The Bush presidency has been a total disaster. He needs something to distract the American people's attention from his failure. What is the solution? Wag the dog: start a war. Bill Clinton bombed Iraq during his Monica Lewinsky troubles. In addition, it was the neocon plan all along to overthrow the regime in Iran. They've been thwarted up to this point by the press, especially the blogs, from carrying out that dream. We'll need to stop them again:
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff accused Iran yesterday of "ratcheting up" its arms and training support to insurgents in Iraq, and warned that the United States has the combat power to strike Tehran if needed.
Adm. Mike Mullen told a Pentagon news conference the military has evidence - such as date stamps on newly found weapons caches - that shows that recently made Iranian weapons are flowing into Iraq at a steadily increasing rate.
Some of that firepower was used to support insurgents during the recent fighting in Basra in southern Iraq.
Mullen said he has seen evidence "that some of the weapons are recently not just found, but recently manufactured."
Both Mullen and Defense Secretary Robert Gates have made it clear that while all military options are on the table, they prefer to use other pressures on Iran.
"The solution right now still lies in using other levers of national power, including diplomatic, financial and international pressure," Mullen said.
Mullen also said that launching a third conflict in that region would be extremely stressing for US forces,
But "it would be a mistake to think that we are out of combat capability."
"Unusual public accusations":
U.S. military leaders have issued a series of unusual public accusations and warnings about Iran, saying they have new evidence of Iranian-backed attacks on U.S. troops as part of a broader effort to destabilize Iraq.
On Friday, the top uniformed officer in the U.S., Navy Adm. Michael G. Mullen, accused Iran in a televised news briefing of increasing its shipments of weapons to militants in Iraq, in violation of its promises to stem the flow of arms.
The comments by Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, came days after angry complaints by Army Gen. David H. Petraeus and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates.
In addition, military officers in Iraq are planning to publicize evidence of what Mullen called Iran's "malign influence" there.
Military officials said there was no concerted U.S. campaign to intensify pressure on Iran. But taken together, the remarks represent a shift in the military's thinking. Hopes expressed last year that Iran might be tempering its involvement in Iraq seem to have evaporated, and military officials have renewed warnings about the potential for military action.
[...]Underscoring the latest tensions, a cargo vessel under contract to the Defense Department fired on a group of small boats in the Persian Gulf on Friday, briefly touching off alarm in the world energy markets. U.S. military officials said they believed the boats involved in the confrontation were Iranian, but military officials in Tehran denied the incident took place.
President Bush and officials in his administration have been accused by political opponents of using criticism of Iran to shift public attention away from the protracted war in Iraq.
U.S. intelligence experts reversed earlier assessments in December and concluded that Iran was not actively pursuing a nuclear weapons program. But in releasing classified information this week on an alleged nuclear reactor being built in Syria with the help of North Korea, the White House also warned Iran against pursuing such technology.
Here's another view from another blog:
As previously noted, Admiral Mike Mullen told a gathering at the Atlantic Council that he fears the United States and its allies “will have to deal with Iran in the very near future.” That statement left a lot of room for strategic ambiguity. He removed a bit in a press briefing yesterday, Ann Scott Tyson reports.The nation’s top military officer said today that the Pentagon is planning for “potential military courses of action” against Iran, criticizing what he called the Tehran government’s “increasingly lethal and malign influence” in Iraq. Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said a conflict with Iran would be “extremely stressing” but not impossible for U.S. forces, pointing specifically to reserve capabilities in the Navy and Air Force. “It would be a mistake to think that we are out of combat capability,” he said at a Pentagon news conference.
Related Links:
- Clinton warns Iran of U.S. nuclear response
- UN nuke watchdog to revisit Iran: report
- Naval Incident Raises US-Iran Tensions
- Iran says no confrontation with US in Gulf - reports
- Oil prices up on word US ship fired on boats in Persian Gulf
- Questions Linger on Scope of Iran’s Threat in Iraq
- Iran's involvement in Iraq may not have increased: report
1 comment:
And the Clinton Administration complicity in the Iraq Reime change...
Iraq War Vote
By _Scott Ritter_ (http://www.alternet.org/authors/6328/) , _AlterNet_
(http://www.alternet.org/) . Posted _March 3, 2007_
(http://www.alternet.org/ts/archives/?date[F]=03&date[Y]=2007&date[d]=03&act=Go/) .
