Key to Opening the Gates of Hell? Another questionable slideshow. Bush Admin makes another weak case to justify expanding war.

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“The notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is ridiculous. That being said, all options are on the table.” - President Bush, Aug. 13, 2005   “Former president George Bush said Tuesday that a military conflict with Iraq is not inevitable and that his son `clearly does not want war.”’ - Oct 23, 2002   “The idea that somehow we’re manufacturing the idea that the Iranians are providing IEDs is preposterous” - President Bush, last Wednesday, Feb 14, 2007

Keep that last quote in mind as you read this.

You’ve probably noticed that the Bush Administration has been talking a lot about Iran lately and appear to be making the case for an invasion that we can neither afford, have the troops for, nor necessary. No, you aren’t experiencing Deja’ Vu, the case for war with Iran bears more than just a slight resemblance to the case they made against Iraq. And like Iraq four years ago, their “evidence” is extremely thin and, even if 100% correct, doesn’t demand all out war. Fortunately this time, America is no longer seething for revenge as we were in the months following 9/11, and having since learned how the Bush Administration’s case against Iraq was 180′ from the “slam dunk” they were claiming, no one except the most hopeless Neo-Conservative Bush loyalist war-mongers are ready to blindly accept without question whatever this White House now tells them.

Not unlike Colin Powell’s “devastating” slideshow making the case against Iraq at the U.N. in early 2003, the Bush Administration… proving they have learned NOTHING in the last four years, has produced a similar slideshow suggesting evidence of Iranian involvement in Iraq. The presentation does anything but. It makes a strong case that “EFP’s” (Explosively Formed Projectiles) are being used in Iraq… which no one has ever disputed and have been in use since 2004… and tells you that the weapons came from Iran… yet only one seizure actually took place at the Iraq/Iran border: a cache of TNT, not mortars or missiles. The ENTIRE basis for their claims of “Iranian government complicity” seems to be that capture of five Iranian officials in Iraq last month (see last weeks column) whose release was lobbied for by the President of Iraq. Let’s look at a few of the photos from that slideshow (this was the first photo to capture my attention):

(Click to enlarge)

This weapon was both made in “September, 2006″ and found “September 9, 2006″, barely more than a week later. Okay, MAYBE this weapon rolled off the assembly line on September 1st, was shipped to Iraq on September 2nd, and traveled 500 miles undetected to just South East of Baghdad in less than a week before Iraqi police found it, but that’s exceedingly unlikely. If weapons are being snuck into Baghdad from Iraq that quickly and easily without detection, then it is no wonder security in Iraq is as bad as it is right now.

Also notice that the font and information on the weapon on the left looks nothing like the “confirmed Iranian munition” on the right (81 MM HE is 81mm “high explosive”). Some have pointed out that it seems highly unlikely that Iran… a longtime ally of Russia (and the Soviet Union before that)… would produce American-style 81mm mortars instead of the Soviet format 82mm shell size (Russia has done this for years so that Soviet troops could use captured American ammunition in their weapons, but we could not use theirs in ours). Both mortars include “H.E.”, the ENGLISH abbreviation for “high explosive”, though only the 2006 weapon includes the word “mortar” in English. What’s wrong with this picture (besides everything)?

(Click to enlarge)

Above is another supposedly Iranian munition found in Iraq. It is difficult to see even at full size, but what appears to be a date on the front of the ordinance reads: “54-02-06″. Not sure what month or day “the 54th” is, but the numbers are clear. And the “06″ can not be a year if the weapon was found in “2004″ as they claim. If these numbers are not a date, then what are they and where IS the date on this weapon? The numbers do not conform to the alphanumeric Serial Number format found on every other weapon in the slideshow. And every other munition shown has a date on it. The shell itself also looks nothing like any of the other munitions in the slideshow. If these weapons were all being produced by the Iranian government, there would be more consistency among fonts and serial number formats across weapons. This shell looks nothing like the one above (or below).

(Click to enlarge)

On the front of this RPG is the date “5-31-2006″… May 31, 2006. ONLY the United States writes the date in “Month/Day/Year” format. The rest of the world uses the more logical “Day/Month/Year” format, including Iran. If this weapon did indeed come from Iran, it was built in the U.S…. and in 2006! This particular anomaly appears on just about every munition in the slideshow.

