http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article1434540.ece

Not saying I believe it or don't believe it. Just passing on because it makes for an interesting topic.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 9:13 AM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 9:05:51 AM

put me in charge... I'll but up some Tehran.

2/27/2007 9:23:59 AM

who cares about the middle east anymore

we have britney spears and anna nicole's shit to keep us entertained

gg news media

dont forget sharpton

2/27/2007 9:24:11 AM

Quote :

"But General Peter Pace, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said recently there was “zero chance” of a war with Iran."

Similar phrases have been repeated by numerous high ranking officials in the White House and even the President himself. I can see an accidental skirmish or two breaking out, at worst a light bombing just a klick inside the Iranian-Iraqi border, but I seriously don't see the White House starting any war. Even if they wanted to, they just don't have the men and resources to do so.

2/27/2007 11:22:14 AM

i'm afraid a democrat will get elected in 2008 and feel the need to start a war with iran in order to not seem "soft" on terrorism. i hate that politics seems to work that way.

2/27/2007 11:23:31 AM

^Either way, one of two things will happen:

A) We'll get Israel do it

B) Send in an airstrike without putting boots on the ground (well, as far as the media knows)

2/27/2007 11:27:02 AM

getting israel to do it seems like a pretty scary prospect as well.

2/27/2007 11:29:51 AM

Yea, and the Gulf states just opened up their fly zones to the Israelis the other day...

If we let Israel do it, I guarandamntee you it will be in the next 6 months while Bush is still in power...

2/27/2007 11:31:31 AM

sarijoul you think the democrats would be willing to start a war with iran just so they wont be seen as soft? wow thats pretty fucking scary

2/27/2007 11:35:59 AM

i think it could happen. and yeah, it is scary. hopefully someone with a little more backbone and character than that will get elected.

2/27/2007 11:40:16 AM

i just mean if someone wants to go to war to make the world safer, ok...or to remove an evil leader, ok...or to prevent a larger conflict or something, ok....but to 'prove' that they are not soft? wow

2/27/2007 11:41:09 AM

I've heard various reports of SF incursions into Iran to get targeting data

2/27/2007 11:45:10 AM

I think Israel attacking Iran under the pretense they're alone is a non-starter. For lack of a better phrase, who is Israel's best drinking buddy?

Quote :

"i just mean if someone wants to go to war to make the world safer, ok...or to remove an evil leader, ok...or to prevent a larger conflict or something, ok....but to 'prove' that they are not soft? wow"

Isn't that kind of what the Israeli PM did with the recent Lebanese conflict in a way? (I'm not Jew-hating.) His credentials on defense were supposedly soft in the recent election, so he ordered the Israeli military to go guns blazing when their two soldiers were abducted.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 11:49 AM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 11:46:14 AM

Quote :

"I've heard various reports of SF incursions into Iran to get targeting data"

this has been going on for years...

2/27/2007 11:49:36 AM

Quote :

"The US air force is regarded as being more willing to attack Iran. General Michael Moseley, the head of the air force, cited Iran as the main likely target for American aircraft at a military conference earlier this month."

Yeah no shit, their commitment to any major combat is minimal at best and they can use it as an excuse to push for more funds for the most over-funded branch in the armed forces.

2/27/2007 11:56:29 AM

Yeah, here's best to least effective military forces:

Marines (disclaimer: Marine Corps brat)
Navy
Army
Air Force, tied with Coast Guard
National Guard

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 12:03 PM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 12:03:21 PM

^you can put the National Guard/Reserves in the same boat as Army/Marines since they are the backbone/majority of deployed forces

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 12:23 PM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 12:23:06 PM

bullshit.

2/27/2007 12:36:30 PM

^^^ Yeah, I call bullshit on that entire list. I'm not going to get in the Marines / Army debate but I've worked with too many National Guard and Reserve Soldiers and Marines to discount what they bring to the table. Quite honestly, their civilian experience often compliments the limited world of the military. I don't know how you get off putting Navy up there. I'd definitely put them above the USAF (Seabees hooked us up a lot) but above Army? You've lost your mind hoss. Additionally, you can't knock the Coast Guard since they're consistently doing their job day in and day out regardless of if they're deployed or not, even if it is a completely different mission.

