The United States faces a possible war with Iran to curb its nuclear ambitions and a “period of confrontation” with China over its currency, a top US lawmaker warned Saturday.
Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said his fellow conservative, fresh from their historic elections romp this week, support “bold” action to deal with Iran.
If President Barack Obama “decides to be tough with Iran beyond sanctions, I think he is going to feel a lot of Republican support for the idea that we cannot let Iran develop a nuclear weapon,” he told the Halifax International Security Forum.
“The last thing America wants is another military conflict, but the last thing the world needs is a nuclear-armed Iran… Containment is off the table.”
The South Carolina Republican saw the United States going to war with the Islamic republic “not to just neutralize their nuclear program, but to sink their navy, destroy their air force and deliver a decisive blow to the Revolutionary Guard, in other words neuter that regime.”
Graham is nuts!!!
In my opinion, all these War hawks would be better suited to rebuilding the U.S., before starting another military adventure. Face it, with the exception of the Drones that are piloted by real pilots 7,000 miles away from the action, the rest of the military, the “Grunts” , use 20th Century equipment & tactics. Perhaps the U.S. might achieve some or most of the objectives Mr Graham calls for, but what will the final cost be to the American people & the other Western world? Perhaps Mr Graham can shed light on why it’s taken over 10 years in Afghanistan with no end in sight to a solution? This nonsense that the U.S. is so mighty, yet can’t see its way clear to defeat a militant group in a remote part of the World, doesn’t say much for what he speaks. If he really truly believes in in his country, then he would lead the charge to cut the Military budget, close the vast array of military installations around the world, bring the personnel home, stop the trillions of dollars going down the rat hole that support and prop up the War profiting machine that’s bleeding the country dry. Of course, that would take courage to do, something that hasn’t been shown to exist in the Government, both inside & out.
The ‘neutralization’ rhetoric may be a bit more incendiary – about United States going to war with the Islamic republic – but the reasons for it and the alleged facts to back them are not really new.
Perhaps the the recent predictable articles by the NYT and WSJ-duel rants on how Wikileaks provides all the real information on the extent of Iranian support for anti-U.S. forces in Iraq and Iran’s alleged role is fresh information to strengthen the old augments for both the old and new war hawks to jump start the call for smashing the Iranian nuclear threat.
In that I would like to direct readers to a fine article -http://www.cjr.org/campaign_desk/what_did_wikileaks_really_tell.php?page=all -By Ali Gharib
The article brings home that “What the documents really reflect is the American military’s point of view what was happening, what the intelligence guys on the ground reported on Iran’s role; the same American intelligence that thought Saddam had weapons of mass destruction and thought that Saddam had connections to September 11.”
“The last thing the world needs is a nuclear-armed Iran…” but we know that……..
Great, now Obama can stall them and in 2012 run another LBJ countdown commercial. The political stupidity will only grow.