Bush Reaffirms Aggressive Stance, Threatens Iran

President Bush, in a speech two days ago, restated (story here) the importance of his doctrine of "pre-emptive" war against "gathering threats" and "grave dangers" materializing. It is important to note that true pre-emption is entirely contingent on there actually being an imminent threat to interrupt with a pre-emptive attack. Given this, Bush's brand of "pre-emption" is really an affirmation of America's right to attack anyone at any time, with a minimum of justifying rhetoric about "gathering threats".

Judging from recent talk from the White House, this doctrine is being employed again, despite its utter failure in Iraq, against the Islamist regime in Iran. The Bush administration claims that Iran has been working to develop nuclear weapons; Iranian officials claim only to be working towards developing nuclear power, as is their right under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

Bush also stated that "We may face no greater challenge from a single country than from Iran." What exactly this "challenge" is, or how it constitutes an imminent threat to the United States, Bush did not make clear. Blustering by Iranian President Ahmadinejad about "wiping Israel off the map" has led many conservative commentators to claim Iran has intentions of using nuclear weapons against Israel. What is never considered by these commentators, however, is exactly why Iran would employ weapons against Israel which would also result in the mass killing of Palestinians who are in such close proximity to Israel. Neither do they address how Iran would justify a nuclear attack against anyone, knowing that such an attack would bring a nuclear firestorm down upon their country in retaliation. Such a policy would be nonsensical and suicidal, and while President Ahmadinejad is certainly an extremist, there is no indication that he is insane enough to follow such a path to destruction.