Wikistrat post @ CNN-GPS: Ten Roads to Israel-Iran War
Friday, February 17, 2012 at 12:20PM Editor’s Note: The following piece, exclusive to GPS, comes from Wikistrat, the world's first massively multiplayer online consultancy. It leverages a global network of subject-matter experts via a crowd-sourcing methodology to provide unique insights.
Either Israel and the United States are engaged in a brilliant psychological operations campaign against Iran or the two long-time allies really are talking past each other on the subject of Tehran’s reach for a nuclear bomb. Either way, all this Bibi Netanyahu said, Leon Panetta said chatter is producing some truly jangled nerves over in Iran on the subject of Israel’s allegedly imminent attack on that country’s nuclear program facilities.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu keeps publicly implying that his nation can’t wait on Iranian events for as long as the Obama administration – with its looming embargo of Iranian oil sales to the West – would like. Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta keeps tripping over his own tongue, saying one day that America is doing its best to keep Israel’s attack jets grounded and the next offhandedly remarking to reporters that Tel Aviv is inevitably going to pull that trigger sometime this spring.
Again, as psyop campaigns go, this is brilliant, because it not only keeps the Iranians nervous and guessing, it forces them out into the diplomatic open with all manner of implausible counter-threats that reveal their increasing desperation.
Stipulating all this brinkmanship - coordinated or not - this week’s Wikistrat crowd-sourced analysis exercise involves imagining the range of possible pathways to an Israel-Iran war. We don’t offer odds here. We just try to cover a wide array of possible vectors toward the trigger-pulling point.
Read the entire post at CNN's GPS blog.
Arab Spring, Egypt, Iran, Israel, Middle East, Turkey, US Military, US foreign policy | in CNN/GPS blog, Wikistrat | Email Article | Permalink | Print Article 
Reader Comments (4)
Well, I don't know if we have intentionally entered into a propaganda game with the Israeli's to make the Iranians nervous. I know that the constant talk of missiles and submarines and preemptive strikes and nuclear weapons is making everyone else nervous.
I also know that there are interests and entities right here in our own country and in our own government apparatus that feed and leak information to the press in order to persuade the American people that some agenda needs to be followed.
It seems to me that the decision has been made. I may not be privy to the meetings or the cables but I have been around a long time. As I sit here looking out at another beautiful Southern California sky...I think this...the shooting match has been delayed by the instability in Egypt and Syria. We and the Israeli's needed Egypt. The Iranians needed, or at least wanted, Syria. How long are we willing to wait? How long are the Israeli's able to wait?
I like #10 - the EMP blast. But still what are the repercussions for anyone popping a nuke under any circumstances?
How about an unlikely path. The Iranians test a nuclear device and get about 150 Kt. They then say we deliver too. Leave us alone.
Just back from Israel and I am thinking; sure feels like war. Question for WikiStrat is, How do we keep it from happening?