FP monitors similarities in the preparation for the Iraq war and the events of Iran: Do you know wha

"Foreign Policy" published a report by Michael Hirsch and Lara Siligman, saying that the Trump administration says it does not want war with Iran, but many of its actions say something else. 
In the year since President Donald Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal with Iran in 2015, his administration has raised tensions by re-imposing sanctions on Iran, stifling Iran's oil exports, and then classifying the Revolutionary Guard As a terrorist group, and recently sending a strike force including an aircraft carrier to the Gulf. 
The authors note that as a reaction, Iran has said it will begin to partially withdraw from the nuclear agreement, which Iran and other signatories have adhered to so far, "noting that this is a move that Trump critics fear would use it to justify an attack on Iran.
"It is clear that Trump's policy toward Iran was signed by national security adviser John Bolton, who has always called for regime change in Tehran and was a key figure in pushing for war in Iraq two decades ago," the magazine says. 
According to the report, "Observers see a similarity between what is happening now and what happened during the period of preparation for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, not least the presence of Bolton himself, this time in a stronger position than his position in 2003, and the concern is that Bolton was in late 2002 and beginnings 2003, was an agent for the secretary of state. He was war-weary and accused of manipulating intelligence to justify the invasion. In 2015, he said he regretted his role in what was seen as a strategic disaster.
"It was Bolton, not President and Defense Minister Patrick Chanahan, who announced this week the dispatch of the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln, the striking force that included four 52 Middle East bombers, to send a clear and unambiguous message to the Iranian regime that An attack on American interests, or the interests of our allies, will be met with a non-compromising force). " 
The report notes that "there are reports that the Trump administration is acting on intelligence information about Iranian threats made by the Netanyahu government, which also has a history of trying to incite a military aggression against Iran."
According to the authors, Bolton's role in the deployment announcement shocked several national security professionals in Washington. "I never heard that it happened," said Greg Thilman, a former State Department intelligence official who bumped into Bolton when he worked under his command before the invasion of Iraq. , It is unprecedented ... that a national security adviser used his authority to send this statement, this did not happen even in the invasion of Iraq, "while a spokesman for Bolton did not respond directly to the request to comment. 
"After America's 16-year invasion of Iraq, we are turning back to another unnecessary conflict in the Middle East, based on a wrong and misleading logic," the report states.
The report points out that Trump's critics believe Iran is more dangerous because it is bigger and more militarily powerful than Iraq, and that the nuclear agreement with Iran would have maintained more peace than the UN sanctions against Saddam two decades ago. 
"It seems to me a clear effort (from the US) to provoke Iran to carry out an attack. There is a lot of similarity with Iraq. When Iraq was under pressure to allow UN inspectors to inspect its facilities and dismantle missiles, Change the thing, and I expect that the same thing will happen now, Iran was committed to the terms of the nuclear agreement, it is America that did not comply. "
"The difference between Iraq in 2003 and Iran today is that, at least until now, there seems to be no plan for an American invasion, but critics like Thilman see a provocation similar to the Bush administration's provocation to Saddam, Iraq under the pretext. " 
"I do not know if this is like the Iraq war, because Bolton wants a war with Iran and is looking for a chance," the magazine quoted former Pentagon official Lauren Dejong Schulman, who currently works for the New American Security Center, as saying. Bolton found that the Pentagon "responds to its priorities and interests quickly, without discussion, and wants people to realize that it is directing US policy toward Iran."
According to the report, the national security adviser did not conceal his continued desire to change the regime in Tehran. In an article he wrote in 2015, he wrote that "the real solution for the Malian nuclear weapons is to get rid of the mullahs themselves." He said that recently, "I do not think you'll have more celebrations of the revolution you're going to enjoy," he said in a videotape published by the White House, addressed to Iranian spiritual leader Ali Khamenei. 
The Wall Street Journal reported in January that Bolton had asked the Pentagon to provide Iranian military targets to the White House after people fired mortars in Baghdad.
The magazine reveals that there is some evidence that since the appointment of Bolton, he saw Iran's confrontation as his main agenda, and sought to prevent opposition in Iranian affairs, even though the task of the National Security Adviser is to be honest broker between different views, Trump, who was reportedly reluctant to appoint Bolton at the beginning of his administration, dismissed former national security adviser HR McMaster and came to Bolton weeks before he withdrew from the nuclear deal. Both McMaster and then-Secretary of State Rex Tilerson tended to find a way to keep the nuclear agreement Iran, and was Tillerson was later dismissed to open the way for the most hawkish Mike Pompeo.
The report quoted US officials as saying that the request to move the pieces came from the Central Command, but left to the White House to announce it. The spokesman for the Central Command (CENTCOM), Navy Commander Bill Arban: "Central Command began to develop a demand for troops after close and clear indicators That Iranian forces and proxy forces are preparing for a possible attack on US forces in the region. " 
"The new Central Command chief, Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, appears to be in line with Bolton about Iran's threat to America and its allies. He spent half of his 30-minute speech in Washington on Wednesday ringing the alarm about Tehran's (malignant) activities and global ambitions," the authors say.
"Iran is the most important long-term threat to stability in the central command operations area," McKenzie said, adding that while Tehran was responsible for the deaths of more than 600 US troops in Iraq, while some critics criticized troop movements The last American in the region, as a mere symbolic review of power, McKinsey issued an implicit threat that America would not hesitate to use lethal force. 
"At a time when we are not seeking war, Iran should not confuse our deliberate policy with our unwillingness to act," McKinsey said. "We are deploying a force of experience, experience and readiness.
The report finds that although Shanahan told Congressmen on Wednesday that Congress had reached "very high credible intelligence" on Friday about an imminent Iranian threat, the administration did not provide details, raising some questions raised about two decades ago. At the time, a number of foreign intelligence experts accused Bolton of manipulating information about Iraq to justify his hard-line views and threatening those who disagreed with him. 
"The style of behavior that I saw at Bolton at the time and later was that he established a good record in the selection of intelligence that serves any cause he wants to support," the two authors quoted Thulman as saying. "Bolton's record is terrible," Trump says. Details, and not many questions when it comes to intelligence briefings. "
The Foreign Policy concludes its report by pointing out that Bolton's performance in the run-up to the Iraq war caused him to be accused by Democratic Senator Joe Biden at a congressional hearing to consider Bolton's candidacy as UN ambassador in May 2005.