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Will the US attack Iran? An alternative hypothesis Historical and Investigative Research - 23 Feb 2006 The president of the United States has made angry
public statements against Iran because Iran apparently wishes to acquire
nuclear weaponry. Will the US attack Iran? Some of my readers have asked me
to make a prediction. This is my view: A scientist who pays attention not
to the public statements, but to the record of past United States behaviors
towards Iran and Israel, will have to be surprised if the US
attacks Iran. Naturally, a scientist must predict what she expects, not what
would surprise her, so the scientific prediction here is that the US will
not attack Iran. But can we think of an alternative reason, then, for
all this media noise concerning Iran’s nukes? Yes: I believe the point of
this is to produce a diplomatic effort to strip Israel of
its nuclear arsenal. For example, take a look at the Toronto Star: “That Iran’s
nuclear research program must come back under UN control goes without saying.
But for that country’s pride, some counter-weight has to be offered.”[1] What “counter-weight” will we throw at Iranian
“pride” to make the Iranians stop seeking nukes? The Toronto Star
drops a hint:
I think I can sniff the direction this is eventually
going in: Israel’s nuclear arsenal dismantled in exchange for Iranian
cooperation with a ‘nuclear-free Middle East.’ In fact, as we shall see
below, the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) has already referred the
matter to the UN Security Council with this very recommendation. I can see, however, one plausible scenario
where the US does indeed attack Iran. But it would not be to stop Iran’s
nuclear program (though this would certainly be the publicly given reason).
Rather, should the US -- surprisingly -- attack Iran, this will be in
order -- not so surprisingly -- to create the conditions for a Muslim
attack on Israel. I will explain this possibility as well. ___________________________________________________________ Table of Contents █ The
public atmosphere being created: not conducive █ The true relation of geopolitical
forces
█ The impact of the media █
Raymond McGovern: useful if you understand who he is (CIA) █ Raymond McGovern says that Iran has a right to get nuclear weapons
█ Is
Raymond McGovern an anti-Israeli propagandist? █ Says
Raymond McGovern: destroy Israel’s nuclear program; buy a “nuclear-free zone
in the Middle East” █ The IAEA calls for a 'nuclear-free Middle East.' The media follows McGovern in applauding this, and so does...the
Israeli government! █ But
the US might yet attack Iran ___________________________________________________________ The public atmosphere being created:
not conducive to a US attack on Iran The public is being bombarded with the ‘news’ that
Iran is trying to get nuclear weapons and that the Western powers are supposedly
very upset about that. In consequence, there is much speculation that perhaps
the US will attack Iran. However, President Bush is highly unpopular at home
and abroad for launching a war against Iraq on a pretext that everybody now
considers to have been a lie: the alleged presence of so-called ‘weapons of
mass destruction’ (WMDs). And “the campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan have
stretched the military capability of the world’s only superpower to the
limit,”[2]
disgruntling the soldiers, so the general circumstances do not appear
conducive to Bush launching a new war, on the same pretext, when the
previous military engagements have not even been completed. The climate in the media this time around is also
very different. Before the attack on Iraq, the media told the public that
attacking Iraq might be unfair but -- crucially -- not too dangerous. We were
told that there was insufficient evidence that Saddam Hussein really had
WMDs. And he was not really a threat, even with WMDs, we were told, because
he was already not in charge of much of his country, patrolled as it was by
NATO. Moreover, he was letting the UN inspectors in, so why not just continue
with the inspections? The Bush administration claimed that Saddam Hussein was
in league with Al Qaeda, but the media consistently contradicted this, and
told the public over and over again that there was no evidence to link Saddam
Hussein with Al Qaeda. In sum, an attack on Iraq would be unfair and
unnecessary, but it would not be too dangerous. True, some argued that
attacking Iraq might lead to an increase in Islamist radicalism, but this was
presented as a diffuse rather than a direct and immediate threat. By sharp
contrast, the mass media is now telling the Western public that attacking Iran
would represent a direct and immediate threat to them
personally -- economic, terrorist, and military. Here follow some
examples from last week. On 12 February 2006 The Buffalo News wrote: “...a Los
Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll done in late January showed that 57 percent of
Americans favored military action to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear
weapons. It’s unclear whether pollsters asked those in favor if they were
prepared to watch Iran wreck the world economy by withholding oil from the
market and watching the price rise to $100 a barrel.”[3] In other words, the 57% of Americans who favor an
attack on Iran -- a slim majority -- are wrong because Iran might “wreck the
world economy” by doubling oil prices if attacked. And yet this is mild. A much bigger paper, The
Boston Globe, tells its American readers that Iran might kill them
if the US attacks Iran, and they assure us that this is the opinion of US
intelligence and military strategists, no less: “Iran is prepared
to launch attacks using long-range missiles, secret commando units, and
terrorist allies planted around the globe in retaliation for any strike on
the country’s nuclear facilities, according to new US intelligence
assessments and military specialists. ...military
and intelligence analysts warn that Iran -- which a recent US intelligence
report described as ‘more confident and assertive’ than it has been since the
early days of the 1979 Islamic revolution -- could unleash reprisals across
the region, and perhaps even inside the United States, if the hard-line
regime came under attack.”[4] Accordingly, the public is also being told that the
US means to follow a more pragmatic and diplomatic approach this time around.
Says The Daily Telegraph: “...having
achieved an early degree of consensus, the White House is determined to
maintain a united international response in the hope that it might ultimately
persuade the hard-line Iranian regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to come
to its senses.”[5] The US, in “consensus” with others, will generate an
“international response” that will try to “persuade.” It is the only way
because, as The Guardian explains, “Iran knows its
strength. The Iraq adventure has exposed the painful limits to force, and
America can no longer make a credible threat of invasion: it has forfeited
the power to frighten.”[5a] But the best reasons to be skeptical that the US
will attack Iran are not the above. In my view, the US ruling elite does not
want to attack Iran now for the same reasons that it hasn’t wanted to attack
Iran in the past: because the US ruling elite is allied with the Iranian
elite against Israel. ___________________________________________________________ The true relation of geopolitical
forces If you are a consumer of the Western mass media you
will likely perceive the structure of geopolitical alliances in a completely
different way: with the US supposedly allied with Israel against Iran. I
think you should be skeptical of this model, and to motivate your skepticism
I will present, from an awesome heap of data, just two revealing items: one
to illustrate what I believe is the true relationship between the US and
Iran, and another to illustrate the true relationship between the US and
Israel (I will leave you to consult the detailed HIR investigations on these
relationships if you find the two examples proffered insufficient). Then I
will move on to explain what I think all this noise concerning Iran’s nuclear
program is really about.
