"Is it a good thing for the Iranians to think there are occasions where the U.S. would use force? Sure," said Eliot A. Cohen, a professor at Johns Hopkins University who directed the Air Force's definitive study of the first war against Iraq. "But I don't get a sense that people in the administration are champing at the bit to launch another war in the Persian Gulf."So, just what would it take to make the good professor get that sense? Maybe someone at the White House can messenger over an actual bit with chomp marks on it...
Earlier in the piece, we read:
"The problem is that our policy has been all carrots and no sticks," the [Bush administration] adviser told a gathering of academics and outside strategists, according to members of the audience. "And the Iranians know it."No sticks? Armies in bordering countries do not qualify as being even vaguely stick-like? Just what "carrots" have we, in fact, offered? Better question: Why are authorities dishing out this dissembling swill? The real scoop can be found in lots of places -- for example, William Arkin's recent column.
To my knowledge, the first to report on plans to use nukes against Iran was former CIA officer Phil Giraldi, writing in the American Conservative. Let's review:
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...See also here. Many considered these words outlandish last summer; they seem prophetic now, when even mainstream news outlets feel free to discuss a nuclear strike -- although news stories relegate such talk to the inner paragraphs, as though the first military use of The Bomb since Nagasaki were a purely technical matter.
Giraldi is partnered with another former CIA man, Vincent Cannistraro, who has had his eye on Michael Ledeen as a possible perpetrator of the Niger forgeries. Ledeen decried Cannistraro as a trafficker in "groundless" accusations. But on the Iran front, at least, Cannistraro and Associates seemed to be on the money. Perhaps they were right about Ledeen as well...?
There's something funny going on: Although the Bush administration earmarked Iran as being part of the so-called Axis of Evil back in 2002, the CIA was forced to shut down one of its most successful penetrations of an Iranian espionage operation. Read this fascinating story from roughly a year ago.
Iran had a program to scoop up recruits in South America. (There is a long, as-yet untold story about extreme Islam in that continent.) These recruits would then be in a good position to come to the United States and operate on behalf of Tehran. The CIA penetrated this operation; even during the Clinton years and the short-lived U.S./Iran detente, the funding continued for the Agency's efforts to spy on Iran.
But the Bushies pulled the plug on the project, citing alleged budgetary problems -- just at the time when they started to ramp up the rhetoric against Iran. Now (according to common report) we have very limited intelligence assets in that country, and no way to know who the Iranians have recruited to come here.
Meanwhile, Ahmed Chelabi -- who has definite ties to Iranian intelligence -- has been slowly rehabilitated.
And am I the only one to notice that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has been spouting a bunch of guff that could have been scripted by the neocons? ("Okay, Mahmoud -- you play the heavy. Here are your lines...")
Is your "Spidey sense" tingling too...?
You have made a number of good observations in this blog post Joseph. This is why I must now send the NSA and CIA to fully check you out.
ReplyDeletetwo thoughts. one, the whole thing reeks to high heaven, not just ahmadinejad's bizarre and inflammatory (almost suicidal) rhetoric. what worries me is the fact that these crazies will stop at nothing to achieve their goal, and given the public resistance, they may delude themselves into believing that we'll need yet another 'new pearl harbor' to sway public opinion.
ReplyDeletetwo, one really stinky piece i cannot get out of my head is the altogether way too coincidental fact that valerie plame's beat was not just wmd counterproliferation, but IRAN.
ya just gotta wonder if her brewster jennings operation stumbled onto more than just the alleged attempts to smuggle in those 'to-be-found' wmd's three years ago. joe mentioned the madsen suspicion (via wayne madsen, admittedly) recently. but i just can't help but wonder if there was more to it than even that, and certainly more than trying to shut joe wilson up.
and the thing is, there is no way plame could publicly call foul here, as all of it would have been highly top secret.
curiouser and curiouser....
For what its worth, I am convinced (as many of the original Iran hostages allege) that Ahmedinejad was one of the leaders of the U.S. embassy hostage-takers (was that 1979?) whose actions led to the downfall of the Carter administration, and installed G.H.W.Bush as vice-President. His actions were overtly anti-American, but served a purpose of G.H.W.BUSH. Today, Ahmedinejad (if it is "him") seems to be again behaving in an overtly anti-American way that in fact advances the plans of G.W.Bush to attack Iran. It is beyond strange the way he is playing into Bush's hands, taunting us and inviting war. No matter what is motivating him, Bush couldn't ask for a better ally. I can't even begin to understand it.; I am only describing what I see and hear. Anyone.....?
ReplyDeleteRegarding Ahmedinejad's role as a student leader during the hostage takeover: What is surprising and interesting to me is that this history has NOT been played up. It's as if the Bush forces don't want us to re-live the hostage crisis. Why?
ReplyDeleteYears ago, I met an Iranian dissident (anti-Shah and anti-Khomenei) named Farah Mansoor. I couldn't deal with him for long because -- well, he was impossible. Just not the sort of personality I could easily tolerate, especially at that point in my life. But that should all be water under the bridge by this point.
He was writing a book -- never published -- on the hostage crisis and the earlier fall of the Shah. This wasn't armchair stuff; he was out for documentation.
You cannot find his writings online -- he was too paranoid ever to publish anything -- but over a decade ago, he did do a few radio interviews. Here is a summary of one of those interviews:
"This series of interviews covers the landmark research of Farah Mansoor, a member of the Iranian resistance whose historic research on the rise of the Khomeini regime documents the decisive role of the United States in developing Islamic fundamentalist forces in that country as the anti-communist successors to the Shah's government. Farah has documented that U.S. Ambassador to Iran, Richard Helms, learned that the Shah had cancer in 1974. Former Director of Central Intelligence Helms promptly informed the CIA and Department of State with the result that, by 1976, George Bush's CIA was actively supporting and grooming the Khomeini forces. The subsequent takeover of the U.S. embassy in Teheran, the withholding of the U.S. hostages until after President Carter's defeat was assured, the Khomeini government itself and the Iran-Contra scandal proper were all outgrowths of this profound and long-standing relationship. It should be noted that parts of this relationship have been misunderstood as what has become known as "the October Surprise." Although there was, massive collusion between the Reagan-Bush campaign and the Khomeini forces during the 1980 election campaign, there was no "deal" cut during the campaign. Rather, the "deal" was part of a covert operation begun years before and the collusion during the campaign was an outgrowth of it."
If you are interested in buying the tape of this interview, the URL from which I took the above text is here:
http://p216.ezboard.com/frigorousintuitionfrm31.showMessage?topicID=44.topic
I SEEM to recall Farah telling me personally that he felt there was some collusion between the Bush/Helms forces and a few key figures in the "student" movement that took over the embassy. If that's true, then the Ahmadinejad connection is obvious.
But please do NOT trust my memory on this point...I spoke to Mansoor some twelve-or-so years ago, and all I can really recall was that I ate a LOT of fruit as we spoke. It was good and I was starving.