Who thinks parading our boats around Iran is going to intimidate them?

[NNN0LHI]

I don't think so. They seen what happened in Iraq when the leader of a country gets intimidated and allows themselves to be disarmed by the US. The Iranian people know if they go the same way Saddam did their country will be turned into a scene from a Mad Max movie just like Iraq. We are wasting gas.

Don

[KG]

1. they aren't afraid of the US

[Horse with no Name]

3. You are correct

Problem is that their leader is as batshit crazy as ours.
They both want to weinie wag and for the same reason.
To try to hold on to the leadership of their country when they are barely hanging on.

[blondeatlast]

6. Iran might well be a pretty good friend of the US if Bush and Ahmadinejad weren't

having their international, nukular powered pissing contest.

[NNN0LHI]

8. I agree. It would be much easier if we could "reason" with Ahmadinejad like Saddam

We may as well get over that idea though. Because it ain't happening.

Don

[bdamomma]

13. they are both religious fanatics also.

[blondeatlast]

22. Another good point. nt

[earthside]

9. Provocative

My understanding is that the 'president' of Iran is mostly a figurehead ... the power over the military rests with the Islamic Council and the top ayatollah.

It seems to me that what Bush/Cheney are hoping for is that these naval wargames will provoke Iran into making a mistake of some sort --- thereby justifying a 'defensive' response from the U.S.

So, let's just hope that the religious clerics running Iran are very careful and restrained in the face of our 'batshit crazy' leader.

[leftchick]

23. actually much like bush, Ahmadinejad is the front man

A crazy front man but one none the less. Any decisions on what Iran does or doesn't do is made by the Mullahs.

[MemphisTiger]

2. It's a political move and they know it

Their military knows what we have but seeing it first hand off your coast is pretty intimidating.

[no_hypocrisy]

4. Part of me is thinking "Remember the Maine -- 2007".

Stuff can "happen" and blame can be assigned to anyone.

[acmavm]

5. Apparently the bush** administration is trying to ensure that even

those in the Middle East that didn't hate us change their minds.

It's not about Iran, it's about the entire region.

[BeyondGeography]

7. No kidding; what's the cost of all that pointless muscle flexing?

And, if we ever waded into Iran with our military, we'd be defeated in the same manner as is happening in Iraq. We're still living in the age of industrial war and the world has changed.

From Rupert Smith's, "The Utility of Force,"

<If Smith is right, the U.S. military still has a long way to go in adapting to the world in which it finds itself. On the walls in our war colleges still hang the portraits of Grant and Lee, the paintings of the Leyte Gulf and the massed bomber formations over the skies of Germany in 1944. In our curricula are Chancellorsville and Inchon. But these, Smith believes, are not only the wars of the past -- they are the wars of a different era of conflict, and he has written his book to explore the patterns of new kinds of struggle.

The Israelis got a taste of this last summer, when they found themselves up against the Lebanese militia Hezbollah -- a queer amalgam of light infantry equipped with the latest Chinese and Russian technology, local guerrillas, international terrorists, a social welfare movement and a political party, trained by Syrians and Iranians and backed by volunteers from all kinds of places, including Africa. The war was not over territory or a concrete dispute but over symbols; it took place in a densely populated area in southern Lebanon and northern Israel where the "villages" had the population of a concentrated suburb outside a large American city. This was a different kind of war for the Israelis, and it's the kind of war we can expect too. To some extent, it is already the war we are experiencing in Iraq and Afghanistan.>

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/18/AR2007011801981.html

[FogerRox]

10. Iran can give the US a bloody nose

Defensive missile systems:

25km range
Tor M-1

http://www.youtube.com/v/rLfmNOOBYLE
http://www.youtube.com/v/4c7pSRR3nFQ

..............................................

36km range
Pechora-2M

http://www.youtube.com/v/ePpoviOT8gk


......................................
90 mile range
Beter than the Patriot ?
S-300

http://www.youtube.com/v/qTit6Vh2XT4


..........................
Sam-6

[blueworld]

11. Who thinks Big Dick's plan is to provoke an accidental incident?

Then * won't have to go to Congress for a war authorization he knows he won't get. He'll be defending the Homeland against the Terrorist Axis Evil Tyrant Whatever-the-hell who is supporting those who are after your children.

And we don't even have any recorders, I mean reporters embedded in the flotilla to tell us the truth. :hide:

[Hubert Flottz]

12. 5 deferment Dick Hitler wants more war and he can't handle what

he already has...can you say insanity?

[H2O Man]

14. I think it

increases tensions, and that is not a good thing.

If someone who has identified you as his enemy, and is making demands that you not own a specific weapon in your home, began pacing back-and-forth in front of your property with a shotgun, it doesn't matter if you are intimidated or not. You should be able to recognize that his behavior increases the risk of events spinning out of control.

[NNN0LHI]

18. Last time this was tried the Iranians took troops form our "coalition partner" prisoner

If that didn't cause things to "spin out of control" I kind of doubt anything will.

Don

[H2O Man]

19. Well, if that's

not reassuring, I don't know what is! (smile)

I recognize that they are rational people in both the United States and in Iran, and that every situation will not result in WW3. I also recognize that there are people within the bowels of the administration that want to start a conflict between the US and Iran. I suspect that increasing the US presence near Iran will not decrease the chances of the irrational folks provoking an incident. However, you may well be right.

[mmonk]

15. Not me.

They will just keep holding the Americans they are holding until the operations inside their country to bring them down stop.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

16. It's a helluva good way to set up a Tonkin Gulf "incident.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

17. Iran must be yawning

They are probably thinking hasn't the US got better things to do like going to a baseball game than parading around in Iranian waters?

[seemslikeadream]

20. maybe a little incident might not really be Iran's doing

[KansDem]

21. Look at the map...

Compare the areas of Iran to Iraq (Iran is almost four times the size of Iraq):
Iran--1.648 million sq km (slightly larger than Alaska)(CIA factbook)
Iraq--437,072 sq km (slightly more than twice the size of Idaho)(CIA factbook)

Compare population (CIA factbook):
Iran--65,397,521
Iraq--27,499,638

Iran is much bigger than Iraq, so how's Bush going to take on Iran when he can't even win in Iraq? (And he's been in Iraq longer than the US was in WWII).

Does he and his base really think attacking Iran is a good idea? (yeah, I know, but I had to ask it)