had a debate with my boss last night about Sy Hersh's terrifying New Yorker article describing Bush administration plans to attack Iran, potentially with nuclear weapons. After reading the Hersh piece, my boss was understandably worried, describing his reaction to the article in road-to-Damascus-revelation terms. They're going to do this, he said.

    I told my boss that I couldn't believe it was possible the Bush administration would do this. I ran through all the reasons why an attack on Iran, especially with any kind of nuclear weaponry, would be the height of folly.

    Iran, unlike Iraq, has a formidable military. They own the high ground over the Persian Gulf and have deployed missile batteries all throughout the mountains along the shore. Those missile batteries, I told him, include the Sunburn missile, which can travel in excess of Mach 2 and can spoof Aegis radar systems. Every American warship in the Gulf, including the carrier group currently deployed there, would be ducks on the pond.

    The blowback in Iraq would be immediate and catastrophic, I reminded him. The Shi'ite majority that enjoys an alliance with Iran would go indiscriminately crazy and attack anyone and anything flying the stars and stripes.

    Syria, which has inked a mutual defense pact with Iran and is believed to have significant chemical and biological weapons capabilities, would get into the game.

    China, which has recently established a multi-billion dollar petroleum relationship with Iran, might step into the fray if it sees its new oil source at risk.

    Russia, which has stapled itself to the idea that Iran's nuclear ambitions are for peaceful purposes, would likewise get pulled in.

You must read the whole thing.

One can only pray that this time out, the media won't roll over and get behind this insanity. And pray is the operative word. Here's Whiskey Bar on the matter:

Maybe it's just me, but I've been at least a little bit surprised by the relatively muted reaction to the news that the Cheney Administration and its Pentagon underlings are racing to put the finishing touches on plans for attacking Iran – plans which may include the first wartime use of nuclear weapons since Nagasaki.

I mean, what exactly does it take to get a rise out of the media industrial complex these days? A nuclear first strike against a major Middle Eastern oil producer doesn't ring the bell? Must every story have a missing white woman in it before the cable news guys will start taking it seriously?

I suppose I could understand it if all we had was Sy Hersh's word that the administration is planning another "pre-emptive" war in the Middle East. After all, we're talking about the same reporter who peddled all those crazy, unsubstantiated allegations about torture at Abu Ghraib prison. You can't be too careful with a journalistic loose cannon like that.

<SNIP>

After all, the corporate media complex has already shown a remarkable willingness to ignore or rationalize conduct that once would have been considered grossly illegal, if not outright war crimes. And the right-wing propaganda machine is happy to paint any atrocity as another glorious success in the battle for democracy (that is, when it's not trying to deny it ever happened.) Why should we expect something as transitory as a nuclear strike to change the pattern?

Let's be honest about it: For both the corporate and the conservative media, as well as for their audiences, an air campaign against Iran would make for great TV – a welcome return to the good old days of Desert Storm and Shock and Awe. All those jets soaring off into the desert twilight; the overexposed glare of cruise missiles streaking from their launch ships; the video game shots of exploding aircraft hangers and government buildings, the anti-aircraft tracers arcing into the night sky over Tehran – it would be war just the way we like it, far removed from the dull brown dust, raw sewage and multiple amputees of the Iraqi quagmire.

And to keep things interesting, we’d have the added frisson of nuclear weapons – a plot twist that would allow blow-dried correspondents to pose in borrowed radiation suits, give Pentagon flacks the opportunity to try out new euphemisms for killing people, and encourage retired generals to spice up their on-air military patter with knowing references to blast effects, kilotons, roentgens and fallout patterns.

<SNIP>

Why should anyone or anything change? When a culture is as historically clueless and morally desensitized as this one appears to be, I don’t think it’s absurd to suppose that even an enormous war crime – the worst imaginable, short of outright genocide – could get lost in the endless babble of the talking heads. When everything is just a matter of opinion, anything – literally anything – can be justified. It’s only a matter of framing things so people can believe what they want to believe.

Well, kids, the phrase du jour is ''wild speculation'' but the mouthpieces at Fox News were right in there pitching ...

More information on the potential nuke-you-lar nightmare here.

No wonder I find myself humming "Duck and Cover" again.

