Day: February 12, 2007

Joint Chiefs Chair Denies Bush Officials’ Iran Weapons Claim

Jon Ponder

Red-handed: Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Peter Pace has quashed a story put out by anonymous Bush officials yesterday purporting that the government of Iran was supplying weapons to Shi’ite insurgents in Iraq:

We know that the explosively formed projectiles are manufactured in Iran. What I would not say is that the Iranian government, per se [specifically], knows about this,” he said. “It is clear that Iranians are involved, and it’s clear that materials from Iran are involved, but I would not say by what I know that the Iranian government clearly knows or is complicit.

It’s good for the republic, though tragically too late, that a general is finally calling the president on his bullshit.

Quote du Jour

Buck Banks

But what is war? What is needed for success in warfare? What are the habits of the military? The aim of war is murder; the methods of war are spying, treachery and their encouragement, the ruins of a country’s inhabitants, robbing them or stealing to provision the army, and fraud and falsehood termed military craft. The habits of the military class are the absence of freedom, that is, discipline, idleness, ignorance, cruelty, debauchery and drunkenness. And in spite of all this, it is the highest class, respected by everyone … and he who kills the most people receives the highest rewards.

— Count Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy (1821-1910), Russian writer

Former Bush Official Says Admininstration Is Deliberately Provoking Iran

Jon Ponder

This one is on the record:

“They intend to be as provocative as possible and make the Iranians do something [America] would be forced to retaliate for,” says Hillary Mann, former Bush national security official.

Some view the spiraling attacks as a strand in a worrisome pattern. At least one former White House official contends that some Bush advisers secretly want an excuse to attack Iran. “They intend to be as provocative as possible and make the Iranians do something [America] would be forced to retaliate for,” says Hillary Mann, the administration’s former National Security Council director for Iran and Persian Gulf Affairs.

U.S. officials insist they have no intention of provoking or otherwise starting a war with Iran, and they were also quick to deny any link to Sharafi’s kidnapping. But the fact remains that the longstanding war of words between Washington and Tehran is edging toward something more dangerous.

A second Navy carrier group is steaming toward the Persian Gulf, and NEWSWEEK has learned that a third carrier will likely follow. Iran shot off a few missiles in those same tense waters last week, in a highly publicized test.

With Americans and Iranians jousting on the chaotic battleground of Iraq, the chances of a small incident’s spiraling into a crisis are higher than they’ve been in years.