War Games

All that stuff about focusing on attacking Iran? William Arkin thinks it’s true:

Early Despite Denials, U.S. Plans for Iran War: The U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) has been conducting theater campaign analysis for a full scale war with Iran since at least May 2003, responding to Pentagon directions to prepare for potential operations in the “near term.”

The campaign analysis, called TIRANNT, for “theater Iran near term,” posits an Iraq-like maneuver war between U.S. and Iranian ground forces and incorporates lessons learned from Operation Iraqi Freedom.

These studies, war games, and modeling efforts have been the first step in shifting the bulk of planning from almost exclusive focus on Iraq to Iran. At CENTCOM headquarters in Tampa, Florida, at Army and Air Force CENTCOM support headquarters in Georgia and South Carolina, and at service analysis and operations research organizations like the Center for Army Analysis at Fort Belvoir (thanks readers for correcting me), a monumental effort has been underway to “build” an Iran country baseline for war planning.

As I’ve said before in these pages, I don’t believe that the United States is planning to imminently attack Iran, and I specifically don’t think so because Iran doesn’t have nuclear weapons and it hasn’t lashed out militarily against anyone.

But the United States military is really, really getting ready, building war plans and options, studying maps, shifting its thinking.

I suppose the only lighter-than-bleak lining here is that unless the plan is nukes and/or bunker busters only, they will have to pull out of Iraq in order to have any troops…

But I don’t think the US is going to be greeted with flowers, do you?

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8 Responses to War Games

  1. Andrew says:

    Wait a second – did you just say that the use of nuclear weapons would lead to some kind of good result? Uh, isn’t that kinda like: I just lost both my legs but at least I got rid of my athlete’s foot?

  2. Michael says:

    Not what I meant! I meant “preparation for a stupid invasion would have a temporarily positive effect”!

  3. Patrick (G) says:

    hmmm,
    Iran currently has fewer friends than we do, so we might be able to fool ourselves into thinking that we might be able to get away with “just” bunker-busters and tactical nukes.

    Never mind that our Iraqi misadventure has show our Military Leadership (civilian and uniform) to have a combined strategic IQ of about 75.

    Iran has three times the number of bodies as Iraq, and like Iraq, it too has obligatory military service. If Iraq was a 12-division war that we tried to do with ten divisions, and eventually could not control, does that make Iran a 36-divsion war ? or a 48-division war if you add it on to Iraq ?

    Also, I saw something recently, possibly at Gilliard’s, that Iran has developed an underwater missile. Not a Nuclear missile, but a missile which is conceivably intended take out Aircraft Carriers.

    Take out our Aircraft Carriers and we lose our air supremacy. Without our air supremacy, our ground game becomes much more tenuous. We’ve been making do with hillbilly armor for at least two years while Iran’s equipment and troops would be fresh, and know more about us than we know about them; We’ve given the Iranians three years to study our tactics, our strengths and our weaknesses and how we adapt to adversity. We’d be sacrificing 150 thousand american soldiers by launching a nuke against Iran

    Attack Iran, after invading Afghanistan and Iraq, and we’d force every muslim country and every oil-exporting country to get serious about the American Threat. How fast would Hugo Chavez take away our Venezuelean Oil? (faster than you could say ‘Citgo’ is my bet).

    Take out our oil, and you’re taking out our economy.

    Let’s see, what else…how about Iranian special forces teams running around the District of Columbia just like the D.C. sniper of yesteryear? I’m sure that they could take out a few high-profile targets to make their point.

    If George W. Bush launched a nuclear attack against Iran, do you think our Constitutional Republic would survive?
    I don’t think so.

  4. Brian says:

    I’m wondering who it was that decided, instead of something like “Operation Everlasting Truth, Justice & American Way,” to call this plan “Tyrant”?

    Although that may answer Patrick (G)’s question above. Would our Constitutional Republic survive? Maybe the point is that it wouldn’t. Start a world war, and you can think about cancelling some elections. That would keep a bunch of people out of jail.

  5. Jean Camp says:

    The US could bomb Iran in the fall of 2006, thereby kicking all bad news off the front page and showing only how Big Bad W is protecting us all. It might not make you feel safe but it could swing the election.

    Later the Chinese would retaliate and the value of the dollar would plummet.

    However, partisan needs would be served and the Dems would fail to take the House as voters flock to the Brave Strong Party that Protects US From Scary Foreign Men.

    I think the Dems should push a ruling noting that:
    1. bombing Iran is act of war
    2. only Congress can declare war (something we may have forgotten)
    3. Congress has not declared war on Iran (because apparently W is eaily confused on this matter)
    4. to avoid partisan division, no declaration of war will be considered within 60 -90 days of the election

  6. Al Dixon says:

    Think about it if you were in Bush’s shoes what would you do? Because you run the risk of Iran getting nuclear weapons attempting to destroy isreal then threating all other arab countries to being nuked if they dont cut off the oil supply to the west.

  7. Al Dixon says:

    Think about it if you were in Bush’s shoes what would you do? Because you run the risk of Iran getting nuclear weapons attempting to destroy isreal then threating all other arab countries to being nuked if they dont cut off the oil supply to the west.

  8. Al Dixon says:

    Also this has to be in the back of you mind you have russia and china who both support iran for that is there main source of oil. You also have russia supplying them with weapons and if it came down to a world war it would be iran china russia north korea and possible some more arab countries as the axis and The U.S. , Australia, Israel, and western europe as the allies but then you’ll have some european countries that will want out for they dont wanna get nuked. Look at England there trying to get out of the iran situation cause they dont wanna get nuked and france being the bastards they are will probaly back out too but hopefully not. Maybe they’ll see that their in danger of attack too.

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