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        New Message Board Archives >> 2007 General Board Posts >> Next Target Tehran ?
        
(Message started by: UN solved on Jan 15th, 2007, 10:22pm)
Title: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by UN solved on Jan 15th, 2007, 10:22pm
"Weapons of mass destruction will provide the rationale for military action, though it won't be limited to attacks on a few weapons factories. It will include limiting Iranian retaliatory capability, using bombers to destroy up to 10,000 targets in the first day of any war, and special forces flying in to destroy anything that's left. "

http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,1990498,00.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,1990962,00.html

UNsolved
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by chewy on Jan 15th, 2007, 10:59pm

Quote:
Bush plans to add war on Iran to his triumphs in Iraq and Afghanistan


Triumphs?????
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by Charlie on Jan 16th, 2007, 2:37am
Going to war with Iran would be a whole new ballgame. I doubt we will even though it's pretty well known that a considerable number of our dead or maimed soldiers are likely at the hands of the several thousand Iranians making life miserable for everyone in Iraq. We are stretched thin.

Iran has a large oppositionist party that we need to exploit. It would probably have as much and likely more success than a bloody invasion.

Charlie
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by UN solved on Jan 16th, 2007, 9:52am
Everyone keeps saying 'we're stretched thin' when in reality we've only committed about 10% of our forces for Iraq.

The way outta Iraq will be through Iran

We're building HUGE bases over there on the border w/ Iran ... and these bases are not for what's going on in Iraq right now.

UNsolved
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by BMoneeTheMoneeMan on Jan 16th, 2007, 10:09am
Estimates are that 40 to 50% of the insurgents killed or captured in Iraq are from Saudi Arabia.  
The majority of the hijackers on 9/11 were from saudi arabia.
The only right a woman has in Saudi is the right to get beaten with a stick.

Howcome nobody ever talks about saudi arabia?
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by JeffB on Jan 16th, 2007, 10:58am
If I heard right, we have an additional carrier battle group heading to the gulf.
If we did strike I think this would largely be a naval engagement. Two battle groups is a massive amount of power!
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by vig on Jan 16th, 2007, 11:21am
How stupid can we be?
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by BMoneeTheMoneeMan on Jan 16th, 2007, 11:31am

on 01/16/07 at 11:21:15, vig wrote:
How stupid can we be?


You are asking about Bush Jr.  The possibilities are endless.
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by JeffB on Jan 16th, 2007, 11:42am
WASHINGTON - The U.S. military has sold forbidden equipment at least a half-dozen times to middlemen for countries — including Iran and China — who exploited security flaws in the Defense Department’s surplus auctions. The sales include fighter jet parts and missile components.

In one case, federal investigators said, the contraband made it to Iran, a country President Bush branded part of an “axis of evil.”

In that instance, a Pakistani arms broker convicted of exporting U.S. missile parts to Iran resumed business after his release from prison. He purchased Chinook helicopter engine parts for Iran from a U.S. company that had bought them in a Pentagon surplus sale. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, speaking on condition of anonymity, say those parts made it to Iran.


If we did do anything it will NOT be like the late 80s when we were being "harrassed" by guys in speed boats with uzi's.
On a side note, I wonder if we would send the USS Vincennes?
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by Kevin_M on Jan 16th, 2007, 12:30pm

on 01/16/07 at 02:37:10, Charlie wrote:
Iran has a large oppositionist party that we need to exploit. It would probably have as much and likely more success than a bloody invasion.


One of the links briefly touches on your thought, Charlie.  :)


Quote:
In the aftermath, the US will support regime change, hoping to replace the ayatollahs with an Iran of the regions. The US and British governments now support a coalition of groups seeking a federal Iran. This may be another neocon delusion, but that may not be the point. Making Tehran concentrate on internal problems leaves it unable to act elsewhere.




Among just one of the concerns mentioned in the link --


Quote:
The naval forces, including British ships, train to pre-empt Iranian interference with oil shipments through the straits of Hormuz.



This from a 1997 study:


Quote:
The Relevance of Strategic Geography in the Middle East

The United States continues to have vital interests in the Middle East, including the survival of allies, especially Israel, and the denial of control of Persian Gulf energy resources to hostile powers. To secure these interests it must be able, in the last resort, to project military power over great distances and ensure access to forward bases and facilities in the region. In this regard Egypt, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey are especially important. The challenges to American power projection capabilities will grow if the proliferation of advanced weapons to regional adversaries accelerates.


Russian control or dominance of the Caspian Sea and Basin will ensure Moscow's control of the key oil and gas distribution systems from the region to the outside world and give it great leverage over supply. Continued instability in the North Caucasus and Transcaucasus, Thrkey, and Afghanistan poses serious potential threats to the various pipelines that have been proposed for transporting oil and gas to the international markets. Any deployment of significant Russian forces in Iran, Turkmenistan, or Afghanistan could resurrect concerns about Russian ambitions in regard to the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean. It will be recalled that the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was viewed by the United States as a strategic threat to the Persian Gulf since it brought Soviet air power 600 miles closer to the Strait of Hormuz. It was the trigger for the enunciation of the Carter Doctrine and the development of the Rapid Deployment Joint Task Force.



Peripheral Barriers


Quote:
At the world's oil hub the Strait of Hormuz, which separates Iran from the Arabian peninsula and links the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, is another vital choke point. A longer strait, it also contains three major islands: Qeshm, Hormuz, and Hanjam. During the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war and the 1991 Gulf War, the strait assumed even greater strategic importance as the gateway for much of the world's oil supply. World powers, including the United States, relied on the strait for transport of oil tankers and warships. Free access to the strait allowed the United States to bring in its navy to help contain Iraqi forces on the eastern shores of Kuwait and Iraq in 1990-91, whereas restricted access would have prevented this deployment, depriving the Americans of a significant portion of their firepower.


