The coming war with Iran

[boracayjohnny]

So says this article.

Something I found in my intarweb wanderings. What say you.

WPR Article | The New Rules: The Coming War With Iran

While the debate over whether Israel will strike Iran ebbs and flows on an almost weekly basis now, a larger collision-course trajectory is undeniably emerging. To put it most succinctly, Iran won't back down, while Israel won't back off, and America will back up its two regional allies -- Israel and Saudi Arabia -- when the shooting finally starts. There are no other credible paths in sight: There will be no diplomatic miracles, and Iran will not be permitted to achieve a genuine nuclear deterrence. But let us also be clear about what this coming war will ultimately target: regime change in Tehran, because that is the only plausible solution.

Tehran had plenty of reasons to make mastering the uranium-enrichment cycle and other technical capabilities necessary to achieving a nuclear deterrent a strategic priority following America's post-Sept. 11 regime-toppling invasions of Iran's two next-door neighbors, Afghanistan and Iraq. But the course of the Arab Spring, and especially NATO's successful Libyan intervention, has dramatically ratcheted up its sense of urgency. Even more unsettling is the increasingly likely prospect that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, a key ally, will fall from power sometime over the next several months, limiting Tehran's ability to resupply Hezbollah and Hamas in the event they need to be unleashed upon Israel in retaliation for any military strikes on Iran's nuclear installations.

Meanwhile, the U.S.-led push to launch a Western embargo of Iran's oil exports could threaten as much as one-third of Iran's total export earnings, according to some expert accounts. The damage will come not just from Europe, which has pledged to stop buying Iranian oil, but also from Asian economies, which are already going out of their way to divert their purchases toward more reliable suppliers. In this regard, Iran's chief regional rival, Saudi Arabia, has become their most aggressive suitor -- by design, of course.

Given such dramatically reduced market leverage, Tehran will be forced to cut its prices further for those non-Western buyers, like China, which, while sidestepping the embargo on principle and as a supply hedge, will nonetheless maximally exploit Iran's isolation. Frankly, this is the primary reason why China likes being friends with rogue regimes: the opportunity to loot their natural resources at bargain basement prices. Just take a look at China's mineral trade with North Korea, which Beijing has emptied at below-market prices while paying off the military elite that now commands the government. Myanmar presents a similar tale.

But China will not go to the mattresses on Iran's behalf, any more than big-talking Russia will. In truth, a regime-toppling war in Iran will overwhelmingly work to China's long-term benefit, just like it did in Iraq. In the short run, Beijing will end up paying more for the product. But money is not China's problem -- supply is, and an Iran opened back up to global investment and Western technology would soon re-emerge as a far larger source of both oil and gas. So yes, expect Beijing to make all of its usual obstructionist moves, and then cry crocodile tears when the regime finally falls, because the Chinese will invariably clean up on both the reconstruction process and the improved energy export flows.

This gets us to why Israel has to start this war: The perceived existential threat of Iran's nuclear weapons will not be tamed by any outside superpower, and indeed it cannot be. In the case of North Korea, both South Korea and Japan-and by extension the U.S.-have no choice but to live with Pyongyang's nukes, because trying to remove that threat militarily, right on China's border, is a nonstarter. But living with a nuclear North Korea is made tolerable because of Beijing's perceived influence over the regime.

In the case of Iran, there is no great power to rein in escalations on both sides. So the world won't be able to tolerate a Persian Gulf version of North Korea. Israel's existence is conceivably threatened, as is that of all-important energy pillar Saudi Arabia. Those twin realities guarantee that America will fight at Israel's side and do whatever it takes to defend Saudi oil infrastructure, which is the only part of that sacred Islamic land that Tehran would dare target as part of a Götterdämmerung strategy.

