Tony Cartalucci

Al Qaeda and MEK;US allies?!

US-Iran: Inverted Reality, Real War. America’s Al Qaeda Mercenaries. Iran is Fighting the Largest State Sponsor of Terror

In its march toward yet another war, the United States accuses Iran of using military force to establish itself as a “regional hegemon.” It accuses Iran of being the largest state sponsor of terrorism in the world. It accuses Iran of aiding rebels in Yemen, the government in Syria, and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
But what the United States leaves out about Iran is just as important as what it accuses Iran of.

Familiar Lies
For one, the Middle East already has a regional hegemon – the United States. Even the wildest accusations against Iran regarding state sponsored terrorism pale in comparison to Al Qaeda and the self-proclaimed Islamic State (ISIS) whose terrorism spans the globe, including standing armies operating in Libya, Syria, Yemen, and Afghanistan – several of which Iran itself is specifically fighting.
The US also supports terrorist organizations within Iran including the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK). MEK enjoys the support of National Security Adviser John Bolton – who lobbied for them for years while they were listed as a foreign terrorist organization by the US State Department itself.
Thus, Iran finds itself involved in Yemen, Syria, and Lebanon precisely to stave off openly declared intentions by the US to include Iran next under its already expansive hegemony over the Middle East.
During Washington’s slow-motion blitzkrieg across North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia, now decades of lies have continued generating excuses, pretexts, and artificial threats to justify America’s unending wars and Washington’s march toward its next target – Iran.

Iran is Resisting Regional Hegemony
The US invasion of Afghanistan along Iran’s eastern borders in 2001, then the US invasion of Iraq along Iran’s western borders in 2003 left the nation surrounded by US military forces. The invasions, followed by extended occupations were only two of the most extreme examples of Washington’s aggressive military encirclement of Iran itself.
US proxy wars against Libya, Syria, and Yemen also sought to eliminate political and military blocs allied to Tehran. Coupled with deliberate, crippling economic sanctions and a campaign of admitted and concerted political subversion aimed at Iran itself – the US has all but declared war against Iran.Iran finds itself on the US regime change “hit list,” dubbed the “Axis of Evil” by US President George Bush who presided over the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. On the list alongside Iran was Libya – now a divided and destroyed failed state after US military intervention there in 2011 – as well as Syria which still faces US-backed militants and a still-ongoing US military occupation of its territory.
Iran has been surrounded by an openly hostile United States and its allies for now nearly two decades. What the US characterizes as “Iranian aggression” is merely the rational steps any government surrounded by hostile forces would take to defend itself, its territory, and its people.
The Middle East is already subject to a regional hegemon – the United States – presided over by a government thousands of miles away. And if the US would be bold enough to presume dominion over an entire region of the planet so far from its own shores, it should come as no surprise that it would also shift responsibility for the disruptive consequences of its hegemony onto the nations still resisting it from within the region.

Iran is Fighting the Largest State Sponsor of Terror
In a recent interview with The Epoch Times, US Congressman Van Taylor of Texas called Iran “the largest state sponsor of terror in the world.” He cites Iranian support for groups like Hamas and Hezbollah as examples. It is a claim being repeated throughout America’s pro-war establishment.
However – it is not entirely true, and it omits mention of state sponsored terrorism that eclipses it even if it were.Groups like Hamas actually fought against Damascus and its Iranian allies during the recent conflict in Syria – calling into question claims of “Iranian state sponsorship” of Hamas.
Hezbollah – on the other hand – does enjoy close ties with Iran. But it also dedicated large amounts of resources and manpower – not creating terrorism across the Middle East – but fighting it – specifically in taking on ISIS and Al Qaeda in Syria and Iraq.
It was Iran and Hezbollah who aided Syrian forces on the ground while Russia provided air support that began rolling back ISIS and Al Qaeda from 2015 onward.
ISIS and Al Qaeda – ironically – persist in Syria only in areas under the protection of US-NATO forces. This includes in Al Qaeda-held Idlib where the US has repeatedly warned Damascus and its allies not to retake under threat of military retaliation.
While US accusations against Iran regarding “state sponsorship of terror” remain nebulous, US intelligence agencies themselves have admitted the US and its allies’ role in the creation of terrorist organizations like ISIS.The US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) – for example – as early as 2012 had noted (PDF) a Western and Persian Gulf-led conspiracy to create what it called at the time a “Salafist” [Islamic] “principality” [State] precisely in eastern Syria where ISIS would eventually find itself based.
The DIA document would explain (emphasis added):
If the situation unravels there is the possibility of establishing a declared or undeclared Salafist principality in eastern Syria (Hasaka and Der Zor), and this is exactly what the supporting powers to the opposition want, in order to isolate the Syrian regime, which is considered the strategic depth of the Shia expansion (Iraq and Iran).
On clarifying who these supporting powers were, the DIA memo would state:
The West, Gulf countries, and Turkey support the opposition; while Russia, China, and Iran support the regime.
The US and its allies have also been shipping weapons and supplies to Al Qaeda’s other affiliates in Syria. Along with Saudi Arabia and Qatar, the US has provided thousands of tons of weapons to militants in Syria – while also conceding that Al Qaeda’s Syrian franchise, Jabhat al-Nusra is the best armed, most well equipped militant front in the conflict.
Attempts to claim “moderate rebels” defected over to al-Nusra along with their US arms to explain the terrorist organization’s prominence doesn’t explain who was giving al-Nusra more arms and cash to attract such large-scale defections in the first place.The US has also been caught using Al Qaeda in Yemen to wage proxy war there. The Associated Press in an article titled, “AP Investigation: US allies, al-Qaida battle rebels in Yemen,” would report (emphasis added):
Again and again over the past two years, a military coalition led by Saudi Arabia and backed by the United States has claimed it won decisive victories that drove al-Qaida militants from their strongholds across Yemen and shattered their ability to attack the West.
Here’s what the victors did not disclose: many of their conquests came without firing a shot.
That’s because the coalition cut secret deals with al-Qaida fighters, paying some to leave key cities and towns and letting others retreat with weapons, equipment and wads of looted cash, an investigation by The Associated Press has found. Hundreds more were recruited to join the coalition itself.
The US has also since been caught transferring weapons systems to Al Qaeda in Yemen.

CNN in its article, “Sold to an ally, lost to an enemy,” would admit (emphasis added):

Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners have transferred American-made weapons to al Qaeda-linked fighters, hardline Salafi militias, and other factions waging war in Yemen, in violation of their agreements with the United States, a CNN investigation has found.

It is clear – by the US government’s and the US media’s own admissions – that the US is the “largest state sponsor of terror,” literally arming Al Qaeda across the region – then calling forces raised by nations like Iran “terrorists” for arraying themselves against them.
Then there is MEK – a US-backed terrorist organization previously listed as such by the US State Department itself – now openly hosted in Washington and spoken for by current US National Security Adviser John Bolton – who by no coincidence is also the leading voice advocating war with Iran.

MEK was listed as a terrorist organization for a reason. It has carried out decades of brutal terrorist attacks, assassinations, and espionage against the Iranian government and its people, as well as targeting Americans including the attempted kidnapping of US Ambassador Douglas MacArthur II, the attempted assassination of USAF Brigadier General Harold Price, the successful assassination of Lieutenant Colonel Louis Lee Hawkins, the double assassinations of Colonel Paul Shaffer and Lieutenant Colonel Jack Turner, and the successful ambush and killing of American Rockwell International employees William Cottrell, Donald Smith, and Robert Krongard.

Admissions to the deaths of the Rockwell International employees can be found within a report written by former US State Department and Department of Defense official Lincoln Bloomfield Jr.

on behalf of the lobbying firm Akin Gump in an attempt to dismiss concerns over MEK’s violent past and how it connects to its current campaign of armed terror. A similar narrative has now been predictably adopted by the Western media.To this day MEK terrorists have been carrying out attacks inside of Iran killing political opponents, attacking civilian targets, as well as carrying out the US-Israeli program of targeting and assassinating Iranian scientists. MEK is described by Council on Foreign Relations Senior Fellow Ray Takeyh as a “cult-like organization” with “totalitarian tendencies.” While Takeyh fails to expand on what he meant by “cult-like” and “totalitarian,” an interview with US State Department-run Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty reported that a MEK Camp Ashraf escapee claimed the terrorist organization bans marriage, using radios, the Internet, and holds many members against their will with the threat of death if ever they are caught attempting to escape.

MEK was delisted by the US State Department as a foreign terrorist organization after extensive lobbying efforts – not because evidence indicated they no longer belonged on the list. They were delisted specifically to allow the US to more openly support MEK’s efforts to undermine and overthrow the Iranian government including through the use of continued violence.

If Al Qaeda and MEK are the sort of “allies” the US has enlisted to confront “Iranian aggression” in the Middle East, how is Iran rather than Washington the true threat to regional or even global peace and stability?

