Tom Engelhardt sees the neocons leading Bush over the cliff into Iran.
More reports in British press that air strike preparations are at an advanced state, though timing could be as soon as this Spring or as late as next year.
NYT - Feith's build-a-war workshop. How they manipulated intel last time.
Iran captures two al-Qaeda on way to Iraq. White House debates response, doesn't wish to stop pushing its own terrorist groups into Iran.
From the Vanity Fair article -
In April, Seymour Hersh reported in The New Yorker that U.S. troops were already on the ground in Iran, negotiating alliances with the Azerbaijanis in the North, the Kurds in the Northeast, and the Baluchis in the Southeast. In September, Time reported that a U.S. campaign to wipe out Iran's nuclear program could entail bombing up to 1,500 targets. More recently, Paul Craig Roberts, a former assistant secretary of the Treasury under Ronald Reagan, asserted in the Baltimore Chronicle that Bush "will attack Iran with tactical nuclear weapons, because it is the only way the neocons believe they can rescue their goal of U.S. (and Israeli) hegemony in the Middle East." Adds former C.I.A. officer Philip Giraldi, "I've heard from sources at the Pentagon that their impression is that the White House has made a decision that war is going to happen."Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb-Bomb Iran
According to Sam Gardiner, the most telling sign that a decision to bomb has already been made was the October deployment order of minesweepers to the Persian Gulf, presumably to counter any attempt by Iran to blockade the Strait of Hormuz. "These have to be towed to the Gulf," Gardiner explains. "They are really small ships, the size of cabin cruisers, made of fiberglass and wood. And towing them to the Gulf can take three to four weeks."
Bush has directed StratCom to draw up plans for a massive strike against Iran, at a time when CentCom has had its hands full overseeing operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. "Shifting to StratCom indicates that they are talking about a really punishing air-force and naval air attack [on Iran]."
Can The Neocons Really Get Us Into a Second War? - M.J. Rosenberg. Yeah, we haven't locked them away yet.
About that Iranian nuclear weapons program - Ayatollah Khamenei actually issued a fatwa against the production, stockpiling or use of nuclear weapons in 2005. Russian general predicts US nuclear attack on Iran. - Gary Leupp
Gates: Bombs tie Iran to Iraq extremists Is this the beginning of the campaign for war? NYT article. Greenwald response - The NY Times returns to pre-Iraq-war "journalism" - anonymous administration sources making provocative claims but offering no proof. This briefing was delayed because the CIA questioned its claims. E&P: 'NYT' Reporter Who Got Iraqi WMDs Wrong Now Highlights Iran Claims.
Meanwhile, about that surge - Corruption, incompetence, militia infiltration plague Iraqi forces, new US soldiers in Baghdad find.
On a collision course with no escape route - Brunei Times
Pat Buchanan - Joint Resolution needed to stop attack. A similar article here. "In questions of powers, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution." - Thomas Jefferson
John Dean - Leading Experts Say Congress Must Stop An Attack on Iran. Place resolution in an appropriations bill. Congress has the power, do they have the will?
The Hill - Dems united on Iraq, divided on Iran.
An attack before April 2007 Bush and Cheney determined despite opposition.
It's worth recalling that the 1981 attack on Osirak backfired. After the attack Iraq secretly greatly expanded a nuclear weapons program that was months away from a bomb before the first Gulf War.
Ayatollah Khamenei has today warned that if under attack, Iran will hit back at US interests worldwide.
Ackerman - The plain fact is that by inclination, history and political necessity, every major Iraqi Shia politician is closer to Iran than to the United States.
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