Virtually all of America's strategic allies and rivals will ultimately forgive our involvement because, in the end, each will benefit: China and India, from Iran's resurrection as an energy exporter; Turkey, from Iran's diminution as a regional leader; and the rest of the world, from the Persian Gulf being spared from a lengthy period of unstable nuclear brinkmanship. Only Russia stands to lose outright, but that has been true regarding virtually every good thing that has happened in this world for the past two decades, and Moscow cannot do anything about it, save for beating down a tiny neighbor now and then.

Of course, Beijing and Moscow will regret the precedent of yet another Western-led regime-change effort targeting a fellow authoritarian state. But since this war will be conducted prior to Iran's weaponization of its nuclear capacity, the enduring rule-set regarding nuclear weapons being off-limits will be preserved.

As for this looming war being more about regime change than wiping out Iran's nuclear programs, that is simply a case of being realistic. Unless the West were willing to invade Iran and occupy it, Iraq-style, there is no chance that any airstrike-only war will decisively terminate Tehran's reach for the Bomb. Since there is zero chance of America rerunning the Iraq war, U.S. and Israeli air and unconventional attacks will, at best, push Iran's weaponization date back several years. But, frankly, our targeting strategy will likewise prioritize damaging the regime's capacity to control its population, because unless an Arab Spring-like uprising ensues, or an acceptable regime infighter emerges victoriously with a "grand bargain" in hand, we will simply have to "rinse and repeat" at some future date.

That is the path we are on: Israel and America will soon go to war with Iran -- for as many times as it takes. In each instance, our proximate goal will be to kick the nuclear "can" as far down the road as possible, but our ultimate goal will be regime change.

Stunningly familiar, isn't it?

For years I have argued that Iran will get the Bomb and that we would be better off accepting that and subsequently going for the same "soft kill" outcome we previously achieved with the Soviet Union through arms control and détente. But just like with Iraq back in 2002, I have come to the conclusion that the world simply can't get there from here, for all the reasons detailed above.

Nothing is going to stop this war dynamic from unfolding -- not China, the U.N., the Pentagon's strategic "pivot" to East Asia, our upcoming presidential election, nor our nation's much-discussed war fatigue, much less "decline."

Nothing.

So get ready for war with Iran. Because once Assad is gone, that is what comes next.

[PortDawg]

It's just a matter of time...

[mrvette]

Decent written article, someone finally understands the shituation the way I have for some 30 years now, nothing new to me....

the only part that is rong is toward the end about that regime change, that's the easy part, as is eliminating their nuclear program....that all takes maybe 2 days at most....probably less than 6 hours, really.....

[Joecooool]

I think its time to let Israel stand on their own.

We shouldn't have the right to tell them they can't defend themselves and in return, we shouldn't have the be obligated to clean up the mess when the rest of the Arab world jumps in their shit. We have given them close to a hundred billion dollars worth of military aid. Thats enough. Let the chips fall where they may.

If they want to pick a fight they can suffer the consequences.

[Loco Vette]

So Iran should be allowed to develop nuclear weapons without interference?

[Sea Six]

Originally Posted by Joecooool

I think its time to let Israel stand on their own.

We shouldn't have the right to tell them they can't defend themselves and in return, we shouldn't have the be obligated to clean up the mess when the rest of the Arab world jumps in their shit. We have given them close to a hundred billion dollars worth of military aid. Thats enough. Let the chips fall where they may.

If they want to pick a fight they can suffer the consequences.

It's always those scheming, warmongering Israelis that are stirring up conflicts over there.

It's NEVER the other way around.

If those Israelis are dumb enough to go on the offense one time too many and they get obliterated, it will be their own damned fault.

How'm I doing, Joe?

[Sea Six]

When idiots like this make comments like this, it's easy to see how ignorant, talking-points-reading Pubs get confused about how all Arab-Israeli conflict is really 100% Israel's fault.

Knesset Chairman Benjamin Netanyahu said during a speech that “if the Arabs lay down their arms there will be no more war, but if Israel lays down its weapons there would be no more Israel."

[Torqaholic]

They have people who want to die... We have people who want to die...
Funny thing (to me) is those who don't want to die thinking they can make these decisions.