Calculating the Risk of War in Iran

Calculating the Risk of War in Iran


by F. William Engdahl

January 29, 2006
GlobalResearch.ca



In the past weeks media reports have speculated that Washington is ‘thinking the unthinkable,’ namely, an aggressive, pre-emptive nuclear bombardment of Iran, by either the United States or Israel, to destroy or render useless the deep underground Iranian nuclear facilities.

The possibility of war against Iran presents a geo-strategic and geopolitical problem of far more complexity than the bombing and occupation of Iraq. And Iraq has proven complicated enough for the United States. Below we try to identify some of the main motives of the main actors in the new drama and the outlook for possible war.

The dramatis personae include the Bush Administration, most especially the Cheney-led neo-conservative hawks in control now of not only the Pentagon, but also the CIA, the UN Ambassadorship and a growing part of the State Department planning bureaucracy under Condi Rice. It includes Iran, under the new and outspoken President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It includes Putin’s Russia, a nuclear-armed veto member of the UN Security Council. It includes a nuclear-armed Israel, whose acting Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert, recently declared that Israel could ‘under no circumstances’ allow Iranian development of nuclear weapons ‘that can threaten our existence.’ It includes the EU, especially Security Council Permanent Member, France and the weakening President Chirac. It includes China, whose dependence on Iranian oil and potentially natural gas is large.

Each of these actors has differing agendas and different goals, making the issue of Iran one of the most complex in recent international politics. What’s going on here? Is a nuclear war, with all that implies for the global financial and political stability, imminent? What are the possible and even probable outcomes?


snip


http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=%20EN20060129&articleId=1841

against Iran by them.

The U.S. has neither the troops or the economy to conduct such a mission.

Maybe we should set up a Peace Department as recommended by Dennis.

speak, the possiblity does not seem that remote...

Iran's sunburst anti-ship missiles pose a serious threat to US ships in the persian Gulf. Iran could shut down the straits of Hormuz, cutting off the supply of oil to the U.S., causing gas prices to rise to a possible $10 per gallon in the U.S. Iran has bio and chemical warheads and the missiles to deliver them(against Iraq and Israel). This would provoke a nuclear response. Also, Iran has the ability to mobilize an army of 1 million men, which might stream over the border into Iraq, if Iran is attacked.

Any way you cut it, a strike on Iran will result in a large scale regional war with thousands if not millions dead. This is not one of those surgical strike three-day-wars we have grown accustomed to. The consequences of such an action are almost unthinkable, which makes me think that it will not happen. If it does I fear for my nation and the world.



Welcome to DU!