Bush Backs Israeli Attack On Iran

Mark Elliot Cullen

You don’t seriously believe anyone would prosecute them for war crimes, do you?

Jul 13, 2008 @ 4:32 PM

John Maszka

Experts have been predicting that Bush would authorize a strike on Iran for years:

“I believe President Bush is going to order air strikes (on Iran) before he leaves office” -Norman Podhoretz (Lyons, 2007).

Bush and his cronies say they want peace and diplomacy, but the problem with the members of Bush administration is that you can’t trust them. You can’t take what they at face value.

As former Nixon aide John W. Dean wrote, “George W. Bush and Richard B. Cheney have created the most secretive presidency of my lifetime. Their secrecy is far worse than during Watergate.”

The administration secretly planned and prepared for war with Iraq without disclosing it to the general public. Planning began in November of 2001 and included upgrading airfields in various Gulf countries, moving supplies to the region and the construction of necessary facilities.

By April 2002, the planning and preparation for war was also being hidden from Congress. Bush had instructed General Tommy Franks not to make financial requests through Washington. “Anything you need, you’ll have.”

The money would no longer be appropriated through congress. By the end of July 2002, Bush had approved more than thirty projects totaling over $700 million. Congress had no knowledge or involvement.

In December of 2002, Bush and Rumsfeld agreed to start secretly deploying troops into the theatre so as not to attract the attention of the press or the rest of the world.

The first deployment order went out on December 6, 2002 and deployments continued every two weeks or so thereafter. Troops were given less than a week’s notice at times.

In January 2003, the Bush administration arranged for much of its humanitarian relief to be disguised as general contributions to conceal its war planning from the NGO recipients.

Yet, when asked about Iraq, Bush’s favorite response was “I have no war plans on my desk.” At one point or another after the planning began, nearly every member of the administration publicly denied any plans to go to war with Iraq.

The question remains: Why would we expect the Bush administration to start being honest and up front about its intentions now?

A better approach to Iran would be negotiations. We need to give Iran an honorable path of retreat. While Fareed Zakaria agrees that there is no reason not to use sanctions and embargoes against states such as Iran, he suggests that we also need to “allow a viable way out.” That is to say, we need to negotiate and not merely mandate.

I think we should more concerned about acquainting ourselves with the realities of Iran’s foreign policy initiatives, and intelligently determining our most reasonable course of action.

Jul 13, 2008 @ 5:29 PM