Inverted Reality, Real March to War
It is upon these feet of clay that the US builds its case against Iran – with catastrophes from Washington’s many other wars of aggression in the region still burning in the background.
Iran lacks the economic and military might to pose a real threat to the world even if it wanted to. It only poses a threat to distant nations closing in around it, seeking conflict with Iran, and domination over a region Iran itself is geographically located in.
Conversely, the United States still possesses the largest economy and military on Earth and has a demonstrated track record of falsely accusing nations of various provocations to initiate devastating wars of aggression.
The US – even if it does not resort to war – is imposing economic damage not only on Iran but on nations the world over who – without coincidence – do not perceive Tehran as a threat and do a considerable amount of trade with Iran.
US aggression toward Iran and its allies – even if total war does not break out – have demonstrably destroyed the region – from Syria to Yemen – miring even America’s own allies in protracted, costly wars and setting the entire region back decades in terms of economic and social development.
Were peace to break out in the Middle East tomorrow – nations like the US and its NATO allies would have the least to do with developing the region. That role would go instead to China who is already attempting to foster stability as a condition to extend its global infrastructure building spree into the Middle East.
Even in terms of selling weapons to Middle Eastern nations – Russia and China have competitive systems US allies are even now considering.
Thus chaos is the only environment in which US primacy over the region can continue to thrive – justifying military bases and the billions of dollars needed to build, occupy, supply, and expand them, justifying military interventions – direct and by proxy – pressuring governments to either join or defend against them, and justifying immense weapon sales to allies like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to keep those interventions going.It is a multi-trillion dollar industry, and one only Washington is shameless enough to openly and continuously promote. There is no lie too big or disgraceful to keep America’s last major export of chaos profitable.
*
The original source of this article is Global Research

By Tony Cartalucci, Global Research

US-Iran: Inverted Reality, Real War. America’s Al Qaeda Mercenaries. Iran is Fighting the Largest State Sponsor of Terror

June 8, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

US-Delisted MEK Terrorists Still Openly Committed to Violence

In 2012, the US State Department would delist anti-Iranian terrorist group – Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) – from its Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) list. Yet years later, MEK has demonstrated an eager desire to carry out political violence on a scale that eclipses the previous atrocities that had it designated a terrorist organization in the first place.

In the US State Department’s official statement published in September 2012, the rationale for delisting MEK would be as follows (emphasis added):

With today’s actions, the Department does not overlook or forget the MEK’s past acts of terrorism, including its involvement in the killing of U.S. citizens in Iran in the 1970s and an attack on U.S. soil in 1992. The Department also has serious concerns about the MEK as an organization, particularly with regard to allegations of abuse committed against its own members.

The Secretary’s decision today took into account the MEK’s public renunciation of violence, the absence of confirmed acts of terrorism by the MEK for more than a decade, and their cooperation in the peaceful closure of Camp Ashraf, their historic paramilitary base.

Yet US policy before the State Department’s delisting, and events ever since, have proven this rationale for removing MEK as an FTO to be an intentional fabrication – that MEK was and still is committed to political violence against the Iranian people, and envisions a Libya-Syrian-style conflict to likewise divide and destroy the Iranian nation.

However, facts regarding the true nature of MEK is not derived from Iranian state media, or accusations made by MEK’s opponents in Tehran, but by MEK’s own US sponsors and even MEK’s senior leadership itself.

“Undeniably” MEK “Conducted Terrorist Attacks”

By the admissions of the United States and the United Kingdom, MEK is undeniably a terrorist organization guilty of self-admitted acts of terrorism. The UK House of Commons in a briefing paper titled, “The People’s Mujahiddeen of Iran (PMOI),” it cites the UK Foreign Office which states explicitly that:

The Mojahedin-e Khalq (MeK) is proscribed in the UK under the Terrorism Act 2000. It has a long history of involvement in terrorism in Iran and elsewhere and is, by its own admission, responsible for violent attacks that have resulted in many deaths.

The briefing paper makes mention of “assiduous” lobbying efforts by MEK to have itself removed from terrorist lists around the globe.

A 2012 Guardian article titled, “MEK decision: multimillion-dollar campaign led to removal from terror list,” would extensively detail the large number of prominent US politicians approached and paid by MEK as part of this lobbying effort.

Yet there is more behind MEK’s delisting than mere lobbying. As early as 2009, US policymakers saw MEK as one of many minority opposition and ethnic groups that could be used by the US as part of a wider agenda toward regime change in Iran.

The Brookings Institution in a 2009 policy paper titled, “Which Path to Persia? Options for a New American Strategy Toward Iran” (PDF), under a chapter titled, “Inspiring an Insurgency: Supporting Iranian Minority And Opposition Groups,” would openly admit (emphasis added):

Perhaps the most prominent (and certainly the most controversial) opposition group that has attracted attention as a potential U.S. proxy is the NCRI (National Council of Resistance of Iran), the political movement established by the MeK (Mujahedin-e Khalq). Critics believe the group to be undemocratic and unpopular, and indeed anti-American.

Brookings would concede to MEK’s terrorist background, admitting (emphasis added):

Undeniably, the group has conducted terrorist attacks—often excused by the MeK’s advocates because they are directed against the Iranian government. For example, in 1981, the group bombed the headquarters of the Islamic Republic Party, which was then the clerical leadership’s main political organization, killing an estimated 70 senior officials. More recently, the group has claimed credit for over a dozen mortar attacks, assassinations, and other assaults on Iranian civilian and military targets between 1998 and 2001.

Brookings makes mention of MEK’s attacks on US servicemen and American civilian contractors which earned it its place on the US FTO, noting:

In the 1970s, the group killed three U.S. officers and three civilian contractors in Iran.

And despite MEK’s current depiction as a popular resistance movement in Iran, Brookings would also admit (emphasis added):

The group itself also appears to be undemocratic and enjoys little popularity in Iran itself. It has no political base in the country, although it appears to have an operational presence. In particular, its active participation on Saddam Husayn’s side during the bitter Iran-Iraq War made the group widely loathed. In addition, many aspects of the group are cultish, and its leaders, Massoud and Maryam Rajavi, are revered to the point of obsession.

Brookings would note that despite the obvious reality of MEK, the US could indeed use the terrorist organization as a proxy against Iran, but notes that:

…at the very least, to work more closely with the group (at least in an overt manner), Washington would need to remove it from the list of foreign terrorist organizations.

And from 2009 onward, that is precisely what was done. It is unlikely that the MEK alone facilitated the rehabilitation of its image or exclusively sought its removal from US-European terrorist organization lists – considering the central role MEK terrorists played in US regime change plans versus Iran.

While MEK propaganda insists that its inclusion on terrorist organization lists around the globe was the result of a global effort to “curry favor with Iran’s clerical regime,” it is clear that the terrorist organization earned its way onto these lists, and then lobbied and cheated its way off of them.

The MEK is Still Committed to Violence Today

While Iranians mourned in the wake of the Ahvaz attack, MEK was holding a rally in New York City attended by prominent US politicians including US President Donald Trump’s lawyer Rudolph Giuliani and former US National Security Adviser under the Obama administration, James Jones.

During the “2018 Iran Uprising Summit” Giuliani would vow the overthrow of the Iranian government.

MEK leader Maryam Rajavi would broadcast a message now posted on MEK websites. In her message she would discuss MEK’s role in fomenting ongoing violence inside of Iran.She would admit:

Today, the ruling mullahs’ fear is amplified by the role of the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) and resistance units in leading and continuing the uprisings. Regime analysts say: “The definitive element in relation to the December 2017 riots is the organization of rioters. So-called Units of Rebellion have been created, which have both the ability to increase their forces and the potential to replace leaders on the spot.”

The roadmap for freedom reveals itself in these very uprisings, in ceaseless protests, and in the struggle of the Resistance Units.

Riots by definition entail violence. The riots taking place across Iran beginning in late 2017 and continuing sporadically since – of which Rajavi and her MEK take credit for organizing – have left dozens dead including police.

One police officer was shot dead just before New Year’s, and another three were killed in late February 2018 during such riots.

In the region of Ahvaz specifically, MEK social media accounts have been taking credit for and promoting ongoing unrest there. Ahvaz was more recently the scene of a terrorist attack in which gunmen targeted a parade leaving dozens dead and scores more injured.

Rajavi and MEK’s ultimate goal is the overthrow of the Iranian government. As Brookings admits in its 2009 paper, the Iranian government will not cede power to US-orchestrated regime change without a fight – and MEK was recruited as a US proxy specifically because of its capacity for violence.Brookings would note:

Despite its limited popularity (but perhaps because of its successful use of terrorism), the Iranian regime is exceptionally sensitive to the MEK and is vigilant in guarding against it.

It was for this reason that Brookings singled them out as a potential proxy in 2009 and recommended their delisting by the US State Department so the US could provide more open support for the terrorist organization.

It is clear that Rajavi’s recent admissions to being behind political violence inside Iran contravenes the US State Department’s rationale for deslisting MEK on grounds that the group had made a “public renunciation of violence.”

