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Author Topic: War Provocations and Peace Actions  (Read 19982 times)

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AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #285 on: April 27, 2019, 05:31:59 pm »
Agelbert NOTE: This Christian Pastor tells it like it is in this podcast. He says both Republicans and Democrats are consistent warmongers, our wars are Biblically CONDEMNED and an American Christian's "Founding Fathers" are named exclusively in the New Testament. He makes it clear that our military us NOT for defensive purposes and gives several irrefutable examples of the bloodfest that American Wars have visited on other nations (and on Americans too).

He explains how War destroys the souls of American youth and gives statistics about how many, who did not die in combat, but were horribly scarred by their experience, eventually commit suicide because of the spiritual degradation caused by the depravity they were ordered to engage in during wars for profit.

From the slaughter of the Native Americans to the present, he makes it clear the the USA has ALWAYS been a wicked nation, and NEVER been a Christian nation.

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #286 on: May 01, 2019, 12:24:49 pm »
4*30*19~BOLIVARIAN UPDATE~REPORTS YOU WILL NOT HEAR ANYWHERE ELSE5,262 views


Florida Maquis
Published on Apr 30, 2019

4*30*19~THE EVENT,...THAT WASN'T...*FIZZLE FIZZLE...FAIL!
9,944 views


Florida Maquis
Published on Apr 30, 2019
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #287 on: May 01, 2019, 02:32:55 pm »
Venezuela’s Guaidó Falsely Claims Military Uprising in Progress: Mainstream Media Falls in Line

April 30, 2019

Tuesday morning self-declared president and opposition leader Juan Guaidó called on the military and the population to oppose the Maduro government. Only a few thousand civilians and very few soldiers heeded the call. Mike Fox reports from Caracas


https://therealnews.com/stories/venezuela-guaido-military-uprising
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #288 on: May 14, 2019, 09:18:20 pm »
Guaidó 😈 Calls for US Military 🦍Cooperation, but few Venezuelans Support the Move
May 14, 2019

Parallel president and opposition leader Juan Guaidó says he would like to coordinate with the US military, but following his failed April 30th coup attempt, few Venezuelans show interest. Mike Fox reports from Caracas


https://therealnews.com/stories/guaido-calls-for-us-military-cooperation-but-few-venezuelans-support-the-move
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #289 on: May 14, 2019, 09:21:28 pm »
Trump Provokes Iran With Intensified Economic War
May 14, 2019

Trump and Bolton’s strategy is to bait Iran into a war Bolton’s wanted for twenty years - says Trita Parsi, President of the NIAC


https://therealnews.com/stories/trump-provokes-iran-with-intensified-economic-war

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #290 on: May 22, 2019, 10:18:03 pm »
🦕 Pompeo shaking hands with 🦖 Putin

May 19, 2019

Trump-Bolton Aggression Against Iran Contained by Russia, Japan, China, and EU

Vijay Prashad says the very dangerous statements, economic sanctions and military aggression unleashed by Washington this week against Iran was countered by cool headed diplomacy by Japan, Russia, EU and China


https://therealnews.com/stories/trump-bolton-aggression-against-iran-contained-by-russia-japan-china-and-eu
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #291 on: May 22, 2019, 10:44:45 pm »
SNIPPETS from Doomstead Diner Daily 5/21 HEADLINES:

Trumplethinskin is getting rather desperate to wag the (i.e. raise the price of OIL for his Hydrocarbon 🦕👹🦖 Hellspawn owners - so they won't help throw him under the impeachment bus - while simultaneously taking the world's attention away from his rather blatant financial crimes history now being discussed here and there publicly) "evil Iran" dog.


It ain't workin' because way too many people are onto this false flag SCAM the US Government has used WAY TOO OFTEN (i.e. sinking the battleship Maine, Gulf of Tonkin, Bush fooling Saddam into invading Kuwait in 1991, 9/11, Shrub Iraq "WMD" lie, etc. SEE: 😈 One EVIL Trick Pony).

This comment I read today says it all:

Quote
DEDA CVETKO

Why should Iran talk to the US government? It was the Trump administration - at the behest and request of the Israelis and their Saudi brethren - that broke the Iran nuclear deal, not the other way around. And the wide consensus of the entire civilized world is that Iran did act honorably and did uphold its share of the deal. No doubt about this. None whatsoever...

You know, your signature on a piece of binding international treaty - even when the signature is that of the preceding president - is not merely an autograph memorabilia. It is a serious, legally binding commitment which ties the entire nation into a very serious, meaningful set of interlocking, mutually reciprocal obligations with the contractual counterparty. An international contract actually obligates the signatory to act in a good-faith manner and to prevent deliberate sabotaging of the contract. 

Indeed. My only quibble with this fellow, who is probably an intelligent and perceptive Iranian, and obviously a caring, responsible human being, is the timing of when, precisely, the US Government declared war on ALL humanity.

I think it's been a while.


As long as 🦕 Iran, and all the other 🐉🦕🦖 countries that export oil and gas, keep doing that ☠️ instead of transitioning to 100% Renewable energy, they are on the wrong side of that war against ALL humanity.

You've cut right to the nut of it.

Your commenter points out the futility of "talking" to the government of the US. We have signaled that "treaties" are as binding as the administration that enters them, and that naked self interest trumps all other considerations. The Native peoples of this country try could have told them.

No one should be surprised that Trump will declare global thermonuclear war to defend the prerogatives of the ailment, or to save his own ass.

Join me in a chorus of "Support da troops."

Well said.

The sentence snippet read in the following screenshot is not what it seems.


Daniel Sheehan 👍 is reading a truth from the former FBI chief which was fired by Trump. While the words are true, Sheehan makes a point of saying that the framing is duplicitous.

The reason for that is that Comey is pushing the "most of the top people in government are principled and a few bad apples like Trump mess all this up" meme. That is the COVER. That is the GUISE.

Sheehan makes it clear, in so many words, that this type of prose is used to lull people to sleep while the fascist takeover of our government, now nearly complete, proceeds under this cover.

The FACT is that, as things ARE now, you do not even get a chance to reach a high position in the U.S. Government unless you are ALREADY compromised. Principled behavior is verbotten in the U.S. Government.

 
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #292 on: May 25, 2019, 05:55:59 pm »

Trump Offers No Evidence of Iranian Threat or Terrorism

May 24, 2019

Eugene Puryear and Paul Jay discuss the hypocrisy of Trump allying with 👹 Saudi Arabia, the largest sponsor of global terror, over concerns about alleged Iranian terrorism


Story Transcript

PAUL JAY: Welcome to The Real News Network. I’m Paul Jay.

