Monday, April 10, 2006
Not ruling out any option.
Abridged Seymour Hersh, via Greg Djejerian:
eta: Wonkette has more:
Joint Chiefs of Staff: Let's stop talking about using tactical nuclear weapons on Iran.I would feel somewhat better about this -- if not all warm and fuzzy -- if I thought, as Djejerian seems to, that the military officers leaking to Hersh are involved in psy-ops.
White House: No, let's keep looking at that option.
eta: Wonkette has more:
[T]he idea of using tactical nuclear weapons in such situations has gained support from the Defense Science Board, an advisory panel whose members are selected by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. “They’re telling the Pentagon that we can build the B61 with more blast and less radiation,” he said.I suppose I could read Hersh's article in The New Yorker, but I like to wait until the paper copy arrives in the mail -- I'm old skool that way.
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It's psyops or sincere or both. The president is poker player in chief, so W wouldn't be doing his job were he not trying to make Iran believe it's truly under the gun. News reports make it seem reasonable to believe the United States military is crippled w.r.t. large scale non-nuclear war, so arguably if we don't wave nukes, we're waving nothing but our bare asses.
I get the psy-ops concept, but I think leaks to Seymour Hersh are an unlikely way to try to get the message to the Iranians.
Why wouldn't Hersh want to help? Seems like a patriot guy to me, and not obviously anti-realpolitik.
BTW, it sure is a ridiculous looking crisis compared to our historical paradigms for nuclear standoffs. It's Cuba without the missiles, without the Soviets and with an adversary half way around the world. To the extent national security experts truly perceive this worthy of the nuclear option they seem to be conceding we are effectively defenseless against suitcases. I suppose it's true, but it would be quite an admission from this particular administration.
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BTW, it sure is a ridiculous looking crisis compared to our historical paradigms for nuclear standoffs. It's Cuba without the missiles, without the Soviets and with an adversary half way around the world. To the extent national security experts truly perceive this worthy of the nuclear option they seem to be conceding we are effectively defenseless against suitcases. I suppose it's true, but it would be quite an admission from this particular administration.
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