2/27/2007 12:50:27 PM

^ For Navy vs. Army, cause domination of seapower (submarines) is worth more than domination of landpower IMO.

I'm not knocking the Coast Guard, they do their job well, just cause I can't remember the last time our country had a coastal incident. (U-boats off the eastern coast in WWII???)

As far as effectiveness, the National Guard is serviceable, but lets be realistic, two days a month does not a professional soldier make.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 12:58 PM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 12:53:19 PM

Unless Iran drops a nuclear bomb on somebody, we will not invade it. I may just be an ROTC washout who watches too much History Channel but I will guarantee this assertion 100%. George W. Bush may be dumb, but unless he's actually clinically retarded he can see that if we have this much trouble in Iraq, where at least the damn Kurds kind of like us, we won't have any luck in a much bigger country with rougher terrain and more people who are more crazy.

We may bomb it, and we may put special forces on the ground, we may even have to fight them on the ground at the Iraqi border (though I doubt all of these things), but we will not invade.

2/27/2007 12:55:04 PM

Quote :

"A) We'll get Israel do it"

Correction. If anything, Israel gets the US to do shit...not the other way around.

Quote :

"Yeah, here's best to least effective military forces: Marines (disclaimer: Marine Corps brat) Navy Army Air Force, tied with Coast Guard National Guard"

Marines and Army go home to their wives after the invasion and all the 'fun' is over. National Guard sit and rot while they get blown up by IED's. I'd put National Guard at the top if not near it.

(not saying ALL army and marines go home, but they are usually replaced by the NG for 'occupying' duties)

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 1:04 PM. Reason : fda]

2/27/2007 1:03:10 PM

Quote :

"and more people who are more crazy."

I thought the Iranian peeps liked us?

2/27/2007 1:12:29 PM

No, they dislike us, but they dislike us for nationalist rather more so than than religious reasons.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 1:16 PM. Reason : fixed it]

2/27/2007 1:15:46 PM

What's really sad is that by stepping up our rhetoric and military pressure, we are uniting their people behind an unpopular extremist. A substantional portion of the people in Iran are young (didn't live through the hostage crisis, etc.) and thirsty for change.

2/27/2007 1:44:54 PM

Quote :

"Marines and Army go home to their wives after the invasion and all the 'fun' is over."

I did?

2/27/2007 1:46:21 PM

Quote :

"i'm afraid a democrat will get elected in 2008 and feel the need to start a war with iran in order to not seem "soft" on terrorism. i hate that politics seems to work that way."

Doubt it. Any Democrat who gets elected in 2008 will probably have come in under an anti-Iraq War policy. Implicit in that is an anti-Iran War policy as well.

Quote :

"I thought the Iranian peeps liked us?"

Most of them actually do, but the constant talk about dropping bombs on their country tends to have a rather unnerving effect on the populace.

Quote :

"What's really sad is that by stepping up our rhetoric and military pressure, we are uniting their people behind an unpopular extremist. A substantional portion of the people in Iran are young (didn't live through the hostage crisis, etc.) and thirsty for change."

Agreed. If it weren't for this entire nuclear crisis, then the current President would have been toppled by now due to very weak economic conditions (20% unemployment). Some say the entire nuclear crisis was promoted by the Iranian government in order to distract them from troubles at home.

2/27/2007 1:57:41 PM

I think its more complicated than that. Yes the economy is doing poorly, but the regime is currently being propped up by the price of oil. Also, we talk about overthrowing the government all the time, but with the instability of Iraq next door, do the Iranians really want to risk turning out like that? Granted we can sit back and say, "well the conditions are totally different" but its not our necks in the noose.

