{"id":4408,"date":"2008-07-15T18:39:13","date_gmt":"2008-07-16T01:39:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=4408"},"modified":"2008-07-16T12:04:24","modified_gmt":"2008-07-16T19:04:24","slug":"candidates-punt-on-iraq-israel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2008\/07\/15\/candidates-punt-on-iraq-israel\/","title":{"rendered":"Candidates Punt on Iraq-Israel"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ray\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Stray Thoughts<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Candidates Speak: Un-Reality About Iraq<\/strong><\/em> (Updated)<\/p>\n

You say you expected more rhetoric than reality from Senators Obama and McCain yesterday in their speeches on Iraq and Afghanistan?\u00c2\u00a0 Well, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s certainly what you got.<\/p>\n

What I find nonetheless amazing is how they, and the pundits, have taken such little notice of the dramatic change in the political landscape occasioned by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bombshell on July 7\u00e2\u20ac\u201dhis insistence on a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153timetable\u00e2\u20ac\u009d for withdrawal of US troops before any accord is reached on their staying past the turn of the year.<\/p>\n

Responding to a question at his press conference yesterday, President George W. Bush showed that he was vaguely aware that the timetable is, as Robert Dreyfuss<\/a> says (in Truthout, July 7<\/a>), a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153big deal.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0 Bush even alluded haltingly to the possibility of extending the UN mandate still further.<\/p>\n

But it is far from clear that Maliki, who is under great domestic pressure, would be able to sell that to the various factions upon which he depends for support, much less to those which he must keep at bay.\u00c2\u00a0 As Dreyfuss points out, Maliki and his Shiite allies are also under considerable pressure from Iran, which remains the chief ally of the ruling alliance of Shiites.\u00c2\u00a0 Most important, Maliki is by no means in control of what happens next.<\/p>\n

Israel<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Here\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s where it gets sticky.\u00c2\u00a0 No one who knows about third rails in US politics would expect the candidates or the fawning corporate media (FCM) to address how those now running Israel are likely to be looking at the implications of a large US troop withdrawal from Iraq next year.<\/p>\n

I am remembering how I was pilloried on June 16, 2005, immediately after Congressman John Conyers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 rump-Judiciary Committee hearing in the bowels of the Capitol, for a candid answer to a question from one of his colleagues; i. e., if the invasion of Iraq was not about WMD, and not about non-existent ties between Iraq and al-Qaeda, then why did we attack?<\/p>\n

In answer, I used the acronym OIL.\u00c2\u00a0 O for oil; I for Israel; and L for Logistics, meaning the military bases deemed by neoconservatives as necessary to protect both.\u00c2\u00a0 Neither the House members present nor the media people seemed to have any problem with oil and military bases as factors\u00e2\u20ac\u201din itself an interesting commentary.<\/p>\n

However, the suggestion that one main motive was an attempt to make that part of the Middle East safer for Israel (yes, folks, the neocons really thought that attacking Iraq would do that)\u00e2\u20ac\u201dwell, that was anathema.<\/p>\n

As it is anathema today to suggest that this is still one of the main reasons, besides oil, that Elliott Abrams, other neocons\u00e2\u20ac\u201dnot to mention Vice President Dick Cheney and his team\u00e2\u20ac\u201dinsist we must stay, Maliki and his associates be damned.\u00c2\u00a0 (See the cartoon in the Washington Times today showing Maliki and words telling him \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We are NOT leaving.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d)<\/p>\n

Here in Washington we can sit back and quibble over the implications of such remarks by Maliki and other Iraqi leaders.\u00c2\u00a0 The Israelis have to take such statements seriously.\u00c2\u00a0 No agreement on US forces staying into 2009 without a timetable for withdrawal?\u00c2\u00a0 For Tel Aviv, this is getting very serious.<\/p>\n

My guess is the Israeli leaders are apoplectic.\u00c2\u00a0 The fiasco in Iraq clearly has made the region much more dangerous for Israel.\u00c2\u00a0 There are actually real \u00e2\u20ac\u0153terrorists\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153extremists\u00e2\u20ac\u009d now in Iraq, and the prospect of US troops leaving has got to be a cause of acute concern in Tel Aviv.<\/p>\n

Keeping the US Entangled: Iran<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

This dramatic change\u00e2\u20ac\u201dor even just the specter of it\u00e2\u20ac\u201dgreatly increases Israel\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s incentive to ensure the kind of US involvement in the area that would have to endure for several years.\u00c2\u00a0 The Israelis need to create \u00e2\u20ac\u0153facts on the ground\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00e2\u20ac\u201dsomething to guarantee that Washington will stand by what U.S. candidates, including Sen. Obama, call \u00e2\u20ac\u0153our ally.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0 (Never mind that there is no mutual US-Israel defense treaty.)\u00c2\u00a0 Israel is all too painfully aware that it has only six more months of Bush and Cheney.<\/p>\n

