[Peace-discuss] Bomb Iran

[C. G. Estabrook]

	February 9, 2007
	Is Bombing Iran Bush's Call?
	by Patrick J. Buchanan

In aborting Iran's nuclear program, "all options are on the table."

Some version of this threat against Iran has lately been made by John 
McCain, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards and Mitt Romney. [And by Barack 
Obama in his 2004 campaign for the Senate. --CGE]

Yet, if an attack on Iran is among "options ... on the table," who put 
it there? Who gave President Bush the authority to attack Iran? And when 
was it granted? And are all options also "on the table" if North Korea 
continues to test nuclear weapons?

What makes these questions other than academic is that Bush is putting 
in place military assets that will enable him to order and effect the 
rapid nuclear castration of Iran. But scarcely a peep of protest has 
been heard from our congressional leadership.

Observers have noted the dispatch of minesweepers and another U.S. 
carrier to the Persian Gulf, the naming of Admiral Bill "Fox" Fallon to 
head CentCom, which today manages two ground wars, and the return of 
U.S. fighter-bombers to Turkey. In March's Vanity Fair, Craig Unger reports:

"The same neocon ideologues behind the Iran war have been using the same 
tactics – alliances with shady exiles, dubious intelligence on WMD – to 
push for the bombing of Iran. As President Bush ups the pressure on 
Tehran, is he planning to double his Middle East bet?"

Ex-Israeli Prime Minister "Bibi" Netanyahu has told CNN: "Iran is 
Germany, and it's 1938. Except that this Nazi regime that is in Iran ... 
wants to dominate the world, annihilate the Jews, but also annihilate 
America."

More ominous than the hawk-talk is Unger's report that "Bush has 
directed StratCom (U.S. Strategic Command) to draw up plans for a 
massive strike against Iran at a time when CentCom has had its hands 
full overseeing operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Shifting to StratCom 
indicates that they are talking about a really punishing air force and 
naval air attack (on Iran)." So says retired Col. Patrick Lang, formerly 
of the Defense Intelligence Agency.

Now, this dramatic turn toward Iran – as a menace and source of our 
troubles in Iraq, which began with Bush's speech announcing the surge – 
can have other interpretations.

Bush may be waving a big stick in Tehran's face to compel it to 
negotiate its nuclear program. He may be reassuring the Saudis and 
Sunnis that America will not leave them to face a nuclear Iran. He may 
be recruiting and rallying an anti-Iran coalition of Israel and Sunni 
Arab states to stand up to the Shi'ite superpower in the Gulf. He may be 
playing to the home crowd in America, which is more receptive to keeping 
nuclear weapons away from the mullahs than in making Iraq safe for 
democracy at a cost of 100 U.S. dead a month.

But whatever motive he has, Bush is putting in place forces to enable 
him to order an all-out attack on Iran's navy, air force, and 
anti-aircraft, anti-ship and land-based missiles – and all its known 
nuclear facilities.

Now, as there is no indication Iran is preparing any attack on U.S. 
forces or facilities, or the homeland, such a U.S. attack would be the 
first strike in a preventive war – like the ones Japan executed at Port 
Arthur in 1904 and Pearl Harbor in 1941. Only Bush could claim Iran had 
been repeatedly warned of what he would do.

So, we return to the question: Does Bush have the authority to do this? 
If so, where did he get it, as Congress alone is empowered in the 
Constitution to declare war?

Discussing preventive war on Iran on "Hardball," Sen. Jim Webb said he 
is considering introducing a resolution declaring that Bush has no 
authority in present law to launch a war on Iran.

Such a resolution, HJR 14, has already been introduced in the House by 
Rep. Walter Jones, Republican of North Carolina, and now has the backing 
of 28 members. In an anguished plea to President Bush, Ron Paul, 
Republican of Texas, implored: "Don't do it, Mr. President. Don't bomb 
Iran. ... We don't need it. We don't want it."

Paul went on to declare that, today, Bush has no authority – in the 
Constitution, in the law or in morality – to launch a preemptive war on 
another nation that has not attacked us.

So, will the neocons get their way and their new war – on Iran?

Or will Congress follow the guidance of Jefferson: "In questions of 
powers, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him 
down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution."

Those member of Congress today apologizing for having voted Bush a blank 
check for war on Iraq might better tell Bush, by joint resolution, that 
he has no blank check for a war on Iran.

Or is this Congress, too, terrified of crossing the War Party?

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