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Intelligence and military sources in the United States and abroad are
reporting on various factors that indicate a U.S. military hit on Iranian nuclear
and military installations, that may involve tactical nuclear weapons, is in
the final stages of preparation. Likely targets for saturation bombing
are the Bushehr nuclear power plant (where Russian and other foreign national
technicians are present), a uranium mining site in Saghand near the city of
Yazd, the uranium enrichment facility in Natanz, a heavy water plant and radioisotope
facility in Arak, the Ardekan Nuclear Fuel Unit, the Uranium Conversion Facility
and Nuclear Technology Center in Isfahan, the Tehran Nuclear Research Center,
the Tehran Molybdenum, Iodine and Xenon Radioisotope Production Facility, the
Tehran Jabr Ibn Hayan Multipurpose Laboratories, the Kalaye Electric Company
in the Tehran suburbs, a reportedly dismantled uranium enrichment plant in Lashkar
Abad, and the Radioactive Waste Storage Units in Karaj and Anarak.
Primary target: Bushehr nuclear reactor and hundreds of Russian technicians
Other first targets would be Shahab-I, II, and III missile launch sites, air bases
(including the large Mehrabad air base/international airport near Tehran), naval
installations on the Persian Gulf and Caspian Sea, command, control, communications
and intelligence facilities. Secondary targets would include civilian airports,
radio and TV installations, telecommunications centers, government buildings,
conventional power plants, highways and bridges, and rail lines. Oil installations
and commercial port facilities would likely be relatively untouched by U.S. forces
in order to preserve them for U.S. oil and business interests.
There has been a rapid increase in training and readiness at a number of U.S.
military installations involved with the planned primarily aerial attack. These
include a Pentagon order to Fort Rucker, Alabama, to be prepared to handle an
estimated 50,000 to 60,000 trainees, including civilian contractors, who will
be deployed for Iranian combat operations. Rucker is home to the US Army's aviation
training command, including the helicopter training school.
In addition, there has been an increase in readiness at nearby Hurlburt Field
in Florida, the home of the U.S. Air Force Special Operations Command. The U.S.
attack on Iran will primarily involve aviation (Navy, Air Force, Navy-Marine
Corps) and special operations assets.
There has also been a noticeable increase in activity at Marine Corps Air Ground
Combat Center at Twentynine Palms, California, a primary live fire training
activity located in a desert and mountainous environment similar to target areas
in Iran.
From European intelligence agencies comes word that the United States has told
its NATO allies to be prepared for a military strike on Iranian nuclear development
and military installations.
On November 17, 2005, Russian President Vladimir Putin spent seven hours in
secret discussions with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan during the
the opening ceremonies in Samsun, Turkey for the Russian-Turkish underwater
Blue Stream natural gas pipeline, festivities also attended by Italian Prime
Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
According to sources knowledgeable about the meeting, Erdogan promised Putin,
who has become a close friend, that Turkey would not support the use of its
bases by the United States in a military attack on Iran. That brought a series
of high level visits to Turkey by Bush administration officials, including CIA
chief Porter Goss, FBI Director Robert Mueller, and Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice.
Although Erdogan listened to Goss's and Rice's pleas for Turkish logistical,
political, and intelligence help for an attack on Iran and Turkish Army Chief
Yasar Buyukanit heard much the same from Pentagon officials during his recent
trip to Washington, the word is that Putin now has enough clout in Ankara to
scuttle any use of Turkey by the U.S. for an attack on Iran. [Mueller delivered
Ankara intelligence "proof" of Iranian backing for Kurdish Workers'
Party (PKK) guerrillas in Turkey. Intelligence agencies and business intelligence
units around the world are now discounting any intelligence coming from the
Bush administration as neocon propaganda invented by think tanks and discredited
intelligence agencies in Washington, Tel Aviv-Herzliya, and Jerusalem].
A U.S. Attack on Iran: The Perfect Storm for wider nuclear conflict
U.S. political and military officials have also approached Bahrain, Saudi Arabia,
Pakistan, Jordan, Oman, and Azerbaijan seeking their support for a U.S. attack
on Iran. Ina replay of the phony pre-war intelligence on Iraq, Washington is trying
to convince various countries that a link exists between Iran and "Al Qaeda."
Polish intelligence sources report that Poland's Defense Minister Radek Sikorski
assured Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld of Poland's support for any U.S. strike
against Iran. Sikorski is a former American Enterprise Institute colleague of
such neo-cons as Richard Perle, Michael Ledeen, and Lynne Cheney, the so-called
"Second Lady" of the United States. Sikorski and Polish Foreign Minister
Stefan Meller assured Rumsfeld and Rice, respectively, that Poland would stand
by the United States during the split in NATO that will occur as a result of
the American strike. Polish intelligence sources, who are unhappy with the arrangement
of the new right-wing government in Warsaw with the Bush administration, leaked
the information about the recent U.S. demarche to NATO in Brussels about preparation
for the attack.
Similar intelligence "leaks" about the U.S. attack plans were also
leaked to the German magazine Der Spiegel.
