Progress in the War on Iran – Moon of Alabama

June 21, 2007

Progress in the War on Iran

The Israeli dis-information site Debka rumors about a third and fourth carrier to move on Iran.

Nearly unnoticed Congress yesterday declared all but open war on Iran. The House passed Resolution 21:

110th CONGRESS

1st Session

H. CON. RES. 21

Calling on the United Nations Security Council to charge Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad with violating the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and the United Nations Charter because of his calls for the destruction of the State of Israel.
…

And if the U.N. doesn’t act the U.S. will have to take on the burdon alone …

Only two representatives voted against the resolution. Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul.
Paul said:

This resolution is an exercise in propaganda that serves one purpose: to move us closer to initiating a war against Iran. Citing various controversial statements by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, this legislation demands that the United Nations Security Council charge Ahmadinejad with violating the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

Having already initiated a disastrous war against Iraq citing UN resolutions as justification, this resolution is like déja-vu. Have we forgotten 2003 already? Do we really want to go to war again for UN resolutions? That is where this resolution, and the many others we have passed over the last several years on Iran, is leading us. I hope my colleagues understand that a vote for this bill is a vote to move us closer to war with Iran.

Clearly, language threatening to wipe a nation or a group of people off the map is to be condemned by all civilized people. And I do condemn any such language. But why does threatening Iran with a pre-emptive nuclear strike, as many here have done, not also deserve the same kind of condemnation? Does anyone believe that dropping nuclear weapons on Iran will not wipe a people off the map? When it is said that nothing, including a nuclear strike, is off the table on Iran, are those who say it not also threatening genocide? And we wonder why the rest of the world accuses us of behaving hypocritically, of telling the rest of the world “do as we say, not as we do.” …

Meanwhile General Petraeus is telling the London Times, without a shred of evidence, that al-Sadr militia with the help of Iran are holding the abducted five Brits.

But it was reported that most likely special police forces did take these hostages. The special police force is infiltrated by the Badr brigades, not friends of al-Sadr. There is no evidence that Iran is involved. But what Petraeus is aiming at is British support for an attack on Iran.

Meanwhile Cheney is holding back the five abducted Iranian diplomats:

The fate of the five men has reached the highest levels of the White House, with Bush’s top foreign policy advisers meeting to discuss the issue in the spring. They agreed to hold the men as they do other foreign fighters captured in Iraq, with their status reviewed every six months.

They were originally due for review six months after their detention — or by mid-July. Instead, the Multinational Force headquarters reviewed their status in April, meaning they are not eligible for another review until October, U.S. officials said. Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker were unaware that a review had occurred until last week, the officials noted.

So Rice and Gates were not informed?

It is Gates job to keep Cheney under control and to avoid a war on Iran. That’s why he was put where he is. Let’s hope he isn’t losing more bureaucratic infights like the above.

The consequences could be disastrous.

Posted by b on June 21, 2007 at 13:42 UTC | Permalink

Comments

There is indeed a very disturbing trend of public talk and hints by politicians at the nuclear ‘option,’ designed, it seems, to make the unthinkable just another instrument of policy. After enough of such talk, the deed will seem less shocking, or at least that’s the plan. Why is there no protest from Europe, Russia or China?
Bernhardt, I have a vague recollection of story in Germany just prior to WWI of a member of the Reichstag shouting NEIN! when voting on war. I guess he was the Ron Paul of the day. Too bad one or two aren’t enough. Just as Morse and Gruening weren’t enough here.

Posted by: Lysander | Jun 21 2007 14:24 utc | 1

We are not going to war with Iran and We are not bombing Iran. This is plainly saber rattling. The only question is whether Iran thinks the threat is as real as you apparently do.
Why aren’t we going to war? Because the US has pratically all of its armour, much of its equipment and most of its combat troops grouped into a few locations in Iraq within easy reach of Iranian missles. Iran’s GPS system is sophisticated enough to guide missles to these locations and Iran has enough missles with more than sufficient range to destroy these locations.
If the US bombs Iran, it seems certain Iran would destroy much of the US military ground might.

Posted by: jml | Jun 21 2007 14:28 utc | 2

jml: it’s time to repost here one of Paul C. Roberts’ piece.
Provoking Iran so that they assume they’ll get bombed, and will move first to annihilate most of US forces could be one of the plans here. The idea is then that they could nuke the heck out of Iran.
That plan is wrong on many levels, but when was the last time a stupid counter-productive plan stopped BushCo from endorsing it?

