Unqualified Offerings

Via one of the internet’s premier bedwetter blogs, I find an article in As-Sharq al-Awsat purporting to detail Iran’s plan for retaliation against possible US strikes. Codenamed “Judgement Day,” the operation includes

1- A missile strike directly targeting the US bases in the Persian Gulf and Iraq , as soon as nuclear installations are hit.

2- Suicide operations in a number of Arab and Muslim countries against US embassies and missions and US military bases and economic and oil installations related to US and British companies. The campaign might also target the economic and military installations of countries allied with the United States .

3- Launch attacks by the Basij and the Revolutionary Guards and Iraqi fighters loyal to Iran against US and British forces in Iraq , from border regions in central and southern Iraq .

4- Hezbollah to launch hundreds of rockets against military and economic targets in Israel .

According to the source, in case the US military attacks continue, more than 50 Shehab-3 missiles will be targeted against Israel and the al Quads Brigades will give the go-ahead for more than 50 terrorists cells in Canada, the US and Europe to attack civil and industrial targets in these countries.

What about the last stage in the plan?

Here, the Iranian source hesitated before saying with worry; this stage might represent the beginning of a world war, given that extremists will seek to maximize civilian casualties by exploding germ and chemical bombs as well as dirty nuclear bombs across western and Arab cities.

Some of this the Iranians can probably do, some of it they’d merely like us to think they can do and some of it is probably to impress people who aren’t Americans at all. For instance, any American air operations against Iran will require logistical support in and overflight of Arab muslim countries. So scary talk of hitting those countries. Meanwhile there’s the question of who will vote for what in the Security Council and the IAEA – this article is the stick to the carrot of yesterday’s offer to allow intrusive inspections again if Iran’s case stays out of the Security Council.

Michael Young already considered pretty much all of the options on the list above and found good reasons Iran would prefer not to resort to them. I think he’s right. I also think that, if it comes to war, they’ll do as much of it as they can manage, because once fighting starts nobody wants to be seen to lose face. The likely Bush-Blair response to the reprisals is to escalate their demands to regime change, and a world that Iran’s proxies have been blowing up and shooting at may well bless the enterprise.

And then there you go: land war and eventual occupation after all, the best-laid plans of Mark Steyn notwithstanding.