The United States is currently building a case for war against Iran. In the last several days, military representatives have presented some parts of explosive devices as presumed evidence that Iran has been supplying Iraqi Shiite insurgents with highly effective weapons. The claim, repeated by President Bush, is that these devices are being sent into Iraq on the orders of the "highest government officials". For this claim there is no evidence presented. There has been considerable skepticism expressed by journalists, congress members, military experts and knowledgeable academics. The Boston Globe ("Doubts raised on linking of Iran to US deaths in Iraq," Feb. 14), among other major news sources, has a fair treatment of this issue.
These charges against Iran are actually several years old and probably have been orchestrated to take some of the heat off of the Bush-Cheney disaster in Iraq. But there is much more at stake here than public relations. The Bush administration has pressed U.N. Security Council members to impose strict sanctions against Iran over its nuclear development program, claiming that it is a cover for a nuclear weapons program. Most of the American public has accepted the heated rhetoric about this nuclear program, given how uncritical the media have been in reporting this issue. Calling Iran's nuclear program a "nuclear crisis" or a "nuclear standoff" paints a picture of atomic weapons at the ready. This is as far from the truth as were the "weapons of mass destruction" that were presented as the reason to start war on Iraq.
The Iranians do not have nuclear weapons. They do not have the ability to make nuclear weapons. They are in the early stages of development of facilities that can enrich uranium, a necessary step in preparing fuel for nuclear reactors. At this point they can barely do that job. Even if their goal were to make weapons, and they progressed at a reasonable pace toward that goal, experts estimate that it would take anywhere from three to eight years. Under the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, to which Iran is a signatory, they have the right to produce fuel for a reactor (four to five percent enrichment), which they have been developing for many years. The Bush administration has insisted that their purpose is to enrich fuel for nuclear bombs (90 to 95 percent enrichment). Such a goal requires a far more extensive enrichment facility than exists.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the U.N.'s nuclear treaty enforcement agency, had regular extensive inspections of facilities before the United States pushed for sanctions. Those inspections showed no violation of treaty requirements against weapon development. The surest way to guarantee that no weapons are developed is through those inspections. In response to the U.S. bullying, Iran reduced access to the inspectors. This is one of the many ways that the United States is goading Iran into returning the Bush administration's belligerence.
The most frightening development in the last year has gone mostly unreported in the United States. The United States has put two Carrier Battle Groups in the Arabian Gulf, poised to attack Iran, and a third may be on the way. A Carrier Battle Group is a military city, with a gigantic aircraft carrier, essentially a mobile airport, at its center. The carrier is a nuclear powered vessel 20 stories high, with 70 to 80 planes and 6,000 crewmembers. Accompanying that juggernaut is an armada - several supply ships, pairs of guided-missile carrying cruisers and destroyers, as well as two attack submarines, capable of carrying dozens of nuclear cruise missiles.
These two Carrier Battle Groups are threatening Iran right now. Either one of those can destroy all of Iran as well as most of the Middle East with its nuclear weaponry. And the Bush-Cheney government is threatening to use these Armageddon machines. This is what administration officials, as well as many members of congress and presidential candidates, mean when they say that "all options are on the table." This situation is horrendous. The U.S. media are shirking their duty to inform. Much of what we know comes from the foreign press (for example, "Target Iran: US able to strike in spring", The Guardian, Feb.10). The one hint of this U.S. weapons build up that made the news was the barely noted collision of a U.S. attack submarine, the Newport News, with a Japanese freighter in the Straits of Hormuz on Jan. 8. This location is within 25 miles of Iran. The reporters did not ask why the sub was there. There was presumably little damage to the sub and scanty reference to the condition of the freighter. The story disappeared the next day.
We should all be extremely worried, given the series of disastrous military decisions made by the Bush-Cheney leadership. We must insist through petitions, calls to congress members and demonstrations, that our government's massive nuclear threat be withdrawn from the Middle East. We must insist that the United States engage Iran in constructive negotiations to lower the threat of war. The Iraq war should be a sufficient lesson that U.S. bullying does not aid its security. The U.S. war on Iraq must be ended quickly, as a sizable majority of U.S. voters agree. The Iran war must not be allowed to happen.
