Next Stop, Iran

The Los Angeles Times notes that UberDick Cheney is ratcheting up the tough talk to Iran by invoking Israel in the role of bad cop:

"Cheney, who often has delivered the Bush team's toughest warnings to foreign capitals, said Iran was 'right at the top' of the administration's list of world trouble spots, and expressed concern that Israel 'might well decide to act first' to destroy Iran's nuclear program. The Israelis would let the rest of the world 'worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterward,' he added in a radio interview with Don Imus that was also broadcast on MSNBC.

"The tough talk was part of the administration's attempt to halt what Iran contends is a peaceful, civilian nuclear energy program but which Washington believes is a clandestine program to develop nuclear weapons. Facing weak diplomatic and military options, the administration has issued increasingly stern warnings in hopes that threats of sanctions and international isolation will convince Iran to shun nuclear weapons. President Bush and other top administration officials also have spoken in menacing terms about Iran in recent days. But Cheney's words marked the first time that a senior official has amplified the threat by suggesting that the United States could be unable to prevent military attack by its close allies in Jerusalem, analysts and diplomats said.

"The startling reference to an Israeli attack was 'the kind of strong language that will get their attention in Tehran,' said one allied diplomat in Washington, who spoke on condition of anonymity. 'There's a rhetorical escalation here: They've ratcheted up the threat level by bringing Israel in,' said Henri J. Barkey, a former State Department official during the Clinton administration."

UberDick's latest rhetoric comes on the heels of a Seymour Hersh story in the New Yorker alleging that C.I.A. operatives are already in Iran to determine potential targets of attack. Hersh contends the goal, according to his sources, is to agree on three dozen or more targets that would do much to cripple Iran's infrastructure.

"According to a former high-level intelligence official, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld met with the Joint Chiefs of Staff shortly after the election and told them, in essence, that the naysayers had been heard and the American people did not accept their message. Rumsfeld added that America was committed to staying in Iraq and that there would be no second-guessing.

"'This is a war against terrorism, and Iraq is just one campaign. The Bush Administration is looking at this as a huge war zone,' the former high-level intelligence official told me. 'Next, we're going to have the Iranian campaign. We've declared war and the bad guys, wherever they are, are the enemy. This is the last hurrah 'we've got four years, and want to come out of this saying we won the war on terrorism.'"

As for covert activities in and near Iran, Hersh writes that the Bush Administration is working closely with Pakistan intelligence to gauge Iran's nuclear threat and with Israel to develop potential targets inside Iran.

"The Pentagon's contingency plans for a broader invasion of Iran are also being updated. Strategists at the headquarters of the U.S. Central Command, in Tampa, Florida, have been asked to revise the military's war plan, providing for a maximum ground and air invasion of Iran. Updating the plan makes sense, whether or not the Administration intends to act, because the geopolitics of the region have changed dramatically in the last three years.

"It is possible that some of the American officials who talk about the need to eliminate Iran's nuclear infrastructure are doing so as part of a propaganda campaign aimed at pressuring Iran to give up its weapons planning ...

"In my interviews over the past two months, I was given a much harsher view. The hawks in the Administration believe that it will soon become clear that the Europeans' negotiated approach cannot succeed, and that at that time the Administration will act. 'We're not dealing with a set of National Security Council option papers here,' the former high-level intelligence official told me. 'They've already passed that wicket. It's not if we're going to do anything against Iran. They're doing it.'

"Under Rumsfeld's new approach, I was told, U.S. military operatives would be permitted to pose abroad as corrupt foreign businessmen seeking to buy contraband items that could be used in nuclear-weapons systems. In some cases, according to the Pentagon advisers, local citizens could be recruited and asked to join up with guerrillas or terrorists. This could potentially involve organizing and carrying out combat operations, or even terrorist activities. Some operations will likely take place in nations in which there is an American diplomatic mission, with an Ambassador and a C.I.A. station chief, the Pentagon consultant said. The Ambassador and the station chief would not necessarily have a need to know, under the Pentagon's current interpretation of its reporting requirement."

Are the neocons gearing up for an Act II? Is Hersh smoking weed with Oliver Stone?

Stay tuned.