I don't think it's at all out of line to criticize Iran, or even declare military force an option

. . . IF that military force is directed against some PROVEN provocation or some assault on our nation, including against our forces. It's a separate issue (not an unimportant one) that Bush has placed our soldiers there. They shouldn't be anyone's targets for unwarranted assault. The U.S. can never tolerate any LEGITIMATE outside threat to our nation or our citizens, and that includes from Iran.

However, there has been absolutely NO EVIDENCE of any threat to our nation or our citizens from the GOVERNMENT of Iran as Bush and other U.S. politicians claim. Reports yesterday indicated that the Bush administration has "postponed" plans to publish a "dossier" of Iranian interference in Iraq because they were "divided over the strength of the US evidence."

Indeed the same day there were reports that the incidents of Iranian assistance in the Iraq violence they intended to highlight were actually committed by Iraqi generals instead. Two senior Iraq generals have been implicated in an attack against American forces in Karbala on Jan. 20th that killed 5 American soldiers. The kidnapping and killing of the 5 soldiers had previously been blamed on Iranian elements.

All of this is not to say that there aren't individuals and, possibly, organizations in Iran which would oppose our military 'interests', but, the Iranian GOVERNMENT has only declared they'd repel those military 'interests' within their OWN borders. If Bush doesn't threaten their sovereign nation, they don't threaten ours.

It's Bush's 'interest' in suppressing Iran's oil influence which is the ONLY reason that Bush is using the weight of our nation's defenses to pressure the Iranian government and destabilize yet another oil power in the region. After bombing Iran everywhere the Bush regime claims the 'underground nuclear bunkers' they imagine are located with our own nuclear bunker-busters, self-described 'democracy czar' Elizabeth Cheney is ready to fly in a compliant sampling of Iranian exiles to assume power after they chase Mahmoud Ahmadinejad into his own hidey-hole.

The Bush regime wants this next preemptive assault to be legal-like. A military assault on Iran at this point can't be called 'legal'. There is no law or venue that the Bush regime has at their disposal that they can use to find Iran guilty of, or as an accomplice to, anything illegal. Their entire aggressive posture toward Iran is based on the 'decider's' fanciful imagination. There is no international law which would allow PREEMPTIVE military action against Iran for any of Bush's charges, outside of IMMEDIATE self-defense as with our soldiers in neighboring Iraq.

The U.N., which finally agreed to weak sanctions against Iran which are un-enforceable by military means, hasn't found ANY EVIDENCE at all of any ambition by Iran to transform it's uranium production from their stated peaceful purpose of energy production to making weapons as Bush, Cheney and their WH minions regularly claim in their speeches and interviews.

The box that Bush is constructing around Iran with our battleships and his heightened rhetoric is designed to provoke Iran, perhaps, into retaliating with some direct assault on our Iraq forces so Bush can have his manufactured pretext for his planned bombing raids. It's also likely that he wants to use the full sheaf of false authority he's used so far to keep our soldiers in place; spreading chaos and unrest, suppressing Iraq's ability to become an oil power again; reaching out to stifle Iran's oil influence; all at the behest of, and the furtherance of Bush and Cheney's relationships with their Saudi Arabian benefactors who want Iran's oil off the market.

The U.S. position on the oil was made transparently clear by then National Intelligence Director John Negroponte, who testified in a Feb.2 hearing last year that, "a combination of rising demand for energy and instability in oil-producing regions is increasing the geopolitical leverage of key producing states."

"Record oil revenues and diversification of its trading partners are further strengthening the Tehran government." Negroponte warned the senate committee. Negroponte and others in the Bush regime are worried that Iran will just 'diversify' or change who they sell their oil to; like to Russia or China, who both have major oil deals pending with Iran.

Also, it should be clear to everyone by now that Bush' militarism has alienated the very sources of oil that we rely on for a steady supply at a reasonable price. Just as a change in driving habits here in the U.S. could pressure the price, a decrease in Bush's saber-rattling would unquestionably bring oil prices back down to Earth, and not just for U.S. market. A decrease in militarism by this American regime would cause a revival of the international cooperation which marked past periods of relatively low oil costs.

"If you can stop the politicians from making negative statements, I am sure you will see almost 15 dollars disappear from the price." Qatar's oil minister told reporters at the peak of last year's oil price rise.

On the other hand, a continuation of the present intimidation campaign against Iran threatens to lead to an actual military attack which would ensure prohibitive oil prices would remain in place for years, marked by increases of over $100 a barrel. No amount of manipulation could wipe away that self-inflicted wound on our nation, come to pass as a result of the actions of this lame-duck loser.