On Friday, President Trump announced that he’s going to use a special provision of some old law to allow him to sell arms to Saudi Arabia without having any approval from Congress. And he’s also sending 1,500 more troops to the Middle East to “protect U.S. interests in the region,” we’re using the word ‘alleged,’ because he didn’t, Iranian threats. Earlier this month the Trump administration already sent thousands of additional troops to the region, along with an aircraft carrier strike group, four bomber aircraft, and fighter jets. Here’s what Trump had to say at a Rose Garden press conference.

DONALD TRUMP 🦀: We want to have protection in the Middle East.   We’re going to be sending a relatively small number of troops, mostly protective, aome very talented 🦍 people are going to the Middle East right now. And we’ll see how. And we’ll see what 😈 happens. Well I think it’s going to be very good in the Middle East. Iran has been a as you know they staged terror all over the world. They’re a much different country now than when I first got here when I first got here. They were at 14 different locations fighting.


PAUL JAY: I don’t know what he’s talking about about the 14 different locations. I wish someone in the press corps had actually asked them to name the 14. I think it’s questionable if he could name 14 countries. Number two, what are these terrorist acts that Iran is responsible all over the world? It’d have been nice if someone in the press corps had asked him to name, say, three terrorist acts that Iran’s responsible, all over the world. And of course, the threat is coming from Iran, as the United States moves an aircraft carrier, jet fighters, and thousands of troops towards Iran. So the question is who’s threatening who, here.

Now, there’s the idea that the threat level from Iran has increased. It was dismissed by a British general. His name is Major General Chris Ghika, if I’m pronouncing it correctly. Here’s what he said.

CHRIS GHIKA: No, there’s been no increased threat from Iranian-backed forces in Iraq and Syria.

PAUL JAY: So where’s the evidence? And it’s quite remarkable that in the media now, in CNN and other media, because they have been on such an anti-Trump bandwagon, there’s a very interesting moment taking place where they’re not completely buying into all this anti-Iranian rhetoric, because they’re so out to get Trump. So there’s something–I find that there’s something positive in all the craziness that’s been going on in the corporate media.

Anyway, to talk about all of this, now joining me from Washington is Eugene Puryear. He’s a journalist and author and activist, a regular contributor to The Real News Network. He’s also the co-founder of Stop Police Terror Project DC. Thanks for joining us, Eugene.

EUGENE PURYEAR: Happy to be here, Paul. Thanks for asking me.

PAUL JAY: So the Middle East, again, is even more a tinder box. What do you make of what’s happening?

EUGENE PURYEAR: Well, you know, the first thing I thought seeing the increase in troops and the arm sales is sort of shades of Desert Shield in the wake of Desert Storm. It was clear then that the George H.W. Bush administration, they knew what they wanted to do, but they had to create this posture of defensiveness, the line drawn in the sand. They were selling Patriot missile batteries to Saudi Arabia. They were sending all these troops there. And I think as we’ve seen in the commentary from the British general, there’s been no change in the status quo. And quite frankly, I mean, what possible threats has Iran done? I mean, in fact, most of the Iranian activity in countries like Iraq, for instance, has been in the direction of what President Trump said he wanted over several years, which was the fighting against ISIS.

So I think we’ve seen relatively consistently here that it’s a complete and total canard. Given the forces that Iran has in the region, if they wanted to do something they certainly could have by now, and certainly have not. Have consistently said they do not. But this sort of defensively-based military buildup to me seems very much like shades of war, and an attempt to provide an alibi ahead of time, or whatever may happen, a Gulf of Tonkin incident, or maybe something more real than the Gulf of Tonkin incident. But by upping the escalation ladder, as they say in military parlance, puts themselves in a better position to be able to launch an offensive war against Iran.

PAUL JAY: Yeah. I mean, again, the corporate media has completely not been on this story sinceTrump became president. But at Real News we’ve been saying from day one of his presidency, frankly even before, during the campaign, that this administration is focused on bringing down the government of Iran. It’s the number one foreign policy priority for a lot of reasons, not the least of which, if you want to be the global hegemon, it means you have to be the hegemon in every region. And most particularly you’ve got to be the hegemon in the region where there’s oil. And if the bigger picture foreign policy objective is, I don’t know, the containment of China, whatever that means, then again you want to control all the oil from the Middle East so you can use that as leverage against China, as well. And from the beginning, Trump has been appointing cabinet ministers, secretaries of state, secretaries of defense, national security advisers, and each appointment is a more rabid advocate of overthrowing the government in Iran. And of course now with John Bolton, you have the most rabid advocate of that you could possibly find in the foreign policy establishment. But why do you think they’re pushing this so much now, interestingly enough, after he supposedly got cleared by the Mueller report?

EUGENE PURYEAR: Yeah, you know, it’s an interesting piece, and I’m glad you brought up Bolton. It’s worth noting that both Bolton and Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani have been paid huge sums of money, into the six figures, to actually give speeches in favor of Iranian regime change. They’re not only advocating it, but have benefited quite handsomely from it. But you know, I think the timing here is interesting. I mean, I think certainly from the point of view of Bolton and others, I’m sure it’s one of those you’ve got to try to get it in while you can, especially before 2020. I don’t think most people want a war with Iran. And so I don’t think this is the type of thing the political hands in the White House are going to want to see, probably not now, but certainly not in 2020. But there may be sort of a political window there that it is a major issue. That was always a big issue in the Reagan administration, for instance, in terms of covert action and overt action in Central America. Election year timetables and the like.

I think also you have the issue of Trump not only being cleared from the Mueller–allegedly being cleared by the Mueller report, as it were, but then being still in a situation where, quite frankly, the only thing he’s been able to do so far to bring the media to his side, to bring any Democrats to his side, have been these military strikes. I mean, certainly we’ve seen the missiles launched against Syria, for instance. have seen some of the most bipartisan praise that Trump has gotten. So in many ways, given that the Democrats and many subsets of the Democrats who are very heavily in tune with pro-Israeli forces, would also like to see more aggressive action against Iran. It also, I think, is a way for him to shore up his own support, to create narratives around the Trump administration that are more positive for him, to tamp down criticism from elements of the Democratic Party, because he’s pursuing a major agenda for many of them.