Because the media steers your attention always to
what public officials say in their diplomatic exchanges, many people
have gotten the impression, since 1979, that the Islamist Iranian ruling
elite and the US ruling elite are enemies. True, the Iranian Islamists helped
oust the Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, and the shah had indeed been a
repressive right-wing US puppet installed in power by a 1953 CIA coup.[6] It
is true that Khomeini supporters in Iran denounced the brutal SAVAK,[6a] and
true that, as The Washington Post says, the Ayatollah Khomeini himself
“came to power denouncing the shah’s dreaded SAVAK secret service,” which the
CIA had created for the shah.[7] Moreover, the new
Iranian government, after the shah left but before Khomeini took
completely over, indeed “promised to abolish SAVAK.”[8] Be
that as it may, what I think matters most is that Khomeini, once in power,
was not bothered in the least by the “very close ties that SAVAK, under the
shah, [had] maintained with the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.”[7] In fact, Khomeini was so unbothered
by this that he turned SAVAK (i.e. the CIA), wholesale, into his repressive
security service.[9] So Khomeini
was an enemy of the US? On the contrary: Khomeini betrayed the Iranian
revolution. It is true, of course, that Khomeini began calling
the United States ‘Great Satan’ in public and even seized hostages at the US
embassy in Tehran (redeemed for an astonishing and, to the Iranian Islamists,
quite convenient sum of US dollars)[10];
and it is true also that US officials reciprocated with counter-denunciations
of the Iranian mullahs. The public rhetoric indeed was: ‘we are enemies.’
Moreover, Khomeini said aloud that he wasn’t interested in continuing the
shah’s arms purchases from the US.[11]
But, once again, I think it matters more that the secret behaviors of
the US and Iran were just the opposite: throughout the Iran-Iraq war that
began immediately after Khomeini rose to power, the Reagan administration
sent billions of dollars in armament, every year, to the Iranian Islamists --
who paid for these weapons. This became part of the infamous
‘Iran-Contra’ scandal (also called ‘Iran-gate’) when made public.[12] Once exposed, Reagan administration officials
stammered that they had done it all to beg the Iranians for their influence
on the Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon, in the hopes that Hezbollah would let
its handful of US hostages go. That is to say, the US ruling elite had
been sending billions of dollars in military hardware, every year, for many years,
to Iran, an Islamist and terrorist state that murdered its own
teenagers in fanatical ‘human wave’ attacks against Iraqi artillery, because,
US officials earnestly explained, they had been trying to free a few US
citizens who were the hostages, in Lebanon, of a Lebanese terrorist
organization. This explanation was always a bit of a stretch, so I
felt some relief when I found out that it couldn’t be true. As The New
York Times has since explained, it was “soon after
taking office in 1981 [that] the Reagan Administration secretly and abruptly
changed United States policy and allowed…several billion dollars’ worth of
American-made arms, spare parts and ammunition to the Iranian Government… The
change in policy came before the Iranian-sponsored seizure of American
hostages in Lebanon began in 1982. . .”[13]
(my emphasis) In other words, since the arms shipments began
before any hostages existed in Lebanon, the arms shipments cannot logically
have had anything to do with releasing hostages in Lebanon. And,
therefore, says The New York Times, “No American rationale for
permitting covert arms sales to Iran could be established.” But aren’t we
lacking a bit in imagination? If the US ruling elite was not arming the Iranians
to the teeth for many years in order to release a handful of hostages in
Lebanon (as it claimed when caught), then how about this hypothesis: the US ruling
elite wanted Iran to win the Iran-Iraq war. One might be tempted to object that this hypothesis
is a bit too obvious, but in science this is not a valid objection. For the sake of argument, what would this mean,
geopolitically? To get a handle on that, we need to understand what was
perceived to be at stake in the Iran-Iraq war. As The New Yorker’s
Milton Viorst explained: “At stake was
whether the secular Baathism of Saddam [Hussein] or the radical Shiism of
[the Ayatollah] Khomeini would prevail in Iraq, and perhaps in the Middle
East.”[14] So, if the US wanted Iran to win the
Iran-Iraq war, then it wanted Iranian-style Islamism to spread in the Middle
East. But would this make any sense? Well, it would certainly be consistent
with other major foreign policy behaviors of the United States. For
example, this is: 1) consistent
with the Gulf War, which the US provoked to destroy Iraq after US strategists
fretted out loud that, since Iran had lost the Iran-Iraq war (despite all the
US help), it was imperative to strengthen Iran and contain Iraq[15];
and 2) consistent
with the current US invasion of Iraq, which -- everybody seems agreed -- will
turn Iraq into a de facto province of Iran once the American troops
leave.[16] My hypothesis is also consistent with Jared Israel’s
well-documented and more general hypothesis that overall US policy in Asia
has been to sponsor Islamist radicalism with the aim to destabilize US rivals
in that part of the world.[17] More
specifically, the view that the US wanted Islamist radicalism to win in the
Iran-Iraq war is: 1) consistent
with the US creation -- with the help of Pakistani and Saudi Arabian
Islamists -- of the Islamist/terrorist force of the mujahedin (or mujahideen)
in Afghanistan, to attack the Soviet Union[18]; 2) consistent
with US Pentagon-Iranian cooperation to import thousands of these same
mujahedin to Bosnia to fight alongside Alija Izetbegovic against the Bosnian
Serbs[19]; 3) consistent
with the fact that Alija Izetbegovic was an Islamist and terrorist, and a big
fan of the Ayatollah Khomeini, creator of the Iranian Islamo-terrorist regime[19a];
and 4) consistent with
the tight alliance over the years between the US and Saudi Arabia, a major
sponsor of Islamist terror everywhere in Asia, and also the country that the
US has armed more than any other in the world.[20] My hypothesis is consistent with much else besides,
and you may consult HIR’s in-depth investigation into the relationship
between the US and Iran here: And yet despite all this evidence, which is publicly
available, The New York Times ‘concludes’ that, since the absurd ‘arms
for hostages’ explanation was false, we just cannot imagine why the US ruling
elite would arm the Iranians… This can be topped, however. Just the other
day, the British daily The Guardian explained the supposed Iranian-US
enmity as follows: “Iran will never forgive the US for backing Iraq in the
bloody eight-year Iran-Iraq war.”[21] So
the fact that the US in fact backed Iran in that war (followed up by
the US destruction of Iraq, an additional courtesy to Iran[22])
is simply denied -- just like that. You are supposed to treat US public
statements -- (the US did say in public that it preferred an Iraqi
victory) -- as the real data, paying zero attention to the actual behaviors
of US policymakers. The Guardian also says,
about the ongoing invasion of Iraq, that “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?” But why is this presented as “foolish”? What we have to explain is why every major policy
initiative of the US in the Middle East, year after year, turns out to
benefit Iran. The Guardian says: incompetence. But will incompetence
produce the exact same result, year after numbing year? Perhaps it can. But
the obvious hypothesis, when an actor engages over and over again in
behaviors that achieve always the same result, is that the actor desires this
result: the US ruling elite wants to strengthen Iran. This hypothesis,
however, will not be put on the table. Not even to be considered. Not even to
be dismissed with derision. In this way, the most obvious hypothesis becomes unthinkable.
