Declining US Empire cannot tolerate Iran

The following is a very good piece of analysis by Michael T. Klare on the mentality of the people at the Bush administration circle whom Kate refer to as members of the declining empire who are not ready to accept the reality. "How dare they stand up to us in that way?" Michael says that White House officials must be saying to one another in private today. And: "We'll teach them a thing or two! - Just you watch!"

Beware Empires in Decline
Michael T. Klare | October 13, 2006

Foreign Policy In Focus

I believe that the common wisdom in Washington regarding military action against Iran is wrong. Just because American forces are bogged down in Iraq, and Condoleezza Rice appears to enjoy a bit more authority these days, does not mean that "realism" will prevail at the White House. "

The common wisdom circulating in Washington these days is that the United States is too bogged down in Iraq to consider risky military action against Iran or - God forbid - North Korea. Policy analysts describe the U.S. military as "over-burdened" or "stretched to the limit." The presumption is that the Pentagon is telling President Bush that it can't really undertake another major military contingency.

Added to these pessimistic assessments of U.S. military capacity is the widespread claim that a "new realism" has taken over in the administration's upper reaches, that cautious "realists" like Condoleezza Rice have gained the upper hand over fire-breathing neoconservatives. Ergo: No military strike against Iran or North Korea.

But Kale is not buying any of this. ...

>>> Continued @ Foreign Policy In Focus

Michael T. Klare is a professor of peace and world-security studies at Hampshire College, a Foreign Policy In Focus columnist, and the author of Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America's Growing Dependence on Imported Petroleum (Metropolitan Books, 2004).