There are no active plans to bomb Iran’s nuclear sites, Bush administration officials say, rebutting British media reports and Washington speculation that the U.S. is planning an attack. The last time the war drums were pounded this loudly on Iran was in February, when a New Yorker magazine article said the Pentagon was preparing to launch nuclear weapons at Iran.
That story brought this response from Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman: “The United States is not planning to go to war with Iran. To suggest anything to the contrary is simply wrong, misleading and mischievous.”
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On Tuesday, Whitman told The Examiner: “Nothing has changed. The president has made it clear that we are currently pursuing a diplomatic solution to our concerns with Iran.”
Bush’s key military advisers — Defense Secretary Robert Gates and the Joint Chiefs of Staff — are cool at best to opening up what would be a third front, along with Afghanistan and Iraq.
“I think that the administration believes at this point that continuing to try and deal with the Iranian threat, the Iranian challenge through diplomatic and economic means is by far the preferable approach,” Gates said this week on “Fox News Sunday.” “That’s the one we’re using.”
The London Telegraph and other British papers have stoked war fever in recent weeks with headlines like this: “Bush setting America up for War With Iran.”
The stories have sparked bloggers and columnists in Washington to speculate that Bush aides are leaking war plans to British journalists.
War fever also has risen in the wake of Gen. David Petraeus’ assertion that Iran is fighting a “proxy war,” using Shiite extremists to attack American and Iraqi troops.
The statement has given rise to speculation the U.S. might launch cross-borderattacks on Iranian training centers.
But administration and military officials say that while target contingency planning has been under way for years to identify Iranian nuclear and military targets, there is no urgency to the process.
The war option for Iran ranks low for two main reasons.
First, no U.S. allies favor airstrikes at this point, preferring to try United Nations-backed economic sanctions to pressure Iran to give up its pursuit of atomic weapons.
Second, U.S. ground forces are spread thin because of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, leaving too few troops to respond if Iran counterattacks.
Gates said there is a consensus within the administration not to attack Iranian territory.
“I think that the general view is … we can take care of the Iranian threat, or deal with the Iranian threat inside the borders of Iraq,” he said. “Don’t need to go across the border into Iran.”
