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David Weigel | April 20, 2006

Michael Young darkly contemplates a war with Iran.

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|4.20.06 @ 3:10PM|#

Beginning in May 2003, the U.S. Army began a core analysis for a full-scale war with Iran called TIRANNT (for "theater Iran near term).

Hmm. Doesn't have quite the same ring to it as PATRIOT, but it'll do.

|4.20.06 @ 3:17PM|#

I rip Mr. Young more often than not, mainly as a result of his whole obviously delusional "Hey, there's a great big Mideast/Near East democracy party going on!" line of bullcrap from not long back (although it SEEMS like a million years). But here he has written a convincing, cogent piece that makes me hope (wish?) that our "leaders" are advised by people at least as sensible as him.

|4.20.06 @ 3:42PM|#

Ahmadinejad would face even larger complications if he stirred up trouble in Iraq.

I think this may have it a little backwards in that... I agree that Iran has little to gain from stirring up trouble in Iraq as things stand now. So long as we're stuck in the Iraqi swamp, they can just keep developing their nuclear program--what could be better for them?

...but in response to American led pressure? Why wouldn't Iran light their end of the Iraqi fuse in response to an American led invasion of Iran?

I think Mr. Young is right, however, in that the Iranians have no reason to want an end to our Iraqi adventure for the time being. ...so long as they can go about developing their nuclear program, I'd add.

Iraq is a sword in their hands, and it's dangling over our heads! Why would they throw that away?

Some of us warned against sitting in that chair.

|4.20.06 @ 3:46PM|#

You know, despite the record they've put together in Iraq, I really don't think the administration is itching to invade or even bomb Iran. Of course the president says that all options are open; that's what presidents say. What's his other choice? Saying, "If pushed far enough, I pledge to back down"? The problem is that something does have to be done, or the US (and others) will be shown to be backing down, which is the brinksmanship Young talks about. I've heard a lot of anti-administration voices saying that the administration is talking up Iran in order to "distract people from the quagmire in Iraq". That clearly isn't working, and I don't think they're quite that dumb. Hubristic, yes, but not that stupid.

|4.20.06 @ 3:57PM|#

My question is, what exactly do we lose by being perceived to be backing down? That is, that we haven't already lost by failing miserably in Iraq? One has to think that we look very vulnerable right now in that area of world.

|4.20.06 @ 4:20PM|#

I think we should just "let" the Israelis bomb Iran's nuclear installations back to the stone age. And we should give them any bunker-buster bombs or missiles that they might need if they don't have them already.

Israel is the one threatened with being wiped off the map by Iran's president. True Iran would retaliate against Israel, but I bet the Israelis think that any such retaliation is better than the mass destruction of Israelis.

If the Iranians choose to go after us for "allowing" the Israelis to attack them, then we can and will retaliate in a manner that would devastate Iran, and I don't think they'd be willing to initiate that self-devastation.

|4.20.06 @ 5:06PM|#

Well, there's a reason Israel hasn't adopted the U.S. policy of preemptive strikes against sovereign countries. If it started bombing a country just because it plans, down the road, to wipe Israel off the map, it would be essentially declaring war on the entire mideast. After all, their current approach seems to be working fine. "You want to manufacture WMD's so you can kill us all? Take a number. And go talk to our friends across the Atlantic while you're at it."

|4.20.06 @ 7:17PM|#

Before Bush leaves offfice, there WILL be military action against Iran. The only way it could be avoided is if Iran completely backs down, giving up it's nuclear program and allowing a strict inspection regime to verify--and I don't see that happening.
If you want the true odds of something, watch the money. $73 a barrel oil tells me people in the know are anticipating airstrikes, at least.

|4.20.06 @ 9:32PM|#

We need to find a way to do to Iran what should have happened in Iraq - get the Russians and Chinese on board and UTTERLY ISOLATE IRAN. If we had been able to to this with Iraq, we could have bluffed Saddam and his lackeys right out of their country and avoided the war entirely. Honestly, I blame Russia and China for the Iraq war, based on this alone. Their support for Saddam made him believe that he was safe, leaving the war as our only option.

