Rumors Of War: “2,000 Targets In Iran”
Bush setting America up for war with Iran
By Philip Sherwell in New York and Tim Shipman in Washington
Last Updated: 1:28am BST 16/09/2007
Senior American intelligence and defence officials believe that President George W Bush and his inner circle are taking steps to place America on the path to war with Iran, The Sunday Telegraph has learnt.
Pentagon planners have developed a list of up to 2,000 bombing targets in Iran, amid growing fears among serving officers that diplomatic efforts to slow Iran’s nuclear weapons programme are doomed to fail.
Pentagon and CIA officers say they believe that the White House has begun a carefully calibrated programme of escalation that could lead to a military showdown with Iran.
Now it has emerged that Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, who has been pushing for a diplomatic solution, is prepared to settle her differences with Vice-President Dick Cheney and sanction military action.
In a chilling scenario of how war might come, a senior intelligence officer warned that public denunciation of Iranian meddling in Iraq - arming and training militants - would lead to cross border raids on Iranian training camps and bomb factories.
A prime target would be the Fajr base run by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Quds Force in southern Iran, where Western intelligence agencies say armour-piercing projectiles used against British and US troops are manufactured.
Under the theory - which is gaining credence in Washington security circles - US action would provoke a major Iranian response, perhaps in the form of moves to cut off Gulf oil supplies, providing a trigger for air strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities and even its armed forces.
Senior officials believe Mr Bush’s inner circle has decided he does not want to leave office without first ensuring that Iran is not capable of developing a nuclear weapon.
The intelligence source said: “No one outside that tight circle knows what is going to happen.” But he said that within the CIA “many if not most officials believe that diplomacy is failing” and that “top Pentagon brass believes the same”.
He said: “A strike will probably follow a gradual escalation. Over the next few weeks and months the US will build tensions and evidence around Iranian activities in Iraq.”
Previously, accusations that Mr Bush was set on war with Iran have come almost entirely from his critics.
Many senior operatives within the CIA are highly critical of Mr Bush’s handling of the Iraq war, though they themselves are considered ineffective and unreliable by hardliners close to Mr Cheney.
The vice president is said to advocate the use of bunker-busting tactical nuclear weapons against Iran’s nuclear sites. His allies dispute this, but Mr Cheney is understood to be lobbying for air strikes if sites can be identified where Revolutionary Guard units are training Shia militias.
Recent developments over Iraq appear to fit with the pattern of escalation predicted by Pentagon officials.
Gen David Petraeus, Mr Bush’s senior Iraq commander, denounced the Iranian “proxy war” in Iraq last week as he built support in Washington for the US military surge in Baghdad.
The US also announced the creation of a new base near the Iraqi border town of Badra, the first of what could be several locations to tackle the smuggling of weapons from Iran.
A State Department source familiar with White House discussions said that Miss Rice, under pressure from senior counter-proliferation officials to acknowledge that military action may be necessary, is now working with Mr Cheney to find a way to reconcile their positions and present a united front to the President.
The source said: “When you go down there and see the body language, you can see that Cheney is still The Man. Condi pushed for diplomacy but she is no dove. If it becomes necessary she will be on board.
“Both of them are very close to the president, and where they differ they are working together to find a way to present a position they can both live with.”
The official contrasted the efforts of the secretary of state to work with the vice-president with the “open warfare between Colin Powell and Donald Rumsfeld before the Iraq war”.
Miss Rice’s bottom line is that if the administration is to go to war again it must build the case over a period of months and win sufficient support on Capitol Hill.
The Sunday Telegraph has been told that Mr Bush has privately promised her that he would consult “meaningfully” with Congressional leaders of both parties before any military action against Iran on the understanding that Miss Rice would resign if this did not happen.
The intelligence officer said that the US military has “two major contingency plans” for air strikes on Iran.
“One is to bomb only the nuclear facilities. The second option is for a much bigger strike that would - over two or three days - hit all of the significant military sites as well. This plan involves more than 2,000 targets.”
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I’m wondering why the Iraqis don’t just plant dumb mines all along their border with Iran. Iraq didn’t sign the UN dumb mine treaty. And I also wonder if we have enough intelligent mines to emplace along that same border.
