Capitol Hill Blue Forums Political Issues Foreign Policy & News Bomb Iran

A lot of information, from a writer (Scott Ritter) who actually knows what he is writing about:

http://www.truthout.org/article/acts-war

With due regard for Mr. Ritter's expertise, pia, I would point you to Juan Cole's discussion of the same event for a radically different point of view from someone else whom nevertheless many of us believe knows what he is talking about. Remember please that Mr. Ritter has a serious axe to grind, since his credibility was essentially smashed by the Administration over the WMD issue, and he has been belly-aching about it ever since.

His terse dismissal of the Bush turnaround ("of course the Geneva talks produced nothing") simply ignores the reality on the ground: Mr. Burns was sent with instructions to make no concession or offers. It is the fact that he was there that signaled a change in Administration policy, as Professor Cole points out. In the diplomatic world, change is incremental.

This makes no sense to me, rporter:

It seems you and I agree that an Iranian military response would be forthcoming in any case. In fact, the Iranians have said as much, in no uncertain terms - that if Israel attacks, they will retaliate against US forces in the region.

As for this:My question to you was what you were referring to as a minimal American response. What you seem to be saying here is that there would be a massive American response.

Here our opinions differ. I base my opinion on the fact that Russia has already stated that if the US attacks Iran, they (Russia) would be compelled to come to Iran's defense. In my opinion, the US would be best advised to make their participation in an Israeli attack as covert as possible in order to minimize the risk of all-out global nuclear conflict that would inevitably come about if Russia joined the fight.

Whether that "best advice" would be heeded by the neo-con camp is anybody's guess, but we are talking here about "military perspective", not PNAC pipe dreaming.

In any case, I concur with your implied observation that Israel is likely to act with little or no regard for American interests, and this is most unfortunate since in the larger scheme of things, the opportunity to bring peace to the Middle East, or at least to avert conflict of Armageddon proportions, is most likely to be realized by the actions of the US, and most likely dashed by the actions of Israel.

A complete and immediate reversal of US policy toward Israel is the only means to subdue their belligerence and forestall the likely impending disaster, IMHO, and I believe you would agree. Unfortunately, we'll be seeing flocks of pigs blocking out the sun before that eventuality.

Lastly, rporter, regarding the "Shi'ite response", I urge you to consider that the citizens of Iraq are a heavily armed people, who by and large believe fervently in violent retribution for perceived wrongs.


I was not referring to the Badr Corps or the the Sadrists, I was referring to the throngs of faithful who will almost certainly rise up to obey whatever fatwah is pronounced. And you can be sure any fatwah from the Supreme Ayatollah Khamenei will not stop at the Iran-Iraq border.

Having said that, let's bear in mind too that the Sadrists (I think that's who you meant when you typed "[a]dd the Badr group, who even though anti-Iran are also anti-American occupation and would love the opportunity to kick out the Americans") are indeed more than a match for the Americans, as they showed in 2004 and 2006. And they are most certainly not anti-Iran, not by a long shot. They are deeply nationalistic and anti-interventionist, but let us not forget that Muqtada's fealty is to Khamenei over Sistani, and he has never diverged from a policy of alliance with Iran. Not subservience, but alliance. In truth, he is not opposed in principle to alliance with the US. He is opposed to the Occupation.

Lesson number one from Vietnam, reinforced repeatedly in Iraq: a genuine insurgency cannot be stopped short of genocide. And Americans will not stomach "destroying the village to save it". There is no "neutralizing" of "organizational capabilities" involved, we are talking here about 1300 years of rigorous religious practice, my friend, not a brief single generation of political organizing.

Yes of course.

I think the point I was making is to first look at the military capabilities of armed citizenry, militias, and the military. These are the first responders.

I believe the Kurds would stay at home. They have no love for Iran but are closely allied with the US.

The Sunnis would probably take advantage of the changing political landscape which would become complicated by Iranian backed Shia resistance, thus Iraqi Shias may be fighting two wars.

The Shia response would undoubtedly be the militias first. Both the Badr's and Sadr's would align themselves as allies intent on immediate expulsion of the occupiers. They would be joined by whatever Iraqi military units are Shia while the Sunnis/Kurds would go their separate way. Current estimates range the militias at about 20k each and 180k total military but reduced by my estimate of 25k for Sunnis/Kurds. Thus there will be approximately 175k ready soldiers. Unfortunately for the Iraqis their military has demonstrated a lack of combat worthiness against fellow Iraqs, so we don't know what they would do against heavily armed Americans we can simply reduce their effectiveness summarily by some variable factor. I will choose .5 as it is far better than current evaluations of their effectiveness.

Iraq has an available pool of about 5M men of military age but that number is reduced by 1/2 for reasons noted above. There is no doubt some percentage of those men would join in the retaliation effort. But don't forget support. I estimate 85% support, either spiritual or material, and thus we are at 375k active available fighters. Most of these would be limited to small arms.

Iraqis have very limited air power which would undoubtedly be immediately neutralized by US forces in order to command the skies.

US actions would be predicated on defense rather than offense, thus there would be a change in tactics.

I think what I am saying is even though here may be an immediate response against the US forces, it by no means implies the destruction of those forces. Of greater consequence would be the international response especially if the Iraqis rise up against the American forces and demand their removal from Iraqi soil. I suspect no country would support the US and in fact would probably try to broker a cease fire to extricate the Americans.

I had not thought of this possibility previously and thanks for advising such. The problem I see is I suspect no one is considering it as a possibility. McCain when asked about leaving Iraq by al-Maliki, stated al-Maliki would not do such a thing. I think this is typical of the kind of thinking these people do. In this respect I don't think even if someone has thought of this possibility it has not entered into consideration by VP Cheney.


