Right Wing Nut House

Is it possible that Iran is using a two track approach in its efforts to head off sanctions as well as cool the rhetoric between Tehran and Washington?

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s hectoring letter to George Bush was rightly dismissed by the US government largely because it offered absolutely nothing in the way of concrete proposals for a starting point in negotiations. It was 17 pages of Ahmadinejad - cloistered as he is in Iranian cuckoo land - believing both Arab propaganda as well as the over-the-top exaggerated rhetoric used by the left in the west about America and Bush, telling the President where he’s gone wrong. The exercise would be laughable except one must keep in mind that Ahmadinejad will one day be in possession of a weapon that he has made absolutely plain to all but the most willfully self deluded will be used to destroy Israel and if at all possible, the United States of America.

And while the Iranian President offered nothing new in the letter, it has been rightly pointed out that there was a slight - only a slight - cooling of the overheated, hateful rhetoric that is usually employed by him when talking about the United States. It says something absolutely damning about Iran when we take it as a positive sign that the President of a fairly large nation did not use the term “Great Satan” when talking about America.

It is a real possibility that this letter was meant largely for domestic (and regional) purposes, designed to show the Iranian President as a reasonably sane, albeit a ridiculously ignorant and misinformed person. There certainly was nothing in the letter that could be used as the basis for opening a dialogue.

Then, the other shoe drops.

Time Magazine has revealed that they received another letter on the same day that Ahmadinejad’s letter was delivered to Bush by the Swiss. This communication was from Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khameini’s representative on the Iranian National Security Council Hassan Rohani, and Iran’s former top nuclear negotiator under former President Khatami. It is this letter that appears to contain the meat of Iranian proposals to jump start direct negotiations with the United States:

In the two-page memorandum, intended for publication in the West, Hassan Rohani,representative of the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khameini, on the Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) and Iran’s former top nuclear negotiator, defends Iran’s nuclear posture, decries American bullying, and puts forward a plan to remove the nuclear issue from the U.N. Security Council and return it to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna, a long-standing Iranian goal.

The letter also offers some specific Iranian starting points for negotiation. Rohani said Iran would “consider ratifying the Additional Protocol, which provides for intrusive and snap inspections,” and that it would also “address the question of preventing ‘break-out’” — or abandonment of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Independent nuclear experts consulted by TIME said these proposals were “hopeful” signs.

Why didn’t Ahmadinejad include these proposals in his letter, a communication that was sure to get the widest possible airing due to the historic nature of the missive: It represented the first direct communication between leaders of the two countries since 1979? Why use a media outlet like Time Magazine to make such a serious diplomatic overture?

And make no mistake, these proposals represent a possible breakthrough. The Europeans and the IAEA tried for three years to get Iran to agree to these “snap inspections” which are vital if any kind of confidence can be achieved in monitoring the Iranian program. And their possible agreement to abide by the NPT is another hopeful sign that someone or some faction may be trying to reign in the Iranian President and take a step or two back from the precipice that Ahmadinejad’s rhetoric and actions have brought the Islamic Republic.

The reason for the two track approach to negotiations is not clear and could mean several things. Ahmadinejad could be more subtle than we give him credit for - a longshot to be sure but not impossible. Or his boss Khameini could be either undercutting his efforts or trying to rein him in, seeing the danger of an increasingly isolated Iran. After all, Khameini used as his errand boy the very man that Ahmadinejad fired when he came into office. The Iranian President was unhappy with the moderate’s approach to the negotiations and replaced them with hardliners, virtually guaranteeing that the talks with Germany, France, and Great Britain on their nuclear program would fail.

If it is a sign of factionalism rearing its ugly head in Iran, it couldn’t have come at a worse time. While the Iranian President has been busy gutting the civil service by purging long time employees and replacing them with fanatics (his foreign minister was kicked out of Turkey when he was Ambassador for supporting attacks against Iranian dissidents), a crisis is brewing with the west over his nuclear program that demands experienced, level headed hands to defuse. This communication that we must assume comes directly from Supreme Leader Khameini, is the first hopeful sign that cooler heads might be prevailing at the highest levels and Ahamdinejad may have to change directions or find himself out of a job (or, more likely, on a mortuary slab - victim of an assassination).

This is not the first time that a government wishing to use a back channel to talk with the United States has used the media as a go-between. During the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, Nikita Kruschev used an old army friend, Alexander Fromin, who was a Counselor at the Soviet Embassy in Washington, to contact ABC News correspondent John Scali in order to have the reporter carry personal messages to Kennedy from the Soviet Premiere. Kruschev used the Fromin-Scali channel to bypass his Central Committee who were determined to keep the missiles in Cuba unless the US gave in on moving its missiles out of Turkey. Kennedy eventually gave in to that demand (along with guaranteeing Cuban sovereignty by promising not to invade) but got the Soviets to keep that part of the deal quiet.

Scali later said that while he was troubled by being used in this manner by both governments, he fully recognized the stakes involved and was therefore willing to act as a go between.

While this second diplomatic track using Time Magazine doesn’t have quite the drama of Scali’s secret diplomacy, it could prove to be just as crucial in getting the US and Iran to the bargaining table to head off a confrontation that would result in untold consequences for the region, and for both Iran and the United States.

UPDATE

Marc Schulman has an extremely detailed posting on what exactly was in that second letter as well as some quotes from people who (unlike me) know what the heck they’re talking about:

William Samii, the longtime senior Iran analyst at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, says this:

Mr. Samii seems rather incurious that the Iranian President is having his legs cut off by the Supreme Leader, especially given what Ahmadinejad has been up to in the last few months with his various purges. What Samii seems to be saying is that the Iranian government has split in two - just ignore our President and deal instead with the Supreme Leader Khameini.

Is he saying we can reach some kind of agreement with him and ignore whatever Ahmadinejad says? What the heck is going on in Iran?

Why is it when the world’s thugs, tyrants, madmen, and dictators open their yaps and attack the United States, they sound like someone who’s hacked the Democratic National Committee mainframe and downloaded Howard Dean’s next speech?

The reasons might surprise you. First and foremost, liberal talking points about America are a perfect fit for the victimology used by these galoots to assure their own people that being poor, oppressed, ignorant, and a slave to superstition is not really their own damn fault but rather their plight is due to the evil machinations of Bush, the CIA, and the Zionist Neo-conservative monsters who control America. This is standard boilerplate for the dictators of the world who can claim legitimacy in this regard thanks to a compliant and agreeable media here in this country.

And that’s the second reason the world’s troublemakers use Democratic party talking points when skewering America; they know that their critique will get wide distribution in this, the most media saturated nation on earth. The fact is, they are counting on their allies on the western left to absorb their critique and then regurgitate it into harmless sounding bromides which reflect the essence of their diatribes while making the criticisms more palatable by dressing them up in the language of victimhood and brotherhood.

In short, the world’s bad guys have figured out that the best way to affect American policy and politics is to parrot the rot that emanates from the left on a daily basis.

The liberals deny this, of course, In fact, they get downright apoplectic if you even mention it. But the evidence is there for anyone with half a brain to see. From Osama Bin Laden’s cutsie references to Fahrenheit 911 in his pre-election message, to this latest screamer from Iranian President Ahmadinejad, whose letter to the President could almost have been written (sans the kooky religious overtones) by Noam Chomsky or Ward Churchill, the tyrants of the world seem to have picked up on the fact that they have natural allies in the west who oppose the United States for exactly the same reasons they do.

For example, before even knowing the contents of the letter, Kevin Drum instructed us in what it really meant:

But I guess the interesting question is whether the Bush administration wants to talk with Iran. We know they didn’t want to three years ago, and we also know that the recently proposed talks about Iraq haven’t gotten anywhere, but maybe it’s different this time. After all, they aren’t quite on top of the world the way they thought they were in 2003, and there is a midterm election coming up. It’s just barely possible that if Bush thinks talks could make some kind of progress in the next few months that it might help his chances in November.

But probably not. The Bushies are far more likely to view the Iranian offer as either a trick or a sign of weakness, and the smart money says the Iranians get turned down. Besides, there’s a slim chance the talks might succeed, and what happens to our plans to bomb them back into the stone age then?

Is it coincidence or proof of my thesis that a government mouthpiece at Tehran University echoed Mr. Drum’s comments:

“It would be a big mistake if the United States dismissed it or if they only consider it as a philosophical, religious, historical letter,” Nasser Hadian, a political science professor at Tehran University, said by telephone. “It would be a good idea if President Bush responds to it. It can open up some space.”

