The Nation magazine has learned that the Eisenhower Strike Group
is headed to the Persian Gulf. Could this be a ploy, a show of
strength? Could it be the makings of a blockade and plans for war?
The scheduled arrival date in the Gulf is 21 October, says Dave
Lindorff.
As reports circulate of a sharp debate within the White House over
possible U.S. military action against Iran and its nuclear
enrichment facilities, The Nation has learned that the Bush
Administration and the Pentagon have moved up the deployment of a
major "strike group" of ships, including the nuclear aircraft
carrier Eisenhower as well as a cruiser, destroyer, frigate,
submarine escort and supply ship, to head for the Persian Gulf,
just off Iran's western coast. This information follows a report in
the current issue of Time magazine, both online and in print, that
a group of ships capable of mining harbors has received orders to
be ready to sail for the Persian Gulf by October 1.
As Time writes in its cover story, "What Would War Look Like?"
evidence of the forward deployment of minesweepers and word that
the chief of naval operations had asked for a reworking of old
plans for mining Iranian harbors "suggest that a much discussed --
but until now largely theoretical -- prospect has become real: that
the U.S. may be preparing for war with Iran."
According to Lieut. Mike Kafka, a spokesman at the headquarters of
the Second Fleet, based in Norfolk, Virginia, the Eisenhower Strike
Group, bristling with Tomahawk cruise missiles, has received orders
to depart the United States in a little over a week. Other official
sources in the public affairs office of the Navy Department at the
Pentagon confirm that this powerful armada is scheduled to arrive
off the coast of Iran on or around October 21.
The Eisenhower had been in port at the Naval Station Norfolk for
several years for refurbishing and refueling of its nuclear
reactor; it had not been scheduled to depart for a new duty station
until at least a month later, and possibly not till next spring.
Family members, before the orders, had moved into the area and had
until then expected to be with their sailor-spouses and parents in
Virginia for some time yet. First word of the early dispatch of the
"Ike Strike" group to the Persian Gulf region came from several
angry officers on the ships involved, who contacted antiwar critics
like retired Air Force Col. Sam Gardiner and complained that they
were being sent to attack Iran without any order from the
Congress.
"This is very serious," said Ray McGovern, a former CIA
threat-assessment analyst who got early word of the Navy officers'
complaints about the sudden deployment orders. (McGovern, a
twenty-seven-year veteran of the CIA, resigned in 2002 in protest
over what he said were Bush Administration pressures to exaggerate
the threat posed by Iraq. He and other intelligence agency critics
have formed a group called Veteran Intelligence Professionals for
Sanity.)
Colonel Gardiner, who has taught military strategy at the National
War College, says that the carrier deployment and a scheduled
Persian Gulf arrival date of October 21 is "very important
evidence" of war planning. He says, "I know that some naval forces
have already received 'prepare to deploy orders' [PTDOs], which
have set the date for being ready to go as October 1. Given that it
would take about from October 2 to October 21 to get those forces
to the Gulf region, that looks about like the date" of any possible
military action against Iran. (A PTDO means that all crews should
be at their stations, and ships and planes should be ready to go,
by a certain date -- in this case, reportedly, October 1.) Gardiner
notes, "You cannot issue a PTDO and then stay ready for very long.
It's a very significant order, and it's not done as a training
exercise." This point was also made in the Time article.
So what is the White House planning?
On Monday President Bush addressed the UN General Assembly at its
opening session, and while studiously avoiding even physically
meeting Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was also
addressing the body, he offered a two-pronged message. Bush told
the "people of Iran" that "we're working toward a diplomatic
solution to this crisis" and that he looked forward "to the day
when you can live in freedom." But he also warned that Iran's
leaders were using the nation's resources "to fund terrorism and
fuel extremism and pursue nuclear weapons." Given the President's
assertion that the nation is fighting a "global war on terror" and
that he is Commander in Chief of that "war," his prominent linking
of the Iran regime with terror has to be seen as a deliberate
effort to claim his right to carry the fight there. Bush has
repeatedly insisted that the 2001 Congressional Authorization for
the Use of Force that preceded the invasion of Afghanistan was also
an authorization for an unending "war on terror."
Even as Bush was making not-so-veiled threats at the UN, his former
Secretary of State, Colin Powell, a sharp critic of any unilateral
U.S. attack on Iran, was in Norfolk, not far from the Eisenhower,
advocating further diplomatic efforts to deal with Iran's nuclear
program -- itself tantalizing evidence of the policy struggle over
whether to go to war, and that those favoring an attack may be
winning that struggle.
