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Underneath The "Surge" Strategy

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In this week's article I contrast my earlier premise that Bush's surge will be a good thing in the long run. As you'll recall, in my previous article of 1/10/07, I articulated my vision of how the Democrats will take the White House in 2009 after this ridiculus strategy is affixed to John McCain's presidential bid. As likely as that may happen, I think there are deeper and more serious ramifications to Bush's strategy that will be globally damaging in the process. The next two years of BushCo may be catastrophically pivotal if Congress doesn't pull in the reigns. The broader implications What has become abundantly clear from Bush's speech and subsequent actions is that he is green-lighting his overall strategy, not just to escalate the efforts in Baghdad & Anbar Province, but also to expand the war (i. e. the neo-con's conquest) into Iran & Syria. Here's a pertinent excerpt from his 'surge' speech of January 10th:
"Succeeding in Iraq also requires defending its territorial integrity - and stabilizing the region in the face of the extremist challenge. This begins with addressing Iran and Syria. These two regimes are allowing terrorists and insurgents to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq. Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops. We will disrupt the attacks on our forces. We will interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria. And we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq."
For a while now BushCo has been issuing threats & accusations to goad Iran into conflict. With absolutely no evidence whatsoever, the Bush Administration continues to accuse Iran of fostering its "nookular" weapons program, while Iran has steadfastly claimed its nuclear aspirations are for energy purposes only. It remains to be seen which one is lying more. Over the last few months BushCo has made a number of significant moves to provoke a confrontation with Iran:
  • They've increased the practice of kidnapping. Yes, BushCo kidnaps foreign nationalists in case you weren't aware. (Some might even call that terrorism, but I guess that all depends on your perspective.) The difference is that BushCo labels the people they kidnap as terrorists and calls the kidnapping "detainment". Saying they've been "detained" doesn't sound quite as bad - kind of like they were held up at the airport but they'll be home soon - right? Not quite. When the U.S. detains someone they're locked away indefinately, stripped of all rights (forget about 'habeas corpus' and due process), and likely tortured. Anyway, in December U.S. troops arrested a number of Iranians they claimed were suspected of planning attacks on Iraqi security forces, including diplomats who were later turned over to Iraqi authorities. More recently, after storming the Iranian Consolate in Iraq, U.S. troops "...detained five Iranians and confiscated vast amounts of documents and computer data...".
  • They recently ordered the deployment of the USS John C. Stennis as a second carrier ship in the Middle East, joining the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower. The deployment of carrier ships is clearly posturing for conflict.
  • They pressured the UN to impose sanctions on Iran for persuing nuclear ambitions.
Which camp are you in?
  • Some of you are squarely on the right-wing fringe. You're utterly evil because you're profiting from war & conflict and want it to continue as long as possible regardless of the amount of bloodshed. You look at this debacle as a big chess match - our troops are pawns available for sacrafice. You're the neo-cons responsible for the disinformation & propoganda campaign(s) eminating from the White House and all of those decisions which propogate the economic divide in this country. The rich are getting richer WHILE the poor are getting poorer, but you don't care because you're on the 'right' side of that equasion. You people disgust me.
  • Some of you are ignorants who think this "surge" (i.e. neo-con euphamism for "escalation of the war") is all about gaining the upper hand for victory. Sadly, you've been watching too much Fox (Faux) News or listening to any of the right-wing shills and still think this whole debacle is a matter of winning and losing. You've fallen into the neo-con trap of framing foreign policy with binary thinking. Sure - it's us vs. them. Good vs. evil. You're either with us or you're with the terrorists. You're part of that 30%-40% who still think Saddam had WMD's and attacked us on 9/11. To those of you I say wake up and smell the bullcrap. Start paying attention because our democracy is dependent on you being more intelligent.
  • Some of you who ARE paying attention (somewhat) may think that this whole escalation is Bush's warped, idiotic, arrogant attempt to leave a legacy. You think he really does want to 'win' in Iraq, but of course you're smarter than him and realize there's no way that's going to happen given the current situation. You know this conflict can only be resolved with political and diplomatic solutions - not military solutions. You also understand that the Iraq invasion was largely blood-for-oil and that BushCo lied us into this conflict with phantom WMD's and links to al Qaeda. To those of you I say you're on the right track -perhaps 80% there - but keep digging because there's much more.
  • The rest of us understand the deeper evil underneath the neo-con cabal. It's all about profit and conquest. And this "surge" is about BushCo posturing for Iran and Syria, which has been on their list from the very beginning.
The question now is whether or not the new Democratic Congress has the cajones to stop this train wreck. No pressure here, but the future of the world depends on it.
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Scott Shuster is a progressive columnist, publishing since May of 2005. His liberal ideology is a refreshing diversion from 'politics as usual' in Washington.
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