Friday, March 9, 2012

Loose Talk of War

Significantly, we've seen in the past week current and former directors of Israel's intelligence agency, Mossad, weighing in on the issue of a nuclear Iran, and their remarks aren't particularly supportive of either Rethuglican neocons here or Likudnik Israelis. Reacting to an op-ed piece in the Kaplan Daily by Supreme Chickenhawk Willard "Field Marshal Mittens" Romney, Efraim Halevy said that Field Marshal Mittens was "making the situation worse" by signaling to Iran that he would attack if elected President. Another former Mossad director, Meir Dagan, warned that an Israeli attack on Iran would be devastating to Israel, and that the U.S. should continue to lead efforts to deny Iran a nuclear weapon. To top it off, the current head of Mossad, Tamir Pardo, said as recently as December that a nuclear weapon in the hands of Iran didn't necessarily pose an "existential threat" to Israel.

Such positions seem to be at odds with the Rethuglican neocons here at home and their Likudnik counterparts in Israel. But then, why trust the opinions of one of the world's elite intelligence services when you can gin up another war in the Middle East that someone else's kids will have to fight and die in?