Translated material
To hit or not to hit
US presidential candidates argue about Iran
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini said his country is suspending negotiations with Washington on security issues in neighboring Iraq until US troops stop attacks against Iraqi Shiite militias. Over the past year, several rounds of such talks have taken place in Baghdad at the ambassadorial level. Washington accuses Shiite Iran of training several armed groups in Iraq, which Tehran categorically denies.However, in fact, the suspension of Iranian-American negotiations may be caused by other reasons. Tehran is irritated by renewed rumors that Washington is planning to strike targets in Iran. The British newspaper The Sunday Times claims that the US military has already begun developing plans for “targeted strikes” on training camps located in Iran. The United States believes that instructors from Iran's elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps are training Shiite militants there , including from Iraq. “If the situation in southern Iraq deteriorates again, the United States will blame Iran for this and will strike training camps located in the Iranian province of Khuzestan, bordering Iraq,” says the Sunday Times. “This will be an impressively tough action.”
Washington also does not deny the possibility of a strike on Iran. In April, at a Pentagon briefing, Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen confirmed that such an action was being studied. But he admitted that a third (against the backdrop of Afghanistan and Iraq) conflict in the region “will be very difficult for the United States.”
“Now the Americans are unlikely to dare to open a new front in the Middle East,” Alexander Khramchikhin, head of the analytical department at the Institute of Political and Military Analysis, told Vremya Novostey. In addition, he believes that “targeted strikes on the camps are the most senseless of all possible options for attacking Iran”: “This will infuriate Tehran, which will be the only result. A ground-based covert operation by US special forces could have the greatest effect. Theoretically, it is possible after the US Army leaves Iraq and ceases to be a hostage to the White House’s policy in this region.”
The Iranian issue has caused controversy among US presidential candidates from the Democratic Party. The party's election meeting, held on May 4 on the US Pacific island of Guam, brought victory to the black senator from Illinois, Barack Obama. He was seven votes ahead of New York State Senator Hillary Clinton. Before this, the former first lady said that her US could launch a massive attack on Iran, especially if it attacks Israel. According to Barack Obama, one should be more careful, otherwise one could slide into Bush’s “cowboy diplomacy” towards Iran, which is “a policy of empty threats, saber-rattling and tough statements.”