Fred writes:

"This amounts to a direct warning to the White House: Don't attack Iran, the entire U.S. intelligence community is saying—and, if you do, you should expect to get hit back."

There are good arguments against attacking Iran, but fear of a terrorist retaliatory strike on the Homeland is not one of them. That is just not how a confident superpower behaves.

I believe that the main reason for the notorious appeasement of Germany by France and Britain in the 1930's was the fear in those two countries of enemy strategic bombing of their cities. They had been horrified by such bombing in the Spanish Civil War, and many in the elites predicted that widespread strategic bombing would be the "end of civilization." Hence France and Britain were inhibited from taking any decisive action--even after declaring war, the war remained a tentative "phony war" till Germany launched her invasion of the West. By which time it was too late.

I do not believe military action with Iran is warranted at this time. But if I could be convinced otherwise, I wouldn't want fear of Hezbollah to be the deciding inhibitory factor. The day that the United States starts doing things contrary to its own strategic interest solely to avoid provoking al-Qaeda or Hezbollah, it is on a path to decline, like the French Third Republic in the 1930s.

Instead, if war with Iran should ever come, the U.S. should go ahead with whatever action is needed against Iran, and at the same time raise the Homeland Terrorist Threat Level to Red (Critical) for the duration of the military action. Have the intestinal fortitude to put the country on a war footing here at home (even organize Civil Defense drills if feasible), and that should help prevent any blind-siding by Hezbollah.

Appeasement is the policy of agreeing to another's demands in order to avoid conflict. In the case of WWII, appeasement came in the form of allowing Hitler to annex Sudentland (part of Czechoslovakia) and re-annex the Rhineland and Mussolini to go unpunished for this bloody invasion of Ethiopia. This appeasement came to an end when Hitler invaded Poland and the French and British declared war on Germany.

The situation in Iran is completely different. An intelligence estimate warning against the consequences of an unprovoked invasion of Iran is not the same as countries standing idly by as fascists conquer neighboring lands in a bid for world hegemony.

Additionally, considering the fear of a "terrorist retaliatory strike" (your words, emphasis added) most certainly should be a consideration in formulating a war plan. If the U.S. opts to embark on more military adventurism, the least the military planners can do is to weigh the potential negative outcomes of such a move.

Prior to the foolish invasion of Iraq, many argued about the dire consequences of invading. These warnings were resoundingly ignored by the war planners and the mess we are in now is the direct result of this. To invade a country, which as you admit is unwarranted at this time, with full knowledge that this could result in attacks on the U.S., is not only foolish, but, I would argue, criminal.

There is no way that the USA is weak.

Stupid perhaps but not weak.

There were several reasons why Britain, with France hanging onto its coat tails followed a path of appeasement with Germany.

The French army of the day may have been much larger than the Germans but it was split by the politics of the day (Many Frenchmen feared the rise of the communists and admired Hitler)

For a long time the threat of Stalin's USSR and the spread of communism was seen as the bigger evil. Ironically, Germany was initially seen as a buffer against the spread of Communism.

The scars of WW1 had not healed and the majority of Brits, French and even Germans didn't want a war. (Chamberlin was met by cheering crowds of Germans at the Munich meeting).

On a more practical level, thanks to the USA demanding repayment of its war loans and then the economic stagnation following the Wall street crash, there simply wasn't the money to effectively rearm until early 1939.

Say what you will about the USA but the US military does not go short of money.

For all your silly squabbles about reps and dems, you are all singing from the same hymn sheet on the important matters.

Neither, despite all the navel gazing over Vietnam, have you suffered either the effects of total war on your home land or the loss of a whole generation (as did the French).

The USA is not weak.

It is not now or in the future going to be taken over by hordes of muslim nutters.

Your political structures are as strong, or as weak, as they have ever been.

So stop playing the victim.