Martin van Creveld
“For 15 years, the intelligence agencies have been proven dead wrong. And to this gross exaggeration of Iran’s true intentions and capabilities must be added the fairy tales the same intelligence agencies have been feeding the world regarding Saddam Hussein’s alleged weapons of mass destruction.
The Central Intelligence Agency, Defense Intelligence Agency, National Security Agency and the rest of the American intelligence community may know where Iran’s nuclear installations are located. Or they may not. They may know how those installations are inter-connected, which ones are the most important, and how they can be hit and destroyed. Or they may not.
If their past record is any indication, the intelligence agencies may not even know how to tell whether they know enough about Iran’s nuclear installations — or whether or not they are lying to their superiors, or to themselves. Anybody who believes one word they are saying — let alone uses the “information” they provide as a basis for decision-making — must be out of his or her mind.”
Knowing Why Not To Bomb Iran Is Half the Battle
David Isenberg
“The hawks in both the Republican and Democratic Parties must understand that invading and occupying Iran is simply not an option—for starters, it has three times the size and population of Iraq, where a substantial portion of the U.S. military’s combat units remain occupied—which leaves an air attack as the only feasible option. But such an option is a quick fix, not a solution. Israel’s air strike on Iraq’s Osirak reactor in 1981 made the limitations of such an option clear, as evidenced by the fact that 10 years later, the IAEA found Iraq far more advanced in its covert bomb program than anyone had thought possible.
The U.S. military also understands that attacking Iran would almost certainly shore up the power of the regime by inciting nationalist sentiment and massively tilt internal debates in favor of its most hard-line element—exactly the worst result the United States could want. Iran would not be without options to respond, and those, in turn, would force the U.S. to escalate its own response, thus escalating the limited strike the neo-conservatives claim to want into a full-fledged war.
The end result is lots of pain for no gain. The cons outweigh the pros and everyone, except for neo-conservatives, should understand this.”
What We Know About Iran
Report in “The Guardian” April 26th
“Tehran ‘will retaliate if US attacks’
Iran will harm US interests anywhere in the world if Washington launches a military strike against it, the supreme leader of the country, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, says”
Tehran ‘will retaliate if US attacks’.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
But there are four compelling reasons against a preventive air attack on Iranian nuclear facilities:
- In the absence of an imminent threat (with the Iranians at least several years away from having a nuclear arsenal), the attack would be a unilateral act of war.
If undertaken without formal Congressional declaration, it would be unconstitutional and merit the impeachment of the president. Similarly, if undertaken without the sanction of the UN Security Council either alone by the United States or in complicity with Israel, it would stamp the perpetrator(s) as an international outlaw(s).
- Likely Iranian reactions would significantly compound ongoing U.S. difficulties in Iraq and in Afghanistan, perhaps precipitate new violence by Hezbollah in Lebanon, and in all probability cause the United States to become bogged down in regional violence for a decade or more to come. Iran is a country of some 70 million people and a conflict with it would make the misadventure in Iraq look trivial.
- Oil prices would climb steeply, especially if the Iranians cut their production and seek to disrupt the flow of oil from the nearby Saudi oil fields. The world economy would be severely impacted, with America blamed for it. Note that oil prices have already shot above $70 per barrel, in part because of fears of a U.S./Iran clash.
- America would become an even more likely target of terrorism, with much of the world concluding that America’s support for Israel is itself a major cause of the rise in terrorism. America would become more isolated and thus more vulnerable while prospects for an eventual regional accommodation between Israel and its neighbors would be ever more remote
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Do not attack Iran Zbigniew Brzezinski (International Herald Tribune)
For those not familiar with Iranian political structures President Ahmadinejad isn’t the ultimate power in Iran Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is. It is entirely reasonable to say “if you attack us we will attack back.” The current hysterical rhetoric in the US and its western allies has succeeded in uniting the political powers in Iran and in putting its regional allies in an impossible situation.
The recent statement by US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that the US missions in Iraq and Afghanistan were needed to contain the threat “emanating from Iran”. Is the clearest possible indication that there is no exit strategy and that the US has not even the slightest intention of leaving Iraq — or anywhere else in the region. It clearly indicates that the US strategy of “containing” Iran is a convenient cover for a superpower determined to dominate the region.
Sixteen years ago (during the Kuwait crisis) President George H W Bush promised that “our purpose is purely temporary” and that US forces would depart, nobody believed him. Since that time the United States has beefed up its military presence, which include inter alia:
- The “over the horizon” forces on Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.
- Building enormouse bases in Iraq.
- Increasing its military presence in the southern states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).
The GCC states are trapped between US hegemony and rising Iranian power (caused in large measure by America’s disastrous war on Iraq.) Added to this is that governments in the region are well aware of the appeal to the “Arab street” of much of the rhetoric emanating from Tehran. They know that to side with the US against their coreligionists in Iran is to risk what remains of their political legitmacy amongst their own citizenry. They know also that America’s Iraqi adventure has starkly exposed the limits of American power. They know moreover that America is broke.
It remains to be seen whether any of this is understood by the war hawks in Washington.
markfromireland
