Any hard evidence that 'the surge' is related to an attack on Iran?

I keep hearing 'background noise' that supports this theory. One fact, Negroponte moving to the State Department puts him in a position to 'manage' a team on the ground prepared to support an attack on Iran. Negroponte already has lots of experience in directing death squads.

Some military brass that spoke out against a 'surge' saying it would not change anything on the ground in Iraq, and likely would make matters worse --- well they are being replaced by Bush, and pronto!

Some journalists who visited Baghdad and the Green Zone said some time ago that more troops would not be the answer, and everyone on the ground in Iraq were united in that opinion.

So if 'the surge' is highly unpopular, and unlikely to change events on the ground in Iraq, for what reason is Bush intent on it being executed?

The pieces to this puzzle do not fit.

140,000 can't "manage" Iraq and 20,000-40,000 are going to "manage" Iran???

Tinfoil of the highest order.

Shiite sympathetic to Iran would explode in violence. Perhaps the "surge" troops are reinforcements for Iraqi high value sites such as the Green Zone.

for a surge on Iraq and then another switch; another transparent concoction of a reason to invade Iran.

After all, we promised Israel and we have this political debt to them (as opposed to having political capital). Israel - once a reciprocal business and trading customer with Iran.

Of course, our leaders still have their own reasons - they may still somehow stay in Iraq for the oil and military bases using soldiers from other countries who want to become a U.S. citizen.

Bottome line. We can't trust anyone. Not a soul. Especially our own leaders. We can't trust the Iraq Study Group, we can't trust the Pentagon, we can't trust the CIA or the corporations. We can't trust the UK. We definitely can't trust Israel under their current regime.

Any soldiers or money is one last stab to hang onto the oil, bases, and embassy building, and who knows - we may have already reversed all logic by signing some partnership with Iran to rule it together. Way out there. Not impossible.

"It all points to Iran - they will have soldiers and dollars approved from Congress"

Even 40,000 troops aren't going to do a damned thing in Iran.

No way, no how. They will be another drop in the Iraqi bucket.

:shrug:

The reality is that the surge can barely comprise 15,000 troops and that the troops have been receiving training in how to occupy Iraq, not invade Iran. One of my ex students is a young Marine (he just made corporal) and he's being trained and is slated to enter Iraq around surge time (about six weeks from now). His training is about how to search homes, calm down civilians, and drive thru an urban environment.

The language training he's getting is in Arabic, which people in Iraq speak, not Farsi, which they speak in Iran. If our troops go into Iran the one place you can be sure they won't go is the cities. That would be utter suicide. They'd be hitting military bases, missile batteries, power installations, isolated infrastructure in the boondocks, and nonpopulated transportation hubs.

Iran's land mass is approximately the size of Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Nevada, Utah, and Colorado combined. Its population of 70 million is about the same as that of all those states along with the populations of Oregon, Washington, Texas, and California thrown in. The Army currently extimates it can only muster about 9000 additional troops on the ground for this current "surge." I will suggest to you that invading Iran may take more than just 9000 troops.

An invasion of Iran would make some kind of noise--the scope of invading a country that size is far far beyond what we could do with the surge troops plus all the overtapped troops currently in Iraq. In order to invade Iran, we'd have to pretty much empty our entire force out of Iraq.

There is just no reason to believe we have any ability, let alone workable plans, for invading Iran.

Wes Clark is on the record at Huffingtonpost.com that the surge is wrong and Netanyahu was quoted as saying the surgical strike on Iran is a done deal. Related? I do not know. That is one reason for the OP.

Both may be wrong, but I do not consider their comments 'tin foil' talk.

You might want to reconsider your position in light of multiple sources regarding both the 'surge' and an attack on Iran.

"You might want to reconsider your position in light of multiple sources regarding both the 'surge' and an attack on Iran."

Apples and oranges. The spurt is unrelated, Netanyahu has his own reasons for spinning the facts in a light that will maximize the benefit to Israel. If that includes misconstruing reality, well, that's diplomacy.

Again, even 40,000 troops (and http://thinkprogress.org/2007/01/05/report-military-tells-bush-it-has-only-9000-troops-available-for-surge/">HuffPo is currently linking to a CBS report that the number is more like 9,000) aren't going to do a damned thing to Iran.

of what Bush and Israel are planning to implement.

