Iran War rollout

"God may smile on us, but I don't think so." - anonymous Pentagon adviser quoted by Seymour Hersh April 2006 on Bush administration plans to pressure Iran militarily

The London Financial Times describes the Cheney-Bush administration's current posture toward Iran in the following way.  (The FT puts its articles behind subscription after a day or so.)  From Bush ‘believes conflict is a US-Iran proxy war’ by Edward Luce Financial Times 08/11/06:

Observers say Mr Bush is motivated by two instincts in guiding America’s diplomatic approach.

The first is the president’s visceral instinct to support Israel against its enemies, which he sees in terms of democracy versus totalitarianism. “People should not underestimate just how strongly the president feels in support of Israel and in his anger towards Iran and Syria [because of their sponsorship of Hizbollah],” said Reuel Marc Gerecht, a former senior official at the Central Intelligence Agency and now at the conservative American Enterprise Institute in Washington.

The second is Mr Bush’s belief that the fighting between Israel and Hizbollah is a proxy war between the US and Iran’s theocratic regime, which Washington sees as the most serious threat to stability in the region and beyond. US officials say they have intercepted communications between Tehran and Hizbollah that show Iran continues to supply arms to the Lebanese group.

Although Washington has not released evidence that Iran instructed Hizbollah to cross the “blue line” into Israel last month – when it captured two Israeli soldiers and killed eight others in ensuing clashes that sparked the current crisis – officials insist the Shia movement was doing Tehran’s bidding.

They say it is no coincidence the Hizbollah raid occurred the day after Tehran effectively turned down Washington’s conditional offer of talks over its alleged nuclear weapons programme.

The article's concluding sentences don't bode well for the future:

Republicancritics of Mr Bush say he is risking a broader war because of his refusal to consider talking to unfriendly regimes.

“There was no suggestion Mr Bush wanted to know what Syria thinks,” said John Hulsman, a foreign policy analyst who left the conservative Heritage foundation last month. “This administration continues to believe talking is a sign of weakness. In spite of Iraq, the neocons are still in charge.”

I realize that the neocons is generally pro-Israel, or at least pro-Israeli-hardliner policies.  But you also have to wonder that they aren't also willing to have both Israel and the US plunge into self-destructive policies without serious regard for the extreme risks they involve: Hard-line Neo-Cons Assail Israel for Timidity by Jim Lobe, Inter Press Service 08/11/06.  He writes:

While much of the world has criticised Israel for carrying out a "disproportionate" war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, hard-line neo-conservatives have attacked the government of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert for timidity.

As noted by diplomatic correspondent Ori Nir in this week's edition of The Forward, the U.S.' most important Jewish newspaper, the Israeli government and its military's chief of staff, Gen. Dan Halutz, have been subjected to unusually harsh criticism, including the charge that, by failing to wage a more aggressive war, they were jeopardising Israel's long-term strategic alliance with Washington.

"(Hezbollah) is today the leading edge of an aggressive, nuclear-hungry Iran," wrote Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer earlier this week. "...(Olmert's) search for victory on the cheap has jeopardised not just the Lebanon operation but America's confidence in Israel as well. The tremulous Olmert seems not have a clue."

In particular, Krauthammer and other leading neo-conservatives have assailed Olmert for not launching a massive ground invasion from the outset which, in their view, could have effectively crushed Hezbollah's military capabilities, if not the organisation itself.

"Hezbollah can only be destroyed by a ground campaign," wrote National Review columnist Jonah Goldberg early in the campaign. "If Israel doesn't launch one, it will be worse off."

Still others attacked him for failing to widen the war beyond Lebanon to Hezbollah supporters, Iran and Syria.

Whatever the Olmert government was thinking in launch its war against Lebanon and Hizbullah, it seems clear that a lot of American neocons hope for it to be the immediate prelude to an American war against Iran, and probably Syria, too.