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Today's
Stories
July 23, 2004
Gary Leupp
The 9/11 Commission and the Looming
War on Iran
July
22, 2004
M.
Junaid Alam
Ten Ways to Build a Better Democrat
Brian
McKinlay
Rusted On Down Under: Howard, Bush and Sharon
Jason
Leopold
Cheney Lobbied for Easing of Sanctions on Terrorist Regimes While
CEO of Halliburton
Chris
Floyd
Mob Rule: Ripping the Lid Off of America's Pious Myths
Uri
Avnery
Chirac v. Sharon
July
21, 2004
Paula
J. Caplan
The Emotional Casualities of War: Psychologists
Can't Heal All the Damage
Joshua
Frank
Nader Sleeping with the Enemy? Let's be Fair
Ron
Jacobs
American Exceptionalism
Reza
Ghorashi
The Elections, Iran and al-Qaeda
Amy
Martin
Will Congress Rearm the Guatemalan Generals?
John
Ross
Bush May Lose, But His Wars Will Go On and On
Sex,
Drugs & the Blues!
Serpents in the Garden
CounterPunch's Sizzling
New Book on Culture and Sex is Now Available
Click here to purchase
July
20, 2004
Stan
Cox
The Bush / Kerry War Ticket
Chris
Randolph
An Open Letter to Dr. Ehrenreich: It's Over, Barb!
Forrest
Hylton
The Ghosts of Gonismo: "Popular Patricipation"
and Bolivia's Gas Referendum
Mark
Scaramella
It's Official! Mendocino County is Crazier and Fatter Than the Rest
of California
Sam
Bahour
The World is Knocking on Israel's Door
George
Reiter
A Defense of David Cobb
John
Ross
Burying Iraq, Burying Bush
John
L. Hess
Girlie Stuff: Media Tolerance of Arnold & Co.
Website
of the Day
This Land is Your Land
July
19, 2004
Uri
Avnery
Marie and the Ghosts: the Hoax of Paris
Col.
Dan Smith
What Has Been Accomplished?
Mike
Whitney
Allawi: Our Puppet with a Pistol
Karyn
Strickler
Just Marriage, Not Gay Marriage
Robert
Fisk
The Crisis of Information in Baghdad
David
Swanson
Media Blackout of US Labor Opposition to Iraq
War
Jennifer
van Bergen
The Death of the Great Writ of Liberty
July
17 / 18, 2004
Gary
Leupp
Apocalypse Now: Why the Book of Revelations is
Must Reading
Ghada
Karmi
Vanishing the Palestinians
Lenni
Brenner
When Cattle Unite, Lions Go Hungry: Notes for Ralph Nader
Ben
Tripp
Man on a Bridge: a Ghost Story
Brandy
Baker
What Would Elizabeth Cady Stanton Make of John Kerry?
M.
Shahid Alam
Israel Builds Another Wall
Sasan
Fayazmanesh
Nuclear Hypocrisy: Israel, Iran and the IAEA
Patrick
Bond
The George Bush of Africa
Fred
Gardner
Politics of Marijuana: Cannabiniod Therapuetics
William
Blum
Bush and Thucydides
Ben
Terrall
Carter and the Indonesia Elections: "I Don't See Anything Wrong
with a General Running the Country"
Tom
Barry
John Lehman on the War Path
David
Vest
Dylan Without the Music
Phyllis
Pollack
Return to Sin City: Keith Richards Does Gram Parsons
Ron
Jacobs
Smearing Muhammad Ali: Bob Feller Strikes Out
Joshua
Frank
Kerry to Edwards: "Let's Lose!"
David
Nally
A Call for Sudan: Our Georgraphical Blindspot
Toni
Solo
Bolivia's Gas Referendum
Landau,
Hassan, Prashad & Lindorff
Three Reviews of Moore's F911
Poets's
Basement
Ford, Smith and Albert
July
16, 2004
Dave
Zirin
Adonal Foyle: Master of the Lefty Lay-Up
Shervan
Sardar
Dershowitz, the ICJ and Jim Crow Laws
Ron
Jacobs
The Lil' Engine That Couldn't: Kucinich Surrenders on Anti-War Plank
Robert
Fisk
Iraq, According to Edgar Allen Poe: Coffin Bombs
in Baghdad
Greg
Moses
The Forts of Iraq
Mickey
Z.