Comments

[sooey]

before the united states's christian administration took action and started threatening to nuke iran for the crazy and alarming rhetoric coming from its islamist administration, ariel sharon mused aloud about a pre-emptive strike against iran for threatening to wipe israel off the map. then he had a massive stroke so i guess bush inc took over operation "who's crazier??" by default. this is one i really hope the british have special agent 007 working behind the scenes to defuse. i'd sleep better at night. although, mark steyn would still be out there...

http://www.city-journal.org/html/16_2_iran.html

[Bill-Muskoka]

Antonia,

Thanks for posting that info. Were the Bush maniacs to use nuclear (Hey Dubya, there is how it is properly spelled!) weapons, oh let us call them by their proper name WEAPONS of MASS DESTRUCTION, aka, WMD's on Iran, the U.S.A. may just find themselves being the recipient of similar weapons.

This world has lived the nightmare once, we then lived through the potential nightmare of the Cold War going HOT! If the U.S. Congress, and the American people do not stop Bush and Cheney COLD in their tracks, then they may be opening themselves to their greatest aspiration...ARMAGEDDON!

The nutbar Christian Funnymentalists would rejoice that the End is HERE! They will be taken up, yada, yada, yada! What they do not realize is that there is a huge difference between 'translation' and evaporation!

The sane people in the Pentagon and the members of Congress had better find some balls very fast before their's are turned into cripsy critters.

I know from experience that the warped minds in Washington, D.C. can and will, and have conceived such scenarios. Its Dr. Strangelove all over again.

Not all the nations on this planet are gutless whores who look at the bottom line of profits before deciding. There are many who look at a thing called honour, regardless of outsider's opinions, and will act accordingly to protect their own sovereignty.

The bottom line is this. The U.S. may go around the world into third world countries being the big bad boy on the street, but if they ever piss off China they will find out what a Bad Boy truly is.

China can send a 500 million man army and still have plenty of people left to perform the daily necessities. They are a nuclear (there is the correct spelling again Dubya) power. If China and Russia joined together the U.S. would be squashed flat. Forget all the high tech toys. They will become worthless from EMP anyway!

Gawd! I never thought I would live to hear such insanity again. The morons just will not learn. Like a rabid animals they persist in the folly!

[Flea]

I think it would be foolish to imagine any attack on Iran's military is anything but a bad idea. The question is whether it is a worse idea to do nothing given the apocalyptic crazies running the place. But then we don't live in a country within missile range that various Iranian leaders have promised to obliterate with nuclear weapons.

So, any suggestions for an alternative to either choice are most welcome indeed.

[Smirky the Chimp]

Here's a link to a Union of Concerned Scientists flash video animation showing (1) why Nuclear bunker busters won't work as advertised and (2) why they'll release lots of radioactive fallout which will likely get blown into neighboring countries like Pakistand and Afghanistan.

http://www.ucsusa.org/global_security/nuclear_weapons/nuclear-bunker-buster-rnep-animation.html

[Antonia]

Then, if the bunker busters don't work, let's just drop Mark Steyn on them!

[sooey]

cripes, jesus had better hurry up with that second coming.

[Antonia]

Heh-heh.

Well, this weekend is Catholic/Protestant Easter. The week after is Greek Orthodox Easter. So there are two good days coming up.

Also, the Second Coming is contingent on Israel's Temple Mount being destroyed first so maybe Bush is the anti-Christ because he is trying to prevent it from being destroyed by an Iranian nuclear strike???

I'm just thinking out loud here.

[True North]

The part I love in the Hersh story is how bombing Iran will shame the Iranian regime - and that will cause the Iranian public to rise up, overthrow their government and establish yet another middle east democracy!

Democracy is a form of nuclear fallout!
Freedom loving Iranians must be paying to be nuked.
Freedom is on the march.
God Bless America

[Bill-Muskoka]

Well, as to be expected, Condoliar Rice is spouting off at the mouth. 'Time to act' she says.

Yeppers, it was actually time to act back when the U.S. put their puppet the Shah of Iran into power. Anyone notice how he and Sodumb Insane loved the palaces, all the perks, the power, yada, yada, yada?

Why it was just one cozy family with them both and Washington, D.C.! BUT WAIT! There's more...Those ingrates didn't listen to the Puppet Master. They went and, like in the Wizard of Oz, got a brain. actually more like the brain Igor got in 'Young Frankenstein', or was that Frankenstien?

Anyway, the brain thingy was bad, bad, bad! These puppets started to take and want things to be THEIR WAY!

