John Bolton, America’s ex-ambassador to the United Nations, has called for US air strikes on Iranian camps where insurgents are trained for war in Iraq.
Telegraph.co.uk
Mr Bolton said that striking Iran would represent a major step towards victory in Iraq. While he acknowledged that the risk of a hostile Iranian response harming American’s overseas interests existed, he said the damage inflicted by Tehran would be “far higher” if Washington took no action.
“This is a case where the use of military force against a training camp to show the Iranians we’re not going to tolerate this is really the most prudent thing to do,” he said. “Then the ball would be in Iran’s court to draw the appropriate lesson to stop harming our troops.”
Mr Bolton, an influential former member of President George W Bush’s inner circle, dismissed as “dead wrong” reported British intelligence conclusions that the US military had overstated the support that Iran was providing to Iraqi fighters.
A US military spokesman revealed last week that the elite Quds Force of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards had drafted in personnel from Lebanon’s Hizbollah to train fighters from Iraq’s Shia militias.
Colonel Donald Bacon, a spokesman for the coalition in Baghdad, said captured fighters had told interrogators that thousands of Iraqi fighters were undergoing training in the Islamic Republic.
The main camp is located near the town of Jalil Azad, near Tehran, according to coalition officials.
The capture of Qais Khazali, a major figure in the Shia insurgency alongside Ali Mussa Daqduq, a senior Lebanese Hizbollah guerilla, last year yielded a treasure trove of information on Hizbollah’s activities in Iraq.
“Ali Mussa Daqduq confirmed Lebanese Hizbollah were providing training to Iraqi Special Group members in Iran and that his role was to assess the quality of training and make recommendations on how the training could be improved,” said Col Bacon. “In this role, he travelled to Iraq on four occasions and was captured on his fourth trip.”
Five Britons kidnapped in Iraq are believed to have been put under the control of Quds Force agents after failed attempts to barter the men for Khazali and Daqduq’s freedom.
The importance of the Quds Force to stability in Iraq was demonstrated last week when a five-member Iraqi delegation was sent to Tehran to meet with its commander, General Ghassem Soleimani. The delegation was despatched by the Iraqi government to plead for an end to Iranian meddling in its enfeebled neighbour.
Wild Thing’s comment……..
I wish the rest of the people in the Bush administration would think like Bolton or put him in charge. sigh
Bolton for President!! Bolten is someone I could actually get excited about. Have been trying to wade through his book, and it’s as if he wrote every word he ever thought. I don’t want to miss anything, so I can’t skip around. His observations about the State Dept. are even more scathing than the UN, which we already know is our enemy. The State Dept., even under Republicans, doesn’t change. That group really is wagging the dog. Both Powell and Rice were either co-opted, or they really are hard-core Libs at heart and this wasn’t a stretch at all to get along.
I agree that we need to have strategic strikes against Iran. They don’t think we have the chutzpah to do it.
For every attack against an American, the US needs to respond with bombing mission over Iran. Not one American GI needs to set foot on Iranian soil. B-52’s, B-1’s, and B-2’s can take care of everything.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=O9npENBSmfs
Bolton’s right. We can do this from afar. They need to be taught a lesson. And after bombing them back to the stone age, embargo on! Not one piece of support from us or our allies–no way, no how.
If they’re going to act all high and mighty like their crap don’t stink, well, then they need a time out.
Bolton is a bright light in our government. A true Conservative in a liberal tribe. He is right that we need to strike terrorist training camps in Iran, and maybe Iranian military fores targets also.
Bolton is also right about our State Dept. It is and has been at least since the end of WWII so seemingly against American interests that we would do well without it.
Maybe in 2012 Bolton might be willing to make a run at the White House.
The United States should have leveled Tehran on November 5, 1979 the day after it declared war on the United States, a short 24 hours after the slime took our embassy and our citizens hostage. What the? Our State Department is the UN, has been since October 24, 1945 when both were founded after World War II by 51 “peace-loving Communist states” combined to oppose future aggression. Just look at what we’ve had in the defense department over the past 40 years, Ramsey Clark, Clark Clifford, Robert MacNamara, Cyrus Vance, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Les Aspin, William J. Perry and William S. Cohen, all pacifist or downright Communists. Seems that the Dems have forgotten it was Carter and Brzezinski started a $40 billion covert program of training Islamic fundamentalists in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Bolton is a sole visionary in that septic tank we call the District of Columbia. It will take a nuclear attack on the United States before anyone in that quivering mass of eunuchs will lift a finger, even then they’re likely to only capitulate.
The only way to deal with Islamofascist terrorism, particularly state sponsored like Iran, is to use overwhelming and disproportionate force. Where are the Harry Truman-like leaders that we need to intelligently and successfully deal with this domestic national security and global threat problem? To do less is the equivalent of committing national suicide.
Hiroshima wasn’t enough to bring Japan to it’s senses. Nagasaki finally got the message across. To do less with Iran guarantees our failure.
BobF that is great, thank you sooooo much for the video, I love it.
Lynn I agree, they can do it from afar.
Tom I would love that so much if he would run for President.
Jack…..”Just look at what we’ve had in the defense department over the past 40 years”……yes you are right!! That list of names says so much of a lot of what the problem has been.
Les, we also must never forget about what Israel might be planning too. If Olmert would get a back bone.
It is something that should have been done in 1979. And it should have been done with prejuice and napalm.
KINDESS is WEAKNESS in the eyes of Arabs and Islamofascists… They respect BIG DOGS and BIG BOMBS – big time. They can LIE to infidels according to Robert Spencer (Jihad Watch) and it’s their NORM…. LOCK ‘N LOAD and fly 5,000 miles to smoke a camel!