So I think all of that plays into it. But I think also it’s just a fact that the pieces in place right now–Bolton is in place. Pompeo is in place again. His personal lawyer, which is maybe not relevant to the cabinet, but somebody he’s talking to on an everyday basis who aggressively is for Iran, they’re all lined up. They’re all ready to go. So it may just be the chorus of voices now is so consistently pro-Iran, this is why it’s ramping up at this stage.

PAUL JAY: I mean, you said the voices are so pro-Iran? I mean, pro-Iran government change. Yeah. You mentioned something I think is interesting.

You mentioned Bolton getting paid money. That’s that’s from the MEK, which is an organization even the United States has called terrorist in the past, and so has the United Nations; an anti-Iranian government organization that was based mostly in Iraq. But in fact they did, it seems, pay Bolton $50,000. And there was a very interesting moment on the Sunday morning show on Fox hosted by Chris Wallace where Chris interviews the Iranian ambassador, and–or I’m sorry, the Iranian foreign minister. And he directly accuses Bolton of taking this $50,000. And then Wallace interviews Bolton and asks him about it. Doesn’t specifically try to nail him on the $50,000. But Bolton doesn’t deny it, either. Here’s that clip.

So, Eugene, you also mentioned that the Democrats–I think we should be specific. There’s a section of the Democratic Party that’s very much for regime change in Iran. And I guess the most obvious spokesmen for it is Chuck Schumer, who went, as you mentioned, when Trump threw some missiles at Syria, he said Trump’s finally acting in a presidential way. And of course, Chuck Schumers of this world, of the Democratic Party, are very gung-ho in this anti-Iranian camp. But there are sections of the Democratic Party that really come out. I know Sanders isn’t officially in the Democratic Party, but he and others, and many of these progressive members of Congress have been quite outspoken against an attack on Iran. Don’t you think that’s significant?

EUGENE PURYEAR: I do think it’s significant. And I think Bernie Sanders has been leading the pack on this issue. I mean, it will be very interesting to me to see how it plays out in the House Foreign Affairs Committee, where you have individuals like Representative Ilhan Omar, who has also been outspoken on this issue, but it’s chaired by Eliot Engel, who certainly hasn’t been as vociferous, and in some ways has at times been critical, and differing from those like Chuck Schumer, but is generally more along the lines of at least more sort of aggressive action towards Iran.

So it’ll be interesting to see inside some of those committees there will be clashes between Democrats. I do think it’s significant, because really what we saw right after President Obama left office was that many of the Democrats who actually supported the Iran deal under him really just ran in the other direction when it came under assault and came under attack from Republicans and the Trump administration. So it was unclear whether or not there would be any sort of outspoken opposition I think we have seen with one–and I mentioned Ilhan Omar–sort of the new crop of some of the younger and more progressive people who have come in and spoken out against this. I believe Elizabeth Warren, if I’m not mistaken, last week raised at least some questions-

PAUL JAY: And certainly Tulsi Gabbard has, as well.

EUGENE PURYEAR: Tulsi Gabbard has, and she has been very outspoken on this issue, and really centering her campaign around issues of ending war and militarism more so than any other candidate. So it’s an interesting dance, because it seems that people who are running for president, who of course are more in tune or need to try to be more in tune with sort of the forces on the ground, as it were, are being more critical of this than we’re seeing from Democrats in Congress. But we’re seeing more. I think it’s part of an evolving issue. I think we also saw this with Venezuela, for instance, where you had a number of Democrats jump 100 percent on the regime change bandwagon. But then you saw Ilhan Omar cross-examine Elliott Abrams. Julian Castro is also running for president. Also had some critical comments there. Ro Khanna and others who have also been outspoken on the Iran issue. So it seems like on a number of different issues you’re starting to see, finally, after a long time of complete unanimity, some brakes on the regime change-style foreign policy approaches that have been quite bipartisan for some time.

PAUL JAY: And there’s some very interesting, even kind of weird, fracture lines. The resolution on Yemen, withdrawing any U.S. support for the Saudi war in Yemen. Trump eventually vetoed it, but in the Senate it actually got some Republican support, including Lindsey Graham. And now there’s another kind of weird split on this use of this emergency provision to sell arms to the Saudis without any Senate approval. Both Lindsey Graham and Rand Paul are opposing it. And there seems to be this weird thing where Trump is so connected to supporting Mohammed bin Salman and Saudi Arabia in spite of, you know, the chopping up, killing of Khashoggi, and other–you know, what Lindsey Graham describes as like wild and loose cannon activity. So the Trump camp seems very aligned with the Saudis, but Lindsey Graham, who typically is very much for a regime change in Iran and usually has been pro-Saudi, now he’s actually saying that Trump shouldn’t sell these arms to the Saudis. A lot of weird fracture lines.

EUGENE PURYEAR: Yeah, it is interesting to see how this is playing. I mean, it seemed to me, at least, that since the murder of Jamal Khashoggi there are more and more Republicans and some Democrats who have been almost completely uncritical of Saudi Arabia critical towards Iran. But I think they want to see Saudi Arabia face some sort of punishment, something that appears as if the United States is playing some role as a restraining factor. And I think we saw even with the Saudi Arabia and Qatar split, there were a number of individuals, James Mattis, for instance, who was trying to use some of his diplomatic capital as defense secretary to bridge that gap. And I think Mohammed bin Salman, who has really broken apart the U.S. led security apparatus in the Gulf by aggressively pushing this split with Qatar, and what that has to the broader peace, pushing Qatar more into the camp of Iran, in terms of how their [inaudible] things. The Yemen war, the Khashoggi situation. I think that it’s viewed as being highly problematic by leading forces in the U.S. establishment who may want to help Saudi Arabia, but feel like the sort of loose cannon aspect, to use that same phrase, of Mohammed bin Salman is undermining their ability to really act in a supportive way, because it’s so openly immoral, quite frankly, on so many different levels that people are asking questions, well, why would you back Saudi Arabia? What’s going on with the United States that has so much influence over this country. But you do not want to do anything there?

So I think a lot of this is cosmetic, in some ways. But on the same token, because the Trump administration is so intransigent, and the Saudis, of course, are continuing to do whatever they want, because of that it’s causing individuals like Lindsey Graham to have to be more strident and more critical. So I think they want to go back to sort of the King Abdullah status quo here, the long-term status quo of how things were in Saudi Arabia, and in the Gulf more broadly. But they’re having difficulty doing that because of Trump’s just complete in-the-pocket approach to MBS.