Now the current Iranians want to, GAWD FORBID, be a shareholder in nuclear weapons, just like India, Pakistan, Russia, Israel...Oh did I err there? Israel denies having nuclear weapons I think? No, they have them. The U.S. and Brits made sure they do...just in case!

So, now Bushy is worried for his pals in Israel (not really, but it sure plays well in the media and with the Jewish supporters of Zionism), and they MUST ACT NOW!

Hey, isn't there a contract somewhere in this for more Patriot Missle batteries? How about some ATF-22's? The JTF-35?

Darn airlines stopped buying new planes because people dropped down to the ground after 9/11. I bet some pencil pusher didn't enter that one in their spreadsheet as a negative economic result?

Oh well, not to worry! The U.N. will have a meeting and we all know they are the true guardians of democracy and freedom for this planet! Aren't they?

[Jay Currie]

And the alternative to taking down the Iranian regime would be?

Perhaps we should pass a UN resolution...ooops, did that. Iran has stated it does not accept the resolution. Maybe we should get the more sophisticated Europeans to hold discussions with the Iranians. No, did that and nothing.

Fortunately there is a way out: we can take the Iranians at their word on the fact that - despite the fact they have lied consistently to the UN inspectors and eventually kicked them out of the country, despite the fact they have lied to the Euromats - they may have enriched uranium but they will never, ever, fingers crossed, make a nuke.

And we can console ourselves that the Iranians are way too tough to fight...I mean they very nearly beat Saddam. And, if we want to be extra sure that invading Iran is a non-starter, we can quiver at the prospect that a nuclear equiped, 500 million (one third of the entire population) Chinese state would like nothing better than to nuke Washington and team up with Russia if so much as a hair on a Revolutionary Guard's head is mussed.

Nuke Isreal? Come on, while you can trust Ahmadinejad on no nukes his remarks about obliterating Isreal are just crazy talk. He doesn't mean it...Not that the Isrealis don't richly deserve it of course.

___________

The problem of Iran is rather too serious to joke about. It is a regime which was elected by fraud, rules by a particularily nasty form of intimidation, is lead by religious zealots and which is committed to the destruction of the state of Isreal and the eradication of Jews in the Middle East. It is financing the Shi'ite militas operating as death squads in Iraq.

The question is not if that regime should be removed; rather the question is should it be removed before or after it acquires nuclear weapons.

For you UN fans out there, the Iranian regime now has 14 days to come into compliance with the Security council resolution requiring it to cease its nuclear programme. Yesterday Ahmadinejad announced that the regime had moved to enrihing uranium something it had promised it would not do and which is in clear violation of the UN resolution.

So here is the question: should Iran be allowed to continue to defy the UN? If so why? And if it does why is it impermissable for the US or Isreal or any other nation which believes that a nuclear Iran is a threat to do whatever is needed to remove that threat.

Right now I would like to see the UN actually be useful for once and force Iran to comply with its resolutions. However, as the Iraq epsode demonstrated, the UN - often with its members bought and paid for - tends to go into League of Nations mode when confronted with defiance. Chances are slim to none that the UN is going to have the courage of its convictions on Iran (or the Sudan or Zimbabwe....)

There is going to be a war in Iran. Whether it is a war fought by an international force or a one or two nation operation is an open question. But that war seems to be the only way that the UN's resolutions will be enforced.

[sheena]

Damn you all for making A Flock of Seagulls get stuck in my head.

[sooey]

oops. my bad. i didn't realize i was joking. i seriously thought the united states was threatening to attack iran, possibly with nuclear weapons, to get iran to stop threatening to attack other nations, possibly with nuclear weapons.

[Stephen Reevess]

All idle speculation, to give the left something more to worry about, I presume nuking Tel Aviv by Iran is idle speculation as well.
Despite what they say in public, the last thing the Arabs in the area want is a nuke armed Iran.

[Bill-Muskoka]

True North,

'They will rise up and otherthrow their government.'

EGADS! I am having a deja vu moment for sure.

Are they STILL using that line of BS? REALLY?

Good grief, they never learn. The MSS has more sense than they do and they he lived in a state the DSM-IV hasn't even entered yet!

The evidence is mounting daily that the Pod-people are HERE, on planet, and have taken over the heads of state in many countries! Who woulda thought, eh?

[Bill-Muskoka]

Jay,

Uh, I think their (the U.S.A.) line of credit is overlimit at this time. Maybe next year, eh? When is the next presidential election? 2008? Yeah that would be the right timing.