Respond to what? This?

“Those with insight can already hear the sounds of the shattering and fall of the ideology and thoughts of the liberal democratic systems,” Mr. Ahmadinejad wrote.

If that sounds familiar, Hitler said something similar:

Hitler: “Thus democracy will in practice lead to the destruction of a people’s true values. And this also serves to explain how it is that people with a great past from the time when they surrender themselves to the unlimited, democratic rule of the masses slowly lose their former position.”

Far be it from me to compare Hitler with the left (although reading his rants against the Soviet Union is an interesting exercise in rhetorical comparisons when you substitute “Republican” for “Communist”), but there are some truly remarkable similarities between the language used in Ahmadinejad’s insufferably arrogant lecture and criticisms of Bush and the US government that you can read any day of the week on Daily Kos:

“Sept. 11 was not a simple operation,” he wrote. “Could it be planned and executed without coordination with intelligences and security services, or with extensive infiltration? Of course, this is just an educated guess. Why have the various aspects of the attacks been kept secret?”

[...]

But he asks: “Why have the various aspects of the attacks been kept secret? Why are we not told who botched their responsibilities? And, why aren’t those responsible and the guilty parties identified and put on trial?”

Like any smart 9/11 conspiracy loon, Ahmadinejad couches his accusations in the form of a question, thus inoculating himself against charges of being a nutcase while at the same time, raising a straw man that is impossible to knock down. And anyone familiar with the 2004 Presidential campaign recognizes the rhetoric as coming from the same people (Representative Cynthia McKinney) that the “whole story” of 9/11 is being deliberately withheld from the American people.

Meanwhile, the media is playing their role perfectly. The Associated Press is enthusiastic that this insulting, arrogant, self-serving missive from Ahmadinejad is actually the theocrat’s way of showing he only wants to be our friend - if only the US would stop being so mean to the despots, the mass murderers, and brutes of the world:

In places, he strikes a soft, almost fatherly stance. On its first page, Ahmadinejad strikes a tone of a man who is troubled by a friend’s actions and decides to sit down and give him a little advice.

He later casts himself as a humble teacher and man of faith who mingles with students and common people.

Uh…okay dad. Mind if I borrow the car tonight and oh, by the way, do you have an extra $50 for gas?

Not to be outdone, the New York Times informs us that the President’s belief in Christianity should make him a soul brother of the Iranian President:

While the letter laid out a litany of policy disputes with the United States, it was also personal, urging President Bush, who is candid about his religious conviction, to examine his actions in the light of Christian values. As he has done in the past, the Iranian struck a prophetic tone, which is certain to be well received by his core supporters and mocked by his opponents.

Of course, this is the talking point of talking points for the left; that Bush is a hypocrite because his professed belief in Christianity is at odds with his warlike actions. The fact that the President’s loyalty to the United States should conflict with his belief in “turning the other cheek” or any other Christan platitude is a sure sign that Bush does not allow his faith to dictate American security interests, which makes him directly the opposite of the religious fanatic who currently runs Iran.

There is very little commentary on the left so far about not only what the letter means but what’s in it. This is hardly surprising. When an American hater like Ahmadinejad starts sounding exactly like the President’s opponents, it pays not to advertise that fact for reasons of electoral survival.

But if I were a lefty, I wouldn’t worry. After all, most of the media has your back on this issue and will be extraordinarily careful in not mentioning the similarities between you and a deadly enemy of the United States.

UPDATE II

Stanley Renshon has a fascinating psycological/political take on Ahmadinejad’s letter - which shouldn’t be surprising because Renshon is a political psychologist.

A sampling:

It’s not only that the letter is framed in large religious and political terms like “needs of humanity,” “rational behavior, logic, ethics, peace, fulfilling obligations, justice, service to the people, progress, property, service to the people, prosperity, progress and respect for human dignity,” and calls on Mr. Bush to “follow the teaching of divine prophets.” Words like peace; justice, progress and prosperity have many meanings of course. However, in Mr. Ahmadinejad’s view they all lead in one direction—that Mr. Bush and the United States have, by their behavior both at home and abroad strayed from the path of virtue as defined by Mr. Ahmadinejad and reaped the just rewards of world hated as a result.

Read the whole thing.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahamdinejad may be in trouble.

The Associated Press is reporting this morning that the radical firebrand sent a letter to George Bush through the Swiss embassy, the first direct communication between the Iranians and Americans in 27 years:

Iran’s president has written to President Bush proposing ”new solutions” to their differences, a spokesman in Tehran said Monday.

Government spokesman Gholam-Hossein Elham said the letter would be the first in 27 years from an Iranian leader to an American president.

The letter was sent via the Swiss Embassy, which hosts a U.S. interests section in Tehran, Elham told a news conference.

The United States has had no diplomatic relations with Iran since the 1979 storming of the American Embassy in Tehran.

No doubt there will be much more on this today as the story unfolds. But given Ahmadinejad’s recent rhetoric, I hardly think this letter was his idea. Which could mean some of the slightly less radical but still virulently anti-American, anti-West elements in the Iranian government may have temporarily at least, achieved the upper hand and have forced this course of action on the Iranian President.

Could all the war talk in Washington have spooked the mullahs and forced them to rein in their wild-eyed creation? Trying to glean much from a wire service story is an exercise in pure speculation but we can make some intelligent guesses based on what we know has been happening in Iran over the last few months as Ahmadinejad has been at war with a faction led by former President Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjami:

The more pragmatic Iranian leaders, headed by former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, while in principle supporting continuation of the [nuclear] program, believe that Iran must refrain from antagonizing the West, particularly the U.S., over its nuclear activities. They are more inclined to reach a deal worked out by the three leading EU countries, the United Kingdom, France and Germany, rather than relying on Russian and Chinese support at the Security Council. They believe that the extent of trade and economic ties these two countries have with the U.S. and the EU is critical; confronted with serious pressure from the U.S., both Russia and China might withdraw their support for Iran and leave the Islamic regime out in the cold. Meanwhile, Iran has to provide both countries with lucrative deals to compensate for their support.

The deal with the EU may not initially offer Iran a great deal. But in the long run, by convincing the Europeans that Iran is serious in not wishing to develop nuclear weapons, we can benefit a great deal more than by relying on Russia and China. Moreover the EU, particularly the U.K., has far more leverage over Washington than do Russia and China together.

The above was written by Sadegh Zibakalam, a political science professor at Tehran University and a recognized spokesman for the less radical, more internationalist faction in Iran. Appearing as it does in today’s Daily Star, the editorial offers other clues that the Rafsanjani faction, which in many ways represents the Iranian “establishment,” may be in the ascendancy thanks to a combination of US saber rattling and Ahmadinejad’s own miscalculations regarding the radicalization of Iranian society:

In contrast, the hard-liners, headed by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, advocate a more hawkish approach to the country’s nuclear program. Initially, Ahmadinejad’s disapproval of the way the Iranian team had been negotiating with the Western powers was implicit, but he soon began criticizing the ex-negotiators very openly. Rouhani and his colleagues initially showed constraint and did not respond to Ahmadinejad’s criticisms; eventually however, they lost patience and replied.

They defended their tactics throughout the two years of negotiating with the EU-3, including the two-year voluntary freeze on the country’s enrichment program. The moderates further criticized Ahmadinejad’s comments about Israel and the Holocaust. One reformist newspaper even went so far as to accuse Ahmadinejad of trying deliberately to provoke the U.S. Without naming the president, the newspaper wrote that “it appears that some of our leaders are trying to use the country’s nuclear issue as a tool to score points against the Great Satan. While every effort ought to be undertaken to alleviate U.S. fears about our nuclear program, some of our leaders are in fact behaving in exactly the opposite direction.” Ahmadinejad eventually replaced Rouhani with Ali Larijani.

The future of American-Iranian relations concerning Iran’s nuclear program depends in part on the outcome of the quiet struggle that is unfolding between hard-liners and moderates within the Iranian leadership.

Ahmadinejad’s cleansing of what he sees as “moderate” influences in the foreign service and the ministries did not sit well with the pragmatists who saw their main piplelines that enabled their power (not to mention cutting off their access to ill gotten gains; Rafsanjani is considered the richest man in Iran - not something one achieves on a government salary) closed off to them.

