Maybe Good News - Nimitz Coming Home

Today there's a a report in: http://www.indianexpress.com/story/215163.html. It seems to be a little bit of good news. It notes: "However, USS Nimitz, which headed home today after reaching the end of its deployment period, will be missed by the Indian fighters."

If it is true that it is at the end of its deployment and is coming home then the likelihood of war with Iran is diminishing.

An Incident

Blogging "Iran Attack" provides several interesting articles that suggest the attack is an absolute certainty. I'm not as positive as some of them because I think we will need an incident to occur.

I know all the demonization of Iran has started which is a necessary prelude to war. What is a little scary is that some question whether Iran will fight back. They suggest that after the three to five day of "Big Mother Shock and Awe" the Iranians will beg for peace. I should mention these are the people who predicted the people greeting our forces with flowers on the streets of Iraq . But if they think Iran will fold then that makes them more anxious to attack.

But with all the hype, isn't there still a need for an incident so the president can point to it as the reason he is attacking.

Will we, I mean they, sink one of our ships? Not a big one but one like the one the Brits were captured in. Or, having already used the ship thing, ala the Tonkin Gulf, will we try something new.

If I had to guess then I would suggest that the the incident that leads up to this war will be a capture of American service men and the holding of them as hostage.

Cowboy George will strap on his six shooter and, well you know the outcome.

Watch the Carriers 9/11

The Rule:

We won't attack with one;

We may with two;

We will with three.

September 11, 2007 finds no news on the Truman which is is moored at Pier 14 at Naval Station Norfolk, Va. The USS Kitty Hawk (CV 63) is reported to be in the Indian Ocean; the USS Enterprise (CVN 65) is reported to be in the Persian Gulf; USS Nimitz (CVN 68) is reported to be in the Indian Ocean.

I expect the Truman & Nimitz to be going to the Persian Gulf; the Kitty Hawk back to its station at Yokohama in Japan.

Stayed tuned.

A Poem After Listening to General Petraeus Testify

On 9/11 the day we were attacked
Al Qaeda had no presence in Iraq.
So illogically thinking it was right
We decided it is Iraq we will fight.

We attacked and low and behold
Al Qaeda is now there we are told.
So right this day it seems to appear
Al Qaeda in Iraq is our great fear.

That they are there we have to stay
Until the time we chase them away.
If we didn’t go there it seems to me
Iraq would have been Al Qaeda free.

After four long years and four thousand dead
From all that appears we’ve not gotten ahead.
We're trying to get what we already had
That is why this war makes me so mad.

General Petraeus Lays the Groundwork

Listening to the good general testify I could not but be struck by his answer to one of the question whether our forces were being stretched too thin. He sort of agreed by saying that the Army and Marine ground forces were. He left the impression that the Navy and the Air Force were still robust and ready. I wondered why he gave such an answer unless he knows that they are being readied to bomb Iran.

I wish someone had asked him about what he knew about the intended attack on Iran. It seems strange the general would know and our Congressmen would not. But then again, our Congress has become so irrelevant to the Iraq war that Bush feels no need to keep them in the loop.

I missed it but Andrew Sullivan at "andrew@thealtantic.com" pointed out the general also said: "We cannot win in Iraq solely in Iraq." Sullivan suggests that the US's Anbar strategy is to arm to Sunnis who will be able to take on the Shiite, the natural ally of Iran, when we attack Iran. I sort of agree but also have a sense that the surge's purpose is also to insure that the US forces in Iraq are positioned so that when we attack Iran they will be free from danger. As noted in the Wall Street Journal yesterday, we are building up a base right on the border of Iran. That will probably be used as a location from which we can launch helicopter rescue missions and special forces into Iran once the attack begins.

How dizzying is it all. We were attacked by Al Qaeda on 9/11. At that time they had no presence in Iraq. We attack Iraq and now Al Qaeda has such a presence that the publicly stated ongoing purpose of the Surge is to now try to accomplish what existed before the Iraq attack.

Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition

Robert Graves wrote about his experience in World War I in his book GOOD-Bye To All That. He was a famous British poet who served in the trenches in France as a 19 year old lieutenant. He saw much action.

He tells how in late 1915 he boarded in the house of a woman he called Old Adelphine while waiting to go back to the trenches. He says she told him "all the girls in Annezin prayed every night for the war to end, and for the English to go away - as soon as their money was spent."

About that time he wrote home saying about the French, "I have not met a single case of the hospitality that one meets among the peasants of other countries. It is worse than inhospitality here, for after all we are fighting for their dirty little lives."

He goes on a little later to tell how the British and local French loathed each other saying, "We failed to realize that the peasants did not much care whether they were on the German or British side of the line. They just had no use for foreign soldiers, and were not at all interested in the sacrifices that we might be making for 'their dirty little lives.'”

One can only regret that almost ninety years after Graves experienced the feelings of the French to the English our leaders would not realize that basic fact. People do not like foreign soldiers on their land no matter what their motives. .

Summing Up as of September 10, 2007

President Bush in March dines with Neo-con Icon Norm Podhoretz and speaks of wanting to please his constituents: not the American people, but G_d.. Right after that meeting Icon Normsits down and tells the president that the best way to do this is to bomb Iran. We can't do this unless we have enough carriers in the area. We have the USS Enterprise (CVN 65); we bring back the USS Nimitz (CVN 68); and we plan to send the USS Truman (CVN 75) .

But in June of 07, the Navy decides to add to and display on the USS Truman(CVN 75) a Torah making it the only ship in the Navy with a Torah. It does this within months of sending it off to be in a position to bomb Muslim nations.

Interesting is that if I Google - USS Truman Torah - I come to some internet sites that tell of this dedication. But if I search the Google news site with the same words, nothing comes up. More interesting if I search Senator Levin's Senate site, http://levin.senate.gov/, with the words Torah or Truman there is no mention of it. If Senator Levin does not mention this, and if it has no news coverage, is there a reason for this? Just wondering.