In 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon because the PLO,
from its bases there, was murdering Israeli civilians (in addition to
terrorizing the Lebanese population). The Israeli operation was successful,
but right as the Israelis were about to deal the PLO terrorists the final
blow, the Reagan administration intervened to save the PLO from the Israelis,
moreover providing this terrorist organization with a military escort to
their new refuge -- in Tunis.[23] Why? Because the US is an ally of Israel? From Tunis the PLO was finding it very difficult to
kill Israelis, so the PLO was in fact defeated, at this time. But once
again the PLO’s problems were solved by the US when Bush Sr.’s administration
threatened the Israelis for 8 months with the withdrawal of all economic aid
unless they agreed to bring the PLO inside Israel, which the Israelis finally
did when the Clinton administration continued these policies (known
collectively as the Oslo ‘Peace’ Process).[24]
This US bully diplomacy, which has allowed the PLO to kill many more Israelis
than before, has increased to a high pitch in Bush Jr.’s administration, with
the results that we can all see. Now, would an ally of Israel force the Jewish state
to accept as the government over the West Bank and Gaza Arabs an organization
-- the PLO -- whose controlling core, Al Fatah, traces its roots to Adolf
Hitler’s Final Solution,[25] and whose
founding (and still current) charter states that its purpose is the
extermination of the Israeli Jews?[26] No. An ally would not. My hypothesis that the US is not an ally of Israel
is consistent with sundry other details, such as the fact that, as the Oslo
‘Peace’ Process began in 1994, the CIA was training the PLO, even though the
PLO was that very minute explaining in public, in English, to the Western
press, that it was going to be killing Israeli civilians (and any Arabs who
didn’t want to kill Jews).[27] My hypothesis
is consistent with much else besides, which you may verify by consulting
HIR’s in-depth investigation into the US-Israel relationship here:
Most people do not understand the true arrangement
of geopolitical forces because the Western mass media generally portrays the
US as an enemy of Iran and a friend of Israel. This is in direct contradiction
to the easily documented behavioral facts, and yet a perfect echo of
what US government officials say in their statements to the public. In other
words, the media interprets the pattern of geopolitical alliances precisely
as US government propagandists also do. This naturally suggests that the
Western mass media and the US government are controlled by the same
interests. HIR has produced many demonstrations supporting this but perhaps
the most useful to a newcomer will be the following: But if the media is dishing out propaganda, is it
still possible to figure out what is going on? It is, because you can begin reading
the news with the goal of understanding not what is being ‘reported,’ but
what is being prepared. For example, take Raymond McGovern. ___________________________________________________________ Raymond McGovern: useful if you
understand who he is (CIA) In the year 2002 Raymond McGovern published
editorials in USA Today, The Christian Science Monitor, USA
Today again, The Boston Globe, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel,
and The Washington Post.[27a] It
is just one year, and just one category of media exposure: I give it to you
as an example. He is everywhere. In addition to publishing him with gusto,
the media sits ‘Ray’ McGovern down for interviews left and right, using him
also as a source on all matters having to do with intelligence and foreign
policy. Oh, and if Raymond McGovern ever says anything in public against the
Bush administration, he is immediately quoted, for he is “outspoken Bush
critic Ray McGovern.”[27b] To get a
better sense for the sheer statistical breadth of McGovern's astonishing
media exposure, consult the following HIR investigation: Either Raymond McGovern is uncommonly brilliant or
he has good connections. As it turns out, “Ray McGovern [is] a 27-year
veteran of the CIA’s clandestine service,”[27c] the
CIA outfit in charge of propaganda activities, training of covert
'paramilitary' forces, and such.[27d]
The CIA is allowed by the National Security Act of 1947 to use the
clandestine service for “activity or
activities of the United States Government to influence political, economic,
or military conditions abroad, where it is intended that the role of the
United States Government will not be apparent or acknowledged publicly…”[27e] In other words, those who work for the clandestine
service are professionally required to lie in order “to influence political,
economic, or military conditions abroad.” You will therefore not be surprised
to learn that a different HIR investigation has documented Raymond McGovern
to be a spectacular liar: And another HIR investigation has shown that Raymond
McGovern has a knack for spreading particularly big lies against Israel and
in favor of Israel’s terrorist enemies: As it turns out, Raymond McGovern has become a
regular contributor at Truthout, a website flying under a ‘leftist’
banner and which therefore incessantly attacks Bush. This makes it a natural
home for a Bush ‘opponent,’ and particularly for one who specializes in
attacks against Israel, given the concerted effort to associate attacks against
the Jewish state with ‘the left,’ as they still call it. This is enough for us to ask the question: Given
that those who work for the CIA's ‘clandestine service’ are tasked with
“influenc[ing] political, economic, or military conditions abroad,” but taking
care that “the role of the United States Government will not be apparent or
acknowledged publicly,” isn't it possible that Raymond McGovern's attacks
against Israel are part of a covert US policy? Isn't it possible that he is still
working for the clandestine service, despite the fact that he says he
retired? After all, we have shown that he is a liar, so why should we
automatically believe him when he says that he no longer works for the CIA?
