Topic: War On Terror
The Enemy of My Enemy is NOT My Friend Things are heating up in Iran.... What is the U.S. Government thinking?by Doug Eberhardt
(Libertarian)
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
While the MSM seems to be debating the ins and outs of Obama's relationship with Jeremiah Wright, those of us who don't fall for this ploy of keeping our minds busy on worthless stories are busy contemplating what's really going on behind the scenes.
I'm always asking myself..."What is the U.S. Government thinking when it comes to foreign policy, and then I set out to try and prove my speculations with hard facts.
After a brief potential conflict in Colombia ended without bloodshed in the U.S. governments quest to police the world, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Tuesday that sending a second U.S. aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf could serve as a "reminder" to Iran, but he said it's not an escalation of force.
We believe you Mr. Gates. Wink, Wink...
There has been much written on the potential of a conflict with Iran. It seems things are heating up of late.
It's not a secret that the MSM has stepped up the rhetoric just as they did during the run up to the Iraq war as exposed in the BBC Documentary, "Power of Nightmares."
We're constantly hearing the following mantra from the media: "U.S. officials continue to accuse Iran of increasing its efforts to supply weapons to militants in Iraq." It's no surprise this rhetoric started with a War Street Journal article. (The Wall Street Journal is now owned by Rupert Murdoch's Fox News Corporation for those that didn't know - hence the play on names).
Outside of the little speedboats allegedly buzzing U.S. Navy ships, this seems to be the only justification necessary to attack Iran as there has been no proof of any nuclear program found there, just as there wasn't any found in Iraq prior to it being attacked by the U.S.
Iran and Iraq have been at war for centuries with the latest war just ending 20 years ago. Saddam was even threatening Iran as late as 1999.
U.S. leaders don't agree with the Proverb...... "The enemy of my enemy is my friend" do they? Well, they did at one time when they supported Iraq and Saddam's regime against Iran in that 1980 war, but I want to stay current here. It's not like the U.S. relies on history before making important decisions like war anyway (Vietnam, Korea). Sarc off.
Does the following "current" scenario sound familiar?
The IAEA inspectors want answers from Tehran regarding intelligence received from Western member states on alleged studies on uranium conversion, high explosives testing and work on a missile re-entry vehicle, which all have potential nuclear weapons applications.
"Scott Ritter, former chief United Nations weapons inspector, speaks Sunday at the James A. Little Theater on how no weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq. He also predicted the U.S. will go to war with Iran.
The former U.N. weapons inspector who said Iraq disarmed long before the U.S. invasion in 2003 is warning Americans to prepare for a war with Iran.
"We just don’t know when, but it’s going to happen," Scott Ritter said to a crowd of about 150 at the James A. Little Theater on Sunday night.
Ritter described how the U.S. government might justify war with Iran in a scenario similar to the buildup to the Iraq invasion. He also argued that Iran wants a nuclear energy program, and not nuclear weapons. But the Bush administration, he said, refuses to believe Iran is telling the truth.
He predicted the matter will wind up before the U.N. Security Council, which will determine there is no evidence of a weapons program. Then, he said, John Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, "will deliver a speech that has already been written. It says America cannot allow Iran to threaten the United States and we must unilaterally defend ourselves."
"How do I know this? I’ve talked to Bolton’s speechwriter," Ritter said."
Even though Bolton has bolted, look who replaced him as the U.S. Representative to the UN in 2007:
On April 23, 2007 Dr. Zalmay Khalilzad began as the United States Permanent Representative to the United Nations.
Who is Dr. Zalmay Khalilzad?
The following from Wiki:
"Khalilzad worked for Paul Wolfowitz. He consulted for Cambridge Energy Research Associates, which at the time was conducting a risk analysis for Unocal, now part of ConocoPhillips, for a proposed 1,400 km (890 mile), $2-billion, 622 m³/s (22,000 ft³/s) Trans-Afghanistan gas pipeline project which would have extended from Turkmenistan to Afghanistan and further proceeding to Pakistan. He acted as a special liaison between UNOCAL and the Taliban regime.
He is one of the original members of Project for the New American Century (PNAC) and was a signatory of the letter to President Bill Clinton sent on January 26, 1998, which called for him to accept the aim of "removing Saddam Hussein and his regime from power" using "a full complement of diplomatic, political and military efforts."
A White House favorite whom Bush calls by his nickname, Zal, Khalilzad has worked in two other Republican administrations, those of President Ronald Reagan and Bush's father, President George H.W. Bush.
Khalilzad headed the Bush-Cheney transition team for the Defense Department in 2000 and served as a counselor to former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.
Connections run deep don't they?
Lastly, Khalilzad is a Muslim. More on this in a moment.
Khalilzad told the media, soon after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released its report on Iran, that the Iranian government is clearly going ahead with its nuclear program."
And what did Khalilzad say over the weekend?
"Iran and Syria must stop the flow of weapons and foreign fighters into Iraq, and their malign interference in Iraq," U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said Monday in a report to the U.N. Security Council on behalf of the multinational force in Iraq."
