More like $64 Million. Per month.
In the case of Iran, the question is also ‘what would you be sacrificing for?’ Nobody has come up with anything that even begins to look like a sensible answer.
Then again, when it came to Iraq, people are still mouthing the ‘official’ reasons which don’t stand up to a minute’s serious scrutiny. If a country has WMD, you don’t signal your intention to take them out months in advance. Yes, Iraq was run by a dictator, but why pick on them rather than North Korea or any number of other countries?
Per day, more like.
Here’s some of it, IMHO. This admministration is very consistent about what they want and about getting what they want. The “axis of evil” consisted of Iraq, Iran and North Korea. Iraq is taken care of, it’s a democracy now. North Korea is sore spot, but conventional wisdom is that if attacked they might attack South Korea in retaliation, and they’re so close to Seoul that they could trigger a mega-horrible disaster there. Too risky. That leaves Iran. Too bad for Iran. If i were them, i would be working very hard on making a couple of nuclear bombs, quick. They may have run out of time even for that. If Iraq is stabilized, it would be a nice platform to invade Iran from.
since we are in the neighborhood…
Several thoughts.
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A friend, who is a senior guard officer, who spent 18 months in Kuwait, told me that given current force distribution, enlistment & retirement rates, Iraq troop levels, rotations etc, some time in 2007 they will run out of troops in Iraq. 1.4m in uniform is a big number, but they’re still spread very thin.
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As for Iran, consider this from a Bill Moyers speech. I edited it for space and high-lighted a paragraph. The link to the full text is below. This was written about environmental issues, but I think the belief in rapture applies to emerging Iran policy. This is a pretty provocative discussion. I respect and trust my many Christian friends. I’m from a deeply Catholic tradition and am personally comfortable with many of these concepts on a personal/private level but, as Moyers indicates, I’m troubled when theology drives US foreign policy.
On Receiving Harvard Med’s Global Environment Citizen Award
By Bill Moyers
t r u t h o u t | Perspective
Wednesday 01 December 2004
I accept this award on behalf of all the people behind the camera whom you never see. And for all those scientists, advocates, activists, and just plain citizens whose stories we have covered in reporting on how environmental change affects our daily lives. We journalists are simply beachcombers on the shores of other people’s knowledge, other people’s experience, and other people’s wisdom. We tell their stories.
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That’s one challenge we journalists face - how to tell such a story without coming across as Cassandras, without turning off the people we most want to understand what’s happening, who must act on what they read and hear.
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As difficult as it is, however, for journalists to fashion a readable narrative for complex issues without depressing our readers and viewers, there is an even harder challenge - to pierce the ideology that governs official policy today. One of the biggest changes in politics in my lifetime is that the delusional is no longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat of power in the oval office and in Congress. For the first time in our history, ideology and theology hold a monopoly of power in Washington. Theology asserts propositions that cannot be proven true; ideologues hold stoutly to a world view despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality. When ideology and theology couple, their offspring are not always bad but they are always blind. And there is the danger: voters and politicians alike, oblivious to the facts.
Remember James Watt, President Reagan’s first Secretary of the Interior? My favorite online environmental journal, the ever engaging Grist, reminded us recently of how James Watt told the U.S. Congress that protecting natural resources was unimportant in light of the imminent return of Jesus Christ. In public testimony he said, “after the last tree is felled, Christ will come back.”
Beltway elites snickered. The press corps didn’t know what he was talking about. But James Watt was serious. So were his compatriots out across the country. They are the people who believe the Bible is literally true - one-third of the American electorate, if a recent Gallup poll is accurate. In this past election several million good and decent citizens went to the polls believing in the rapture index. That’s right - the rapture index. Google it and you will find that the best-selling books in America today are the twelve volumes of the left-behind series written by the Christian fundamentalist and religious right warrior, Timothy LaHaye. These true believers subscribe to a fantastical theology concocted in the 19th century by a couple of immigrant preachers who took disparate passages from the Bible and wove them into a narrative that has captivated the imagination of millions of Americans.
Its outline is rather simple, if bizarre (the British writer George Monbiot recently did a brilliant dissection of it and I am indebted to him for adding to my own understanding): once Israel has occupied the rest of its “biblical lands,” legions of the anti-Christ will attack it, triggering a final showdown in the valley of Armageddon. As the Jews who have not been converted are burned, the messiah will return for the rapture. True believers will be lifted out of their clothes and transported to heaven, where, seated next to the right hand of God, they will watch their political and religious opponents suffer plagues of boils, sores, locusts, and frogs during the several years of tribulation that follow.