"I think the plan's been picked: Bomb the nuclear sites in Iran,"
says Gardiner. "It's a terrible idea, it's against U.S. law and
it's against international law, but I think they've decided to do
it." Gardiner says that while the United States has the capability
to hit those sites with its cruise missiles, "the Iranians have
many more options than we do: They can activate Hizbullah; they can
organize riots all over the Islamic world, including Pakistan,
which could bring down the Musharraf government, putting nuclear
weapons into terrorist hands; they can encourage the Shia militias
in Iraq to attack US troops; they can blow up oil pipelines and
shut the Persian Gulf." Most of the major oil-producing states in
the Middle East have substantial Shiite populations, which has long
been a concern of their own Sunni leaders and of Washington
policy-makers, given the sometimes close connection of Shiite
populations to Iran's religious rulers.
Of course, Gardiner agrees, recent ship movements and other signs
of military preparedness could be simply a bluff designed to show
toughness in the bargaining with Iran over its nuclear program. But
with the Iranian coast reportedly armed to the teeth with Chinese
Silkworm anti-ship missiles, and possibly even more sophisticated
Russian anti-ship weapons, against which the Navy has little
reliable defenses, it seems unlikely the Navy would risk high-value
assets like aircraft carriers or cruisers with such a tactic. Nor
has bluffing been a Bush MO to date.
Commentators and analysts across the political spectrum are
focusing on Bush's talk about dialogue, with many claiming that he
is climbing down from confrontation. On the right, David Frum,
writing on September 20 in his National Review blog, argues that
the lack of any attempt to win a UN resolution supporting military
action, and rumors of "hushed back doors" being opened in
Washington, lead him to expect a diplomatic deal, not a unilateral
attack. Writing in the center, Washington Post reporter Glenn
Kessler saw in Bush's UN speech evidence that "war is no longer a
viable option" in Iran. Even on the left, where confidence in the
Bush Administration's judgment is abysmally low, commentators like
Noam Chomsky and Nation contributor Robert Dreyfuss are skeptical
that an attack is being planned. Chomsky has long argued that
Washington's leaders aren't crazy, and would not take such a step
-- though more recently, he has seemed less sanguine about
Administration sanity and has suggested that leaks about war plans
may be an effort by military leaders -- who are almost universally
opposed to widening the Mideast war -- to arouse opposition to such
a move by Bush and war advocates like Cheney. Dreyfuss, meanwhile,
in an article for the online journal TomPaine.com, focuses on the
talk of diplomacy in Bush's 18 Sept. UN speech, not on his threats,
and concludes that it means "the realists have won" and that there
will be no Iran attack.
But all these war skeptics may be whistling past the graveyard.
After all, it must be recalled that Bush also talked about seeking
diplomatic solutions the whole time he was dead-set on invading
Iraq, and the current situation is increasingly looking like a
cheap Hollywood sequel. The United States, according to Gardiner
and others, already reportedly has special forces operating in
Iran, and now major ship movements are looking ominous.
Representative Maurice Hinchey, a leading Democratic critic of the
Iraq War, informed about the Navy PTDOs and about the orders for
the full Eisenhower Strike Group to head out to sea, said, "For
some time there has been speculation that there could be an attack
on Iran prior to November 7, in order to exacerbate the culture of
fear that the Administration has cultivated now for over five or
six years. But if they attack Iran it will be a very bad mistake,
for the Middle East and for the U.S. It would only make worse the
antagonism and fear people feel towards our country. I hope this
Administration is not so foolish and irresponsible." He adds,
"Military people are deeply concerned about the overtaxing of the
military already."
Calls for comment from the White House on Iran war plans and on the
order for the Eisenhower Strike Group to deploy were referred to
the National Security Council press office, which declined to
return this reporter's phone calls.
McGovern, who had first told a group of anti-Iraq War activists
Sunday on the National Mall in Washington, DC, during an ongoing
action called "Camp Democracy," about his being alerted to the
strike group deployment, warned, "We have about seven weeks to try
and stop this next war from happening."
One solid indication that the dispatch of the Eisenhower is part of
a force buildup would be if the carrier Enterprise -- currently in
the Arabian Sea, where it has been launching bombing runs against
the Taliban in Afghanistan, and which is at the end of its normal
six-month sea tour -- is kept on station instead of sent back to
the United States. Arguing against simple rotation of tours is the
fact that the Eisenhower's refurbishing and its dispatch were
rushed forward by at least a month. A report from the Enterprise on
the Navy's official website referred to its ongoing role in the
Afghanistan fighting, and gave no indication of plans to head back
to port. The Navy itself has no comment on the ship's future
orders.
Jim Webb, Secretary of the Navy in the Reagan Administration and
currently a Democratic candidate for Senate in Virginia, expressed
some caution about reports of the carrier deployment, saying,
"Remember, carrier groups regularly rotate in and out of that
region." But he added, "I do not believe that there should be any
elective military action taken against Iran without a separate
authorization vote by the Congress. In my view, the 2002
authorization which was used for the invasion of Iraq should not
extend to Iran."
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20061009/lindorff