Investigative journalist Charley James offers this detailed opinion piece looking at the growing possibilty of US military action in Iran.

By Charley James
After being quietly notified by officials in Dick Cheney’s office, Kuwait – situated between Iraq, Iran and an un-enviable geographic hard place on the northern end of the Persian Gulf – has activated its “Emergency War Plan” as a massive US and European armada is steaming for the region.

Coming on the heels of Operation Brimstone just a week ago that saw US, British and French naval forces participate in war games in the Atlantic to practice enforcing a blockade on Iran, the joint task force is now headed for the Gulf and what could easily turn into a provoked confrontation with Iran, according to the authoritative Middle East Times.
 
The naval force includes a US Navy super carrier battle group accompanied by an expeditionary carrier battle group, a British Royal Navy carrier battle group and a French nuclear hunter-killer submarine.
 
Leading the pack is the nuclear-powered carrier, the USS Theodore Roosevelt and it’s Carrier Strike Group Two. Besides 80-plus combat planes, the Roosevelt is carrying an additional load of French Naval Rafale fighter jets from the French carrier Charles de Gaulle, which is in dry dock.
 
Also reported heading toward Iran is another nuclear-powered carrier, the USS Ronald Reagan and its Carrier Strike Group Seven; the USS Iwo Jima, the Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal and a number of French warships including the nuclear hunter-killer submarine Amethyste.
 
Once the naval force arrives in the Gulf it will be joining two other US naval battle groups already on site: the USS Abraham Lincoln with its carrier strike group and the USS Peleliu with an expeditionary strike group. 
 
This deployment is the largest naval task force from the United States and allied countries to assemble in Persian Gulf waters since Gulf War 1.
 
The object of the naval deployment is to enforce an eventual blockade on Iran if, as expected by many observers, current negotiations over Iran’s insistence to pursue uranium enrichment yields no results.
 
Adding to the volatility is the presence of a major Russian navy deployment sent earlier this year to the eastern Mediterranean comprising the jewel of the Russian fleet, the aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov with approximately 50 Su-33 warplanes that have the capacity for mid-air refuelling. This means the Russian warplanes could reach the Gulf from the Mediterranean, a distance of some 850 miles and would be forced to fly over Syria – not a problem – but Iraq as well, where the skies are controlled by the US military. The guided missile heavy cruiser Moskva is also part of the flotilla. The Russian task force is believed to have no less than a dozen warships and several submarines.
 
For Iran, a naval blockade preventing it from importing refined oil would have devastating effects on its economy, virtually crippling the Islamic republic’s infrastructure. Although Iran is a major oil producer and exporter, the country lacks refining facilities having to re-import its own oil once refined.
 
Iran’s oil – both exported crude as well as returning refined product – passes through the strategic Straits of Hormuz, controlled by Iran on one side and Oman – a US ally – on the other. The strait is about 30 miles wide at its narrowest point, making it easy to control, but at the same time placing Western naval vessels within easy reach of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards fast moving light boats that could be used by Iranian suicide bombers.
 
Although Kuwait is on the opposite end of the entrance to the Gulf and the Straits of Hormuz, Kuwait City is less than 60 miles from Iran and has good reason to worry.
 
“Kuwait was caught by surprise last time, when Iraqi troops invaded the emirate and routed the Kuwaiti army in just a few hours,” a former US diplomat to Kuwait told Middle East Times.
 
I’ve been saying and writing this for months: Cheney and his puppets Bush and McCain are planning a war with Iran before January by one means or another. As was the case before Iraq, they are going through the pretence of seeking UN sanctions knowing they won’t be approved. Even worse, the White House is negotiating diplomatically in bad faith with Iran, fully aware that no country will negotiate when it is told up-front to, in essence, “do what we want first, before we discuss anything substantive.”
 
That’s not diplomacy, it is blackmail.
 
Hopefully, this time the Democrats in Congress won’t be tricked into supporting an Iran War the way they were lied into supporting the Iraq invasion. The world cannot survive another 935 lies.