Trump is itching for war: 'If you think Iraq was a bad war wait until you see Iran'

[workinclasszero]

Ex-Bush official warns Trump is itching for war: ‘If you think Iraq was a bad war wait until you see Iran’
Tom Boggioni 15 OCT 2017 AT 12:18 ET

Appearing on MSNBC’s AM Joy on Sunday morning, the former chief of staff to ex-Secretary of State Colin Powell warned that hardliner Republicans in the Senate are anxious to see the Iran deal go away allowing the U.S. to engage in another war in the Middle East.

Speaking with host Joy Reid, retired U.S. Army Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson said the saber-rattling at North Korea combined with President Donald Trump’s desire to back out of a nuclear deal with Iran is setting the stage for “17 more years of war.”

“The German minister said what Trump has done is make the Iran agreement into a domestic policy thing, meaning domestic politics,” host Reid suggested. “By doing that he’s assured that the new agreement will fail ultimately, and then what you have is one choice: war.

The end game is to provoke Iran enough so we can go to war.”

“I think we are doing the same thing as we did in 2003, and I was very intimate with that process in Iraq,” Wilkerson replied referencing his tenure at the State Department when the U.S. attacked Iraq. “We are marching down the road to war. If you think Iraq was a bad war wait until you see Iran.”

https://www.rawstory.com/2017/10/ex-bush-official-warns-trump-is-itching-for-war-if-you-think-iraq-was-a-bad-war-wait-until-you-see-iran/

[Lithos]

1. Big mistake

Iraq is now primarily Shi’a militia based, Syria is Hezbollah, Iranian Guards with Russian support. Supporting Kurds would mean the Turks would join in. Qatar is out because we just pissed them off. Saudi military sucks. So exactly where would we have any solid base? Israel? That would bring the rest not mentioned above crashing down.

[workinclasszero]

2. Trump and his insane death cult 'value voters' demand Armageddon

Can't turn the entire middle east into a glass parking lot with pesky peace agreements in place now can we?

Hell make it a twofer, NK and Iran all at once, nuclear sneak attack, yeah thats the ticket!

[vlyons]

3. Republicans have been itching for war with Iran for 30 years

Pay back for the hostage taking, and pay back for deposing our Iranian puppet, the Shah.

[KY_EnviroGuy]

9. That, and the fact they can't control Iran.

Repugs are backed by big oil and other resource interests that are pissed because they can't control pipeline routes, access to Iran's oil and other natural resources.

Despite all their political posturing over Israel and hatred toward Muslims, I suspect one just has to follow the money.

[WinkyDink]

12. Payback? What for? They got Reagan because of the hostages.

[JI7]

4. Trump wants out of the Iran deal because it is an Obama Accomplishment but his base does NOT want

war with Iran.

we can't "win" a war against Iran just as we can't win the war in Afghanistan and Iraq.

[DFW]

5. Republicans will not invade Iran.

Republicans are cowards at heart. When they do attack, it's a country they THINK will not shoot back. Reagan attacked the tiny Caribbean island of Grenada. Bush I attacked Panama (though wisely stopped at the Kuwaiti border instead of invading Iraq). Cheney, dba Bush II, did invade Iraq, but it was a major miscalculation, not a change in policy. Don't forget Rumsfeld's words predicting the length of the conflict: "maybe six days, maybe six weeks, certainly not six months." Cheney demanded fictitious intelligence on Iraq from the CIA, and when he didn't get it, he acted as though he had.

But make no mistake, there is not ONE general in the Pentagon who thinks Iran won't shoot back. I don't think our military has enough body bags in their reserves to handle their needs if we invade Iran. The Iranians are armed to the teeth, and would resist like nothing we've ever seen before. Not only that, but it would be stupid, too. There is a lot of hate inside Iran for their clerical dictatorship, and just about the only thing that would unite them behind their regime would be an attack by the United States. I'm not saying Trump isn't stupid enough to want to do it anyway. I'm saying I don't think there are enough stupid Generals in our military to go along with such counterproductive move.

[Rhiannon12866]

6. There is no comparison between Iraq and Iran

For one thing, Iran has three times the population of Iraq. And those who have fought with Iran have learned of their fearlessness - they come in waves, with the "keys to the kingdom" around their necks. The only reason that Iraq survived the Iran-Iraq war was because they had help from more powerful allies - the US being the major one. The Middle East is a volatile region - with complicated alliances - as we should have learned by now and taking on Iran would have to be the most foolhardy thing Trump has done thus far - which is saying a lot.

[KY_EnviroGuy]

10. K & R - Good points.

And, I don't see us finding many allies in such an effort. After following the Iraqi and Syrian conflicts and the Shia triangle formed as a result, I can't even conceive of the mess a war on Iran would cause for the US and any allies we now have in the Middle East.

Despite that, I wont' be surprised to hear some of the old Bush-era neocons coming out of the woodwork soon.

[Willie Pep]

7. I doubt the military would go along with it.

I think the generals would really try to make Trump back off from the idea. I think Bush really believed in the neocon ideology after 9/11 but Trump is not serious enough of a thinker to really buy into anything other than his own vanity and ego. Yes, I think George W. Bush was a deeper thinker than Donald Trump.

[murielm99]

8. Dubya, a deep thinker.

How far we have fallen!

[WinkyDink]

13. Don't over-estimate the wisdom or the ethics of military brass. E.g., Perjurer Colin Powell.

[WinkyDink]

14. Your Mom.

[Baitball Blogger]

15. Because he knows it is the quickest way to shut down dissent.

All of the people protesting the Take a Knee protest will switch to accusing anti-patriotism against anyone who criticizes a president during a time of war.

It is so predictable.