Iran Hostage Crisis 2007: How Cheney Might Try to Trick Us Into War With Iran

[McCamy Taylor]

Sy Hersch had a very informative interview with Wolf Blizter today

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsYelZUjzA0

Basically, he said that Cheney and Co. have given up trying to convince us that Iran is a nuclear threat. I guess that they realized the truth of the saying "You can't fool all the people all the time." They lied about Saddam's nuclear threat and got caught lying. And got caught smearing Ambassador Wilson and his wife when he tried to point out the lying. Now. Hersch says, they are going to claim that Iran's army is nothing but one big terra-ist organization. It must be true. A majority of the members of the US Senate just said so, including a bunch of Democrats, including the front runner Democratic presidential candidate, Hillary. And Bush-Cheney figure they have carte-blanche when it comes to tracking down terra-ists and taking care of then "over there" so that we do not to fight them "at home."

Anyway, now that we are all clear that Iran's Revolutionary Guard is nothing but one big terra-ist organization (Congress said so, no fair for them to try to object later), it is the duty of the administration to use its own terra-ist organizations, the CIA and the US Army (at least that is what they are according to Iraq) in order to infiltrate and stop the Revolutionary Guard from committing and further acts of terra. According to Hersch, Cheney does not intend to limit himself to aerial attacks. Nope, he plans to send in ground troops. This is important. Send a handful of fighters on the ground into a country as big as Iran with as many soldiers as Iran and you have something invaluable. You have fodder .

When you send a handful of men and women sent into Iran, you are just asking to have some of them captured. Just like the Israeli soldiers that got caught last summer. Like Israel, the US has a "no (wo)man left behind". When Private Fodder gets captured and paraded on Iranian TV for all the world to see, there will be just one thing for the United States to do. The Wag the Dog option. The option that the Republicans insisted that Jimmy Carter should have chosen during the Iranian hostage crisis of the 1980s. The one Israel chose last summer in Lebanon. Invade.

All Cheney and Co. have to do is send some hapless soldiers into harm's way into Iran doing what the US Senate has made all nice and legal--waging the war against terrorism on the sovereign soil of another country. Lots of US soldiers will die. Lots of Iranians will die. Oil prices will rise through the roof. The Saudi Royals will reward their Bush lackeys for a job well down. Democratic leaders will protest, but not too loud, since this terribly unpopular war will improve their prospects in the elections next year.

Now, that does not sound too hard, does it?

[pscot]

1. Tricks? Cheney don't got no tricks.

Cheney don't need no tricks to bomb Iran. He don't need no stinking tricks to bomb Iran. He bomb anybody he want, and what you going to do about. Impeachment is off the table.

[L. Coyote]

2. Here we go again. Classic Republican BAIT and SWITCH. Iraq vs. Iran

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x1946957

The DEMS took power in Congress because of opposition to the war.

Bait and Switch #1: Bush announces the Surge. Suddenly, the debate is about the surge, not the war.

Months pass and the debate returns to the war. The strategy worked with perfection.

Bait and Switch #2: Make everyone focus on Iran. Even journalists are working full-time on this ruse.

And, DU is falling for it head over heels. It will take many months to undo this one too!

[Rosa Luxemburg]

3. didn't the British try this one and the 'hostage sailors' went home in new suits?

remember? didn't work and the Iranian president sent them home in 'fashionable' suits!

[madrchsod]

4. what army does he think he has?

[McCamy Taylor]

7. Exactly. Hersch's sources are often military. To me that means that the Pentagon

knows that the Neo-Cons are considering an Iran Hostage 2007 scenario and are trying to counter it by spreading the word to the public that Cheney intends to send ground troops into harms way into Iran (where they will become fodder, it is just common sense.

However, this is a situation in which the Pentagon might not be able to prevent Cheney and Pals from acting, even if they know what the NeoCons are up to. They can not control every single special ops force in the US military and NSA and CIA. If they manage to lose a single blonde female behind enemy lines and get her picture plastered all over FOX News, the media wars will begin. The Iranians might not even be given a chance to return her.

[whistle]

5. Just how will Israel benefit from all of this?

[McCamy Taylor]

8. Israel's position will be much worse. This isn't for Israel. It is for Saudi Arabia

to weaken the Shia and strengthen the Sunnis, particularly the Wahhabis. Israel is completely irrelevant in this equation. Israel has no oil. Things will be worse for Israel if there is a war between the US and Iran, because the entire Middle East will be destabilized. Right now, Iran is offering to fight Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and other places. With Iran tied up in a war with the US, Saudi Arabia will be free to fund its Wahhabi terrorists--Al Qaedi--to wreck havoc where ever it wants, and the US will be too busy fighting Shia to even pay attention to Al Qaeda. The Wahhabi/Saudi dream of a Arab dominated Middle East can become a reality. The Neo Cons want the US to control all that oil, but the Saudis have other ideas. The end game will get nasty.

