Report: U.S. Planning April Iran Attack

Kuwait's As-Siyasa newspaper claimed Wednesday the United States is planning a missile attack on Iran later this month.

Citing unnamed sources, the newspaper said no ground troops would be involved in the air-launched attack, which it said President George Bush would justify by citing Iran's alleged complicity in fueling conflicts in Iraq, Somalia, Yemen, Lebanon and Afghanistan.

Analysis: Iraq deployment extensions

WASHINGTON, April 4 (UPI) -- The Pentagon announced Monday about 1,000 troops with the 25th Infantry Division will have their current deployment in Iraq extended by 45 days.

It also announced two units that will return to Iraq in 2007 with less than a year of rest and reset time since their last Iraq deployment.

The 4th ID will return to Iraq just nine months after it returned from its 2005-2006 deployment.

Who will bite first, the U.S. or Iran?

MOSCOW. (RIA Novosti political commentator Pyotr Goncharov) - The world is waiting for April 6, when the United States supposedly plans to launch Operation Bite against Iran.

Washington has accumulated the required forces in the region: two task groups in the Persian Gulf, including the aircraft carriers USS Dwight Eisenhower and USS John Stennis, four nuclear submarines, two dozen cruisers, and more than 400 sea- and ground-based aircraft, including Stealth planes that will allegedly carry out the greater part of the task.

The approved targets are the Natanz uranium enrichment facility, the Isfahan nuclear research center, the Araq heavy-water plant, the Bushehr nuclear power plant, air force and naval bases, air defense centers, and command and control headquarters.

Rumblings In Russia Of U.S. Strike On Iran

A Russian official denied Russian media rumors that the United States planned airstrikes on Iran's nuclear facilities Friday.
"Our contacts with the U.S. side give no grounds for such expectations," Alexander Losyukov, a deputy foreign minister, told RIA Novosti.

RIA Novosti said the United State has not ruled out a military response to Iran's refusal to halt the enrichment of uranium for its nuclear program.

Iran ready to defend itself from possible U.S. attack - speaker

ISLAMABAD, April 5 (RIA Novosti) - Iran is prepared to defend itself should the United States attack it, the speaker of Iran's parliament said Thursday.

The last few days have seen reports in Russian and foreign media that the U.S. has scheduled an operation, codenamed Bite, against Iran for 4:00 a.m. local time April 6. The operation, should it materialize, would deliver air strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities over a 12-hour period.

"The Iranian people are ready and determined to protect their land and to repel any enemy attack," Gholam Ali Haddad-Adel said at a press conference during his visit to Pakistan.