I see the New York Times review of Richard Clarke's novel The Scorpion's Gate is up and in it we find this wonderful tidbit:
In Clarke's novel, the United States has declared victory in Iraq and pulled out, leaving in place a Shiite government that's a puppet of Iran. Distracted by Iraq, America has ignored the far more serious threat posed by Iran and its little-known Qods (or Jerusalem) Force, "the covert action arm of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps," which Clarke asserts (here and in his nonfiction) has long been among Al Qaeda's chief backers. "Washington did Tehran's work for them," one of his characters explains. "While all the American attention was focused on car bombs in Baghdad, the Iranians secretly built nuclear weapons while denying it and tricking the Europeans and Americans into thinking that they were five years away from a bomb."
I seem to recall somebody else who was also raising the alarm bells on Qods Force back in October ...
Now Clarke, as I think even a cursory reading of Against All Enemies indicates, is about the last person to be in the tank for the Bush administration, so I just wanted to get rid of the canard that they're the only ones advancing this argument to begin with.
So, you are agreeing with Clarke that the war in Iraq is a dangerous distraction from real threats to our national security?
Strange, the last bit of science fiction Clarke wrote, Ten Years Later had the (surely unintended) consequence of bolstering my view that the WOT could never be addressed solely as a police security matter. Perhaps Clarke is working a double game?
The threat now is Iran and its nukes.
"The threat now is Iran and its nukes."
No. The threat is the Iranian regime's support for terrorism. It doesn't matter if they have nukes as long as they stop making trouble.
In Iran, Arming for Armageddon
I agree the Mad Mullahs of Iran are a real threat to our strategic interests. If they could only remain as a counter to the Suni's in the ME (The House of Saud) perhaps this would be a good thing.
Unfortunately the extreme radical clerics/cultists behind the rise of the new Iranian President are too wacko. They actually believe their own rethoric/religious mysticism/ideology. Think religious cultists as in David Koresh, Waco and the Branch Davidians (disawoved sect of the Seventh Day Adventists), and like Jim Jones and his Kool-Aid set.
For more on this family tree, see this piece from The American Spectator (HT The American Thinker):
Eminentoes
True Fanatic
By Patrick Devenny
Published 12/15/2005 12:07:50 AM
[...]
AHMADINEJAD'S ODD FIXATION ON the apocalypse may stem from his close association with Ayatollah Mesbah-Yazdi, a fire-brand cleric who advocates total separation from the West. Mesbah-Yazdi has lived in virtual isolation for the past 20 years, holed up in de-facto exile in the Shi'ite holy center of Qom. Considered extreme even by the hard-liners of the ruling Guardian Council, Mesbah-Yazdi is thought to be a rival of Supreme Guide Ayatollah Khamanei, the two having clashed quietly over political and doctrinal issues. Such a fissure is not difficult to imagine, given Mesbah-Yazdi's fanatical devotion to the tenets of extremist Shi'a Islam, which -- in his estimation -- justify the immediate execution of those who dare insult the religion. Mesbah-Yazdi has also suggested that killing "intellectuals" is sanctioned by God himself, and that "pluralism" is Satanic trickery.
[...]
Read More
Here
For further discussions see this lively discussion thread here at WoC:
Here and Here
Something else of interest is there is info surfacing that the recent plane crash that killed many Iranian journalists wasn't just simply an accident of mechanical neglect but an deliberate act.
See Dr. Zin's new post:
Here
and this is interesting:
German Intelligence Warns That Iran Has New Missiles
Here
and Charles Krauthammer puts this all in perspective:
In Iran, Arming for Armageddon
Here
"A novel about the perils of not listening to its author ..."
Nice little dig there, but not entirely accurate. We have no idea who the author of The Scorpion's Gate is, so it's not fair to say we didn't listen to him. There must be a whole army of these guys, dug in like ticks all over Washington, ready to write "books" for senators and congressmen.
I don't read many novels, unless they were written by dead Russians, and this excerpt from The Scorpion's Gate is why:
Forget the Iranians, it's people who sell stuff like this for $15 a pound that need to be stopped.
Is Iraq a distraction? No. The Pentagon and the White House are fully capable of fighting a world war, especially one that doesn't require that US armed forces be deployed all over the world (I mean other than where they already are, which come to think of it...is all over the world).
Anyway, my point is that managing all this in indeed possible; the strategy in Iraq explicitly implies a world-wide, or at least Middle East-wide, grand strategy i.e. disrupt terror cells where they exist, and democratize the Middle East. That strategy calls for letting Iran ferment in the hopes that its indegenous democracy movement will gain power before the Ayatollas get too trigger happy. An unprevoked nuke attack by them would certainly unify most of the world, including the UN and Europe, against them.
If anyone is capable of coordinating a world-wide campaign against Islamists, the US is. Far worse would be the opposition stategy of just focusing on al-Q, which at this point is hardly more than a symbol or brand-name.
The latest elections in Iraq are deeply inspiring, and have the whole world once again wondering if, just maybe, Bush will win in Iraq. Europe and to an extent even the UN have accepted that they have to live with Bush for the rest of his term. In all these things, Bush's 2004 election win by a comforable margin (they can't cheat if it isn't close!) has been ABSOLUTELY CRITICAL.
The trouble in my view is continuing to win in the home front. That means fighting off scandle after scandle, which is very difficult given the anti-war side seems unwilling and unable to offer very many constructive criticisms.
A second trouble is, will the Iraqi army, which is actually becoming a viable fighting force, revert back to its old ways (abandoning posts at the first sign of trouble, acting like conscripts, etc.) if the U.S. draws down.
OK just some thoughts...I think I'm straying from the topic!
So does this mean Clarke and all those LLL's like him who love to say "we shoulda attacked Iran or N. Korea instead of Iraq blah blah" does this mean they are on baord for Phase 3 Iran. Clarke doesnt really support a war on Iran or anyone just another reason he can knock on the Iraq phase. I would really love to just once see a reporter ask one of these jerk offs if they would support a war on whatever threat they claimed was more important just once and force a locked in answer no side step dodge, not holding my breath thou.
Besides Bush has always been looking towards Iran after 9-11 he said this was going to be a long war anyone who thought it ended with Afghanistan was wrong just like those who think Iraq is the end. Attack on Iran first was suicide we didnt have the numbers to invade conquer and occupy the whole middle east at once. We have done with what we have its called stradegy we did Afghanistan first then Iraq while at the same time spliting Iran and Syria while surrounding Iran on all sides. If we had gone into Iran first Iraq would have been embolden and if anyone thinks that while we were knee deep in Iran that Saddam shooting down those No-fly-zone pilots would not have expanded the war into Iraq and and oh yeah now the Aljizz is saying we are at war with Muslims from Afghanistan to Iraq so now Syria jumps in and we got a WW2 level war. No Bush was smart divide and conquer phase 1 Afghanistan, phase 2 Iraq, phase 3 to be determined but I am leaning towards massive air strikes on Iran, leadership decapitation and no fly zone over the whole nation then from thier depends on what the Iranian people do. Syria I think is isolated boxed in and Assad is so weak a strong wind will take his regime out, besides with no Iran he will be irrelevent and ripe for phase 4 if nessecary.
These lame remarks are like someone in WW2 complaing why we attacked N. Africa or Normandy why not just go right into Germany from the North Sea seams simple right??