Bush is intent on wrapping all of his inventions toward Iran into another imagined defense of our 'national security' in his self-appointed role as the protector of the world, but he's fashioned himself, and our nation, into the aggressor in this face-off of interests with Iran. The question which is absent from all of those who are advocating for an escalation of our military posture toward Iran is also the most important contradiction in Bush's military posture toward Iraq: What happened to the due process and adherence to law which are inherent in the democracy Bush claims to be defending in his aggression toward these sovereign nations?

Where is the EVIDENCE that Iran poses a threat to our national security to the degree that military action is legal and appropriate under our own laws and Constitution? Where is the EVIDENCE?


http://journals.democraticunderground.com/bigtree

...if those forces are engaged in an illegal foreign occupation. They are legitimate targets. They should not be there.

The rest of your comments are spot on, IMO.

as legitimate, despite Annan's previous declaration of the invasion as illegal.

...and the U.N. ruled their occupation "legal," would you no longer consider resistance a legitimate response? There is no doubt in my mind that the invasion was a crime and that the occupation is simply an extension of that crime.

The Iraqi resistance has legitimacy in their self-defense, but, violence directed against our forces which is not in immediate self-defense shouldn't be seen as acceptable just because the occupation isn't legitimate; legally, morally or otherwise. The rub is the point of provocation. That's what makes the entire operation so destructive. Our troops are provocative by their presence alone. There can be no clear line of defense in Iraq, under these conditions, for our troops who've been placed there.

I don't think, however, that Iran has any right to threaten or endanger our troops in Iraq. I don't think it's been shown that they are.

Besides if the US already has SF teams within Iranian territory, then any attacks from Iran are not unprovoked, are they?

Outside of their borders, Iran is subject to the same intended restraints on the use of force as everyone else.

I can't tell what you're calling 'preemptive war', but I don't advocate it in any form.

without hurting ourselves even more. I agree with much of what you say above. They may shut down the Straits of Hormuz, shutting off a great deal of the world's oil. Many experts say that will cause our oil to go as high as $200 per barrel. $5 oil? $7 oil? Good luck getting to work, and heating the house, and buying groceries that will triple in cost.

Also, we have 150,000 soldiers right next door to Iran. They can cut these soldier off, the Shiites in Iraq may very well turn on us also, as their loyalty is bound to be greater to Iran next door, fellow Shiites, than it is to us, invaders who have caused the death of tens of thousands.

So be very careful before you think that military force is okay. Bush's chance at that ended when he invaded Iraq.

Military force should be the last option, outside of immediate defense.

Bush and Cheney should have all of their power taken from them. Still, our nation (and our soldiers) can't forfeit the right to self defense just because they're at the helm.

I imagine, from reading your post, that a discussion about the consequences of attacking Iran to the geopolitical reality that we would have ZERO allies other than Israel would be beyond the scope of the inquiry

who might act against us. It's a standard statement of America's right to defend itself against unwarranted aggression, provocation, and attack.

That doesn't sidestep the absolute necessity to exhaust every peaceful avenue before considering the use of military force. As I tried to express, there are more than enough legal, moral, and constitutional barriers to any justification of what Bush is doing in Iraq or contemplating doing to Iran which he's ignoring. Those would provide more than enough room for allies to support the U.S. in its opposition to any of Iran's advancement of illegal or threatening interests if followed and adhered to.

But, unprovoked attacks must be met with a necessary, but hopefully, measured defensive response.

I thought we avoided armageddon that time around. If I call correctly, they promised to bury us, armed the north vietnamese against us and gave them planes and missiles to kill our guys with, but we didn't nuke them because of the consequences.

Its been nice, but I'll leave this thread now. Looking for excuses to blow up anyone who is considered to be a threat to Israel is not my cup of tea.

Peace...er, nevermind.

These are the parameters of the debate and I've come down firmly against ANY unprovoked military action against Iran, even then, in accordance with our laws, our constitution, and our moral values, which should more than provide for peace.

You've seriously mis-characterized what I've written Jacobin.

on edit: shoot first and ask questions later is not what I meant when I mentioned the right to immediate defense. It's, in fact, written into the Geneva protocols as a right to immediate defense.

They're no threat to us.

Anybody talking about a strike on Iran are the same sort of chickenshit assholes talking about how Iraq was 15 minutes away from attacking New York.

Iran is not our enemy.

February 2, 2007 at 08:18:22

Where is the EVIDENCE that Iran threatens the U.S. in Iraq or anywhere else?

by Ron Fullwood

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_ron_full_070202_where_is_the_evidenc.htm