MEK is not only refusing to renounce violence, MEK’s most senior leader has just publicly and unambiguously declared MEK’s policy is to openly wield violence inside Iran toward destabilizing and overthrowing the government.From the United States’ ignoring of its own anti-terrorism laws – aiding and abetting MEK while still on the US State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organizations list – to the US now portraying MEK as a “reformed” “resistance” organization even as its leader takes credit for ongoing political violence inside Iran, it is clear that once again the US finds itself a willing state sponsor of terrorism.It was as early as 2007 that Seymour Hersh in his New Yorker article, “The Redirection Is the Administration’s new policy benefitting our enemies in the war on terrorism?” would warn:

To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush Administration has decided, in effect, to reconfigure its priorities in the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has coöperated with Saudi Arabia’s government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is backed by Iran. The U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A by-product of these activities has been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda.

It is clear in retrospect that the rise of the self-proclaimed “Islamic State” (ISIS), Al Qaeda, Al Nusra, and other extremist fronts in Syria were a result of this US policy. It is also clear that there are many other extremist groups the US has knowingly whitewashed politically and is covertly supporting in terrorism aimed directly at Iran itself.

It is just a matter of time before the same denials and cover-ups used to depict Syrian and Libyan terrorists as “freedom fighting rebels” are reused in regards to US-backed violence aimed at Iran. Hopefully, it will not take nearly as long for the rest of the world to see through this game and condemn groups like MEK as the terrorists they always have been, and continue to be today.

Also in retrospect, it is clear how US-engineered conflict and regime change has impacted the Middle Eastern region and the world as a whole – one can only imagine the further impact a successful repeat of this violence will have if visited upon Iran directly.

By Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine“New Eastern Outlook”.

October 1, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Who Are Washington’s “Revolutionaries” in Iran?

The US backed Iranian opposition are neither “revolutionary,” nor even “in” Iran. Yet they have been designated as Washington’s proxies of choice, and an alternative government they seek to place into power in Tehran.

As the US-led proxy war in Syria reaches a relative stalemate and with time on Damascus and its allies’ side, Washington’s wider agenda of using the conflict as a stepping stone toward regime change in Iran is leading into a much larger conflict.

Geopolitical expert F. William Engdahl has pointed out the means through which Western oil corporations have orchestrated global schemes to raise oil prices to make American shale oil production profitable. At the same time, the US has for years now used sanctions against Iran, political subversion in Venezuela, war in Libya, and proxy war in Ukraine to prevent Tehran, Caracas, Libya’s opposition, and Moscow from benefiting long-term from higher oil prices.

For Iran, undermining its oil revenues and reintroducing sanctions and secondary sanctions on nations that refuse to recognize America’s withdrawal from the so-called Iran Nuclear Deal, is done in tandem with direct, covert subversion inside Iran itself.

Together, these efforts seek to cripple Iran as a functional nation state, as well as reduce its influence through the Middle Eastern and Central Asian regions.

US Portrays Terrorist Cult as “Iranian Opposition”

Just as the US has done in Libya and Syria, it is using terrorist organizations to attack and undermine the Iranian state.

With Iranian-backed militias already fighting Al Qaeda and its multitude of affiliates including the self-proclaimed “Islamic State” (ISIS) in Syria and Iraq, the likelihood of these militant forces being exported into Iran itself – should Iranian-backed militias be pushed out of Syria and Iraq and destabilization inside of Iran itself reach that threshold – is high.

But there is another, lesser known group the US is portraying as the voice of Iran’s opposition, a group that is – by its own US sponsors’ admission – undemocratic, terroristic, and cult-like.

It is the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran, also known as the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK).

Until 2012, MEK was listed by the US State Department as a foreign terrorist organization. Only through immense lobbying was MEK delisted. Since being delisted, no evidence suggests the fundamental aspects of MEK that make it a terrorist organization have changed. In fact, US-based corporate-financier policy think tanks that have advocated MEK’s use as a proxy against Iran have admitted as much.

The Brookings Institution in a 2009 policy paper titled, “Which Path to Persia? Options for a New American Strategy Toward Iran” (PDF), would openly admit (emphasis added):

Perhaps the most prominent (and certainly the most controversial) opposition group that has attracted attention as a potential U.S. proxy is the NCRI (National Council of Resistance of Iran), the political movement established by the MeK (Mujahedin-e Khalq). Critics believe the group to be undemocratic and unpopular, and indeed anti-American.

Brookings would elaborate regarding its terrorist background, stating (emphasis added):

Undeniably, the group has conducted terrorist attacks—often excused by the MeK’s advocates because they are directed against the Iranian government. For example, in 1981, the group bombed the headquarters of the Islamic Republic Party, which was then the clerical leadership’s main political organization, killing an estimated 70 senior officials. More recently, the group has claimed credit for over a dozen mortar attacks, assassinations, and other assaults on Iranian civilian and military targets between 1998 and 2001.

American-Killing Terror Cult: US Delists Mujahedeen e-Khalq (MEK)

Brookings also mentions MEK’s attacks on US servicemen and American civilian contractors, noting:

In the 1970s, the group killed three U.S. officers and three civilian contractors in Iran.

Brookings would also emphasize (emphasis added):

The group itself also appears to be undemocratic and enjoys little popularity in Iran itself. It has no political base in the country, although it appears to have an operational presence. In particular, its active participation on Saddam Husayn’s side during the bitter Iran-Iraq War made the group widely loathed. In addition, many aspects of the group are cultish, and its leaders, Massoud and Maryam Rajavi, are revered to the point of obsession.

Brookings would note that despite the obvious reality of MEK, the US could indeed use the terrorist organization as a proxy against Iran, but notes that:

…at the very least, to work more closely with the group (at least in an overt manner), Washington would need to remove it from the list of foreign terrorist organizations.

And in 2012, after years of lobbying, that is precisely what the US did. Regarding that decision, the US State Department’s 2012 statement titled, “Delisting of the Mujahedin-e Khalq” would claim:

With today’s actions, the Department does not overlook or forget the MEK’s past acts of terrorism, including its involvement in the killing of U.S. citizens in Iran in the 1970s and an attack on U.S. soil in 1992. The Department also has serious concerns about the MEK as an organization, particularly with regard to allegations of abuse committed against its own members.

The Secretary’s decision today took into account the MEK’s public renunciation of violence, the absence of confirmed acts of terrorism by the MEK for more than a decade, and their cooperation in the peaceful closure of Camp Ashraf, their historic paramilitary base.

Nothing in the US State Department’s statement indicates that MEK is no longer a terrorist organization. It simply notes that it has publicly – as a means of political expediency – renounced violence. It should be noted that the Brookings Institution’s 2009 policy paper’s mention of MEK is under a chapter titled, “Inspiring an Insurgency,” inferring armed violence all but guaranteeing MEK militants will indeed be one of several fronts carrying out that violence in their capacity as US proxies.

It would be the “cultish” MEK leader, Maryam Rajavi, whom prominent American politicians and political lobbying groups would work with for years before MEK was removed from the US list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations in 2012. This includes prominent pro-war advocates – particularly war with Iran – now current National Security Adviser John Bolton, Newt Gingrich, and current legal adviser for US President Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani.

This year at the annual “Free Iran” conference held in Paris, US State Department-funded and directed Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty would report in its article titled, “Trump Allies Tell Paris Rally ‘End Of Regime’ Near In Iran,” that:

Close allies of U.S. President Donald Trump have told a “Free Iran” rally in Paris that the end of the Iranian regime is near and that sanctions against the country will be “greater, greater, and greater.”

“We are now realistically being able to see an end to the regime in Iran,” legal adviser Rudy Giuliani said on June 30 at the rally, organized by exiled opponents including the former rebel People’s Mujahedin, which is banned in Iran.

Giuliani pointed to recent protests that have erupted in Iran amid continued financial hardships following Trump’s decision to pull out of the 2015 nuclear deal and reimpose sanctions on Tehran.

Thus, virtually every aspect of the 2009 Brookings paper is being openly pursued as a matter of US foreign policy, including US support for MEK – an organization that has previously killed US servicemen and American civilian contractors, and by its own supporters’ admissions, is still involved in terrorism.

The ultimate irony is that these same US MEK supporters claiming the MEK and its political NCRI wing will overthrow the “dictatorial ayatollahs,” admit the MEK itself is “undemocratic” and “cultish,” everything Iran’s government is accused of by US politicians and pundits.

The MEK May Help Destroy Iran, But Will Never Rule It

Just as other “pro-democracy” groups have been promoted by Washington amid previous regime change efforts, “Iranian” MEK terrorists will be used to destabilize, pressure, and possibly even overthrow the Iranian government, but Iran will be left in fractured ruins.

MEK and its NCRI political wing will never rule a functional and unified Iranian nation-state, just as US-backed terrorists in Libya preside – and only tenuously so – over fractions of Libya’s territory and resources.

