Amateur Hour

In January Defense Secretary Robert Gates wrote a secret memo to the White House expressing his concern that the U.S. had no strategy with regard to the developing Iranian nuclear weapons capacity. The contents of this memo have been leaked to The New York Times by lower-level individuals operating anonymously, with or without Gates' consent. The resulting article is here.

I presume Secretary Gates is worried the U.S. has no military strategy in the event that non-military strategies fail. He is perhaps also hinting that the diplomatic steps we've been taking amount to "no strategy," although that is not his brief. The White House has, of course, denied having "no strategy."

COTTonLINE suspects the reason Gates has not been asked for military options is that this White House has no intent of employing military options, whatever Iran does. This is another example of amateurish behavior by the Obama White House.

Whatever their private intentions, the White House should have asked for military options in order to keep the pro-Israel people in the Pentagon quiet and increase the pressure on Iran. And you never know, they might need a military option after all.