By Con Coughlin | Telegraph.co.uk, 04/07/2008There are two ways of interpreting this week's warning by America's top military officer, Admiral Mike Mullen, that opening a new front in the Middle East by launching air strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities would be "extremely stressful".
Either the United States, with the help of its favoured Middle Eastern proxy, Israel, is already preparing to take out Iran's main nuclear facilities, and is simply preparing public opinion for the likely consequences of such action.
Or America's top brass, who already have their work cut out prosecuting two major military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, are trying to pre-empt any thoughts President George W. Bush, the nation's commander-in-chief, might have about ordering his armed forces into action against the mullahs.
Senior military officers, whether in Britain or America, specialise in the art of understatement, and what Mr Mullen means by "extremely stressful" is what most laymen would take to be "catastrophic".
It's not just that such an attack could, in the words of Mohammed elBaradei, the head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog, turn the region into a fireball.
The Iranians have made it abundantly clear that they would do their utmost to close the Straits of Hormuz in the Gulf, the main shipping channel for 60 per cent of the world's oil.
With oil prices yesterday tipping $146 a barrel and most Western economies already struggling to cope with the inflationary consequences of soaring oil prices, it is not difficult to imagine the effects the strangulation of the main oil export artery would have on the world's economy.
But however dire the consequences might be of a military strike against Iran, that has not prevented speculation reaching fever pitch this week with various scenarios being advanced about when and how such action might occur. The revelation that 100 Israeli fighter jets took part in simulated bombing raids over the eastern Mediterranean last month suggests Israel is putting the finishing touches to its own preparations for a unilateral strike, while in Washington there is much talk of President Bush authorising action during the window between this November's presidential election contest and his successor's inauguration next January. And the seasoned American investigative journalist Seymour Hersh reveals in the latest edition of the New Yorker that U.S. forces are already conducting covert operations inside Iran, while Mr Bush has personally raised $400 million to fund Iranian dissident groups opposed to the mullahs' overthrow. |
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