...attack Iran. Bartcop describes his correspondence with a U.S. naval officer (via maha--thanks...; italics mine):
I have a friend who is an LSO on a carrier attack group that is planning and staging a strike group deployment into the Gulf of Hormuz. (LSO: Landing Signal Officer- she directs carrier aircraft while landing) She told me we are going to attack Iran. She said that all the Air Operation Planning and Asset Tasking are finished. That means that all the targets have been chosen, prioritized, and tasked to specific aircraft, bases, carriers, missile cruisers and so forth....Always ready to go in harms way, Marines rarely ever question unless it's a matter of tactics or honor. But something seems awry. Junior and senior officers are starting to grumble, roll their eyes in the hallways. The strain of deployments is beginning to hit every jot and tittle of the Marines and it's beginning to seep into the daily conversation of Marines and Naval officers in command decision.
"I know this will sound crazy coming from a Naval officer", she said. "But we're all just waiting for this administration to end. Things that happen at the senior officer level seem more and more to happen outside of the purview of XOs and other officers who typically have a say-so in daily combat and flight operations. Today, orders just come down from the mountaintop and there's no questioning. In fact, there is no discussing it. I have seen more than one senior commander disappear and then three weeks later we find out that he has been replaced. That's really weird. It's also really weird because everyone who has disappeared has questioned whether or not we should be staging a massive attack on Iran."
"We're not stupid. Most of the members of the fleet read well enough to know what is going on world-wise. We also realize that anyone who has any doubts is in danger of having a long military career yanked out from under them. Keep in mind that most of the people I serve with are happy to be a part of the global war on terror. It's just that the touch points are what we see since we are the ones out here who are supposedly implementing this grand strategy. But when you liason with administration officials who don't know that Iranians don't speak Arabic and have no idea what Iranians live like, then you start having second thoughts about whether these Administration officials are even competent."
Regarding the nature of a possibleprobable attack:
"I don't think it's limited at all. We are shipping in and assigning every damn Tomahawk we have in inventory. I think this is going to be massive and sudden, like thousands of targets. I believe that no American will know when it happens until after it happens. And the consequences...whatever the consequences...they will have to be lived with. Something inside me tells me to tell it anyway."
I asked her why she was suddenly so cynical.
"I have become cynical only recently. I also don't believe anyone will be able to stop this. Bush has become something of an Emperor. He will give the command, and cruise missiles will fly and aircraft will fly and people will die, and yet few of us here are really able to cobble together a great explanation of why this is a good idea. Of course many of us can give you the 4H Club lecture on democracy in the Mid East. But if you asked any of the flight officers whether they have a clear idea of what the goal of this strike is, your answer would sound like something out of a think tank policy paper. But it's not like Kosovo or when we relieved the tsunami victims. There everyone could tell you in a sentence what we were here doing."
"That's what's missing. A real sense of purpose. What's missing is the answer to what the hell are we doing out here threatening this country with all this power? Last night in the galley, an ensign asked what right do we have to tell a sovereign nation that they can't build a nuke. I mean the table got EF Hutton quiet. Not so much because the man was asking a question that was off culture. But that he was asking a good question. In fact, the discussion actually followed afterwards topside where someone in our group had to smoke a cigarette. The discussion was intelligent but also in lowered voices. It's like we aren't allowed to ask the questions that we always ask before combat. It's almost as if the average seaman or soldier is doing all the policy work."
She had to hang up. She left by telling me that she believes the attack is a done deal. "It's only a matter of time before their orders come and they will be sent to station and told to go to Red Alert."....
"Yes. We're gong to hit Iran, bigtime. Whatever political discussion that are going in is window dressing and perhaps even a red herring. I see what's going on below deck here in the hangars and weapons bays. And I have a sick feeling about how it's all going to turn out."
Basically, there are 535 people who can do something to stop this--the U.S. Congress. And they're too craven and cowardly to do anything about it. I just don't know how to stop Bush short of impeachment, and that's not going to happen.
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Just so you know, this popped up on a diary on DailyKos and was promptly removed. I suspect that it will eventually make its way to Snopes. Not that it means we won't be attacking Iran, but this doesn't pass the sniff test.
I would like to think that an attack on Iran might have some influence on the unwillingness of Congressional leaders to consider impeachment.
Todd - yep, it was first posted on DailyKos. Kos's take on it, and links to some of the questions that got it yanked here:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/9/2/15560/00042
In short: 1. did Maccabee (the diarist who posted this) really remember that long a conversation verbatim? 2., Would a marine officer really call from an aircraft carrier to leak all that information? 3., lots of supporting details seem to be of the "making shit up" variety.
Too many holes in this story but I'm afraid the US will attack Iran within the next 100 days.
