Cheney Beats the Drums of War

Jitendra Joshi writes for AFP: "Cheney's warning to Iran recalled UN Security Council resolutions in 2002 that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein faced 'serious consequences' if he failed to come clean on his alleged stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.

"Speaking on CNN Sunday, Democratic Representative Jane Harman said the administration's threatening language against Iran was 'very dangerous.'

"'We heard about mushroom clouds and other images before the military action in Iraq. I wish the president would avoid that,' she said, calling for tougher UN sanctions on Iran instead of 'war-mongering threats.'"

About World War III

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Peter Baker wrote in The Washington Post on Friday: "When President Bush this week raised the specter of World War III if Iran manages to build nuclear weapons, he not only roiled the diplomatic world, he also underscored how much Iran has come to shadow the political dialogue both here in Washington and on the presidential campaign trail.

"While Iraq has faded from the Beltway debate for now, Iran has emerged as the top foreign policy topic of the moment."

AFP reported on Friday: "Bush's warning that Iran must be denied nuclear arms to avoid 'World War III' was just 'a rhetorical point,' not a prelude to Armageddon, his spokeswoman said Thursday. . . .

"'The president was not making any war plans, and he wasn't making any declarations,' said press secretary Dana Perino. 'He was using that as a rhetorical point.'"

Reality Check

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Fareed Zakaria writes in Newsweek: "The American discussion about Iran has lost all connection to reality. Norman Podhoretz, the neoconservative ideologist whom Bush has consulted on this topic, has written that Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is 'like Hitler . . . a revolutionary whose objective is to overturn the going international system and to replace it in the fullness of time with a new order dominated by Iran and ruled by the religio-political culture of Islamofascism.' For this staggering proposition Podhoretz provides not a scintilla of evidence.

"Here is the reality. Iran has an economy the size of Finland's and an annual defense budget of around $4.8 billion. It has not invaded a country since the late 18th century. The United States has a GDP that is 68 times larger and defense expenditures that are 110 times greater. Israel and every Arab country (except Syria and Iraq) are quietly or actively allied against Iran. And yet we are to believe that Tehran is about to overturn the international system and replace it with an Islamo-fascist order? What planet are we on? . . .

"We're on a path to irreversible confrontation with a country we know almost nothing about. The United States government has had no diplomats in Iran for almost 30 years. American officials have barely met with any senior Iranian politicians or officials. We have no contact with the country's vibrant civil society. Iran is a black hole to us -- just as Iraq had become in 2003."

Who Cheney Quotes

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It's fascinating to see who Cheney quotes in his speeches. Yesterday's speech included his two favorite Middle East Scholars: Fouad Ajami and Bernard Lewis.

"As Fouad Ajami said recently, Iraq is not yet 'a country at peace, and all its furies have not burned out, but a measure of order has begun to stick on the ground,'" Cheney said.