Seems to me we aren’t using all of our technology to keep the Iranians in their own battlespace. Failing that, I have no qualms about paying these fuckers back for all the terrorism that they have been part or parcel to since 1979.
The only reason why, Ahmeddickwad and his devil worshipping religious (cough, cough) leaders are talking shit, is because no one has yet to take them to task over their sponsorship of terrorism throughout the ME.
Taking out their entire WMD program and the military infastructure would be a nice little message for Syria also.
Want to see a state sponsor of terrorism collectively shit their pants? Then smash Iran and watch the Syrians tremble as they soil themselves in fear.
It’ll be a beautiful thing to watch.
Out
September 15th, 2007 at 6:18 pmIranians are annoying. I saw one interviewed on the Today Show say things like “our military’s powerful” blah blah blah.
September 15th, 2007 at 6:34 pmIf he waits long enough he can read about all kinds of ingenious war strategies from outside sources …and I’m sure some might be the answer…we have a huge open source of knowledge in this country to take advantage of.
September 15th, 2007 at 6:34 pmGentlemen - The time of reckoning in near - very near. For the first time in a very long while the US has three (3) carrier battle groups in the Gulf. The last was escorted into the region by the Britsh Royal Navy recently. Expect this to kick off within the next two to three weeks. Tops.
Therefore, the first GBU/B 43 in the stick shall have the following written on it:
The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who would attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee.
September 15th, 2007 at 7:33 pm(Ezekiel 25:17)(Samuel L. Jackson - “Pulp Fiction”)
As a politcal science question who knows why there might be a bond between Chavez and Iran…Muhammad Mossadegh and the 1950’s is a start..an and an m-5 leak will give it the real drama and the basis of Chavez’s fear of the US.
This includes the US, Britain, Anglo-Iranian Oil Company and the world bank and maybe the m-5 and CIA, and I mean maybe
There is more than one understanding, but academia has away of making villians out of the hand that feeds it.
This I believe is a must know, and a must know well, to really know your enemies mind set
September 15th, 2007 at 7:49 pmLet the ass whooping begin!
September 15th, 2007 at 8:12 pmRock On Baghdad Aviator
September 15th, 2007 at 8:28 pmLet the ass whoopin commence and godspeed to our fighter pilots
Baghdad Aviator
Best to you and all our fighter pilots. The time is really near. They have left us no choice but to force them to stand down and stand down they will - way down.
I am sure our good men can assist ahmadickwad in seeing the aura of his halo.
God Speed.
September 15th, 2007 at 8:55 pmSupport the Mission…God’s Speed!
September 15th, 2007 at 9:09 pmTarget #1 should be their only gas refinery.
Target #2 should be all their navy vessels, subs etc.. We’re over due for some naval engagements. I’m sure our hunter sub commanders would like to load some hot shot sometime this century.
September 15th, 2007 at 9:14 pmBaghdad Aviator -
EXCELLENT choice in scripture. Truer words have never been spoken.
September 15th, 2007 at 9:42 pmAh-mah-ah-need-a-jihad is exploring the outer limits of belligerent mouthiness. It might be because it plays well at home, because he thinks there can be no response, because he’s desperate and needs to distract, or because he wants a response so he can either a) play victim, or b) give his Guards and the Qud something to do besides wonder if he’s too nuts to leave alive. IMO.
September 15th, 2007 at 10:10 pmIf an attack does come it better be just these surgical strikes. Use our air superiority and take out the essential facilities of Iran’s military, but nothing else. A ground war would be pointless and foolish.
Additionally, is there any possibility to cut back on the word play? Yes it so witty to call democrats democRATS and betrayacrats or “Ah-mah-ah-need-a-jihad” It’s clever the first time but it just starts getting childish.
September 16th, 2007 at 12:58 amit all looks easy on paper, but lets dont get to cocky..we know alot of what iran has ,but we probably dont know everything they have..it wouldnt suprise me if they already have a few nukes to try to take out our fleet..wasnt n korea bragging about something like this a few years back with a missle test?
September 16th, 2007 at 6:39 am