This further exposes what the US intends to do regarding Iran, and that it has nothing to do with improving the lives or prospects of the Iranian people – especially considering Iran’s collective plight is owed not to Iran’s current leadership, but to America’s decades-long policy to encircle, contain, undermine, and overthrow Iran’s institutions.

America’s foreign policy in regards to Iran must be understood in this context – that it is merely a continuation of Washington’s use of violent, terrorist fronts to divide and destroy targeted nations to eliminate competitors and their influence from regions of the globe US special interests seek to reassert themselves in – and nothing more.

The high costs continued conflict with Iran will represent will be paid by the American taxpayers, and should this conflict be allowed to escalate, by the blood of American service members. The result – should this foreign policy continue forward, will not be in the interests of either Americans or Iranians – who will collectively suffer the consequences of future conflict, just as the American people and nations invaded by the US have suffered in the past.

Tony Cartalucci is Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook” where this article was originally published.

Tony Cartalucci, New Eastern Outlook

July 16, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

US National Security Advisor John Bolton Backs Terrorists

Talk surrounding US President Donald Trump’s move to appoint John Bolton as his new National Security Advisor has focused on Bolton’s role in promoting the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq and the profound contrast his appointment signifies in light of President Trump’s 2016 campaign promises to “drain the swamp.”

However, Bolton’s appointment carries with it greater implications both to those apparently criticizing him as well as those attempting to promote him. Bolton has – for years – lobbied for a terrorist organization guilty of kidnapping and killing both US service members as well as US civilian contractors, along with an untold number of Iranian civilians and politicians in a campaign of terror that has stretched over several decades and continues today.

Worst of all, the terrorist organization Bolton lobbied for was literally listed on the US State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organizations list during his lobbying activities – in direct violation of US counter-terrorism laws.

That organization – Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) and its political front, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) – has since been delisted as of 2012. However, the organization was delisted not because it has fully given up armed terrorism, but because the US has planned since at least as early as 2009 – according to Washington’s own policy papers – to use MEK as armed proxies against the nation of Iran.

MEK are Terrorists, Even According to Their US Sponsors

Despite claims by a growing army of MEK advocates spanning various social media platforms, MEK is without doubt a dangerous terrorist organization. Even those seeking to sponsor MEK as a militant proxy against Iran have admitted as much.

In the 2009 Brookings Institution policy paper, “Which Path to Persia? Options for a New American Strategy Toward Iran,” US policymakers openly admitted MEK’s candidacy as a US proxy (emphasis added):

Perhaps the most prominent (and certainly the most controversial) opposition group that has attracted attention as a potential U.S. proxy is the NCRI (National Council of Resistance of Iran), the political movement established by the MEK (Mujahedin-e Khalq). Critics believe the group to be undemocratic and unpopular, and indeed anti-American.

In contrast, the group’s champions contend that the movement’s long-standing opposition to the Iranian regime and record of successful attacks on and intelligence-gathering operations against the regime make it worthy of U.S. support. They also argue that the group is no longer anti-American and question the merit of earlier accusations. Raymond Tanter, one of the group’s supporters in the United States, contends that the MEK and the NCRI are allies for regime change in Tehran and also act as a useful proxy for gathering intelligence. The MEK’s greatest intelligence coup was the provision of intelligence in 2002 that led to the discovery of a secret site in Iran for enriching uranium.

Brookings policymakers also openly acknowledged that MEK was without doubt a terrorist organization (emphasis added):

Despite its defenders’ claims, the MEK remains on the U.S. government list of foreign terrorist organizations. In the 1970s, the group killed three U.S. officers and three civilian contractors in Iran. During the 1979-1980 hostage crisis, the group praised the decision to take America hostages and Elaine Sciolino reported that while group leaders publicly condemned the 9/11 attacks, within the group celebrations were widespread. Undeniably, the group has conducted terrorist attacks—often excused by the MEK’s advocates because they are directed against the Iranian government. For example, in 1981, the group bombed the headquarters of the Islamic Republic Party, which was then the clerical leadership’s main political organization, killing an estimated 70 senior officials. More recently, the group has claimed credit for over a dozen mortar attacks, assassinations, and other assaults on Iranian civilian and military targets between 1998 and 2001. At the very least, to work more closely with the group (at least in an overt manner), Washington would need to remove it from the list of foreign terrorist organizations.”

It should be noted that Brookings’ mention of MEK was made under a chapter titled, “INSPIRING AN INSURGENCY Supporting Iranian Minority and Opposition Groups,” indicating that groups being considered for US sponsorship would undoubtedly be armed and carry out a campaign of violence – if not terrorism, then the full-scale military operations similar US-sponsored militant groups have been carrying out in Syria.

Brookings recommendation that MEK be removed “from the list of foreign terrorist organizations” would eventually be fully realized by 2012 – spear

headed by lobbyists led by prominent US politicians and policymakers including US National Security Advisor John Bolton.

MEK’s Decades of Terrorism and its Future Terrorism

MEK has carried out decades of brutal terrorist attacks, assassinations, and espionage against the Iranian government and its people, as well as targeting Americans including the attempted kidnapping of US Ambassador Douglas MacArthur II, the attempted assassination of USAF Brigadier General Harold Price, the successful assassination of Lieutenant Colonel Louis Lee Hawkins, the double assassinations of Colonel Paul Shaffer and Lieutenant Colonel Jack Turner, and the successful ambush and killing of American Rockwell International employees William Cottrell, Donald Smith, and Robert Krongard.

Admissions to the deaths of the Rockwell International employees can be found within a 2011 report written by former US State Department and Department of Defense official Lincoln Bloomfield Jr. on behalf of another lobbying firm – Akin Gump – in an attempt to dismiss concerns over MEK’s violent past and how it connects to its current campaign of armed terror.

The report would state:

The State Department’s Country Reports on Terrorism 2009 document says that the MEK killed the deputy chief of the US Military Mission in Tehran in 1973, two members of the US Military Assistance Advisory Group in 1975, and two employees of Rockwell International in 1976, and that it claimed responsibility for killing an American Texaco executive in 1979.

MEK’s violent past of armed terrorism, coupled with admissions by the US that it seeks to use MEK as an armed proxy against Iran calls into question the US State Department’s decision

Regarding that decision, the US State Department’s 2012 statement titled, “Delisting of the Mujahedin-e Khalq” would claim:

With today’s actions, the Department does not overlook or forget the MEK’s past acts of terrorism, including its involvement in the killing of U.S. citizens in Iran in the 1970s and an attack on U.S. soil in 1992. The Department also has serious concerns about the MEK as an organization, particularly with regard to allegations of abuse committed against its own members.

The Secretary’s decision today took into account the MEK’s public renunciation of violence, the absence of confirmed acts of terrorism by the MEK for more than a decade, and their cooperation in the peaceful closure of Camp Ashraf, their historic paramilitary base.

The US State Department admits that the organization carried out terrorism in the past and continues today with abuses toward its own members. And as US policymakers within the pages of Brookings papers admit, the entire campaign aimed at delisting MEK in the first place was to legitimize the organization’s use as a militant proxy against Iran – a role that will most certainly violate MEK’s supposed “renunciation of violence” and contravene the grounds upon which MEK was delisted as a terrorist organization by the US State Department in the first place.

John Bolton’s Advocacy of Terrorists

Considering the undeniable terrorist nature of MEK past, present, and Washington’s own admitted plans for its terrorist future, the troubling nature of John Bolton’s advocacy for the group comes into full focus. This is particularly so within the context of Bolton’s new role as National Security Advisor.

Bolton’s role in lobbying for MEK and NCIR has been promoted most prominently by his own supporters among the US media. Right-leaning CNS – for example – in an article titled, “Senior US, Saudi Figures Call for Tehran Regime to be Overthrown,” would admit:

Bolton, who has attended the annual NCRI event for a decade, cited Iran’s military intervention in Syria, in maneuvering in Iraq, and its support for Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists and for Houthi militia in Yemen.

The same article would note however, that:

Supporters view the NCRI and affiliated People’s Mujahedeen Organization of Iran (MEK) as a viable opposition to the clerical rulers in Tehran, and praise it for exposing the regime’s covert nuclear programs.

Detractors view with suspicion its history of support for the regime of Saddam Hussein, and what critics have described as cult-like behavior.

The MEK was designated a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. until 2012, when the Obama administration delisted it, citing a renunciation of violence and “the absence of confirmed acts of terrorism by the MEK for more than a decade.”

Foreign Policy would also expose Bolton’s lobbying efforts. In FP’s 2011 article titled, “MEK rally planned for Friday at State Department,” it would include mention of a full-paged ad taken out in the Washington Post. The ad included a letter to then US President Barack Obama which stated:

We are writing to you with urgency to underline the need for an immediate decision to remove Iran’s opposition group the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK) from the list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO).

The 2011 ad was signed by John Bolton along with other prominent US politicians including Howard Dean, Rudy Guiliani, and Tom Ridge.

