Seymour
Hersh On Bush's
Plan For Iran
By Thomas Riggins
11 October, 2007
Countercurrents.org
Seymour
Hersh is back with another New Yorker article (“Shifting
Targets: The Administration’s plan for Iran,”
issue of October 8, 2007). It seems that the Iran plan has changed a
bit since his last article, six or seven months ago,appeared. Hersh
isn’t sure that Iran will be attacked, but there is certainly
a hugh military build up taking place. Since there is no real evidence
that Iran is making the Bomb, the new rationale for attack is that Iran
is attacking us!
Here is a quote from Bush
in August of this year: “Shia extremists, backed by Iran, are
training Iraqis to carry out attacks on our forces and the Iraqi people
... I have authorized our military commanders in Iraq to confront Tehran’s
murderderous activities.”
Hersh’s article makes
it clear that Bush is just fabricating these charges to con the American
people into supporting his policies. The Iraqi Prime Minister, Nuri
al-Maliki (who is kept in power by American troops) has given the lie
to Bush’s allegations by stating that Iranian and Iraqi relations
were “improved to the point that they are not interfering in our
internal affairs.” It seems its only Bush who is interfering in
Iraq’s “internal affairs” [leaving the war out of
account] by, for instance, keeping the really murderous Blackwater mercenaries
in theatre and paying off this ultra-right Republican corporation will
millions in tax payer money.
The President’s supporters
can only try to build support for his policies by the most outlandish
and even stupid arguments. Norman Podhoretz, a notorious right wing
hack who is always given media coverage, is quoted by Hersh as writing
that Iranian President Ahmadinejad is “like Hitler ... whose objective
is to overturn the going international system and to replace it ...
with
a new order dominated by Iran.” Podhoretz thinks we must attack
Iran, and, he gets to meet with Bush!
Now, granted that Iran is
not the Duchy of Grand Fenwick, but the idea that Iran is out to dominate
the world is so ridiculous that Podhoretz has only succeeded in making
a fool out of himself. Unfortunately, it appears that he has the ear
of another fool as Hersh quotes him as saying “Bush is going to
hit” Iran. As I said, Hersh isn’t sure about this. He writes,
“I was repeatedly cautioned, in interviews, that the President
has yet to issue the ‘execute order’ that would be required
for a military operation inside Iran, and such an order may never be
issued.” Lets hope Bush keeps his head.
By the way, this article
throws some light on the Gen. Petraeus “Betray Us” flap.
If the general lies to the Congress to create a pretext for attacking
Iran, then “Betray Us” or “Betray U.S.” would
be an appropriate nickname. Well, here is what he told Congress. Hersh
quotes him as saying Iran is waging “a proxy war against the Iraqi
state and coalition forces in Iraq.” But we saw above that the
leader of the Iraqi state says that Iran is not interfering in Iraq.
Petraeus out and out lied to the Congress and the American people. He
should be stripped of his stars and dishonorably discharged before his
actions cause the death of more American soldiers and Iraqi civilians.
This article points out that
all the main charges against Iran that Bush is harping about (and that
his tin pot general mostly repeats)-- trying to get the Bomb, supplying
the “enemy” with weapons, and sending agents into the country
are all dubious and unproved.
Hersh gives three reasons
for the shift away from emphasis on Iran's nuclear ambitions to its
providing weapons to the insurgents fighting the U.S. 1.) the American
people are not buying the nuclear threat hype, 2.) our intelligence
agencies insist that Iran is at least 5 years away from making a bomb
[if that is what they are up to], 3.) it seems "that Iran is emerging
as
the geopolitical winner of the war in Iraq." It seems to me that
this last reason is the biggest reason motivating Bush and his supporters.
Hersh points out that "The
crux of the Bush Administration's strategic dilemma is that its decision
to back a Shiite-led government after the fall of Saddam has empowered
Iran, and made it impossible to exclude Iran from the Iraqi political
scene."
It was the decision to invade
and occupy Iraq in the first place, I think, that was flawed That decision
was made by people profoundly ignorant of the history and the nature
of the countries and peoples of the region. It was also made by people
who are arrogant and have not even learned from our own history. Ignorance
and arrogance go together. President Bush should check out Proverbs
16:18. As we all know, after Korea, Gen. MacArthur reputedly said the
US should never get involved in a land war in Asia. Then followed the
disaster in Vietnam and now Iraq.
One of Hersh"s sources
tells him one reason Bush is bogged down and losing in Iraq is his failure
to do the things that could help him succeed, such as engaging positively
with Syria and Iran (as was proposed by the Iraq Study Group). Another
points out that the type of bombing plan the Pentagon would engage in,
if ordered by Bush, can't work without good intelligence on
which targets to hit. The U.S. has no such reliable intelligence. Attacking
Iran will further complicate the situation for the U.S. in Iraq and
just make a bigger mess for whomever has to clean up after Bush is out
of office.
Everyone should try to get
a copy of Hersh's article to read. I have only presented a few of its
high lights. The article itself gives ample evidence that the case against
Iran is very weak and mostly contrived. Pressure has to be increased
on the Congress to try and rein Bush and his generals in before they
can create an even bigger catastrophe in the Middle East. Congress can
stop them, it simply lacks the courage and will to do so. So the people
must apply the pressure to shore up our so-called representatives. Congress
should go on record now that Iran cannot be attacked without its explicit
consent. The war powers must be taken back and reside in the Congress
as intended by the Founders.
Thomas Riggins
is the book review editor of Political Affairs and can be reached at
[email protected]
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