PAUL JAY: Yeah. I think Graham’s basic critique is that MBS is not a reliable partner in bringing down the government of Iran. It’s not that Graham has different objectives there. He just thinks that MBS is nuts. And he actually used so many words. The hold on your picture just went freaky.

Just finally I think it’s important to talk about just what the U.S. strategy in Iran is, towards Iran is. One, they are already waging a war, an economic war. The sanctions are crippling. And these sanctions are essentially illegal, this kind of collective punishment against the Iranian people that these sanctions are mostly affecting is a violation of international law. Iran is not an imminent threat to the United States. But number two, the movement of all this military might towards Iran, from what my Iranian friends are telling me, they think is more in the realm of a psyop to create this maximum pressure on Iran. Because what they really–the real strategy is about fomenting civil war in Iran. There’s apparently the Saudis and the Americans are involved in trying to arm Sunni populations within Iran. They’re trying to find other ways to have various divisions amongst the Iranian people. And I have friends, for example, in Los Angeles that have been in the past, mostly, tremendously critical of the theocracy in the Iranian government. And now they’re actually defending it, because they see what the U.S. policy is leading to is turning Iran into another mess like Iraq.

EUGENE PURYEAR: Yeah, I think that is exactly right. I think obviously–I mean, maybe this is true, but it seems as fantastical that they would actually want a war with Iran. I mean, you know, just look at the history of the Iran-Iraq war, and I think it’s easy to see how difficult that would be.

But I think historically, I mean, the policy of sanctions, certainly the way they were used on Iraq, is explicitly designed to try to increase the pressure, increase the pain, increase divisions in the political establishment. And certainly, you know, those have been quite on display in the past couple years, really, since President Ahmadinejad stepped down or his term was over. A lot of the divisions between more “moderate” forces, more conservative forces. And I think that’s a big piece of it. I think just, to again reference the Iran-Iraq war, certainly for Saddam Hussein, that was a major piece of his strategy was to try to find ways to break apart different ethnic groups, different sects of Islam, or whatever it may be in order to weaken the country internally. That seems like a more logical strategy than just an outright direct war, which I’m not sure the United States can even really carry out to the degree necessary. I mean, even though 120,000 troops that was at once rumored, it’s not even close to what they’d need, and the length and the intensity would be outrageous.

I think what they’re hoping for here is either wanting to force Iran into some sort of, you know, just completely total Carthaginian-style surrender, which I don’t think will happen. But that could happen if they can provoke a greater economic collapse, or if they’re able to break the country apart, because in some ways that’s the second best option. Like, if you could not have regime change in Iran, you can certainly try to hobble the country of Iran and have a situation like, say, Libya, where the country is divided between four or five different groups. And I think we can see other times in the past where this has been a key element of different countries trying to undermine different countries. So I think certainly they would hope for either a complete capitulation, or internal regime change. I think they’re more than willing to settle for hobbling the country by having armed groups, if not break the country apart, at least start to create a level of chaos to where Iran, which is a powerful economy in many different ways, certainly regionally, but also internationally, hobbling it from being able to play that role.

PAUL JAY: Yeah. I just–to agree with you, and I’m going to end it with me agreeing with you. If they actually care about international terrorism, then how do you ally with Saudi Arabia, which is without question the country that has supported more international terrorism than any other country on earth? If you’re worried about Iran and its repression, domestic repression. And certainly there is domestic repression in Iran, political repression. But it’s nothing compared to the repression in Saudi Arabia, where they cut young people’s heads off for blogging criticism. The hypocrisy of the American position is really unbelievable, and such that while the corporate media, like CNN and MSNBC is maybe poking some holes in the increased Iranian threat at this time, and what Trump’s doing, because they’re so anti-Trump, they never go after the underlying assumption of the U.S.-Saudi relationship, or even ask, you know, where is all this international terrorism that Iran supports? Where is it? It really comes down to Iran’s support for Hezbollah in Lebanon. And some support for Hamas, which is–Hezbollah defends Lebanese sovereignty. And that’s what they’ve done. And at any rate, it comes down to what you said, what I said at the beginning, and the corporate media just won’t deal with this issue. This is all about regional hegemony requires total hegemony. And Iran is outside the American umbrella. And that, in the mindset of the John Boltons and others of this world, go right back the Project for a New American Century thinking, there can’t be such a thing on planet Earth as governments that have actual independence and some military political power that are not under direct American control.

EUGENE PURYEAR: Absolutely.

PAUL JAY: All right. Well, we’ll end it here. Thanks very much for joining us, Eugene.

EUGENE PURYEAR: Thanks so much for having me.

PAUL JAY: And thank you for joining us on The Real News Network.

https://therealnews.com/stories/trump-offers-no-evidence-of-iranian-threat-or-terrorism

Agelbert NOTE: The media won't deal with the real issue (i.e. The MIC owned US Petro-State wants FULL SPECTRUM DOMINANCE hegemony forevah and evah, amen) because they are part of MIC's propaganda arm, PERIOD.

God help us because we will all perish waiting for anybody else to.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #293 on: May 28, 2019, 06:03:16 pm »
Agelbert NOTE: No, this story does not belong in the "Money" Topic thread. Yes, it definitely belongs in the "War Provocations" Topic thread.


May 28, 2019


Quote
youshallnotkill
Quote
Trump’s ‘deal of the century’ will go to hell — Palestinian Leader Mahmoud Abbas said.

That's were it came from to begin with.
Yep.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #294 on: May 29, 2019, 12:16:58 pm »
MAY 27, 2019

Today on the Memorial Day edition of TRUNEWS we discuss the murderous betrayal Israel carried out against the most decorated vessel from a single engagement in U.S. history. In part one of this powerful story, we are joined by survivor Phillip Tourney, a damage controlman who fought to put out napalm fires that day; and retired sailor turned author, David Gahary, to detail the intentional butchering of Americans, chronicled in their new book, “Erasing the Liberty.” Rick Wiles, Matt Skow, Phillip Tourney, David Gahary. Airdate: 5/27/19.



Six Day War Massacre: USS Liberty Veterans Reveal Truth About Israeli Attack (Part 2)

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #295 on: June 04, 2019, 07:02:42 pm »
The U.S. Cult ☠️ of Bombing and Endless War

BY William J. Astore, TomDispatch

PUBLISHED June 4, 2019

U.S. wars are increasingly waged from the air, not on the ground -- a reality that makes the prospect of ending them ever more daunting. The desire to minimize U.S. "boots on the ground" and domestic resistance to war has made air power an abstraction for American decision-makers while subjecting people in foreign lands to a steady diet of "Made in USA" bombs and missiles.

