Two Words from an Admiral's Mouth Made the Economy Tremble

It took only two simple words pronounced by a four-star American marine to trigger a reaction which, alongside the current crisis, could sink us into the abyss.

This week the U.S. Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Mike Mullen warned that opening a new front in the Middle East by launching arial attacks against Iranian nuclear installations could be “extremely stressful.” The announcement is clearly a warning, and one which might be interpreted to mean that Israel and the USA are planning a combined short-term military action. It may be necessary to prepare public opinion for what might well turn out to be a revelation that the highest echelons of the American army, given its numerous problems in iraq and Afghanistan, are warning George W. Bush of the consequences that ordering such an attack would have.

Communications experts interviewed by the British journal The Telegraph (July 4, 2008) consider that Admiral Mullen’s words – extremely stressful – should be translated as “catastrophic”. Thus, the problem is not only that such an attack would convert the region into an enormous hotbed, as the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Inspector Mohammed elBaradei believes, but that the Iranians have made it clear that they will do everything in their power to make the Strait of Ormuz – through which over 60% of the world’s petroleum must pass – impassable, something completely disastrous in a context in which the price of oil breaks records every day. In fact, it took only the Israeli vice president announcing on June 6th that, “if Iran continues her program of nuclear armament, we will attack,” for the price of oil to rise by 9 percent.

According to the aforementioned British newspaper, Mullen has commented on the possibility of a unilateral Israeli attack by saying, “that part of the world is already extremely unstable, and there is no need to make it any more so.” However, as far as Iran’s presumed nuclear aspirations go, Mullen has declared, again according to The Telegraph, “I still believe that Iran is in the process of acquiring nuclear weapons and I believe they should be dissuaded from such a goal,” a statement openly contradictory to the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) of 2007, according to which Tehran was said to be in no position to acquire nuclear weapons.

The conclusion appears to be that the United States and the rest of the western world should “dissuade” Iran at all costs, no matter how “stressful” the consequences may be. In this sense it appears that the American president, contrary to the opinion of the intelligence community reflected in the NIE 2007, has given 400 million dollars to distant Iranian groups who intend to undermine Tehran’s regime, just as the journalist Seymour Hersh revealed to The New Yorker (June 29, 2008) that the American army is already executing military operations behind Iranian front lines.

Added to this was Mike Mullen’s trip to Israel to meet with top Israeli officials and military men, and Israel’s arial maneuvers in the eastern Mediterranean. As can be seen, the prognoses seem to be rather somber, and some estimations set a possible attack on Iran between the November elections and the new president’s assumption of power. The reason for this is that the Israeli lobby in the United States does not want to wait for a new administration; and this is why, despite the opposition to the attack of Admiral Mullen and of Defense Secretary Robert Gates, the aforementioned lobby is egging the United States closer and closer to war.

It is fitting to ask who such a course of events would actually benefit. The response is clear: nobody. Not even Israel. The west has had to deal with far more lethal governments than the Ayatollah regime, including some that truly aimed to convert themselves into military powers. In the 2002 State of the Union speech, however, President Bush solemnly affirmed: “The USA will not allow the most dangerous regimes of the world to threaten us with the most destructive weapons of the world.” This declaration obviously failed with North Korea, where the North Americans have had to eat their own words. Despite the evident Korean danger, at no time has Korea been threatened in the same way as Iran. Why?

But there’s more. Last June 2nd, William Kristol, High Priest of the war party and Director of The Weekly Standard, stood before the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and declared that McCain and Obama were “in reality no different” with respect to the Iranian question. On the other hand, George W. Bush generally trusts McCain to destroy the Iranian nuclear installations. All of the “neocon” war party is sounding the alarm about an attack on Iran, and the Israeli lobby is pushing President Bush towards a war which is not even vaguely in the interests of the west. What could happen in case conflict does erupt?

If the attack were carried out unilaterally by Israel, the Hebrew Air Force would have to fly over Syria, Turkey or Saudi Arabia; something which, to put it mildly, they would not appreciate, and which would probably have consequences for the entire region. They would also have to fly over occupied Iraq, something which would involve the western allied forces in the operation, whose economies are already supporting imposed economic sanctions and who hope to be able to solve diplomatically a crisis which is already harming them.

Furthermore, how could they respond to Iran? It is almost impossible to know. Israel lacks the capacity to conduct hundreds of arial incursions, as the U.S. did in both Gulf wars as well as in the Balkans. Would Israel be attacked and see herself forced to respond in the midst of a terrible escalation? Would Iran manage to close off the Straits of Ormuz with pilots on suicide missions? The possibility of a global recession would be more than likely. What would Hamas, Hezbollah, and Syria do, given that they are now sitting in negotiations with Israel? Would the probability of Palestinian peace improve at all? Decidedly not, and Iran might manage to use the Shiites to make the American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan pay such a high price in blood that they would see themselves forced to end a war which Israel began. Unfortunately, according to the U.S. constitution, this decision corresponds exclusively to Congress; it is not a decision which one of the worst presidents in North American history could delegate to Ehud Olmert.

Only a fool could believe that an attack on Iran is a priority of western interests, even more so when neither the NIE 2007 – the opinion of the totality of the American intelligence community – nor the IAEA have concluded that Iran is truly building nuclear weapons. All of this must be taken into account by the enormous quantity of irresponsible advisors who, comfortably plopped in front of their computers, perpetrate commentary which incite a war which people neither want nor need, and which is being planned, as all important things are, without the knowledge of ‘the people’ to whom they constantly appeal. All of them, willingly or not, are a part of the war party which, in an absolutely frivolous manner, conspire the world over for the advent of a disaster of incalculable proportions.