Hate to interrupt everyone's Guckert fun, but Bush has been
running his mouth off again. Now, he's sending a clear message that he would support Israel if it attacked Iran:
"Clearly, if I was the leader of Israel and I'd listened to some of the statements by the Iranian ayatollahs that regarded the security of my country, I'd be concerned about Iran having a nuclear weapon as well. And in that Israel is our ally, and in that we've made a very strong commitment to support Israel, we will support Israel if her security is threatened."
Now, this alarming statement came in the midst of a pledge of support for the Europe 3 process. But the first part also eerily echoes a Steven Hayes comment during
Diane Rehm's Friday News Roundup (at 37:45). Which suggests this is an operative White House talking point.
I'm particularly alarmed by this because I have long suspected that the White House may look on active involvement of Israel as their last remaining solution to their intractable problems in Iraq (they can't afford to lose there, but they don't have the troops needed to actually win there; unless they solve this problem, then Iran basically scores a huge win against the US). We don't have any more troops. And BushCo couldn't get support for a draft here in the US. But Israel has a draft, and a whole lot of good soldiers.
What I'm suggesting is that it wouldn't take much for for an attack on Iran to leak into a unified war against Iran and Iraqi insurgents. Or hell, with Bush banging the war drums against Syria, why not launch a war across the whole Middle East?