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Table of Contents █ Acknowledgments and announcements ► Bill Clinton and George Bush Sr. Appended preface Impressed
by the division of labor, integration, and functional articulation of their
component human ‘cells,’ we have, for a long time, trotted out the body
metaphor to analyze our institutions or corporations—the
root ‘corpo’ comes from the Latin ‘corpus’ meaning ‘body.’ If the metaphor is
productive, perhaps we should adopt also, from the medical doctor, the method
of investigation whereby he pokes and prods to observe bodily reactions with
which to evaluate the body’s health. Professionals
of ‘action research’ have taken this idea seriously. These are investigators
who act upon—‘poking’ and
‘prodding’ our systems or social ‘bodies’—in order to produce an
institutional response with which to evaluate and diagnose. They have been
recruited to improve the performance of for-profit and non-profit
organizations. Whereas
a traditional anthropologist will participate and observe seeking to
understand but not to change, action researchers, like medical doctors,
define the healthy direction of the institution under study—to which they,
typically, belong—in order, with their research, to nudge it in that desired
direction. Such is the influential program defended by Danny Burns in Systemic Action Research: A strategy for
whole system change. Without
consciously seeking to, I became an action researcher when I proposed, in the
context of the US academic system, new international relations hypotheses—in
particular, about the goals of those responsible for state-level decisions in
the United States. The reaction I produced forced me to reconsider my earlier
hypothesis about the health of that academic system. I
used to think that in the United States—above and beyond the citizen
liberties guaranteed in the Constitution—the ‘academic liberty’ of a
professor and researcher was institutionally protected, for this is what
academic handbooks expressly state. The explicit purpose, according to the
same handbooks, is to protect the generation of new ideas, the challenge to
the old, and an open debate, indispensable to advance scientific progress and
therefore our understanding. I
discovered, however, as other academics also have, that in the field of
political theory complete liberty does not exist in the United States.
Certain theories are considered ‘taboo.’ If you propose them, the consequence
is not a civilized and collegial effort to debate and refute; on the
contrary, power is mobilized to censor and persecute. Those who do not buckle
under the pressure of protected dogma may even pay with their employment. After
the same experiment in Mexico I reach a different conclusion. At least at ITAM,
where I now teach, there is enough academic liberty to question the dominant
theories in international relations. It is possible, here, to propose a
minority hypothesis. This is what ITAM students have now demonstrated by
inviting me—successfully—to present, in our institution’s most important
auditorium, the hypothesis according
to which the power elites in the United States and Iran are not enemies—as
they publicly represent themselves to be—but allies (and for a long
time). I
thank the student organization UNE for this invitation. In
order to propitiate a scientific debate—healthy
for an academic institution—we reproduce below the text of my conference,
presented in the Raúl Baillères Auditorium on Tuesday August 30, 2016. Transcript of the Conference : “IRAN AND THE US: ¿Friends or Foes?” Acknowledgments and announcements Welcome.
Thank you for coming to this, your conference. I would like, first of all, to
thank the student organization UNE for inviting me, and Abraham Mercado for
taking care of so many details, and for his original inspiration to organize
this conference. And I
see here a few members of an organization called ‘Diálogos…’ I’d like to make
the ‘plug.’ Um…, get in touch with Salomón Sacal, who is here (raise your
hand, Salo), in case you are interested in joining an organization that puts
together soirées to discuss interesting topics for young people, and adults,
and older folk. Um…,
and I want to begin first with—before we get into it—with a couple of
announcements. First,
I introduce you to my website, in case you find the themes you will hear
today interesting and wish to know more, see more documentation. The web
magazine is called Historical and
Investigative Research and you will find it at www.hirhome.com. You are not
seeing here…—I forgot to put the address! But you will see it in the bottom
part of all my slides. Ah,
and in this webpage, there, above that article that right now is the first,
you will find tonight—or at the latest tomorrow—the text of this conference,
with the documentation on every particular mentioned today. So, if you want
to go check that documentation… And the more skeptical among you will want to
go check because several times during my conference you will say, “No! That can’t
be! It can’t be true!” So you should go, because you can examine the
documentation and try and see if I told you any lies. Ah,
and also, in the same webpage, right below the text of the conference,
starting tomorrow, at the latest, you will find this series called Psychological Warfare and Political
Grammar, which discusses and documents many of the topics that we will
present today.
Finally,
if after listening to what I shall present today, and investigating a little
bit further the additional materials, you are left with a desire for more, then I invite you to my course Antisemitism, and the Political History of
the West, where we go deeply into all these topics that you will hear and
many more.
[In
this course] we cover 2500 years of Western history in order to grasp the
role of antisemitism in the political history of the West, and ah…, all of
that as background to understand better today’s geopolitics. And we have lots
of fun. It is a fun course. Some of you here have taken it already. It is
open to the entire public; it is an extension course. So you don’t have to be
an ITAM student. You can bring your parents, your aunts, your cousins, your
friends from other universities—whoever you want. And we will begin this
course in February, next semester. If you want, send me an email (I forgot to
put the email there) but look for me in the ITAM system and send me an email
if you want to sign up. Okay…
Without further ado, let’s get started. PRESENTATION According
to an ancient Roman saying, “Where there is controversy, there is liberty.” I
came here to promote controversy. Let us celebrate that, for it shows that
here, at ITAM, we are still free. In Iran, one cannot speak freely. There can
be no controversy there. The
question I wish to answer is the following: How to explain that, after four decades of US policy in the Middle
East, the theocratic and Islamist Iranian state—part of the ‘Axis of Evil’
according to George Bush Jr.’s diatribes—is stronger than ever? That will be
the topic of my conference today.
