Sy of relief.
Huh. Sometimes the radio receiver inside my head works quite well. Frightfully well, even.
Yesterday I posted an entry focusing mainly on Daniel Ellsberg's call to the anonymous analysts and advisers in the Pentagon to leak the administration’s plans to attack Iran, up to and including a first use tactical nuclear strike in an effort to take out the supposed underground laboratories in which Iran is attempting to build its own nuclear weapons. I also referenced some articles that Seymour ("Sy") M. Hersh has written for The New Yorker about U.S. war planning vis-à-vis Iran.
Three hours later, I heard a taped interview with Hersh on a 9:00 a.m. news/talk show out of the Pacific Northwest, in which he expounded on this very topic.
Hersh was recorded in an interview with Steve Scher about the administration's plans for Iran last Friday (22 September), which was aired on the first hour of yesterday's (Thursday, 28 September) Weekday, a news/talk programme originated at KUOW, an NPR station in Seattle; in it, Hersh called the U.S. war plans for Iran "operational" rather than "contingent" (or "contingency planning"), which means that a number of high officials really think that the U.S. will launch some kind of a military strike against Iran in the not-too-distant future. (As opposed to the U.S.'s contingency plans to attack, say, Canada. Anyone up for some Canadian bacon..?) He also said that Iran has a much stronger, more credible -- and more insidious -- threat than the possibility that they may acquire nukes, in their backing of Hezbollah (for an idea as to the consequences of this, see the recent war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, in which the Israeli military for once did not cover itself with glory); he maintains that Iran has thus far been a calming influence on the Shi'ite militias in Iraq, and if Iran wished, they could stir the pot to make things far more uncomfortable for the U.S. troops there. (This last is one major reason why top U.S. military officers are not exactly keen on attacking Iran.)
Hersh was explicit in expressing his dislike of the Bush (43) administration, even moreso than he was in the recent roundtable at The New Yorker's web site discussing the war in Iraq and the "War on Terror" five years on; Hersh went so far as to call "Dubya" the worst U.S. President since the 1840s, citing James Knox Polk and "clowns like that." (Personally I think James Buchanan was a far worse prexy than Polk, but to each his own. I wonder if some of the build-a-wall-along-the-Mexican-border right-wingers will pillory Hersh for calling the man who presided over the U.S.'s grab of around a third -- or was it half? -- of Mexico's territory one of the worst presidents in history.) It'll be interesting to see if Hersh's dropping the pretense of neutrality that is supposed to be a hallmark of American journalism (well, at least since the heady days of the yellow press) during the course of an interview affects how his future articles are received; then again, Hersh is noted for shooting from the hip, and his reporting was and remains pretty controversial.
Yesterday I posted an entry focusing mainly on Daniel Ellsberg's call to the anonymous analysts and advisers in the Pentagon to leak the administration’s plans to attack Iran, up to and including a first use tactical nuclear strike in an effort to take out the supposed underground laboratories in which Iran is attempting to build its own nuclear weapons. I also referenced some articles that Seymour ("Sy") M. Hersh has written for The New Yorker about U.S. war planning vis-à-vis Iran.
Three hours later, I heard a taped interview with Hersh on a 9:00 a.m. news/talk show out of the Pacific Northwest, in which he expounded on this very topic.
Hersh was recorded in an interview with Steve Scher about the administration's plans for Iran last Friday (22 September), which was aired on the first hour of yesterday's (Thursday, 28 September) Weekday, a news/talk programme originated at KUOW, an NPR station in Seattle; in it, Hersh called the U.S. war plans for Iran "operational" rather than "contingent" (or "contingency planning"), which means that a number of high officials really think that the U.S. will launch some kind of a military strike against Iran in the not-too-distant future. (As opposed to the U.S.'s contingency plans to attack, say, Canada. Anyone up for some Canadian bacon..?) He also said that Iran has a much stronger, more credible -- and more insidious -- threat than the possibility that they may acquire nukes, in their backing of Hezbollah (for an idea as to the consequences of this, see the recent war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, in which the Israeli military for once did not cover itself with glory); he maintains that Iran has thus far been a calming influence on the Shi'ite militias in Iraq, and if Iran wished, they could stir the pot to make things far more uncomfortable for the U.S. troops there. (This last is one major reason why top U.S. military officers are not exactly keen on attacking Iran.)
Hersh was explicit in expressing his dislike of the Bush (43) administration, even moreso than he was in the recent roundtable at The New Yorker's web site discussing the war in Iraq and the "War on Terror" five years on; Hersh went so far as to call "Dubya" the worst U.S. President since the 1840s, citing James Knox Polk and "clowns like that." (Personally I think James Buchanan was a far worse prexy than Polk, but to each his own. I wonder if some of the build-a-wall-along-the-Mexican-border right-wingers will pillory Hersh for calling the man who presided over the U.S.'s grab of around a third -- or was it half? -- of Mexico's territory one of the worst presidents in history.) It'll be interesting to see if Hersh's dropping the pretense of neutrality that is supposed to be a hallmark of American journalism (well, at least since the heady days of the yellow press) during the course of an interview affects how his future articles are received; then again, Hersh is noted for shooting from the hip, and his reporting was and remains pretty controversial.