Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Government in secret talks about strike against Iran

The Telegraph are reporting that the UK government are having secret talks to discuss the possibility of military strikes against Iran, saying that a strike against Tehran is "inevitable", if the Iranians do not stop their uranium enrichment programme.

The language coming from Downing Street has changed dramatically since Jack Straw recently said that an attack against Iran was "inconceivable."

Now it would appear they are meeting to discuss what the consequences of an air strike on Iranian soil would be.

Firstly, the Iranians have every right under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty to produce nuclear energy, provided it is not for the production of nuclear weaponry. We have so far been given no proof whatsoever that Iran is producing nuclear weapons.

As in the case of Iraq, we are hearing of the battle plans before we are given actual solid proof of why we need to go into battle.

A senior Foreign Office source said: "Monday's meeting will set out to address the consequences for Britain in the event of an attack against Iran. The CDS [chiefs of defence staff] will want to know what the impact will be on British interests in Iraq and Afghanistan which both border Iran. The CDS will then brief the Prime Minister and the Cabinet on their conclusions in the next few days.

"If Iran makes another strategic mistake, such as ignoring demands by the UN or future resolutions, then the thinking among the chiefs is that military action could be taken to bring an end to the crisis.
I beg to differ. I think an attack on Iranian soil will only be the beginning of the crisis. As I argued here, the Iranians are unlikely to suffer an attack without some form of retaliation.

And one of the ways they could retaliate is through invading Iraq. The US and UK forces there are already weakened and unable to control the insurgency. What possible chance would they have against an army the size of Iran's and, with 60% of Iraq's population being Shia, an army with more claim to being "liberators" than we have.

The same ignorance and arrogance and imperial posturing that took us into the nightmare of Iraq is about to be repeated.

Click on title for Telegraph story.

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