Fwd: [NOLA_C3_Discussion] Fwd to C3, etc. US to move warships near Iran [The Nation] (lead up to war just before Nov. elections?)

[Guest guest]

---------- Forwarded message ----------

malcolm willison <malcolmrw2002

Sep 22, 2006 11:03 AM

[NOLA_C3_Discussion] Fwd to C3, etc. US to move warships near

Iran [The Nation] (lead up to war just before Nov. elections?)

 

 

Greetings, all: Disturbing news below from the Nation. Sounds like

it's time to get the peace movement activated on this specific issue.

 

Pax, Malcolm

 

Mark Schaeffer <markalban1 wrote:

nysnet <nysnet >

Mark Schaeffer <markalban1

Fri, 22 Sep 2006 02:35:16 -0400 (EDT)

[nysnet] US to move warships near Iran [The Nation]

 

 

www.thenation.com (web only)

 

War Signals

 

Dave Lindorff article | posted September 21, 2006

 

As reports circulate of a sharp debate within the White House over

possible US military action against Iran and its nuclear enrichment

facilities, The Nation has learned that the Bush Administration and

the Pentagon have issued orders for a major " strike group " of ships,

including the nuclear aircraft carrier Eisenhower as well as a

cruiser, destroyer, frigate, submarine escort and supply ship, to head

for the Persian Gulf, just off Iran's western coast. This information

follows a report in the current issue of Time magazine, both online

and in print, that a group of ships capable of mining harbors has

received orders to be ready to sail for the Persian Gulf by October 1.

 

As Time writes in its cover story, " What Would War Look Like?, "

evidence of the forward deployment of minesweepers and word that the

chief of naval operations had asked for a reworking of old plans for

mining Iranian harbors " suggest that a much discussed--but until now

largely theoretical--prospect has become real: that the U.S. may be

preparing for war with Iran. "

 

According to Lieut. Mike Kafka, a spokesman at the headquarters of the

Second Fleet, based in Norfolk, Virginia, the Eisenhower Strike Group,

bristling with Tomahawk cruise missiles, has received recent orders to

depart the United States in a little over a week. Other official

sources in the public affairs office of the Navy Department at the

Pentagon confirm that this powerful armada is scheduled to arrive off

the coast of Iran on or around October 21.

 

The Eisenhower had been in port at the Naval Station Norfolk for

several years for refurbishing and refueling of its nuclear reactor;

it had not been scheduled to depart for a new duty station until at

least a month later, and possibly not till next spring. Family

members, before the orders, had moved into the area and had until then

expected to be with their sailor-spouses and parents in Virginia for

some time yet. First word of the early dispatch of the " Ike Strike "

group to the Persian Gulf region came from several angry officers on

the ships involved, who contacted antiwar critics like retired Air

Force Col. Sam Gardiner and complained that they were being sent to

attack Iran without any order from the Congress.

 

" This is very serious, " said Ray McGovern, a former CIA

threat-assessment analyst who got early word of the Navy officers'

complaints about the sudden deployment orders. (McGovern, a

twenty-seven-year veteran of the CIA, resigned in 2002 in protest over

what he said were Bush Administration pressures to exaggerate the

threat posed by Iraq. He and other intelligence agency critics have

formed a group called Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.)

 

 

Colonel Gardiner, who has taught military strategy at the National War

College, says that the carrier deployment and a scheduled Persian Gulf

arrival date of October 21 is " very important evidence " of war

planning. He says, " I know that some naval forces have already

received 'prepare to deploy orders' [PTDOs], which have set the date

for being ready to go as October 1. Given that it would take about

from October 2 to October 21 to get those forces to the Gulf region,

that looks about like the date " of any possible military action

against Iran. (A PTDO means that all crews should be at their

stations, and ships and planes should be ready to go, by a certain

date--in this case, reportedly, October 1.) Gardiner notes, " You

cannot issue a PTDO and then stay ready for very long. It's a very

significant order, and it's not done as a training exercise. " This

point was also made in the Time article.

 

So what is the White House planning?

 

On Monday President Bush addressed the UN General Assembly at its

opening session, and while studiously avoiding even physically meeting

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was also addressing the

body, he offered a two-pronged message. Bush told the " people of Iran "

that " we're working toward a diplomatic solution to this crisis " and

that he looked forward " to the day when you can live in freedom. " But

he also warned that Iran's leaders were using the nation's resources

" to fund terrorism and fuel extremism and pursue nuclear weapons. "

Given the President's assertion that the nation is fighting a " global

war on terror " and that he is Commander in Chief of that " war, " his

prominent linking of the Iran regime with terror has to be seen as a

deliberate effort to claim his right to carry the fight there. Bush

has repeatedly insisted that the 2001 Congressional Authorization for

the Use of Force that preceded the invasion of Afghanistan was also an

authorization for an unending " war on terror. "

 

Even as Bush was making not-so-veiled threats at the UN, his former

Secretary of State, Colin Powell, a sharp critic of any unilateral US

attack on Iran, was in Norfolk, not far from the Eisenhower,

advocating further diplomatic efforts to deal with Iran's nuclear

program--itself tantalizing evidence of the policy struggle over

whether to go to war, and that those favoring an attack may be winning

that struggle.