If Ahmadinejad has indeed proposed “new solutions” to deal with the Iranian nuclear program, it had better be more than mere atmospherics. The issues between the US and Iran go far beyond nuclear weapons and having Tehran address their meddling in Iraq, their support for Hizbollah in Lebanon which is a major obstruction to democracy in that country, as well as their support for Hamas would seem to be a prerequisite before any serious rapprochement could happen.

I would hate to see this letter rejected out of hand. But given the Iranian President’s track record, I’m sure Washington will be extremely cautious about responding positively to anything Ahmadinejad has to say.

According to the Sunday Times of London, a senior Israeli intelligence official has recently briefed Washington on the possibility that Iran is much farther along in developing nuclear weapons than previously believed:

The attack on President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has called for Israel to be “wiped off the map”, came as it emerged that the head of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, secretly discussed the nuclear programme with officials in Washington last week.

Meir Dagan, the Mossad chief, is believed to have passed on the latest Israeli intelligence on covert Iranian plans for enriching uranium, with a warning that Tehran may be nearer to acquiring nuclear weapons than widely believed.

[...]

Dagan, a stocky former commando who was injured in the 1967 six-day war, was sent to Washington by Olmert, the victor of last month’s Israeli elections, to prepare the way for his own visit to the White House on May 23. The Mossad boss is thought to have held meetings with counterparts at the CIA, the Pentagon and national security council. “Dagan is not given to small talk and niceties,” said an Israeli intelligence source, who believes he told the Americans: “This is what we know and this is what we’ll do if you continue to do nothing.”

The Washington Times reports on the meeting with Dagan and quotes Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert who appears to be the only world leader willing to stand up and tell the truth about the fanatical Iranian leader President Ahmadinejad:

Mr. Olmert, in a weekend interview with the German newspaper Bild, denounced Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in some of the strongest language yet heard from an Israeli leader.

“Ahmadinejad talks today like Hitler spoke before seizing power,” Mr. Olmert was quoted as saying. “We are dealing with a psychopath of the worst kind, with an anti-Semite. God forbid this man from ever getting his hands on nuclear weapons.”

Olmert misspoke. Hitler spoke about Czechoslovakia exactly the same way that Ahmadinejad talks about Israel after he seized power. In fact, not since Der Fuhrer was giving his impassioned orations dripping with venom against his faux enemies before his henchmen in the Reichstag has a leader of a major power talked about wiping a country “off the map.” Clearly, the Israelis are worried.

But how significant is it that the head of the Mossad would come to Washington to brief the CIA about an accelerated Iranian nuke program?

The fact that we haven’t had any leaks about this meeting prior to this weekend probably means that it strengthens the President’s case and weakens the case of his detractors. I’m sorry for sounding so cynical but the culture of leaking at the CIA would almost by definition mean that if Mossad was telling the CIA something at odds with what the White House had been saying, it would have been in print at either the New York Times or the Washington Post within a couple of days. The fact that this leak appeared in the Sunday Times and was apparently from the Mossad and not the CIA is also significant.

As far as its significance to our Iran policy, it should add more urgency to an already urgent cause. We are far from running out of diplomatic options, but before any peaceful solution can be found, the revelations by the Israelis (which dovetail with other reports leaked from the IAEA regarding Iraqi centrifuge upgrades) should require us to at the very least insist upon full disclosure by the Iranians of their entire nuclear program, including any military parts that we believe are active. This “two track” nuclear program was almost dismissed in the leaked portions of the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran’s nuclear capability that came to light last summer. Perhaps its time for our clueless spooks to take another long, hard look at that aspect of the Iranian program.

We need a little more urgency in our negotiations with the Europeans as well as trying to shake the Russians and the Chinese to stop their obstructionist policies and get on the sanctions bandwagon. It may be time to name a special emissary of some kind who could work full time on these issues.

Too bad we’re sending James Baker to Iraq…

I missed all the fun this past weekend piling on poor Maryscott O’Connor when the pajama-clad left/dom exploded from the pages of the Washington Post onto righty blogs as the poster girl for the Daffy Duck left.

First, I was happy to see that we have one thing in common; we both smoke when we write. Longtime readers of this site know that when I prepare for my muse to take me in her arms and stroke me (yes…it’s THAT kind of relationship friends), I brew a strong pot of fresh bean coffee (this time of day I prefer either Kona or a Jamaican blend) and carefully place a freshly opened pack of Basic 100’s Full Flavor cigarettes within easy reach. The two - coffee and cigarettes - go together like sex and Barry White. And when in the throes of creative ecstasy, watching as the words writhe effortlessly (or tortuously) on the monitor in front of me, I unconsciously caress one cigarette after another, drawing the smoke deep into my lungs and exhaling a Murrowesque cloud of thoughtful, wisdom drenched, aromatic vapors.

If I can’t write like Murrow, at least I kinda smell like him.

Anyway, Maryscott sure sounded angry, didn’ she? Doc Sanity should make a housecall on this fruit and nut cake. Failing that, I think the poor woman needs a gigantic hug from all of us righties who make her life so miserable, day after day.

But Maryscott has the advantage of being in possession of at least half a brain. Poor Jim Carroll of the Boston Globe has not been vouchsafed such a luxury:

LAST WEEK, the rattling of sabers filled the air. Various published reports, most notably one from Seymour M. Hersh in The New Yorker, indicated that Washington is removing swords from scabbards and heightening the threat aimed at Iran, which refuses to suspend its nuclear project. It may be that such reports, based on alarming insider accounts of planning and military exercises, are themselves part of Washington’s strategy of coercive diplomacy. But who can trust the Bush administration to play games of feint and intimidation without unleashing forces it cannot control, stumbling again into disastrous confrontation?

An Iranian official dismissed the talk of imminent US military action as mere psychological warfare, but then he made a telling observation. Instead of attributing the escalations of threat to strategic impulses, the official labeled them a manifestation of ”Americans’ anger and despair.”

The phrase leapt out of the news report, demanding to be taken seriously. I hadn’t considered it before, but anger and despair so precisely define the broad American mood that those emotions may be the only things that President Bush and his circle have in common with the surrounding legions of his antagonists. We are in anger and despair because every nightmare of which we were warned has come to pass. Bush’s team is in anger and despair because their grand and — to them — selfless ambitions have been thwarted at every turn. Indeed, anger and despair can seem universally inevitable responses to what America has done and what it faces now.

“Rattling of sabers”…”removing swords from scabbards”… It sounds like Mr. Carroll has accidentally stumbled onto a game of Dungeons and Dragons. And the fact that “every nightmare of which we were warned has come to pass” would make things pretty dicey for us if only someone would please tell us 1) which nightmares are Carroll talking about and 2) who did the warning?

This is called hyperbole. Writers use it in lieu of outright lying when trying to sound like they know what they’re talking about. Not only does it give them a privileged frame of reference (Am I the only one who racked my brain frantically trying to conjure up which nightmares he was talking about and which one of 10,000 unhinged lefties might have warned us about them?) but it certainly does heighten the drama, doesn’t it?

Except, of course, this is not a screenplay, it’s a newspaper column. Or is it? Mr. Carroll’s psychological analysis of the Bush Administration’s “anger and despair” as well as our own “anger and despair” (I guess “anger and despair” are lethally contagious) makes it seem as if rather than appearing on the OpEd page, Carroll’s screed might have better been published in another venue more suited to his penetrating amateur psychoanalyzing.

I guess Mad Magazine didn’t have the space available.

Mr. Carroll explains:

While the anger and despair of those on the margins of power only increase the experience of marginal powerlessness, the anger and despair of those who continue to shape national policy can be truly dangerous if such policy owes more to these emotions than to reasoned realism. Is such affective disarray subliminally shaping the direction of US policy? That seems an impudent question. Yet all at once, like an out-of-focus lens snapping into clarity, it makes sense of what is happening. With the US military already stressed to an extreme in Iraq by challenges from a mainly Sunni insurgency, why in the world would Washington risk inflaming the Shi’ite population against us by wildly threatening Iran?

But such a thing happened before. It was the Bush administration’s anger and despair at its inability to capture Osama bin Laden that fueled the patent irrationality of the move against Saddam Hussein. The attack on Iraq three years ago was, at bottom, a blind act of rage at the way Al Qaeda and its leaders had eluded us in Afghanistan; a blindness that showed itself at once in the inadequacy of US war planning. Now, with Iran, nuclear weapons are at issue. And yet look at the self-defeating irrationality of the Bush team’s maneuvering. How do we hope to pressure Tehran into abandoning its nuclear project? Why, by making our threat explicitly nuclear.

