Scott Ritter Says US Attack On Iran Set For June
Mark Jensen | February 21, 2005

On Friday evening in Olympia, former UNSCOM weapons inspector Scott Ritter appeared with journalist Dahr Jamail. -- Ritter made two shocking claims: George W. Bush has "signed off" on plans to bomb Iran in June 2005, and the U.S. manipulated the results of the Jan. 30 elections in Iraq....

Scott Ritter, appearing with journalist Dahr Jamail yesterday in Washington State, dropped two shocking bombshells in a talk delivered to a packed house in Olympia's Capitol Theater. The ex-Marine turned UNSCOM weapons inspector said that George W. Bush has "signed off" on plans to bomb Iran in June 2005, and claimed the U.S. manipulated the results of the recent Jan. 30 elections in Iraq.

Olympians like to call the Capitol Theater "historic," but it's doubtful whether the eighty-year-old edifice has ever been the scene of more portentous revelations.

The principal theme of Scott Ritter's talk was Americans' duty to protect the U.S. Constitution by taking action to bring an end to the illegal war in Iraq. But in passing, the former UNSCOM weapons inspector stunned his listeners with two pronouncements. Ritter said plans for a June attack on Iran have been submitted to President George W. Bush, and that the president has approved them. He also asserted that knowledgeable sources say U.S. officials "cooked" the results of the Jan. 30 elections in Iraq.

On Iran, Ritter said that President George W. Bush has received and signed off on orders for an aerial attack on Iran planned for June 2005. Its purported goal is the destruction of Iran's alleged program to develop nuclear weapons, but Ritter said neoconservatives in the administration also expected that the attack would set in motion a chain of events leading to regime change in the oil-rich nation of 70 million -- a possibility Ritter regards with the greatest skepticism.

The former Marine also said that the Jan. 30 elections, which George W. Bush has called "a turning point in the history of Iraq, a milestone in the advance of freedom," were not so free after all. Ritter said that U.S. authorities in Iraq had manipulated the results in order to reduce the percentage of the vote received by the United Iraqi Alliance from 56% to 48%.

Asked by UFPPC's Ted Nation about this shocker, Ritter said an official involved in the manipulation was the source, and that this would soon be reported by a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist in a major metropolitan magazine -- an obvious allusion to New Yorker reporter Seymour M. Hersh.

On Jan. 17, the New Yorker posted an article by Hersh entitled The Coming Wars (New Yorker, January 24-31, 2005). In it, the well-known investigative journalist claimed that for the Bush administration, "The next strategic target [is] Iran." Hersh also reported that "The Administration has been conducting secret reconnaissance missions inside Iran at least since last summer." According to Hersh, "Defense Department civilians, under the leadership of Douglas Feith, have been working with Israeli planners and consultants to develop and refine potential nuclear, chemical-weapons, and missile targets inside Iran. . . . 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. . . . The hawks in the Administration believe that it will soon become clear that the Europeans' negotiated approach [to Iran] cannot succeed, and that at that time the Administration will act."

Scott Ritter said that although the peace movement failed to stop the war in Iraq, it had a chance to stop the expansion of the war to other nations like Iran and Syria. He held up the specter of a day when the Iraq war might be remembered as a relatively minor event that preceded an even greater conflagration.

Scott Ritter's talk was the culmination of a long evening devoted to discussion of Iraq and U.S. foreign policy. Before Ritter spoke, Dahr Jamail narrated a slide show on Iraq focusing on Fallujah. He showed more than a hundred vivid photographs taken in Iraq, mostly by himself. Many of them showed the horrific slaughter of civilians.

Dahr Jamail argued that U.S. mainstream media sources are complicit in the war and help sustain support for it by deliberately downplaying the truth about the devastation and death it is causing.

Jamail was, until recently, one of the few unembedded journalists in Iraq and one of the only independent ones. His reports have gained a substantial following and are available online at dahrjamailiraq.com.

Friday evening's event in Olympia was sponsored by South Puget Sound Community College's Student Activities Board, Veterans for Peace, 100 Thousand and Counting, Olympia Movement for Justice & Peace, and United for Peace of Pierce County.

Some background information on their airforce:

http://homepage.eircom.net/~steven/iriaf.htm

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Defector declares that Iranian military "pro-US"....for what that is worth, which is probably not much:

Defector says Iranian military pro-U.S.
Believes as many as 40% 'waiting for the arrival of America'

March 5, 2004
WorldNetDaily.com

A former commander of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has defected to Azerbaijan and disclosed that Iran's military is infused with pro-U.S. sentiment.

Col. Bakharali Bagiryan arrived in Baku last week.

"I came to Azerbaijan 40 days ago and was registered with the Azerbaijani representative office of the UNHCR as a political �migr�," Bagiryan said at the Baku Press Club Feb. 23.

