I don't want to be right and I don't want to say I told you so.

[King Coal]

I'm sure many of you are in the same boat. I said several months ago to several people that Bush was going to go to war with Iran, and I was told I was crazy. I'm really scared now that I may of been prescient. Shit. I'm feeling blue brothers and sisters. This could get ugly.

[zanne]

1. I don't see how that would be possible...

Without a draft.

[King Coal]

2. I don't see how it would be possible with a draft.

[ananda]

3. AFAICT...

Cheney plans to use precision air strikes to take out
the Irani Republican Guard... no ground forces.

[MADem]

12. They're all over hell. They aren't all sitting in a circle at the old

Crown Prince Reza Air Base in Esfahan. They're scattered.

I don't think we have the intel to target that precisely.

And then, there's the day after.

If anyone does any 'taking out' of personnel I don't think it will be us.

[soothsayer]

17. 233 targets to bomb, plus we will give $$$ to an insurgency there

and put in some CIA and bilgewater forces to foment trouble

[PDJane]

4. I think you're right.

I've said so for about a year.

This bunch don't feel they need a draft, because, y'see, they're just going to send in the air guys, bomb the shit out of the place, kill a million or so, and there won't need to be a ground war.

I think someone should take away that crystal ball of theirs; it's seriously faulty.

[zanne]

15. Isn't that what "shock and awe" was all about?

Trying to win wars from the air in the middle east isn't happening anymore. Either that, or they want a regional war.

[soothsayer]

19. They fear a Persian superpower (Saddam's Iraq actually stabilized the M.E.)

so---because they fear a dem sweep in 2008 until 2016---they feel we'll ignore iran and let it become a superpower and then we'll be in real trouble trying to fight them in 8 or 9 years. So they want to bomb them back to the stone age before they leave office. That's how they're thinking about this. The repubs aren't happy because it will ensure their defeat and the Dem sweep of the WH and both houses(yay!) but supposedly bush and cheney don't care.

[Warpy]

5. I've wanted to be wrong for the last 7 years

I wanted to be wrong about Stupid's character and ineptitude.

I wanted to be wrong about this country's turn to Empire.

I wanted to be wrong about the deterioration in the infrastructure, the economy, health care, and every other domestic item we deal with every day, due to the focus on war, war war.

I wanted to be wrong about this idiot's total lack of understanding about even the most basic things: that there are sects and tribes in Iraq who have hated each other for centuries; that printing money just leads to inflation; that fattening the rich while beggaring everybody else leads to a shutdown of the consumer economy and depression; that treating the rest of the world like imbecile servants leads to being abandoned in time of need; that ignoring reality to pursue dogma invariably has a bad outcome.

I would be delighted to say I was wrong about everything. Unfortunately, I was not.

[Tyler Durden]

6. Know how feel..

Line from an extremely mediocre science fiction movie:

"Nobody ever listens to me, and I'm usually RIGHT."

[Zywiec]

7. People have been saying this for many years

Remember this one from 2005: Scott Ritter Says U.S. Plans June Attack On Iran

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.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8130.htm

[shadowknows69]

9. Soldiers themselves have been telling me this

From what I gathered this has been the plan all along, albeit a very fluid one. Many troops I talked to thought they were going to do it over a year ago.

[jojo54]

13. It's a damn shame that no enough people listened to him.

He is one of the few people that knew what was going on and ballsy enough to say so.

[Zywiec]

14. I believe he was mistaken.

In February 2005 he said there were already signed orders to bomb Iran in June 2005. I don't remember that ever happening. Do you?

[bananas]

20. No, Ritter wasn't mistaken.

The person who wrote that misunderstood what Ritter said, Ritter clarified it in other talks and in a March 2005 Al Jazeera article:
"To be clear, the source did not say that President Bush had approved plans to bomb Iran in June 2005, as has been widely reported. The President had reviewed plans being prepared by the Pentagon to have the military capability in place by June 2005 for such an attack, if the President ordered."
Published on Wednesday, March 30, 2005 by Al Jazeera
Sleepwalking to Disaster in Iran
by Scott Ritter
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0330-31.htm

[bananas]

29. He also clarified it on Randi Rhodes show

Ritter was on Randi's show on or before April 13 2005:
"I heard Scott Ritter on Randi Rhodes (Air America) clarifying an erroneously written story about the potential US military preemptive attack on Iran in June, 2005."

http://www.gnn.tv/headlines/2167/Scott_Ritter_Bush_s_Brinkmanship_with_Iran

Scott Ritter: Bush's Brinkmanship with Iran
Wed, 13 Apr 2005 15:46:33 -0500
Summary:

I’ve been wondering why Congress axed $2B for veterans until I heard Scott Ritter on Randi Rhodes (Air America) clarifying an erroneously written story about the potential US military preemptive attack on Iran in June, 2005. Ritter stated that in October, 2004, President Bush reviewed Pentagon plans to have a military capability to attack by June 2005, if the President so orders. When Secretary of State Condi Rice was confronted by America’s European alllies in February 2005 about this covert plan, she said that “the question is simply not on the agenda at this point — we have diplomatic means to do this”. That is until June 2005, as Ritter articulated so well to Rhodes. It will be the same “either you’re with us or against us” brinkmanship, de ja vu. Here’s the article Ritter wrote to set the record straight.

Sorry Combat Veterans, you’ll just have to wait to get proper medical treatment until Bush as destroyed the world.

