02-03-2017, 01:58 PM
Patrick Buchanan--paleo-conservative that he is, and Nixon acolyte that he once was--is sounding the alarm about the militant tone of the Trump administration, when Gen. Michael Flynn marched into the White House Briefing Room to declare that "we are officially putting Iran on notice."
"The Coming Clash with Iran"
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/b...with-iran/
Buchanan is right to compare this provocation to Obama’s chemical weapons “red line” in Syria, an ultimatum that led Obama to threaten the use of force against the regime of President Assad before ultimately accepting a peaceful resolution (engineered by Russia's Putin, we should recall).
Trump is fast cementing a reputation for following through on his campaign promises. (His supporters applaud him for that, no doubt.) So it's hard to dismiss Flynn's not-so-veiled threat as mere "saber rattling," especially in light of Steve Bannon's apparent worldview of a coming "clash of civilizations."
Buchanan asks--
Is the United States making new demands on Iran not written into the nuclear treaty or international law—to provoke a confrontation?
Did Flynn coordinate with our allies about this warning of possible military action against Iran? Is NATO obligated to join any action we might take?
Or are we going to carry out any retaliation alone, as our NATO allies observe, while the Israelis, Gulf Arabs, Saudis and the Beltway War Party, which wishes to be rid of Trump, cheer him on?
Bibi Netanyahu hailed Flynn’s statement, calling Iran’s missile test a flagrant violation of the U.N. resolution and declaring, “Iranian aggression must not go unanswered.” By whom, besides us?
Fair questions all. Buchanan goes on to write--
The problem with making a threat public—Iran is “on notice”—is that it makes it almost impossible for Iran, or Trump, to back away.
Tehran seems almost obliged to defy it, especially the demand that it cease testing conventional missiles for its own defense.
This U.S. threat will surely strengthen those Iranians opposed to the nuclear deal and who wish to see its architects, President Hassan Rouhani and Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, thrown out in this year’s elections.
If Rex Tillerson is not to become a wartime secretary of state like Colin Powell or Dean Rusk, he is going to have to speak to the Iranians, not with defiant declarations, but in a diplomatic dialogue.
Tillerson, of course, is on record as saying the Chinese should be blocked from visiting the half-dozen fortified islets they have built on rocks and reefs in the South China Sea.
A prediction: The Chinese will not be departing from their islands, and the Iranians will defy the U.S. threat against testing their missiles.
Wednesday’s White House statement makes a collision with Iran almost unavoidable, and a war with Iran quite possible.
Why did Trump and Flynn feel the need to do this now?
And Buchanan points out the obvious contradiction between Trump's campaign rhetoric and the recent pronouncements of his national security team:
High among the reasons that many supported Trump was his understanding that George W. Bush blundered horribly in launching an unprovoked and unnecessary war on Iraq.
Along with the 15-year war in Afghanistan and our wars in Libya, Syria, and Yemen, our 21st-century U.S. Mideast wars have cost us trillions of dollars and thousands of dead. And they have produced a harvest of hatred of America that was exploited by al-Qaida and ISIS to recruit jihadists to murder and massacre Westerners...
Unlike the other candidates, Trump seemed to recognize this.
It was thought he would disengage us from these wars, not rattle a saber at an Iran that is three times the size of Iraq and has as its primary weapons supplier and partner Vladimir Putin’s Russia.
When Barack Obama drew his red line against Bashar Assad’s use of chemical weapons in Syria’s civil war, and Assad appeared to cross it, Obama discovered that his countrymen wanted no part of the war that his military action might bring on.
President Obama backed down—in humiliation.
Neither the Ayatollah Khamenei nor Trump appears to be in a mood to back away, especially now that the president has made the threat public.
I have a few questions of my own: Is Trump's chief strategist Steve Bannon really trying to make "a clash of civilizations" a self-fulfilling prophecy? If so, are he and the president of one mind on this worldview? Is the president even aware that his emerging foreign policy looks like so much "scattershot," lacking coherence, diplomacy and rationality?
"The Coming Clash with Iran"
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/b...with-iran/
Buchanan is right to compare this provocation to Obama’s chemical weapons “red line” in Syria, an ultimatum that led Obama to threaten the use of force against the regime of President Assad before ultimately accepting a peaceful resolution (engineered by Russia's Putin, we should recall).
Trump is fast cementing a reputation for following through on his campaign promises. (His supporters applaud him for that, no doubt.) So it's hard to dismiss Flynn's not-so-veiled threat as mere "saber rattling," especially in light of Steve Bannon's apparent worldview of a coming "clash of civilizations."
Buchanan asks--
Is the United States making new demands on Iran not written into the nuclear treaty or international law—to provoke a confrontation?
Did Flynn coordinate with our allies about this warning of possible military action against Iran? Is NATO obligated to join any action we might take?
Or are we going to carry out any retaliation alone, as our NATO allies observe, while the Israelis, Gulf Arabs, Saudis and the Beltway War Party, which wishes to be rid of Trump, cheer him on?
Bibi Netanyahu hailed Flynn’s statement, calling Iran’s missile test a flagrant violation of the U.N. resolution and declaring, “Iranian aggression must not go unanswered.” By whom, besides us?
Fair questions all. Buchanan goes on to write--
The problem with making a threat public—Iran is “on notice”—is that it makes it almost impossible for Iran, or Trump, to back away.
Tehran seems almost obliged to defy it, especially the demand that it cease testing conventional missiles for its own defense.
This U.S. threat will surely strengthen those Iranians opposed to the nuclear deal and who wish to see its architects, President Hassan Rouhani and Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, thrown out in this year’s elections.
If Rex Tillerson is not to become a wartime secretary of state like Colin Powell or Dean Rusk, he is going to have to speak to the Iranians, not with defiant declarations, but in a diplomatic dialogue.
Tillerson, of course, is on record as saying the Chinese should be blocked from visiting the half-dozen fortified islets they have built on rocks and reefs in the South China Sea.
A prediction: The Chinese will not be departing from their islands, and the Iranians will defy the U.S. threat against testing their missiles.
Wednesday’s White House statement makes a collision with Iran almost unavoidable, and a war with Iran quite possible.
Why did Trump and Flynn feel the need to do this now?
And Buchanan points out the obvious contradiction between Trump's campaign rhetoric and the recent pronouncements of his national security team:
High among the reasons that many supported Trump was his understanding that George W. Bush blundered horribly in launching an unprovoked and unnecessary war on Iraq.
Along with the 15-year war in Afghanistan and our wars in Libya, Syria, and Yemen, our 21st-century U.S. Mideast wars have cost us trillions of dollars and thousands of dead. And they have produced a harvest of hatred of America that was exploited by al-Qaida and ISIS to recruit jihadists to murder and massacre Westerners...
Unlike the other candidates, Trump seemed to recognize this.
It was thought he would disengage us from these wars, not rattle a saber at an Iran that is three times the size of Iraq and has as its primary weapons supplier and partner Vladimir Putin’s Russia.
When Barack Obama drew his red line against Bashar Assad’s use of chemical weapons in Syria’s civil war, and Assad appeared to cross it, Obama discovered that his countrymen wanted no part of the war that his military action might bring on.
President Obama backed down—in humiliation.
Neither the Ayatollah Khamenei nor Trump appears to be in a mood to back away, especially now that the president has made the threat public.
I have a few questions of my own: Is Trump's chief strategist Steve Bannon really trying to make "a clash of civilizations" a self-fulfilling prophecy? If so, are he and the president of one mind on this worldview? Is the president even aware that his emerging foreign policy looks like so much "scattershot," lacking coherence, diplomacy and rationality?