OH FOR GOD’S SAKE!

I’m trying very hard not to lose control, a task made nearly impossible when reading such imbecilic, idiotic drivel.

The attack on Iraq three years ago was, at bottom, a blind act of rage at the way Al Qaeda and its leaders had eluded us in Afghanistan; a blindness that showed itself at once in the inadequacy of US war planning.

You’ll have to excuse me while I wipe my monitor of the spittle that exploded from my sputtering mouth, which occurred just prior to my jaw hitting the floor and starting to dig.

“At bottom” nothing. Say it was for oil. Say it was to avenge Saddam’s attempted assassination of his father. Say it was to get his buddies at Haliburton richer. Say it was because Bush knew there were no WMD’s but invaded anyway to help him win re-election.

Posit any crackpot, confused, moonbat theory about why we invaded Iraq. But to say that “at bottom” the invasion was an “act of blind rage” is mindless. The notion has no basis in fact whatsoever, There is not a shred of proof for it.

Proof? Proof? We don’t need no stinkin’ proof. We’ve got Jimbo Carroll and his Travelling Pseudo-Psychoanalytical Crystal Ball to look into the souls of men and tell us what they’re really thinking and feeling. And, of course, that special insight granted to only the purest of liberals who, after all, only have our best interests at heart and a desire to tell us what it all means.

And is this guy serious about “the inadequacy of US war planning” in Afghanistan? We did in a couple of months what the second most powerful army in the history of human civilization - the Soviet Military - couldn’t accomplish in a decade! And this represents “inadequacy in US war planning?” Get. A. Grip.

It’s almost as if Carroll has ensconced himself in an alternate imaginary universe, oblivious to the reality in this one, skipping along with his head in the clouds and his foot in his mouth, spouting his lunacies without realizing that the inhabitants of the real world look upon him as we would a masturbating monkey in the zoo; with a mix of curiosity and embarrassment.

More words of wisdom from our Flatulently Freudian Flim-Flam Fakir:

As if that were not irrational enough, the Bush administration chose this month, in the thick of its nuclear standoff with Tehran, to reveal plans for a new nuclear weapons manufacturing complex of its own — a major escalation of US nuclear capacity. This represents a movement away from merely maintaining our thousands of warheads to replacing them. The promise of new bombs to come, including the so-called bunker-buster under development, may be the final nail in the coffin of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which binds Washington to work for the elimination of nukes, not their enhancement.

Set the cauldron of Iraq to boiling even hotter by daring Iran to join in against us. Justify Iran’s impulse to obtain nuclear capacity by using our own nuclear capacity as a thermo-prod. How self-defeating can our actions get?

Surely, something besides intelligent strategic theory is at work here. Yes. These are the policies of deeply frustrated, angry, and psychologically wounded people. Those of us who oppose them will yield to our own versions of anger and despair at our peril, and the world’s. Fierce but reasoned opposition is more to the point than ever.

“Nuclear standoff?” Um…that would require two states to possess the demon weapons, something that may come to pass sooner rather than later but is not the case at present. Therefore, Carroll can drop the dramatic pretensions anytime he wishes.

As for our “bunker busters,” those have been in development for more than a decade which means that the former Commander in Chief William Jefferson Clinton also signed off on their development. Was he suffering from “anger and despair” too?

Building new nukes and retiring old ones is not against the NPT or START nor is it considered provocative except by anyone but liberals like Carroll who view any attempt by the United States to defend itself as “provocative” by default. I guess when someone says that they wish to destroy you while in the midst of racing to build weapons that can accomplish that task, we should avoid provocations like improving our ability to stop a bunch of maniacs from bringing about the end times.

The hysterics on the left about the United States using nuclear weapons has a kind of breathless, gossipy quality to it - sort of like a bunch of 13 year old girls talking about sex at a sleepover: “And then he kissed me and I got all mushy inside…OOOOOH.” It’s as if the mere discussion of the subject is both exciting and forbidden at the same time while giving the writer a special thrill to be in virgin territory. It’s not going to happen. To believe that there is one chance in a million of it happening is ignorant. Or it is a deliberate attempt to add to the “Bush is evil” theme that seems to be lefty writer’s favorite pastime.

Carroll is not a serious man. And to write a column so full of laughable postulates about the inner motivations of the Bush Administration is to reveal a either a writer who is extremely bored with himself or, more likely, unconsciously transferring his own “anger and despair” onto his enemies.

Wonder what Dr. Sanity would have to say about that?

UPDATE

Jonah Goldberg:

The week the deranged president of Iran again calls for the annihilation of Israel and once again denies the Holocaust ever happpened James Carroll draws the only logical conclusion: Bush is a lunatic and this administration is run by “deeply frustrated, angry, and psychologically wounded people.”

That about covers it…

Jawdropper of the day is from Bilmon of the site Whiskey Bar who, it turns out, is a very silly person. In fact, given the level of silliness in this post about the right and “Munich,” as well as some truly funny misconceptions, obfuscations, misrepresentations, relativistic meanderings, and demonstrably lazy thinking, my BS-O-Meter ticked wildly upward to the point that I felt the gentleman needed to have his proverbial clock cleaned so that the record (if anyone cares about such an arcane matter as history) can be set straight.

This is getting to be something of a regular feature at The House, sort of like a daily horoscope except it doesn’t appear daily and a horoscope contains more ultimate truth than anything found on liberal websites. For some reason, my takedowns of David Neiwert, Glenn Greenwald, and other lefties always seems to occur on the weekends. Thus, a tradition is born. It’s almost like my other weekend tradition of making myself hamburgers every Saturday night for dinner except there’s a helluva lot less meat in liberal “Here’s what’s evil about the right” posts.

I actually agree with Mr. Bilmon’s initial postulate; it is silly to compare the Allied surrender at Munich with doing nothing about Iran. The trouble is, no one was doing that. In fact, as I pointed out here, Bill Kristol of the Weekly Standard took another “road to World War II” moment - the German re-militarization of the Rhineland - and tried to stretch that dubious analogy to cover our inaction regarding Iran’s drive for nuclear weapons. Bilmon gets around to pointing that out but not until he makes a fool of himself criticizing the right for bringing the specter of “a feeble old man standing on an airport tarmac, holding an umbrella in one hand and waving a meaningless scrap of paper in the other.”

As I said earlier, no one has brought up the Munich simile except Mr. Bilmon. What Hugh Hewitt, Bill Kristol, and others were tortuously trying to say by bringing up the re-occupation of the Rhineland was to point out that if the French and British had acted while the balance of forces were so immensely heavy in their favor, Hitler would have been forced into a humiliating retreat that probably would have meant his being deposed by the German army. In my post debunking Kristol, I point out that, in fact, France was not entirely opposed to the notion of a strengthened Germany given that most western democracies saw Stalin’s Soviet Union as the real threat to world peace.

What makes the Munich analogy even more problematic (probably the reason no one on the right has used it) is that by 1938 and the Czechoslovakian crisis, that balance of forces had been redressed considerably by Germany. And while the combined armies of Britain, France, and the Czechs could have ultimately defeated Hitler, the cost would have been infinitely greater than simply pushing the two measly brigades that Hitler marched into the demilitarized zone back a few dozen miles.

Mr. Bilmon must have had Munich on the brain which is the reason for the obvious disconnect. Or perhaps he was making an obscure point about “The Road to Munich” which was a long chapter in Shirer’s Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. Either way, it’s idiotic. Curious that Bilmon heads a paragraph “Party like it’s 1938″ and then reveals that, in fact, his right wing targets were talking about the Rhineland occupation which occurred in 1936. But we better not tell Mr. Bilmon that. He’s on a roll about Munich and the wrong lessons being drawn by the right about the singular failure of will on the part of the British. And once a liberal gets on a roll (even if he’s laughably wrong) one might as well try and stop Teddy Kennedy from crashing “Dollar Draught” night at the “Coyote Ugly” bar.

Speaking of ugly, here is what passes for deep thought by Mr. Bilmon regarding his analysis of that elfish Iranian trickster, President Ahmadinejad:

“…[W]hile the by-now stock comparison between Ahmadinejad and Hitler is absurd militarily, politically it’s not nearly as far fetched as the normal run of Orwellian newspeak.