Couldn't he be merely posing as a Bush ‘opponent’ in the media, the
better to undermine Israel among ‘leftists’? He certainly looks the part. Under the lens of this hypothesis, whatever Raymond
McGovern says about the dispute over Iran’s nuclear program is bound to be
interesting. Happily, McGovern just published a piece on the Truthout
website with the title “Juggernaut Gathering Momentum, Headed for Iran.”[27f] In
it, McGovern argues that Iran has a right to get nukes because it is
threatened by the US and Israel; so, in order to stop the Iranian nuclear
program, McGovern recommends that the Israeli nuclear program be abolished. Interesting. Below I analyze both McGovern’s premise and his
recommendation, and then I show you how common his views are in the mass
media. _____________________________________________________ Raymond McGovern says that Iran has a
right to get nuclear weapons In his Truthout piece, McGovern says: “Iran signed the
Non-Proliferation Treaty and insists (correctly) that the treaty assures
signatories the right to pursue nuclear programs for peaceful use. And when
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice claims, as she did last month, ‘There is
simply no peaceful rationale for the Iranian regime to resume uranium
enrichment,’ she is being, well, disingenuous again.” But McGovern does not stop at saying that Iran has a
right to peaceful nuclear technology. He also defends Iran’s pursuit of
nuclear weaponry. His arguments are two-fold: (1) Iran is supposedly in
danger from the United States, and (2) Iran is supposedly in danger from
Israel.
In his Truthout piece, McGovern says: “It is altogether
reasonable to expect that Iran’s leaders want to have a nuclear weapons
capability as well, and that they plan to use their nuclear program to
acquire one. From their perspective, they would be fools not to. Iran is one
of three countries earning the ‘axis-of-evil’ sobriquet from President Bush
and it has watched what happened to Iraq, which had no nuclear weapons, as
well as what did not happen to North Korea, which does have them.” In other words, it is “altogether reasonable” that
Iran get nuclear weapons because Iran, McGovern suggests, is at
risk from the United States. McGovern’s position here is awkward, for two
reasons. The first is that the entire history of the US-Iran
relationship has to do with the US arming to the teeth the Iranian ruling
elite. We’ve seen above the ‘Iran-Contra’ example, when the Reagan
administration publicly claimed to oppose the Iranian Islamists but
secretly sent them billions of dollars in armament, every year, throughout
the Iran-Iraq war. The behavioral facts do not suggest that the
Iranian Islamists have ever been held in disfavor by US policymakers. The second awkwardness in McGovern’s position is
arguably greater. Right as the Reagan administration was illegally arming the
radical Iranian Islamists in the Iran-Iraq war, guess who was the Reagan
administration’s ‘All Intelligence Agent’? No! Yes: Raymond McGovern. “Ray
McGovern...served as the ‘All Intelligence Agent’ during the Reagan
administration. He was responsible for briefing the President, the Vice
President, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Cabinet and National Security
Advisor.”[28] So here is the question: Given that McGovern and
other US officials were telling us in the 1980s, though it wasn’t true,
that the US and Iranian ruling elites were enemies, if Raymond McGovern now
tells you, again, that the US and Iranian ruling elites are supposedly
enemies, should you believe him? Or I can ask it like this: Should you believe “Ray
McGovern, a 27-year veteran of the CIA’s clandestine service”[29] --
in other words, a professional liar -- when he tells you for the second time
something that was a spectacular lie (and a crime) the first time? Wouldn’t you have to be what businesspeople call ‘a
sucker’?
Under the hypothesis that Raymond McGovern is an
anti-Israeli propagandist we would not be surprised to find him saying
something like this: “And Iran’s
rival Israel, which has not signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty but somehow
escapes widespread opprobrium, has a formidable nuclear arsenal cum delivery
systems.” Translation: “And since Israel is a danger to Iran,
how come nobody complains that Israel has not signed the Non-Proliferation
Treaty and has a formidable nuclear arsenal?” Then McGovern adds the following: “Israeli
threats to destroy Iranian nuclear facilities simply provide additional
incentive to Tehran to bury and harden them against the kind of Israeli air
attack that destroyed the Iraqi nuclear facility at Osirak in 1981.” Translation: “Since Israel is threatening Iran,
small wonder that the Iranians are getting nuclear weapons!” I will call to your attention that it is the
president of Iran, as you may recall, who’s been saying publicly that
Israel should be “wiped off the map” -- not vice versa.[34]
What Israel has said -- even according to McGovern, above -- is that it will
merely shoot to disarm its genocidal enemy, which is therefore the
mildest possible self-defense against the biggest possible threat. And yet
McGovern interprets this as Israel threatening Iran, by way of
explaining that Iran therefore should be allowed the very nuclear weapons
with which it might wipe Israel off the map. In light of Raymond McGovern's position, let us
examine a bit more carefully this question: _____________________________________________________ Is Raymond McGovern an anti-Israeli
propagandist? In his Truthout piece, Raymond McGovern says
that Israel has a “policy of massive -- often disproportionate -- retaliation
against the Arabs.” I think this is enough to establish that he is an
anti-Israeli propagandist. But if this is not immediately obvious, then let
me take you on a short stroll so that you can see precisely why. Israel is a country surrounded by Arab states
pledged to destroy it, and these states have made good on their word by
launching genocidal wars.[31] In these
conflicts Israel has actually returned land that its genocidal enemies
lost in battle, something no victorious victim of aggression had ever
done in interstate warfare before. Why this remarkable behavior? Because
the Israelis were hoping in this manner to buy a promise of peace from these
states. It is true that after the 1967 Six Day War Israel retained the West
Bank and Gaza, but this is because the Arab states refused to accept these
territories back (which they had previously held illegally) if this meant
they had to promise never again to attempt the extermination of the Israeli
Jews![32]
And then, in the early 1990s, Israel did the unbelievable: it allowed the PLO
into the West Bank and Gaza, setting in motion the ‘Oslo process,’ ever since
which date Israel has given the PLO more and more power over the Arab
population. But the PLO does not flinch from murdering children in the
street, or from sending their own children -- even girls -- to blow
themselves up in order to do it. In particular, the PLO is fond of killing
Jews. Why in the world did the Israelis bring such people
into the Jewish state? Because Israeli leaders lied to the Israeli people,
telling them that the PLO was interested in a piece of land, and therefore
that giving land to the PLO would end the killings of Jews. Trusting in hope,
rather than reason, the Israeli Jews accepted an argument that amounted to
saying the following: that an antisemitic terrorist organization will kill
fewer Jews it if is made more powerful and brought closer to its Jewish
targets. But…why did the Israelis believe any such absurdity
from their leaders’ lips? Part of the reason is that hordes of Israeli
journalists and intellectuals, as well as Jewish journalists and
intellectuals in the Diaspora, have always managed to find the argument that
makes ‘the Jews’ once again to blame every time another Arab terrorist kills
another innocent Jew. Such arguments, believe it or not, find an echo among
many ordinary Israeli Jews, in part because the ethical culture of Judaism
conditions Jews to think that self-criticism is always virtuous, so if they
are blaming themselves surely they must be acting out of a sense of
