David Raymond Amos@DavidRayAmos
Replying to @DavidRayAmos@Kathryn98967631 and 48 others Methinks the stupidity of Trump
and all the other leaders truly astounds many people blessed with a
conscience, a sense of honour and a little common sense N'esy Pas?
John Bolton, the Saudis and the hawkish forces pushing the White House toward a war with Iran
3797 Comments Commenting is now closed for this story.
John Sollows The
clerics pulling strings in Iran are no angels, but the U.S. is the bad
guy in this tale. ALL American allies should unite and nix the
direction the Trumpists are taking.
David Amos Reply to @John Sollows: At the risk of being redundant I will quote then respond
"We're talking about somebody who makes Dick Cheney look like Mother Teresa."
Bolton holds sway, too. Under his counsel, Trump reneged on his promise
to withdraw troops from Syria. Although Trump objected to regime change
in Venezuela, he heeded Bolton's advice to push for an uprising to oust
dictator Nicolas Maduro. When that uprising failed, a peculiar thing
happened: The president told reporters he needed to rein in his national
security adviser.
"He has strong views on things, which is OK," Trump said of Bolton. "I'm the one who tempers him."
YEA RIGHT
Allan Campbell Canada needs to distance itself from the u.s. madness.
David Amos Reply to @Allan Campbell: YUP
Jack Richards 15 of the 19 Sept 11th hijackers were citizens of Saudi Arabia.
Lorraine Karuse Reply
to @David Allan: Check PBS Frontline series - Who created ISIS - the
shia getting upper hand after US destroyed the Sunni stronghold and
leaving
David Amos
Reply to @lorraine
karuse: FYI obviously I crossed paths bigtime with the PBS Frontline
dudes in Beantown before I ran in the election of the 38th Parliament
enjoy
James Rockford - ( Spaceman ) The U.S. is the most warring nation on earth. Of it's 239 years in existence, it's been in a war 222 of those years. John Oaktree Reply to @James Rockford - ( Spaceman ):
War is what makes the US economy run.
James Rockford - ( Spaceman )
Reply to @John Oaktree:
Only because industry runs the White House.
David Amos
Reply to @John Oaktree: "War is what makes the US economy run"
YUP.
David Amos
Reply to @James Rockford - ( Spaceman ): "Only because industry runs the White House. "
True
Richard Dunphy When Trump comes across as the voice of reason, you just know there is something bizarre going on.
David Amos Reply to @Richard Dunphy: I concur
Gerry Podbielski "Netanyahu has claimed credit for convincing Trump to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal."
Indeed, through powerful lobby groups like AIPAC, Israel is running the show in the US.
David Amos Reply to @Gerry Podbielski: "Indeed, through powerful lobby groups like AIPAC, Israel is running the show in the US."
Everybody knows that
Stan Smith The
world is getting sick of the US going around the world and attacking and
destroying relatively defenceless countries. No one, including Canada,
should trust them anymore.
David Amos Reply to @Stan Smith: "No one, including Canada, should trust them anymore."
Methinks everybody knows why my Loyalist ancestors never did N'esy Pas?
Matt Evans I'm getting tired of being best friends with the world's biggest bully
David Amos Reply to @Matt Evans: Me Too
Robert Borden Bolton
knows Trump only believes in one side "winning", so he's doing
everything possible to force a situation where Trump will have to take
action, or at least force Iran to do something first.
With this lot in charge, not much good can come from what they are doing.
David Amos Reply
to @Robert Borden: It don't look good. Methinks the stupidity of Trump
and all the other leaders truly astounds many people blessed with a
conscience, a sense of honour and a little common sense N'esy Pas?
John Bolton, the Saudis and the hawkish forces pushing the White House toward a war with Iran
Bolton, the president's national security adviser, once endorsed a plan to 'bomb Iran'
U.S.
national security adviser John Bolton, left, and Saudi Crown Prince
Mohammed bin Salman, right, are considered key influencers of U.S.