Since MEK has only been removed from the US State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organizations list since 2012, CNS, Foreign Policy, and the lobbying efforts of Bolton himself serves as evidence that Bolton provided support and lobbying services to what was a listed terrorist organization in blatant violation of 18 U.S. Code § 2339A – providing material support to terrorists.

Bolton’s speeches openly supporting MEK prior to 2012 are easily found online. One published in 2010 features Bolton speaking in Paris openly advocating not only the US removing MEK from its Foreign Terrorist Organizations list, but also lobbying for US support to be provided to MEK and others in what he called the “Iranian opposition.” Since the 2012 delisting, Bolton has continued attending MEK events and advocating both support for MEK and openly calling for the US-led overthrow of the Iranian government.

While some have attempted to defend Bolton and others lobbying for MEK claiming that MEK could not have been removed from the State Department’s list even if it was no longer a threat to the US without the aid of lobbying – it should be remembered that the job of adding or removing terrorist organizations from the State Department’s list is the responsibility of the Bureau of Counterterrorism in the State Department – not political lobbyists.

The State Department itself notes on its website that:

The Bureau of Counterterrorism in the State Department (CT) continually monitors the activities of terrorist groups active around the world to identify potential targets for designation. When reviewing potential targets, CT looks not only at the actual terrorist attacks that a group has carried out, but also at whether the group has engaged in planning and preparations for possible future acts of terrorism or retains the capability and intent to carry out such acts.

Clearly – however – the presence of immense lobbying campaigns like those led by Bolton on behalf of MEK indicates that the State Department’s list is dictated by political motivations, money, and lobbying, not independent analysis provided by US security and intelligence professionals either in the US State Department or elsewhere within the US government.

Furthermore, it is clear by the US State Department’s own criteria that MEK is still very much a foreign terrorist organization. According to its own criteria, any organization that is even planning or preparing for possible future acts of terrorism, must be included on the list. US policymakers and even John Bolton himself have openly stated that MEK will be used as an armed proxy against Iran.

A Terrorist Collaborator Advising on US National Security

A National Security Advisor openly guilty of violating US anti-terrorism laws having provided material support to a US State Department-listed foreign terrorist organization for years illustrates just how profoundly compromised US institutions are and reflects an agenda that not only exclusively serves special interests – but does so at the cost of the American people’s actual security.

The position of National Security Advisor – officially known as “the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs” – is described by the US White House’s official website as part of the National Security Council as follows:

The National Security Council (NSC) is the President’s principal forum for considering national security and foreign policy matters with his senior national security advisors and cabinet officials. Since its inception under President Truman, the Council’s function has been to advise and assist the President on national security and foreign policies. The Council also serves as the President’s principal arm for coordinating these policies among various government agencies.

A National Security Council that includes lobbyists representing terrorist organizations with American blood on their hands constitutes not only a dire threat to actual US national security, but global security as well.

MEK terrorists backed by a nation possessing nuclear weapons and a history of provoking wars through fabricated evidence and staged incidents ensures that America’s foreign policy will continue to pursue destructive wars abroad at the cost of US treasure and blood and the resources and lives of nations the US sets its industrialized military aggression upon.

John Bolton – however – is not the architect of the policy he has advocated for well over a decade. He is simply fulfilling what US policymakers themselves have meted out in the pages of US policy papers for just as long. These policymakers – in turn – are funded by American arms manufacturers, energy conglomerates, financial institutions, and other immense corporate-financier special interests.

The Brookings Institution whose 2009 paper, “Which Path to Persia?” spelled out verbatim the steps Bolton has since undertaken with his lobbying efforts, has a long list of such corporate-financier interests underwriting and directing its work.

While exposing John Bolton’s complicity in the material support of egregious terrorists and his efforts to use them as armed proxies against Iran in a war he has attempted to promote and instigate for years is important, it is equally important to expose, confront, isolate, and extinguish the influence of the corporate-financier interests that have underwritten and directed Bolton’s efforts and the efforts of countless others working to drag the United States, its allies, and the rest of the planet into another destructive conflict.Understanding that efforts to remove MEK from the US State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organizations list and prepare them for their role as armed proxies against Iran transcended the administrations of George Bush, Barack Obama, and now Donald Trump exposes the continuity of agenda – regardless of who occupies the White House or US Congress – advanced by these unelected corporate-financier interests.

Tony Cartalucci , Journal-neo

Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”

April 3, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Tehran Was Always America’s And Thus The Islamic State’s Final Destination

Several were left dead and many more injured after coordinated terror attacks on Iran’s capital of Tehran. Shootings and bombings targeted Iran’s parliament and the tomb of Ayatollah Khomeini.

According to Reuters, the so-called “Islamic State” claimed responsibility for the attack, which unfolded just days after another terror attack unfolded in London. The Islamic State also reportedly took responsibility for the violence in London, despite evidence emerging that the three suspects involved were long known to British security and intelligence agencies and were simply allowed to plot and carry out their attacks.

It is much less likely that Tehran’s government coddled terrorists – as it has been engaged for years in fighting terrorism both on its borders and in Syria amid a vicious six-year war fueled by US, European, and Persian Gulf weapons, cash, and fighters..

Armed Violence Targeting Tehran Was the Stated Goal of US Policymakers

The recent terrorist attacks in Tehran are the literal manifestation of US foreign policy. The creation of a proxy force with which to fight Iran and establishing a safe haven for it beyond Iran’s borders have been long-stated US policy. The current chaos consuming Syria and Iraq – and to a lesser extent in southeast Turkey – is a direct result of the US attempting to secure a base of operations to launch a proxy war directly against Iran.

In the 2009 Brookings Institution document titled, “Which Path to Persia? Options for a New American Strategy toward Iran,” the use of then US State Department-listed foreign terrorist organization Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK) as a proxy for instigating a full-fledged armed insurgency not unlike that which is currently unfolding in Syria was discussed in detail.

The report explicitly stated:

The United states could also attempt to promote external Iranian opposition groups, providing them with the support to turn themselves into full-fledged insurgencies and even helping them militarily defeat the forces of the clerical regime. The United states could work with groups like the Iraq-based National council of resistance of Iran (NCRI) and its military wing, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MeK), helping the thousands of its members who, under Saddam Husayn’s regime, were armed and had conducted guerrilla and terrorist operations against the clerical regime. although the NCRI is supposedly disarmed today, that could quickly be changed.

Brookings policymakers admitted throughout the report that MEK was responsible for killing both American and Iranian military personnel, politicians, and civilians in what was clear-cut terrorism. Despite this, and admissions that MEK remained indisputably a terrorist organization, recommendations were made to de-list it from the US State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organization registry so that more overt support could be provided to the group for armed regime change.

Based on such recommendations and intensive lobbying, the US State Department would eventually de-list MEK in 2012 and the group would receive significant backing from the US openly. This included support from many members of current US President Donald Trump’s campaign team – including Rudy Giuliani, Newt Gingrich, and John Bolton.

However, despite these efforts, MEK was not capable then or now of accomplishing the lofty goal of instigating full-fledged insurrection against Tehran, necessitating the use of other armed groups. The 2009 Brookings paper made mention of other candidates under a section titled, “Potential Ethnic Proxies,” identifying Arab and Kurdish groups as well as possible candidates for a US proxy war against Tehran.

Under a section titled, “Finding a Conduit and Safe Haven,” Brookings notes:

Of equal importance (and potential difficulty) will be finding a neighboring country willing to serve as the conduit for U.S. aid to the insurgent group, as well as to provide a safe haven where the group can train, plan, organize, heal, and resupply.

For the US proxy war on Syria, Turkey and Jordan fulfill this role. For Iran, it is clear that US efforts would have to focus on establishing conduits and safe havens from Pakistan’s southwest Balochistan province and from Kurdish-dominated regions in northern Iraq, eastern Syria, and southeastern Turkey – precisely where current upheaval is being fueled by US intervention both overtly and covertly.

Brookings noted in 2009 that:

It would be difficult to find or build an insurgency with a high likelihood of success. The existing candidates are weak and divided, and the Iranian regime is very strong relative to the potential internal and external challengers.

A group not mentioned by Brookings in 2009, but that exists in the very region the US seeks to create a conduit and safe haven for a proxy war with Iran, is the Islamic State. Despite claims that it is an independent terrorist organization propelled by black market oil sales, ransoms, and local taxes, its fighting capacity, logistical networks, and operational reach demonstrates vast state sponsorship.

The Ultimate Proxy, the Perfect Conduit and Safe Haven

The Islamic State reaching into Iran, southern Russia, and even as far as western China was not only possible, it was inevitable and the logical progression of US policy as stated by Brookings in 2009 and verifiably executed since then.

The Islamic State represents the perfect “proxy,” occupying the ideal conduit and safe haven for executing America’s proxy war against Iran and beyond. Surrounding the Islamic State’s holdings are US military bases, including those illegally constructed in eastern Syria. Were the US to wage war against Iran in the near future, it is likely these assets would all “coincidentally” coordinate against Tehran just as they are now being “coincidentally” coordinated against Damascus.