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He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #296 on: June 06, 2019, 08:31:50 pm »
D-Day: How the US Supported Hitler’s Rise to Power

June 6, 2019

On June 6, 1944, Allied forces stormed the beaches of Normandy, France, opening a second front against German fascism. The largest contingents of fighters were British, American, and Canadian. This battle has been depicted in movies and books as the decisive turning point of World War II, a ferocious struggle against a superior enemy. But as The Real News Network's Paul Jay and author Peter Kuznick discuss, D-Day was also the moment where the United States' opposition to communism could no longer outweigh its tacit acceptance of Nazism, and the U.S. industrialists who helped rearm Germany after World War I could no longer profit from Hitler's Germany.

“In the aftermath of [World War I], there was such strong anti-war sentiment throughout Europe and throughout the United States that people were very, very loath to get involved in another war, and they were willing to tolerate things they perhaps shouldn't have,” Kuznick said. “The attitude in the United States was that the United States had been effectively suckered into the war by the munitions manufacturers and the bankers. That instead of it being a noble cause to make the world safe for democracy, to fight the war to end all wars, it was really a war to secure the vast Morgan loans to the British and the French and way to fatten the coffers of DuPont and the other munitions makers.”

This opposition to war is why the U.S. and other countries tolerated German rearmament in the '30s, and in the case of many American manufacturers, helped Germany rearm. GM, IBM, and Ford played a major role in rearming Germany. Jay mentioned that in 1938, Hitler even gave notorious anti-Semite and anti-unionist Henry Ford the Grand Cross of the German Eagle, the highest medal a foreigner could receive from the Nazi party. Then, going into World War II, the U.S.'s “big underlying strategy,” Jay explained, was to allow Germany and Russia to fight and “kill each other,” even as the Soviet Union wanted “the British and the Americans and Canadians to join a united front or a broad front of alliance against Hitler as far back as 1939.”

Kuznick explained that then-Senator Harry Truman suggested that the U.S. support whoever was winning the war, whether that was the Russians or the Germans. Moreover, U.S. neutrality in the Spanish Civil War was an example of how extreme post-World War I anti-war sentiments were—as well as a missed opportunity to prevent fascism from spreading.

All of this was happening at the same time that U.S. industrialists were rearming Hitler's Germany, and making money from it.

“There are a lot of American elites who were involved in helping finance and helping rearm and helping rebuild the German economy during this period,” Kuznick said. “A lot of those folks who we call the ‘Greatest Generation' were Nazi enablers, and many of them saw the Nazis as a bulwark against Bolshevism, as against communism, and were therefore happy and willing to support and allow and tolerate and turn a blind eye to the rearmament of Germany during this time because they saw the Nazis as the way to stop the Communists and the Soviet Union.”


Story Transcript

PAUL JAY: Welcome to The Real News Network. I’m Paul Jay.

On June 6, 1944, the Allied forces stormed the beaches of Normandy, France, and opened a second front against German fascism. The largest contingents of fighters were British, American, and Canadian. This battle has been depicted in movies and books as the decisive turning point of World War II, a ferocious struggle against a superior enemy. Here’s Donald Trump in London speaking about D-Day and the triumph of those soldiers.

DONALD TRUMP: On June 6, 1944, tens of thousands of young warriors left these shores by the sea and air to begin the invasion of Normandy and the liberation of Europe and the brutal Nazi occupation. It was a liberation like few people have seen before. Among them were more than 130,000 American and British brothers in arms. Through their valor and sacrifice they secured our homelands and saved freedom for the world.

PAUL JAY: No doubt the soldiers who sacrificed in the tens of thousands, killed and wounded, did wage a valiant and courageous fight. My father was in the Canadian Air Force, attached to the RAF, and was part of a mission to arm and support the French partisans. Most of my father’s fellow airmen were killed. Like many vets, my dad did not like talking about the war and he was not filled with stories of triumph and heroism, although surely he and millions of others were such heroes. But was D-Day the dramatic turning point in the war? Was the role of the United States the critical difference in the defeat of the Nazis? And what really drove the decisions that led to so much horror and death?

Now joining us from Washington is Peter Kuznick. He’s a professor of history and director of the Nuclear Studies Institute at American University. He’s the author of The Untold History of the United States, co-written with Oliver Stone, as well as Rethinking the Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Thanks for joining us, Peter.

PETER KUZNICK: Hi, Paul.

PAUL JAY: So before we get into D-Day and what happened there, and what the significance of D-Day was, I think there’s sort of a bigger backstory here about the rise of Hitler and Hitlerite militarism. And I always understood that the Versailles treaty after the end of World War I, one of the most important parts of that treaty, was that Germany should never be allowed to rearm. And the second [war] should never have been possible. What happened?

PETER KUZNICK: Well, that’s actually a long and complicated story, partly that also is a product of World War I. You have to remember that in the aftermath of the war, there was such strong anti-war sentiment throughout Europe and throughout the United States that people were very, very loath to get involved in another war, and they were willing to tolerate things they perhaps shouldn’t have. The attitude in the United States was that the United States had been effectively suckered into the war by the munitions manufacturers and the bankers; that instead of it being a noble cause to make the world safe for democracy, to fight the war to end all wars, it was really a war to secure the vast Morgan loans to the British and the French, and a way to fatten the coffers of DuPont and the other munitions makers.

PAUL JAY: And this is–you’re talking about the first World War.

PETER KUZNICK: Yeah, the first World War. Because there’s such strong anti-war sentiment that nobody really wants to get involved in World War–another war in Europe in the 1930s. So they tolerate German rearmament in ways that they shouldn’t have, even though they were aware this was taking place. And as you know, it was more than just tolerating it. The American manufacturers were involved in helping it happen.

One of my Ph.D. students recently completed an excellent dissertation about the role of GM, IBM, and Ford in rebuilding the German economy in the 1930s, and helping directly, in the case of GM and Ford, with German rearmament. They were willing to do things to support the German military they were not willing to do to rearm in the United States during this period. And they stayed involved in ways that really defied U.S. law up until the war actually began. And then during the war their subsidiaries in Europe continued to produce, continued to make profits, which they were able to accrue after the war ended. In fact, GM and Ford were able to sue the U.S. government for millions of dollars for reparations for their plants that the U.S. bombed and destroyed in Europe during the war that were producing for the Nazis. So American business had a shameful record.

