For Neocons, Iran War Aim Is Still Regime Change

[laststeamtrain]

For Neocons, Iran War Aim Is Still Regime Change

Analysis by Gareth Porter*

WASHINGTON, Oct 30 (IPS) - Vice President Dick Cheney and his neoconservative allies in the George W. Bush administration only began agitating for the use of military force against Iran once they had finally given up the illusion that regime change in Iran would happen without it.
And they did not give it up until late 2005, according to a former high-level Foreign Service officer who participated in the United States discussions with Iran from 2001 until late 2005.

Hillary Mann, who was the director for Persian Gulf and Afghanistan Affairs on the National Security Council staff in 2003 and later on the State Department's Policy Planning Staff, observes that the key to neoconservative policy views on Iran until 2006 was the firm belief that one of the consequences of a successful display of U.S. military force in Iraq would be to shake the foundations of the Iran regime.

That central belief was conveyed to conservative columnist Arnaud de Borchgrave of the Washington Times in April 2002 by prominent neocon figures who told him the Bush administration "had decided to redraw the geopolitical map of the Middle East".

The Bush doctrine of pre-emption, they said, "had become the vehicle for driving axis of evil practitioners out of power". The removal of Saddam Hussein, according to the neocon scenario, would bring a democratic Iraq that would then spread through the region, "bringing democracy from Syria to Egypt and to the sheikhdoms, emirates and monarchies of the Gulf."

Under the influence of this central myth, after the 9/11 attacks, some of Cheney's allies in the Pentagon conceived the objective of removing every regime in the Middle East that was hostile to the U.S. and Israel.

<more>

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39857