On the Diane Rehm show today; Col. Sam Gardiner, retired from the U.S. Air Force; taught strategy at the National War College, Air War College, and the Army War College.
Personally, I think that the nuclear enrichment card is being put out there as a straw man. I think that the objectives are much broader than that. It's very interesting to me that from the middle of October up until a few weeks ago we didn't hear about the nuclear enrichment program. It was only after it appears as if the Prime Minister of Iraq Malachi put his foot down about our pointing to Iran as the cause of the situation in Iraq that we seemed to go back to the nuclear enrichment. I think that the Bush administration -- and I'll use words they have used for seven years -- they want to send a message to the Iranians -- a message, and that's important because they keep using that term -- not to be involved they way they are in the Middle East. It's about support for Hezbolah. It's about support for Hamas. It's about what they're doing in Iraq. And now it's about what they're doing in Afghanistan. It's a broader picture of what the Iranians are doing, and as in the run up to the Gulf War, the nuclear card is being played to generate support for something that's broader.
...I think the U.S. has a major program for regime change in Iran. ABC news has reported that the objective is destabilizing the government. It appears as if in the not too far past, maybe after Christmas, a major agreement was reached with the intelligences committees of Congress for the major funding of a program to destabilize the regime in Iran.
http://wamu.org/programs/dr/ Gee. And we wonder why Congress has been so ineffective at slowing down Bush's agenda.