Philosopher
Willard Quine says: “The
argument that sustains a paradox may expose the absurdity of a buried premise
or of some preconception previously reckoned as central to physical theory,
to mathematics, or to the thinking process. Catastrophe may lurk, therefore,
in the most innocent-seeming paradox. More than once in history the discovery
of paradox has been the occasion for major reconstruction of the foundations
of thought.”[1] Quine
says ‘catastrophe’ ironically, for it is such only for the ideological ivy
that grows around any tradition. A curious and creative mind welcomes a
paradox as an invitation: it is there that
my model of the Universe must be reformed and (how swell!) now I can go about
it. Beyond
“physical theory, mathematics, or the thinking process,” paradoxes likewise
surface in social theory, where they are likewise invitations to reform our
models. Here
is a paradox: the Israeli premier’s speech last year before the US Congress,
when he denounced—because he believes this prepares the destruction of
Israel—the nuclear treaty that Obama soon after signed with the Iranians.[2]
The
treaty, asserted Netanyahu, is entirely lacking in reliable mechanisms to
verify compliance, even more so to punish violations. To boot, the treaty lifts
the sanctions earlier imposed on Iran, opening the floodgates of large
sources of capital for the nuclear weapons that—everybody agrees—the
ayatollahs desire.[3] And
whatever do they want them for? They have loudly and publicly denounced the
existence of Israel, demanded its destruction, promised its destruction.[4] And
the paradox? That lies in the relation between these events and a model of
international relations so widespread and traditional that it is not even
recognized as a hypothesis, and which supposes that US bosses are the best
allies of the Israelis and worst enemies of the Iranians. This model predicts
Iranian denunciations of pro-Israeli policies; since we got the
inverse, we have a paradox. Once
the paradox has been spotted, we must first try to dissipate it without for
that abandoning the model. And this is proper, because all manner of
complexities might exist, and a model must not be thrown away before giving
them due consideration. For
instance, one might argue that the Israeli premier is outrageously obstinate;
the treaty, far from imperiling the security of his State, is the best tool
to protect it, but he just won’t see it. He can’t understand. One
is inclined to suppose, however, given the motivation of Israeli leaders to
properly evaluate the Iranian threat, that they must have read the text
carefully; why then can’t they understand, as Obama insists, that the treaty
protects them? New paradox. But
let us give this one a pass: let us pretend not to see it and grant that
Netanyahu somehow cannot understand the treaty. The dominant model predicts
that Washington will not sign with its worst enemies until it has satisfied
its most important allies—so fearful, they, for their survival—that the
treaty protects them. But the opposite occurred. President Obama, visibly
offended with Netanyahu’s speech, signed with his worst enemies over the
objections of his most important allies. Another paradox. We
may thus turn here and offer a different solution. Yes, the treaty with Iran is a great danger to Israel, but US
bosses have a multitude of interests. Their alliance with Israel is but one
of them. This time, other interests weighed more and this explains why the
treaty was signed. This
solution has the benefit of asserting something that is undeniable: US bosses
have a multitude of interests. The problem is that, even so, to sign an
agreement with their worst enemies—one that their best allies say prepares
the destruction of selfsame allies—renders
paradoxical the labels ‘enemy’ and ‘ally.’ And perhaps also the notion of
‘interests.’ We
are getting bogged down; a more radical solution is required. Let
us then propose that US bosses in reality are the best allies of the Iranians and the worst enemies of the Israelis. This solution evaporates the
paradox. Now the description of events makes sense: Obama & Co. signed a
nuclear treaty with their best allies, later denounced by their worst
enemies. But
hold on. A new difficulty appears. In
public, and often with a fair measure of passion, Washington claims to be the
best ally of Israel and the worst enemy of Iran. Under the new model, these
public statements become paradoxical. Can we escape this problem? One
way out is to say that public claims about our ‘preferences’ are entirely
lacking in information value; they may be ignored. This
solution receives much support from the work of economists. They study the
manner in which people’s preferences affect their decisions under conditions
of scarcity. Preferences cannot be observed; only inferred from behavior. But
not all behaviors are equally informative. Mere speech, a mere statement that
‘I love this’ or ‘I hate this,’ is so inexpensive to produce—economists call
it cheap talk—that falsification, whenever
there is an interest, becomes profitable. The
general principle is the following: the more a person pays for something, the
safer is the inference that they really prefer it. Spanish vocabulary votes
in favor of this view, for ‘caro’ means ‘expensive’ and also ‘loved.’
[English behaves similarly, for ‘dear’ likewise means both ‘expensive’ and
‘loved’ – FGW] Applying
this perspective, economists produced a revolution in experimental behavioral
science when they became psychologists, entering the lab to test the
postulates and predictions of game theory.
