Iran

In 2001 I started writing a novel. It was based on a handful of facts but was supposed to be pure fiction. The premise was that the Republican Party had become the arm of fanatic Apocalyptic Christians who wanted to force Armageddeon. My jumping off point was Reagan's Interior Secretary, James Watt's statement that the second coming was at hand so we don't need an environmental policy. My premise was that the selection of George Bush as resident of the White House was intended to put a malleable figure head who could be manipulated into starting the final war over the Holy Land with America as the force of God against Islam. I had reached a point where I was considering what kind of dramatic event I could use for the climax.

The next day was 9/11/2001. I was in Manhattan on 9/11. There was no way I could continue my novel after that day.

But as the years have continued, even though I can't return to the novel (not even sure it was ever worth it!), I realize that my premise was frighteningly close to the truth. And it is increasingly clear that America IS being led by fanatics who believe we are in the midst of a Crusade against Islam.

We are on a collision course to war that will be far, far worse than the Iraq quagmire. We are going headlong into a war that will link up the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And this collision course is being driven by BOTH sides.

The President of the United States is playing the same "smoking crater" lie with Iran that he did with Iraq. From Guysen.International.News:

Remember when Bush told us that Saddam Hussein was linked to al-Qaeda? Well I was one of those who was saying back then that was impossible. Hussein, a secularist who spent a fair amount of time torturing and oppressing the religious extremists of Iraq, and the religious extremists of al-Qaeda who spent a fair amount of time killing and oppressing secularists, had nothing in common. I spoke out as much as possible saying that Bush was lying. And, in the end, the only link between Iraq and al-Qaeda was al-Qaeda support for one of the anti-Hussein Kurdish groups. Bush lied to get us into a war we never should have been in and look where it has taken us.

Well, it's happening again as Bush is trying to expand the war into Iran. This comes from Guysen Israel News:

The American Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns has said that Iran was transferring arms to the Taliban in Afghanistan. He added that talks regarding new sanctions against Tehran would start in the UN in a few weeks. (Guysen.Isra×›l.News)

No. Iran is NOT transferring arms to the Taliban. The Taliban is a group of Sunni fanatics linked to al-Qaeda who have spent a great deal of time oppressing and killing Shi'ites in Afghanistan. Iran is a Shi'a theocracy that would love to see the Shi'a of Afghanistan independent of the Sunnis of Afghanistan, including the Taliban. After 9/11 I felt that one of our best strategies would have been to work with Iran to fight al-Qaeda and the Taliban because if there is one nation on earth that hates al-Qaeda as much as America it is Iran. Instead Bush has done his best to prove correct the accusations that America is conducting a crusade against all Islam by picking fights with the most prominent secularist (Saddam Hussein), the most prominent Shi'a extremists (Iran) and the most prominent Sunni extremists (al-Qaeda and the Taliban), all of whom hate eachother as much as they hate America.

I swear. John McCain once seemed reasonable to me. But he has become the worst, most glibly foolish war monger in the running, it seems. From MoveOn.org (the group that has recently teamed up with VoteVets.org to give our veterans more of a voice):

At a campaign stop on Wednesday, Sen. John McCain was asked what to do about Iran. His response? He sang "bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran" to the tune of the Beach Boys' "Barbara Ann."

Seriously.

He says it was a joke, but the bottom line is that it is reckless saber-rattling against Iran at a time when tensions are high. Will you help us counter his message on TV?

McCain is laughing at the idea of unilaterally attacking Iran.

McCain is, in effect, laughing at this:

and this: (from the New England Journal of Medicine via The Memory Hole)

Because THAT is what his Iraq Escalation/Iran attack would produce more of. Dead and wounded American soldiers. And for what? NEITHER Iraq under Hussein nor Iraq have had any dealings with al-Qaeda. Why aren't we fighting al-Qaeda. While McCain wants to expand the Iraq quagmire into Iran, al-Qaeda is also expanding, entering Iraq thanks to us, expanding in Somalia, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Algeria, Morocco...and extremists are taking power in Bahrain. And McCain wants to make it all worse.

A poll conducted by BBC in 27 countries shows that Bush's idea of an "Axis of Evil" may get some international support. Problem is, according to world opinion, the US is part of that Axis of Evil...or perhaps Axis of Destabilization:

According to a poll made for the BBC, carried out in 27 countries, 56% of those interviewed see in Israel, the United States, Iran and North Korea, "the countries with the most harmful influence on the world". (Guysen.Isra×›l.News)

Checking out the BBC website, shows that Israel, Iran and the US are viewed as having a "mostly negative influence" on the world by more than 50% of people polled. North Korea does slightly better with 48% of people polled seeing them as having a "mostly negative influence." So the US is slightly better than Iran and slightly worse than North Korea in its influence on the world, it seems. Great job, Bush! The world, which loved us under Clinton/Gore now see us as about as much a threat to the world as Iran and North Korea thanks to Bush/Cheney.

Looking at it from the other end, Canada, EU collectively, and Japan top the list as having a "mostly positive influence" according to more than half of people taking the poll. It is interesting that Japan does so well given how much China, Taiwan and the Koreas hate them. Isreal's low rating is not surprising given their unpopularity in the Muslim world and the negative view of their war with Lebanon.

I recently reported on the buildup to war in the Perian Gulf, with a second carrier strike force arriving in the area for the first time since the invasion of Iraq. That already signaled something big coming, and it included direct threats against Iran.

