Bush and Iran/q

What is Bush playing at with all this anti-Iran bluster? He droned on the other day on American TV about there being two mortal enemies in Iraq - AQ and the Iranians and that "America will act to protect our interests and our troops”.


With the American 'strategy' in Iraq in ruins, about 70% of Americans not believing in the occupation but more importantly the catastrophic effects of the invasion (1 million dead 3 million refugees, the infrastructure ruined...) the only option Bush seems to have is for an escalation of the conflict. The fighting isn't working carry on fighting. You'd think that after being beaten on the ground by Sadr's army, losing the intellectual argument and losing on the political front (the 2006 elections in the US, Blair being toppled (ok GB is still on track), the Spanish PM getting kicked out, Bush himself in deep sea opinion poll ratings) that a sane politician would begin to walk away from the debacle, find some scapegoats and call it quits or do the decent thing and top himself.

But Bush won't I guess, being none of the above. This is nothing to do, really, with the psychological make up of the head chimp himself, but to do with the string pullers who operate him. No, of course not some cabal but some pretty powerful sets of interests that act with longer term thinking that most other people do. The destruction of Iraq was only partly to do with 'getting the oil' (I presume we can now totally discount the what was it again, ...the democracy argument the decent liberals used to use for their support of the crusade?), for, in the short term, that argument looks pretty suspect. Have you seen the price of a barrel of oil lately? 112 dollars at the last count. But that will all change once the dollar collapses and some other currency is brought in. The real stakes in the whole grotesque affair was securing the oil fields long term, not only for the US but for its minnions in Europe and and lesser useful idiots throughout the world. The enemy - take your pick from China and Russia.

The American assualt on Iraq, essentially worked. That's what nobody on either side of the debate can face up to admitting. The left can't face it because it's a major stick to beat the right with. But the right can't admit it, without owning up to the fact that they have willfully colluded with a lie of Hitlerian proportions. It's worked because, whilst squelching the lives of millions of people underfoot, it has given the US a secure military base in the middle of the chess board.


The US has succeeded in spreading it's monochrome death-based version of a way of life to the Middle East. Sadr's resistance is inevitable and there will be more rebellions and more airstrikes on civilians. But as long as Bush can talk about, even think about, escalating the conflict, all that is pretty secondary. Of course, any resistance is worthy of our support (whatever that could mean), even if the secular left has serious reservations about the religious beliefs of the Iraqi militias. But in the end, it's going to take something far, far bigger to oust the American behemoth, the stirring of which is making itself felt. . .