Neoconservative 'hopes, prays' Bush will bomb Iran

In the Wall Street Journal, Norman Podhoretz, a leading neo-con thinker (if that's not a contradiction in terms) says that he "hopes and prays" that President Bush attacks Iran.

"Although many persist in denying it, I continue to believe that what Sept 11, 2001, did was to plunge us headlong into nothing less than another world war," writes the editor-at-large of Commentary, who also sits on the Council on Foreign Relations. "I call this new war World War IV, because I also believe that what is generally known as the Cold War was actually World War III, and that this one bears a closer resemblance to that great conflict than it does to World War II."

Whenever people talk about WWIV, when most sane people are actually acutely aware that we have never had WWIII, it is very good indication of the general nuttiness of the speaker and Podhoretz is obviously out there ahead of the pack.

Podhoretz believes that "the plain and brutal truth is that if Iran is to be prevented from developing a nuclear arsenal, there is no alternative to the actual use of military force--any more than there was an alternative to force if Hitler was to be stopped in 1938."

"Since a ground invasion of Iran must be ruled out for many different reasons, the job would have to be done, if it is to be done at all, by a campaign of air strikes," the op-ed continues. "Furthermore, because Iran's nuclear facilities are dispersed, and because some of them are underground, many sorties and bunker-busting munitions would be required. And because such a campaign is beyond the capabilities of Israel, and the will, let alone the courage, of any of our other allies, it could be carried out only by the United States. Even then, we would probably be unable to get at all the underground facilities, which means that, if Iran were still intent on going nuclear, it would not have to start over again from scratch. But a bombing campaign would without question set back its nuclear program for years to come, and might even lead to the overthrow of the mullahs."

Podhoretz thinks that Bush "intends, within the next 21 months, to order air strikes against the Iranian nuclear facilities from the three U.S. aircraft carriers already sitting nearby....If this is what Mr. Bush intends to do, it goes, or should go, without saying that his overriding purpose is to ensure the security of this country in accordance with the vow he took upon becoming president, and in line with his pledge not to stand by while one of the world's most dangerous regimes threatens us with one of the world's most dangerous weapons."

Now, the fact that we are talking about a man who believes we are in the middle of WWIV tells us all we need to know about the mental health of Mr Podhoretz, but the scary thing is that people like this have long been listened to by the equally insane people who currently inhabit the White House.

He concludes:

"It now remains to be seen whether this president, battered more mercilessly and with less justification than any other in living memory, and weakened politically by the enemies of his policy in the Middle East in general and Iraq in particular, will find it possible to take the only action that can stop Iran from following through on its evil intentions both toward us and toward Israel," Podhorez writes in conclusion. "As an American and as a Jew, I pray with all my heart that he will."

What really is there to say about such people and such a mindset? Bush has been "battered more mercilessly and with less justification than any other (President) in living memory"? I mean, is he for real here? Bush has been given a free ride by most of America's press until the stench of Iraq became so overwhelming that even they couldn't ignore it any longer.

However, reality is not something that the neo-cons have ever been fond of, as Richard Perle's rewriting of the Iraq war in today's Guardian attests to.

Perle was also interviewed by Phillipe Sands at the Hay Festival and he also indicated, similarly to Podheretz, that he is keen for an attack on Iran to begin.

He seemed to recant on his recanting of support for the war (in a Vanity Fair article). He dissembled, in my view, on the key facts: his claims that there were ties between Saddam and Osama Bin Laden, and that the WMD would definitely be found. But most significantly, he gave us a clear hint on when the bombing of Iran might begin: once US troop numbers in Iraq had diminished to the point where they could not be an easy target after the surgical strikes of Iran that he foresaw.

So both Poderetz and Perle, both neo-con loons who were proven wrong in everything they said prior to the Iraq war, are now both anxiously pushing the need for the US to expand it's Iraq disaster into Iran.

In any other country, under any other administration, these two men would be so fatally wounded from their false predictions regarding Iraq, that their words could be dismissed as the rantings of inconsequential lunatics.

Sadly, we live at the time of the Bush administration and both of these lunatics might actually be giving us a foretaste of what is to come.

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