Senior officers: 'Military plan against Iran Nukes is ready'
Pastor Dale Morgan
Jun. 11, 2007 19:37 | Updated Jun. 11, 2007 9:24
*Senior officers: 'Military plan against Iran Nukes is ready'*
U.S. Navy, Air Force would play primary roles in any action taken
against Tehran
By YAAKOV KATZ
--Jerusalem Post
Predicting that Iran will obtain a nuclear weapon within three years and
claiming to have a strike plan in place, senior American military
officers have told The Jerusalem Post they support President George W.
Bush's stance to do everything necessary to stop the Islamic Republic's
race for nuclear power.
Bush has repeatedly said the United States would not allow Iran to "go
nuclear."
A high-ranking American military officer told the Post that senior
officers in the US armed forces had thrown their support behind Bush and
believed that additional steps needed to be taken to stop Iran.
Predictions within the US military are that Bush will do what is needed
to stop Teheran before he leaves office in 2009, including possibly
launching a military strike against its nuclear facilities.
On Sunday, Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut said the US should
consider a military strike against Iran over its support of Iraqi
insurgents.
"I think we've got to be prepared to take aggressive military action
against the Iranians to stop them from killing Americans in Iraq," he
said. "And to me, that would include a strike over the border into Iran,
where we have good evidence that they have a base at which they are
training these people coming back into Iraq to kill our soldiers."
According to a high-ranking American military officer, the US Navy and
Air Force would play the primary roles in any military action taken
against Iran. One idea under consideration is a naval blockade designed
to cut off Iran's oil exports.
The officer said that if the US government or the UN Security Council
decided on this course of action, the US Navy would most probably not
block the Strait of Hormuz - a step that would definitely draw an
Iranian military response - but would patrol farther out and turn away
tankers on their way to load oil.
On Sunday, the Israel Air Force held joint exercises with visiting US
pilots, but IDF sources dismissed speculation that the drills were
connected to an attack on Iran.
The US officer said that perhaps even more dangerous to Israel and the
Western world than Iranian nukes was the possibility that a terrorists
cell associated with al-Qaida or global jihad would acquire a highly
radioactive "dirty bomb" or a vial of deadly chemical or biological
agents. The officer said al-Qaida was gaining a strong foothold in the
Middle East and that Israel was being surrounded by global jihad
elements in Lebanon, Jordan and Sinai.
"Iran is a state-sponsored type of terrorism that can be dealt with," he
said, adding that it was far more difficult to strike at the source of
an isolated terrorist cell.
To combat this threat, the US Navy has come up with a plan for a
"1,000-ship navy" - a transnational network composed of navies from
around the world that would raise awareness of maritime threats and more
effectively thwart sea-based terrorism and the illicit transfer of arms
by sea.
"The idea is to allow free trade and to prevent criminal and terror
activity at sea," the officer said.
A smaller-scale example of the US Navy's vision is NATO's Active
Endeavor antiterrorism operation based in Naples. Israel plans to send
an officer to be stationed there in the coming months. NATO launched
Operation Active Endeavor in wake of 9/11 and has succeeded in bringing
together a number of Mediterranean countries to work together in Naples
to share information on naval terrorism and suspicious vessels in the
region.