More Iran

So you heard the rhetoric from the Chimp and now the Iranians have raised the stakes. The U.N Security Council has the issue. Fine, it can go a lot of ways from here, most of it not good unless the Iranians are given the opportunity to back down gracefully and save face. I think the Chimp is too myopic to give them that opportunity, to even recognize the option is open to him, if the Iranians even want one by now. Remember, this situation is one of our own making.

When the Chimp, with his grandiose vision of 'remaking the region', branded Iran, Iraq, and North Korea the 'Axis of Evil', he put them all on notice they were in the U.S.' gunsights. He backed that up by attacking Iraq. The Iranians countered by electing a radical, reactionary government. They see what's going on in Iraq, are probably funding some of the insurgency along with an intelligence gathering network, and they know there is not much we can do against them. There is little we can do diplomatically either. Quoting Taylor Marsh (take the time to read the whole post):

...

Because of our situation in Iraq and the lack of credibility of President Bush, which has spilled over to brand America, this is going to be a very long month, with what lies at the end presenting a very ugly scenario. For some of us, the country of true malevolence has always been Iran, and because of Bush's preoccupation with preemption and his naivety on Iran, not to mention the lack of real intel inside that country, today, our options are between Israel and a U.S. airstrike.

...

With all due respect to the lovely Taylor, I doubt airstrikes will seriously disable the Iranian nuclear initiative [short of a Linebacker I & II campaign; i.e. carpet bombing and all the collateral damage and bad press that comes with it]. Personally, I don't think the Iranians would have raised the rhetoric to this level if they weren't pretty certain they were immune from conventional attacks against the infrastrutcure. I mean Good lord, we have air bases all around them.

Remember this: A guy doesn't go waving his prick around with the expectation of getting it cut off. Iran wouldn't put all that money at risk of being bombed into dust so easily. So that means we'll have to put boots on the ground to ferret out the labs and processing facilities. Where will we get the troops from? Are we gonna use nukes? Are we gonna let Israel use them? Are we prepared for the Armageddon that will surely follow such actions. And what about the Iranian oil? We are addicted after all.

How did we paint ourselves into this corner? We put the Republicans in charge.

Update:

The Russians might be the key to diffusing the situation. This would be a good time for the Chimp to back off the rhetoric and allow the Iranians the wiggle room to accept this offer.