Posted by: CluelessJoe | Jun 21 2007 14:47 utc | 3

Only two!
What happens when an elected body is more sheeplish than the ppl who elected them? We really have entered an age where the distinction between fact and fiction (create our own reality) is washed away. I’m not referring to lies, or canny strategy, both of which may be effective when well done; nor to rabble rousing and populist appeals, which can also be a great tool (see Sarko the First), nor even to propaganda, which used to be a category of discourse or persuasive influence one could delimitate, describe and discuss, but to the Orwellian world, where successive and uncoordinated tableaux are created, unveiled, must be adhered to, and are then superseded by some new nonsense, a new myth, contradictory principles, etc.
Still, no attack on Iran. All the posturing obscures. Iran will most likely end up as a US partner. I almost added Israel after US. the crux of the matter is what are the powerful forces playing these games, how are they shaped over time, how do they interact, etc.

Posted by: Noirette | Jun 21 2007 15:09 utc | 4

Would tend to agree with jml, except for 2 considerations.
First, CluelessJoe’s point. Since when did Cheneyco show any judgment in real considerations of war?
Second is “US military ground might”. Increasingly, there is reason to doubt that such a thing exists at the moment. Within the Army everyone is experiencing shortages, especially of manpower, and borrowing from Peter to pay Paul. Many suspect that, when Army officially reports continued combat readiness, successful recruiting, full staffing, it is lying, or at least doing something very creative with the numbers. Which could mean that even executing a relatively orderly, safe withdrawal could be a challenge. And since that order apparently isn’t on the horizon, the attrition of “ground might” will continue.
This suggests one other dark scenario for US chest thumping towards Iran. It seems absurd to me, but never am I sure how low to go in guessing the aims and actions of the Cheney gang. Could they hope that if Iran can be provoked into attack, the Brits and other European allies would join the fight? Or looking for an excuse to bring Israeli troops into the battle? In any case, Iran won’t take the bait.
Congress may imagine that it is merely saber rattling. Even if this is so, it does, as Ron Paul argues, scream of American exceptionalism. What good in the world can the House imagine would come of such a resolution, to make it worth putting on the record at all?

Posted by: small coke | Jun 21 2007 15:31 utc | 5

Meanwhile, CNN reports:
14 US Troops Killed in Past 48 hours
Five of them were killed today in one roadside bombing in Baghdad.

Posted by: Bea | Jun 21 2007 15:50 utc | 6

Perhaps I’m being naive. But do we really believe the administration is insane enough to use tactical nuclear weapons, much less nukes on population centers? I believe they might consider and actually use some sort of nuclear bunker buster to destroy underground Iranian bomb making facilities, because of the percieved cost – reward tradeoff. But using tactical nuclear weapons? The cost of doing so is astronomical and is plainly greater than any benefit that could be garnered from a military reprisal.
And why would we need to use nukes? Aren’t our bombers and cruise missles sufficient to inflict tremendous damage on Iran?
My point above is that Iran can easily destroy a large percentage of US military assets becuase they are clustered together. The US cannot do so. At most it can destroy Iranian infrastructure through a sustained bombing campaign and a much smaller percentage of Iranian forces. Given Iranian oil wealth and its ability to rebuild its economy (lets not forget that the US unlikely to bomb oil facilities), the US is likely to be the loser in any conventional bombing / missle exhange campaign.

Posted by: jml | Jun 21 2007 15:55 utc | 7

Let’s take a closer look at that 1948 Convention, shall we?

Article 1
The Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish.
Article 2
In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
* (a) Killing members of the group;
* (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
* (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to
bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
* (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
* (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
Article 3
The following acts shall be punishable:
* (a) Genocide;
* (b) Conspiracy to commit genocide;
* (c) Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;
* (d) Attempt to commit genocide;
* (e) Complicity in genocide.

Now perhaps we can take a little unofficial survey. Since coming to power, which leader(s) currently in office has/have violated these articles to a greater extent?
A. Ahmadinejad
B. al-Maliki
C. Olmert
D. Putin
E. Bush
F. Blair
No further comment.