Bagiryan said many Iranian military troops would like to defect.

"In Iran, the military are not issued with passports, which deprives them of the opportunity to leave the country legally," he said. "I have been sent to Azerbaijan in the capacity of a representative of those who want cardinal changes in Iran's state structure."

The IRGC are Islamic shock troops and are Teheran's key liaison with international terrorist groups, such as Lebanese Hezbollah.

Bagiryan said some 40 percent of servicemen in the Iranian army think as he does and are "waiting for the arrival of America in Iran."

"The strengthening of the U.S. position in the region causes optimism among many Iranian servicemen and they secretly support the operation in Iraq," the colonel said. "I think that many of them would back a similar U.S. operation in Iran."

Bagiryan said Teheran's claim that the Iranian army fully supports the government is groundless. He said he intended to stay in Azerbaijan and help those fighting for the national interests of southern Azerbaijan.

His remarks appeared in the Baku newspaper Turan, an independent, non-governmental news agency close to the People's Front of Azerbaijan.

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OpEd piece describing US vs. Iran militarily...for what that is worth

Russia has sold Iran the S-300PMU. It is a highly effective, fast, surface-to-air missile that’s very hard to jam and stop, says Richard Fisher, a senior fellow at the Jamestown Foundation. Over the Persian Gulf, the S-300 will make future U.S. air operations far more difficult. Fisher says that Pentagon officials quietly assert that America currently does not have the air power to counter the deadly S-300 missile. China has also bought these missiles and deploys dozens of them directly opposite Taiwan.

Iran also possesses the Shahab-3, a three stage and highly accurate surface-to-surface missile with an 800 mile range. It is capable of delivering a conventional or nuclear warhead and is within range of any target in Israel.

Perhaps the most worrisome weapon in the Iranian arsenal is the Russian made 3M-82 Moskit, nicknamed Sunburn. Sunburn is a wave skimming, Mach 2.5, ship eating monster that delivers a 750 pound warhead of high explosives. It has a 160 mile range and can be configured to carry a nuclear payload. Iran conceals them in fortified caves along the Iranian coast. Such a weapon enables Iran to control the Straights of Hormoz and deny ship traffic coming or going in the Persian Gulf. Jack Spencer of the Heritage Foundation says, “Whether or not we can defend against this is a good question. Probably under perfect conditions we would defend against one or two. But under war conditions, to defend against many would be difficult.”

The Aegis ABM interceptor is not designed to deal with the supersonic cruise missile threat and the U.S. Navy Aegis warships are reported to be unable to defend themselves against the latest Russian supersonic cruise missiles.” Aegis warships are there to defend the carriers and if they can’t defend themselves a carrier is a fish in a barrel.

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Iranian military parade:

http://www.acig.org/artman/publish/article_249.shtml

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A status report on Iran's military:

IRANIAN MILITARY STRENGTH
Report Addresses Russian-Iranian Arms Sales Controversy

Anthony Cordesman
CSIS Burke Chair in Strategy

WASHINGTON, October 20, 2000 - Iran has not spent enough on military modernization to build up its conventional weapons, according to a new report by Anthony H. Cordesman, CSIS Burke Chair in Strategy.

The report analyzes Iranian military capabilities and addresses the recent controversy over Russian-Iranian arms transfers, which will be the subject of a Wednesday, Oct. 25, hearing on Capitol Hill. The report is available on the CSIS Web site, http://www.csis.org.

"Iran has carefully focused its arms buys on proliferation and creating a threat to shipping in the Gulf," Cordesman writes. "Iran does represent a potential threat to U.S. interests, but it has not had a major conventional arms build-up or received large destabilizing transfers of advanced conventional weapons. The violations of U.S. and Russian agreements have been minor, have had little military meaning, and been more technical than substantive.

"Neither Iran's arms imports nor production efforts have come close to offsetting the impact of its underspending on military modernization, and its relative 'poverty' in arms imports," Cordesman writes. "Iran still has a force structure filled with obsolete and obsolescent military equipment. Iran's procurements to date cannot compensate for the steady decay of Iran's older equipment." Among the topics covered in Cordesman's comprehensive analysis are military expenditures, arms transfers, focused poverty and asymmetric threats, problems with obsolescence, conventional warfighting, asymmetric wars, and the far more serious threat posed by Iranian proliferation.

Cordesman, holder of the CSIS Arleigh Burke Chair in Strategy, is an adjunct professor of national security studies at Georgetown University. He was formerly a Wilson Fellow at the Smithsonian Institution and national security assistant to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). He has served in senior positions in the Departments of Defense, State, and Energy and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. He has also served in overseas positions with NATO, and in Iran, Egypt, Lebanon, and Germany.