compassion and justice, and surely the other side, after noticing that the
Jews are trying to be nice, will reach Enlightenment and stop all the
killing. Hence: ‘land for peace.’ Isn’t it obvious that this will work? Alas...! The less rosy truth is that those Israelis
who supported the ‘Oslo process’ deluded themselves. First, because --
contrary to what they like to think -- they really did not show
compassion for the West Bank and Gaza Arabs over whom they empowered the PLO
thugs, who, when they are not extorting or murdering these Arabs, or sending
them to blow themselves up, daily bludgeon them with antisemitism[32a];
and second, because Oslo supporters certainly did not show any compassion for
the Jewish settlers in the West Bank and Gaza. Pro-Oslo Israelis have tried
hard to convince themselves that the Jewish settlers, as opposed to the
antisemitic murderers who kill them, are the enemies of peace! But what makes
the delusions in the pro-Oslo camp especially amazing is that these ‘leftist,’
‘pro-peace’ Israelis have not been murdering reason to serve their own
selves; on the contrary, they have put themselves in great peril. Partly out
of pride for their own ethics, and partly disguising their own antisemitism
(Jewish 'self-hatred') as ethical self-criticism, many Israelis collectively bent
over backwards to accommodate those who wish to destroy them, twisting
the humanitarian impulse into an abrogation of self-defense: a kind of
self-immolation that has begun with the sacrifice of the settlers. Such pathologies of reasoning should be criticized,
as Kenneth Levin has intelligently done, because the Jews naturally have a
right to defend themselves (and certainly from terrorists who wish to
exterminate the Jewish people...).[32b]
But Raymond McGovern, you see, puts a different spin on things. His
criticism of the Jewish state is that, according to him, Israel supposedly
has a “policy of massive -- often disproportionate -- retaliation against the
Arabs.” He cannot be saying this out of ignorance, because McGovern worked at
least 27 years for US Intelligence and moreover he is sometimes introduced as
“Ray McGovern, former CIA chief for the Middle East.”[33] So
unless he is a complete moron it appears that he wants to prevent you from
thinking. This is why I think that Raymond McGovern is an anti-Israeli
propagandist. Now, a historian needs a working hypothesis for why
each document he examines was produced, in order to interpret it.[29a]
Here, we need a hypothesis that will explain why Raymond McGovern’s Truthout
article exists. For example: Given
then
HIR has documented that the mass media consistently
tells people that any allegation that the ruling elite is engaging in nasty secret
activities to the detriment of the people is a ‘conspiracy theory,’ and
therefore automatically without merit -- in fact, ‘conspiracy theories’
aren't merely wrong, but also stupid and absurd (an examination of the
evidence is, in consequence, laughably superfluous).[30] If
you have been properly trained by this regime of repetition, the above
hypothesis will appear -- quite in spite of my analysis -- too far-fetched to
consider, leaving you with the only alternative on offer: that Raymond
McGovern is an honest, principled Bush opponent, and a US patriot, because
that is what he says he is (why else would the media seek him so much if he
were not the real McCoy?). This will force you to say that the ‘All
Intelligence Agent’ on watch while US Intelligence secretly armed an
official enemy, Iran, is...an honest patriot. But, Alas..., you have
nowhere else to go, because the alternative is a ‘conspiracy theory.’ My own view is as follows. If the media, repeating
what US military and intelligence officials say, is telling the public that
attacking Iran is very dangerous, and if ‘former CIA’ officials are
simultaneously telling the public that Iran has a right to get nukes so long
as it is supposedly threatened by Israel, it does not appear that a war
against Iran over its nuclear program is what is being prepared. What this
seems to be preparing, rather, is a diplomatic process that will offer the
dismantling of Israel’s nuclear deterrent in exchange for a halt to Iran’s
nuclear program, there to produce a ‘nuclear free Middle East.’ Lo and behold, this is precisely what Raymond
McGovern appears to propose. I turn to this next. ___________________________________________________________ Says Raymond McGovern: destroy
Israel’s nuclear program; buy a “nuclear-free zone in the Middle East” How about a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East?
Who, according to McGovern, might be the obstacle to this dream of peace? “Israeli
leaders seem allergic to the thought that other countries in the region might
be able to break its nuclear monopoly and they react neuralgically to
proposals for a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East.” The Israelis, says McGovern, desire neither nuclear
parity nor a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East because they want to keep
their “nuclear monopoly” (this has nothing to do, in other words, with the
recurrent Muslim threats to destroy Israel). McGovern reports that the US is supposedly “bending
over backward” to support Israel. Here is what he cites in evidence: “...the US
delegation to the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency] delayed the
proceedings for a day in a futile attempt to delete from Sunday’s
report language calling for such a [nuclear-free] zone.
The final report called for a ‘Middle East free of weapons of mass
destruction.’ This is the first time a link has been made, however
implicitly, between the Iranian and Israeli nuclear programs.” What Raymond McGovern refers to above is serious
business. The IAEA has referred the matter of Iran's nukes to the UN Security
Council, the world's top enforcer. And what the UN Security Council has been
officially asked to enforce is a ‘Middle East free of weapons of mass
destruction,’ which, as McGovern explains, is synonymous with stripping
Israel of its nuclear arsenal. Now, the United States of America is the greatest
superpower in history. If the United States ruling elite is keen on
something, it will get its way. For example, the US ruling elite can even
launch wars of aggression without UN Security Council approval, and yet bring
in the UN post facto to legitimize what it did, as happened in the
case of Yugoslavia. The US ruling elite can also get the
UN Security Council to rubber stamp an invasion of Iraq, with or without
actual weapons of mass destruction to show. This is because the US is the big
fish at the UN Security Council, as it is also the big fish at the IAEA --
because the US is the biggest superpower in history. So if this formidable,
awesome, unstoppable power, the United States of America, was “bending over
backwards” to help the Israelis, as McGovern claims, how come the effect was
so minor (“delayed the proceedings for a day”) and the effort “futile”? Why
did a diplomatic move get made towards dismantlement of Israel's
indispensable nuclear deterrent? __________________________________________________________ The IAEA calls
for a 'nuclear free Middle East.' The media follows McGovern in applauding
this, and so does...the Israeli government! The Guardian wrote this on
7 February: “On the face
of it, Iran has every reason to feel insecure. While America occupies two of
Iran’s neighbors and Israel’s nuclear weapons point at Tehran, paranoia seems
as justified as it is dangerous.”[35] It makes sense for Iran to see itself at risk from
the US and Israel. This is also what Raymond McGovern is selling. We
shouldn't be surprised: as you may recall, it was The Guardian who
explained the supposed enmity between the US and Iranian elites as resulting
from the US supposedly having backed Iraq in the Iran-Iraq war,
something that did not happen. Thomas Friedman, writing in The New York Times,
wrote the following on 10 February: “If Iran
develops a nuclear bomb, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and possibly other Sunni Arab
states are bound to follow. The Sunni Arabs can overlook Israel’s bomb, but
they will never stand for the Persian Shiites having a bomb and them not.