The use of terrorism, extremists, and proxies in executing US foreign policy, and the use of extremists observing the Islamic State and Al Qaeda’s brand of indoctrination was demonstrated definitively during the 1980s when the US with the assistance of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan – used Al Qaeda to expel Soviet forces from Afghanistan. This example is in fact mentioned explicitly by Brookings policymakers as a template for creating a new proxy war – this time against Iran.

For the US, there is no better stand-in for Al Qaeda than its successor the Islamic State. US policymakers have demonstrated a desire to use known terrorist organizations to wage proxy war against targeted nation-states, has previously done so in Afghanistan, and has clearly organized the geopolitical game board on all sides of Iran to facilitate its agenda laid out in 2009. With terrorists now killing people in Tehran, it is simply verification that this agenda is advancing onward.

Iran’s involvement in the Syrian conflict illustrates that Tehran is well aware of this conspiracy and is actively defending against it both within and beyond its borders. Russia is likewise an ultimate target of the proxy war in Syria and is likewise involved in resolving it in favor of stopping it there before it goes further.

China’s small but expanding role in the conflict is linked directly to the inevitability of this instability spreading to its western Xianjiang province.

While terrorism in Europe, including the recent London attack, is held up as proof that the West is “also” being targeted by the Islamic State, evidence suggests otherwise. The attacks are more likely an exercise in producing plausible deniability.

In reality, the Islamic State – like Al Qaeda before it – depends on vast, multinational state sponsorship – state sponsorship the US, Europe, and its regional allies in the Persian Gulf are providing. It is also sponsorship they can – at anytime of their choosing – expose and end. They simply choose not to in pursuit of regional and global hegemony.

The 2009 Brookings paper is a signed and dated confession of the West’s proclivity toward using terrorism as a geopolitical tool. While Western headlines insist that nations like Iran, Russia, and China jeopardize global stability, it is clear that they themselves do so in pursuit of global hegemony.

Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”, where this article first appeared.

Activist Post.com

June 11, 2017 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

If Terrorists Targeted Russia, Who’s Behind the Terrorists?

Eleven have been killed and dozens more injured in what is an apparent terrorist attack on St. Petersburg’s metro system. Western analysts are assigning possible blame for the attack on either terrorists operating from Russia’s Chechnya region, or possibly terrorist groups affiliated with fronts fighting in Syria.

Western analysts are also attempting to cement a narrative that downplays the significance of the attacks and instead attempts to leverage them politically against Moscow. A piece in the Sydney Morning Herald titled, “Fears of a Putin crackdown after terror attack on St Petersburg metro,” would attempt to claim:

So who is to blame? No one has said officially. The BBC’s Frank Gardner says suspicions will centre around Chechen nationalists or an Islamic State inspired group wanting payback for Putin’s airstrikes in Syria. Or it could be a combination of both.

Putin has in the past justified crackdowns on civilian protests by citing the terror threat. But will he this time, and will it work?

At least one pro-Kremlin commentator has linked the attack to the recent mass demonstrations organised by Putin’s political opponent.

Yet, in reality, the demonstrations and the terrorist groups being implicated both share a significant common denominator – both are openly long-term recipients of US-European aid, with the latter group also receiving significant material support from US-European allies in the Persian Gulf, primarily Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

US-European support for foreign-funded organizations posing as “nongovernmental organizations” (NGOs) running parallel efforts with terrorist organizations undermining Moscow’s control over Chechnya have been ongoing for decades.

Beyond Chechnya, the United States’ own Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) would admit in a 2012 memo (PDF) that:

If the situation unravels there is the possibility of establishing a declared or undeclared Salafist principality in eastern Syria (Hasaka and Der Zor), and this is exactly what the supporting powers to the opposition want, in order to isolate the Syrian regime, which is considered the strategic depth of the Shia expansion (Iraq and Iran).

The DIA memo then explains exactly who this “Salafist principality’s” supporters are (and who its true enemies are):

The West, Gulf countries, and Turkey support the opposition; while Russia, China, and Iran support the regime.

In essence, the “Salafist” (Islamic) “principality” (State) was a creation of the US in pursuit of its attempted regime change agenda in Syria. The current, self-proclaimed “Islamic State” is situated precisely in eastern Syria where the DIA memo claimed its state sponsors sought to place it. Its role in undermining Damascus and its allies’ attempts to restore peace and order to the Syrian state is obvious.

The fact that NATO-member Turkey served as a logistical, training, and financial hub for not only the Islamic State’s activities, but also other terrorist groups including Al Qaeda’s regional franchise – Al Nusra – also further implicates not only possible Al Qaeda and Islamic State involvement in the recent St. Petersburg blast, but also these organizations’ state sponsors – those who “support the opposition” in Syria.

Whether the United States played a direct role in the St. Petersburg blast or not is inconsequential. Without the massive state sponsorship both Washington and its European and Persian Gulf allies have provided these groups, such global-spanning mayhem would be impossible. The fact that the US seeks to undermine Russia politically, economically, and in many ways, militarily, and has recently fielded US-European-funded mobs in Russia’s streets – means that it is likely not a coincidence violence is now also being employed against Russia within Russian territory.

As per US policymakers’ own documented machinations – such as the 2009 Brookings Institution report, “Which Path to Persia?: Options for a New American Strategy Toward Iran” (PDF) – a militant component is prescribed as absolutely essential for the success of any street movement Washington manages to stir up against targeted states.

In the Brookings Institution document, it stated unequivocally in regards to toppling the government of Iran, that (emphasis added):

Consequently, if the United States ever succeeds in sparking a revolt against the clerical regime, Washington may have to consider whether to provide it with some form of military support to prevent Tehran from crushing it. This requirement means that a popular revolution in Iran does not seem to fit the model of the “velvet revolutions” that occurred elsewhere. The point is that the Iranian regime may not be willing to go gently into that good night; instead, and unlike so many Eastern European regimes, it may choose to fight to the death. In those circumstances, if there is not external military assistance to the revolutionaries, they might not just fail but be massacred. Consequently, if the United States is to pursue this policy, Washington must take this possibility into consideration. It adds some very important requirements to the list: either the policy must include ways to weaken the Iranian military or weaken the willingness of the regime’s leaders to call on the military, or else the United States must be ready to intervene to defeat it.”

The policy document would also openly conspire to fund and arm listed terrorist organizations including the notorious Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK). The document would state:

The United States could work with groups like the Iraq-based National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) and its military wing, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), helping the thousands of its members who, under Saddam Husayn’s regime, were armed and had conducted guerrilla and terrorist operations against the clerical regime. Although the NCRI is supposedly disarmed today, that could quickly be changed.

It would also admit that (emphasis added):

Despite its defenders’ claims, the MEK remains on the U.S. government list of foreign terrorist organizations. In the 1970s, the group killed three U.S. officers and three civilian contractors in Iran. During the 1979-1980 hostage crisis, the group praised the decision to take America hostages and Elaine Sciolino reported that while group leaders publicly condemned the 9/11 attacks, within the group celebrations were widespread.

Undeniably, the group has conducted terrorist attacks—often excused by the MEK’s advocates because they are directed against the Iranian government. For example, in 1981, the group bombed the headquarters of the Islamic Republic Party, which was then the clerical leadership’s main political organization, killing an estimated 70 senior officials. More recently, the group has claimed credit for over a dozen mortar attacks, assassinations, and other assaults on Iranian civilian and military targets between 1998 and 2001. At the very least, to work more closely with the group (at least in an overt manner), Washington would need to remove it from the list of foreign terrorist organizations.

If US policymakers have openly conspired to arm and fund known terrorist organizations guilty of murdering not only civilians in nations like Iran but also citizens of the United States itself, why would they hesitate to do likewise in Russia?

While the US poses as engaged in a battle against the so-called “Islamic State” in Syria, it has left its obvious, overt state sponsors unscathed both politically and financially. If the bombing in St. Petersburg is linked to US-European-Persian Gulf state sponsored terrorism, it will be only the latest in a long and bloody tradition of using terrorism as a geopolitical tool.

The US, having been frustrated in Syria and having little to no leverage at the negotiation table, is likely trying to “show” Moscow that it can still create chaos both beyond Russia’s borders amongst its allies, and within Russia’s borders – regardless of how well Russians have weathered such tactics in the past.

Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

By Tony Cartalucci , Journal-neo

April 8, 2017 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

The Mujahedeen e-Khalq: The US Prepares to Back a New Terrorist Army in Iran, Prelude to a Wider War?

As US attempts to extort a settlement in Syria built on regime-change, US senators and generals conspire to arm and back a new terrorist army aimed at Iran.

An October 7, 2015 hearing before the US Senate Committee on Armed Forces (SASC) titled, “Iranian Influence in Iraq and the Case of Camp Liberty,” served as a reaffirmation of America’s commitment to back the terrorist organization Mujahedeen e-Khalq (MEK) and specifically 2,400 members of the organization being harbored on a former US military base in Iraq.