2/27/2007 2:53:41 PM

The political structure of Iran is much more complicated and promising than pre-invasion Iraq. Also, I am suggesting that change via internal rather than external forces is achievable.

2/27/2007 3:23:07 PM

Quote :

"Also, we talk about overthrowing the government all the time, but with the instability of Iraq next door, do the Iranians really want to risk turning out like that? Granted we can sit back and say, "well the conditions are totally different" but its not our necks in the noose."

One thing going for Iran that means it wouldn't turn into Iraq is that everyone is pretty much Persian. So there wouldn't be any kind of ethnic group conflict taking place if a civil war broke out there for some reason.

Iran strikes me as the type of place that will eventually become a Persian version of the USA. We have a democracy with a Christian basis. I think they'll eventually become a democracy with a Muslim basis. All the instruments are in place for democracy to rise: elections, national pride (the Persian Empire, unlike the Arab states, have not always been subjected to foreign power), a working national infrastructure (something severely lacking in Iraq). The only thing hindering it is a board of clerics which vets candidates, but I'm not of the opinion that all of the clerics are insane and hellbent on destroying "the Great Satan". I'm sure some are shrewd and realize what would happen to themselves if such a conflict broke out, so at the end of the day moderation will win. All that is needed is for us to not give the radicals anything to run against by staying out of their affairs and letting the overwhelming will of the populace rise. Does our current administration think that way? I tend Republican, but I'm not sure they can see that far. Their backing and pushing for "fair democratic" Palestinian elections and the eventual victory of Hamas shows a complete lack of foresight.

Encouraging words, signs that Ahmadinejad's backers are starting to think he's nuts too:

Quote :

"Mr Ahmadinejad did not respond to these remarks and continued very much as before. The turning point, however, came during the municipal elections in early December. They were the first national elections since his victory. At the beginning of the campaign, everyone assumed that the election would be a battle between hardliners championed by the president on the one hand, and reformists on the other. Mr Ahmadinejad won an impressive election victory in 2005 It was widely assumed that the conservatives would either win or, at least, take most of the seats. But, as the campaign unfolded, it became increasingly apparent that there was a serious division among the hardliners. The reason was clear. The overconfident president had refused to agree on a compromised list of candidates with the other conservatives. As a result, and to the astonishment of most Iranians, the hardliners entered the elections with two different lists in many constituencies. The election results were catastrophic for Mr Ahmadinejad, particularly in critical seats such as Tehran and some other major cities. "

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6396873.stm

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 3:31 PM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 3:30:02 PM

Quote :

"One thing going for Iran Iraq that means it wouldn't turn into Iraq a quagmire is that everyone is pretty much Persian Arab. So there wouldn't be any kind of ethnic group conflict taking place if a civil war broke out there for some reason."

Sound familiar?

Iran: Persian 51%, Azeri 24%, Gilaki and Mazandarani 8%, Kurd 7%, Arab 3%, Lur 2%, Baloch 2%, Turkmen 2%, other 1%
Iraq: Arab 75%-80%, Kurdish 15%-20%, Turkoman, Assyrian or other 5%

Not to mention that pesky 7% Kurdish population sits on a large portion of Iran's oil reserves, and that the first country to get its act together will lunge at the oil reserves on the other side of their enemy's border. Don't get me wrong, I don't think Iran is nearly as hostile to us as some other places in the Middle East, but I'm not seeing a revolution at this point as a positive thing.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 5:57 PM. Reason : damnit]

2/27/2007 5:57:05 PM

The Iraqi bombings right now are almost entirely Shia vs. Sunni (leaving out the American factor).

That dynamic doesn't exist in Iran I don't think. I've never heard of the Azeris doing anything.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 6:15 PM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 6:12:15 PM

just wait till we create the dynamic by arming one group

Quote :

"I'm not knocking the Coast Guard, they do their job well, just cause I can't remember the last time our country had a coastal incident. (U-boats off the eastern coast in WWII???)"

the coast guard is in the persian gulf protecting oil interests

2/27/2007 6:40:32 PM