 

" I think the plan's been picked: bomb the nuclear sites in Iran, " says

Gardiner. " It's a terrible idea, it's against US law and it's against

international law, but I think they've decided to do it. " Gardiner

says that while the United States has the capability to hit those

sites with its cruise missiles, " the Iranians have many more options

than we do: They can activate Hezbollah; they can organize riots all

over the Islamic world, including Pakistan, which could bring down the

Musharraf government, putting nuclear weapons into terrorist hands;

they can encourage the Shia militias in Iraq to attack US troops; they

can blow up oil pipelines and shut the Persian Gulf. " Most of the

major oil-producing states in the Middle East have substantial Shiite

populations, which has long been a concern of their own Sunni leaders

and of Washington policy-makers, given the sometimes close connection

of Shiite populations to Iran's religious rulers.

 

Of course, Gardiner agrees, recent ship movements and other signs of

military preparedness could be simply a bluff designed to show

toughness in the bargaining with Iran over its nuclear program. But

with the Iranian coast reportedly armed to the teeth with Chinese

Silkworm antiship missiles, and possibly even more sophisticated

Russian antiship weapons, against which the Navy has little reliable

defenses, it seems unlikely the Navy would risk high-value assets like

aircraft carriers or cruisers with such a tactic. Nor has bluffing

been a Bush MO to date.

 

Commentators and analysts across the political spectrum are focusing

on Bush's talk about dialogue, with many claiming that he is climbing

down from confrontation. On the right, David Frum, writing on

September 20 in his National Review blog, argues that the lack of any

attempt to win a UN resolution supporting military action, and rumors

of " hushed back doors " being opened in Washington, lead him to expect

a diplomatic deal, not a unilateral attack. Writing in the center,

Washington Post reporter Glenn Kessler saw in Bush's UN speech

evidence that " war is no longer a viable option " in Iran. Even on the

left, where confidence in the Bush Administration's judgment is

abysmally low, commentators like Noam Chomsky and Nation contributor

Robert Dreyfuss are skeptical that an attack is being planned. Chomsky

has long argued that Washington's leaders aren't crazy, and would not

take such a step--though more recently, he has seemed less sanguine

about Administration sanity and has suggested that leaks about war

plans may be an effort by military leaders--who are almost universally

opposed to widening the Mideast war--to arouse opposition to such a

move by Bush and war advocates like Cheney. Dreyfuss, meanwhile, in an

article for the online journal TomPaine.com, focuses on the talk of

diplomacy in Bush's Monday UN speech, not on his threats, and

concludes that it means " the realists have won " and that there will be

no Iran attack.

 

But all these war skeptics may be whistling past the graveyard. After

all, it must be recalled that Bush also talked about seeking

diplomatic solutions the whole time he was dead-set on invading Iraq,

and the current situation is increasingly looking like a cheap

Hollywood sequel. The United States, according to Gardiner and others,

already reportedly has special forces operating in Iran, and now major

ship movements are looking ominous.

 

Representative Maurice Hinchey, a leading Democratic critic of the

Iraq War, informed about the Navy PTDOs and about the orders for the

full Eisenhower Strike Group to head out to sea, said, " For some time

there has been speculation that there could be an attack on Iran prior

to November 7, in order to exacerbate the culture of fear that the

Administration has cultivated now for over five or six years. But if

they attack Iran it will be a very bad mistake, for the Middle East

and for the US. It would only make worse the antagonism and fear

people feel towards our country. I hope this Administration is not so

foolish and irresponsible. " He adds, " Military people are deeply

concerned about the overtaxing of the military already. "

 

Calls for comment from the White House on Iran war plans and on the

order for the Eisenhower Strike Group to deploy were referred to the

National Security Council press office, which declined to return this

reporter's phone calls.

 

McGovern, who had first told a group of anti-Iraq War activists Sunday

on the National Mall in Washington, DC, during an ongoing action

called " Camp Democracy, " about his being alerted to the strike group

deployment, warned, " We have about seven weeks to try and stop this

next war from happening. "

 

One solid indication that the dispatch of the Eisenhower is part of a

force buildup would be if the carrier Enterprise--currently in the

Arabian Sea, where it has been launching bombing runs against the

Taliban in Afghanistan, and which is at the end of its normal

six-month sea tour--is kept on station instead of sent back to the

United States. Arguing against simple rotation of tours is the fact

that the Eisenhower's refurbishing and its dispatch were rushed

forward by at least a month. A report from the Enterprise on the

Navy's official website referred to its ongoing role in the

Afghanistan fighting, and gave no indication of plans to head back to

port. The Navy itself has no comment on the ship's future orders.

 

Jim Webb, Secretary of the Navy in the Reagan Administration and

currently a Democratic candidate for Senate in Virginia, expressed

some caution about reports of the carrier deployment, saying,

" Remember, carrier groups regularly rotate in and out of that region. "

But he added, " I do not believe that there should be any elective

military action taken against Iran without a separate authorization

vote by the Congress. In my view, the 2002 authorization which was

used for the invasion of Iraq should not extend to Iran. "