That’s about brothers with a centuries-old rivalry. And if the Arab world
starts to go nuclear, then you will see the crumbling of the whole global
nuclear nonproliferation regime.”[36] Iran getting nukes means that everybody will
get nukes, he says. Friedman’s focus is clearly on the proliferation issue,
not on Iran per se. This agrees with McGovern’s frame, which is to make
arguments about the importance of keeping the Middle East region nuclear-free.
Friedman hasn’t yet recommended stripping Israel of its nuclear deterrent,
but that may come in due course. After all, from his perch as “foreign
affairs columnist” at The New York Times, Friedman has been a
sometimes passionate apologist for Israel’s enemies -- for example, he
defended both Mahmoud Abbas and Muhammad Dahlan as “responsible Palestinians”
(i.e. 'moderates'), even though Abbas is who invented the strategy of talking
‘peace’ in order to prepare the Israelis for slaughter, and even though
Dahlan used his CIA training to kill innocent Jews and any Arabs opposed to
the PLO.[37] Friedman has
also written an entire book -- From Beirut to Jerusalem -- painting
the Israelis as the supposed bad guys in the Middle East conflict. But if The New York Times is hesitating a
bit, The Irish Times has certainly plunged ahead. As Tom Wright
complained in a rebuttal editorial on 14 February, “Over the past
couple of weeks The Irish Times has published a number of opinion articles
that directly link the problem of Iran’s nuclear programme to the fact that
Israel has nuclear weapons. Vincent Browne
(February 1st) wrote, ‘So what do we expect? If Israel, a declared enemy of
Iran, has nuclear weapons, the only effective deterrent against Israel using
such weapons against Iran and its allies is to acquire nuclear weapons
itself.’ For Browne, the West should keep its ‘hands off Iran’ until Israel,
which he continues to see as an illegitimate state, is dealt with first. Similarly,
according to Tariq Ali (February 3rd), ‘The Iranian ‘crisis’ of today has
been carefully manufactured. Iran has as much right to nuclear weapons as any
of the existing nuclear states. Why is Israel’s 200-bomb arsenal acceptable?
India and Pakistan are also fine. What all three states share in common is
loyalty to the (American) empire.’ Even the
eminently more reasonable Garret FitzGerald (January 28th) suggested the
roots of the Iranian problem lie in the failure of the US to prevent Israel
going nuclear in the 1960s.”[38] A barrage. The Toronto Star puts it like this: “That Iran’s nuclear
research program must come back under UN control goes without saying. But for
that country’s pride, some counter-weight has to be offered… Israel’s nuclear
program is completely unsupervised by the UN.”[39] It appears, then, that my prediction -- which is
that the ‘Iranian nuclear crisis’ will be used to deprive Israel of its
nuclear deterrent in order, ostensibly, to create a ‘nuclear-free’ Middle
East -- is not outlandish. Opposition to such a policy could certainly prevent
it from happening, but it is not clear where such opposition will come from,
given that the ‘Israeli government’ has already endorsed this approach. Believe it or not. The Australian reports that
“Israeli officials were taken aback by the approval of a clause in the IAEA
[International Atomic Energy Agency] document implying dismantlement of
Israel’s nuclear arsenal.” They “were taken aback,” were they? But then they
are serious about tradition, because Israeli leaders have a long
tradition of endorsing any policy that will endanger Jewish lives. And look:
“Israel yesterday applauded the decision by the international community to
move against Iran, despite discomfort about the resolution’s indirect
reference to Israel’s own alleged nuclear program.”[40]
But the US might yet attack Iran If, surprisingly, the US should attack Iran, I
predict that a Muslim attack on Israel will quickly follow. You will remember
that when the US attacked Iraq in the Gulf War, it was Israel that
Iraq retaliated against, launching rockets against Israeli civilians. Israel
has again been blamed -- including all over the Western media -- for the
ongoing US attack against Iraq. This is quite despite the fact that the US
attack on Iraq will turn this country into Iran’s westernmost province,
almost bordering with Israel, even as nuclear-seeking Iran is calling for the
extermination of the Israeli Jews. How did Israel benefit? Israel’s nuclear deterrent is of no use against an
attack from its borders, because it is one of the tiniest states in the world
and you cannot very well throw a nuclear bomb if it is going to explode next
to your own house. So, depending on how urgent the US ruling elite perceives
the destruction of Israel to be, they might launch an attack against Iran to
produce a response attack against Israel that will immediately be portrayed
as an unfortunate ‘unintended consequence.’ Then they will build a new
Holocaust Museum and solemnly declare: “never again.” The remaining Jews in the Diaspora will be the most
vulnerable Jews in history.