Today I hear even more alarming news. From Truthout.com:

U.S. officials insist they have no intention of provoking or otherwise starting a war with Iran, and they were also quick to deny any link to Sharafi's kidnapping. But the fact remains that the longstanding war of words between Washington and Tehran is edging toward something more dangerous. A second Navy carrier group is steaming toward the Persian Gulf, and NEWSWEEK has learned that a third carrier will likely follow. Iran shot off a few missiles in those same tense waters last week, in a highly publicized test. With Americans and Iranians jousting on the chaotic battleground of Iraq, the chances of a small incident's spiraling into a crisis are higher than they've been in years.

A THIRD carrier strike force may follow? This build up may be LARGER than the buildup to the Iraq invasion. Larger...more expensive...far more casualties.

Let me ask again, why are we fighting the two nations, Iraq and Iran, who before our invasion were the two Muslim nations MOST opposed to al-Qaeda? And why do we ignore Saudi Arabia's support of al-Qaeda?

From the Jerusalem Post:

A US Navy strike group led by the assault ship USS Bataan steamed through the Suez Canal on Tuesday on its way to join the buildup of American forces in the Middle East...

The Navy is in the midst of a regional buildup, with the group of the aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis on its way as well as 21,500 US soldiers being sent to Iraq. The carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower is already in the region.

The United States has not had two carriers in the Mideast since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

The Bataan will join a second amphibious assault ship, the USS Boxer, which was on port visit in Dubai on Tuesday.

Brown said the Pentagon recently extended the tour of duty of the Boxer's US Marine Expeditionary Unit, which is in Iraq.

Emphasis mine. We have 2 carriers there for the first time since the invasion. We are bringing up a strike force with amphibious assault capability. Why? Here is what the official claim is:

The Bataan is on a routine six-month deployment to the region to conduct "maritime security operations" which includes boarding and searching ships suspected of carrying terrorists or nuclear components to Iran, the Navy said.

As Bush builds up for an invasion of Iran (Ominous Note: The US has just moved another aircraft carrier into the Persian Gulf...for the first time since the Iraq invasion), we are also trying to track down illegal sales of weapons to Iran. Interestingly, we seem to be one such source.

In the tangled web of arms sales that the United States chooses to participate in, you never know where your auctioned off weapons might go. From the Fresno Bee:

WASHINGTON (AP) - Fighter jet parts and other sensitive U.S. military gear seized from front companies for Iran and brokers for China have been traced in criminal cases to a surprising source: the Pentagon.

In one case, federal investigators said, contraband purchased in Defense Department surplus auctions was delivered to Iran...

In that instance, a Pakistani arms broker convicted of exporting U.S. missile parts to Iran resumed business after his release from prison. He purchased Chinook helicopter engine parts for Iran from a U.S. company that had bought them in a Pentagon surplus sale. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents say those parts did make it to Iran.

Sensitive military surplus items are supposed to be demilitarized or "de-milled" - rendered useless for military purposes - or, if auctioned, sold only to buyers who promise to obey U.S. arms embargoes, export controls and other laws.

So, as Bush continues to try and expand his anti-Muslim crusade, the CIA has concluded that Iran is NOT currently developing nukes. From Truthout:

Washington - A classifed draft CIA assessment has found no firm evidence of a secret drive by Iran to develop nuclear weapons, as alleged by the White House, a top US investigative reporter has said.

Seymour Hersh, writing in an article for the November 27 issue of the magazine The New Yorker released in advance, reported on whether the administration of Republican President George W. Bush was more, or less, inclined to attack Iran after Democrats won control of Congress last week...

Cheney said the White House would circumvent any legislative restrictions "and thus stop Congress from getting in its way," he said.

The Democratic victory unleashed a surge of calls for the Bush administration to begin direct talks with Iran.

But the administration's planning of a military option was made "far more complicated" in recent months by a highly classified draft assessment by the Central Intelligence Agency "challenging the White House's assumptions about how close Iran might be to building a nuclear bomb," he wrote.

"The CIA found no conclusive evidence, as yet, of a secret Iranian nuclear-weapons program running paallel to the civilian operations that Iran has declared to the International Atomic Energy Agency," Hersh wrote, adding the CIA had declined to comment on that story.

Don't you love it when American right wing nutjobs start crawling even further right and bump right into their avowed enemies?

Iran's hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called Tuesday for a purge of liberal and secular teachers from the country's universities, urging students to return to 1980s-style radicalism.

"Today, students should shout at the president and ask why liberal and secular university lecturers are present in the universities," the official Islamic Republic News Agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying during a meeting with a group of students.

David Horowitz, publisher of FrontPage magazine, and whose archive of articles is available online, has long advocated for something he calls "an academic bill of rights." Essentially, the academic bill of rights argues in language that would make the sophists blush with pleasure, that universities are not teaching, they are indoctrinating, and therefore, "intellectual balance" should be brought to bear. It's carefully worded to indicate that no professor should be hired or fired based on political views. It all sounds so reasonable. And then, when you click on Professor Horowitz's blurbs for his most recent book, The Professors, you find this:

I love Scott Addam's Dilbert comic strip, for his pathologically flematic view of all things wrong with corporate America. It's for his morbid detachment from his subjects and his eye for detail that I found curious the following post.

From The Dilbert Blog: Another Run at the Nobel Peace Prize:

The Crazy-Ass Backwards plan doesn't work if you hold the common and somewhat racist U.S. view, that the people "over there" only understand brute force. In that case, any flexibility on the part of the U.S. looks like weakness and an invitation to be kicked some more.

But from what I gather about pride, it's a substitute for power in the Middle East. If you give people pride, they don't feel so much need to kill you. Is that true? Beats me. I have no pride myself so I confess to not understanding it. But I know that brute force isn't working, at least at the puny level we are willing to apply it.

As many of you will gleefully point out, I'm no expert on the Middle East. This thought experiment is only intended to make you think different about a so-far unsolvable problem. Sometimes that's useful.