PAUL JAY: Talk about the story of Henry Ford, because it’s a good–it’s not just Henry Ford. The sections of the American elites, the British elites, including the king of England, who now–we now know didn’t step down because of his marriage to an American woman. He really stepped down because he was so pro-Hitler he became an embarrassment. And Henry Ford himself gets some kind of award from Hitler.

PETER KUZNICK: Yes, Henry Ford got an award. Henry Ford–there were some good things one might say about Henry Ford, but we have to also note that he was viciously anti-union, and that he was a vicious anti-Semite. His newspaper reprinted the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, helped popularize that myth, that falsity, throughout America; spewed anti-Semitism in his publications, and his personal life. Hitler had a portrait of Henry Ford above his desk in his office. And Hitler said, Henry Ford is my hero. And that was in part because of his anti-Semitism, and a lot of his other reactionary ideas that-

PAUL JAY: Henry Ford used to send Hitler money on his birthday every year.

PETER KUZNICK: And then the Germans did give Henry Ford an award, and Henry Ford was happy to accept it. He later tries to change the record and say that he wasn’t a supporter of Hitler, but I think clearly the Ford Motor Company was doing Germany’s bidding. But it wasn’t just that. It was Prescott Bush. It was the uncle of George Bush, and father, and grandfather, who was very much instrumental in working with Brown Brothers Harriman, and got called on the carpet for this during the war with the Trading with the Enemies Act.

So there are a lot of American elites who were involved in helping finance and helping rearm and helping rebuild the German economy during this period. It’s a shameful episode. Oliver and I go into it in some depth in the documentary Untold History and the book of Untold History because we think it’s a very important story that gets swept under the carpet when we’re talking about these people being the greatest generation. A lot of those folks who we call the ‘greatest generation’ were Nazi enablers, and many of them saw the Nazis as a bulwark against Bolshevism, as against communism, and were therefore happy and willing to support and allow and tolerate and turn a blind eye to the rearmament of Germany during this time, because they saw the Nazis as the way to stop the Communists and the Soviet Union.

PAUL JAY: And wasn’t that really the–that was the big underlying strategy, wasn’t it? They thought that the Germans would march east, not west, and that if there was a war with Germany and Russia that would just be hunky dory for the West. Let the Germans and these Russians kill each other.

PETER KUZNICK: Among those who explicitly stated that was Senator Harry Truman, who on the floor of the Senate said if the Germans are winning we support the Russians, and if the Russians are winning we support the Germans. And that way let them kill as many of each other as possible. That was not Roosevelt’s attitude. But we had time, we had chances to intervene to prevent this. One of the key episodes in the rise of fascism, the spread of fascism, was the Spanish Civil War. And the U.S. maintained a dumb neutrality in the Spanish Civil War. And again, this was a product of this strong hatred of World War I and the deep anti-war sentiment, which normally would be a positive sentiment. We wish we had more of that in the United States today. But in the 1930s this was a chance to stop Hitler, and the U.S. maintained its neutrality throughout the Spanish Civil War. The only nation that was really supporting the Spanish Republic was the Soviet Union.

PAUL JAY: And that was–the Spanish Republic was the elected government, overthrown by the fascist Franco backed by Hitler. And it was–in fact Hitler, uses the Spanish Civil War as a way to show off his air force, and his new military ability, and test some of his weapons. I mean, an obvious place to intervene if they actually wanted to stop fascism in Europe.

PETER KUZNICK: Well, and Roosevelt looked back on it and said we were going to rue the day when we didn’t intervene to stop Hitler when we had the chance.

There are a number of times when we could have stopped Hitler. But number one, people didn’t want to go to war. Number two, they downplayed the threat that Hitler represented, even though Hitler lays this out explicitly. In Mein Kampf he talks about taking over the Soviet Union. He talks about populating the Ukraine. He really lays out his plans very, very clearly, but people didn’t want to take it seriously. And then we pay the price for that. So sometimes it is necessary to fight. And we do have to be vigilant. But what complicates it, of course, is the post-war history, where the Cold War was, as we’ve talked about, extraordinarily dangerous and unnecessary and avoidable. And the U.S. interventions repeatedly, militarily, were not in the cause of freedom and stopping fascism, but were more often in the cause of spreading U.S. foreign policy goals and interests and intervening repeatedly on the wrong side in support of the oppressors, support of the militarists. We can through that history. We have before.

PAUL JAY: My understanding is the Soviet Union had been asking for the British and the Americans and Canadians to join a united front or a broad front of alliance against Hitler as far back as 1939. And once the Germans did start directly engaging, fighting against the Soviet Union, and began the invasion, Stalin kept asking over and over again for a second front to be opened in the West. And there wasn’t much interest in it up until the defeat of the Germans at Stalingrad.

PETER KUZNICK: Yeah. Well, in fact, it goes back long before 1939, when the Soviets adopted the popular front strategy in 1935. That was an attempt to reach out to the liberal progressive forces in the West for an antifascist alliance to stop Hitler in the mid-1930s. The Soviets saw what was coming, and they interpreted the West’s refusal to ally against Hitler as a sign that the West was hoping that Hitler would move East, as he promised, against the Soviet Union and destroy communism.

On the British side, Churchill says back after the Bolshevik Revolution that he wants to strangle Bolshevism in the cradle. You have to remember that the West sent troops into the Soviet Union in 1918 and 1919, and this was partly an effort to defeat the Russian Revolution. We’ve got the prolonged Russian Civil War as a response to that. And then the U.S. also sent more than 10,000 troops into Russia in 1918 and 1919. So this goes way back. The Brits, the Japanese, the French, they all had troops in there right after the Russian Revolution. They saw Bolshevism as a threat. And clearly the Bolsheviks were not playing by the rules. When the Bolsheviks released the diplomatic papers showing the Sykes-Picot treaty and showing that the British and the French and the Russians had divided up the world after World War I, that World War I was really a war to make the world safe for colonialism, to redivide the world’s colonies, not a war to make the world safe for democracy, it had exposed the lie at the source of American involvement in World War I.