I don’t say this because of Ahmadinejad’s Holocaust denials or his public fantasies about Israel being wiped off the map. I certainly don’t dismiss those remarks. I’m keenly aware that all too many “sensible” observers (most of them on the political right) dismissed Hitler’s Mein Kampf ravings as merely a carny act to bring in the rubes. But I also know that firebreathing rhetoric about destroying the “Zionist entity” has been a staple of Middle Eastern political hate speech since Nasser’s time if not before – just as talk about nuking Mecca has become an occasional feature of American political hate speech. I take such talk seriously, and I think everybody should, but I don’t automatically assume that those who say such things are actually planning to commit genocide.

No, Ahmadinejad’s resemblance to Hitler – and the reason why I find him a legitimately scary guy – is more a function of his role in the decay of the Iranian revolution, which is starting to take on some definite Weimer overtones.

“Public fantasies” about destroying Israel that he “certainly [doesn't] dismiss?”

Talk about Orwellian doublespeak! They are either fantasies or something not to be dismissed. Which is it and why undercut their brutality by referring to them as fantasies in the first place? And as long as you brought up my soul brotha Adolf Hitler, has there been the leader of a sovereign state since Der Fuhrer who has spoken so brazenly about the destruction of a neighbor? But of course, after telling us he doesn’t dismiss such rhetoric, he then proceeds to do so by comparing Ahmadinejad’s threats to destroy Israel with some of our mouthbreathers on the right who call for nuking Mecca (Representative Tancredo called for nuking Mecca in response to an Islamic nuclear weapon being detonated on American soil which is a far cry from Ahmadinejad’s threat to destroy Israel without provocation).

I know it must have escaped Mr. Bilmon in all the hustle and bustle of smearing conservatives but I wonder if he happened to notice that President Ahmadinejad is the leader of a nation working to get its hands on nuclear weapons while the mouthbreathers are leaders of their local beer chugging club - a slight but significant difference when talking about being able to “nuke” anyone. Even if Bilmon can come up with more significant examples of conservative cluelessness about nuking Mecca, no American President with his finger on the nuclear trigger has been quoted as saying any such thing.

And by taking the default position that we shouldn’t “automatically assume that those who say such things are actually planning to commit genocide,” Mr. Bilmon gives us a perfect illustration as to why no one will ever trust the left with American national security (except perhaps in extremis given the current crew’s continuing cluelessness about homeland security) until Bilmon et. al. turn that statement around 180 degrees: In a post 9/11 world we must automatically assume the worst.

This, of course, is the chasm between 9/10 liberals and 9/12 conservatives (”neo” or not). This is not the place nor do I have the inclination today to rehash the entire pre-war debate about pre-emption or Saddam’s support for terror groups which are becoming more obvious with every revelation contained in the Saddam documents and notwithstanding Peter Bergen putting his hands over his ears and screaming “NEENER, NEENER, NEENER.” The point being that there is a threat of mass casualty terrorist attacks carried out by enemies of the United States and nothing and nobody should be overlooked nor the threat downplayed as just some political ploy by the party in power.

I would hope that if the left regains the White House in 2008, we on the right never question the chief executive about moves he or she might make to protect us. And please don’t throw Clinton’s questionable military moves during his impeachment troubles up in my face. The last I looked 1998 comes before September 11, 2001 on the calendar.

Bilmon then goes into a long, mostly correct analysis of what Seymour Hersh referred to as Ahmadinejad’s “white coup” that has changed the face of the Iranian government. Instead of radical theocrats turned inward toward oppressing their own people, Ahmadinejad and his allies have overturned the status quo by kicking out the corrupt, established order and installed fanatics. Mr. Bilmon almost gets to the truth in this passage:

In his recent New Yorker article, Sy Hersh calls this Ahmadinejad’s “white coup,” and cites a recent wave of forced resignations in the Foreign Ministry. More importantly, key Revolutionary Guard commanders also have been turning up dead – like the dozen or so who died in a plane crash last December. Some are said to have been leading opponents of Ahmadinejad.

(Update 10:10 pm ET: I should have been more circumspect here. It isn’t clear whether the RG officers who died where enemies or allies of Ahmadinejad. Nor is there hard evidence that the crash was due to an act of sabotage. It is reasonably clear, however, that a subterranean power struggle is under way inside Iran, and that Ahmadinejad’s moves to consolidate power are at the center of it.)

It isn’t hard to see some ominous parallels here. A Marxist would probably say Ahmadinejad is playing the classic Bonapartist role: taking advantage of a political stalemate between social classes to forge a personal dictatorship. Or maybe he’s just the inevitable product of an authoritarian system in terminal decline, like Milosevic in Yugoslavia. Or maybe he’s really only explicable in Iranian terms.

I don’t know. But Ahmadinejad’s combination of demogogic appeal, ideological zealotry and end-times eschatology does make him a much more plausible stand-in for Hitler than an apparachik like Milosevic or a thug like Saddam. Even Juan Cole – hardly a neocon sympathizer – has called Ahmadinejad “essentially fascist.”

Ahmadinejad’s purge was not confined to the Foreign Ministry. Every part of government has undergone a shake-up, replacing radicals with fanatics. In fact, this has been happening for years in both the Assembly of Experts (the body who supposedly oversees the office of the Supreme Leader but who, in actuality have become much more radicalized under Khamenei’s rule) and the Guardian Council whose handpicked members rule on the constitutionality of laws passed by the legislature.

It is unclear whether the “purification” of the Iranian revolution has the complete backing of the Supreme Leader. But it is equally clear that he could put a stop to it if he wanted to. The resistance to Ahmadinejad has coalesced around two disparate personalities; former Presidents Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani (who might be said to represent the “old guard” of the revolution) and Mohammad Khatami who has been described in the western press as a “moderate” which means that he didn’t want to murder quite as many innocent Iranian civilians as his predecessors. Both men wholeheartedly supported the secret Iranian nuclear program with Rafsanjani making the initial moves during his first term as President.

All this points to big trouble. Even if the Supreme Leader tires of Ahmadinejad’s pulling the tail of the lion and replaces him, the chances are very good it will be with either one of the gentlemen mentioned above. The Iranian nuclear program would continue apace only this time, without the overblown rhetorical swipes at the west. This will make it extraordinarily easy for the Iranians to drive a wedge between us and our European allies who are looking desperately for a way to avoid a confrontation and would leap at the chance of pretending to negotiate with a “reasonable” Iranian leader. Of course, in practical terms this means that Iran would probably have a bomb by the end of the decade.

Finally, after once again carrying on his lonely crusade in raising the specter of Munich (since no one on the right has done so lately) Bilmon brings up a “missed opportunity” that the Iranians gave us in 2003. He quotes from a piece by a former Bush White House national security insider who says we missed a big chance to make an accommodation with the mullahs:

In the spring of 2003, shortly before I left government, the Iranian Foreign Ministry sent Washington a detailed proposal for comprehensive negotiations to resolve bilateral differences. The document acknowledged that Iran would have to address concerns about its weapons programs and support for anti-Israeli terrorist organizations. It was presented as having support from all major players in Iran’s power structure, including the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei . . . Unfortunately, the administration’s response was to complain that the Swiss diplomats who passed the document from Tehran to Washington were out of line.

But this side of the story really goes back further, to the Clinton administration’s dithering response to the blossoming of the Iranian democracy movement in the late ’90s and the 2000 presidential victory of moderate reformer Mohammad Khatami.

The opportunity for detente was out there, but the Clintonites were utterly intimidated by our own hardliners – not least the ones in their own party – and never developed a coherent policy either to engage the reformers or challenge their opponents.

Every meaningful “reform” initiated by President Khatami was either blocked by the legislature or invalidated by the Guardian Council. And these were not earth shattering changes; basic issues like women being able to walk around without being clubbed by Revolutionary Guard religious enforcers and allowing opposition newspapers to publish something critical of the regime every once and a while.

How US engagement with Iranians would have changed this one iota is wishful thinking or worse, a refusal to recognize the true nature of the regime regardless of whether a “reformer” or a fanatic is President. Liberals get all doe-eyed and squishy when it comes to talking with nutcases like Ahmadinejad or that frequent overnighter at the White House Yasser Arafat. They believe that if they talk long enough and persuasively enough, they can change these gimlet eyed radicals into reasonable people.

One more reason to distrust the left with the security of the country.