Ad Infinitum?: Presidential Campaigns in the Age of TV
Dan
Bacher
A Landmark Win for Salmon and the Tribes
Dave
Lindorff
The Mumia Case: Support from NAACP, But a Movement
in Shambles
Paul
McGeough
Did Allawi Shoot Inmates in Cold Blood?
Website
of the Day
10 Reasons to Fire Bush (and 9 Reasons Kerry Won't Be Any Better)
| July
23, 2004
"We
Will Continue to Look and See If the Iranians Were Involved"
9/11 Report
Builds Case for Expanding the War By
GARY LEUPP
One
day the headlined fact of significance was that the 9-11 Commission
found no Iraq/al-Qaeda link. This was a blow to the Bush administration,
especially its neoconservative contingent, which must realize that
it has diminishing credibility, even as it struggles to stay in
power and doggedly implement its Southwest Asia regime change agenda.
The next day the headlined fact was that the same commission found
that eight of the 9-11 hijackers had passed between Afghanistan
and Iran between October 2000 and February 2001, with Iranian border
guards’ knowledge, and official orders to those guards not
to stamp their passports. In other words, the report says: there’s
been no al-Qaeda link to Iraq (now occupied by U.S. troops), but
there has been one to Iran (not occupied by U.S. troops). Commission
Chairman Thomas H. Kean has said specifically that this passage
of Saudis through Iran raises the possibility that Iran and al-Qaeda
had an operating relationship, There must be a lot of folks thinking
(as some very much want them to think); “The CIA screwed up
on the intelligence, so we didn’t attack the right country.
Turns out Iran’s a much more serious enemy.”
The
CIA, which understands how facts can be used and abused, immediately
emphasized that there’s no evidence for any operational link
between Teheran and the 9-11 attacks. (The CIA has itself, by the
way, been abused by the Commission’s report that faults it---
for “intelligence failures,” rather than the Office
of Special Plans---for collecting and disseminating pro-war disinformation.)
Iranian officials predictably again denied any Iran/al-Qaeda connections,
emphasized the difficulty of policing such a long border, and expressed
willingness to improve relations with the U.S. The Iraqi “ambassador”
to Washington (interestingly, an American citizen) told the press
that Iran has actually cooperated with the present “handover”
government, and has detained Afghan fighters, some of whom might
have been headed to Iraq. (The new “government” of Iyad
Allawi is probably not inclined to contribute to the Iran vilification
campaign; Allawi is widely known as a long-term CIA operative, but
he may have reasons to oppose U.S. plans for neighboring Shiite
Iran.)
But
this fact about these eight men, three or four years ago crossing
the Afghan-Iranian border, is a potentially powerful piece of information,
the sort that the neocons can be expected to maximally exploit.
Regime change in Iran is, after all, a major neocon objective (although
not official U.S. policy). A government official told Jenifer Johnston
of the Sunday Herald that “there will be much more intervention
in the internal affairs of Iran” in a second term. The neocons
know that if Bush is reelected, they may be able to carry out their
plans
This
new, manipulable fact about border crossing is a fine addition to
the anti-Iran dossier they are building. Here we supposedly find
Iranian officialdom interacting in some way with the lives of some
al-Qaeda terrorists, at least on the Afghan border. (The question
of borders generally, and responsibility for their policing, has
been an issue from the outset of the occupation of Iraq. Given the
length and porousness of the borders---with Saudi Arabia, Jordan,
Syria, Iran, Kuwait---and the inevitability of opposition to U.S.
occupation throughout the region, we can expect to hear more charges
that unfriendly governments are abetting “terrorist”
crossings into Iraq, as moves against those governments are prepared.)
One can build on this factoid, to construct a shocking narrative
in which named Iranian mullahs have foreknowledge of, and input
into, 9-11. Skillfully handled, such a tale might generate sufficient
public support for whatever you plan to do in Iran (and if in the
future, it comes out that U.S. action rested on lies…well,
the deed will be done and the liars unlikely to face trial). Anyway,
this announcement of Iran travel by so many 9-11 hijackers is a
gain for the neocons, coming just as their prior case for an Iraq
attack collapses completely.The U.S.-Planned “Popular Uprising”
It
seems there are plans for a repeat of 1953, when the CIA in one
of its boasted success stories removed Mossadegh and returned the
shah to the Peacock Throne. There will not be an invasion, but what
some have called a “popular uprising.” A popular uprising
in Iran, planned in Washington, would seem an oxymoron. But perhaps
we can view the uprising as a movie scenario, authored by some fine
neocon mind.