[Ti-Guy]

"And the alternative to taking down the Iranian regime would be?"

This is ridiculous. Just because you've concluded that the Iranian regime "has to be taken down" you assume, by asking this question, that the rest of us have got to come up with a better military strategy than nuking the crap out the country?

I suggest you guys sit this one out and this time let the adults come up with a strategy for dealing with Iran (which should involve the end of US interference in the Middle East eventually). You warmongers are already responsible for the mess in Iraq...Do you really want another humanitarian disaster on your consciences?

[Bill-Muskoka]

Ti-Guy,

But that is all they know! Bombs are the way to peace. Just ask those guys at SAC! Ooops, SAC doesn't exist anymore. Oh well, its all just like a video game to the Hawks.

What was that song they played in 'Dr. Strangelove: or How I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb' as Slim Pickens rode the H-Bomb down from the BUFF?

Personally, I am really hoping for Klatu and Gort to land and make an announcement! It should happen now that NASA wants to export their insanity to the Moon and Mars!

[Jay Currie]

Ti-Guy, I am inclined to think that Iraq - given that the US was unwilling to entertain the division of the country - is doing well and adjusting to democracy. But that is by the way.

Do tell, what would you adults be thinking by way of an Iran strategy? A super-dooper UN resolution? Abject capitulation? A flying squad of Euro diplomats?

Being the sophisticated nuanced sort of chaps you undoubted are, perhaps you see this as a law enforcement problem? Or, and this is at least consistent, maybe you think Iran has a perfect right to develop nuclear weapons and use them as they see fit. Perhaps you see the principles of non-proliferation as really rather worn out. And maybe you see out and out defiance of UN resolutions as entirely ok.

But, seriously, what would you adults do?

Because doing nothing, the current option, will produce a nuclear armed, non-compliant Iran whose President is on record as calling for the elimination of Israel.

It will also, in the fullness of time, produce a full scale nuclear war in the region and, if I were a betting man, I would have to like the Israelis chances with a thirty year headstart on both warhead and delivery technology.

Basically, if the Iranian regime continues down its present path without there being international intervention Tehran, Qom and assorted other Iranian cites are in critical danger of being reduced to glassy bowls with the deaths of millions of people.

Ahmadinejad may believe that there is a hidden ayatollah who is going to materialize shortly; but in the real world the closer Iran gets to weapons production the closer it gets to its own destruction.

But I am sure you adults will be able to sort all that out....Maybe nuking Israel first thereby eliminating the problem...

[Ti-Guy]

"But I am sure you adults will be able to sort all that out....Maybe nuking Israel first thereby eliminating the problem..."

Like I said, let the grown-ups handle this. You guys are all over-stimulated from playing too many video games.

[Stephen Reevess]

The scary thing is their is much opposition to the idea of Bush nuking Iran,(which of course is to be expected, and rightly), but much less opposition or outrage to the idea of Iran nuking Israel.

[Stephen Reevess]

Don't worry Sooey, Mark Steyn is not going to nuke anyone.

[JWhyle]

Spengler In Asia Times On-line

"Bush's October surprise - it's coming!"

One hears not an encouraging word about US President George W Bush these days, even from Republican loyalists. Yet I believe that Bush will stage the strongest political comeback of any US politician since Abraham Lincoln won re-election in 1864 in the midst of the American Civil War.

Two years ago I wrote that Bush would win a second term as president but live to regret it. Iraq's internal collapse and the president's poll numbers bear my forecast out. But Bush's Republicans will triumph in next November's congressional

elections for the same reason that Bush beat Democratic challenger John Kerry in 2004. Americans rally around a wartime commander-in-chief, and Bush will have bombed Iranian nuclear installations by October.

There's more here from the always prescient Spengler.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/HD11Ak03.html

[Jay Currie]

Ti-Guy, I am sure an adult like yourself can come up with something a bit cleverer than a video game remark.

Seriously, what do you see as the way forward with Iran? What is the adult approach?

I have a few sub-nuclear options up at my blog. But what are yours??

[sooey]

enh. mark steyn is more than welcome to push his NUKE IRAN opinions. push comes to shove, i am firmly on the side of israel and firmly against islamic expansionism. it's the agenda of the american administration that gives me pause.

[sooey]

it's pretty problematic for the world when the one super power would appear to be a war profiteerer. 's'all i'm sayin'.