Posted by: Bea | Jun 21 2007 16:04 utc | 8

Since 1897, when the British accepted an invitation to form an oil Protectorate over a portion of what is now Kuwait, the ongoing resource war over Middle East petroleum has ebbed and flowed without pause.
It’s been 110 years now that European and American armed forces have been variously shooting, bombing, drawing and redrawing “national” borders with ethnic strife in mind (divide and conquer), forging alliances and puppet states, and toppling every government that did not act within the interests of the Western powers.
This is the land of Lord Curzon, of Lawrence of Arabia, of Rommel the Desert Fox, of the Shah and of Savak, of Stormin’ Norman and Peter Pace and now Petraeus.
This is the land of the Hundred and Ten Years War.
The only reliable way to gauge how much longer this fighting will continue is to gauge how much oil is left.
Iran? Iran will either join the Amero/Brit orbit, playing by our rules, and selling petroleum on our terms, or they will be toppled in turn. If Bush doesn’t do it before he goes back to Connecticut, the Democratic President elected in 2008 will do it, because every player in Washington, DC knows that for America to surrender our dominance of the Middle East is to surrender our dominance of the global economy.
No, effendi, Iran is not going to join our orbit. They’ve been there, done that, and fought their way out again.
Historically, this is Iran’s big chance to gain complete economic independence, and to exercise once more their traditionally strong influence on the entire region.
And they are as likely to pass on this chance as the Americans were to pass on Manifest Destiny back in the 1800’s.
And so America is going to treat Iran as fairly and politely as it treated Geronimo.

Posted by: Antifa | Jun 21 2007 16:49 utc | 9

But do we really believe the administration is insane enough to use tactical nuclear weapons, much less nukes on population centers?
Some are itching for it, a culmination. An act with its own pedigree, its own calling card, its show of supremacy. (Long preparation, as pointed out.) So, yes, without any doubt whatsoever.
They did itbefore, and in a way have been doing it since with depleted uranium. The US has trashed all International agreements on nuclear non-proliferation.
However they won’t do it when the overall advantage to be gained is nil. (I hope.)

Posted by: Noirette | Jun 21 2007 17:16 utc | 10

from Lysander:Why is there no protest from Europe, Russia or China?
Answer: everybody is expecting and awaiting the begining of the Fall of USA.
Exactly the same happened with the Fall of USSR. It is a hypnotic sensation, when you see the BIG ONE going directly to the disaster.

Posted by: no-curious | Jun 21 2007 17:26 utc | 11

from Lysander: Why is there no protest from Europe, Russia or China?
Answer: everybody is expecting and awaiting the beginning of the Fall of USA.
There is that, yes.
Other ‘developed’ countries expect the US to kill millions of Muslims, Arabs, Persians, lets not be formal, and take over the oil there, with their military might. That is the best case scenario. (They will have to share with OECD, which includes China.)
Worst case will impact everyone badly but the upper strata consider they will be resilient, in control, protected.
All – all – the pols are blowing smoke, temporizing, getting the National Security State into shape – repression of the little ppl, as otherwise the elites cannot have swimming pools, pristine forests, helicos and super cars, snob meets, sushi, kiwis, … and all the rest.
There are no techno fixes, none.
Economic ‘growth’ in the ‘West’ cannot continue without genocide.
That has been known for at least 30 years after the slave was killed by the tractor and old style colonialism went out of fashion. It was smooth sailing for a while.

Posted by: Noirette | Jun 21 2007 18:47 utc | 12

agreeing with @2 & a lot of @9
the USA military does not want to tangle with Iran now or even the next few years until they have a reduced-risk situation.
too few means & too many contigencies.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Jun 21 2007 18:47 utc | 13

Follow-up to #8:
Collateral Genocide

Posted by: Bea | Jun 21 2007 19:03 utc | 14

B
If Cheney is reduced to winning bureaucratic infights about releasing Iranian hostages, then, in the bigger picture, he ain’t really winning anything at all. It’s a classic spoiler tactic for holding up movement on the diplomatic tracks that are now in play; the fact that there are diplomatic tracks in play represents the bureaucratic loss for Cheney.
Clueless – the only way to provoke the Iranians into a military response is to go to war with them first. Given that the JCS has been overtly telling the Iranians that this is not going to happen for nigh on two years now, and that this messaging has some serious credibility to it now that Gates is SecDef, it’s hard to see how they can really be provoked.