Ditto many comments here. Whether the conversation is legit or not, the fact that we even consider it shows what we already know. Bush's pattern is clear. When he's losing a war, his solution is to start another one. Who knows, one day schoolchildren might have to be reminded that there was a war in Iraq before the Great Iran War.
Yep, smells like bogus.
And for you guys up there at US: do you really think there's any possibility for this craziness to happen? For me this is way way too unreal. I mean, this is so absurdly out of reality that it can't be true.
Gabriel,
This administration doens't live anywhere close to a little place called the reality-based community.
What I cannot grasp is why our fucking Congress won't even consider impeachment.
First of all, I find it irritating that Kos deleted it. Of course he is free to do what he wants with his site, but I am free to be irritated by it. If he doubts the veracity of a post, he can leave a comment, or write his own post. Blogs should be a place for people to discuss things even if they strain the bounds of credibility.
Second, perhaps the story fails the smell test, but Bush, Cheney, and the rest don't smell like roses, either.
Third, the premise of the story is credible. The problem with the story is that servicepersons should not be revealing operational details such as what we see in this story. On the other hand, they are not supposed to inadvertently fly across the United States with live nuclear weapons, either. These things do happen.
I was watching Jon Stewart..Yes the show where I get all my news. They played a clip of Geroge Bush who was making a speech about Vietnam, suggesting that if the US had "stayed the course" during that conflict, the US would have won. They tried to joke about it, it was Jon Stewart after all, but it really scared me. I never believed that the United Stated would go into Iran especially with the quagmire that's occuring in Iraq. But if Bush is dumb enough to make statements like that, maybe he's dumb enough to invade Iran.
If Bush is impeached, would that really affect anything? I might be wrong about this, but wasn't Clinton impeached during his second term? If he was, it doesn't apperar to have had any affect on his tenure in the White House. I'm Canadian, I'm not even sure what impeachment entails exactly.
Impeachment is only the first stage, but can end in removal from office. The House impeaches, and the Senate then tries them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impeachment
Clinton was impeached, but the Senate cleared him. Since you need a two-thirds majority in the Senate to successfully knock a President out of action, it couldn't really happen under present circumstances. An impeachment proceeding by the House would almost always be little more than a rap over the knuckles.
...of course, when people say "impeach", they're also saying that the Senate should support it, too. So basically what people are asking for is the constitutional process to sack the President...
A rather silly hoax imo.
Naval personnel have more brains than this to spill the beans on such a sensitive subject. A carrier is like a floating city yes, meaning it's hard to recognize absolutely everything that's going on. But there are plenty of dedicated personnel that would inform a superior officer in a heartbeat so as not to compromise the mission.
This sort of behavior would land this person in the Brig for eternity. A risk I dare say even the dumbest of Navy personnel would not take.
LSO's are junior officers too, they're not included in the main talking channels.
"This sort of behavior would land this person in the Brig for eternity. A risk I dare say even the dumbest of Navy personnel would not take."
I agree that it wouldn't be a sensible move, but it would be a principled move. If there was an officer who knew this was happening they might leak it if they thought it was important for the public to know.
Still I think this is more on the hoax side of things, but a pretty good one as it is close to plausible.
Agree with your comment Alex. However, and the following statements will sound contradictory (sorry); the need for certain things to be kept secret during these troubled times is imperative. And, when has there ever been a time without troubles? It's also common knowledge that the Fleet has been outside of Iran for months.
Without a doubt there are many ordinary/common people that could run the government better than is being done now.
Understandably, it is frustrating without a doubt that the public is not told more nor involved to a greater degree with what is really transpiring on this blue marble of ours.
Transparency and the lobbyist's who really do rule-the-roost via the money mongers need to be addressed to the 10th degree, to the 11th, and 12th degree.
Captain Unelected is going to attack Iran? He and what army?
That's how I've been answering that rumor for years. Even if Fearless Flightsuit is really that mind-bogglingly stupid, Richard the Lying-Hearted should not be, for example.
If President MORON really believes that Vietnam was winnable, I agree we should start quaking in our boots. But who says he believes it? He says it, that's all. Wouldn't exactly pass peer-review.
This is also pretty on point: http://www.thiscantbehappening.net/2007.09.01_arch.html#1189274699602
Second, perhaps the story fails the smell test, but Bush, Cheney, and the rest don't smell like roses, either.
Without a doubt there are many ordinary/common people that could run the government better than is being done now.
Without a doubt there are many ordinary/common people that could run the government better than is being done now.
Without a doubt there are many ordinary/common people that could run the government better than is being done now.
Without a doubt there are many ordinary/common people that could run the government better than is being done now.
Thanks a lot.
Without a doubt there are many ordinary/common people that could run the government better than is being donenow..
bedava sohbet