If that’s not enough, how about this curious case of Bilmon blaming the Bush (”Cheney”) Administration for not accommodating the Iranians who approached us with open arms:

The irony is that the point when America was in the best possible position to dictate a deal (an ultimatum, really) to the Iranians – after the fall of Baghdad three years ago – was also the point when the Cheney administration was least willing to even think about negotiations. Such is the price of hubris. Given what’s happened since then, is it any surprise that the uranium “crisis” – and Ahmadinejad’s defiance – have only boosted his political popularity and clout?

Ahmadinejad doesn’t need Bush to be defiant. After saying that the Iranian President’s rhetoric should be taken seriously earlier, here Bimon seems to be saying that it’s Bush’s fault Ahmadinejad is throwing nuclear spitballs at the White House. Which is it?

And can you imagine the reaction of Bilmon, the left, and the entire State Department to an American demarche to Iran in the form of a veiled ultimatum? This is why people like Bilmon cannot be taken seriously. Heads he and the left win; tails, Bush loses.

And this is what passes for deep thought on the left.

Even though I agree with some of what Bilmon says regarding the current crisis, as is usual with the left, faux analogies, exaggerated rhetoric, false assumptions, and an uncanny ability to obfuscate the truth by exhibiting a blind hatred of all things Bush makes even their most trenchant analysis ring more hollow than the chocolate Easter Bunny I plan on eating with my hamburger tonight.

In his Wednesday column, David Ignatius has a cautionary tale about conflict with Iran that is chilling in its implications for the future. He asks if the situation with Iranian nuclear ambitions is analogous to what President John F. Kennedy faced with the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 and if there are any “lessons” that can be learned from our experience in facing down the Russians during that crucial 13 days in October.

I do not believe much in “learning” from history in this fashion. History’s broad sweep precludes such lessons drawn from specific events such as the Missile Crisis, a once in a generation confrontation between superpowers. The currents that make up the ebb and flow of historical forces also have changed radically since that time as the forces of democracy, globalization, and capitalism are in the ascendancy - the exact opposite of what was occurring in the early 1960’s as the Soviet model was sweeping across Africa, establishing a toehold in Asia, and even being dallied with in Latin America.

Kennedy saw the challenge which is why he thought Viet Nam so important. Increasing American advisers from Eisenhower’s 850 to an eventual total of 16,500 before he died, Kennedy saw Viet Nam as the last chance for the west to establish a credible deterrent to the expansion of the Soviet model in the third world.

And we know where that led.

Ignatius describes a valuable atmospheric surrounding the Missile Crisis; the way Kennedy reached his decision:

Kennedy’s genius was to reject the Cuba options proposed by his advisers, hawk and dove alike, and choose his own peculiar outside-the-box strategy. He issued a deadline but privately delayed it; he answered a first, flexible message from Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev but not a second unyielding one; he said he would never take U.S. missiles out of Turkey, as the Soviets were demanding, and then secretly did precisely that. Disaster was avoided because Khrushchev believed Kennedy was willing to risk war — but wanted to avoid it.

The Bush administration needs to be engaged in a similar exercise in creative thinking. The military planners will keep looking for targets (as they must, in a confrontation this serious). But Bush’s advisers — and most of all, the president himself — must keep searching for ways to escape the inexorable logic that is propelling America and Iran toward war. I take heart from the fact that the counselor to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Philip Zelikow, is an expert on the Cuban missile crisis who co-authored the second edition of Allison’s “Essence of Decision.”

The key here is “willing to risk war but want[ing] to avoid it.” There seems to be a general belief on the right that the Iranian hierarchy cannot be negotiated with, that they are not rational human beings and would, in fact, welcome death and destruction as it would then meet the conditions for the re-appearance of the so-called 12th Imam who would unite Islam and conquer the world.

I have no idea if this is true. I am not completely dismissive of the idea as many on the left seem to be nor do I necessarily think the entire Iranian government has gone of the edge of a cliff and lost touch with reality. That’s what makes this crisis so unpredictable. President Ahmadinejad uses rhetoric the likes of which have not been seen on the international stage since the days of Adolph Hitler’s thundering orations threatening to wipe Czechoslovakia “off the map.” At that time, Neville Chamberlain dismissed Hitler’s apoplectic rants as political sops to the militarists in the German government. (Chamberlain remained blissfully ignorant of the fact that Hitler was the #1 German militarist until it was far too late).

Since we’re talking about a nuclear Iran, we can be vouchsafed no such luxury of miscalculation. And given the recent history of US-Iranian relations, prudence dictates that we take Ahmadinejad at his word and plan accordingly. Herein lies the fallacy in Mr. Ignatius’ historical parallel with October, 1962: With Russia, we were dealing essentially with a state that was as concerned about its survival as we were. At present, we are not so sure that the leaders of the Iranian theocracy share that concern.

For that reason, some see military action as inevitable. The reasoning goes that under all circumstances, the Iranians must not be allowed to make a nuclear weapon because they do not recognize “traditional” nuclear deterrence strategies. In order for Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) to work, both sides have to fear destruction. It is an open question whether the theocrats in Iran fear any such possibility.

Of course, this won’t stop the diplomatic dance at the United Nations or in the capitals of Europe where America will go to seek allies and partners in sanctions and in military planning. But perhaps it might be useful to recall one aspect of the Missile Crisis that, above all others, may have led to the defusing of tensions between the superpowers; the unwritten promise by the United States government that it would not seek to overthrow the Castro regime. In short, a guarantee of Cuban sovereignty.

Kruschev wrote in his memoirs that the reasons he placed missiles in Cuba in the first place was to redress what the Russians saw as a strategic imbalance between the two countries and to protect his client from a Bay of Pigs repeat. The missiles were removed only after Kennedy promised privately to retire the obsolete Jupiter missiles based in Turkey (which were as provocative from the Soviet point of view as missiles in Cuba were to the United States) and a further guarantee that the Americans would not invade or use a proxy army to overthrow Castro. Later, Bobby Kennedy reasoned that such a promise did not include attempts to assassinate Castro, which continued until at least 1965.

Would such a Quid Pro Quo work with the Iranians? Could we guarantee the sovereignty of the Iranian state in exchange for intrusive inspections by the IAEA and a promise by the mullahs not to enrich uranium?

All would depend on whether or not the leaders of Iran are indeed rational and fear war with the United States and the destruction of their regime. And much would also depend on the IAEA, an organization that would have to prove itself to be more than the nuclear enabler it has been in the past.

A tall order, that. And before we could even contemplate such an agreement, there would have to be what diplomats call “confidence building measures” in the interim, something that at this point, seems to be beyond the capability of both countries. Clearly, only a trusted third party could initiate such a dialogue. And given the pariah state of the Iranian nation, such a list would be very short indeed.

There will come a point where direct negotiations with the Iranians will become inevitable. It would help considerably if when that occurs, those negotiations have a chance of succeeding. For that to happen, nothing - including a military option or our willingness to guarantee Iranian sovereignty - can be taken off the table. For when thinking about war with Iran, it is best to remember that unforeseen consequences inevitably follow from conflict.

And those consequences may be so harmful to our interests that we may wish we had explored every option to end the crisis peacefully.

“Beware of Neocons Bringing Up Nazi Germany” was the working title of this post but I chucked it in favor of a header more reflective of my mood this morning.

It is indeed disheartening to read this piece in the Weekly Standard by Mr. Kristol, a usually clear headed, incisive thinker, who raises the specter of Hitler’s march into the Rhineland as a simile for our situation with Iran:

IN THE SPRING OF 1936–seventy years ago–Hitler’s Germany occupied the Rhineland. The French prime minister denounced this as “unacceptable.” But France did nothing. As did the British. And the United States.

In a talk last year, Christopher Caldwell quoted the great Raymond Aron’s verdict: “To say that something is unacceptable was to say that one accepted it.” Aron further remarked that Blum had in fact seemed proud of France’s putting up no resistance. Indeed, Blum had said, “No one suggested using military force. That is a sign of humanity’s moral progress.” Aron remarked: “This moral progress meant the end of the French system of alliances, and almost certain war.”

William Shirer said basically the same thing in Rise and Fall of the Third Reich which, given the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, is certainly true. But it is also true that trying to compare French reluctance to stop the Germans from re-militarizing what, after all, was their own territory with trying to prevent the Iranians from getting the bomb is a bit of a stretch. It had been 18 years since Versailles and the treaty by that time was seen as a disaster. Even without an integrated Europe, war reparations (suspended by the allies in 1930) along with depression had emasculated the German economy. By 1936, some politicians saw a weak Germany as a drag on their own economies (and a poor buffer against the Soviets). Hitler marching into the Rhineland killed the treaty once and for all, a turn of events that the shortsighted French did not view unkindly.

