by Qutb » Wed Apr 12, 2006 3:31 pm
From William Arkin's Washington Post <!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://blogs.washingtonpost.com/earlywarning/2006/04/iran_send_in_th.html#more" target="top">blog</a><!--EZCODE LINK END-->:<br><br>Contrary to all the speculation this week that all U.S. contingency planning for Iran is about quick, surgical action short of war, both the Army and Marine Corps are newly looking at full scale war scenarios. <br><br>In the case of the Marines, Iran is a thinly veiled country called Karona. <br><br>(...)<br><br>In other words, the Karonan campaign is based upon a "scenario" approved and directed by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld for fighting future war. The Karona campaign does give some insight into how the American military sees a real Iran war. The "centers of gravity" seem realistic and the "Phase I" objectives seem logical and sound. <br><br>In the world of "campaign planning," this kind of broad brush gaming built to gauge assumptions and needs goes on all the time in the background. According to the Marine Corps, building such a detailed scenario, even against a nominal enemy, "serves to answer the questions of how much, how far, by what means, and in what configuration will we project a force ashore if conducting a STOM [Ship-to-Objective Maneuver] operation." <br><br>In the real world though, Karona easily morphs into Iran. Like the early 1990's nuclear war planning I discussed yesterday, the danger with the Karonan scenario is that in the U.S. military, the political scenario and over-the-top characterization of the enemy begins to look like reality. <br><br>For Iranians looking in, the certain assumption on the part of the Americans of an aggressive and reckless Iran feeds a picture of American military preparedness that could be seen not just as prudent but also as a harbinger of a pre-ordained clash. <br><br>Tomorrow: Army campaign planning for a land war with Iran and the Caspian Sea scenario.<br><br> <p></p><i></i>