I’m not making this up. Like Monbiot, I’ve read the literature. I’ve reported on these people, following some of them from Texas to the West Bank. They are sincere, serious, and polite as they tell you they feel called to help bring the rapture on as fulfillment of biblical prophecy. That’s why they have declared solidarity with Israel and the Jewish settlements and backed up their support with money and volunteers. It’s why the invasion of Iraq for them was a warm-up act, predicted in the Book of Revelation where four angels “which are bound in the great river Euphrates will be released to slay the third part of man.” A war with Islam in the Middle East is not something to be feared but welcomed - an essential conflagration on the road to redemption. The last time I Googled it, the rapture index stood at 144 - just one point below the critical threshold when the whole thing will blow, the son of God will return, the righteous will enter heaven, and sinners will be condemned to eternal hellfire.
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As Grist makes clear, we’re not talking about a handful of fringe lawmakers who hold or are beholden to these beliefs. Nearly half the U.S. Congress before the recent election - 231 legislators in total - more since the election - are backed by the religious right. Forty-five senators and 186 members of the 108th congress earned 80 to 100 percent approval ratings from the three most influential Christian right advocacy groups. They include Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Assistant Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Conference Chair Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, Policy Chair Jon Kyl of Arizona, House Speaker Dennis Hastert, and Majority Whip Roy Blunt. The only Democrat to score 100 percent with the Christian coalition was Senator Zell Miller of Georgia, who recently quoted from the biblical book of Amos on the senate floor: "the days will come, sayeth the Lord God, that i will send a famine in the land.’ he seemed to be relishing the thought.
And why not? There’s a constituency for it. A 2002 TIME/CNN poll found that 59 percent of Americans believe that the prophecies found in the Book of Revelation are going to come true. Nearly one-quarter think the Bible predicted the 9/11 attacks. Drive across the country with your radio tuned to the more than 1,600 Christian radio stations or in the motel turn some of the 250 Christian TV stations and you can hear some of this end-time gospel. And you will come to understand why people under the spell of such potent prophecies cannot be expected, as Grist puts it, “to worry about the environment. Why care about the earth when the droughts, floods, famine and pestilence brought by ecological collapse are signs of the apocalypse foretold in the Bible? Why care about global climate change when you and yours will be rescued in the rapture? And why care about converting from oil to solar when the same God who performed the miracle of the loaves and fishes can whip up a few billion barrels of light crude with a word?”
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Here’s the link
dwinterfield, this is pretty scary. 
I think that we are in agreement. given current force distribution, enlistment & retirement… etc etc. we are spread thin. But by thin, I mean that we don’t have several divisions of bored men waiting to go some where. We do, however, have the men and the ability to field them. We would simply need to take them from somewhere else.
So again it comes back to what we want to sacrifice to achieve our military goals - if indeed Iran is one of them. Rotations get extended, stop losses are instituted, families suffer, morale dips, political pressure rises, homeland defense is lessened. The question isn’t, can we do it. The answer to that is yes. The question is, as Wombat articulated, does it achieve a result desireable enough to warrant the problems and loss of life associated with it.
Erik
Just another irony, and I don’t know if this is still true. As I understand it, in the 1980s, among all middle eastern countries (excluding Isreal), Iran had the largest educated middle class and the highest affinity toward western and US culture. It was probably an artifact of the Shah. It’s too bad we seem unable to recognize and encourage potential allies.
Too bad Americans can’t vote on it…oh wait. I forgot. We gave Bush permission when “we” voted him back in for a second term, right? At least I think that’s what he said.
Susan
This is basically correct. Your timing looks a bit out to me. The Islamist revolution that deposed the Shah was in 1979 so you’d be talking about the late 70s rather than the 80s. The revolution decimated the pro-Western middle class—many were slaughtered, some managed to escape and no doubt many more went into emotional exile.
As a graduate student and teacher in Oxford in the late 70s, I knew quite a lot of liberal and leftist Iranians who were culturally indistinguishable from Westerners but not particularly pro-American. Some would have welcomed Marxist revolution but none would have been in favour of Islamist revolution. The fate of several friends was of considerable concern at that time and I’m still unclear what happened to some of them. Having returned to Australia in the early 80s, I met several Iranian refugees who confirmed our worst fears about pro-Western and pro-communist Iranians. The refugees had literally run for their lives; one had walked across the mountains into Pakistan in winter with her sister losing another sister along the way to hunger and cold.
Recently there has been a push towards liberalisation. This is supported by some clergy and actively resisted by others. I strongly suspect that the pro-western elements would not be unfavourably disposed towards America nor American culture but would not welcome open US muscle flexing in the region.
Susan, and others, I’m wondering what you could see as the reasons FOR going to war with Iran? Further, what would be your criteria for going to war with ANY country.