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Demographics and statistics of Iran's military


Military branches: Islamic Republic of Iran regular forces (includes Ground Forces, Navy, Air Force and Air Defense Command), Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) (includes Ground Forces, Air Force, Navy, Qods Force [special operations], and Basij [Popular Mobilization Army]), Law Enforcement Forces

Military manpower - military age: 21 years of age (2004 est.)

Military manpower - availability: males age 15-49: 20,937,348 (2004 est.)

Military manpower - fit for military service: males age 15-49: 12,434,810 (2004 est.)

Military manpower - reaching military age annually: males: 912,569 (2004 est.)

Military expenditures - dollar figure: $4.3 billion (2003 est.)

Military expenditures - percent of GDP: 3.3% (2003 est.)

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My take?

The US military beats Iran on paper and in simulation. In reality, such a victory would come at a high price, as their military is neither the push-over nor the small size of Iraq's. It would be a bloody war that we would win, but at what cost and what result?

What muddies they waters, however, is our current involvement with Iraq and the state of our over-extended military makes it highly unlikely that you will see military action (at least extensive that is) against Iran this year or within the next several years.

I see attempts at diplomacy, followed by Iran going nuclear and nothing more occurring unless Israel should become involved or Iran should flex its muscle in Iraq.

This is the beginning of an interesting scenario in the Middle East, that will probably take years to take true form. What would probably be best is if revolution occurred in Iran thus displacing the current regime. We cannot say if such a revolution would be supportive of the US, however, but many believe it is definately worth a shot.

I believe Ritter's prediction will not come to fruition this year, or at least, I hope that it does not.

oops

Well, I would have just thrown out the blanket prediction that the middle east would be even more fucked up this year, but hey, specifics are nice too.

I can't say I'm really surprised about this. I think Nick started a thread on either the old board or just after this new board went up, and there were several posts in there (including mine) talking about the best way to engage Iran -- leave the "revolution" to the Iranians themselves. Most of the population in Iran is under 30, wearing Nikes and Levy's, eating McDonald's and watching MTV and other American programming via satellite. They are very much at odds with the spiritual leaders of Iran and want a western-style, open democratic form of government. Us invading Iran and instituting our form of government would only serve to severely undercut efforts by Iran's own citizens to institute change.

I agree, and I hope the Bush administration does too.

Bush should be castrated and locked in a very small cage.

That is not the kind of debate we're looking for here. We don't even have this information from a good source yet.

--PunkDavid

Gus the janitor here at work, has just stated that he has been abducted by aliens and that is proof there is exterestial life out there

Agreed.

fix iraq first, then you guys can go to another mess

I agree, one fuck up at a time.

the irony is that listen to Britney Spears there is alternative

Ritter was spot-on about Iraq. And he was soundly jeered for saying that there were no WMD in Iraq. However, he knew the weapons state of Iraq in an intimate way I don't think he could really know about Iran plans or about elections manipulation. And, there's always the chance that some/all of the information he's getting is intended to discredit him in his passing it on. I would think he would have checked it out very carefully before making these assertions. In all, though, I have to say that election massaging would hardly be surprising. I really don't think this adminstration is above very much.

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Added after some research:

http://www.dailykos.com/comments/2005/2 ... /711/72#72

Apparently, there's some concern about the source of the quotes. Maybe Ritter didn't say what he is purported to have said.

That was exactly how I felt about this thread when it started this morning. Exactly.



Another shocker.

--PunkDavid

OK is this the appropriate place to discuss Bush's comments?
He said it was ridiculous to say that we were planning on attacking Iran, but having said that, all options are on the table. Anyone else think that ridiculous and on-the-table are pefect opposites?

No. The comment from Bush was in response to a time-table in attacking Iran and that an attack was currently planned and imminent. That is ridiculous. Yet who's to say that an attack, when all else fails and Iran is being openly aggressive (a la North Korea), won't be necessary, either from us or our allies (read: Israel). All options cannot be dismissed at this point. It's just not all options are currently being planned. I don't see the two points as polar opposites.

I believe the point is that it is "ridiculous" to say that we are definitely planning to attack, as in we aren't filling up the gas tanks on the jets just yet.

I never understand why Bush goes at things this way. What if I was arguing with someone and I said, "Look, I just want to sit down and talk, but understand, I might stab you later if you persist on not seeing things my way." Does he really expect a country to work with us if he's reserving the right to kick the shit of out them?

I think, right now, rhetoric is all we have to work with. We certainly don't want to undermine anything the EU or European nations are trying to do in terms of talking Iran down (while we don't necessarily agree with the approach, we still need to work with them). At the same time, we need to send Tehran a stern reminder that diplomacy is the best course and, to the extent it doesn't want to engage it, it may meet a similar fate as Iraq (or, simply, we may destroy the nuclear facilities ourselves).