-Caveat Lector-
Begin forwarded message:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: July 16, 2007 12:41:41 AM PDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Bush Has Already Lost Interest in Iraq; Now He's Obsessed
with War on IRAN
Cheney pushes Bush to act on Iran
· Military solution back in favour as Rice loses out
· President 'not prepared to leave conflict unresolved'
Ewen MacAskill in Washington and Julian Borger
The Guardian, July 16, 2007
http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/story/0,,2127343,00.html
While Dick Cheney, left, favours military threats,
Condoleezza Rice, centre, prefers diplomacy.
George Bush, right, has sided with Cheney.
Photograph: Evan Vucci/AP
The balance in the internal White House debate over Iran has
shifted back in favour of military action before President George
Bush leaves office in 18 months, the Guardian has learned.
The shift follows an internal review involving the White House, the
Pentagon and the state department over the last month. Although the
Bush administration is in deep trouble over Iraq, it remains
focused on Iran. A well-placed source in Washington said: "Bush is
not going to leave office with Iran still in limbo."
The White House claims that Iran, whose influence in the Middle
East has increased significantly over the last six years, is intent
on building a nuclear weapon and is arming insurgents in Iraq and
Afghanistan.
The vice-president, Dick Cheney, has long favoured upping the
threat of military action against Iran. He is being resisted by the
secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, and the defence secretary,
Robert Gates.
Last year Mr Bush came down in favour of Ms Rice, who along with
Britain, France and Germany has been putting a diplomatic squeeze
on Iran. But at a meeting of the White House, Pentagon and state
department last month, Mr Cheney expressed frustration at the lack
of progress and Mr Bush sided with him.
"The balance has tilted. There is cause for concern," the source
said this week.
Nick Burns, the undersecretary of state responsible for Iran and a
career diplomat who is one of the main advocates of negotiation,
told the meeting it was likely that diplomatic manoeuvring would
still be continuing in January 2009. That assessment went down
badly with Mr Cheney and Mr Bush.
"Cheney has limited capital left, but if he wanted to use all his
capital on this one issue, he could still have an impact," said
Patrick Cronin, the director of studies at the International
Institute for Strategic Studies.
The Washington source said Mr Bush and Mr Cheney did not trust any
potential successors in the White House, Republican or Democratic,
to deal with Iran decisively. They are also reluctant for Israel to
carry out any strikes because the US would get the blame in the
region anyway.
"The red line is not in Iran. The red line is in Israel. If Israel
is adamant it will attack, the US will have to take decisive
action," Mr Cronin said. "The choices are: tell Israel no, let
Israel do the job, or do the job yourself."
Almost half of the US's 277 warships are stationed close to Iran,
including two aircraft carrier groups. The aircraft carrier USS
Enterprise left Virginia last week for the Gulf. A Pentagon
spokesman said it was to replace the USS Nimitz and there would be
no overlap that would mean three carriers in Gulf at the same time.
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