I am going to do some more thinking on this

As above I included both major militia groups. Don't be confused by American failure to "eradicate" the Sadrists. The reasons are more of a political nature than a military one. The Sadrists are more than capable in a stand up fight against the Iraqi military or against the Badr Corps, however without air support they are limited to asymmetric tactics.

The Americans have respected the holy places which the Sadrists have fortified and thus the Americans were severely inhibited in their actions. This would not be the same case if any of the militias came after the Americans in their own bases. The attacks would be most probably mortar attacks which require a more effective prevention.

This is confusing to me. What does it mean to say al-Sadr owes fealty to Ayatollah Khamenei? Seems you want to intimate something but don't say it.
I suspect al-Sadr represents a divergent path. He is more independent of Iran (can anyone say any Iraqi Shias are truly independent of Iran?)than the other parties, but remains committed to governance of the people just as his father did. I also suspect there is a closer relationship between al-Sistani and al-Sadr than you believe. Since 2004 al-Sistani has been using al-Sadr as a conduit for his personal political beliefs and al-Sadr in return has been using al-Sistani as his religious benefactor.

Anyway there is some momentary wiggle room while all the players take their seats by election time. There is an interesting article, To Bomb, or Not to Bomb That is the Iran question by Reuel Marc Gerecht, one of the leading neocon foreign policy theoreticians, which is not only pertinent but offers neocon insight into their thinking.

You raise a lot of interesting points, as always rporter. I appreciate the thought and effort you put into your posts, although I may sometimes have different ideas or conclusions.

Indeed. Far short of destruction of the US forces, a few thousand casualties would be sufficient to destroy any appetite in America for an ill-advised adventure against Iran. And I agree that the international hue and cry would be absolutely deafening. Almost certainly, it would doom any chance of American influence in Iraq, and greatly strengthen Iran's hand.

I don't think any of this is unknown or even mysterious to Pentagon or State. Rather, I suspect these likelihoods are well enough understood to have solidly blocked the Cheney policy, and may well stand until the end of the second Bush term. I think Secretary Rice understands these risks sufficiently to prevent the Commander in Chief from taking a reckless course.

But as you have stated on many occasions, Israel is the wild card, and continued US compliance does nothing to deter the Zionistas.

Yes, I only want to put the thought out there, not to state it without equivocation. There's a lot to equivocate about, I don't think it's a simple matter. I do think you are mistaken about the relationship between Muqtada and Sistani, and I would encourage you to review the actions of Sistani in response to al Sadr's 2004 insurrection as well as al Sadr's political statements vis-a-vis Sistani's calls for reconciliation in 2006-07 for evidence of the tension between the two.

Khamenei is a higher ranking figure in Shi'ite terms than Sistani. Muqtada al Sadr spent a great deal of his formative years in Iran, and was educated in Najaf, which is more Iranian than Iraqi, bear in mind. If Khamenei issues a fatwah commanding all Shi'ites to rise up against the Americans in response to an Israeli attack against Iran, and Sistani calls for calm, my expectation is that al Sadr would go along with Khamenei. No doubt al Hakim would, as you seemed to speculate in your post.

I think your expectation is belated as al-Sadr independently og the Iranians has already stated he would respond if Iran were to be attacked by the US. So it's not a consideration what Ayatollah Khamenei wants.

Also remember al-Sadr is not a religious scholar as was his father or al-Sadr's brothers. He has been for the most part a politician without religious credentials. (This may be changing but no one has verified those reports, last I heard).

Imputing that Ayatollah Khamenei could issue a fatwah which al-Sadr would immediately follow is akin to imputing that if the Pope told JFK to do something he would have. These guys can and do operate independently of their religious affiliations and in this case al-Sadr may consider nationalism far more important than religion, remembering his father dictum, governance of the people.
There is in fact more than just some evidence, it is a well known, and in fact al-Sadr called for the expulsion of al-Sistani for being too close to Iran. This suggests al-Sadr is not as close to Iran as some would have us believe and certainly not as close as SCRIRI, like al-Hakim.
al-Sistani and al-Sadr compliment each other and thus offer a complete package for Iraqi consideration when and if elections come.

Anyway by the end of the year we should have a better idea of what will happen.

There has been several arguments floating around the net implicitly grounded in the thought that reasonable men would act according to well founded logical arguments and yet we have seen in recent historical events the very lack of a well thought out plan of action. Reasonable speculation can only take us so far before reality, representing every possible action, rears it's ugly head and offers the viscerally illogical paths of irresponsible recklessness. Apparently many people believe common sense and logic will prevail as it is seemingly the current method of action. This is akin to the argument that what the administration has done to prevent another terrorist attack on America has worked. My response is if the "enemy" has not planned another attack then doing nothing would have worked just as well. Likewise because reasonable people at State and the Pentagon have the upper hand does not imply they will have it tomorrow. If the President was so easily convinced to invade Iraq on the advice of a "slam dunk" what would convince him now to attack Iran?

Neocon thinkers (many of whom I believe to be unregistered ISraeli agents, as they would prefer to represent the Israel policy positions before American policies)believe that Iran must be dealt with sooner rather than later. John Bolton talks about it incessantly and Reuel Gerecht argues the case in the previously posted link.

Anyway regarding this issue I am not as optimistic as you.

I know you're not, we've had this discussion going for a long time, and you've consistently taken a more pessimistic view. I do tend to be a (some would say starry-eyed) optimist about these things, always "hoping for the best" and looking at the evidence from the perspective of bringing about the best (or, least bad) result.