Well, in that case, I believe we were encouraging them, but then the Ayatollah’s kicked out the Shah.
Not saying we do a good job of encouraging, as I believe we do not, just not sure in this case.
Tom
I suppose I fall under others. So let me just give a quick reaction, Erik.
There are countless reasons why the USA, at some point or another, might with some justification go to war with Iran. You surely aren’t asking for a full list are you? (Then the first question would collape into the second.) I get the impression that you think there is a morally and strategic reason right now that is more or less obvious. I don’t think that there is, nor do I think that others here do.
I was looking for something close to a blunt insider source on Iran in order to throw some light on this question. My first port of call is usually Stratfor; I don’t believe them very often but think they come closer than anyone else i can think of to articulating what the admin, the miliatary and the American right are thinking without just being a propaganda source. here is a secondary report on what they are currently saying about Iraq.
No, my question was sincere. I’m just wondering if anyone sees any benefits to invading Iran. I don’t have a grand answer that I’m about to pull out of my pocket. The second question is really at the heart of the discussion. There’s really no point in discussing whether a particular war is justified if the person that you’re speaking with NEVER believes that war is justified. In that case, the question regarding particulars is moot and frankly a waste of time. Might as well just sit around and defame our leadership - at least that gets straight to the point.
Erik
Of course there are benefits in invading Iran. The question is, is it morally justifiable or not? If i want to learn how to play whistle, i could find someone who has good whistles, kill him, take his whistles and use them to make beautiful music, but would it be morally justifiable? Would it be right? Probably not.
I don’t believe there is any good reason to start a war; this is something that should be done only at the last resort.
I don’t get it, glauber. Is there never a good reason, or can it be a last resort?
And really, you make my point for me. It is hardly worth discussing the merits of a war in Iran if you do not believe in war. It’s simply enough to say, I don’t believe in war… we don’t even need to mention the country.
I personally believe there are justifiable reasons for war - but they are extreme and would have to be obvious to everyone (not “we think they have WMD and we’re going to go see”). At this point in time I do not see an obvious or justifiable reason to attack Iran–especially when already involved in a military fiasco in Iraq. My personal guess is that the administration will find a way to get the U.S. out of Iraq after the election (boasting that we’ve now brought democracy to Iraq) and will then move on Iran. (Disclaimer: That’s just my own belief, based on no deep reading…just the feeling I get. I don’t usually read extensively about political issues as they are always so skewed you can’t believe any of it.)
Susan
Erik, i was afraid it was going to be a waste of my time too. But fortunately i have some spare time today. 
What do you not understand in my previous post? The sentence “Is there not a good reason, or can it be a last resort?” doesn’t make good grammatical sense to me.
Whenever I want to understand what neo-conservatives are thinking about in terms of foreign policy, I go to the Project for a New American Century web site (link below). here’s a recent memo on Iran.
July 20, 2004
MEMORANDUM TO: OPINION LEADERS
FROM: WILLIAM KRISTOL
SUBJECT: CFR Report on Iran
One has to hand it to the Council on Foreign Relations. Just as Iran has spent the last several months reconfirming why it was a charter member of the “axis of evil,” a CFR taskforce, led by former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski and former DCI Robert Gates, has concluded that the time is now ripe for a policy of “engagement” with Iran. This, in spite of the fact that:
Iran continues to tell the International Atomic Energy Agency - along with the British, Germans and French - to stuff it when it comes to Tehran’s nuclear weapons program.
Iranian officials, caught red-handed in New York photographing likely terrorist-targets, were expelled from the United States.
Iranian intelligence agents were caught in Iraq building car bombs and are now assisting Iraqi radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr’s efforts to rebuild his militia.
Iran’s hard-line clerics and revolutionary guards have eliminated virtually all remaining reformist elements from the government over the past year.
Iran apparently has had and continues to have a working relationship with bin Laden’s al Qaeda. Indeed, if the 9-11 commission report is accurate, Tehran might well have been involved in both the 1996 Khobar Towers attack and in 9-11. Furthermore, Iran today harbors senior al-Qaeda leaders.
And, today, the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz reports that the head of Israeli military intelligence research has warned the Knesset defense committee that Iran might well give non-conventional weapons, such as chemical weapons, to Hizballah, the Iranian-backed terrorist organization.
We do need a coherent, serious policy toward Iran; one of containment, pressure, accountability and, ultimately, regime change. If the CFR report helps force a real debate on Iran policy and encourages the Bush Administration not simply to kick the can down the road until after election day, it will have (inadvertently) performed a service.
http://www.newamericancentury.org/index.html