Psychologists
had been asking their participants to make decisions about a few cents, or
even symbolic points. That doesn’t work, said the economists; it’s the same as
asking people to tell us verbally whether they prefer this or that. In order
really to know what a person prefers, you have to observe them making
decisions over significant sums. Thus, in the behavioral economics lab,
participants can gain real money with their decisions—sometimes as much as
three months’ salary are on the table. Thanks to these investigations, quite
expensive, we have learned much in the last decades. And we are still
learning. I
think the study of politics and international relations must adopt the same
basic principle: verbal statements are cheap
talk. Their production cost is so low, and the benefits of falsification
so large, especially for politicians, that we may cast them aside. It is
quite cheap to yell, from one end, “Axis of Evil,” and from the other, “Great
Satan.” If we really wish to infer the true preferences of the power
elites—of those who make state-level decisions—then we must pay attention to
the expensive behaviors, putting words to one side. Bernadotte
Schmitt, a historian of diplomacy, implicitly made this very recommendation
when he observed: “[even]
diplomatic records… never tell the whole story of a diplomatic transaction,
as Bismarck long ago avowed, for the motives of the negotiators are seldom
declared.”[5] If
diplomats negotiating behind closed doors are averse to declaring their true
preferences, even more so politicians speaking into the microphone, when it costs
them nothing to make us happy. To understand them, then, we must pay
attention to what does cost them something, for that is where the heart is. If we
accept this reasoning, then we must watch the nuclear treaty between the
United States and Iran, whose cost of production is a great deal higher than
appeasing Israelis with an ‘I love you.’ All
right, but here comes the most important challenge.
We
have chosen this new model of international relations—which supposes US
leaders are best allies of the Iranians and worst enemies of the Israelis—in
order to explain a particular event: Netanyahu’s 2015 speech and its context.
But what about other events of similar or greater importance? Can it explain
them too? Let’s be more precise: Is the new model also more consistent with
these other events than with our previous model? That’s the question that
must decide, in a scientific evaluation, whether we (provisionally) accept
the new model or else we reject it. A
first and obvious question is: What happened afterwards? In other words,
following the signing of the treaty, what did the Iranians do? And how did US
bosses react? After
signing what Obama called “The Historic Treaty that will Prevent Iran from
Acquiring a Nuclear Weapon,” Iran immediately tested new nuclear-capable
missiles adorned with the phrase “Israel must be wiped out” (October 2015).
What was the reaction? Obama presented no objection, and the UN lifted the
sanctions earlier imposed on Iran (January 2016).[6] A few
gasps were heard in the US Congress, for Obama had promised to respond
against the ayatollahs if they developed further their ballistic missiles.
But Obama and his advisors huddled and in March presented an interpretation
according to which the treaty denies the UN Security Council any authority to
respond to Iran’s development of ballistic missiles. If that were not enough,
in April, after Iranian complaints, Obama announced that he would also
eliminate sanctions unrelated to the nuclear issue, giving the ayatollahs
indirect access to the US financial system.[7] This
is all consistent with Obama’s announcements immediately after becoming
president, the first time. In a
speech directed at the Ayatollahs, he said to them: “I
would like to speak clearly to Iran’s leaders... My administration is now
committed to diplomacy that addresses the full range of issues before us.
...This process will not be advanced by threats.”[8]
Obama
in truth does not threaten, for when the ayatollahs do not comply, there are
no consequences. All of
these events, paradoxical under the earlier model, fit quite nicely with the
new one. Can
the old model be saved? Should we limit ourselves to this evidence, then yes.
US leaders, we would then say, were traditionally the best allies of the
Israelis and the worst enemies of the Iranians, but starting with President
Obama these relations were inverted. Now,
however, if in reevaluating the earlier model for pre-Obama days we should find paradoxes there too, then we might
have to push back the date when a pro-Iranian—and, by implication,
anti-Israel—foreign policy began. The
first question concerning the previous presidency should be: In Iran’s
neighborhood, what was George Bush Jr.’s most expensive policy initiative?
Without a doubt, this was the invasion of Iraq. According to a study by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER),
by January of 2006 the invasion had already cost 630 billion dollars.[10] About
this invasion, there is a generalized opinion that it was one great gift to
Iran. Long ago, in 2006, The Guardian expressed
it thus: “Iran
is the true winner of that war. They only had to sit tight and smile as the
West delivered on a golden plate all the influence Iran had always sought in
the Middle East. The US and its allies will soon be gone from Afghanistan and
Iraq, leaving Iranian-backed Shias dominant in both countries, their
influence well spread across Syria, a chunk of Saudi Arabia and other
countries for decades to come. Historic Iranian ambitions have been fulfilled
without firing a shot while the US is reduced to fist-shaking. How foolish
was that?”[11] This
newspaper is putting its finger on a paradox, for the dominant model does not
predict that US leaders will spend billions of dollars to give Iran “all the
influence Iran had always sought in the Middle East.” It predicts just the
opposite. How to explain this result, then, without abandoning the dominant
model? What
happens is that, in Washington, says The
Guardian, they are all idiots. That’s
a solution? Now we are saying that the most powerful people in the world,
whose vast resources include a first-rate diplomatic service and the best
intelligence infrastructure, and who—in order to protect their global empire—pour
themselves into the study of geopolitics, despite all this understand
nothing. New paradox. And
it ain’t the only one. As reported in the International
Herald Tribune, as the US military invaded they bombed the Iranian
dissidents, enemies of the ayatollahs, who had established their bases in
Iraq. And then they chased the survivors on land.[12] And the ayatollahs, as reported in the Financial Times, exerted themselves mightily to
assist—politically, materially, and militarily—that invasion.[13] Why? Because, said the Financial Times, they wanted to get
rid of Saddam Hussein. Nobody doubts it. But they preferred to have their
worst enemy, the world superpower, the mighty ‘Great Satan,’ across the border? More paradoxes. The
paradoxes dissipate if we suppose that Washington, in Bush Jr.’s
administration, was already Teheran’s best friend. Thus, when the Iranians
failed to defeat Saddam Hussein, their regional rival, the US bosses moved sand
and earth to eliminate him. Then
they left, leaving Iraq ready to be swallowed as Iran’s westernmost province.
