Shifting targets

Dick Cheney is looking for an excuse to launch surgical strikes against Iran, according to Seymour Hersh of The New Yorker. There has been a shift in targeting away from a broad bombing plan toward select strikes against the Revolutionary Guards, he said. The campaign to convince Americans that Iran poses an imminent nuclear threat didn't work, he told CNN, so Cheney now wants to go after the Iranian troops who are "killing our boys" in Iraq. This is worrying some Europeans, including France, who think the U.S. is exaggerating the extent of Iranian meddling in Iraq. The CR (which is not mentioned by Hersh) has played a small but integral role in Bush's Iraq policy, not only by supporting the invasion but also by playing up the Iranian threat by entering into radar talks. The CR might want to keep in mind that any bombing of Iran would, as one European diplomat told Hersh, likely lead to asymmetrical attacks by Iran on European targets.