Hillary Clinton knew years before she voted for the Iraq war that Saddam
Hussein didn't have WMDs -- Bill Clinton lied about Iraq's weapons programs to
justify attacking the country in 1998.
Senator Hillary Clinton wants to become President Hillary Clinton. "I'm in,
and I'm in to win," she said, announcing her plans to run for the Democratic
nomination for the 2008 Presidential election.
Let there be no doubt that Hillary Clinton is about as slippery a species of
politician that exists, one who has demonstrated an ability to morph facts
into a nebulous blob which blurs the record and distorts the truth. While she
has demonstrated this less than flattering ability on a number of issues,
nowhere is it so blatant as when dealing with the issue of the ongoing war in
Iraq and Hillary Clinton's vote in favor of this war.
This issue won't be resolved even if Hillary Clinton apologizes for her Iraq
vote, as other politicians have done, blaming their decision on faulty
intelligence on Iraq's WMD capabilities. This is because, like many other
Washington politicians at the time, including those now running for president, she
had been witness to lies about Iraq's weapons programs to justify attacks on
that country by her husband President Bill Clinton and his administration.
"While there is no perfect approach to this thorny dilemma, and while people
of good faith and high intelligence can reach diametrically opposed
conclusions, I believe the best course is to go to the UN for a strong resolution
that scraps the 1998 restrictions on inspections and calls for complete,
unlimited inspections with cooperation expected and demanded from Iraq," Senator
Clinton said at the time of her vote, in a carefully crafted speech designed to
demonstrate her range of knowledge and ability to consider all options. "I
know that the Administration wants more, including an explicit authorization to
use force, but we may not be able to secure that now, perhaps even later.
But if we get a clear requirement for unfettered inspections, I believe the
authority to use force to enforce that mandate is inherent in the original 1991
UN resolution, as President Clinton recognized when he launched Operation
Desert Fox in 1998."
Hillary would have done well to leave out that last part, the one where her
husband, the former President of the United States, used military force as
part of a 72-hour bombing campaign ostensibly deemed as a punitive strike in
defense of disarmament, but in actuality proved to be a blatant attempt at
regime change which used the hyped-up threat of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction
as an excuse for action. Sound familiar? While many Americans today condemn
the Bush administration for misleading them with false claims of
unsubstantiated threats which resulted in the ongoing debacle we face today in Iraq
(count Hillary among this crowd), few have reflected back on the day when the man
from Hope, Arkansas sat in the Oval Office and initiated the policies of
economic sanctions-based containment and regime change which President Bush later
brought to fruition when he ordered the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.
"My vote," Hillary said with great sanctimony, "is not, however, a vote for
any new doctrine of pre-emption, or for unilateralism, or for the arrogance
of American power or purpose -- all of which carry grave dangers for our
nation, for the rule of international law and for the peace and security of people
throughout the world." But by citing the policies of her husband, there can
be no doubt that this was exactly what her vote was about.
I should know. From January 1993 until my resignation from the United
Nations in August 1998, I witnessed first hand the duplicitous Iraq policies of the
administration of Bill Clinton, the implementation of which saw a President
lie to the American people about a threat he knew was hyped, lie to Congress
about his support of a disarmament process his administration wanted nothing
to do with, and lie to the world about American intent, which turned its back
on the very multilateral embrace of diplomacy as reflected in the resolutions
of the Security Council Hillary Clinton so piously refers to in her speech,
and instead pursued a policy defined by the unilateral interests of the
Clinton administration to remove Saddam Hussein from power.
I personally witnessed the Director of the CIA under Bill Clinton, James
Woolsey, fabricate a case for the continued existence of Iraqi ballistic
missiles in November 1993 after I had provided a detailed briefing which articulated
the UN inspector's findings that Iraq's missile program had been
fundamentally disarmed. I led the UN inspector's investigation into the defection of
Saddam Hussein's son-in-law, Hussein Kamal, in August 1995, and saw how the
Clinton administration twisted his words to make a case for the continued
existence of a nuclear program the weapons inspectors knew to be nothing more than
scrap and old paper. I was in Baghdad at the head of an inspection team in the
summer of 1996 as the Clinton administration used the inspection process as
a vehicle for a covert action program run by the CIA intending to assassinate
Saddam Hussein.