And that’s a done deal, by the way, because early this year [CORRECTION: early in 2015] the Associated Press reported that Iranian
officials had taken control of the Iraqi armies. And this, as the article
also mentions, with the approval of US generals.[14] Iran,
take good note, is inheriting all the military hardware that the US left on
the ground in that country. But
if we may push the beginning of a pro-Iranian policy back into the George
Bush Jr. presidency, it is reasonable to ask whether we can push it further
back. Bill Clinton and George Bush Sr. The previous
president was Bill Clinton. What happened there? What were his most expensive
policies? Those would be two: the containment of Iraq and his military
intervention in Yugoslavia, including the bombing of Serbia. The
containment of Iraq is a policy that lasted the entire Clinton presidency and
was later continued by George Bush Jr. until he decided to invade. It
involved restricting the military movements of Saddam Hussein with the famous
‘no fly zones’ in the northern and southern portions of his country, plus a
naval blockade, arms inspections, and economic sanctions. According to the
study by the National Bureau of
Economic Research, mentioned earlier, the policy of containment was even costlier than
that of invasion. The main
beneficiaries of that containment were the ayatollahs, for Saddam Hussein’s
Iraq was the main obstacle to their regional ambitions. To defend here
the dominant model, one would have to see this as a secondary effect and
never the intention of the policy
of containment. The problem is that the containment of Iraq began, in fact,
in the previous administration, that of George Bush Sr., and from the
beginning it was conceptualized—explicitly—as a way to strengthen Iran. After being
sworn in, Bush Sr. received in 1988 a study from the Department of State that
urged him to “strengthen Iran and contain Iraq,” and this study was included
in State’s ‘transition book,’ which prepares all pertinent questions for the
new president. The author was Zalmay Khalilzad.[15]
In
1989 Khalilzad wrote an editorial for the Los
Angeles Times detailing how the outcome of the Iran-Iraq war had left the
Iraqis militarily stronger relative to the Iranians (45 divisions against
12). This asymmetry was undesirable, said Khalilzad, echoing his influential
internal recommendation to “strengthen Iran and contain Iraq.”[16] In
1990 Khalilzad was named assistant undersecretary of defense, in charge of
the Pentagon’s policy planning. Almost immediately, after instigating Kuwait
to provoke Iraq, the US assured Saddam Hussein—by way of Ambassador April
Glaspie—that if Iraq responded militarily, in the US “we have no opinion on
the Arab-Arab conflicts, like your border disagreement with Kuwait.”[17]
When Hussein, perceiving the green light, invaded Kuwait, George Bush
launched the Gulf War—which devastated Iraq—and later began to “contain” it.
The consequence was, as Khalilzad desired, to “strengthen Iran.” This
policy to “contain Iraq”—designed to “strengthen Iran”—is the policy that
Bill Clinton followed during his entire tenure. We may, therefore, on this
evidence, push back the beginning of the pro-Iranian policy to the beginning
of the Clinton presidency. But since this was originally a Bush Sr. policy,
we may push it back a bit more. But
this is overdetermined, and we have yet to evaluate the other important evidence
from Clinton’s tenure. The
other very expensive Bill Clinton policy was his intervention in Yugoslavia.
This included the bombardment of Serbia, quite dramatic, but also many
other—less obvious and less well known—activities to arm the enemies of the
Serbs in Bosnia: Alija Izetbegovic and his followers.
As it
turns out, Izetbegovic had published in the 1970s a book titled Islamic Declaration where he expresses
his admiration for the Iranian regime of Ayatollah Khomeini and calls for the
ethnic cleansing of non-Muslim populations in Bosnia. His objective was to
create in Europe a purist Islamic state, under Sharia law, in imitation of
Iran.[18]
In 1983 the Yugoslav government had condemned Izetbegovic to 14 years in
prison—later reduced to 5—for preaching civil war in Yugoslavia.[19] Barely out of prison, in the elections of 1990, when he
competed for the Bosnian presidency, Izetbegovic republished Islamic Declaration as campaign platform.
This was one of the main causes of the civil wars in Yugoslavia. In
that conflict, the most notorious cause
célèbre of the international demonization of the Serbs was Srebrenica,
where it is alleged that the Serbs committed a great massacre of Muslims.
