Cedarford raises a spurious issue:
Nice flap starting about Iran’s weapons killing hundreds of troops since 2004. High tech weapons the Mullahs tested out using Hezbollah in Lebanon are being built in 3 Iranian factories and shipped across the Iraqi Border. With targeting and electronic security under the direction of Iranian al Quds Forces that report straight to Ayatollah Khamenei.
140 Iraqis cops/soldiers killed, 17 Brits killed, 170 Americans killed and 600 wounded (including over 200 horrific maimings) by Iranian Explosively Formed Projectiles.
The weapon is only 10 inches by 6 inches, easly concealable, and will penetrate all armored US vehicles. They are made in 3 Iranian factories in military production parks north of Tehran.
Iranian 81mm mortars, sniper rifles, RPGs – made and delivered after 2004 – account for hundreds more Iraqi deaths and dozens of US troops.
Do we do something about it?
In short, no. That would be incredibly short-sighted, considering that there are far more countries that could regard US weapons sales as a justifiable casus belli. By this reckoning, the September 11th attacks were fully justified due to the many Islamists killed by the Egyptian and Saudi Arabian governments armed by the USA.
You cannot claim that you are beyond justice simply because you happen to be the most powerful at the moment. You can, of course, simply operate on the principle that might makes right, but there are no shortage of historical examples demonstrating how the powerful usually overestimate their power and the way in which things usually ends poorly for those who primarily upon it.
If you don’t want to see American troops killed, then perhaps you should not order them to play target in a kill zone.
The neocons are really starting to reach here and it’s not going to work. The American people will not support any military effort against Iran without first experiencing one or more major attacks, preferably atomic or nuclear, blamed on Iran. Even that might not be enough considering the widespread suspicions about the current administration’s willingness to manufacture another Maine/Lusitania/Gulf of Tonkin incident.
This doesn’t mean the administration won’t simply go ahead and do what it wants without public support. Bush has already eviscerated the Republican Party’s political prospects – you may recall I was one of the only people predicting this a few years ago – so he might as well go ahead and destroy it for the next two generations by leaping headlong into a third undeclared and unpopular war.