European intelligence sources also report that the recent decision by Putin
and Russia's state-owned Gazprom natural gas company to cut supplied of natural
gas to Ukraine was a clear warning by Putin to nations like Ukraine, Poland,
Romania, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia, Moldova, France, Austria,
Italy, Hungary, Bosnia, Serbia, and Germany that it would do the same if they
support the U.S. attack on Iran. Gazprom natural gas is supplied, via pipelines
in Ukraine, from Russia and Turkmenistan to countries in Eastern and Western
Europe. The Bush administration charged Russia with using gas supplies as a
"political tool."
Putin has additional leverage on Western Europe since former German Chancellor
Gerhard Schroeder accepted an appointment to the board of a joint Russian-German
North European Gas Pipeline Consortium that is controlled by Gazprom. The pipeline
will bring Russian gas to Scandinavia, Germany, Netherlands, and Britain, giving
Putin additional leverage over Washington in Europe.
Southeast Asian intelligence sources report that Burma's (Myanmar's) recent
abrupt decision to move its capital from Rangoon (Yangon) to remote Pyinmana,
200 miles to the north, is a result of Chinese intelligence warnings to its
Burmese allies about the effects of radiation resulting from a U.S. conventional
or tactical nuclear attack on Iranian nuclear facilities. There is concern that
a series of attacks on Iranian nuclear installations will create a Chernobyl-like
radioactive cloud that would be caught up in monsoon weather in the Indian Ocean.
Rangoon (Yangon) capital moved 200 miles north over fears of monsoon season Iran nuclear fallout?
Low-lying Rangoon lies in the path of monsoon rains that would continue to
carry radioactive fallout from Iran over South and Southeast Asia between May
and October. Coastal Indian Ocean cities like Rangoon, Dhaka, Calcutta, Mumbai,
Chennai, and Colombo would be affected by the radioactive fallout more than
higher elevation cities since humidity intensifies the effects of the fallout.
Thousands of government workers were given only two days' notice to pack up
and leave Rangoon for the higher (and dryer) mountainous Pyinmana.
In neighboring West Bengal, the leftist government and its national leftist
allies around the country are planning massive demonstrations during Bush's
upcoming trip to India. They are protesting the war in Iraq as well as the threats
against Iran.
Reports from Yemen indicate that western oil companies are concerned about
U.S. intentions in Iran since the southern Arabian country catches the edge
of the monsoon rains that could contain radioactive fallout from an attack,
endangering their workers in the country.
The Bush administration aborted last minute plans to attack Iranian nuclear
and political installations prior to the 2004 presidential election. On October
9, Rumsfeld met with defense minister colleagues on the now decommissioned USS
John F. Kennedy in the Persian Gulf to seek support for the attack. That meeting
has been confirmed by the Danish Defense Minister who was in attendance, however,
the topic of the meeting was not discussed. According to U.S. naval personnel
on board the Kennedy, a special "war room" was set up to coordinate
the attack. Britain, Australia, Italy, Netherlands, and Japan did not attend
the meeting because of their opposition to the attack plans.
Intelligence and military officials around the world are also bracing for the
results of a U.S. attack on Iran. This includes the distinct possibility of
a major Shia retaliatory attack in Iraq, the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia,
Kuwait, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon, and Afghanistan against
U.S. military, diplomatic, and economic targets in the region. Radioactive fallout
from a conventional or tactical nuclear attack on Iran will result in major
problems with Pakistan, India, China, Russia, Japan, and other downwind countries
in Asia and the Pacific Rim, possibly including the fall of the Pervez Musharraf
government in Pakistan and replacement by a radical Islamist regime having possession
of nuclear weapons. That would provoke a military response from nuclear power
India.
In a counter-attack, Iran would immediately launch its Shahab I and II missiles
at the U.S. Green Zone in Baghdad, the Al Udeid airbase in Qatar, the US Navy
base in Bahrain, Camp Doha base in Kuwait, Al Seeb airbase in Oman, Baghdad
International Airport, the U.S. base in Kandahar, Afghanistan. Iran would also
launch its long-range Shahab III missiles on the Israeli cities of Tel Aviv,
Haifa, Beersheba, Eilat, and the Israeli nuclear complex at Dimona. Iranian
missiles would also be launched at US naval ships in the Persian Gulf and oil
installations in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.
The virtual end of NATO as a viable defense organization may also result from
an attack that will drive a final wedge between Washington and Europe. And China
may elect to respond financially and militarily against the United States since
Iran is China's second largest source of imported Middle East oil after Saudi
Arabia and plans to use an Iranian terminal for the export of natural gas from
Turkmenistan. [China now imports 60 percent of its oil needs, and Iran represents
17 percent of those imports].
Russia recently participated in, through the Shanghai Cooperation Organization
(SCO), a three-way military exercise (code named "Indira 2005") between
Russia, China, and India to prepare for any new U.S. power projections in Asia,
including an attack on Iran, a prospective SCO member. Last August, Russia and
China held their first-ever joint land-sea-air military exercises.
Iran also held a large military exercise in early December in Bandar Abbas
on the Gulf. An Iranian C-130 carrying Iranian journalists from Mehrabad airport
to Bandar to cover the exercise crashed into a Tehran apartment building on
December 6, killing at least 116 people, including 68 journalists.
Within the U.S. military and across the globe, there is heightened tension
about the intentions of the neocon Bush administration and its allies in Israel.