[bananas]

30. March 11 2005 interview with Raw Story's Larisa Alexandrovna

"No. Someone else wrote that I had said that."
"it is taken totally out of context"
"That does not mean we are going to bomb"


http://web.archive.org/web/20050602073344/http://rawstory.com/news/2005/index.php?p=170

3/11/2005
Nuking the spin: Former UN weapons inspector talks to Raw Story on Iran, Iraq
Filed under:
General
— site admin @ 3:39 pm


Exclusive: Raw Story chats with Scott Ritter

By Larisa Alexandrovna | RAW STORY Staff

In a candid interview with RAW STORY, former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter sets the record straight on his comments about Iran, shares his concerns about the threats facing America and discusses his hopes. RAW STORY’s interview with Ritter will be published in three parts.

Iran’s nuclear program

Raw Story’s Larisa Alexandrovna: Scott, first let me thank you for taking the time to speak with me. I want to get right to the meat of things by asking you about a comment you reportedly made in February of this year in your joint appearance with journalist Dahr Jamail in Washington state, where you were quoted as saying that George W. Bush had signed off on plans to bomb Iran in June 2005.

Former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter: No. Someone else wrote that I had said that.

Raw Story: So it is not correct?

Ritter: It is not wildly incorrect, but it is taken totally out of context. The emphasis is placed on the wrong things. What I said was that the President, in October of 2004, had been briefed by the Pentagon. In preparation to have in place by June 2005 a viable military option. This was in response to instructions by the President that the US must be prepared to implement the next phase of its Iran policy or strategy; the first phase of course being the pursuit of the so called diplomatic option-in other words allowing the European Union to carry out its outreach program.

Raw Story: So Secretary of State’s Condoleezza Rice’s comments regarding not taking any options off the table would echo that sentiment, it seems.

Ritter had just come back from Europe, and this is what I was talking about during that speaking engagement, said that military plans were not on the table at this time. I said that she was a liar; either she is being really cute or she is lying. Military plans are on the table and the President has signed off on those plans. That does not mean we are going to bomb, but to sit here and pretend that we have fully embraced the diplomatic option or have not considered military plans is wrong. I reminded everyone of the situation in the fall of 2002 where the same Condoleezza Rice, along with Donald Rumsfeld, Collin Powell, and other members of the Bush administration were saying that the United States was embarking on serious diplomatic path to resolve the situation in Iraq. They made these statements to Congress in the fall when the President had already signed off on plans for an Iraq invasion in August. She lied then and she is lying now.

Raw Story: So based on this pattern that you are pointing out, does that then mean an attack on Iran is probable?

Ritter: No, what is happening is that in June, the U.S. will walk away from Europe with regard to their outreach in Iran. If the situation is not resolved by June, the US will shift its policy and methodology. Now this is not speculation on my part. This has been stated. Then will seek to impose robust sanctions against Iran.

Raw Story: The UN has to approve those sanctions still.

Ritter: Right. Only the UN Security Council can apply those sanctions and the Russians and the French have already said we are not game, we are not playing.

When we confront the Russians with our desire to impose sanctions and the Russians must know there is something else outside of sanctions; so when they are saying no, they know they are opening the door to something else. That something else is a military bombardment. In that event, the U.S. has to be prepared; the Pentagon has been tasked with being prepared to launch a massive military bombardment by June of 2005. October of 2004 was a status report on those preparations.

<snip>

[Mrs. Overall]

24. I heard Ritter tell Amy Goodman on Democracy Now several months ago

that if we do attack Iran, to expect $9 a gallon gas. I posted this recently, and someone said that the administration has finessed a plan to go after Iran that wouldn't disrupt oil production or prices at all. Wish I could remember the details.

[Lerkfish]

8. yep right there with ya.

I was also told I was crazy.

we'll see who's crazy.

[MADem]

10. I still don't see it happening with US forces.

Gulf forces, maybe. Jordanians, Egyptians, anyone who owes the Saudis for their largesse over the years, hey, why not.

We've been plussing them up lately with the latest and greatest in military equipment. And we've been teaching them how to behave interoperatively in a big way recently.

Stand by for the next big Holy War. Hopefully it won't last as long as the last one, which dragged on for over a decade.....

[soothsayer]

18. US Navy plus Israel is supposed to come in through Syria

[MADem]

25. That would be quite the trick. I doubt Syria would sit quietly by... nt

[renie408]

27. Here's the thing, even these morons have to have learned SOMETHING from Iraq

You would think that the way their last plan worked out, it might slow them down a little.

They have to have more plans in place than how to get INTO the war. Like getting back OUT. Getting in is the easy part.

[Lil Missy]

11. I think there is a war with Iran in he works too, but I think Cheney is behind it.

[Arkansas Granny]

16. I know how you feel. I tried to tell people for months before the

Iraq invasion that there was nothing that Saddam could do that would stop Bush from his plans to go to war. He's trying the same tactics now to convince people that we should attack Iran. I can't believe that there are people out there who can't see through this ruse.

[BlooInBloo]

21. Um, people have been talking for YEARS about how we're going to war with Iran...

... You're late to the game.

[King Coal]

22. Well, I was the first one here, Hammerhead.

[BlooInBloo]

23. Sure you were, tiger.

[renie408]

26. Interesting claim to fame. n/t

[King Coal]

28. I don't mean at DU, renie, I mean here where I work.

Sabe el burro?