Examining the documentation—much of which barely saw the media light of
day—some investigators, yours truly included, have concluded that what
happened in Srebrenica were Muslim
massacres of Serbs. In
this controversy the research published in 2002 by Cees Wiebes, tasked with
putting together an addendum to the official Dutch report on these events,
for which he received unlimited access to the Dutch intelligence archives, is
of some moment.[20] Why Dutch? Because the UN blue
helmets responsible for protecting Srebrenica had been Dutch soldiers. Wiebes
documented that the Muslim ranks in Bosnia overflowed with jihadi terrorists
from other parts of the world, imported to Bosnia by agency of a joint operation
put together by the Pentagon and the Iranian ayatollahs. These revelations
caused such a stir in Holland that the Dutch government—implicated in these
events, for they had been on the ground—resigned.[21]
There
is much food for further comment in all this (see here),
but putting that aside, we must observe that these events are once again consistent
with the hypothesis of a close alliance between US and Iranian bosses. And
this justifies, aside from the evidence already considered, the
interpretation that, from the beginning of the Clinton presidency, Washington
was already Teheran’s best ally. But,
as we already said, we can push this back to the beginning of Bush Sr.’s
tenure, whose Gulf War and policy of containment, according to chief planner
Zalmay Khalilzad, were meant to strengthen Iran. Arriving
here, then, the obvious question is whether we cannot push back the
usefulness of our new model to interpret President Ronald Reagan’s tenure,
which coincided with the Iran-Iraq war. That
war is one that Ayatollah Khomeini provoked when he sent weapons to Kurdish rebels
in Iraq’s north and Shia rebels in its south, yielding the predictable
consequence: Saddam Hussein sent his troops against Iran. But
Khomeini wasn’t ready because, after the Iranian revolutionary shootout, he
was short on spare parts and ammunition for his military infrastructure. Who
had these? ‘Great Satan’—object of Khomeini’s very public and emotional
diatribes—for Khomeini had inherited his made-in-the-USA arsenal from the
deposed Shah, ally and client of Washington. As
the New York Times explained, “Iran
at that time was in dire need of arms and spare parts for its American-made
arsenal.”[22] But
if ‘Great Satan’—his worst enemy—would have to supply Khomeini with spare
parts and ammunition, then why—never pausing in his barrage of insults
against the United States—did he provoke a war with Iraq, whose military
infrastructure was formidable? Paradox—another.
The
new model dissipates the paradox. Casting aside—as always—public expressions
of friendship or enmity, if we suppose that Reagan was Khomeini’s ally, then
Khomeini was counting on getting US weapons shipments to fight Iraq. Those
shipments arrived, in fact, right on time.
‘Iran-Contra’
became the biggest scandal of the Reagan presidency. Even as Reagan denounced
in public the Iranian regime, the CIA had been sending billions of dollars in
weaponry to the ayatollahs. When this became public, Reagan explained to his
amazed citizenry that he had been entirely out of the loop, but those
responsible, in any case, had acted in good faith. How
so? In
Lebanon, he said, the terrorist group Hezbollah had taken hostage a handful
of US citizens; so, because Hezbollah is a creation of the Iranian
Revolutionary Guard, they had sent billions of dollars in clandestine
weaponry to the ayatollahs, hoping they would in return lean on Hezbollah to
release those hostages. This
explanation courts absurdity. But in any case, as a congressional
investigation showed ten years later, it is inadmissible in principle. Why?
Because the arms transfers to Iran began in 1981, but Hezbollah didn’t take its first hostage until 1982. So those transfers had nothing
to do with releasing hostages.[23] What remains? Once again the pattern
of alliance—a dramatic alliance—between US bosses and the Iranian ayatollahs. We
may then push back the origin of this alliance, on this evidence, all the way
back to the inauguration of Ronald Reagan, which happened in 1981, when those
arms transfers began. There
is just one president left: Jimmy Carter. For it was during his tenure, in
1979, that Ayatollah Khomeini’s theocratic Islamist revolution triumphed,
inaugurating the terrorist regime that to this day governs Iran. It is
quite interesting, here, that beyond having created the Shah of Iran’s
military infrastructure, the United States had built also his intelligence
and secret police operation: SAVAK. In fact, SAVAK was considered a franchise
of the CIA, and Khomeini, when he was in the opposition, denounced it in
those very terms: as Great Satan’s tool. The dominant model, consistent with
the public expressions of enmity, predicted that Khomeini, after taking
power, would get rid of SAVAK. The
opposite happened. Khomeini
baptized his own internal espionage and repressive apparatus with the name
SAVAMA and tapped Hossein Fardust, a close friend of the Shah, and heretofore
SAVAK’s number two, to lead it. And not only that. Practically all of SAVAK’s
personnel remained to staff SAVAMA. “They
are the same!”, cried Al Tabatabai—press attaché at the Shah’s embassy in
Washington—to the media, after the Islamist coup, right before a bullet
silenced him in front of his home, in Maryland.[24] Another
paradox? But we can get rid of it too if we suppose that the Islamist coup in
Iran was, from the beginning, US policy, and coordinated, most probably, with
SAVAK’s own operatives—that is to say, with the CIA. This
hypothesis receives additional support if you consider Jimmy Carter’s
creation of the Rapid Deployment Joint Task Force (RDJTF), soon to become the
US Central Command or CENTCOM. This is a gigantic investment—very expensive.
CENTCOM’s mission is to protect, by means of military deployment, the
interests of US bosses in an ‘Area of Responsibility’ (AOR) that includes the
countries of the Middle East, North Africa, and Central Asia.
The New York Times explains that “The
origins of the Central Command go back to 1979 when the Shah of Iran was
overthrown and his country was in turmoil as a result of the Islamic
revolution… To
provide a military capability to back up President [Carter's] policy in the
Gulf, [in 1980] a command designated the Rapid Deployment Joint Task Force,
which was to be a precursor of Centcom, was formed. Paul X. Kelley…[its] first
commander…was told to draw up plans to
defend Iran against a Soviet invasion…”[25] So,
from the very moment that Ayatollah Khomeini’s regime began, Washington
became its protector. This is interesting because everybody recognizes that
the previous ruler, the Shah of Iran, had been a US ally, but CENTCOM was not
created to protect the Shah, but to protect Khomeini’s theocratic and
terrorist regime. Support
for Ayatollah Khomeini’s regime, therefore, began with Ayatollah Khomeini, during Jimmy Carter’s presidency.