In
it, the youth in a very youthful country (who lack any connection
to the era of the brutal shah, which concluded in January 1978-9
with the most genuinely popular revolution ever experienced by a
Muslim nation), people dissatisfied with the existing order, rise
up and topple the mullahs. These are youth who, in what State Department
officials have actually conceded is a form of “democracy,”
are dissatisfied with the complex legislative process that gives
Muslim clerics too much influence over their lives.
They
are influenced by American popular culture, know a lot about America
from relatives who have lived here, and some are willing to work
with Americans to make the “popular uprising” possible.
Their environment is oppressive enough to make them demand change,
while just free enough to allow for discussion and organization,
and for networking with exiles (such as the former shah’s
son). A series of actions of the above-mentioned exponents of “intervention
in the internal affairs of Iran,” conducted in tandem with
these dissidents (and perhaps others) brings down the existing regime,
through a well-planned uprising, replacing the regime with one that
is pro-U.S., democratic, and pro-globalization. It agrees to host
U.S. military bases, abjure any aspirations for nuclear weapons
(such as those possessed by nearby states), reform its Islam, recognize
Israel and contribute to a comprehensive solution of the “Middle
East problem.” That’s the scenario.
Some
are convinced there will be no attack on Iran, arguing that the
Bush administration is overstretched and embarrassed in Iraq. But
the above-mentioned “intervention in Iran’s internal
affairs” (subversion, in other words) is presumably quietly
underway, as we speak. Further action must be accompanied by anti-Iran
propaganda credible to the American public. The announcement of
putative Iran/al-Qaeda links comes as the U.S. government insists
Iran is trying to produce nuclear weapons, violating treaties to
which it is signatory. The U.S. argues that Iran has no need to
even generate electricity through nuclear power, and that the whole
program is military in character. (In fact the nuclear program goes
back to the 1950s, and in the 1970s the U.S., Germany and France
all signed contracts to construct nuclear reactors in the shah’s
Iran. Meanwhile Iran discussed with Israel the purchase of Jericho
missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads.
The
mullocracy that came to power with Khomeini opposed nuclear power
in general, but from the early 1990s Iran negotiated with post-Cold
War Russia to complete the Bushehr reactor. Putin insists Russia
will go ahead with a perfectly legitimate deal. If that happens,
the plant could be completed next year or at least by 2007.) The
U.S. points to the fact that IAEA investigators detected traces
of enriched uranium on gas centrifuges at the Nantanz facility.
Iran denies that it has enriched uranium.
Israel,
the Nukes and Bush
Jane’s
Intelligence Digest suggests that Israel is mulling over a preemptive
attack on Iranian nuclear facilities, à la Osiraq, 1981.
This
has been under discussion for some time. (Israel of course has its
own nuclear weapons, but views the acquisition of nukes by Iran
or any of the Arab nations as an intolerable existential threat.)
One imagines that some in the planning process are thinking about
the relationship between this attack and the planned popular uprising.
Meanwhile there is a move underway in Congress to produce legislation
backing “regime change” in Iran. As with Iraq, there
are multiple reasons. Iran has been accused of harboring al-Qaeda
members, although Teheran says, plausibly enough, that it detains
any found. Iran has been accused of complicity in the May 12, 2003
suicide attacks in Riyadh. Iran aids Hizbollah, the Shiite Lebanese
militia, and various Palestinian groups. The same formula that worked
in the case with Iraq (weapons of mass destruction threat; al-Qaeda
connections; support for some sort of terrorism) is being applied
here, while 160,000 troops battle “insurgents” across
Iran’s long borders with Afghanistan and Iraq. In this situation,
the remarks of the Commander-in-Chief, President Bush, are of great
interest, expressing succinctly the dialectic of disinformation.
“Acting Director McLaughlin said there was no direct connection
between Iran and the attacks of September the 11th,” said
Bush. (The president is willing to believe the temporary CIA chief’s
view, for the time being, lest he be seen as chomping at the bit
to regime-change Iran.) He immediately added, however, “We
will continue to look and see if the Iranians were involved…
As to direct connections with Sept. 11, we’re digging into
the facts to determine if there was one.” Do not these “ifs”
sound in fact like future news? Do you not suppose that the appointed
long-term CIA director will, in the interview process, be asked,
“What do you think about the al-Qaeda links to Iran?”
There are, I’ll bet you, people working around the clock,
imaginatively, to find Iranian (and Syrian) involvement in 9-11.
