Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Sioux Nation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Patricia Trinchero who wrote (99162)	2/12/2007 2:35:08 PM
From: SiouxPal	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 361327

Scary Movie 2 by Paul Krugman Attacking Iran would be a catastrophic mistake, even if all the allegations now being made about Iranian actions in Iraq are true. But it wouldn’t be the first catastrophic mistake this administration has made, and there are indications that, at the very least, a powerful faction in the administration is spoiling for a fight. Before we get to the apparent war-mongering, let’s talk about the basics. Are there people in Iran providing aid to factions in Iraq, factions that sometimes kill Americans as well as other Iraqis? Yes, probably. But you can say the same about Saudi Arabia, which is believed to be a major source of financial support for Sunni insurgents — and Sunnis, not Iranian-backed Shiites, are still responsible for most American combat deaths. The Bush administration, however, with its close personal and financial ties to the Saudis, has always downplayed Saudi connections to America’s enemies. Iran, on the other hand, which had no connection to 9/11, and was actually quite helpful to the United States in the months after the terrorist attack, somehow found itself linked with its bitter enemy Saddam Hussein as part of the “axis of evil.” So the administration has always had it in for the Iranian regime. Now, let’s do an O. J. Simpson: if you were determined to start a war with Iran, how would you do it? First, you’d set up a special intelligence unit to cook up rationales for war. A good model would be the Pentagon’s now-infamous Office of Special Plans, led by Abram Shulsky, that helped sell the Iraq war with false claims about links to Al Qaeda. Sure enough, last year Donald Rumsfeld set up a new “Iranian directorate” inside the Pentagon’s policy shop. And last September Warren Strobel and John Walcott of McClatchy Newspapers — who were among the few journalists to warn that the administration was hyping evidence on Iraqi W.M.D. — reported that “current and former officials said the Pentagon’s Iranian directorate has been headed by Abram Shulsky.” Next, you’d go for a repeat of the highly successful strategy by which scare stories about the Iraqi threat were disseminated to the public. This time, however, the assertions wouldn’t be about W.M.D.; they’d be that Iranian actions are endangering U.S. forces in Iraq. Why? Because there’s no way Congress will approve another war resolution. But if you can claim that Iran is doing evil in Iraq, you can assert that you don’t need authorization to attack — that Congress has already empowered the administration to do whatever is necessary to stabilize Iraq. And by the time the lawyers are finished arguing — well, the war would be in full swing. Finally, you’d build up forces in the area, both to prepare for the strike and, if necessary, to provoke a casus belli. There’s precedent for the idea of provocation: in a January 2003 meeting with Prime Minster Tony Blair, The New York Times reported last year, President Bush “talked about several ways to provoke a confrontation, including a proposal to paint a United States surveillance plane in the colors of the United Nations in hopes of drawing fire.” In the end, Mr. Bush decided that he didn’t need a confrontation to start that particular war. But war with Iran is a harder sell, so sending several aircraft carrier groups into the narrow waters of the Persian Gulf, where a Gulf of Tonkin-type incident could all too easily happen, might be just the thing. O.K., I hope I’m worrying too much. Those carrier groups could be going to the Persian Gulf just as a warning. But you have to wonder about the other stuff. Why would the Pentagon put someone who got everything wrong on Iraq in charge of intelligence on Iran? Why wasn’t any official willing to take personal responsibility for the reliability of alleged evidence of Iranian mischief, as opposed to being an anonymous source? If the evidence is solid enough to bear close scrutiny, why were all cameras and recording devices, including cellphones, banned from yesterday’s Baghdad briefing? It’s still hard to believe that they’re really planning to attack Iran, when it’s so obvious that another war would be a recipe for even bigger disaster. But remember who’s calling the shots: Dick Cheney thinks we’ve had “enormous successes” in Iraq. Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company Published on Monday, February 12, 2007 by New York Times

To: Patricia Trinchero who wrote (99162)	2/12/2007 2:44:38 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 361327

Report: Cheney to snub Japan defense minister for calling Iraq war 'mistake' iht.com The Associated Press Published: February 11, 2007 TOKYO: U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney plans to spurn meetings with Japan's defense minister next week in protest over his having called the American-led Iraq war a "mistake," a news report said Monday. Cheney is to meet top officers in Japan's Self-Defense Forces during a visit starting Feb. 20 but has asked Japan not to schedule any talks with Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma, Kyodo News agency said. Late last month, Kyuma told reporters the decision to invade Iraq was a "mistake" because it was based on the erroneous assumption that Saddam Hussein's government had weapons of mass destruction. Kyuma later backtracked, saying he meant that the decision to attack Iraq should have been thought through more cautiously. "I did not say it was a mistake, but I thought at the time (the U.S.) should have been more cautious," Kyuma said. In Washington, Lea Anne McBride, a spokeswoman for Cheney, said the vice president's schedule was filled before he received any invitation from Kyuma to meet. "He is looking forward to a full day of meetings in Japan, including meetings with the emperor, the prime minister, the chief Cabinet secretary and the foreign minister," McBride said. "This schedule was set in advance of receiving a request from the defense minister." Japan sent ground troops to southern Iraq on a humanitarian mission after the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion, but the Japanese contingent was pulled out last year. Japan currently operates airlifts in the region in support of the U.S.-led forces, a mission set to end in July. Despite U.S. President George W. Bush's plan to boost troop numbers in Iraq, Japan will not hastily decide whether to continue providing the airlifts, Kyuma said. Cheney, a strong advocate of Iraq's invasion, is expected to meet top Japanese military officials as well as U.S. military officers based in Japan, Kyodo said. Foreign Ministry officials were not immediately available to comment on the report.