Seven pages of waffle

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/07/07/080707fa_fact_hersh?currentPage=1

This loooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnggggggggg article about the preparations for a military strike against Iran by George W Bush's White House is detailed but flawed by its assumptions.

Its primary assumption is that there is no need to do what the current administration is doing. There is no need for a military option. Lets just talk!

The author could have skipped all the prattle and just gone with-

'When I spoke to him last week, [Joschka] Fischer, who has extensive contacts in the diplomatic community, said that the latest European approach includes a new element: the willingness of the U.S. and the Europeans to accept something less than a complete cessation of enrichment as an intermediate step. “The proposal says that the Iranians must stop manufacturing new centrifuges and the other side will stop all further sanction activities in the U.N. Security Council,” Fischer said, although Iran would still have to freeze its enrichment activities when formal negotiations begin. “This could be acceptable to the Iranians—if they have good will.”'

Well, they don't have good will. Over and over and over again, the Iranians have said that they want nuclear power (which would give them very easy access to enriched uranium) and they deserve nuclear power and nobody is going to deny them nuclear power. What part of that do you New Yorker morons not understand? For the Iranians, have long, hazy, imprecise talks is a perfect way of passing the time while they get their nuclear processes right. Once they get them right, the talking will stop. Barack can phone Ahmedinejad every day, he won't get talks. Once Nuclear Iran is a fact, nobody will return his calls.

Those in the US military who oppose military action in Iran are participating in politics- something they just don't get to do. The US constitution is clear about who gets to decide US foreign policy, and its not the Joint Chiefs of Staff, CENTCOM or every two-bit Colonel. It is the Presidents prerogative, and secondarily the State Department. The fact is, the US definitely has the power to destroy Irans nuclear facilities, and not only that, it must. Iran is not a country any sane person wants to have nuclear-armed. That does not mean declaring war on the Iranian people, and indeed it means killing very few of them. It will be a big insult to the manhood of the average Iranian man in the street, but they'll get over it.

I would much rather have a nation of indignant Iranians than a sulphurous hole in the ground where Israel used to be.