The point of the OP was that with almost universal agreement that the "surge" is a bad idea, and would not change things on the ground, what does it mean when Bush continues to push it in a big way?

I for one do not think Bush is pursuing an obviously futile act without there being a hidden purpose behind it. Sy Hersh reported some time ago that Bush was intent on carrying out the attack on Iran, in the face of strong opposition from the Pentagon to such a plan.

Your point that the 'surge' will not make much difference on the ground is well taken. Now tell me what you think it means since Bush is clearly moving forward with it?

something that makes me :puke: thinking about it, I get the strong sense that this is solely about his political legacy. It's the way he, and his coterie of yes-men, see to hang on by their (and the American people's) fingernails until Bush can leave office safely.

Then the mess falls to his successor.

In the interim there is the prospect of blaming a Democratic-controlled Congress to shoulder "blame".

We do not have 2 yrs to 'hang on.' Things are going to get markedly worse no matter what Bush does. The only solution is to begin drawing down our troops and bring in regional powers to facilitate our pull-out.

I think nothing short of a new theatre of conflict will allow Bush to 'hang on.' What are we going to do once we have participated in a 'surgical strike' inside Iran? Iran will definitely respond, our troops in Iraq will be at risk, and the flow of oil will be interrupted?

I think Bush is depending upon the country rallying to his side in such a situation. If there is no strike on Iran, and there is a 'surge' --- you are right, it will not help, and will likely make things worse.

Bush's messianic vision is grounded in continued expansive conquest in the Middle East, and the NeoCons are behind making it happen.

but Bush hanging on at the expense of the American peoples' fingernails.

One thing I have learned from dealing with difficult, delusional and dangerous people (which is a "fun" job BTW) is that one thing is always guaranteed.

You can always count on people acting in their PERCEIVED best interest. That their perception bears little or no link to reality is not important.

All Bush has left is a "legacy".

He will protect that perception. He will not endanger it with Rumsfeld's unknown unknowns. Rolling the dice with Iran is a gamble too far. Bush will stick to what he knows and believes he can control. That is Iraq.

The Neocon ranks are much thinner than they were even 2 years ago, the Whitehouse is adopting a bunker mentality, approval ratings are in the toilet

That article that Clark is reacting to is the ravings of a NeoCon from Israel.

should a planned conflict occur with Iran.

The idea of striking Iran's nuclear facilities is one that can be met with warplanes and guided cruise missiles. You don't need an invasion force if you're simply talking about wiping out a target, not occupying land. The two issues, at least for now, should be considered separate.

That the surge is to protect our troops on the ground in Iraq from a sympathetic Shia uprising that would likely occur should we bomb Iran.

If we bombed Iran heavily enough for it to mean anything as far as disrupting their multi-site nuclear programs, we'd need more than just the 150,000 plus 20,000 "surged" troops in Iraq to handle that uprising. If you double that force--which is closer to the 400,000 troops that the army projected originally in its 1999 wargame for occupying Iraq--you might stand a chance of evacuating a slim majority of the American civilian personnel on the ground in that country. I think it's safe to assume that before they hit Iran, they'll want to evacuate all the good Republican ex-campaign workers who they've put in charge of rebuilding Iraq.

the only reason for these 're-assignments' is because the chimperor doesn't like being told, "No you can't George".

He has thrown his teddy out of the cot several times before, this strikes me as just another instance of his infantile response to facts he refuses to deal with like a grown-up.

Why else did Cheney direct every move in the background. Bush is taking orders IMHO from the NeoCon advisors who are playing on Bush's dream of saving his legacy.

all of his cabal have their heads so far up their own buttholes the haven't got a clue what to do. Bush rewards blind loyalty and punishes perceived disloyalty. It has been like that pretty much since Iraq started to go tits up (about three weeks after the ground war started).

Bush has been intensely paranoid for years, what is so surprising about the way he is acting now? It's not like it is a radical change of form for his administration. They are still screwing up every bit as badly as they always have since 2000.

Legacy, my arse, if he can get to 2008 without being impeached it will be a miracle. The tangled web of lies continues to unravel, each day brings more evidence of incompetence and outright fraud. This criminal administration will be lucky if it can cover up a fraction of what has been perpetrated upon the nation by Bush's office.

That is the real story - keep your eye on what is really happening. Bush and his cronies will be only too pleased if everyone is rushing about squawking about Iran's "nukes" while they try to destroy as much evidence of their wrongdoing as possible.