The 1973 Arab-Israeli War and the Oil Crisis of the 1970s

...the daily shipment of oil through the Strait of Hormuz grew from about 2,400,000 barrels a day in 1957 to nearly 18,000,000 barrels a day in 1975, reflecting the staggering increase in overall demand for Persian Gulf oil as the economies of the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries grew.



MAP:  the lettering in white, upper right.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/wideangle/shows/saudi/images/map1.gif


Sea lines of communication: Oil (thousands of barrels per day) (1975).

http://arabworld.nitle.org/images/120_map13.jpg
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by floridian on Jan 16th, 2007, 1:03pm
Problem is, it is a lot easier to shut down the Straights or interfere with oil transit than it is to keep them open.  Iran has a fairly large arsenal of missiles they bought from from China and Russia, in addition to what Jeff alluded to.  

An attack will pretty much blow any prospect of courting the internal opposition in Iran - at that point, allying with the US will be seen as treason and instead, that country will go deeper into nationalist/fundamentalist fervor.  
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by BobG on Jan 16th, 2007, 1:08pm

on 01/16/07 at 10:09:41, BMoneeTheMoneeMan wrote:
Howcome nobody ever talks about saudi arabia?

Money. Pure and simple.
Saudi Arabia has billions of dollars in US Banks and European Banks.
Follow the money.
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by Kevin_M on Jan 16th, 2007, 1:11pm
And any embargos would maybe not be as successful as might be proposed if China stepped in to take advantage of the economic opportunies by supplying what may be denied from other countries.  



From another link on Un Solved's link provided.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,1987518,00.html


Quote:
Most of Iran's critics continue to regard economic sanctions as an effective diplomatic tool, and last month the UN security council finally passed a resolution that imposed very mild sanctions on the Iranian regime for its nuclear non-compliance. Washington will be pushing for more if, as seems likely, Iran's enrichment programme goes on. But this would be more seriously resisted by Iran's allies on the council, Russia and China.

That is not to say that the US has no way of hitting the Iranian economy. It has put huge pressure on international banks not to back Iranian ventures, forcing many foreign businesses to curb their own trade and investment there. This has been particularly hard on Iran's oil sector, which earns nearly all the economy's foreign exchange. Yet such measures are unlikely to thwart Tehran, which will offer foreign contractors better terms or strike up closer relations with Chinese companies.
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by BMoneeTheMoneeMan on Jan 16th, 2007, 1:11pm

on 01/16/07 at 13:08:16, BobG wrote:
Money. Pure and simple.
Saudi Arabia has billions of dollars in US Banks and European Banks.
Follow the money.


What a shame.  They keep killing and plotting to kill americans, but they have money so noone wants to do anything.

Blood for oil?
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by JeffB on Jan 16th, 2007, 1:17pm
I don't think the U.S. Navy would send even one carrier group through that strait. It is a narrow area that has a few islands occupied by Iran that one must pass to get into the gulf fully.
The Iranians saw first hand how we had control of those seas 20 years ago and I'd bet dollars to doughnuts they would not let us access that area with any kind of ease.
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by JeffB on Jan 16th, 2007, 1:19pm
Just wait till the Royal family gets ousted. I think then we will have big problems.
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by Kevin_M on Jan 16th, 2007, 1:29pm

on 01/16/07 at 13:17:14, JeffB wrote:
The Iranians saw first hand how we had control of those seas 20 years ago and I'd bet dollars to doughnuts they would not let us access that area with any kind of ease.


Which makes trying to incapacitate them militarily seem a thought to prevent this:

from the previous link in last post.


Quote:
Not only would military strikes be unlikely to knock out targets that are well dispersed and defended, they would provoke deadly retaliation by Tehran's proxies in Iraq and Afghanistan against British and US servicemen; the price of oil would rocket, particularly if Iranian commanders retaliated by disrupting tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz; and throughout in the Muslim world and beyond massive popular reaction could well bring down pro-western regimes..


He mentions the unlikelihood of being able to incapacite them though and the aftermath, as Flo mentioned too.
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by eddie on Jan 16th, 2007, 1:35pm
http://tagsave.com/MySpace/FunnyPictures/funny_pictures_0014.jpg
         
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by JeffB on Jan 16th, 2007, 1:43pm

on 01/16/07 at 13:29:50, Kevin_M wrote:
Which makes trying to incapacitate them militarily seem a thought to prevent this:

from the previous link I posted:



Their military tried before and didn't succeed. With the exception of taking out oil platforms that were used to load mines into boats with big guns, most of our engagements were with small arms. Now they have pretty good missile technology that we would have to face.
I wouldn't want to be on a Frigate in those waters these days!
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by Kevin_M on Jan 16th, 2007, 1:48pm

on 01/16/07 at 13:43:34, JeffB wrote:
Their military tried before and didn't succeed. With the exception of taking out oil platforms that were used to load mines into boats with big guns, most of our engagements were with small arms. Now they have pretty good missile technology that we would have to face.
I wouldn't want to be on a Frigate in those waters these days!


I agree, this seems huge.  
Title: Re: Next Target Tehran ?
Post by Charlie on Jan 16th, 2007, 10:41pm
Our best hope is that money will continue to trump fundamentalism. It's about all that keeps the world from being run here, there and everywhere, by people interested in fantasy over fact.

Charlie


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