No More Blank Checks for War

[Frenchy]

No More Blank Checks for War
by Patrick J. Buchanan (more by this author)
Posted 07/11/2008 ET

No More Blank Checks for War - HUMAN EVENTS


After the assassination of the archduke in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914, Austria got from Kaiser Wilhelm a "blank cheque" to punish Serbia. Germany would follow whatever course its ally chose to take. Austria chose war on Serbia. And World War I resulted.

On March 31, 1939, Britain gave a blank check to Poland in its dispute with Germany over Danzig, a town of 350,000 Germans. Should war come, Britain would fight on Poland's side.

Poland refused to negotiate, Adolf Hitler attacked, and Britain declared war. After six years, the British Empire collapsed. Germany was burnt to ashes. Poland entered the slave quarters of Joseph Stalin's empire.

Lesson: No great power should ever give to a small ally or client state a blank check to drag it into war.

This raises the question: Has President Bush given Israel a blank check?

A year ago, Israel attacked and smashed an alleged nuclear reactor site in Syria. In April, Israel held a five-day civil defense drill. In June, Israel sent 100 F-15s and F-16s, with refueling tankers, toward Greece in a simulated attack. The planes flew 1,450 kilometers, the distance to Iran's uranium enrichment facility at Natanz.

On June 6, Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz threatened, "If Iran continues its nuclear weapons program we will attack it."

Ehud Olmert returned from a June meeting with Bush to tell Israelis, "George Bush understands the severity of the Iranian threat and the need to vanquish it, and intends to act on the matter before the end of his term."

Is Israel bluffing, or in dead earnest?

For while Israel can do damage to Iran, she cannot defeat Iran without using nuclear weapons. But any attack Israel launched against Iran would require U.S. complicity, and any Israeli war with Iran would almost certainly require the United States to do most of the fighting to win or end it.

Thus, if George Bush does not want war with Iran, with two U.S. wars already, he must inform the Israelis in unequivocal terms that the United States opposes any Israeli pre-emptive strike on Iran, and will not assist but denounce any such attack.

If Bush believes war with Iran is vital to U.S. security, he should make that case to Congress. To allow Israel to start a war we do not want would be an abdication of his duty as president.

Clearly, among the reasons Israel conducted its dress rehearsal for war was to maximize pressure on Iran to halt enriching uranium. Bush may well have welcomed the added pressure.

But as the Iranians have insisted, they are entitled, under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty they signed and Israel did not, to enrich uranium for fuel in power plants. Tehran has declared it will not be the only nation to surrender its legal rights under the NPT. And in response to the Israeli military exercises, Tehran conducted its own missile-firing exercises this week.

If neither side yields, confrontation is inevitable. Perhaps soon.

For we are only four months from the election, and Israel is pawing the ground to attack Iran's nuclear facilities.

Is this Bush's back door to war with Iran?

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Adm. Mike Mullen, in Israel a week ago, returned to say a "third front" in the Middle East, with Iran, would be "extremely stressful" to U.S. forces.

He is saying that U.S. ground forces probably cannot now cope with another war, with a nation three times as large as Iraq.

Asked about Israel taking unilateral action, Mullen replied, "This is a very unstable part of the world, and I don't need it to be more unstable." But Mullen is not the president. What did Bush tell Olmert? Does Israel have a green light, a yellow light or a red light?

Should Israel attack Iran and Bush deny complicity, he would no more be believed than were Britain and France in 1956. Then, the Israelis stormed into Sinai, and Britain and France said they were intervening to separate the warring nations and secure the Suez Canal. Outraged, Ike ordered the British, French and Israelis alike to get out of Suez and Sinai. They did.

President Bush must step up to the plate.

If he believes sanctions are not succeeding and Iran's nuclear program must be halted, he should go to Congress for authority to neutralize the facilities. If he has not so concluded, he should tell Israel it is not to start a war that U.S. airmen, sailors, soldiers and Marines will have to finish.

America needs to restore that absolute freedom of action in matters of war and peace she once had, before entering the skein of entangling alliances that now encumber the republic.

No ally, no client state, should ever be allowed to drag America into a war she has not chosen, constitutionally, to fight.

No more blank checks for any nation.

[ArmyGuy45]

nice little read..
but after reading this iran is still a threat and still a power.. 2 things i dont like

but i think this article doesnt give Israel credit.. im pretty sure they could fend for them self in Iran with the help of our EQUIPMENT... not soldiers

[cucamelsmd15]

Originally Posted by ArmyGuy45

nice little read..
but after reading this iran is still a threat and still a power.. 2 things i dont like

but i think this article doesnt give Israel credit.. im pretty sure they could fend for them self in Iran with the help of our EQUIPMENT... not soldiers

Personally, I dont think they need the equipment. Also, I think if we were to go to war with Iran, we would arrive sorely disappointed, only to find Israel leveled the place first and we get sloppy seconds.

[Dhunter55]

I agree with Pat. Then again, our gubmint has a history of ignoring the Constitution and playing police the world.

Though Israel would give them a helluva run for their money, I'm not convinced they could handle Iran all by their lonesome in a conventional war. Throw the possibility of Syria aligning with Iran and we're in for a real mess. No way the US is going to sit back on the sidelines and let Israel get their butts whipped.

List of countries by number of active troops - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Pharmakon]

Don't Iran and Russia have strong economic interests in one another? Just how much war do we want on our plate at once? Not that I don't think we could kick Russia's and Iran's butt, but usually before you take a swing at someone they should have deserved it. Especially if rebuilding an America friendly nation after we win a war is now SOP.

[eric_t12]

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Adm. Mike Mullen, in Israel a week ago, returned to say a "third front" in the Middle East, with Iran, would be "extremely stressful" to U.S. forces.

how dare he imply the military of this country somehow has limits!


...well, we're in for another 9/11 boys, he just gave osama the green light.








+1 Admiral.

[nothingness]

Limits as in extreme debts and funding wars that we reaaaaally don't have the means to fund. I mean, look at Russia..besides everything they stand for now or have stood for in the past..were a badass military force and a long war with Afghanistan sent them down the gutter from which they still IMO haven't fully come back from. Governments becoming arrogant and cocky and spreading military force too thin will only become less affective when a real SHTF scenario happens.

Even the greatest leadership of military force has their limits. Wars cost billions and money printed from thin air cripples everything in time.

Israel could run a flyby and bomb strategic targets yes..They have done it before. But the fallout of that would possibly mean WWIII. And my opinion, WOULD mean WWIII. It's really inevitable though from what I see. WWIII has been brewing for awhile. And it's going to be a bad one. Everyone will have different opinions on this, and all are valid in areas..Like Iran is a huge worry as far as their nuclear capabilities. North Korea, same thing...Syria is usually under the radar of alot of talks but is a threat also. It's a weird and confusing time in my own world political rationale. I know these leaders have their evils and have hidden agendas which are usually the complete annihilation of various countries. But i'm torn in my thoughts of should we just mind our own business for awhile and rebuild our own stockpiles and pay off some debts and take a breather or try and be the world police and interfere with disputes that have been going on for sometimes thousands of years? When was the torch passed to the United States to be the sole World Police Bully-Punisher?