President Donald Trump, centre. Bolton is known for his aggression
toward Iran, as are Sunni states such as Saudi Arabia and the United
Arab Emirates. (Reuters)
Asked by a reporter on Thursday if the
U.S. would go to war with Iran, President Donald Trump, a leader whose
aggressive bluster sometimes belies his more isolationist impulses, answered simply: "I hope not."
It was a less-than-reassuring response amid intensifying tensions.
This
week, the U.S. dispatched an aircraft carrier and several B-52 bombers
to the Persian Gulf. The U.S. is reportedly drawing up plans to deploy 120,000 troops to the Middle East in the event that Iran attacks American forces in Iraq. The New York Times reports that intelligence officials have declassified a photo of a purported Iranian missile on a boat in the Persian Gulf.
In another ominous development, the U.S. State Department this week ordered
all non-emergency staff out of Baghdad, a move interpreted by analysts
as a precaution ahead of possible fighting in the region.
U.S.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, centre, and Bolton form part of what
Iran specialist Trita Parsi calls Trump's 'war cabinet' on Iran. (Evan Vucci/Associated Press)
How
this fragile situation came to pass, Iran specialists say, is tied to
the motivations of bellicose actors in the White House, as well as
Mideast powers that cheered on the U.S. exit from the Iran nuclear deal last year.
If not for Trump withdrawing from the nuclear pact; if not for U.S. national security adviser John Bolton's hawkish position toward
Tehran; and if not for Sunni states and Israel wielding influence with
this administration, the U.S. might not be in this crisis, they say.
The
region is becoming a tinderbox, with the risk of miscalculation — a
patrol boat firing a warning shot that accidentally kills an American,
for example — potentially igniting a full-blown war.
Trita Parsi,
the founder of the Washington, D.C.-based National Iranian American
Council, a non-profit representing the Iranian-American community,
laments what he sees as "manufactured" peril of the White House's own
making.
Bolton,
shown listening to Trump, has espoused hawkish views on Iran for years.
He was also one of the architects of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. (Carlos Barria/Reuters)
"This
is an unnecessary crisis," Parsi said of the U.S. now seemingly moving
toward the brink of possible armed conflict, despite Iran's continued
compliance in curbing its nuclear activity in exchange for sanctions
relief from other countries.
"This conflict is only here because John Bolton wants this conflict."
'Makes Dick Cheney look like Mother Teresa'
Bolton has a long history of displaying hawkish tendencies. He has endorsed regime change
in Iran, calling for "the overthrow of the mullahs' regime" in a July
2017 address to the Mujahedin-e Khalq, a militant group that advocates
achieving that end through violence.
He championed the invasion of Iraq in 2003, the disastrous aftermath of which continues to this day.
He also pushed for a pre-emptive strike on North Korea, laying out his case in a 2018 Wall Street Journal op-ed that warned that the U.S. "should not wait until the very last minute" for North Korea to obtain a nuclear weapon.
Before his appointment as Trump's chief adviser on national security, Bolton authored a 2015 op-ed in The New York Times articulating his solution for preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear bomb: "Bomb Iran."
Bolton
served with Vice-President Dick Cheney in George W. Bush's
administration in the aughts. If Cheney was known for his "hard-line"
influence over Bush while pushing the Iraq War and defending
waterboarding interrogation techniques, then Bolton was a hard-liner
among hard-liners, Parsi said.
"We're talking about somebody who makes Dick Cheney look like Mother Teresa."
Bolton
holds sway, too. Under his counsel, Trump reneged on his promise to
withdraw troops from Syria. Although Trump objected to regime change in Venezuela, he heeded Bolton's advice to push for an uprising to oust dictator Nicolas Maduro. When that uprising failed, a peculiar thing happened: The president told reporters he needed to rein in his national security adviser.
"He has strong views on things, which is OK," Trump said of Bolton. "I'm the one who tempers him."
Trump meets with Mohammed bin Salman in the Oval Office. The Saudis and Trump have enjoyed close ties. (Evan Vucci/Associated Press)
While
Trump has long criticized Iran and campaigned for president on a
promise to leave the Iran nuclear deal, his opposition to the Islamic
republic has veered toward more militaristic measures since Bolton's
appointment last year, said retired army lieutenant-colonel Danny Davis,
a fellow with the Defense Priorities think-tank in Washington.
