WASHINGTON
(AP) – U.S. defense officials have signaled that up-to-date attack
plans are available if needed in the escalating crisis over Iran’s
nuclear aims, although no strike appears imminent.
[As seen in the Iraq war, placement of military resources on war footing adds to the pressure to go to war – editor]
WASHINGTON
(AP) – U.S. defense officials have signaled that up-to-date attack
plans are available if needed in the escalating crisis over Iran’s
nuclear aims, although no strike appears imminent.
The Army
and Marine Corps are under enormous strain from years of heavy ground
fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. Still, the United States has ample
air and naval power to strike Iran if President Bush decided to target
nuclear sites or to retaliate for alleged Iranian meddling in
neighboring Iraq.
Among the
possible targets, in addition to nuclear installations like the
centrifuge plant at Natanz: Iran’s ballistic missile sites, Republican
Guard bases, and naval warfare assets that Tehran could use in a
retaliatory closure of the Straits of Hormuz, a vital artery for the
flow of Gulf oil.
The Navy
has an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf area with about 60 fighters
and other aircraft that likely would feature prominently in a bombing
campaign. And a contingent of about 2,200 Marines are on a standard
deployment to the Gulf region aboard ships led by the USS Kearsarge, an
amphibious assault ship. Air Force fighters and bombers are available
elsewhere in the Gulf area, including a variety of warplanes in Iraq
and at a regional air operations center in Qatar.
But there
has been no new buildup of U.S. firepower in the region. In fact there
has been some shrinkage in recent months. After adding a second
aircraft carrier in the Gulf early this year – a move that Secretary of
Defense Robert Gates said was designed to underscore U.S. long-term
stakes in the region – the Navy has quietly returned to a one-carrier
presence.
Talk of a
possible U.S. attack on Iran has surfaced frequently this year,
prompted in some cases by hard-line statements by White House
officials. Vice President Dick Cheney, for example, stated on Oct. 21
that the United States would “not allow Iran to have a nuclear
weapon,” and that Iran would face “serious consequences” if it
continued in that direction. Gates, on the other hand, has emphasized
diplomacy.
Bush
suggested on Oct. 17 that Iran’s continued pursuit of nuclear arms
could lead to “World War III.” Yet on Wednesday, in discussing Iran
at a joint press conference with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Bush
made no reference to the military option.
“The idea
of Iran having a nuclear weapon is dangerous, and, therefore, now is
the time for us to work together to diplomatically solve this
problem,” Bush said, adding that Sarkozy also wants a peaceful
solution.
Iran’s
conventional military forces are generally viewed as limited, not among
the strongest in the Middle East. But a leading expert on the subject,
Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International
Studies, says it would be a mistake to view the Islamic republic as a
military weakling.
“Its
strengths in overt conflict are more defensive than offensive, but Iran
has already shown it has great capability to resist outside pressure
and any form of invasion and done so under far more adverse and
divisive conditions than exist in Iran today,” Cordesman wrote earlier
this year.
Cordesman estimates that Iran’s army has an active strength of around 350,000 men.
At the
moment, there are few indications of U.S. military leaders either
advising offensive action against Iran or taking new steps to prepare
for that possibility. Gates has repeatedly emphasized that while
military action cannot be ruled out, the focus is on diplomacy and
tougher economic sanctions.
Asked in
late October whether war planning had been ramped up or was simply
undergoing routine updates, Gates replied, “I would characterize it as
routine.” His description of new U.S. sanctions announced on Oct. 25
suggested they are not a harbinger of war, but an alternative.
A
long-standing responsibility of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is to
maintain and update what are called contingency plans for potential
military action that a president might order against any conceivable
foe. The secret plans, with a range of timelines and troop numbers, are
based on a variety of potential scenarios – from an all-out invasion
like the March 2003 march on Baghdad to less demanding missions.
Another
military option for Washington would be limited, clandestine action by
U.S. special operations commandos, such as Delta Force soldiers,
against a small number of key nuclear installations.
The man
whose responsibility it would be to design any conventional military
action against Iran – and execute it if ordered by Bush – is Adm.
William Fallon, the Central Command chief. He is playing down prospects
of conflict, saying in a late September interview that there is too
much talk of war.
“This
constant drumbeat of conflict is what strikes me, which is not helpful
and not useful,” Fallon told Al-Jazeera television, adding that he
does not expect a war against Iran. During a recent tour of the Gulf
region, Fallon made a point of telling U.S. allies that Iran is not as
strong as it portrays itself.
“Not militarily, economically or politically,” he said.
Fallon’s
immediate predecessor, retired Army Gen. John Abizaid, raised eyebrows
in September when he suggested that initiating a war against Iran would
be a mistake. He urged vigorous efforts to stop Iran from acquiring
nuclear weapons, but failing that, he said, “There are ways to live
with a nuclear Iran.” He also said he believed Iran’s leaders could be
dissuaded from using nuclear arms, once acquired.
The
possibility of U.S. military action raises many tough questions,
beginning perhaps with the practical issue of whether the United States
knows enough about Iran’s network of nuclear sites – declared sites as
well as possible clandestine ones – to sufficiently set back or destroy
their program.
Among other unknowns: Iran’s capacity to retaliate by unleashing terrorist strikes against U.S. targets.
Nonmilitary specialists who have studied Iran’s nuclear program are doubtful of U.S. military action.
“There is
a nontrivial chance that there will be an attack, but it’s not
likely,” said Jeffrey Lewis, director of a nuclear strategy project at
the New America Foundation, a nonpartisan public policy group.