Looking Beyond Iran And It Ain't Pretty

Attacking Iran, although bad enough, is still only one more stepping stone along the path to their ultimate goal -- to control China. Below are snippets of two excellent articles that work quite well together. Both are very long, but this developing situation isn't something that fits on a postcard.

Containing China: The US's real objective
By Michael T Klare

Slowly but surely, the grand strategy of the Bush administration is being revealed. It is not aimed primarily at the defeat of global terrorism, the incapacitation of rogue states, or the spread of democracy in the Middle East. These may dominate the rhetorical arena and be the focus of immediate concern, but they do not govern key decisions regarding the allocation of long-term military resources. The truly commanding objective - the underlying basis for budgets and troop deployments - is the containment of China.

This objective governed White House planning during the administration's first seven months in office, only to be set aside by the perceived obligation to highlight anti-terrorism after September 11, 2001; but now, despite President George W Bush's preoccupation with Iraq and Iran, the White House is also reemphasizing its paramount focus on China, risking a new Asian arms race with potentially catastrophic consequences.

Bush and his top aides entered the White House in early 2001 with a clear strategic objective: to resurrect the permanent-dominance doctrine spelled out in the Defense Planning Guidance (DPG) for fiscal years 1994-99, the first formal statement of US strategic goals in the post-Soviet era. According to the initial official draft of this document, as leaked to the press in early 1992, the primary aim of US strategy would be to bar the rise of any future competitor that might challenge America's overwhelming military superiority.

And this article lays out just how ugly things will get if the neocons aren't reigned in. Before you read it, you might try envisioning your worst fears. Then read it and find out horribly optimistic you are.

If it comes to a shooting war ...
By Victor N Corpus

One could call this article a worst-case scenario for the new American century. Why worst case? Because of the hard lessons from history. The Romans did not consider the worst-case scenario when Hannibal crossed the Alps with his elephants and routed them; or when Hannibal encircled and annihilated the numerically superior Roman army at the Battle of Cannae.

The French did not consider the worst-case scenario at Dien Bien Phu and when they built the Maginot Line, and the French suffered disastrous defeats. The Americans did not consider the

worst-case scenario at Pearl Harbor or on September 11, and the results were disastrous for the American people. Again, American planners did not consider the worst-case scenario in its latest war in Iraq, but instead operated on the "best-case scenario", such as considering the Iraq invasion a "cake walk" and that the Iraqi people would be parading in the streets, throwing flowers and welcoming American soldiers as "liberators", only to discover the opposite.

Scenario One: America launches 'preventive war' vs China

Our first objective is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival. This is a dominant consideration underlying the new regional defense strategy and requires that we endeavor to prevent any hostile power from dominating a region whose resources would, under consolidated control, be sufficient to generate global power. These regions include Western Europe, East Asia, the territory of the former Soviet Union and Southwest Asia.
–Paul Wolfowitz, former US deputy secretary of defense and currently president of the World Bank

That second article gets very hideous very quickly. Iran won't be a walk in the park like Iraq. (snark) China has the capacity to make everyone's life a fucking hell. And they will definitely do it. They may not even wait for US. They may take the attack on Iran as their justification to immediately pre-emptively attack US. If I were they that's exactly what I'd do.

So Congress sat on their collective hands when, after authorizing the invasion of Afganistan (stepping stone 1), they let Bush attack Iraq (stepping stone 2). Now that Iraq has turned into a hell hole we can't seem to fix, they aren't impeaching Bush and bringing our troops home. If they let Bush attack Iran (stepping stone 3), if any of US are still alive, every single member of Congress who let it happen should be voted out of office. Every last one of them.

The new Congress can then turn Bush over to The War Crimes Tribunal like the current Congress should be doing.