Wag the Dog, here we come!

Well, he has to do something. We must have already won the "War on Terrorism," since there have been few (none?) alerts at nearly the level as we approached the 2004 election.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1920074,00.html
"ISRAEL'S armed forces have been ordered by Ariel Sharon, the prime minister, to be ready by the end of March for possible strikes on secret uranium enrichment sites in Iran, military sources have revealed.

The order came after Israeli intelligence warned the government that Iran was operating enrichment facilities, believed to be small and concealed in civilian locations..."

This is no joke.

Foreign policy experts (like pro Iraq War Kenneth Pollack) participated in mock war games (US vs Iran), put on by the Atlantic magazine. The article about it is called "Will Iran Be Next?" and it's by James Fallows. The conclusions left the players with the opinion that there are NO reasonable military options available to the US at this point in time.

Likewise, "Newsweek has learned that the CIA and DIA have war-gamed the likely consequences of a U.S. preemptive strike on Iran's nuclear facilities. No one liked the outcome. As an Air Force source tells it, 'The war games were unsuccessful at preventing the conflict from escalating.'"

Nevertheless, the Europeans are taking the threat of a US pre-emptive strike very seriously, as is Seymour Hirsch who has interviewed a number of high ranking people at the Pentagon about the possibility. Check out his stuff in the New Yorker.

Bush has only two options: to live with existence of an Iranian bomb, or launch a war with way less than optimal conditions. Let's all hope and pray that he exercises better judgement with regards to Iran than he did with Iraq.