The PNAC / AIPAC Wet Dream

Or, "Is that a nuclear weapon in your pants, or are you just glad to see me?"

According to an article in the Times of London, two Israeli Air Force squadrons are training to deliver a nuclear first strike on three of Iran's nuclear sites. This training includes a round trip flight to Gibraltar and back (rehearsing the 2,000-mile round trip they'll have to make to Iranian airspace). Several attack routes are mapped out, including one that overflies Turkey. Of course, no one is asking the Turks their opinion.

The idea, according to the Times, is to take out three sites by using conventional deep-penetration weapons to gouge open a hole for the small (1/15 the size of the Hiroshima bomb, the standard rhetorical benchmark - but that's still roughly 1 kiloton) nukes to destroy the buried and reinforced facilities.

Now, the US is understandably jumpy about this, primarily about the hell that will be unleashed if Israel actually does it. Our stated position is that we won't approve it - but the Israelis didn't wait for approval when they destroyed the Iraqi reactor at Osirak in 1981. They just did, and worried about repercussions later.

Now, there are factions within this country who anxiously await Israel's attack on Iran. The first, naturally, are the Christian Zionists, who don't like Jews but want Israel to succeed so that Jesus can come again. Most of these people need large doses of antipsychotic drugs.

The second faction is PNAC, the neoconservative "Project for the New American Century." These nattering nabobs include the brain-dead military geniuses who talked the President into miring us up to our noses in Iraq, based on faulty intelligence and ginned-up war hysteria. Most of these people need to be put in cages, and poked at through the bars with sharp sticks by jeering children every Saturday.

The final faction is AIPAC, the America-Israel Political Action Committee. Yep, the Israel lobby. Somehow these people wield great influence within our government, and have several officials in their pockets (like Senator Lieberman of Connecticut). These people just need to sit down and shut the fuck up. Israel is our largest beneficiary of foreign aid, and they feel they can dictate to us.

Now, all that aside, what would be the result of a nuclear attack on Iran by Israel? Well, for starters I see a vast wave of Iranian troops sweeping across the Iraqi border toward Basra, rolling over the Iraqi and coalition forces in their path.

I see a wave of missiles striking Kuwait, Qatar, and Bahrain (all of who were informed by Tehran that they would be the principal targets if the US or Israel attacked them).

I see our forces in Iraq, supply lines cut and under siege by the Shiite majority, set up a fighting withdrawal (probable axis of retreat, straight south to Kuwait; if not, maybe along the desert highways to Jordan).

I see smoke rising from Saudi oil processing plants and tankers as Iranian missiles make hash out of the global economy.

I don't see anything (not a fucking iota) good coming out of an attack by Israel on Iran.