The Bush administration is demonizing Iran, with occasional foot-in-mouth assistance from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and compliance of the corporate mass media. But the Iranian constitution gives Ahmadinejad little power, so ignore the man who dresses like Obama behind the curtain.
Most of the drum beats are just propaganda excuses. For example, "Iranian's have refused some IAEA inspectors, and inspections." This is an excuse that the US engineered by securing special inspections through obscure actions of the UN Security Council, which the US knew Iran could not accept. The US was then able to point to "Iran's refusal to allow IAEA inspections", thereby making Iran look unreasonable, like they're hiding something. But, just as in Iraq, Bush must have underlying motives, or reasons, for war with Iran, right?
The Reasons for Attacking Iran:
These are the reasons that I think are motivating the Bush administration.
1) Controlling Iran has always been part of the neo-con master plan that Bush has bought into. Controlling Iran, like Iraq, entails the benefits of control over natural resources, if only to create predicatability, not necessarily stealing the wealth. Control also entails brining Iran into the corporate globalization free market world view. I find it hard to believe Bush thinks they can achieve "regime change," nevertheless, control is a long-term motivation.
2) Nearer-term, Bush needs to weaken Iran. He must first have chaos in Iran before he can have control. This goal is more urgent, because of the way things have gone badly Iraq. The logic is simple:
The US can't continue to occupy Iraq, because US soldiers are getting chewed up, it's too costly, and the US public is getting restless.
The US can't leave Iraq, because Iraq is now run by Shia political parties that are friendly to Iran, and leaving now would yeild too much regional influence to Iran.
Solution? First attack and weaken Iran, THEN pull back from Iraq (leaving behind US military bases, of course). Call it "The Third Way" to resolving the Iraq problem.
3) Israel Wants It. I confess. I've bought into the perspective that, "What Israel wants, the US wants." Just look at the way Hillary Clinton and John Edwards pander to the Israeli lobby? As far as Iran goes, the message to the Israeli vote is that "Everything is on the Table." Does Israel have any reasons? That doesn't really matter, but in general, they want control too.
4) Potential Nuclear Weapons in Iran. Even if Iran is ten years away from having a nuclear weapon, that's too soon. If an attack could make that twenty years, that's a good thing. Attack them in another ten years, and reset the clock again. Keep doing this, and.... we'll, you get the idea. Preventive war is now a formal part of American miliatry strategic policy, so we might as well make use of it, right? Who's going to stop us?
The recent propaganda about Iranians providing weapons to the Iraqi insurgency is being floated as a trial balloon in this reagard. But the logic falls a little flat; Iran's Shia allys are basically in power in Iraq, and thus don't need weapons to fight the US, and Iran's enemies are the Sunni "Saddam dead ender insurgency" fighting the US. This ties into number 2) above. That is, the US doesn't want Iran to gain influence in the region. Even if Iran isn't giving weapons to the insurgency, the US doesn't want Iran currying favor with the Shia-dominated Iraqi government.
Other Thoughts on the Topic:
The Provoked Response: This is no more a "reason" than the Tonkin Gulf incident was a reason for escalation in Vietnam. That is, the US will try to provoke a response from Iran, and use that as a pretext for attacking (As if nukes ain't good enough you say). This reason hasn't yet materialized, but it will. It will be bolstered by the drum beat of demonization that provides a fertile foundation for the unsuspecting American TV watchers (I hope I'm wrong about this). It helps that they're religious fundamentalists and we're, ah'hem, not. The Iranian Supreme Leader, a title to which Bush and Cheney aspire, has offered predictions to this end: terrorism or human rights violations. So has Zbigniew Brzezinski.
I think five reasons are enough. I suppose the benefits to the defense industry lobby might be another "good reason", but I don't want to be accused of being too cynical. Testing new bunker busters is another good reason, but that's probably considered a mere side-benefit to the inside-crowd who are taking us to war in Iran. Then, there is also the mesianic reason, against which former National Security Advisor, Zignew Brzezinski, spoke out against in his February 1, 2007 testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. It's hard to tell whether this later "reason" is actually motivating the Bush people or is just part of the Bush propaganda drum beat, in this case designed to rally his radical base of christian crusaders.
Scott Ritter offers another reason. The big bully has gotten beat in Iraq. It's time for the deafeated bully to vent elsewhere.... like Iran. To this many people might say say, "We can't go into Iran. We're already stretched too thin in Iraq." We're not "going in to Iran." We're just going to bomb the bajeebers out of 'em. We've got three aircraft carrier groups over there. CNN viewers will get to see more Clintonesque cruise missile launches. No, this isn't a wag-the-dog rationale... OK, maybe that's a "side-benefit."
There are other reasons being given, some of them, while intended to be humorous, have a sickening grain of truth to them.
~
