No subject

today -- they lack not knowledge but a few material prerequisites.  Rven if
they run into obstacles to obtaining these, they are sure to solve the
problem in a few years. 

The knowledge stems from the fact that Iran is one of the bourgeois
semicolonial countries that has taken education of the people seriously.
That is simply a fact that is universally recognized, regardless of the
range of opinions about this government.

The only way to eliminate this knowledge, if it proves possible at all, is
to LITERALLY TRY TO BOMB IRAN BACK TO THE STONE AGE.

Rather than assuming that Putin's successful visit -- which some unknown
force clearly tried to head off with the assassination rumors -- has
effectively quashed the danger of a US attack (I don't claim anyone is
exactly doing that) I think we are about at the moment of crisis in the
conflict: The point where the United States government will have to act or
begin to retreat.  

And retreat can even take the form of a deal in which Iran temporarily
delays its own national economic development, and takes 
Russian help instead.  I don't assume they will do this, or have to do this,
but if such a deal is made it should be viewed as a sop to the United States
for giving up on destroying its  rival. 

NOT its IMPERIALIST rival but a semicolonial country that has grown strong
enough to assert its bourgeois interests more effectively --  interests that
coincide, in certain respects and to a limited degree, with interests of the
working people.

Washington seems to me to have reached the limits of its capacity to win
wider support for war against Iran. The Security Council will not support
them. The Imternational Atomic Energy  Association is lined up against them.
Russia has taken sides. (Perhaps Washington could move them by giving up its
missle plans in Eastern Europe, but the administration opposes any such show
of weakness.) The British government is softening, though Blair stands four
square.  The new ally in France seems more shaky and uncertain than some
people think.

At home, the limits of progress seem to have been reached, at least without
some vast provocation.  The anti-Iran bill did pass the Senate, basically
lending strong support to the war drive against Iran, but Hilary Clinton has
had to retreat from it somewhat.

And the response to the Senate war vote was so much more negative than
expected that the resolution is buried for now in the House -- so there is
no Congressional war resolution, as the administration supporters clearly
expected.

Even Bollinger's militant war cry in introducing Ahmadinejad at Columbia --
portraying him as "the face of evil" and instructing students and faculty
that the only justification for listening to him was to decide how "we" can
fight and defeat him -- got very mixed reviews.

The latest rounds of hysteria have not lessened the opposition (soft though
it may be) to attacking Iran.

Iran cannot be successfully isolated as Iraq was.  Sanctions seem to have
reached their limits. Russia seems committed to vetoing any more sanctions,
and China is also opposed.

So the Bush administration is faced with defeat over Iran as over Iraq.  Can
they accept that Russia has a kind of veto power over what they do? Can they
accept that world opinion can make an aggression impossible?

Or will they decide to show them all that opposition does not matter against
the mighty military power of US imperialism, the only "decider" in the
world?

After all, can anyone doubt that they can do  enormous damage to Iran simply
by deciding to?  I hope noone imagines that Iran has an anti-aircraft
capacity capable of seriously impeding US air power.  If they did, they
would not stake so much on attacking Israel in retaliation. And, of course,
any such self-defense by Iran becomes the pretext for more US attacks.

I think this war is virtually certain to be a disaster for Washington.  But
I do not think we have passed the danger point, I think we are pretty much
right at the crunch -- at least under the Bush administration.