Providing testimony was former US Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, former US Marine Corps Commandant and former Supreme Allied Commander Europe General James Jones, USMC (Ret.), and Colonel Wesley Martin, US Army (Ret.).

All three witnesses made passionate pleas before a room full of nodding senators for America to continue backing not only MEK terrorists currently harbored on a former US military base in Iraq, but to back groups like MEK inside of Iran itself to threaten the very survival of the government in Tehran.

In the opening remarks by Lieberman, he stated:

It was not only right and just that we took them off the foreign terrorist organization list, but the truth is now that we ought to be supportive of them and others in opposition to the government in Iran more than we have been.

Lieberman would also state (emphasis added):

Here’s my point Mr. Chairman, we ought to compartmentalize that agreement also, that nuclear agreement. We ought to put it over there, and not let it stop us from confronting what they’re doing in Syria. Continuing the sanctions for human rights violations in Iran in support of terrorism. And here’s the point I want to make about the National Council of Resistance of Iran and other democratic opposition groups that are Iranian – we ought to be supporting them.

This regime in Tehran is hopeless. It’s not going to change. There’s no evidence … every piece of evidence says the contrary. So I hope we can find a way, we used to do this not so long ago, supporting opposition groups in Iran. They deserve our support, and actually they would constitute a form of pressure on the government in Tehran that would unsettle them as much as anything else we could do because it would threaten the survival of the regime which from every objective indicator I can see is a very unpopular regime in Iran.

The United States, unrepentant regarding the arc of chaos, mass murder, terrorism, civilizational destruction it has created stretching from Libya to Syria, now seeks openly to extend it further into Iran using precisely the same tactics – the use of terrorist proxies – to dismantle and destroy Iranian society.

While Lieberman, General Jones, and Colonel Martin all failed categorically to accurately describe the true nature of the MEK terrorists they seek to support in a proxy war with Iran, the US policy papers these three lobbyists are reading from have done so and in great detail.

MEK is a Listed Terror Organization for a Reason

MEK has carried out decades of brutal terrorist attacks, assassinations, and espionage against the Iranian government and its people, as well as targeting Americans including the attempted kidnapping of US Ambassador Douglas MacArthur II, the attempted assassination of USAF Brigadier General Harold Price, the successful assassination of Lieutenant Colonel Louis Lee Hawkins, the double assassinations ofColonel Paul Shaffer and Lieutenant Colonel Jack Turner, and the successful ambush and killing of American Rockwell International employees William Cottrell, Donald Smith, and Robert Krongard.

Image: MEK terrorists in Iraq, 1997. Saddam Hussein used MEK terrorists to wage proxy war on Iran. Ironically despite accusing Hussein of state-sponsored terrorism for just such a policy, the US eagerly inherited the terrorist organization and has since then aspired to use MEK in a similar fashion.

Admissions to the deaths of the Rockwell International employees can be found within a report written by former US State Department and Department of Defense official Lincoln Bloomfield Jr. on behalf of the lobbying firm Akin Gump in an attempt to dismiss concerns over MEK’s violent past and how it connects to its current campaign of armed terror – a testament to the depths of depravity from which Washington and London lobbyists operate.

To this day MEK terrorists have been carrying out attacks inside of Iran killing political opponents, attacking civilian targets, as well as carrying out the US-Israeli program of targeting and assassinating Iranian scientists. MEK terrorists are also suspected of handling patsies in recent false flag operations carried out in India, Georgia, and Thailand, which have been ham-handedly blamed on the Iranian government.

MEK is described by Council on Foreign Relations Senior Fellow Ray Takeyh as a “cult-like organization” with “totalitarian tendencies.” While Takeyh fails to expand on what he meant by “cult-like” and “totalitarian,” an interview with US State Department-run Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty reported that a MEK Camp Ashraf escapee claimed the terrorist organization bans marriage, using radios, the Internet, and holds many members against their will with the threat of death if ever they are caught attempting to escape.

Not once is any of this backstory mentioned in the testimony of any of the witnesses before the senate hearing, defiling the memories of those who have been murdered and otherwise victimized by this terrorist organization. The de-listing of MEK in 2012 as a foreign terrorist organization by the US State Department is another indictment of the utter lack of principles the US clearly hides behind rather than in any way upholds as a matter of executing foreign policy.

American Support of Anti-Iranian Mercenaries a Prelude to Wider War

MEK has already afforded the US the ability to wage a low-intensity conflict with Iran. MEK’s role in doing so was eagerly discussed in 2009, several years before it was even de-listed as a terrorist organization by the US State Department in the Brooking Institution’s policy paper “Which Path to Persia? Options for a New American Strategy Toward Iran” (PDF).

The report stated (emphasis added):

Perhaps the most prominent (and certainly the most controversial) opposition group that has attracted attention as a potential U.S. proxy is the NCRI (National Council of Resistance of Iran), the political movement established by the MEK (Mujahedin-e Khalq). Critics believe the group to be undemocratic and unpopular, and indeed anti-American.

In contrast, the group’s champions contend that the movement’s long-standing opposition to the Iranian regime and record of successful attacks on and intelligence-gathering operations against the regime make it worthy of U.S. support. They also argue that the group is no longer anti-American and question the merit of earlier accusations. Raymond Tanter, one of the group’s supporters in the United States, contends that the MEK and the NCRI are allies for regime change in Tehran and also act as a useful proxy for gathering intelligence. The MEK’s greatest intelligence coup was the provision of intelligence in 2002 that led to the discovery of a secret site in Iran for enriching uranium.

Despite its defenders’ claims, the MEK remains on the U.S. government list of foreign terrorist organizations. In the 1970s, the group killed three U.S. officers and three civilian contractors in Iran. During the 1979-1980 hostage crisis, the group praised the decision to take America hostages and Elaine Sciolino reported that while group leaders publicly condemned the 9/11 attacks, within the group celebrations were widespread.

Undeniably, the group has conducted terrorist attacks—often excused by the MEK’s advocates because they are directed against the Iranian government. For example, in 1981, the group bombed the headquarters of the Islamic Republic Party, which was then the clerical leadership’s main political organization, killing an estimated 70 senior officials. More recently, the group has claimed credit for over a dozen mortar attacks, assassinations, and other assaults on Iranian civilian and military targets between 1998 and 2001. At the very least, to work more closely with the group (at least in an overt manner), Washington would need to remove it from the list of foreign terrorist organizations.

Proof that Brookings’ policy paper was more than a mere theoretical exercise, in 2012 MEK would indeed be de-listed by the US State Department with support for the terrorist organization expanded. The fact that former senators and retired generals representing well-funded corporate think tanks even just this week are plotting to use MEK to overthrow the Iranian government should raise alarms that other criminality conspired within the pages of this policy paper may still well be in play.

Lieberman himself suggests that proxy war and regime-change should proceed regardless of the so-called “nuclear deal” – with the 2009 Brookings report itself having stated that (emphasis added):

..any military operation against Iran will likely be very unpopular around the world and require the proper international context—both to ensure the logistical support the operation would require and to minimize the blowback from it. The best way to minimize international opprobrium and maximize support (however, grudging or covert) is to strike only when there is a widespread conviction that the Iranians were given but then rejected a superb offer—one so good that only a regime determined to acquire nuclear weapons and acquire them for the wrong reasons would turn it down. Under those circumstances, the United States (or Israel) could portray its operations as taken in sorrow, not anger, and at least some in the international community would conclude that the Iranians “brought it on themselves” by refusing a very good deal.

Clearly, both Brookings in 2009, and Lieberman this week have conspired to use the so-called “Iranian Nuclear Deal” as cover for betrayal and regime change.

For those wondering why Russia has intervened in Syria in the matter that it has, it should be plainly obvious. The US has no intention to stop in Syria. With Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya behind it, and Syria within its clutches, it is clear that Iran is next, and inevitably this global blitzkrieg will not stop until it reaches Moscow and Beijing.

Even as the US adamantly denies the obvious – that is has intentionally created and is currently perpetuating Al Qaeda, the so-called “Islamic State,” and other terrorist groups in Syria, it is openly conspiring to use another army of terrorists against neighboring Iran, live before a US Senate hearing. Should the US succeed in Syria, it would not be the end of the conflict, but only the end of the beginning of a much wider world war.

Land Destroyer

October 12, 2015 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

US-Israel Wage War on Iran in Syria

The ongoing conflict in Syria has always been a proxy conflict aimed at Iran, as well as nearby Russia, and more distant China. As far back as 2007, two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Seymour Hersh warned in his 9-page New Yorker report “The Redirection Is the Administration’s new policy benefitting our enemies in the war on terrorism?,” that a region-wide sectarian war was being engineered by the US, Saudi Arabia, and Israel – all of whom were working in concert even in 2007, to build the foundation of a sectarian militant army.

The report would cite various serving and former US officials who warned that the extremists the West was backing were “preparing for cataclysmic conflict.”