Woodrow Wilson gets us involved because he wants to have a hand in shaping the post-war world. And he says so explicitly. He says otherwise we’ll be forced to sit outside the door and try to shout through a crack under the door. He says we want to be involved with shaping the world. And the world that the British and the French shape after World War I is not a world opposed to colonies, is not a world of self-determination, not a world of freedom, not a world of democracy. It’s a world of colonialism and repression, which is another reason why the Americans did not want to get involved in Europe. They saw the Europeans as corrupt, and Roosevelt says this explicitly in the 1930s and 1940s. He talks about British colonies in Gambia. Talks about the French colonies in Indochina. Talks about the British in India. And he says that this kind of repression cannot be tolerated after World War II. Unfortunately, Roosevelt dies and Truman does allow the British and the French to re-establish their colonial domains after World War II.

PAUL JAY: In the next segment of our interview we’re going to talk more about D-Day and whether it was the decisive battle that broke the back of German fascism, German militarism. So please join us for that on The Real News Network.

https://therealnews.com/stories/d-day-how-the-us-supported-hitlers-rise-to-power
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #297 on: June 09, 2019, 06:32:18 pm »
Agelbert NOTE: This man describes the only correct attitude of a Christian towards war. As you can imagine, this attitude is considered "unpatriotic" by 100% of the pseudo-Christians in the USA. 

Christianity and War

Pastor Robert W. Reed | War Series

Victory Baptist Church

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Agelbert NOTE: For news and analysis of Oil Tanker (False Flag) attack and Pompeo evidence free accusation(s), begin at 17:17 mark.

TruNews

Today on TRUNEWS we discuss the mysterious attack on two oil tankers near the Strait of Hormuz, and detail how Secretary Pompeo’s blanket assignment of blame to Iran has set the stage for further provocations to be used to start Israel’s war. Rick Wiles, Edward Szall, Doc Burkhart, Kerry Kinsey. Airdate June 13, 2019.


False Flag or Provocation? U.S. 😈 Quickly Blames Iran for Attacks on Ships
11,711 views


https://www.trunews.com/prayer

Agelbert ADDED NOTE: What an amazing coincidence that this "incident" enabled the price of oil to jump 4% even as a historic glut was tanking prices and profits for the darling of the 🦍 M.I.C., the Hydrocarbon 🦕🦖 Hellspawn...


He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

Surly1

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Re: War Provocations and Peace Actions
« Reply #299 on: June 14, 2019, 07:06:20 am »
Remember the Maine. That's my first response. then I found Jim Wright wrote this:
http://www.stonekettle.com/2019/06/remember-maine.html

Remember The Maine



"In spite of all its horror, we must regard the sinking of the Lusitania as an event most important and favourable to the Allies. The poor babies who perished in the ocean attack struck a blow at German power more deadly than could have been achieved by the sacrifice of 100,000 men."
-- Winston Churchill, commenting on the “unprovoked” attack on the luxury liner RMS Lusitania, torpedoed by German U-boat U-20 on May 7, 1915. 1,200 people died in the icy waters off the coast of Ireland. The attack caused international outcry and was one of the factors that led to US involvement in WWI and was used to stoke anti-German sentiment in the United Kingdom.

It was later revealed Lusitania regularly engaged in the transport of thousands of tons munitions and war materiel using civilian passenger service as camouflage, a fact that had been deliberately kept from the British public and Lusitania’s passengers.

Trump on Twitter quoting US Secretary of State Pompeo, “It is the assessment of the U.S. government that Iran is responsible for today's attacks in the Gulf of Oman...."

The government.

It is the assessment of the US government.

Not the US intelligence community, the US government.

You want to pay attention to the weasel words.

[Edit: Moments ago, Pompeo blamed Iran for the attacks, “citing evidence from US intelligence” instead of just saying “US government. He did not, however, present any of this alleged evidence.]

Two tankers were attacked this morning in the Gulf of Oman near the mouth of the Straits of Hormuz.

Japan's Trade Ministry said the two vessels were carrying "Japan-related” cargo.

Four tankers were attacked last month in the same region.

Two more today and it’s starting to look like a trend.

Naturally prices surged on international markets as investors panicked at this sudden threat to the oil supply.

US officials are – predictably – blaming Iran for the attacks.

The general consensus in the press and world opinion is that Iran must be behind these attacks.

Must be.

There’s no evidence yet, at least none that any nation is willing to make public. No one actually witnessed Iran carrying out these attacks. It’s the assessment of our government, but not of the professionals – at least, not yet.

Still, perhaps conveniently, there really isn’t another obvious candidate.

But, as a retired US Navy Intelligence officer who spent significant time in that part of the world, I've got to say this assumption doesn't make a hell of a lot of sense. Not to me anyway.

Right now, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is in Tehran.

Japan’s leader is meeting with Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in an attempt to rekindle nuclear disarmament talks – something the Trump administration is adamantly opposed to. And Trump himself said so on Twitter again this morning.

And suddenly there are these attacks on tankers ...

...carrying Japanese cargo?

That's damned coincidental, if it is indeed a coincidence.

But if it's Iran, as our leaders say it must be, and it's not a coincidence, then what's the message?

Japan isn't threatened by Iran. 

Iran isn’t threatened by Japan.

Japan is currently in Iran attempting to negotiate a future equitable to Iran and Iran blows up cargo destined for Japan?

I repeat, what's the message here? Don’t try to negotiate with Iran? Is that the message? Because that message seems like it would be a lot more likely to come from somebody other than Iran.

Somebody who doesn’t want Japan and Iran talking.

Somebody who doesn’t want Iran talking to anybody.

Unless, you know, it is just a damned odd coincidence.

And maybe it is. How do you know?

How do you know?

Perhaps start with your intelligence assets, the professionals who spend their entire lives looking at this problem, instead of some political hack running the State Department who tells you only what you want to hear.

And the first thing you have to ask as an intelligence analysts is: Who benefits from these attacks?

Start there. Don’t start with the assumption Iran is behind the attacks and then reverse engineer the data and the politics to make it so. That’s how we ended up invading Iraq for 9-11. I know, because I was there.

Who benefits from these attacks?

And that's the question you don't see asked.

You see a lot of blame tossed around this morning. A lot of speculation. But the press doesn’t ask "who benefits?"

This morning, as we edge closer and closer to war, President Trump is furiously tweeting about impeachment and how somebody spied on his campaign and how he’s under no obligation to report when foreign intelligence agents hand him dirt on his opponents and something about the “Prince of Whales,” but you don’t see him asking: “who benefits?”

And you’re not seeing it from any of our other so-called leaders either.

We all just assume Iran benefits. But do they? And can you prove it?

Who benefits from attacking oil tankers in the Gulf of Oman?

Start here: The attackers didn't get the cargo.

And that’s significant.

