And then what? They don't fight a conventional war. You will have to wipe them out totally. Again, we don't have the stones for that.

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I am not talking ground invasion. I am talking of a quick reaction Division size force to hold the area near the Gulf.

Then the war would move north most likley via air power and cruise missle attacks. the hope would be to cause enough destruction to collapse the government there and get Iranians more pliable in charge.

If they popped off nukes, then all bets would be off and it would be more of an ALKIM scenario.

Keep in mind though, if we go in using air power and missles and there are elements of the Iranian Guard that goes to ground, we will have to put in troops. you cannot hold ground with air power.

This war would be fought at the strategic level initially, with targets of opportunity being taken out and the people of Iran given the chance to stop the destruction by rejecting the current regime. US ground troops would be used very sparingly.

But would they? If so, life is good. If not, life can be very difficult.

I find it difficult to believe that a muslim would side with a non-muslim over a muslim. Even in our armed forces, we can't trust them. What more there?

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Insanity.

Utter insanity.

what are you calling insane?

Aklim has a good point here. The Iranian govt will NOT collapse by mere air power. Most certainly our air attack on Iran would rally the whole country around their government. Remember what happened on 9/11? Suddenly Bush was popular even among the Dems. I supported him back then too. (He lost my support the following year as the drumbeat to invade Iraq started).

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Iran is definitely not the main reason we're stuck there. Most of the insurgent activity has been from the Sunnis. In fact lately there's hardly any violence compared to the recent past. We're stuck there because the Sunnis & Shiites don't want to reconcile and get off their butt and build up their military. I say again that the best solution to that is to issue a withdrawal timetable. That should give them some encouragement to get off their asses and get their act together.

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Of course there's also the possibility that we are stuck there because our govt wants us to be "stuck" there. Wasn't there a report recently that showed that the Iraqi govt had actually satisfied most of the benchmarks? Even the Iraqi govt now wants us out but the White House insists on keeping bases there and a permanent military presence. Perhaps as a launching pad for a possible invasion of Iran?

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Expert: Iran `doctored' photo of missile launches
By CARLEY PETESCH, Associated Press Writer
2 hours, 4 minutes ago

NEW YORK - An Iranian photograph showing a cluster of missile launches was apparently altered to add a fourth missile lifting off from a desert range, a defense analyst said Thursday.

"There's no doubt the photo was doctored," said Mark Fitzpatrick, director of the Non-Proliferation Program for the London-based International Institute For Strategic Studies.

The image, posted Wednesday on a Web site owned by Iran's Revolutionary Guards, showed four missiles moments after launch, leaving trails of glowing exhaust and clouds of billowing brown dust.

The scene was described as part of military maneuvers in which nine missiles were test fired, including an enhanced version of the Shahab-3. Iranian officials say the new missile has a range of 1,250 miles, which would enable a strike on Israel and most of the Middle East. The tests drew immediate criticism from Washington.

Some media outlets used the photo Wednesday, but not The Associated Press.

The photo on the Sepah News site was replaced Thursday with an image showing three missiles — which appear to be the same as the earlier photo. In place of the fourth missile, however, the photo showed one still on the ground in its launch position and what appears to be a vehicle nearby.

That photo was used by the AP Thursday, and later the apparently altered photo was added for purposes of comparison. The image with four launches was taken off the Sepah site's main news page, but both photos were on its archive Thursday.

Fitzpatrick, a former State Department official who followed arms control issues, believes the photo was manipulated after the missile malfunctioned.

"They had a rocket launch and one failed," he said. "They have had other tests that have succeeded, but Iran tends to exaggerate its capabilities."

There was no immediate comment from Iranian government officials on the photos.

"The whole purpose of these launches was to demonstrate Iran's capabilities and a photo showing one out of four rockets failing doesn't have the intended impact," Fitzpatrick said.

That you would discuss an invasion of Iran as if it was some nicely contained war game.

We already have two wars going, both of which have been going much longer than the duration of WWII and neither of which has an end in sight. Starting a third war against a country that doesn't threaten us makes no moral or strategic sense, especially when we don't have sufficient resources for the missions in Iraq and Afghanistan.

To invade Iran = insanity. IMHO.

DCULKIN, I didn't make the strategy, I am just supposing what it would be based an educated guess.

As for someone else's comment regarding us not leaving Iraq, well I told you that too... Iraq is the new Germany for the new not so cold war...it is our forward operating base, don't you get it?

DC: don't think of it as two wars with a thrid brewing: it is one conflict for control of the region in one fashion or another...

You mean what the strategy would be if we went insane and decided to invade Iran when we didn't need to?I don't know what I wrote that made you think that I don't understand that simple concept.Call it what ever you want to call it. I don't see how expanding our operations into Iran is good for anybody. I also don't think the fighting in Iraq has much to do with the fighting in Afghanistan except that one is distracting us from the other.

I meant to say "No thanx to Iran who has been supplying weapons to all sorts of wonderful individuals in Iraq".

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That's gonna do nothing but encourage more terrorism because we are in their "holy land". Iraq isn't Germany and the Germans were much more comfortable with us being there, especially since it offered protection against the Eastern Block. Iraq has no desire for such protection and there will always be elements fighting it. If this strategy is part of the "war on terror" it's beyond retarded.

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