White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan has already stated,
when asked about Iranian connections to the 9-11 hijackers, “Apparently
it’s something that’s evolved over time.” No “if”
here, but the imputation of a definite and evolving relationship
between al-Qaeda and Iran. Meanwhile despite assertions to the contrary
by members of his own administration, Bush labels Iran “a
totalitarian society…I have long expressed my concern about.”
The
world-changing plan of the concerned neocons (which, one must stress,
might well be adopted in its essentials by a Kerry administration)
targets less the original foe, al-Qaeda, than a list of diversely
uncooperative governments and peoples from the Mediterranean to
Central Asia. But to proceed down their road they must use 9-11,
manipulating the emotions of the masses as they approach each new
task, and link each new task to that special day in autumn a few
years back that means everything’s different now, and from
now on, new rules apply. If the Iran/al-Qaeda/9-11 link gets further
hyped in weeks to come (as Syria gets further linked to various
“forces of evil”) we will know that the neocons, however
beleaguered, are still driving policy.
*
* *
(Later,
July 20.) Ominous to see James Woolsey, former CIA head and key
player in the newly created (third) Committee on the Present Danger
(this time, the danger being “radical
Islamism”), on CNN’s Lou Dobb program just now,
brazenly repeating already discredited information about Saddam/al-Qaeda
links. He’s also confidently predicting that more and more
Iran/al-Qaeda links will be found. His colleagues will no doubt
seek, and if they seek, they will surely find many such links, more
and more reasons to hate and fear Iran. They’ll hope that
people aren’t bright enough to observe that the religious
faiths of bin Laden’s jihadis and Iran’s mullahs are
mutually antagonistic, and that al-Qaeda militants detest the Iranian
regime. Saudi “Wahhabism” and Iranian Shiism are incompatible,
just as they both are with Baathist secularism. But just as the
Bush administration successfully conflated (in the American mind)
al-Qaeda and 9-11 with Iraq, it can try to do the same now with
9-11 and Iran.
A
task force co-chaired by Zbigniew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter’s
national security adviser (and one-time big-time advocate of anticommunist
jihad in Afghanistan), has just challenged Bush Iran policy. This
is good; it shows us that the elite are not united on the Iran issue,
and maybe their division will even help prevent the threatened intervention.
But meanwhile Hazim al-Shaalan, defense minister in the new Iraqi
quasi-government declares, “Iranian intrusion has been vast
and unprecedented since the establishment of the Iraqi state.”
By such statements the “fully sovereign” regime, headed
by CIA operative and homicidal brute Iyad Allawi, abets plans for
an American intrusion into Iran.
Gary Leupp is Professor of History at Tufts University,
and Adjunct Professor of Comparative Religion. He is the author
of Servants,
Shophands and Laborers in in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan; Male
Colors: The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan;
and Interracial
Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and Japanese Women, 1543-1900.
He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's merciless chronicle of
the wars on Iraq, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia, Imperial
Crusades.
He
can be reached at: gleupp@granite.tufts.edu
Weekend Edition July 17 / 18, 2004
Gary
Leupp
Apocalypse Now: Why the Book of Revelations is
Must Reading
Ghada
Karmi
Vanishing the Palestinians
Lenni
Brenner
When Cattle Unite, Lions Go Hungry: Notes for Ralph Nader
Ben
Tripp
Man on a Bridge: a Ghost Story
Brandy
Baker
What Would Elizabeth Cady Stanton Make of John Kerry?
M.
Shahid Alam
Israel Builds Another Wall
Sasan
Fayazmanesh
Nuclear Hypocrisy: Israel, Iran and the IAEA
Patrick
Bond
The George Bush of Africa
Fred
Gardner
Politics of Marijuana: Cannabiniod Therapuetics
William
Blum
Bush and Thucydides
Ben
Terrall
Carter and the Indonesia Elections: "I Don't See Anything Wrong
with a General Running the Country"
Tom
Barry
John Lehman on the War Path
David
Vest
Dylan Without the Music
Phyllis
Pollack
Return to Sin City: Keith Richards Does Gram Parsons
Ron
Jacobs
Smearing Muhammad Ali: Bob Feller Strikes Out
Joshua
Frank
Kerry to Edwards: "Let's Lose!"
David
Nally
A Call for Sudan: Our Georgraphical Blindspot
Toni
Solo
Bolivia's Gas Referendum
Landau,
Hassan, Prashad & Lindorff
Three Reviews of Moore's F911
Poets's
Basement
Ford, Smith and Albert
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