What would be the consequences of a US or Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear energy sites? 

At the 2006 Perdana Global Peace Forum, Australian medical scientist Dr. Helen Caldicott provided an authoritative analysis of the devastating impact on human life that would result from the radiation release from such an attack. [VIDEO: The Dangers of a Nuclear War, Global Research, July 28, 2006]

Dr. Caldicott described the catastrophic deaths that would result from a conventional attack on nuclear facilities and the long-term increase in cancer deaths from the radiation release.  

Should the attack be made with nuclear weapons—as some of Bush's criminally insane neoconservative advisers advocate—the populations of many countries would suffer for generations from radioactive particles in air, water, and food chains.  Deaths would number in the many millions.

Such an attack justified in the name of "American security" and "American hegemony" would constitute the rawest form of evil the world has ever seen, far surpassing in evil the atrocities of the Nazi and Communist regimes. 

Dr. Caldicott detailed the horrible long-term consequences for the Iraqi population from the US military's current use of depleted uranium in explosive ammunition used in Iraq. Caldicott explained that "depleted" does not mean depleted of radiation.  She explained that each time such ammunition is used, radioactive particles are released in the air and are absorbed into people's lungs.  We are yet to see the horrific civilian casualty rate of the American invasion—or the true casualty rate among US troops.

Dr. Caldicott expressed bewilderment why the rest of the world does not stand up to the US and force a halt to its crimes against humanity.  

One man heard her—Vladimir Putin, President of Russia. 

On February 10 at the 43rd Munich Security Conference, President Putin told the world's assembled political leaders that the US was trying to establish a "uni-polar world," which he defined as "one single center of power, one single center of force and one single master."

This goal, Putin said, was a "formula for disaster."  

"The United States," Putin said, truthfully, "has overstepped its borders in all spheres"  and "has imposed itself on other states." 

The Russian leader declared: "We see no kind of restraint—a hyper-inflated use of force." 

To avoid catastrophe, Putin said a reconsideration of the entire existing architecture of global security was necessary. [Putin says U.S. wants to dominate world, By Louis Charbonneau, Reuters,  Feb 10, 2007]

Putin's words of truth fell on many deaf ears.  US Senator John McCain, America's most idiotic and dangerous "leader" after Bush and Cheney, equated Putin's legitimate criticism of the US with "confrontation."  

America's new puppets—the states of central and Eastern Europe and the secretary general of NATO, no longer a treaty for the defense of Europe but a military force enlisted in America's quest for empire—lined up with McCain's argument that Russia was in fundamental conflict "with the core values of Euro-Atlantic democracies." 

 Even the BBC's defense and security correspondent, Rob Watson, jumped on the American propaganda bandwagon, tagging Putin's speech a revival of the cold war.

No delegate at the security conference stood up to state the obvious fact that it is not Russia that is invading countries under pretexts as false as Hitler's and setting up weapons systems on foreign soil in order to achieve military hegemony.  

The reception given to Putin's words made it clear to Russia, China, and every country not bribed, threatened or purchased into participation in America's drive for world hegemony that the US has no interest whatsoever in peace.  Intelligent people realize that American claims to be a moral and democratic force are mere pretense behind which hides a policy of military aggression.

The US, Putin said, has gone "from one conflict to another without achieving a fully-fledged solution to any of them."

Putin has repeatedly stressed Russia's peaceful intentions and desire to focus on its economy and to avoid a new arms race. In his speech on the 60th anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany, Putin said: "I am convinced that there is no alternative to our friendship and our fraternity. With our closest neighbors and all countries of the world, Russia is prepared to build a kind of relationship which is not only based on lessons of the past but is also directed into a shared future."

In his 2006 state of the nation speech, Putin noted that America's military budget is 25 times larger than Russia's.  He compared the Bush Regime to a wolf who eats whom he wants without listening.  Putin is being demonized by US propagandists, because he insists upon Russia being a politically and economically independent state [Putin lashes out at 'wolf-like' America, Guardian, May 11, 2006]

The Bush Regime has taken the US outside the boundaries of international law and is acting unilaterally, falsely declaring American military aggression to be "defensive" and in the interests of peace.  Much of the world realizes the hypocrisy and danger in the Bush Regime's justification of the unbridled use of US military power, but no countries except other nuclear powers can challenge American aggression, and then only at the risk of all life on earth.

The solution is nonmilitary challenge. 

The Bush Regime's ability to wage war is dependent upon foreign financing. The Regime's wars are financed with red ink, which means the hundreds of billions of dollars must be borrowed.  As American consumers are spending more than they earn on consumption, the money cannot be borrowed from Americans.

The US is totally dependent upon foreigners to finance its budget and trade deficits.  By financing these deficits, foreign governments are complicit in the Bush Regime's military aggressions and war crimes.  The Bush Regime's two largest lenders are China and Japan.  It is ironic that Japan, the only nation to experience nuclear attack by the US, is banker to the Bush Regime as it prepares a possible nuclear attack on Iran.

If the rest of the world would simply stop purchasing US Treasuries, and instead dump their surplus dollars into the foreign exchange market, the Bush Regime would be overwhelmed with economic crisis and unable to wage war.  The arrogant hubris associated with the "sole superpower" myth would burst like the bubble it is.  

The collapse of the dollar would also end the US government's ability to subvert other countries by purchasing their leaders to do America's will.

The demise of the US dollar is only a question of time.  It would save the world from war and devastation if the dollar is brought to its demise before the Bush Regime launches its planned attack on Iran.

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Paul Craig Roberts [email him] was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan Administration. He is the author of Supply-Side Revolution : An Insider's Account of Policymaking in Washington;  Alienation and the Soviet Economy and Meltdown: Inside the Soviet Economy, and is the co-author with Lawrence M. Stratton of The Tyranny of Good Intentions : How Prosecutors and Bureaucrats Are Trampling the Constitution in the Name of Justice. Click here for Peter Brimelow's Forbes Magazine interview with Roberts about the recent epidemic of prosecutorial misconduct.