To
summarize, Washington powerbrokers have not been erratic but deadly
consistent in their support for Iran. From Carter to Obama, Democrat or
Republican, they have all followed a pro-Iranian policy. It’s
time we returned to the question of Israel. If we suppose that Washington
powerbrokers are not only consistent, but also rational and logical, this is
bad news for Israel, for the ayatollahs, so favored by US policy, promise out
loud to destroy the Jewish State. Let
us ask, then: Aside from the nuclear treaty with Iran, what has been the
dearest policy of these US bosses toward Israel? Without
question, this has been what they call the ‘Peace Process,’ or the ‘Oslo
Process,’ after the city where the accord was negotiated that set events on
the path toward the ‘Two-State Solution,’ one for Israel, and another for the
Palestinians in the territories of Judea and Samaria (‘West Bank’). Though
the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993-94, from Jimmy Carter forward all
presidents have pushed in this direction, with threats against the Israelis
whenever deemed necessary.[26] Let
us evaluate the context. First. These are territories that Israel
acquired in 1967, after defeating a Muslim coalition whose announced
purpose—according to the main instigator, Gamal abd el Nasser of Egypt—was
the destruction of Israel.[27] Second. When the dust cleared, the Pentagon
conducted a secret study—since declassified—concerning Israeli security,
according to which, without the territories of Judea and Samaria, Israel
cannot survive a Muslim world determined to destroy it.[28]
Third. The beneficiary of US presidential
diplomacy, and presumed future government of any Palestinian State, is Yasser
Arafat’s and Mahmoud Abbas’s PLO/Fatah,
now better known as the ‘Palestinian Authority.’ Fourth. PLO/Fatah, in 1974, elaborated a document called the ‘Plan of
Phases,’ according to which they would promise peace in order to enter
negotiations and would then utilize any territory thus acquired to destroy
Israel.[29] Fifth. Even though few now remember this, it
was explained on the front page of the New
York Times in 1979: PLO/Fatah
armed and trained Ayatollah Khomeini’s guerrillas, the same that fought the
Islamic revolution of 1979. Then, PLO/Fatah assisted with the creation of
SAVAMA (Khomeini’s intelligence infrastructure) and also the Revolutionary
Guard. Together, Arafat and Khomeini promised to destroy Israel.[30]
Sixth. The relationship between PLO/Fatah and Iran remains very close. To
cite one piece of evidence, right as the nuclear deal between the US and Iran
was about to be signed, the official Iranian press office announced, in
August of last year, that PLO/Fatah
and Iran had signed an agreement for “all out cooperation.”[31] It
follows, does it not, that the US has insisted in giving Judea and
Samaria—territories indispensable to Israeli security—to Iran, the State
whose entire mission in life is to destroy the Jewish State. It
seems fair to conclude that the policy of the US presidents has been
radically pro-Iranian and, in consequence, radically anti-Israeli. On this
basis I believe we should replace our model of international relations. If we
wish to predict what is going to happen in the following months and the
following years—instead of finding ourselves totally staggered, astonished,
and amazed by every new headline—well then we need a model that does match the events of the last four
decades, rather than insist with a model that produces only paradoxes when we
cover the length of those four decades. Many
thanks for your attention.
[1] Quine, W. V. 1976[1966]. The Ways of Paradox and Other Essays:
Revised and Enlarged Edition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
(p.1) [2] Complete Transcript of Netanyahu’s
address to Congress. Washington Post.
3 March 2015. [3]
In order to evaluate
Netanyahu’s statements about the nuclear treaty, one must read and analyze
the text of the treaty. The following article analyzes the content of the
treaty and provides links so that anyone interested can read directly the
text of the same. “A
Bad Deal”; Times of Israel; August
2, 2015; by Nevet Basker. [4] Iranian leaders, with great
consistency, have been calling for Israel’s destruction over the years, ever
since Ayatollah Khomeini insisted that “[Israel] should vanish from the page
of time.” Their intent is clearly genocidal. Here follow three more recent
examples, and then a link to a source that lists many more incitements by
Iranian leaders. EXAMPLE 1 “the Iranian President [called] for
Israel to be ‘wiped off the map’...” This
is a reference to a statement made by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, at the time
President of Iran. SOURCE:
BLAIR CONSIDERS UN SANCTIONS AS HE SPEAKS OF 'REVULSION' AT IRANIAN
PRESIDENT'S SPEECH, The Independent (London), October 28, 2005, Friday, Final
Edition; NEWS; Pg. 5, 745 words, BY ANNE PENKETH AND COLIN BROWN EXAMPLE 2: “One of Iran’s most influential ruling
cleric [sic] called Friday on the Muslim states to use nuclear weapon against
Israel, assuring them that while such an attack would annihilate Israel,
it would cost them ‘damages only’. ‘If a
day comes when the world of Islam is duly equipped with the arms Israel has
in possession, the strategy of colonialism would face a stalemate because application of an atomic bomb would not
leave any thing in Israel but the same thing would just produce damages in
the Muslim world,’ Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani told the crowd
at the traditional Friday prayers in Tehran. Analysts
said not only Mr. Hashemi-Rafsanjani’s speech was the strongest against
Israel, but also this is the first time that a prominent leader of the