I twice traveled to the White House to brief the National Security Council
in the confines of the White House Situation Room on the plans of the
inspectors to pursue the possibility of concealed Iraqi weapons of mass destruction,
only to have the Clinton national security team betray the inspectors by
failing to deliver the promised support, and when the inspections failed to
deliver any evidence of Iraqi wrong-doing, attempt to blame the inspectors while
denying any wrong doing on their part.
This last fact hits very close to home. As a former Marine Corps officer,
and as a Chief Inspector responsible for the welfare of the personnel entrusted
to my command, I take the act of official betrayal very seriously. "I want
the men and women in our Armed Forces to know," Senator Clinton said during
her speech defending her vote for war, "that if they should be called upon to
act against Iraq, our country will stand resolutely behind them." I am left to
wonder if, in citing the record of her husband when he was President, if
Hillary would stand behind the troops with the same duplicitous 'vigor' that her
husband displayed when betraying the UN weapons inspectors?
In February 1998 the Clinton administration backed a diplomatic effort
undertaken by then-Secretary General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, to help
get the weapons inspection process back on track (inspections had been stalled
since January 1998, when a team I led was prevented by the Iraqis from
carrying out its mission because, as the Iraqis maintained, there were too many
Americans and British on the team implementing the unilateral policy of regime
change instead of the mandated task of disarmament). Hillary stated that she
wanted a strong UN resolution designed to promote viable weapons inspections,
and specifically singled out the compromises brokered by Kofi Annan to get
inspectors back into Iraq as a failed effort which weakened the inspection
process. What she fails to mention is that her husband initially supported the
Annan mission, not so much because it paved a path towards disarmament, but
rather because it provided a cover for legitimizing regime change.
I sat in the office of then US Ambassador to the United Nations, Bill
Richardson, as the United States cut a deal with then-United Nations Special
Commission Executive Chairman Richard Butler, where the timing and actions of an
inspection team led my myself (a decision which was personally approved by Bill
Clinton) would be closely linked to a massive US aerial bombardment of Iraq
triggered by my inspection. I was supposed to facilitate a war by prompting
Iraqi non-compliance. Instead, I did my job and facilitated an inspection that
pushed the world closer to a recognition that Iraq was complying with its
disarmament obligation. As a reward, I was shunned form the inspection process
by the Clinton administration.
In April 1998 Bill Clinton promised Congress that his administration would
provide all support necessary to the UN inspectors. In May 1998 his National
Security Team implemented a new policy which turned its back on the
inspectors, seeking to avoid supporting a disarmament process which undermined the
policies of regime change so strongly embraced by Bill Clinton and his
administration. When I resigned in August 1998 in protest over the duplicitous policies
of Bill Clinton's administration, I was personally attacked by the Clinton
administration in an effort to divert attention away from the truth about what
they were doing regarding Iraq. Four months later Bill Clinton ordered the
bombing of Iraq, Operation Desert Fox, referred to in glowing terms by Hillary
Clinton as she endorsed the policies of deception that led our nation down
the path towards war.
"So it is with conviction," Hillary said at the moment of her vote, "that I
support this resolution as being in the best interests of our Nation. A vote
for it is not a vote to rush to war; it is a vote that puts awesome
responsibility in the hands of our President and we say to him -- use these powers
wisely and as a last resort. And it is a vote that says clearly to Saddam
Hussein -- this is your last chance -- disarm or be disarmed."
It turned out Saddam was in fact already disarmed. And it turned out that
Hillary's husband, President Bill Clinton, knew this when he ordered the
bombing of Iraq in 1998. Hillary can try to twist and turn the facts as she defends
the words she spoke when casting her fateful vote in favor of a war with
Iraq. But no amount of re-writing history can shield her from the failed
policies of her very own husband, policies she embraced willingly and whole
heartedly when endorsing war.
Run, Hillary, run. But your race towards the White House will never outpace
the hypocrisy and duplicity inherent in your decision to vote for war in
Iraq.
(http://digg.com/submit?phase=2&url=http://www.alternet.org/story/48729&title=It Doesn't Matter If Hillary Apologizes for Her Iraq War
Vote&topic=politics)
Tagged as: _iraq_ (http://www.alternet.org/tags/iraq/) , _hillary clinton_
(http://www.alternet.org/tags/hillary%20clinton/)
Scott Ritter served as a former Marine Corps officer from 1984 until 1991,
and as a UN weapons inspector in Iraq from 1991 until 1998. He is the author
of several books, including "Iraq Confidential" (Nation Books, 2005) and
"Target Iran" (Nation Books, 2006).
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