And Don't Say A Single Goddamned Word

I don't often write in the blunt and rude manner used in what follows. But at this point, I know of no other way to try to break through the impenetrable wall of resistance and denial on this subject.

Let it be noted that, should the unimaginably awful happen and the United States should attack Iran, the Democratic Congress will be the co-equal creators of a catastrophic war crime that will place the U.S. on the list of the most monstrous nations in all of history, along with Nazi Germany.

The list of people who should be regarded as future war criminals will also include most of the leading contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination. With all their sickening drivel about leaving "all options on the table" and talk about "offensive military action," they only make the likelihood of an attack more probable -- to say nothing of the loathsome Obama's leading the charge to impose punitive sanctions on Iran, the kind of sanctions championed by the Clinton administration that helped lead directly to the invasion and occupation of Iraq by the Bush administration.

Alain Gresh writes:

Silently, furtively, sheltered from cameras, the war on Iran has begun. Numerous sources confirm that the United States has intensified its aid to several armed movements with an ethnic base - Azeris, Baluchis, Arabs, Kurds: minorities that together represent about 40 percent of the Iranian population - with the objective of destabilizing the Islamic Republic. In this context, ABC television revealed in the beginning of April that the Baluchi group, Jound Al-Islam ("The soldiers of Islam") which had just led an attack against the Guardians of the Revolution (about twenty dead) had enjoyed secret American assistance. A report by the Century Foundation (1) reveals that American commandos have been operating in the interior of Iran itself since the summer of 2004. January 29, 2002 in his State of the Union speech, President George W. Bush classified Iran, along with North Korea and Iraq, in the "Axis of Evil." On June 18, 2003 he asserted that the United States and its allies "would not tolerate" this country's accession to nuclear weaponry. It is perhaps useful to recall the context of the time. Mr. Mohammad Khatami was then president of the Islamic Republic and was multiplying his appeals for a "dialogue of civilizations." In Afghanistan, the United States had benefited from the active support of Tehran, which had used its many connections to facilitate the overthrow of the Taliban regime. On May 2, 2003 during a meeting in Geneva between Iranian Ambassador Javad Zarif and Mr. Zalmay Khalilzad - then President Bush's special envoy to Afghanistan - the Tehran leaders submitted a comprehensive negotiation proposal to the White House that covered three issues: weapons of mass destruction, terrorism and security, and economic cooperation (2). The Islamic Republic declared itself ready to support the Beirut Summit (2002) Arab Peace initiative and to contribute to the transformation of Lebanon's Hezbollah into a political party. On December 18, 2003 Tehran signed the additional protocol to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), a protocol that several countries only have ratified and which considerably strengthens the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) surveillance capabilities.

All these overtures were purely and simply swept aside by the American administration, which remains focused on one goal, the overthrow of the "mullahs' regime." To create the conditions for a possible military intervention, it continues to brandish the "nuclear threat." For years, alarmist reports have been produced by successive American administrations and always refuted. In January 1995, the director of the American agency for weapons control and disarmament asserted that Iran could have the bomb in 2003; simultaneously Defense Secretary William Perry asserted that that objective could be reached before ... 2000. These "forecasts" were repeated the following year by Mr. Shimon Peres (3). Yet, in 2007, in spite of the progress made by Iran with respect to uranium enrichment, the IAEA deemed that Tehran will not have the "capabilities" to produce the bomb sooner than four to six years from now.

What is the situation, really? Since the 1960s, i.e., well before the victory of the Islamic Revolution, Iran sought to develop a nuclear infrastructure to prepare the post-oil period. With the development of technologies, complete mastery of the civilian nuclear cycle makes the shift to military usage much easier. Have the leaders in Tehran made that decision? Nothing allows us to assert that. Does the risk exist? Yes, and for reasons that are easy to understand.

During the Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988), Saddam Hussein's regime used chemical weapons against Iran - in violation of all international treaties: neither the United States nor France became indignant over this usage of weapons of mass destruction, which traumatized the Iranian people. Meanwhile, American troops are encamped in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Iran is surrounded in a dense network of foreign military bases. Finally, two neighboring countries, Pakistan and Israel, have nuclear weapons. What Iranian political leader could be insensitive to such a context?

How then to avoid Tehran acquiring nuclear weapons, which would relaunch the arms race in a region already highly unstable and which would deal a fatal blow to the Non-Proliferation Treaty? Contrary to what is often suggested, the essential obstacle does not reside in Tehran's desire to enrich uranium: Iran, according to the NPT, has the right to do that, but has always asserted that it was ready to voluntarily allow restrictions to that right and to accept a reinforcement in the IAEA's controls to avoid any potential use of enriched uranium for military purposes.

The Islamic Republic's fundamental preoccupation lies elsewhere, as the agreement signed November 14, 2004 with the European "troika" (France, United Kingdom, Germany) proves: Iran agreed to provisionally suspend uranium enrichment, with the understanding that a long-term agreement "would furnish firm commitments on security issues." Those commitments having been rejected by Washington, Iran resumed its enrichment program.

Gresh has more. Read it.

Almost three months ago, I described in detail a series of actions that might help deter the current administration from launching an attack on Iran. You can probably think of a number of others, if you seriously put your mind to it. Some of those actions require the Democratic Congress to do something, or at least try to do something. Thus far, the Congress has not seriously tried to do even one of them: it has not moved to rescind either AUMF, nor has it passed a resolution condemning a possible attack on Iran, let alone proposed that such a non-defensive attack would be an impeachable offense. It has done nothing. Periodically, a few Democrats will make noises about doing something -- at some time in some indeterminate future.

What in God's name are they waiting for? The possible (and maybe probable) end of civilization as we have known it, a world crisis that we cannot even begin to imagine, and perhaps the imposition of martial law in the U.S.?

I also proposed certain actions that individuals, including the leading liberal bloggers -- who enjoy a combined readership somewhere between half a million and one million people per day -- could take. If they chose to, these bloggers could mobilize their readers to put enormous pressure on the Democratic members of Congress. They could continue the pressure every day, which is what it would take with these worthless cowards, until the Congress did something. With only one or two exceptions, they have done and do nothing. Why not? There are not that many explanations, and all of them are uniformly awful: they're too stupid to realize how catastrophic the consequences of an attack on Iran would be; they understand what the consequences would be, but they're too cowardly themselves to take any action that might matter; they value their "influence" and their "connections" with prominent Democrats too highly even to consider endangering them; or they agree that America is uniquely great, so great and so indescribably good and perfect that we have the right to tell the entire rest of the world how it must conduct itself. And if anyone dares to defy us, they further agree we have the right to murder millions of people who never attacked us, and who do not even threaten us.

So let me tell you something. If this paralysis and inaction continues, and if the Bush administration does order an attack on Iran, I don't want to hear one goddamned word from a single goddamned Democrat about how terrible and calamitous it is. They've been able to take action for months, and they can take action now. They do nothing.

And for all those goddamned bloggers who have done and continue to do nothing: if an attack should come, don't say a goddamned word about how monstrous it is. You had your chance. You blew it. You didn't give a shit.

I don't want to hear a single goddamned word. Not one.