As I Have Been Saying
Via Suburban Guerrilla in The Times [the real newspaper in London, not the bird cage liner in New York]: Iran threatens Gulf blitz if US hits nuclear plants
IRAN has threatened to launch a missile blitz against the Gulf states and plunge the entire Middle East into war if America attacks its nuclear facilities.
Admiral Ali Shamkhani, a senior defence adviser to the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned that Gulf states providing the US with military cooperation would be the key targets of a barrage of ballistic missiles.
This isn’t bombast from the ribbon cutting figurehead of Iran, Ahmadinejad, this is from the national security advisor to the real power in Iran, Khamenei, the man with actual control of Iran’s military. They can do it, and they will do it if attacked.
8 comments
…dovetails nicely with the previous post, I’d say. Iran supposedly has a sufficiently plentiful supply of various sorts of anti-ship missiles and potential launch platforms to make any sort of military strike against them an interesting proposition…
Having just reanalyzed oil, economic and military data for the region, esp for Iraq/Iran, (see post Saturday) I concluded that Iraq’s invasion was ALWAYS just a stepping stone to the overriding goal of taking out Iran’s govt. And that it HAD tobe an air war. And that Iran would HAVE to respond with a ground war targeting regional oil facillities and other countries, in multiple directions (Iraq first, but Afghanistan, Oman, UAE, etc.
Do we still have three carrier groups in the region? It seems much is in place, but I expected to see this happen closer to election 2008.
As Israel found out, Jack, even the unguided rockets that Iran manufactures can be a problem and their anti-ship missiles work against modern warships. It isn’t even a function of accuracy when they can “shotgun” a response and overcome the Patriot systems that are defending. There are coastal mountains that will be used for launching, and many will be in hardened sites.
I read your Saturday post, Kevin, a lot of work, and I agree, that in addition to wanting to get rid of Saddam, because his dad didn’t, the Shrubbery would like to effect regime change in Iran to out-Reagan Reagan. This is part of his “legacy dream” that the neocon use to push their delusions.
There are still three carrier groups, but they will all be out in the Arabian Sea if they go into attack mode because you can’t maneuver in the Persian Gulf. Iran has a coast line on the Gulf of Oman/Arabian Sea and a few diesel subs to make things “interesting” for the carriers.
Iran is a place we just don’t want to go until we have weaned ourselves from oil. The Chinese would not react well to the results of an attack against Iran.
There is one question that occurs to me time and time again: Is the US government mad or stupid enoough to take on Iran? If so does it really want to shut off a large chunk of the world’s oil supply? Just looking at a map of the Persian Gulf and it looks clear that Iran could shut it off and keep it shit off with ease.
I personally believe the current administration is both crazy and ignorant enough to do almost anything. Because they are generally fearful people, they believe everyone else is just as fearful. They think they can bully the world and don’t realize that there are people just as stupid and ignorant, but who are not fearful, and who will not back down.
Don’t forget, Iran “played nice” after 9/11 and got nothing for their efforts, so they are not apt to offer to play nice again.
I haven’t had a chance to read Kevin’s post yet but I will later. However, I agree with Bryan that you cannot rule out anything with this administration. Their world picture is severely distorted and as we have seen over and over they do not seem to have the ability to see the logical results of their actions. Couple the insane reality with the fact they won’t listen to advice that doesn’t agree with their picture of what they want to believe they are just crazy enough to do it. Our only hope is that the military commanders will see the potential disaster for what it is and not go along. Thin gruel.
I’m putting what hope I have in the larger role being played by the Navy, which should be tuned to the anti-ship capabilities of Iran, which are nasty. The military is going to have to explain reality to the civilians.
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