___________________________________________________________ Footnotes and Further Reading [1] Nuclear
spectre haunts world, The Toronto Star, February 7, 2006 Tuesday,
OPINION; Pg. A17, 619 words [2] Bush knows that
America needs its friends this time As the showdown develops, the White House
is going out of its way to keep its Western allies on side, reports Con
Coughlin in Washington, The Daily Telegraph (LONDON), February 12, 2006
Sunday, NEWS; IRAN CRISIS; Pg. 30, 638 words, Con Coughlin [3]
Neo-conservatism: New York's gift to Republicans; A liberal state provides
fertile ground for the most significant counter-culture philosophy of the
last 25 years, Buffalo News (New York), February 12, 2006 Sunday,
FINAL EDITION, VIEWPOINTS; Pg. H1, 2375 words, By Patrick Reddy - SPECIAL TO
THE NEWS [4] IRAN IS
PREPARED TO RETALIATE, EXPERTS WARN, The Boston Globe, February 12,
2006 Sunday, THIRD EDITION, NATIONAL/FOREIGN; Pg. A1, 1175 words,
BY BRYAN BENDER, GLOBE STAFF [5] Bush knows
that America needs its friends this time As the showdown develops, the White
House is going out of its way to keep its Western allies on side, reports Con
Coughlin in Washington, The Daily Telegraph (LONDON), February 12, 2006
Sunday, NEWS; IRAN CRISIS; Pg. 30, 638 words, Con Coughlin [5a] 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 [6] "HOW THE
UNITED STATES DESTROYED DEMOCRACY IN IRAN IN 1953: Re-print of 16 April 2000
New York Times article"; with an introduction by Francisco Gil-White;
Historical and Investigative Research, 5 January 2006; [6a] Before Khomeini came to power, in 1978, The
Washington Post wrote that “More than 10,000 persons gathered at
the university to demand the government's resignation and shout support for
exiled religious leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. ... SAVAK has been one
of the key targets of the protestors.” Khomeini was clearly the flag for the
anti-shah, anti-SAVAK movement. SOURCE: 8 More
Die in Continuing Iranian Violence, The Washington Post, October 30, 1978,
Monday, Final Edition, First Section; Around the World; A17, 294 words, From
news services and staff reports, TEHRAN [7] Khomeini Is Reported
to Have a SAVAK of His Own; Khomeini Reported to Have Own SAVAK-Style Agency,
The Washington Post, June 7, 1980, Saturday, Final Edition, First Section;
A1, 1706 words, By Michael Getler, Washington Post Staff Writer [8] “Never once
mentioning the shah by name, the 63-year-old prime minister confirmed that
his government will not sell oil to Israel and South Africa and promised to
abolish SAVAK, the much-feard secret police. He said as prime minister he
will support the "legitimate rights" of the Palestinians and in
general struck a nonaligned, pro-Islamic stance rather than the militantly
pro-Western tilt of the shah. ...The promise to do away with SAVAK, infamous for
use of torture and arbitrary imprisonment, was central to Bakhtiar’s
20-minute address in the ornate turn-of-the-century majlis, or lower house of
parliament. He promised that a special commission will be named to
investigate abuses by SAVAK agents.” SOURCE: U.S.
Dismantling Intelligence Gear, Storing It in Iran; New Prime Minister Pledges
Drastic Shift; Iranian Leader Pledges to Halt Abuse by Police, The Washington
Post, January 12, 1979, Friday, Final Edition, First Section; A1,
952 words, By Jonathan C. Randal, Washington Post Foreign
Service, TEHRAN, Jan. 11, 1979 [9] “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; 21
February 2006; by Francisco Gil-White [10] To read about
Khomeini’s seizure of hostages at the US Embassy in Tehran, and what this
reveals about the real relationship between Khomeini and the US ruling elite,
visit:
[11] “Khomeini is
opposed to any new arms purchases, a multi-billion-dollar source of income
for the United States.”
[12] "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 December 2005; by Francisco Gil-White
[13] 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 [14] Viorst M.
1994. Sandcastles: The Arabs in search of the modern world. New York: Alfred
A. Knopf (p.41) [Much of this book first appeared in The New Yorker.] [15] “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 December 2005; by Francisco Gil-White [16] Notice how
matter-of-factly The Guardian puts it: “Iran is the
true winner of that war [the US invasion of Iraq]. 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…” SOURCE:
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 If you would like to read more on why the
consequence of the US invasion of Iraq will be to give Iraq to Iran, visit:
[17] Behind US
actions, a semi-covert strategy of promoting Islamism: [18] Two revealing
pieces:
[19] “How the U.S.
& Iran have Cooperated to Sponsor Muslim Terror (And this while loudly
denouncing one another in public...)”; Emperor’s Clothes; 13 April 2003; by Jared
Israel. [19a] "WHAT REALLY HAPPENED IN BOSNIA?: Were the Serbs
the criminal aggressors, as the official story claims, or were they the
victims?"; Historical and Investigative Research; 19 August 2005; by
Francisco Gil-White [20] THE ARMING OF
SAUDI ARABIA; Transcript of FRONTLINE PBS Show #1112; Air Date: February 16,
1993 [21] 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 [22] "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 December 2005; by Francisco Gil-White [23] “In 1982 the
US military rushed into Lebanon to protect the PLO from the Israelis”; from
IS THE US AN ALLY OF ISRAEL: A CHRONOLOGICAL LOOK AT THE EVIDENCE; Historical
and Investigative Research; by Francisco Gil-White. [24] “In 1991,
Bush Sr.'s administration forced Israel to participate in the Oslo process,
which brought the PLO into the West Bank and Gaza”; from IS THE US AN ALLY OF
ISRAEL: A CHRONOLOGICAL LOOK AT THE EVIDENCE; Historical and Investigative
Research; by Francisco Gil-White. [25] The most
complete documentation on this is here:
Some of this material was originally published here:
[26] “Article
9…said that ‘armed struggle is the only way to liberate Palestine.’ Article
15 said it is ‘a national duty to repulse the Zionist imperialist invasion
from the great Arab homeland and to purge the Zionist presence from
Palestine.’ Article 22 declared that ‘the liberation of Palestine will liquidate
the Zionist and imperialist presence and bring about the stabilization of
peace in the Middle East.’” TRANSLATION
BY: The Associated Press, December 15, 1998, Tuesday, AM cycle,
International News, 1070 words, Clinton meets with Netanyahu,
Arafat, appeals for progress, By TERENCE HUNT, AP White House
Correspondent, EREZ CROSSING, Gaza Strip The talk of ‘purging’ and ‘liquidating’ a
‘presence,’ and the insistence on violence as the “only way to
liberate Palestine” (!) makes it clear that the PLO’s founding goal was --
and remains -- genocide. [27] “In 1994
Yasser Arafat was given a Nobel Peace Prize, and the CIA trained the PLO,
even though Arafat’s henchmen were saying in public, this very year, that
they would use their training to oppress Arabs and kill Jews”; from IS THE US
AN ALLY OF ISRAEL?: A Chronological Look at the Evidence; Historical and
Investigative Research; by Francisco Gil-White [27a] Congress can't fix fractured intelligence, USA TODAY,
May 22, 2002, Wednesday,, FINAL EDITION, NEWS;, Pg. 10A, 488 words Protecting the homeland: Don't jeopardize
intelligence links, Christian Science Monitor (Boston, MA), July 25, 2002,
Thursday, OPINION; Pg. 09, 697 words, Ray McGovern, WASHINGTON Appeasement wrong policy toward Iraq, USA TODAY,
September 12, 2002, Thursday,, FINAL EDITION, NEWS;, Pg. 12A, 615 words RAY MCGOVERN Ray McGovern, a CIA analyst from
1964-90, is now co-director of the Servant Leadership School, an inner-city
outreach ministry in Washington.; HOW 'INTELLIGENCE' NOW SERVES THE DEFENSE
DEPT., The Boston Globe, September 29, 2002, Sunday, ,THIRD EDITION, Pg. D11,
812 words, BY RAY MCGOVERN The best intelligence? CIA, Milwaukee Journal
Sentinel (Wisconsin), November 22, 2002 Friday, FINAL EDITION, Pg. 19A, 811
words, RAY MCGOVERN President Bush's Selection of Henry Kissinger,
The Washington Post, December 2, 2002 Monday, Final Edition, EDITORIAL;
Pg. A20, 343 words [27b] A CONSUMMATE BUREAUCRAT ADEPT AT CURRYING FAVOUR, The
Independent (London), June 4, 2004, Friday, First Edition; NEWS; Pg. 4, 658
words, ANDREW GUMBEL IN LOS ANGELES [27c] US INTELLIGENCE SHAKE-UP MEETS GROWING CRITICISM, The
Boston Globe, January 2, 2005, Sunday, THIRD EDITION, Pg. A1, 1016
words, By Bryan Bender, Globe Staff [27d] “[The Central Intelligence Agency’s] Directorate of
Operations, the agency’s clandestine service. . ., manages the agency’s
counterterrorism center, espionage and paramilitary operations.”
