The tactics of playground bullies.

Anyone else catch Amy Goodman's "Democracy Now!" on TV earlier today? Well, one of her guests was Phyllis Bennis who is a Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies specializing in the Middle East and United Nations.

What I found interesting is Bennes' idea on how our upcoming war with Iran might start. It was her suggestion that the Bush regime may ignite this war by relying on the ignorance of Americans, i.e., their lack of understanding the forms aggression can take against other nations, to include acts of war as a way to dupe them in to buying it.

Here then is what she had to say:

"....the new stories that have come out in the last couple of days in Time magazine and elsewhere, indicating that there have in fact been orders preparing to deploy U.S. Navy warships towards Iran with the goal being not necessarily a direct military strike, but rather a naval blockade of Iranian oil ports, which, of course, constitute an act of war.

"In that situation, the danger, of course, is that if there was, for example, imagine, a week or so of a U.S. blockade of Iran’s ports, Iran knows, its government and its people know, that that's an act of war. Most Americans don't know that a blockade is considered an act of war. And if Iran responded militarily, which unfortunately would be their right under Article 51 of the UN Charter calling for self-defense rights, the Bush administration would very likely call that an unprovoked attack on peaceful U.S. ships and would respond militarily, claiming to be responding in self-defense. That's, I think, a very serious danger that we face right now. And seeing Bush at the United Nations choosing not to use that rostrum as a podium for escalating threats, direct threats, against Iran, it makes the danger of a unilateral military move right now all the greater."

So a simple act of war--blockcading Iranian ports--could rightfully be responded to by Iran with an attack on U.S. forces. Americans, not the brightest bulbs in the room, would see a war response by the U.S. against Iran as justifiable.

At first I thought Bennes' claim Americans, because of their ignorance of international law, would jump behind Bush and his next war despite our blockade being the act that would ignite a war as funny. But upon reflection of course, I realize she's most probably right. After all, we need only look at the huge percentage of Americans still believing there exists an Iraq--9/11 link, despite the administration's denial there wasn't any (after taking us to war on their claims there were!).

And then we need only look to history to ponder how many other wars we were lured into by phony claims "They started it first!" As Stephen Lindeman, writer on America's long imperialist history says of the U.S. and it's wars, "The only rules we observe are the ones we make up as we go along."