Tuesday, March 27, 2007

What is Iran up to?

Iranian Revolutionary Guards
David Seaton's News Links
The United States is making a great effort to intimidate Iran, militarily, economically and diplomatically. Demonstrations of Bush's "resolve" have taken place in the United Nations and also militarily, as the article I include from Debka indicates.

Obviously the Iranians, by the simple and cheap expedient of capturing 15 British sailors show the world they are not intimidated. Is this a miscalculation? Should they be intimidated?

What would happen if, as the Debka article suggests, the United States finally did attack Iran? Would that be a disaster for Iran? For some Iranians, yes of course it would, but for others it may in fact be the desired result.

If Iran were attacked it would in one stroke finish off any "reform" movement and permit the hardliners to purge all dissenters. In the patriotic fervor that would follow any attack on Iran by foreigners, the faction Ahmadinejad represents would be consolidated for a generation.

What about Iran's atomic program?

An attack might set the atomic program back by several years. Wouldn't that be a major defeat for Iran? ...What if Iran's atomic bomb was nothing more than the cheese in the mousetrap?

Perhaps what is really at stake is Iran's credibility among the world's Muslim masses. Never forget that the only Arab government with any democratic legitimacy is Hamas of Palestine. The moderate Arab governments that the US considers its allies are despised by most of their subjects because of their closeness to the "Zionists and Crusaders".

Any attack on Iran that didn't result in "regime change" would be seen as ineffectual. If Iran is finally attacked by the USA and Israel and is still standing after the attack, then, just as happened with Hezbollah last summer, they will be heroes to Muslims all over the world... and not just Muslims, their prestige in all the the third world would be immense. "Moderate" Arab governments that were seen to be collaborating with the USA in clear benefit to Israel might never live it down.

So perhaps, the United States is walking into yet another trap. DS


Huge US naval maneuvers off the coast of Iran - Debka

Abstract: More than 10,000 US personnel, two aircraft carriers and 100 warplanes begin biggest simulated demonstration of force in Gulf since the 2003 invasion of Iraq(...) military sources note that the exercise was launched March 27 the day before the Arab League summit opens in Riyadh, to demonstrate the Bush administration’s determination not to let Iran block the Strait of Hormuz to oil exports from the Persian Gulf, or continue its nuclear program. Taking part are the USS Stennis and USS Eisenhower strike forces. With Iran’s Revolutionary Guards one week into their marine maneuvers, military tensions in the Gulf region are skyrocketing and boosting world oil prices. Intelligence sources in Moscow claim to have information that a US strike against Iranian nuclear installations has been scheduled for April 6 at 0040 hours. The Russian sources say the US operation, code-named “Bite,” will last no more than 12 hours and consist of missile and aerial strikes devastating enough to set Tehran’s nuclear program several years back. The maneuver also occurs four days after 14 British seamen and one crew-woman were seized by an Iranian Revolutionary Guards warship, with no sign that their release is imminent. READ IT ALL

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