Sheesh, the knees are really jerking hard in this thread. I’m pretty well done here except to say the idea that Iran could be invaded solely from the sea (or even the major percentage from the sea) is ludicrous and shows a complete lack of understanding of major military operations…especially logistics. It also shows a complete lack of even a cursory understanding of how the US operates…or even freaking recent history for gods sake.
Sam is absolutely right…disreguarding all else except pure strategy, taking Iraq IS benificial if one wants to invade Iran. It, along with Afghanistan, provides an ideal staging area to build up forces for an multi-front invasion (which is kind of how the US military opperates in case this was lost on anyone in the last two major conflicts we were involved in). It gives us everything we need…mainly it gives us an unassailable area to build up yet another massive force (men, equipment, supplies, etc) to attack with, the hallmark of recent US strategy.
This is not to say that this was Bush’s or the administrations goal…I seriously doubt it was more than a contingency on page 100 of ‘the plan’, if that (hell, if they HAD a goal except to take out Iraq I’d be very surprised). Its not to say that invading Iraq was a smart idea…it wasn’t, even if it does give us a logistical advantage in a strategically vital region. Its not to say that because we are in such a position that we should use it…conquering Iran might not be that difficult for the US (though I shudder to think what it would cost), but holding it AND Iraq afterwards would be a royal bitch. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say it would be well neigh impossible IMO.
As to Zag’s assertion that once the main army moved out we’d be vulnerable in our rear areas, again this shows not only a lack of understanding of how the US operates logistically, but also a lack of understanding even of the current insurgency issues in Iraq. The Iraqi insurgents aren’t attacking our main military facilities, and are only occationally bothering with our logistics…they are mainly attacking ‘soft’ civilian type targets, attacking ‘civilian contractors’ and mixing it up with our patrols occationally. And this during an occupation, not during full scale combat operations, when the military is on a totally different footing. That means we have the light stuff out, that air cover is minimal, etc…and from what I understand a lot of our logistics is actually being done (at least partially) by ‘civilian contractors’. Source for that was a show on the History Channel a couple of nights ago, so no idea how accurate it is.
The bases we are constructing in Iraq would be pretty much proof against anything the Iraqi insurgents could possibly throw at them, and the US is pretty manic about protecting its logistics and its rear area during full scale military operations…again, the insurgents MIGHT be able to nickle and dime us a bit (at great cost to them as they’d have to come out and seriously fight), but it would have nearly no effect on our supply lines, at least not for the duration of the actual invasion, how ever long that would be. Its one of the reasons the US takes so long to build up before an invasion…they want to get their logistics completely set before combat operations commence.
After the destruction of the Iranian military and the beginning of the nightmare that would be occupation, the Iraqi insurgents would be the least of our worries. Anyway, this is all pure speculation and just an intellectual excersize…I don’t see an invasion of Iran or anywhere else in the cards reguardless of who wins in November. There simply is no will for it in the US, except from maybe a few die hard war hawks flapping about. I seriously doubt there is any real enthusiasm for war even from Bush and the Administration…after all, they achieved their goal of taking out Iraq, now all they have to do (if they win in November) is spend the next 4 years smoothing things over and they might be set in 2008 as well. At any rate they just MIGHT be able to keep a majority of seats in the House and Senate if they can make this all look good in the next term.
Unless something radically changes (i.e. a nation state like Iran can be conclusively linked to a future direct attack against the US) I think our foriegn adventures are done for some time to come.
-XT