[27e] National Security Act; Title V; SEC. 503 (e). For the Full text of the National Security Act,
visit: Either link will work just fine. To read an analysis of what the National Security
act did to US democracy, visit:
[27f] "Juggernaut Gathering Momentum, Headed for
Iran"; [28] Webactive.com
calls itself “The Source for Progressive Streaming Media.” And what is
progressive these days? Former CIA officials. Here is their blurb for 2 July
2003: [ NOTE
04/17/2010: The Webactive page no longer exists. The same description of Ray
McGovern appeared on Pacific Radio, and we took the Google cache of that
page: Veteran
Intelligence Professional Ray McGovern: Bush administration slanted
intelligence info prior to Iraq war (Audio) As more and
more US troops die in Iraq each day, the U.S. Congress, in closed door
sessions, is examining the question of whether the Bush administration used
undue influence over the intelligence community to slant intelligence
information to support invading Iraq. Ray McGovern
was a member of the CIA for 27 years and he served as the “All Intelligence
Agent” during the Reagan administration. He was responsible for briefing the
President, the Vice President, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Cabinet and
National Security Advisor. He’s now part of a group of former intelligence
agents who are so dismayed with the intelligence used to support going to war
against Iraq that they formed a group called Veteran Intelligence
Professionals for Sanity or VIPS. In this
commentary for Peace Watch Ray McGovern points to an unsual pattern on the
part of Vice President Dick Cheney to visit the CIA headquarters, which he
did 27 times prior to the invasion. * Ray
McGovern, spokesperson for Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity. [29] US
INTELLIGENCE SHAKE-UP MEETS GROWING CRITICISM, The Boston Globe, January 2,
2005, Sunday, THIRD EDITION, Pg. A1, 1016 words, By Bryan Bender, Globe
Staff [29a] "About the HIR method"; Historical and
Investigative Research; 17 December 2005; by Francisco Gil-White [30] “Is this
website an example of 'conspiracy theory'?”; Historical and Investigative
Research; 4 October 2003; by Francisco Gil-White [31] The state of
Israel was created legally in 1947 by a vote at the UN. An Arab state in the
other half of what had been British Mandate ‘Palestine’ was also created, but
the Arabs considered the existence of a Jewish state in any shape or form
simply too offensive, and so they launched a combined Arab attack against
Israel in 1948. Azzam Pasha, Secretary General of the Arab League, announced
publicly, and proudly, what the war would be about: “This will be
a war of extermination and a momentous massacre which will be spoken of like
the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades.” Mind you, the Holocaust had just ended. To read more
about this, and see the documentation, visit:
For another example, Nasser announced his genocidal
intent right before the 1967 Six Day War. To read about this, visit:
[32] "It was
not clear how military victory could be turned into peace. Shortly after the
war's end Israel began that quest, but it would take more than a decade and
involve yet another war before yielding any results. Eshkol's secret offer to
trade much of the newly won territory for peace agreements with Egypt,
Jordan, and Syria was rejected by Nasser, who, supported by an emergency
resupply of Soviet arms, led the Arabs at the Khartoum Arab Summit in The Sudan
in August 1967 in a refusal to negotiate directly with Israel."
[32a] To read about how the PLO murders Arabs who oppose the
killing of Jews, visit:
Here below is a report from Agence France Presse on
the fact that murdering Arabs for selling land to Jews is PLO policy:
Selling land to Jews is economically attractive
because they pay well, and because keeping the land is a risk given that the
armed thugs which the Palestinian Authority calls its policemen are fond of
confiscating land:
[32b] Levin, K. 2005. The Oslo syndrome: Delusions of a
people under siege. Hanover, NH: Smith and Kraus. [33]
Comment&Analysis: There was no failure of intelligence: US spies were
ignored, or worse, if they failed to make the case for war, The Guardian
(London) - Final Edition, February 5, 2004, Guardian Leader Pages, Pg. 26,
1185 words, Sidney Blumenthal [34] "the
Iranian President [called] for Israel to be 'wiped off the map'..." 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 [35] 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 [36] Driving
Toward Middle East Nukes in Our S.U.V.'s, The New York Times, February 10,
2006 Friday, Late Edition - Final, Section A; Column 1; Editorial Desk;
Pg. 25, 782 words, By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN, LONDON [37] “In 1994,
Yasser Arafat was given a Nobel Peace Prize, and the CIA trained the PLO,
even though Arafat's henchmen were saying in public, this very year, that
they would use their training to oppress Arabs and kill Jews”; from “Is the
US an Ally of Israel?: A Chronological Look at the Evidence”; Historical and
Investigative Research; by Francisco Gil-White [38] Israel not to
blame for Iran's nuclear blackmail, The Irish Times, February 14, 2006
Tuesday, OPINION; Opinion; Pg. 18, 1035 words, Tom Wright [39] Nuclear
spectre haunts world, The Toronto Star, February 7, 2006 Tuesday,
OPINION; Pg. A17, 619 words [40] Iran threat
like Hitler: Merkel, THE AUSTRALIAN, February 6, 2006 Monday,
All-round Country Edition, WORLD; Pg. 11, 935 words, Peter Conradi, Abraham
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