The people in the reality-based community told the neo-conservatives that going into Iraq was going to cause more terrorism and more anti-Americanism. They also told them Iraq would be likely to splinter without a strongman to hold it together. They listened politely and thought to themselves…”precisely, we’ll break that country to pieces and they’ll never be able to project force outward again.” It works for our allies in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Israel. And the neo-cons care more about them than they care about us. So, how’s it working out?
THREE years after its invasion of Iraq the US Administration acknowledged yesterday that the war has become “a cause” for Islamic extremists worldwide and there is a risk of the country becoming a safe haven for terrorists hoping to launch fresh attacks on America.
According to CIA data released yesterday, there were 11,111 terrorist incidents last year, killing more than 14,600 non-combatants, including 8,300 in Iraq. Of the 56 American civilians killed by terrorists in 2005, some 47 of them were in Iraq.
If the idea is to win a war on terrorism, we are not winning. But, if the idea is to break Iraq into warring factions to prevent any government from being able to reconstitute an army and menace their neighbors…well, we’re doing quite well.
Next up Iran. If Iraq is divided among Kurds, Arabs, Turkomen, and Persians, Iran is divided among Persians, Kurds, Azeris, Arabs, and Balochis.
The neo-conservative master plan involves empowering these groups with millions in cash and explosives, and having them carry out sabotage until the mullahs in Iran are more preoccupied with re-establishing order within Iran than projecting power outside Iran…to Iraq…or anyplace else.
All these areas adjoin countries that are either hostile to Iran’s ruling clerics or contain US troops. The United States has dramatically expanded its presence in the region post-September 11, 2001, even as it has raised the level of its anti-Tehran rhetoric. US troops and advisers currently reside in Iraq, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Turkey and Pakistan. At the same time, Tehran maintains ambiguous relations with neighbors Pakistan, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Turkey and Iraq…
As for Azerbaijan, their President visited Washington yesterday, even as they issued more public denials that they are operating secret CIA prisons for us. The prisons are the least of our worries. One year ago, rioting broke out further to the south, in Khuzestan province.
This month’s riots gave a tantalizing indication of what a US-backed covert operation in Iran might look like. After several days of civil chaos, between five and 31 people were dead with hundreds injured or imprisoned. Iran’s defense minister and the highest-ranking ethnic Arab in government, Rear Admiral Ali Shamkhani, arrived in Ahwaz to declare that “Iranian Arabs enjoy a high status in the Islamic Republic of Iran, and I assure you any other type of political system but the Islamic Republic would have sought ways for uprooting them, just as the ousted Shah’s regime moved in that direction”.
Confirmation that these riots were related to American infiltration came more recently, from Seymour Hersh:
“teams of American combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups”. The template seems identical to the period that preceded US air strikes against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan during which a covert Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) campaign distributed millions of dollars to tribal allies.
Whether or not Iran builds a nuclear weapon is a serious issue. But, their nuclear ambitions are only one part of a bigger picture. CheneyCo. wants Iran back the way it was in the 1970’s when it was our arms dealers’ biggest client. He wants to leave office knowing he wiped out the sanctions on Libya, Iraq, and Iran and the oil/arms industries are free to do business anywhere in the world. To accomplish that, he must get rid of the mullahs.
If we want to know where the four billion dollars of missing Pentagon cash went, we should start by asking the tribal chieftans in Iran how much cash they’ve received from our intelligence operatives.