Trump's policy of "maximum pressure"
has escalated to the point where Iran is now in a chokehold. The U.S.
aims to stop Iran's exports of oil to other nations, threatening
penalties for Iran's customers. Applying such pressure without offering a
release valve could cause the Iranians to lash out in a way that could
spark a war, Davis said.
"If you push somebody into a corner, then
push them into a cage, then into a corner of that cage, they'll
eventually come to a decision of letting themselves be crushed, or using
the military power they have," Davis warned.
The prospect of
cutting off oil exports would be tantamount to "an act of war," said
Barbara Slavin, director of the Future of Iran Initiative at the
Atlantic Council, a geopolitical think-tank in D.C.
"We're really
at a very dangerous moment now," she said. "I call that cruel and
counterproductive. Many of us are scratching our heads because I don't
think there's any real strategy behind it."
A
giant election billboard shows Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu and U.S. President Donald Trump shaking hands. Netanyahu has
claimed credit for convincing Trump to withdraw from the Iran nuclear
deal. (Jack Guez/AFP/Getty Images)
If
there is a plan, she said, it might be a bid by Bolton and Secretary of
State Mike Pompeo to see their regime-change dreams come true by
inflicting so much misery on the Iranian people that economically
starved resisters rise up and topple their rulers.
"That's delusional," Slavin said.
Speaking in Moscow this week, Pompeo said the U.S. is not seeking war with Iran.
Influential allies
But
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, Sunni states with historical
enmity for Iran's Shia Muslim-majority population, are engaged in a
proxy war with Iran. Both countries have pushed the U.S. to take a more
aggressive stance against Iran.
The Saudis and Emiratis have been
close regional allies for the Trump administration, with the White House
showing deference to the Saudis by siding with the kingdom on the Qatar blockade, and offering a tame response to the slaying of a Washington Post journalist by assailants believed to have taken orders from the Saudi crown prince.
"And
let's not leave out Israel," Slavin said. The Jewish state wants the
Iranian government contained and to have less money to fund groups
like Hezbollah, which the U.S. classifies as a terrorist organization.
A
damaged Andrea Victory ship is seen near the Port of Fujairah in the
United Arab Emirates on May 13. The U.S. blamed Iran for sabotaging oil
tankers, a claim that Iran has denied. (Satish Kumar/Reuters)
This
week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told an event in
Jerusalem that Israel had enjoyed renewed relations with Arab neighbours
because "we are united in our desire to stop Iranian aggression."
Last
year, Netanyahu claimed credit for ending U.S. participation in the
Iran nuclear deal, boasting: "We convinced the U.S. president [to exit
the deal] and I had to stand up against the whole world and come out
against this agreement."
Slavin was not surprised to hear analysts like Davis and Parsi speculate that alleged Iranian attacks on four oil tankers — among them Saudi and Emirati vessels — might be "false flag" incidents staged to incite war.
"I
think there are various parties interested in fomenting a war and
creating an incident that can be blamed on Iran," Slavin said. "But
there are a lot of hotheads in Iran, too. And they're very angry with
what the Trump administration has done."
Meanwhile, a top British general's assessment that there has been no threat increase from
Iran in the region drew rebuke from the Pentagon, a rare statement of
disagreement from a fellow member of the Five Eyes nations that
supposedly share intelligence information.
Such discrepancies
have roused questions about whether the administration's intelligence on
Iran should be trusted, reviving echoes of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, a
conflict cheered on by Bolton and justified using false or overstated evidence of Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction.
With discrepancies on intelligence arising once again, this time with Iran, Parsi warned against history repeating itself.
"We should be skeptical," he said. "Bolton has blatantly lied before."
Matt
Kwong is a Washington-based correspondent for CBC News. He previously
reported for CBC News as an online journalist in New York and Toronto.
You can follow him on Twitter at: @matt_kwong
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