Islamic Republic openly suggests the use of nuclear weapon against the Jewish
State.” We
point out that Hashemi Rafsanjani is not merely “one of Iran’s most
influential ruling cleric[s],” but the very father of the Iranian nuclear
program. SOURCE:
“RAFSANJANI SAYS MUSLIMS SHOULD USE NUCLEAR WEAPON AGAINST ISRAEL”; Iran
Press Service; 14 December 2001
“Israel… has no cure but to be
annihilated.” This
is a message that Iranian ‘supreme leader’ (it’s an official title) Ayatollah
Ali Khamenei sent on his Twitter account in November 2014. SOURCE:
“IRAN’S KHAMENEI: NO CURE FOR BARBARIC ISRAEL BUT ANNIHILATION; Slate; 9 November 2014; by Daniel
Politi THE LONG LIST If
you have the stomach for it, and would like to consult a longer list of
documented incitements to genocide against the Israeli Jews, you may do so in
the following sources: http://jcpa.org/article/20-threats-iranian-leaders-made-in-2013/ http://jcpa.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/IransIntent2012b.pdf [5] Schmitt, B. E. (1936). Review: American Neutrality, 1914-1917. The Journal of Modern History, 8(2), 200-211. (p.203) [6] We
give a detailed, documented account of this sequence of events in the
following article: “Introduction: The Iran Deal: What does it teach us?”; from
PSYCHOLOGICAL WARFARE & POLITICAL GRAMMAR; Historical and Investigative
Research; 31 August 2016; by Francisco Gil-White [7] We give a detailed, documented
account of this sequence of events in the following article: “Introduction: The Iran Deal: What does it teach us?”; from
PSYCHOLOGICAL WARFARE & POLITICAL GRAMMAR; Historical and Investigative
Research; 31 August 2016; by Francisco Gil-White [8] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HY_utC-hrjI [10]
“War in Iraq versus Containment”; Prepared for the CESifo Conference
on “Guns and Butter: The Economic Causes and Consequences of Conflict,” held
in Munich, Germany on December 9 and 10, 2005; by Steven J. Davis, Kevin M.
Murphy, and Robert H. Topel. (All are scholars at the University of Chicago
School of Business and the National Bureau of Economic Research.) [11] Comment & Debate: No more fantasy
diplomacy: cut a deal with the mullahs: Iran cannot be prevented from
developing nuclear weapons, only delayed. We must negotiate not ratchet up
the rhetoric, The Guardian (London) - Final Edition, February 7, 2006
Tuesday, GUARDIAN COMMENT AND DEBATE PAGES ; Pg. 31, 1095 words, Polly
Toynbee [12] “U.S. Bombed Bases of Iranian Rebels
in Iraq”; International Herald Tribune | New York Times; Thursday 17 April
2003; by Douglas Jehl [13] “War Sirens Herald Iran's Hour of Revenge”; Financial
Times; March 24, 2003, Monday Usa Edition 1; Section: Comment & Analysis;
Pg. 17; Headline: War Sirens Herald Iran's Hour Of Revenge; By Khairallah
Khairallah [14]
“Two to three Iranian military
aircraft a day land at Baghdad airport, bringing in weapons and ammunition.
Iran's most potent military force and best known general — the Revolutionary
Guard's elite Quds Force and its commander Gen. Ghasem Soleimani — are
organizing Iraqi forces and have become the de facto leaders of Iraqi Shiite
militias that are the backbone of the fight [against ISIS]. Iran carried out
airstrikes to help push militants from an Iraqi province on its border.” FUENTE:
Iran Has Never Been More Influential In Iraq”; Associated Press; 12 January 2015; by Hamza Hendawi Qassim
Abdul-zahra. “Asked
[by reporters] about Iran’s military operations in Iraq,” Army General Martin
Dempsey—nothing less than the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff—expressed: “ ‘I think Iranian influence
will be positive,’ ” and he celebrated that “ ‘the two countries [move] more
closely together economically or even politically…’ ” FUENTE:
“Dempsey: US eyes new ways to aid Iraq forces”; Daily Mail; 8 January 2015; by Associated Press [15]
“Mr. Bush and his aides were
urged to rethink Persian Gulf policy from the moment they took office.
Shortly after Mr. Bush won the Presidency in November 1988, a State
Department strategist drafted a paper for the President-elect urging that the
United States take a fresh approach to the region. Mr.
Khalilzad advised in the paper that America's new policy should concentrate
on strengthening Iran and containing Iraq. The paper was included in the
State Department Policy Planning Staff's official 'transition book,' which
reviewed all the foreign policy issues the new President would soon have to
confront.” SOURCE:
THE 1992 CAMPAIGN; Bush’s Greatest Glory Fades As Questions on Iraq Persist, The New York Times, June 27, 1992,
Saturday, Late Edition - Final, George Bush, Section 1; Page 1; Column 5;
Foreign Desk, 2554 words, By ELAINE SCIOLINO with MICHAEL WINES, Special to
The New York Times, WASHINGTON, June 26 [16]
“Iran Future As A Pawn Or A Gulf
Power”; Byline: Zalmay Khalilzad; Los Angeles Times July 16, 1989, Sunday,
Home Edition Section: Opinion; Part 5; Page 2; Column 4; Opinion Desk [17]
To see the documentation on how
the US instigated Kuwait to provoke Iraq, read the section titled “The
US ordered Kuwait to provoke Irak” in the following article: “Why Bush
Sr.'s 1991 Gulf War? To Protect Iranian Islamism: Like father, like son: this
is also the purpose of Bush Jr.'s war.” Historical
and Investigative Research; 20 Dec 2005; by Francisco Gil-White To
see the documentation on the exchange between ambassador April Glaspie and
Saddam Hussein—object of a sharp controversy in the United States after it
was published by the Iraqi government—visit: “CONFRONTATION
IN THE GULF; Excerpts From Iraqi Document on Meeting With U.S. Envoy”; The New York Times; 23 September 1990. [18] I
analyzed here the translation to the French, which is the version
that I originally consulted: Izetbegovic, Alija.