This time, Russia and China need to learn that it would be better to avoid the war and help us bluff the theocrats out of power.

The onus is really on them, and what we need is the diplomatic power to bring this about.

|4.21.06 @ 12:48AM|#

Chad,

The theocrats will not leave power in Iran. Period.

Sanctions will not work either, except to harm the innocent Iranian people. If nobody manages to persuade them not to build the bomb, and nobody destroys their nuclear facilities, they will get the bomb. Period.

Michael Young does have a point though. Would Iran ever use it? The retaliation would be in kind and stone age delivering. It is easy enough to trace where nuclear material was made too, assuming you can get samples, in much the same way as DNA. So giving it to terrorists will provoke the same obliterating response.

The question is does anyone have the guts to just let them have it and hope they are sane enough to want to continue living to never use it?

|4.21.06 @ 5:12AM|#

Those innocent Iranians are and will continue to be harmed under every scenario, sanctions included. When I say sanctions, I mean real ones. Nothing goes in or out. No medicine. No food. They starve in pools of oil until they fold. If they launch an attack, we retaliate firmly but in a limited fashion.

Of course, it would never come to this. They would fold BEFORE such sanctions ever took place. That is the whole point. We can win this fight without war, but it requires that everyone but Iran be on the same page.

Iran with nukes is a far bigger problem than you are portraying. First, there is the issue of radicals with bombs and plausible deniability. Second is the issue that their bombs would prevent us from massing troops anywhere in the area.

|4.21.06 @ 8:28AM|#

Chad, that sounds like the chain email going around urging people not to buy gas from the two largest oil companies. "We can do this if everyone pitches in!" The reality is that everyone won't join such multilateral cooperative sanctions.

In the past thirty years, sanctions have failed far more often than they've succeeded, with only 21 percent of international efforts being successful and only 13 percent where the U.S. has unilaterally imposed them. Also, sanctions are far more likely to be successful when the countries involved had friendly relations initially.

|4.21.06 @ 9:48AM|#

If indeed the Iranian leaders have the support of only 20% of their citizens, and if most Iranians desire a liberal democracy and view the USA favorably, then maybe the best thing to do is a stealthy decapitation strike, using assassins and commandos, with limited collateral damage. I don't know if such an attack is possible or feasible, but I note in the recent Hersh article (and the more recent Bowden Atlantic article) that US elite troops have been able to operate covertly within Iran.

As for an all-out air attack, targeting hundreds of sites for [conventional and/or nuclear] bombardment, I glumly conclude that would unite the Iranians (paticularly the Persian population) in nationalist fervor, and strengthen their leaders. The collateral deaths of Russian and Chinese nuclear engineers would not help. Do not forget that the Russians still have thousands of nuclear warheads targeted on the USA; theirs is the only arsenal that can actually destroy our entire nation.

|4.22.06 @ 7:58PM|#

I don't know if Ahmadinejad would use nuclear weapons if he developed them. My guess would be no, if for no other reason than fear of retaliation. Some have argued that deterence wouldn't work with someone who regaurds some Worldwide Islamic-Theocracy Revolution as more important than his own life but I am not sure Ahmadinejad falls in that category.

I would hope (likely or not) that the position of our leaders on this one is to publicly make it look like the US might be willing to nuke Iran (for the deterrence value) if its government attacks the US or our allies; but to really only plan on going in and take them out the conventional way (with all the measures normally taken to avoid innocent casualties) if they launch an attack.

Some will point out that the US military is streched thin right now but an attack by Iran would:
1) increase the number of people willing to enlist (hell I would enlist in that case)
2) encourage US allies to aid militarily in removing Iran's government
3) if necessary, induce US leaders to reduce US troop presence in Iraq (by moving many into Iran) and concentrate those remaining around necessary supply lines.