So if a Muslim says it's ok to attack another Muslim country, it's justified then right? This way it can't be called a Crusade right?
What did the U.S. top military official say last week?
"The U.S. ambassador's report to the council echoed the assessment last week by Adm. Mike Mullen, the top U.S. military official, who said it is clear that recently made Iranian-made weapons are flowing into Iraq, including to insurgents leading the fight recently in Basra in southern Iraq."
"But Mullen, who chairs the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said he has "no smoking gun" proof that the highest leadership in the Iranian government has approved the stepped up support for insurgents who are killing U.S. and Iraqi forces."
Anyone care to guess where the "smoking gun" will come from? My guess is their inside man, Khalilzad, but seriously....does it really matter what the smoking gun is? Does it really matter what the majority of American people want?
Of the 68 million people living in Iran, 1.3 million are not Muslim. Many of those 1.3 million people are Christians and Jews. All 68 million are humans. I guess they're all just collateral damage just like all those people in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and of course, Iraq, the "enemy of my enemy."
Do we really want 68 million more people upset with the U.S. Government or does it make more sense to "Love thy neighbor?"
A good start is to ask your neighbor, and give him this book at the same time.
Remember, the antonym to enemy is friend. If our government doesn't stop this nonsense, we may not have any friends left in the world.
Doug Eberhardt
www.youcanmakeadifference.org
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2008 Doug Eberhardt, all rights reserved.
Published: Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Last modified: Wednesday, April 30, 2008
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Cambridge Energy Research Associates the group Khalilzad consulted for are the most "optimistic" of the time to peak oil prognosticators. Basically their numbers can't be trusted and they are in the pocket of the oil companies. But whenever the media does a story about peak oil they trot out Daniel Yergin of Cambridge Energy Research Associates so that everyone can see a real live expert saying that peak oil is many years off when in reality it is here now.
War with Iran appears to be drawing closer. The pipe line negotiations with Iran, Pakistan and India is contrary to "United States Vital Interests in the Region". Also China, Malaysia and now Sweden have struck deals for natural gas despite the so called trading sanctions.
Utilitarianism tells you to keep the wars small and easy so that you don't loose too many lives. Indeed the enemy of my enemy is my friend! After conquering one of my enemies, if that enemy becomes a threat it is garaunteed that he won't be as hard to battle than had I battled him earlier at his full streangth. We didn't follow this before WW1 and we lost over 100,000 of our own men in a little less than one year. After that we still failed to intervene in Europe and we lost even more of our men. Amazingly since being in Europe, the continent for the most part, has been at peace.
Wars are not fun and they are not popular, but they are necessary reality for world peace.
Why is it not discussed as to the actual reason we are 'dependent' on Middle East oil? Are the same forces keeping us from new drilling off the:
West Coast
East Coast
Alaska
Who is actually funding these green organizations that prevent us using our own resources, thereby forcing us to fight endless wars in the Middle East for 50 years? Nixon was in office when the EPA was created, and drilling off California was banned - why did this happen?
We are being submerged in debt to pay for the imported oil and endless wars on 'terror' - who benefits? Who gets all that interest? Who is being protected directly by these wars?
Meanwhile the West is being stabbed in the back by the Saudis using our $ to push Wahibism everywhere, including our prisons!
Think about it for a second. Do you really believe some tie dye wearing environmentalists could stop the oil companies from drilling for oil if they thought it could be profitable? The Department of Energy's own estimates and reports say that the oil in ANWR would not come on line for at least ten years and it wouldn't provide more than a million barrels a day over about seven years time. We use 25 million barrels a day now and that's just the United States. Oil is a global commodity. That Alaska oil would probably be sold to China. After the United States peaked in oil production in 1970 at 10 million barrels a day we went on a drilling orgy and even with Prudhoe Bay find in Alaska the oil companies still couldn't stave off the decline in production. The last place that there might be oil that hasn't been sufficiently explored it the north east Atlantic coast. Do you know how much it costs to build deep sea oil rigs? Do you know how long it takes for the oil to come on line IF you find it? Do you know how fast deep sea fields peak and decline?
We went after the cheap stuff in the Middle East instead. Not because of environmentalists but because it was cheap and easy. Now it's 40 years later. There are a couple more billion people on the planet and now they want what we have. Demand is way up and production is flat. We tapped all the easy stuff. What's left is hard to get and expensive as hell. The answer isn't drilling for more. The answer is discovering another way. The oil will be gone someday. There is no credible authority that doesn't say 30-40 years from now it won't be worth our while to pump any more at all. After it takes one barrel to get one barrel it ceases to be a source of energy.
Nobody would be digging up the tar sands in Canada if we hadn't already found all the cheap easy stuff.
Don't believe a bunch of tree hugging hippies who can't even stop super models from wearing furs can stop the rich and powerful oil men from drilling where ever they damn well please if those oil men think they can make a profit from it.
The remainder of the light sweet crude that we know of for sure is in the Middle East. Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia. Without the cheap easy oil we're shot.
We either find another way to live or our leaders are going to go take the oil by force.
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2008 Doug Eberhardt, all rights reserved.