RAW STORY: Conservative mag says Cheney plans to nuke IRAN

[yurbud]

Some variation of an attack on Iran was in the pipe, whether the administration had gotten into this embarrassment with Karl Rove and the Downing Street Minutes or not.

The only questions have been 1) how would they justify it, and 2) how would they do it with our troops tied up in Iraq, and the draft likely to cause an uncontrollable backlash.

This seems to imply the answers to both:

1) terrorist attack on US

2) use nukes on Iran, leaving fewer people left to fight there.

The American people would balk at using nuclear weapons unless the attack on the US was itself was nuclear. Neither Iran nor any other country has a motive to use nukes on the US, knowing that it would result in overwhelming retaliation and the destruction of their government and most of their people.

The last line of the excerpt from the American Conservative magazine is the only one that gives me hope, and has come up on other issues too: the military is uncomfortable with what they are being asked to do. This is how we know about Abu Ghraib. A soldier passed along those photos to Seymour Hersh because he thought what was transpiring was wrong, and when the torture policy and detainment policies were being written, Navy JAG officers were so alarmed, they contacted human rights lawyers in DC.

Eventually, we will come to a moment like the one that occurred in the Soviet Union when the hardliners attempted a coup against Gorbachev--the military refused to fire on or act against their own people. It would be better if our elected leaders corrected this problem, but if they do not, our last line of defense is the conscience of those in our military.

You should forward this to your congressman and senators and ask them to investigate and if they approve of allowing a terrorist attack in the US as a pretext for nuking and invading Iran.

http://firstgov.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml

KEY EXCERPTS:

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. Within Iran there are more than 450 major strategic targets, including numerous suspected nuclear-weapons-program development sites. Many of the targets are hardened or are deep underground and could not be taken out by conventional weapons, hence the nuclear option.

As in the case of Iraq, the response is not conditional on Iran actually being involved in the act of terrorism directed against the United States.

Several senior Air Force officers involved in the planning are reportedly appalled at the implications of what they are doing--that Iran is being set up for an unprovoked nuclear attack--but no one is prepared to damage his career by posing any objections.

FULL TEXT:

http://www.justinlogan.com/justinlogancom/2005/07/what_is_the_pla.html
July 22, 2005
What Is the Plan If There's Another 9/11?

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[RUMMYisFROSTED]

1. But Cheney's not President...?

:scared:

[Karenina]

2. Boys and their toys....

:SIGH:

[SpiralHawk]

3. Cheney best be careful because there are traitors in the Bush White House

Traitors in the BushCo White House.

Get them out now.

[joemurphy]

4. Where does Cheney get off asking anyone to do anything?

Last time I checked he wasn't the President, at least not in name.

[aquart]

5. WHY is this article being published?

[JDPriestly]

6. Right. It is highly inflammatory and irresponsible to publish

such information even if it is true, and I doubt that it is. Wouldn't Cheney have to ask Congress for authorization before he could bomb any country? Or did authorization for the Iraq war give this administration carte blanche to start wars anywhere in the Middle East? I don't understand this.

[Eloriel]

7. Yeah, someone ought to look up the IWR but IIRC it DID give

authorization for the whole theater, the whole war on terror. I could be mistaken, but I don't think so.

But I'm surprised at the responses in this thread, as if this administration feels in the least bit constrained by law, or the Constitution, etc. With everything they get away with, they are emboldened for more. They got away with 2 election thefts and 9-11 along with many other smaller things, so a little thing like nuking Iran ain't no big deal.

[aquart]

11. Bomb IN RESPONSE to a bomb.

These babies think Cheney is going to nuke America.

[yurbud]

12. article made it clear Cheney would do it even if he couldn't prove Iran

attacked us--just like they did with Iraq.

Do I think Cheney would nuke a city in the US to make an excuse to invade Iran?

If you had asked me five years ago, I would have said the question was ludicrous. No administration of either party would do such a thing.

Then the Bush people got in and not only ignored warnings of an imminent terrorist attack with planes, but somehow tied up our air defenses so the hijackers could fly around the US unmolested for two hours until they decided at their leisure to fly into buildings. Then when reporters and the joint congressional inquiry found our good friends the Saudis supported the terrorists, the administration not only didn't punish them, they quashed that section of the report. Instead, they used the 9/11 attack as an excuse to invade a country uninvolved in the plot, to strip away our civil liberties, and to all but declare all members of the opposition party traitors.

Now why would an administration composed of oil and defense contractor execs do this? Are they spending hundreds of billions of dollars and lying their ass off because they suddenly grew a conscience and care about the welfare of Iraqis after doing business their dictator for decades? Or did they see a golden opportunity to make a profit for their friends by controlling the second largest source of oil in the world, and being in a position to invade and intimidate other countries in the two biggest oil producing regions, the Persian Gulf and the Caspian Sea Basin?

These guys are businessmen. Just like your health insurance company will let you die to make a few more bucks, the death of a few thousand Iraqis or even Americans is nothing to these guys compared to the trillions to be made on oil as it becomes more scarce.


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[yurbud]

8. the American Conservative has been critical of Bush--first to publish

Col. Karen Kwiatkowski's blistering account of working with the neocons at the Pentagon.

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[nadinbrzezinski]

9. Whjy woudl this shock me

Now emailing my congress critters, like they will do a thing... espeically DiFi... yep right.. now Boxer may... as well as my congresswoman who is showing some real brass balls

[yurbud]

10. whose your congresswoman?

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