[Douglas Carpenter]

10. do you have any evidence that Saudi Arabia that is lobbying for an attack on Iran?

I have certainly not come across any. But if you have any such evidence I would be quite interested in looking at it with an open mind.

Although other political lobbies certainly are encouraging an attack on Iran:

"The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the premier Israel lobby group whose annual convention last year featured a giant, multi-media exhibit on how Iran is "pursuing nuclear weapons and how it can be stopped", has also been pushing hard on Capitol Hill for legislation to promote regime change. Despite White House objections, the group has sought tough sanctions against foreign companies with investments in Iran.

"This bill has been pushed almost entirely by AIPAC," noted Trita Parsi, a Middle East expert at Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies (SAIS) here. "I don't see any other major groups behind this legislation that have had any impact on it"

link: http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/0412-06.htm

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Interview with Eric Alterman:

AIPAC is pushing us to war with Iran -- link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nch43wy8Zb8

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AIPAC, Iran, & Presidential War-Making by Rabbi Arthur Waskow:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rabbi-arthur-waskow/aipac-iran-presidenti_b_43814.html

______________________________________________

"I think of war with Iran as the ending of America's present role in the world. Iraq may have been a preview of that, but it's still redeemable if we get out fast. In a war with Iran, we'll get dragged down for 20 or 30 years. The world will condemn us. We will lose our position in the world."

Zbigniew Brzezinski, Vanity Fair, 2006.


.

[McCamy Taylor]

11. The NeoCons thought this one up on their own, but Saudi Arabia owns the Bushes

I guess Halliburton and Cheney are now allied with United Arab Emirates via Dubai.

Bush and Cheney both will be well reward by their Arab masters once they leave office.

Regarding Israel, they are being used. There are a few wealthy families in that country, and everyone else is fodder to the Bush family's ambition. As James Baker III said "Fuck the Jews. They vote Democratic."

[Douglas Carpenter]

12. well I am simply unaware of any desire on the part of the Saudis or the Gulf

Arab states to encourage an actual war with Iran.

And frankly I am sitting - as I write this - only a few miles from the Persian Gulf.

There are still a great deal of direct commercial flights going back and forth every single day, several times a day between Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states and Iran. They have a great deal of commercial and other relationships.

The Iranian President and the Saudi Monarch met in Riyadh in May for the express purpose of smoothing over any difficulties. And their respective diplomats and commercial interest leaders meet all the time.

Granted there is animosity between many Sunnis who comprise the majority in Saudi Arabia and Shiites who comprise the majority in Iran. There is also an ancient Arab versus Persian rivalry.

But there is a virtually universal consensus throughout the region that an attack on Iran could likely have catastrophic consequences for all the Gulf states to say nothing of Iran. Even if initially the American forces attempted to carry out their attack without using Gulf state bases, facilities or air space -- it is universally recognized by all that subduing Iran will inevitably require the opening up of Gulf state bases, facilities and air space. This would make the oil and natural gas facilities as well as other infrastructure which might include the absolutely essential desalinization plants targets of an Iranian counter attack. This the Iranians could easily do this with their massive array of medium range missiles - deeply embedded in unapproachable terrain - with little to no ability to prevent such attacks. There is also the knowledge that Shiites who identify with Iran significantly comprise a near majority if not a majority in the Eastern Province of Saudi and a solid majority in Bahrain - would be deeply provoked by such an attack.

I simply find no evidence that the Saudis or any of the other Gulf states would view an actual attack on Iran as anything except an extremely dangerous move which would almost certainly carry with it catastrophe for themselves. Although it is fair to say that both the Gulf Arabs and the Iranians are benefiting from the eighty dollar a barrel oil prices which is to a significant extent a side effect of fear of a U.S. military attack.

And I have certainly NEVER, NEVER, NEVER come across one single Gulf Arab who does not vehemently oppose such an attack and views it as anything less than insanity -- with an outcome as anything less than a catastrophe for themselves - however much many of them may loathe the Iranians.
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However, if you or ANYONE else has ANY evidence whatsoever that the Saudis or the Gulf Arabs are lobbying or encouraging an attack on Iran - I would like see it. And I would certainly look at it with an open mind.

[CK_John]

6. IMO, Syria is the real target, Iran is a head fake. n/t

[IndianaGreen]

9. There is no trick to it! Congress already authorized Bush to attack Iran.

When the Democratic Congress voted for the Lieberman Iran War Resolution, they authorized Bush to go to war by declaring Iran's Guard a terrorist group which authorizes Bush to bomb Iran to get at them.

What a fine mess our Democratic Congress has gotten us into!