Posted by: dan | Jun 21 2007 19:20 utc | 15

Bernhard, I thought it was going to be one of your spoofs.
jeeeez

Posted by: beq | Jun 21 2007 19:53 utc | 16

But do we really believe the administration is insane enough to use tactical nuclear weapons, much less nukes on population centers?
Don’t know about population centers, but their own morality Obviously wouldn’t stop them. And Saudi Arabia is in a panic – though it’s so considerate of Israel to be out front taking the hit for the real power in the region.
2 Points. 1) Remember the Fascist Wing of the Repug Party has taken over our country – the ones always laughed off as right-wing nuts. Recall that Barry Goldwater wanted to nuke Vietnam, & these Monstrosities are Farrrrr to the Right of him. These savages are both a) fighting the last war. These are the “we lost Vietnam ‘cuz we didn’t use nukes and by god, we’re not going to make that mistake again” set. b) They’re doing Saudi Arabia’s bidding & they’re scared to death about Iran becoming Top Dog in ME now that xUS has eliminated their natural rivals. (If you read PLang, you know that this actually is a problem. And, don’t forget that Saudi Oil lies under the Shia portion of SA.)
2). Read PC Roberts most recent article. He argues convincingly, I think, that Gen. Pace was removed from power ‘cuz he’s a somewhat moral guy who believes in the rule of law. To wit – he’s stated that Soldiers have a Duty to Disobey an illegal or immoral order, and that using WMD would be just that. Frighteningly well done article. Pace Fired To Clear Way For “National Emergency,” Iran Nuclear Strike?

Posted by: jj | Jun 21 2007 21:22 utc | 17

following the link @17 led to
Mid-Life Crisis For The EU Leviathan
“What makes a people and a nation is a unique history and heritage, language and literature, songs and stories, traditions and customs, blood, soil and the mystic chords of memory.
The EU is a thing of paper, an intellectual construct. Unlike a nation, it has no heart and no soul. And if and when it passes into history because of some irreconcilable dispute, many may regret it. Few will weep.”
The good news here is that the Eurocentric lord & master believes enough in the medicine prescribed (and imposed) to their colonies (particularly in Cyprus, N. Ireland, Kashmir, Africa, Quebec, Palestine) to drink of the same cup themselves.
The bad news is they are clueless.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Jun 22 2007 0:37 utc | 18

Maybe not nukes, but something massively pre-emptive. Consider that the US economy is in serious trouble except for the “military-industrial-congressional” sector. That machine has to be kept primed for the US to maintain any sense of world hegmony. The only things they manufacture today are entertainments and weapons. If you don’t use it, you lose it.
They have no ground forces left to commit, but have very expensive Naval and Air Forces contributing little to Iraq or Afganistan, so time to put them to Work. See Economy above.
Unfortunately, those forces’ skill sets are limited to the big bang therory. You go to war with the stuff you got.
Both the Bushes and the Dems are not nearly as stupid as we credit them; they are pathologically “realists” paddling uphill against the Fall and will do anything to prop up the status of US exceptionalism.
Things are going to get ugly before they get better.

Posted by: Allen/Vancouver | Jun 22 2007 3:02 utc | 19

If Cheney is reduced to winning bureaucratic infights about releasing Iranian hostages, then, in the bigger picture, he ain’t really winning anything at all. It’s a classic spoiler tactic for holding up movement on the diplomatic tracks that are now in play; the fact that there are diplomatic tracks in play represents the bureaucratic loss for Cheney. Dan, #15.
This makes a lot of sense to me. At some point in the game, Cheney lost his grip on the President–or else the President was constrained to keep Cheney at bay. But who had the power to make this happen, and when, and why?
It had to be Rove–the one who stood to lose the most from the November elections.
As thus: “I’ve been a good soldier, I’ve put up with this Cheney guy for six years, and he’s such a loser that not even I, evil genius that I am, could keep the voters in line. How bad is that, amigo? The first thing we do is, we push that Rumsfeld asshole off the boat….”
Which would explain the survival of Rove.
Cheney’s a small-minded, sore-losing, nihilist and a mean drunk–the kind of guy who’d drop atomic bombs on Texas itself to win a bureaucratic infight. He probably scares the hell out of Rove–not that we’ll ever know (since Rove, in his autobiography, will have no choice but to bury the name of “Cheney” in boiling oil).