The legislation drafted by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) being so zealously promoted in Congress calls for the equivalent of a blockade of Iran.\u00c2\u00a0 That would be one way to entangle; there are many others.<\/p>\n

The point is that the growing danger that the Israelis perceive will probably prompt them to find a way to get the US involved in hostilities with Iran.\u00c2\u00a0 Cheney and Bush have pretty much given them that license, with the president regularly pledging to defend \u00e2\u20ac\u0153our ally\u00e2\u20ac\u009d if Israel is attacked.<\/p>\n

All Israel has to do is to arrange to be attacked.\u00c2\u00a0 Not a problem.<\/p>\n

There are endless possibilities among which Israel can choose to catalyze such a confrontation\u00e2\u20ac\u201dwith or without a wink and a nod from Cheney and Abrams.\u00c2\u00a0 The so-called \u00e2\u20ac\u0153amber light” said to have been given to the Israelis is, I believe, already seen as quite sufficient; they are not likely to feel a need to wait until it turns green.<\/p>\n

So far, the resistance of U.S. senior military has been the only real obstacle to the madness of hostilities with Iran.\u00c2\u00a0 (And one need only read Scott Ritter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s article on Truthdig<\/a> this week to get a sense for why they would be chary.)<\/p>\n

Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman, Adm. Mike Mullen, has been described as warning the Israelis that a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Third Front\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in the Middle East would be a disaster.\u00c2\u00a0 I think, rather, he was trying to warn anyone who might listen in Washington, including until now tone-deaf lawmakers.<\/p>\n

Even if the pundits are correct in suggesting that Mullen is joined by Defense Secretary Robert Gates in trying to resist the neocons and Cheney, Mullen\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s tone at his press conference two weeks ago suggested he is fighting a rear guard action\u00e2\u20ac\u201dagainst the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153crazies\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in the White House, as well as those in Tel Aviv.\u00c2\u00a0 And when is the last time the crazies lost a political battle with such implications for Israel?<\/p>\n

Mullen had just returned from Tel Aviv.\u00c2\u00a0 He appreciates better than most the fecklessness of endless speculation over whether Israel or the U.S. might strike Iran first.\u00c2\u00a0 Even if the Israeli leaders have no explicit assurances from the White House, they almost certainly calculate that, once a casus belli is established, their friends in Washington\u00e2\u20ac\u201dand the troops they command\u00e2\u20ac\u201dare likely to be committed to the fray big time.<\/p>\n

Seatbelts Please\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Viewed from Tel Aviv it appears an increasingly threatening situation, with more urgent need to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153embed\u00e2\u20ac\u009d (so to speak) the United States even more deeply in the region\u00e2\u20ac\u201din a confrontation involving both countries with Iran.<\/p>\n

A perfect storm is brewing:<\/p>\n

— Petraeus ex Machina, with a record of doing Vice President Dick Cheney\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bidding, takes command of CENTCOM in September;<\/p>\n

— Sen. McCain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s numbers are likely to be in the toilet at that point (because of the economy as much as anything else);<\/p>\n

— McCain will be seen by the White House as the only candidate with something to gain by a wider war (just as by another \u00e2\u20ac\u0153terrorist incident\u00e2\u20ac\u009d);<\/p>\n

— The Bush\/Cheney months will be down to three;<\/p>\n

— And Maliki will not be able to cave in to Washington on the timeline requirement he has publicly set.<\/p>\n

In sum, Israel is likely to be preparing a September\/October surprise designed to keep the US bogged down in Iraq and in the wider region by provoking hostilities with Iran.\u00c2\u00a0 And don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t be surprised if it starts as early as August.\u00c2\u00a0 Israel\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s leaders may well plead for understanding on the part of those U.S. officials not tipped off in advance, claiming that they could not distinguish amber from green with their night-vision goggles on.<\/p>\n

Would they hesitate?\u00c2\u00a0 Please tell me who\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6just who is likely to turn on the siren, pull them over, and even think of giving them a summons\u00e2\u20ac\u201donce the patrol car computer confirms their privileged licenses?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ray\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Stray Thoughts Candidates Speak: Un-Reality About Iraq (Updated) You say you expected more rhetoric than reality from Senators Obama and McCain yesterday in their speeches on Iraq and Afghanistan?\u00c2\u00a0 Well, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s certainly what you got. What I find nonetheless amazing is how they, and the pundits, have taken such little notice of the dramatic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":64,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-4408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/64"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4408"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4408\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4414,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4408\/revisions\/4414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4408"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=4408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}