Iran Iran Iran -- and MORE war in Lebanon?

Paul Rogers, a Professor at Bradford University in northern England, has a frightening analysis of the logistics of the U.S. deployment in the Persian Gulf. Of the Ronald Reagan carrier strike group:

Two aspects of the carrier's operations are of interest. The first is that the carrier only returned from its previous deployment to the Arabian Sea in July 2006, something usually followed by a longer period of home-porting; instead, the ship has since been taking part in exercises designed to maintain a high state of military readiness. The second concerns the current operations. The navy says that the carrier is actually deploying to the western Pacific to take over from the older carrier, the USS Kitty Hawk - this being the only carrier permanently based abroad (at Yokosuka in Japan), and currently undergoing maintenance.

What is a bit unusual here is that the Kitty Hawk's three-month maintenance work is being undertaken by the crew, not external contractors, with the ship retaining the ability to deploy at short notice if need be. Furthermore, this maintenance started on 8 January, whereas the Ronald Reagan carrier battle-group will not even arrive in the area until mid-February. This does not seem to fit with standing in for the Kitty Hawk and does mean that another carrier battle-group could actually be deployed to the Gulf at short notice. Moreover, this is a strike group that has a crew experienced in recent operations in the Gulf.

And:

Thus the naval forces now gathering in the region include two carrier battle-groups and two expeditionary strike groups, with the possibility of yet another carrier battle-group, centred on the USS Ronald Reagan, being barely ten days away.

This combination of events does not mean that a war with Iran is imminent, although it does mean that a remarkable concentration of forces will be available to the US by late March and early April - including precisely those kinds of forces that would be employed to defend US and coalition assets in the region should a crisis with Iran escalate to open conflict.

And that's not the only bad news in the region, folks. According to Justin Raimondo, the Israelis want a rematch with Lebanon, site of a very humiliating ass-whomping. Lebanon Part II has (per Raimondo) an intimate connection with the imminent attack on Iran:

Last time around, the neocons in the administration reportedly egged the somewhat reluctant Israelis on, and were sorely disappointed when Tel Aviv relented. Next time, they'll go all the way to Beirut – and won't stop until the Americans get to Tehran.

Those who fear war with Iran had best look to Lebanon, where the first shots are being fired. It is, so far, a proxy war, with the Israelis as our stand-ins and Hezbollah allied with the Iranians. It is only a matter of time, however, before the proxies are dispensed with, and the Americans meet the Iranians on the battlefield.

This is what the American "surge" in Iraq is all about: the White House is preparing for a confrontation with the Iranians.

Interesting to see Israel pictured as the tail and DC as the dog. Perhaps we can see neoconservatism as an international force above and beyond both nations?

Remember how easily both parties in Congress rushed to endorse Israel's cruel bombardment? The Israel lobby has no reason to expect anything but a repeat of this shameless complicity. You'll also recall that the "antiwar" liberals of the Huffington Post crowd had practically zero to say about the deaths of thousands of Lebanese, and the rape of a nation. After all, their favorite Democrats in congress voted to endorse the merciless Israeli attack. Hillary Clinton hailed the bombardment of Beirut airport as a valiant act of "self-defense" on Israel's part.

A few paragraphs ago, Israel was the manipulated, not the manipulator. Notive how we've segued rather quickly here from Israel back into blame-the-lobby mode.

Still, Raimondo raises a valid point. I normally don't go in for Democrat-bashing, but those who advocate freedom and sovereignty for all nations learn must learn to confess realities, even the harsher ones. I was particularly annoyed by Bill Maher during the last Lebanese atrocity: He kept repeating the lie that Hezbollah had fired unprovoked rocket attacks against Israeli positions, when in fact those attacks began only after that vile, unjustifiable invasion.

What can we do to stop these wars? Who are these people who insist on making the once-proud name of the United States of America an offensive vapor in the nostrils of the world? Even Bush -- who always seems thisclose to spilling the beans whenever something nasty is planned -- recognizes that war with Iran will hurt our interests. So why does the whole things seem so inevitable?