Posted by: alabama | Jun 22 2007 9:21 utc | 20

Allen
From time to time it’s worth checking out the Centaf daily airpower summaries for Iraq and Afghanistan – the number of US aircraft ( including logistics support and refuelling ) used averages about 220 per day. I would guess that the actaul number of aircraft in theatre that is required to support the operational load is about 700. Some of the aircraft are navy assets flying from those carriers in the Persian Gulf/Arabian sea.
The trend line for use of these assets has increased relentlessly over the past 5 years – ie, given the entropic catastrophe that is englufing the US military in both theatres – the trend will continue to rise as time goes on.
Now for every airframe in theatre you have to multiply by at least 3 to cover for those that have rotated out of theatre and those that are schedule to rotate into theatre to replace those that are currently there. Add in the additional maintenance burden, and I would guess that Iraq and Afghanistan are tying up somewhere in the region of 2500 US airframes. This is a massive committment.

Posted by: dan | Jun 22 2007 11:29 utc | 21

Again, at the risk of making myself repugnantly redundant, I have to say that, next to the quality and level of intelligenece and insight B delivers, the comment section is far above anything else.
“…and so America is going to treat Iran as fairly and politely as it treated Geronimo.”
Ow! As a direct Mayflower Descendant, that kind of hurts, but kudos to Antifa anyway

Posted by: Chuck Cliff | Jun 22 2007 15:15 utc | 22

Wasn’t Cheney before 9/11 part of the old guard, a non-interventionist, a paleo-con? Someone whom the elites could trust to have a cold calculating head as Bush was incompetent, a stumbling figure-head (that must have been understood well in advance, the man is practically certifiable, couldn’t even run a bowling alley or a pizza parlor.) Even Bush Junior was like that in public before 9/11, it was all set for a weak Reagan bis kinda scene, business as usual, no?

Posted by: Noirette | Jun 22 2007 18:21 utc | 23

Iran/Iraq – A Newsweek interview with Larijani, head of the Iranian NSC, answers a question I have asked before:

Q: Still, as long as Washington is hostile to you, isn’t it in your national interest to keep the Americans preoccupied in both Iraq and Afghanistan?
A: There are two points in here. First of all, any insecurity along our neighbors’ borders is going to exert pressure on us. We have about 2½ million Afghan refugees in Iran. It’s a heavy burden on the government and the nation … And if Iraq goes critical, then there will be an influx of refugees coming over the border. We have some 500,000 already. Second, Iran has proven to be a responsible country. We are an oppressed power in the region, and we are not pursuing adventurism.

Usually there are only numbers about Iraqi refugees to Syria and Jordan (and internaly displaced) reported.
It would be stupid to assume that none would flee to Iran, but there never were any reports. Now we know.

Posted by: b | Jun 22 2007 19:03 utc | 24

2-1/2M. Afghan refugees – jesus, Western Powers & Saudi Arabia are creating havoc & misery on a horrific scale.
But as for his comment that Iran isn’t “pursuing adventurism” – No, but they are demanding to be treated as a regional power, which both xUs & Saudi Arabia strenuously oppose.

Posted by: jj | Jun 22 2007 21:02 utc | 25

It wasn’t rocket science to kill and/or immiserate millions of people while stealing their natural resources. That’s the executive summary of European and American history since about 1492.
The problem here is that the Bush plan requires killing and/or immiserating a billion people (give or take a few hundred million either way). The drug-addled Likudniks over at PNAC don’t recognize that their project has too large a scale. They also expected to get away with killing Sunnis (in Iraq) with tacit Shiite approval, and now expect to kill Shiites (in Iran) with tacit Sunni approval.
“Hey Wolfy, would you pass me my crack pipe?”
“Man, that is some good shit.”
“Now, explain again how preemptively attacking Iran
is going to make friends for Israel.”
For the business elite, there is a nice ancillary benefit: chaos in the region makes oil profits soar. Havoc and misery are nice for the bottom line. So either way, the forces behind BushCo win, and everybody else loses. It’s not like any Exxon executives are going to let their kids join the Marine Corps.

Posted by: tigger | Jun 24 2007 1:11 utc | 26

Iran to ration gasoline, drivers race to the pumps
27 June 2007

Posted by: Rick | Jun 27 2007 4:48 utc | 27

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