1999 [1980]. Le manifeste Islamique
(original title: Islamska deklaracija).
Beyrouth-Liban: Éditions
Al-Bouraq. (pp. 75-76; 81-82; 105; 118; 132) The
English translation may be read online here: [19]
“...The court found the accused guilty because it held that
their activity had been directed against brotherhood and unity, and the
equality of our nations and nationalities with a view to destroying
Bosnia-Hercegovina as a Socialist Republic and thus of undermining the social
order of the SFRY. For the criminal act of association for the
purpose of enemy activity and counter-revolutionary threatening of the social
order Alija (Mustafa) Izetbegovic was sentenced to 14 years'...” SOURCE: Copyright 1983 The British Broadcasting Corporation, Bbc Summary Of World Broadcasts, August 22, 1983, Monday,
Part 2 Eastern Europe; B. Internal Affairs; Yugoslavia; Ee/7418/B/1;
, 372 Words, Muslim Nationalists Convicted, (A) Yugoslav
News Agency 1555 Gmt 12 Aug 83 Text Of Report
Belgrade Home Service 1700 Gmt 20 Aug 83 [20] Wiebes, C. (2003). Intelligence and the war in Bosnia
1992-1995: The role of the intelligence and security. Amsterdam:
Netherlands Institute for War Documentation. [21]
Dutch Report: Us Sponsored Foreign Islamists In Bosnia";
By Richard J Aldrich; The Guardian (LONDON); Monday April 22, 2002 To read the Guardian article, go to “Dutch
Report: Us Sponsored Foreign Islamists In Bosnia”: [22] The New York Times, December 8, 1991, The Iran Pipeline: A Hidden Chapter/A special report.; U.S. Said to Have Allowed Israel to Sell Arms to Iran, By Seymour Hersh [23]
The arms transfers, explained
the New York Times, began “in
1981,” which is to say, “before the
Iranian-sponsored seizure of American hostages in Lebanon began in 1982…”
(my emphasis). Astonishingly, instead of putting the obvious hypothesis on
the table—that the US had a policy, even then, to strengthen Iran—the New York Times ducked: “No American
rationale for permitting covert arms sales to Iran could be established.” So
they sent the weapons… just because? SOURCE:
The Iran Pipeline: A Hidden Chapter/A special report.; U.S. Said to Have
Allowed Israel to Sell Arms to Iran, The New York Times, December 8, 1991,
Sunday, Late Edition - Final, Section 1; Part 1; Page 1; Column 1; Foreign
Desk, 2897 words, By SEYMOUR M. HERSH, Special to The New York Times,
WASHINGTON, Dec. 7 [24]
“If the Ayatollah Khomeini was
an enemy of the United States ruling elite, why did he adopt the CIA's
security service?”; Historical and
Investigative Research; 23 February 2006; by Francisco Gil-White [25]
The New York Times, July 22,
1988, Friday, Late City Final Edition, Section A; Page 9, Column 1;
National Desk, 1220 words, WASHINGTON TALK: THE MILITARY; Now
Chiefs Fight for Command Nobody Wanted, By BERNARD E. TRAINOR, Special
to the New York Times, WASHINGTON, July 21 [26]
“US foreign policy in the
Arab-Israeli conflict”; from PSYCHOLOGICAL WARFARE AND POLITICAL GRAMMAR; Historical and Investigative Research;
May 2016; [27] Howard Sachar, A History of Israel: From the Rise of Zionism to Our Time (New
York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1979) p. 616 [28]
PENTAGON STUDY: This Pentagon
document was apparently declassified in 1979 but not published until 1984 in
the Journal of Palestine Studies: "Memorandum
for the Secretary of Defense"; Journal of Palestine Studies, Vol. 13,
No. 2. (Winter, 1984), pp. 122-126. It is
also published as an appendix in: Netanyahu, B. 2000. A durable peace: Israel and its place among the nations, 2 edition. New York: Warner Books. (APPENDIX: The Pentagon Plan, June 29, 1967; pp.433-437) [29]
“Shortly after signing the
Declaration of Principles and the famous handshake between [PLO leader
Yasser] Arafat and [Israeli prime minister] Yitzhak Rabin on the White House
lawn, Arafat was declaring to his Palestinian constituency over Jordanian
television that Oslo was to be understood in terms of the [PLO’s] Palestine
National Council’s 1974 decision. This was a reference to the so-called Plan
of Phases, according to which the Palestine Liberation Organization [PLO]
would acquire whatever territory it could by negotiations, then use that land
as a base for pursuing its ultimate goal of Israel’s annihilation.” FUENTE:
Levin, K. 2005. The Oslo syndrome: Delusions of a people under siege.
Hanover, NH: Smith and Kraus. (p.ix) [30]
“PLO/Fatah
and Iran: The Special Relationship”; Historical and
Investigative Research;
25 May 2010 [revised and improved, 8 September 2010]; by Francisco Gil-White [31] “PLO figure: Iran, Palestine in deal
for all-out cooperation”; IRNA; 11 August 2015. |
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