In fact, at this point, we're not even sure how the ships were attacked. Mine? Missile? Torpedo? Nobody knows, again at least not that they’re saying. But whoever it was and however they did it, they weren’t interested in the cargo. I have some very direct experience in this area, in this gulf, on ships like this, with piracy and oil and you don’t blow holes in a tanker or light it on fire if you’re after the oil.

The attackers didn't get the cargo and made no attempt to do so.

So piracy isn't the motivation.

Or is it?

See, there's more than one form of piracy and this is where I remind you of that surge in oil prices this morning.

What am I saying? Wall Street is behind the attacks? Exxon stock holders? Investors? OPEC? Some sort of James Bondesque plot from the Pierce Brosnan era?

Well … you know, stranger things have happened. Wars have been started for profit more often than we’d like to admit. It is a hell of a lot of money. One hell of a lot of power.

To hell with Spain! Remember the Maine!
-- Rallying cry of Americans who wanted war with Spain following that nation’s attack on USS Maine in Havana harbor, February 15, 1898.

Many years later, following the Spanish American War, it was revealed USS Maine had been destroyed by a coal bunker explosion. An accident.

But I'd rate the probability of that scenario as, well, probably unlikely – but not entirely impossible.

It would be easier to raise oil prices via a variety of safer means, depending on your definition of "safe." Particularly when these attacks are likely to spark a military response.

Very likely, a military response from the US -- despite the fact that these are not our ships, nor our cargo, nor our people, nor our sovereign territory.

And that’s the thing, right there. Isn’t it?

Who wants war between the US and Iran?

Besides us, I mean?

Who wants that war? Who benefits from war between the US and Iran?

Well, a lot of people actually. A lot of nations. A lot of entrenched political and monied power structures.

Now, we're certainly veering dangerously towards conspiracy theory territory here, but the thing is that whoever is behind this, well, they must want war.

They must.

Whoever is behind these attacks, be it a nation or some other agency, they must want war.

Or they are the single most naïve terrorists ever born.

Because war is what you're going to get when you threaten the oil supply.

And the United States is going to be leading the charge. That’s a given, for many reasons beyond just oil.

So, if it is Iran, is that what they’re trying to provoke? War. With America?

Why?

Does Iran really want war with the US?

Of course, the kneejerk jingoistic American answer is: YES!

But, do they? Really?

How does Iran benefit from that war?

The odds are that the US will win – depending on how you define the terms. Maybe not quickly, maybe not easily, maybe at great cost – perhaps even fatal cost -- but eventually the US along with the rest of the world will destroy Iran if pushed into war, because the world can’t afford to have the Straits of Hormuz closed for very long. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, the UAE, those nations cannot allow Iran to close the Straits for long. The nations who depend on the oil which flows via tanker through those straits, they can’t allow those straits to be closed at all.

And that’s what will happen when the US goes to war with Iran.

I’ve been there. I’ve been on the bridge of US cruisers, the point ship of a fleet transiting that narrow strait. I’ve looked at the war plans, hell, I helped write them. It doesn’t have to be complete. It doesn’t have to be total. Such a blockade might not keep warships from fighting their way through – unless somebody gets lucky and sinks an American nuclear aircraft carrier in the channel. But you can’t sail oil tankers through a war zone. Not through that channel under fire.

It doesn’t matter if anybody else can get through, if you can’t sail tankers through the Straits of Hormuz, then you’re screwed.

And there isn’t much anybody could do to stop that once war is joined, short of utter destruction of Iran – perhaps even nuclear destruction. 

Iran knows this.

Their leaders are religious fanatics, but they are not stupid. And they understand war and power just fine. So why would they provoke the US into attacking?

What do they stand to gain?

Now, of course, this is where things get difficult, because we are talking about religious fanatics. Maybe they do want the US to attack. Maybe they think their God will give them victory. Or maybe they’re gambling that the attack will be limited. Maybe they think they they can parley such a strike into sympathy, drive a wedge between the US and its allies, especially if they can play up America’s penchant for unprovoked war ala Iraq.

That would be a hell of a risky plan.

Then again, stranger, riskier, and far more ridiculous plans by fanatics have pushed nations into war.

But you have to ask yourself, why then attack tankers? Why attack these tankers? Why not attack warships? If war is what you want. Iran attacking these tankers just doesn’t make much sense even if they did want war. And the truth of the matter is that no matter who “wins,” war with the US will be very, very bad for Iran. And it’s damned unlikely they would risk any such open conflict, especially since these very same Iranian leaders have repeatedly demonstrated their willingness to sit down at a negotiating table and talk, even sign agreements with the United States and her allies.

Agreements the US walked out on, not Iran.

Of all the nations that might want war between the US and Iran, Iran is the least likely candidate.

And so, we come back ‘round to it.

Back around to the questions we should be asking.

To the questions that the press should be asking.

To the questions our our leaders should be loudly asking right now.

To the questions our intelligence community should be working to answer in detail.

Who benefits?

Who benefits from attacks on these particular targets?

Who has the capability to carry out these attacks. Who has the ability to carry out an attack on oil tankers, underway at sea, in one of the most heavily trafficked sea lanes and thus one of the most heavily surveilled areas in the world, on ships that are specifically on the lookout for such an attack.

Who can carry out that attack and do so in such a manner that the methodology and origin are not immediately apparent?

Who has that capability?

Not only has that capability, but also believes they will directly benefit from a war between Iran and the rest of the world.

Has the capability, is willing to use it, wants a war, and will benefit from the results even if later reveled -- starting with a massive increase in the price of oil.

Now, you tell me: who is that?

My fellow Americans, as President and Commander in Chief, it is my duty to the American people to report that renewed hostile actions against United States ships on the high seas in the Gulf of Tonkin have today required me to order the military forces of the United States to take action in reply…
-- President Lyndon Johnson, August 4, 1964, addressing the nation following two attacks by North Vietnamese gunboats on the American warship USS Maddox in the Gulf of Tonkin.

Whereas these attackers are part of a deliberate and systematic campaign of aggression that the Communist regime in North Vietnam has been waging against its neighbors and the nations joined with them in the collective defense of their freedom…
-- Tonkin Gulf Resolution, August 7, 1964, the US resolution which, as a result of the North Vietnamese attacks on USS Maddox, led directly to the Vietnam War.

In 2005, records from the Maddox Incident were declassified, revealing that in the first “attack” on USS Maddox, the US warship was in fact the aggressor and fired on North Vietnamese vessels first.

The second “attack” never actually happened at all.



 

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