I understand what Mr. Kristol is struggling to say; that IF France and Great Britain had acted, Hitler would almost certainly have been deposed by the Wehrmacht allowing Europe to avoid World War II. Let’s not quibble with metaphors. Let’s quibble with the notion that taking action against Iran has the real possibility of igniting a war, not stopping one.

If we think we have problems in Iraq now with the Sunni insurgents and al Qaeda terrorists, they are nothing compared with the trouble that several hundred thousand Shia militiamen would cause if we bombed Iran. Muqtada al-Sadr, who has promised to unleash his militia against Americans if we bomb Iranian nuclear sites, is just waiting for an opening like this. At a time when other Shia parties are seeking to marginalize the young firebrand, he would suddenly become a hero to ordinary Iraqis (despite their reservations about Iranian influence in their country). Of course, our military can handle al-Sadr but at what cost? And what if other Shia militias including the Badr Brigade join in? We’d be faced with an entirely new situation on the ground, every hand raised against us, one that the left would spin as a second Tet Offensive.

In short, disaster. Kristol may argue that it would be worth it if we could take out Iran’s nuclear program sooner rather than later despite the fact that the Iranians are years from achieving success in building a bomb but I don’t see the rush. Kristol does:

Given Iranian president Ahmadinejad’s recent statements and actions, it should be obvious that it is not “a sign of humanity’s moral progress”–to use Blum’s phrase–to appease the mullahs. It is not “moral progress” to put off serious planning for military action to a later date, probably in less favorable circumstances, when the Iranian regime has been further emboldened, our friends in the region more disheartened, and allies more confused by years of fruitless diplomacy than they would be by greater clarity and resolution now.

I’m sorry, but I believe this to be utter nonsense. The situation two or three years from now may, in fact, be enormously improved. At the same time, how much will things really change in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States, our “friends in the region” who would be “more disheartened” if we go the diplomatic route for the present? And if - an admittedly big if - we can get the Europeans to go along with a sanctions regime that has some real bite, the rickety Iranian economy (more than 20% unemployment) along with a restive populace may moderate the Iranian regime for us. At the very least, we can work like hell to deny the Iranians materials that would assist them in building a bomb. Centrifuges don’t grow on trees. Denying Iran the elements to manufacture them would probably be a good idea.

And how much more “confused” can our allies be than they are now? I daresay holding off on the military option unless it was absolutely necessary would have our friends more apt to assist us in sanctions. As far as Russia and China, I mentioned in another post that they need the west a lot more than they need Iran. Any overt undermining of the sanctions would not be taken lightly by us or our allies. Rhetoric in Iran’s defense is one thing. Actually encouraging the mullahs in their bomb making plans by circumventing sanctions is something else entirely.

Finally, Kristol draws what I believe to be an erroneous conclusion about our Iraq adventure:

The strategist Eliot Cohen was correct when he told the New York Times last week, “I don’t get a sense that people in the administration are champing at the bit to launch another war in the Persian Gulf.” They’re not. No one is. But it is also the case that a great nation has to be serious about its responsibilities, even if executing other responsibilities has been more difficult than one would have hoped.

“Great nations” should also know not to bite off more than they can chew. Our power is not unlimited. The consequences of an Iran strike have been detailed elsewhere including my own take here. Mr. Kristol, who seems to be advocating a “sooner rather than later” strike against Iran (presumably after sanctions fail) must also know the potential consequences of bombing Iran.

Therefore, one wonders about his last statement regarding our difficulties in Iraq. Can’t we be “serious about [our] responsibilities” while at the same time cognizant of our shortcomings? Seems to me, that was exactly our problem in Iraq. Too few troops, too optimistic about handling the insurgency, too little effort at both reconstruction and training the Iraqi army - and here we are today. Iraq is still something of a mess and time is running out to turn the situation around before the political will to stay and finish the job evaporates completely.

Far be it from me to criticize Mr. Kristol’s intent or question his base assumption that Iran with nukes is a very bad thing and needs to be blocked if at all possible. But I’m coming around to the notion that when you have no good choices, there can be no good outcomes. If this make me a defeatist on Iran so be it.

UPDATE

William Arkin of WaPo has this breathless piece of merde regarding war planning full of ominus sounding acronyms, changing metrics, invasion scenarios, and war games.

Wake me when we start shifting military assets closer to the war zone. Tap me on the shoulder when we start getting overflight permissions from the half dozen or so countries where our planes will have to overfly (places where people will be falling all over themselves to leak that fact to the press). Kick me in the shins when we start shifting half the US Air Force around.

We won’t be able to hide preparations that envision at the very least 700-1000 sorties to take out the known Iranian nuclear sites. And if ground troops are involved, you’re talking about a buildup comparable to Desert Storm - about 4-6 months.

Arkins point - that we should throw an arm around the Iranian’s shoulder and tell them that we are, in fact, planning for war and that they better play ball with the international community and stop enriching uranium is well intentioned but myopic. And his analogy with Iraq is curious. Saddam may have believed we sent 160,000 troops to sit in the desert in order to get suntans but no other rational human being did. Everyone on the planet knew we were going to invade.

The problem with all the talk of “war planning” is that it makes us weaker, not stronger. We have time for alternatives to war. If decision time were six months away I’d say go ahead, sit down with Iranian representatives and show them what we can do if you think that will help. But such is not the case and talking about war plans now only plays into the mullah’s propaganda campaign at home and abroad.

We have a good three years to get our stuff together - build a coalition, initiate meaningful sanctions, and plan for the worst. The leaks in recent weeks about our military options have served their purpose of warning the Iranians that we mean business. Arkin suggests we go public by having Rumsefeld say that yes, we are planning for war with Iran. I think this wrongheaded and may in fact have the opposite effect Mr. Arkin visualizes.

For now, the Administration is playing it just right.

There. Don’t you feel a little better now? I knew that you would. When in close combat with your political opponent, it’s always a good idea to take a moment to review, revitalize, and relax.

That’s what we’re doing, of course. This “crisis” has not been the doing of the Bush Administration. The blame for jacking up domestic tensions falls entirely and without question on the rabid dog left. Even liberal Democrats (for the most part) have dismissed immediate military action as a chimera. What passes for analysis on left wing blogs and punditry would have us believe that Bush will bomb Iran to take the heat off of the White House due to the Libby scandal, or that Bush will bomb the mullahs in September to rally the country to the Republican standard, or that the President will attack because he sees the end times coming and wants to start Armageddon.

Someone should just dump a bucket of cold water on their pointy heads and tell them to cool off.

The Administration has held no press conferences, no briefings of any kind. They have given measured, careful responses (outside of the President’s apropos characterization of Sy Hersh’s fantasy story about the United States using nuclear weapons in Iraq as “wild speculation) to the notion of military action against the mullahs. Negotiations remain the primary option of this Administration, despite leaks that were 1) meant to let the Iranians know we mean what we say; and/or 2) signal the Europeans and others to get busy at the UN.

Hersh’s dramatic story about disgusted military officers ready to quit if the JCS recommendations included a nuclear option must be taken with a very large dose of salt. Mr. Hersh has penned some of the most curious (and that is me at my most charitable) volumes that purport to be “fact based” in the last quarter century. The Dark Side of Camelot was almost universally condemned as a scandal mongering load of crap, so much so that one wag referred to it as “The Second JFK Assassination.”

And who could forget The Target is Destroyed, a book about the Soviet downing of KAL Flight 007 where Hersh gave the Soviets a virtual pass in shooting down the civilian airliner all because the US had a spy plane in the vicinity and the Soviets mistook the clear civilian markings on the KAL 747 for our intelligence platforms being flown in converted 707’s. (The pilot who shot down 007 pleaded with his superiors, telling them it was in fact a civilian airliner. So much for mistaken identity).

In fairness, Hersh has done some first class work in exposing aspects of the My Lai massacre as well as a mostly factual account of Henry Kissinger’s tenure as the doyen of American foreign policy. But his otherwise excellent book The Samson Option was criticized for poor sourcing and many of Hersh’s articles in recent years have depended almost exclusively on sources who remain anonymous. In effect, Hersh expects us to take him at his word, his reputation being enough to satisfy our questions regarding the viability of his claims.

