Billmon has followed up on the subject of the mutually confrontational tendencies of the Iranian and American presidents. (Of course, only one of those two has control of a large arsenal of nuclear weapons and half the military spending of the entire world.)
Billmon talks about how the apocalyptic outlooks of Bush and Ahmadinejad may increase their willingness to push an unnecessary confrontation forward. If it just so happens that the policies which you believe will hasten the Second Coming of Christ or the return of the Twelfth Imam are also the policies that you figure are most likely to give you an immediate political benefit, the religious element makes them that much more tempting to adopt. Billmon notes in The Spiral Conflict (04/19/06) that when Bush was recently asked directly in a public appearance about his own views on the fundamentalist "premillenial dispensationalist" notion of the End of the World, he ducked the question itself. But his non-reply included an emphatic statement, "I made it clear, I'll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally, Israel." Billmon writes:
To say that Bush is an emotionally unstable man under absolutely skull-crushing pressure isn't to say he's gone completely off the deep end and thinks God wants him to start the countdown to the Apocalpyse. But it's pretty hard to ignore the growing signs of megalomania ("I'm the decider, and I decide what's best.") We also know from his personal history that religion is Bush's crutch — his substitute of choice for the drugs of his youth. When a dry drunk who came to Jesus rather than seek treatment starts talking obsessively about protecting Israel from the Iranian Hitler, it seems reasonable to be worried, particularly when he has the world's largest military machine at his instant disposal.
This may be one reason we're starting to hear some voices out of Israel — where Armaggedon is a practical possibility rather than a string of best-selling novels — suggesting that war with Iran does not, in fact, have to start right this very minute. Having an American president who's willing to go to war for you is one thing. But having one who's determined to go to war for you, whether you're ready for it or not, is another.
Robert Dreyfuss (Iraq War, Round Two TomPaine.com 04/17/06) speculates about how the various misdeeds of the Bush administration make it imperative for the main players personally as well as politically to keep Republican control of Congress.
Dreyfuss writes:
Missing from the discussion over Iraq in the United States is the growing likelihood that the Bush administration will escalate, not de-escalate, the war. If they do, their goal will be to employ another round of “shock and awe”—namely, massive U.S. military air and ground”—in a desperate effort to tip the balance in Iraq in America’s favor in advance of the 2006 elections. The failed war in Iraq is overwhelmingly the key factor driving down poll numbers for the president, vice president and the Republican Party in general.
It’s by no means clear that Democrats will capture either or both houses of Congress in November, but if they do it will open the floodgates for a never-ending series of partisan investigations by congressional committees, not only into Iraq but the myriad other scandals plaguing the administration. That’s a terrifying prospect for the Bush-Cheney team, and one they cannot allow at any cost. (my emphasis)
Now, Dreyfuss may give the Democrats a little more credit than they've earned. Even with Democrats in control of the House, it would probably still be a real political fight to get them to get really aggressive in investigating the administration's scandals. Especially since so many Democrats are still so remarkably timid about taking firm stands against Bush's disastrous policies in Iraq and dangerous brinksmanship with Iran.
Dreyfuss says that the "realists" in the Bush administration hope to pull out a few thousand troops from Iraq before the 2006 election. And then after the election, they hope to find some kind of peace-with-honor solution to get the Army and Marines away from the disaster zone.
But haven't we been hearing about major troops withdrawals for months? Or, rather, we heard about potentially big troop withdrawals to come after the December 2005 Iraqi elections. The last month or two that idea hasn't been very prominent. Dreyfuss gives us a clue why:
Problem is, the Bush administration’s hawks have a different idea, and there is no reason to think that they are not in control. As in 2003, the hawks are led by Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney and the staffs of the office of the secretary of defense and the office of the vice president. And, as in 2003, President George W. Bush - stubborn to the point of being pig-headed and obsessed with the goal of "winning" the Global War on Terror - is likely to go along, no matter how strong the opposition from the realists. In 2003, the war in Iraq was opposed by virtually the entire professional class at the State Department, the CIA and the U.S. military, yet Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld launched their illegal, unilateral war anyway. (my emphasis)
Williamn Arkin (The Nuclear Option and IranWashington Post blog 04/19/06) has something of a contrarian view. His post is worth reading because it talks about the process of nuclear-weapon decision-making. Among other things, he explains how Dick Cheney as Defense Secretary during the Gulf War kept planning for using nukes even though Old Man Bush, Secreatary of State James Baker and JCS Chairman Colin Powell had already decided against it.
But Arkin is (optimistically?) speculating that at least the nuclear option is unlikely against Iran:
After Sy Hersh’s New Yorker piece, the top officer in the U.S. Air Force made a little noticed remark about nuclear considerations vis a vis Iran. Agence France-Presse reported that Gen. T. Michael ("Buzz") Moseley said he had not taken part in any internal debate over whether nuclear weapons should be considered as a military option against Iran.
"I've not been in any meeting that is portrayed in the way the articles are written over the weekend," Moseley said. The Chief of Staff is also a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
I think Moseley is telling the truth. Consideration of nuclear options at the White House likely has produced no formal meetings, no paper, and I’m fairly certain that no "order" has been conveyed to the military to "prepare" nuclear options.
On the other hand, one of the main points of his post is that Dark Lord Cheney doesn't think he needs peons like the Joint Chiefs of Staff to help him make decisions on using nukes. So Arkin's piece is not all that optimistic.