Also shown is an image of Iranian made TNT seized at the border before it could get into Iraq:

(Click to enlarge)

Notice that EVERYTHING on this munition is written in Farsi… the language of Iran. Even the numbers are in Arabic.

There is another possibility here: that Iran is PURCHASING weapons from multiple sources and then exporting them to Iraq. But they provide NO hard evidence that this is the case. In fact, as in the first slide above, they try and make the case that the weapons are of Iranian make. The RPG in slide #3 is described as an “Iranian” Anti-Tank RPG. If in fact Iran is importing these weapons and then smuggling them into Iraq, that makes the “production date” issue on the first slide even more dubious. And the date-format issue on the third slide even more alarming. U.S. forces in Iraq do not use RPG’s, so these could not be American weapons stolen from us by Iran. And even if they were, we’d surely recognize our own stolen weapons and would of identified them as such in the slide. They do not.

The evidence that Bush is prep’ing to attack Iran:

Just days into the new year, President Bush removed the top two Generals leading U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan… both of whom opposed his “Surge” in Iraq… with Officers that supported his scheme to send an additional 21,500 troops into Iraq. Questions immediately began to arise when their replacements were announced. Lead General George Casey was replaced by *Lieutenant* General David Petraeus… Casey’s underling. But the appointment that *really* caught everyone’s attention was the appointment of *Navy Admiral*, William Fallon, to replace General Abazaid as head of CentCom. Why on Earth would you appoint a Navy Admiral to lead ground forces in Iraq? We had our answer soon after when President Bush ordered the first of two aircraft carriers to the Persian Gulf off the coast of Iran (and a third is rumored to be sent soon).

And still the Bush Administration is insisting it is not preparing to attack Iran… just as they did before they attacked Iraq.

Jon Stewart’s “Daily Show” had a great video that demonstrates the conflicting messages coming out of the White House.

And just WHO are the Iranians arming? Consider that Saddam Hussein was a Sunni… the minority religion in Iraq. When we toppled Saddam, the Bush Administration reflexively helped put the Shi’ite majority in power. Sunni’s boycotted the first post-Saddam election in 2004, which put the Shia majority in most of the top positions in Government. Sunni Saddam declared war on Shi’ite Iran. Now with Saddam gone, Iran has found an ally in the new Iraqi government. 90% of attacks on U.S. troops are by Sunni’s in the so-called “Sunni Triangle”. The likelihood that Shia Iran is arming Sunni’s in Iraq is almost zero. As mentioned here last time, the five Iranian officials “captured in Iraq” last month that President Bush has been citing as examples of Iranians working in Iraq to help the insurgency, were actually diplomats invited by the Iraqi government. These “officials” belong to an Iranian organization called the “Qods” (pronounced “Cuds”), which has a long history of supporting organizations the U.S. opposes: namely Hizbollah in Israel/Palestine. Their logo appears on their ID’s. Incredibly stupid if you’re a secret organization whose job it is to aide terrorists. The final slide of the aforementioned slideshow purports that “Over the last 60 days, Iranian and Iraqi detainees have told us the Qods Force provides support to extremist groups in the form of money and weapons.” There you have it folks. Solid “slam-dunk proof” evidence that Iran is behind the arming of insurgents inside Iraq. Feel better? Can I attack Iran now? Pretty please? With sugar on top?

THIS is the case this White House is making to justify expanding their war in the Middle East to include Iran. In his 2000 RNC acceptance speech, George Bush told us that under President Clinton, our military had been stretched so thin, “two entire divisions would have to report: Not ready for duty!” Today, after six years of his endless wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, we have NO divisions that can report “Ready for Duty!” Our military has been stretched beyond its breaking point. And now they want to *expand* their war in the Middle East to include a country four times the size of Iraq, with a standing army of more than a half-million men with another 350,000 in reserve, allied with Russia and China, based upon seriously flawed evidence and of questionable necessity.

And if Bush starts lobbing missiles at the second of the three nations in his “Axis of Evil”, what do you think the odds are North Korea will sit back and not come to Iran’s aide?

The Bush Administration has cried “Wolf“ too many times now, and fortunately, this time, people are asking questions and voicing their opposition.
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Postscript: HERE’s a little slideshow for anyone pondering the sanity of getting into a shooting match with Iran.

This entry was posted on February 19, 2007 at 1:09 am and is filed under Political News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.