As a man of the left, he can get away with it. Which brings us back to the current meltdown by the left about our military planning to take out Iranian nuclear capability. Despite President Ahmadinejad’s bluster about Iran joining the nuclear club, the “achievement” of Iraqi scientists is so rudimentary and preliminary to building a bomb that one wonders why he even bothered to announce it. The left leaning blog Arms Control Wonk posted a series of articles on the Iranian nuclear program and gave a reasonable timetable for a crash program by the mullahs to make an atomic device:

Assemble 1,300-1,600 centrifuges. Assuming Iran starts assembling centrifuges at a rate of 70-
100/month, Iran will have enough centrifuges in 6-9 months.

Combine centrifuges into cascades, install control equipment, building feed and withdrawal systems, and test the Fuel Enrichment Plant. 1 year

Enrich enough HEU for a nuclear weapon. 1 year

Weaponize the HEU. A “few” months.

Total time to the bomb—about three years.

The difference between what the Iranians achieved yesterday - a successful “cascade” involving 164 centrifuges - and what would be necessary to enrich enough uranium for one single bomb is like the difference between a tricycle and an Indy racing car. In order to weaponize enough uranium for a single bomb, the Iranians would need nearly 10 times the number of centrifuges (that they probably do not have at the moment) spinning at nearly 700 times a second, all working together flawlessly for many months, night and day, before the uranium was enriched not by the measly 3.5% the Iranians claimed yesterday but by at least 80% which most experts say would be the absolute minimum enrichment threshold for the uranium to achieve critical mass and detonate.

The technical challenges for such an operation would tax the labs and brainpower of most First World countries much less the Third World nation of Iran. It took the greatest brains on the planet at the time of the Manhattan Project nearly 3 years and what in today’s dollars would be nearly $75 billion to solve many of the technical problems involved in constructing an atomic bomb. While it is true many of these technical challenges have since been leaked into the public domain, there remain several key steps that are classified.

At the same time, our intrepid spies at the CIA are almost certainly dreaming when they claim as they did in a National Intelligence Estimate that the Iranians are a decade or more away from achieving their nuclear ambitions. The Israelis are under no such illusions as they also have gone on record (by way of background briefings) saying that Iran is much closer to that dangerous goal; 3-5 years being their timetable.

Of course, this timetable does not take into account some “shortcuts” the Iranians could use:

* Purchasing highly enriched uranium from a third party

* Acquiring nuclear weapons elsewhere

* Getting the requisite technical assistance from experienced foreign nuclear scientists.

The first two of these shortcuts are highly unlikely given how closely nuclear material is monitored around the world. And while we’ve been hearing for years that nuclear weapons from Russia have been on the market in all sorts of manifestations including so-called “suitcase” bombs, nuclear artillery shells, and even old short range missiles with nuclear warheads, the fact is not a one has been used. And given how closely Iran has been watched by both Americans and Israelis, it seems highly unlikely the mullahs have been able to purchase a ready made weapon on the black market.

The third shortcut is much more likely. There are indications that the Iranians have already gotten help from Pakistani scientists as well as North Korean technicians. Such assistance could considerably shorten the time for the Iranians to develop a nuclear capability.

The point I’m trying to make is that if we know all this, so does the Administration. This is why the UN is still a viable option and, if necessary, multi-lateral sanctions by Western powers against the Iranians. While the Russians and Chinese both oppose such a move, it is probable they would not overtly undermine such sanctions, bringing as it almost certainly will, trouble with their western partners. And since both giants need the west a heckuva lot more than they need Iran, there’s a good chance that any sanctions regime the US and NATO can come up with will have some bite.

The hyperventilating left and the itchy trigger fingers on the right should bear all of this in mind when discussing what to do about Iran. We have some time. Time to carefully build a powerhouse coalition of nations that takes Ahmadinejad at his word when he says he wants to “wipe the State of Israel off the map.” This won’t be accomplished overnight. But the major weaknesses in Iran’s economy as well as a restive population, chafing at 26 years of theocratic rule, could work in favor of the Iranians being forced to abandon their mad ambition to get the ultimate defense against cartoon blasphemy.

UPDATE

More cold water thrown on the fire by Greg Djerejian.

And Ed Morrissey, while slightly more optimistic about Iranian capabilities, still gives time frame of 2-3 years.

Tom Holsinger believes in scenario #2 above; that the Iranians already have fissionable material via North Korea. Read his deductions at Captains Quarters post linked above, comment #2.

Put yourself in Iran’s place.

Every day, you read how nutty George Bush is, how he’s now got a “messianic complex,” how he believes the end times are here and the rapture at hand, and what a bloodthirsty war monger the President of the United States truly is.

Then Sy Hersh delivers a bombshell of a report saying that this crazy crusader is actually thinking of detonating a nuclear device on your sovereign territory. You put two and two together and come up with…a little bluff of your own:

Iran on Sunday brushed aside what it called a U.S. “psychological war” against its nuclear program after a published report described Pentagon planning for possible military strikes against Iranian atomic facilities. A report by influential investigative journalist Seymour Hersh in The New Yorker magazine, citing unnamed current and former officials, said Washington has stepped up plans for possible attacks on Iranian facilities to curb its atomic work.

The article said the United States was considering using tactical nuclear weapons to destroy Iran’s underground uranium enrichment facilities at Natanz, south of Tehran.

“This is a psychological war launched by Americans because they feel angry and desperate regarding Iran’s nuclear dossier,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told a weekly news conference.

“We will stand by our right to nuclear technology. It is our red line. We are ready to deal with any possible scenario. Iran is not afraid of threatening language,” he added.

That last bit is a little bluff of their own. If we decided to strike - conventional or nuclear - there isn’t much the Iranians could do to stop us and they know it. So the “scenario” involving severe degradation of their nuclear program is one that they are not only unprepared for but fear the most. And as far as them not being afraid of threatening language, I daresay the lights were burning late in the Defense Ministry last night in Tehran.

Some Middle Eastern analysts see a little triangular diplomacy among China, Russia, and the US as a way to stop the Iranian nuke program. Their reasoning goes thusly:

As much as China and Russia engage in the diplomatic maneuvers to pressure Iran, they are not expected to toe the U.S. party line. Their own respective great power agendas play a silent, but potent role in their maneuvers involving Iran. Russia is getting increasingly frustrated about the U.S. “crowding” the immediate neighborhood. Russian President Vladimir Putin bristled at the criticism that the recent elections in Belarus were rigged, simply because they did not bring about the breakup of ties between Russia and what the Western media derisively depict as “the last dictatorship in Europe.” Russia also remains on the defensive about the proposition from the West that it is backing away from democracy. U.S.-Russian competition in Central Asia has become rather nasty.

China is equally annoyed at the Bush administration’s intermittent depiction of it as competitor or even as a “potential adversary.” Beijing was displeased by reports that the recently signed U.S.-India nuclear deal was also aimed at “containing” China.

In view of these conflicting agendas, both Russia and China envision their ties with the U.S. as becoming increasingly competitive. Consequently, Iran’s nuclear enrichment program emerges as an issue where the two countries have ample maneuvering space to extract a “grand bargain” with Washington regarding issues that are of great strategic significance to each of them.

China especially might see pulling American chestnuts out of the fire as just the leverage it needs to get concessions on regional issues, perhaps even on Taiwan if we get worried enough about Iranian nukes. And Putin, lowering the iron fist ever so slowly on his people, could see helping to get an agreement on Iranian nukes as a way to get those pesky American human rights and democracy advocates off of his back.

All of this depends, of course, on America not taking pre-emptive and early action against the Iranian nuclear sites. While the temptation to do so might be great, whatever we give up with regards to Russia and China may look like a great deal if we can avoid the consequences of bombing Iran. In that respect, diplomacy still looks like the best bet - especially since we have at least 3 years and perhaps as long as 5 before Iran presents us with their little nuclear fait accompli.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and their flighty, on-again-off-again chief Mohamed ElBaradei will be paying a visit to the Iranians this week to try and get inspections going again. What good they can do at this point may be ephemeral in that the Iranians have been able to conceal most of their program from the prying eyes of the IAEA, probably developing a so-called “two track” program that includes a civilian component that is relatively open and a military one that is clandestine.

As long as we can keep the Iranians guessing about our response, the more cautious and off balance they will be. That can only bode well for any negotiations that are sure to be initiated after the UN meets at the end of this month to once again discuss sanctions against Iran.