Tag: Iran

Patrick J. McShay, Targeted Assassinations and Foreign Entanglements

James Fetzerblog

Patrick J. McShay “The Iranian regime’s aggression in the region including their use of proxy fighters to destabilize its neighbors must end and it must end now!“ *President Donald J. Trump President Trump’s former National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster once said that “there are basically two ways to fight the United States, asymmetrically and stupid.” We know the disparities between Iran and the U.S. are immense but how much do we really know about Iran’s full capability? One thing we do know is that Iran is a much graver threat…

Gen. Soleimani World’s Most Accomplished Military Figure in Counter-Terrorism: Analyst

James Fetzerblog

Kevin Barrett Republiished from 5 October 2019 TEHRAN (Tasnim) – An American political analyst and author described Iran’s IRGC Quds Force Commander Major General Qassem Soleimani as the “world’s most accomplished military figure” in the field of counter-terrorism. “Major General Qassem Soleimani is the world’s most accomplished military figure in the field of counter-terrorism… Gen. Soleimani’s fight against Daesh (aka ISIS) is a wholehearted fight — unlike America’s ambivalent war on Daesh that has included covert support for the same terrorists it fights,” Kevin Barret from Madison told Tasnim. Following is the…

Doug Bandow, Trump Must Understand a War With Iran Would Be Hell

James Fetzerblog

by Doug Bandow Key point: The entire Middle East could go up in flames. Sixteen years ago, the George W. Bush administration manipulated intelligence to scare the public into backing an aggressive war against Iraq. The smoking gun mushroom clouds that National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice warned against didn’t exist, but the invasion long desired by neoconservatives and other hawks proceeded. Liberated Iraqis rejected U.S. plans to create an American puppet state on the Euphrates and the aftermath turned into a humanitarian and geopolitical catastrophe which continues to roil the Middle East. Thousands…

Philip Geraldi, Saudi Oil Attacks: Time to Back Off on the Threats

James Fetzerblog

Philip Geraldi Attacks on two Saudi Arabian oil facilities on Saturday reportedly reduced the production of Aramco, the state oil company, by one half. It was a devastating demonstration of just how vulnerable the Kingdom’s oil economy actually is. Initial reports suggested that the damage had been caused by explosive drones launched by the Houthi rebels in Yemen, who claimed responsibility, but there has been considerable skepticism regarding whether the drones available to the Houthi could actually have carried out the attack. Inevitably, the United States and the Saudis are…

Andrew J. Bacevich, The Trump Administration’s “Diplomacy of Deference”

James Fetzerblog

Andrew J. Bacevich Trump’s actions are constrained by what Saudi and Israeli leaders are willing to tolerate Iran’s seizure of a British-owned oil tanker transiting the Persian Gulf has let loose a fresh round of media war chatter. Yet should another Persian Gulf War actually occur, who would benefit? Not America, that’s for sure. The central theme of present-day American policy regarding Iran is deference. Nominally, US policy is made in Washington. Substantively, it is framed in Riyadh and Jerusalem, with the interests of the United States figuring only minimally…

Rob Urie, Iran, Venezuela and the Throes of Empire

James Fetzerblog

by ROB URIE With the Trump administration threatening war against Iran and Venezuela, the question of how the U.S. was brought to this point needs to be considered. To argue that current circumstances are particular to this administration is to overlook U.S. history vis-a-vis both Iran and Venezuela and that between them they possess a material proportion of the world’s proved oil reserves (graph below). In 2019, the pretense that local provocations explain anything beyond domestic political posturing is absurd. However, domestic political considerations do explain threats of war to a…

Jack Mullen, Israel Demands New War with Iran: The War to Deliberately Destroy America

James Fetzerblog

JACK MULLEN In 2007, General, retired 4-star U.S. Army general and Supreme Allied Commander of NATO during the 1999 War on Yugoslavia, publicly told the world the United States was planning to take out 7 nations in 5 years. The Lord your God will bring you into the land that you are going to occupy, and he will drive many nations out of it. As you advance, he will drive out seven nations larger and more powerful than you [..] When the Lord your God places these people in your power and you defeat them, you must put…

Pat McShay, Trump pushes back on War with Iran–but for how long?

James Fetzerblog

Pat McShay “The ignorant warmonger masquerading as an American Secretary of State should be arrested for his impersonation of an American government official. — Paul Craig Roberts, The “Father Of Reaganomics” “Every time the U.S. saves a country, they turn it into an insane asylum or a cemetery.” — Ed Galean, Latin American Author “It’s a trick we always use. In Europe, we stop criticism of Israel by bringing up the Holocaust, in the U.S. we call critics anti-Semitic” — Shulamit Aloni, Former Israeli Minister by Patrick J. McShay Spain,…

Gareth Porter, John Bolton’s Nefarious Plot for War with Iran

James Fetzerblog

Gareth Porter John Bolton has gotten away with a dangerous deception. The national security adviser’s announcement Sunday that the Pentagon has deployed air and naval forces to the Middle East, which he combined with a threat to Iran, points to a new maneuver to prepare the ground for an incident that could justify a retaliatory attack against Iran. Bolton presented his threat and the deployments as a response to alleged intelligence about a possible Iranian attack on U.S. targets in the Middle East. But what has emerged indicates that the alleged intelligence…

Scott Ritter, America Just Declared War on Iran and Nobody Blinked

James Fetzerblog

Scott Ritter It is no longer a question of if Americans will die in a conflict with Iran, but when. The United States has long been engaged in a secret shadow war with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), dating back to the American invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003. This conflict took the lives of hundreds of American troops and hundreds more IRGC members. The Iranian opposition to the U.S. occupation of Iraq, and the inability of the U.S. to militarily defeat Iranian forces inside Iraq, was just…