In retrospect, considering the emergence of the so-called “Islamic State” (ISIS), Hersh’s warning has turned out to be prophetic. The destabilization of Syria and Lebanon were noted in particular as prerequisites for a coming war with Iran. Confirming this would be the lengthy policy treatise published by the Brookings Institution in 2009 titled, “Which Path to Persia?”

In it, it is openly discussed that regime change for the purpose of establishing regional hegemony is the only goal of the United States and its regional partners, with attempts to frame the conflict with Iran as an issue of “national security” and “global stability” serving as mere canards.

Throughout the document, US policymakers admit that negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program are merely one of several pretexts being used to foster political subversion from within and justify war from beyond Iran’s borders.

More importantly, Brookings details explicitly how the US will wage war on Iran, through Israel, in order to maintain plausible deniability. It states specifically under a chapter titled, “Allowing or Encouraging an Israeli Military Strike,” that:

…the most salient advantage this option has over that of an American air campaign is the possibility that Israel alone would be blamed for the attack. If this proves true, then the United States might not have to deal with Iranian retaliation or the diplomatic backlash that would accompany an American military operation against Iran. It could allow Washington to have its cake (delay Iran’s acquisition of a nuclear weapon) and eat it, too (avoid undermining many other U.S. regional diplomatic initiatives).

Various diplomatic postures are discussed in consideration of the best formula to mitigate complicity amid a “unilateral” Israeli strike on Iran. Of course, and as the report notes, US-Israeli foreign policy is unified with Israel’s defenses a product of vast and continuous US support. Anything Israel does, therefore, no matter the political or diplomatic facade constructed, it does with America’s full backing – hence the inclusion of “encouraging” in the title of the chapter.

Today, an alleged “fallout” between the US and Israel has been grabbing headlines. Beyond the most superficial of political commentary, there have been no real manifestations of this “fallout.” Israel is still receiving immense aid both military and political from the United States, and Israeli foreign policy is still one with Washington.

The purpose of the feigned “fallout” is to produce room between the US and Israel, so that possible upcoming “unilateral” actions taken by Israel can be disavowed by a “cold” US.

The BBC’s article, “Netanyahu row with Obama administration deepens,” reported that:

A row between the US and Benjamin Netanyahu has deepened, with the Israeli leader accusing America and others of “giving up” on trying to stop Iran obtaining nuclear weapons. The US secretary of state questioned Mr Netanyahu’s judgement on the issue.

This is precisely the political charade implied by the Brookings Institution in their 2009 report as being necessary before any so-called “unilateral” action by Israel could be taken. In reality there is no row, simply a need for establishing plausible deniability ahead of an egregious act of unwarranted, unjust military aggression.

The War on Syria: Containing Iran Before, During, and After Airstrikes

Such theatrics are but one troubling sign that aggression toward Iran is still very much in the cards, that current negotiations are but a smokescreen for preparations to strike Iran anyway regardless of what concession it is willing to make, and that such aggression may take place once the US and its regional partners believe Syria has been reduced to its weakest state possible – if outright regime change is seen as impossible.

Brookings states clearly that:

As the conclusion discusses, an air campaign against Iran’s nuclear sites would likely have to be coupled with a containment strategy—before, during, and especially after the strikes. Containment would be necessary to hinder Iran from reconstituting its nuclear program, prevent it from retaliating against the United States and its allies, and to deal with Iran’s support for violent extremist groups and other anti-status quo activities.

Admittedly, part of that containment strategy have been attempts to destroy Syria and Lebanon – where the majority of Iran’s regional support is based and where Iran would marshal support from in the immediate aftermath of an unprovoked attack on its territory by US-Israeli aggression.

In addition to propping up terrorists across the region to attack Iran’s allies abroad, the Brookings report dedicated an entire chapter to “Inspiring an Insurgency: Supporting Iranian Minority and Opposition Groups.” Here, Brookings talks about backing the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) and its military wing, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) – the latter being a verified terrorist organization, previously listed by the US State Department as such, and guilty of killing not only Iranian civilians throughout decades of terrorism, but also US military personal and US civilian contractors.

For those who have difficulties believing the US would back Al Qaeda terrorists for the purpose of overthrowing the governments of Libya, Egypt, and Syria, they need only look at overt and continuous support for MEK terrorists in a bid to overthrow the government of Iran to uncover the reality of Washington’s willingness to sponsor terrorism.

Brookings would openly admit that:

…even if U.S. support for an insurgency failed to produce the overthrow of the regime, it could still place Tehran under considerable pressure, which might either prevent the regime from making mischief abroad or persuade it to make concessions on issues of importance to the United States (such as its nuclear program and support to Hamas, Hizballah, and the Taliban). Indeed, Washington might decide that this second objective is a more compelling rationale for supporting an insurgency than the (much less likely) goal of actually overthrowing the regime.

Brookings describes in exceptional detail how the US would organize its proxy terrorists. It would claim:

Insurgencies take a long time to succeed, when they succeed at all. It takes time for insurgents to identify leaders and recruit personnel, establish bases and gather equipment, and learn tactics and proficiency with weapons. It takes even longer to win popular support, erode the morale of the government’s armed forces, and then undermine the government’s legitimacy.

It would also claim:

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) could take care of most of the supplies and training for these groups, as it has for decades all over the world. However, Washington would need to decide whether to provide the groups with direct military assistance…

And finally, it would admit:

To protect neighboring countries providing sanctuary to the insurgents. Any insurgency against the Iranian regime would need a safe haven and conduit for arms and other supplies through one or more of Iran’s neighbors.

This precise strategy has been implemented regarding Syria. Material support for terrorists operating in Syria has been provided for years by the West, with the West’s vast media monopolies providing rhetoric to undermine the legitimacy of the Syrian government, and US-created sanctuaries outside of Syria (primarily in Turkey and Jordan) for terrorists to to seek safe havens in and through which a torrent of arms, cash, equipment, and fighters flow.

When understanding that the war in Syria is but a lead up to a larger conflict with Iran – with a literal signed confession created by US policymakers clearly serving as the foundation for several years of American foreign policy across the Middle East – one begins to understand the urgent imperative incumbent upon those who, for the sake of their own self-preservation, are tasked with stopping it.

Russian and Chinese efforts to obstruct US designs in Syria are about more than selfish regional interests, they are a matter of self-preservation, stopping the conflict in Syria from spilling into Iran next, southern Russia afterwards, and eventually enveloping western China as well.

That the US has committed itself to fueling chaos in Syria despite the unlikelihood of actually overthrowing the government in Damascus, costing tens of thousands of innocent people their lives, illustrates the callousness of US foreign policy, highlighting that Western sponsorship of terrorism around the world constitutes perhaps the most egregious, continuous, and most horrifically demonstrable threat to global peace and stability in our age.

As the US and Israel conduct their latest diplomatic charade, a harbinger of even more chaos to come, those concerned must read the policy papers of the West and understand the true nature of their methodology if ever they hope to expose it and stop it.

Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine“New Eastern Outlook”.

Journal-neo.org

April 6, 2015 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

The Islamic State (ISIS) is “America’s Dream Rebel Army”

US policy paper reveals desire for construction of full-scale extraterritorial army to invade Syria. Such an army is being built in Iraq and Turkey and it’s called “ISIS.”

The corporate-financier funded and directed policy think tank, the Brookings Institution, has served as one of several prominent forums documenting and disseminating US foreign policy. It would host in part the architects of the so-called “surge” during the nearly decade-spanning US occupation of Iraq, as well as battle plans for waging a covert war against Iran now well under way.

Part of this covert war against Iran involved the arming and backing of listed terrorist groups, and in particular, the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MEK) which has killed US servicemen, American civilians, as well as countless innocent Iranians over the decades. Among those signing their name to this plan found within Brookings’ “Which Path to Persia?” report, was Kenneth Pollack. Now, in efforts to overthrow the government of Syria, also a stated and integral part of undermining, isolating, and destroying Iran, Pollack has revealed another element of the plan – to create a full-scale proxy military force outside of Syria, then subsequently invading and occupying Syria with it.

In the report titled, “Building a Better Syrian Opposition Army: How and Why,” Pollack cites the so-called “Islamic State” or “ISIS” as the ultimate impetus for expanded US intervention. However, upon looking at Pollack’s proposal, it merely looks as if the US is using ISIS as a pretext to more overtly intervene in order to overthrow the government of Syria – not in fact neutralize ISIS.

After a considerable preamble assuring readers that the aim of creating a “better Syrian opposition army” would exclude sectarian extremists and result in the same “success” the US had in training the Iraqi army, the document explains:

…building a new Syrian army is best not done in Syria itself. At least not at first. The program would need the time and sanctuary to perform the necessary training, reorganization, sorting and socialization into a new Syrian army without the distractions and pressures of Syria itself. The Saudi offer to provide facilities to train 10,000 Syrian opposition fighters is one of reasonable possibility, although one of Syria’s neighbors would probably be preferable. Jordan already serves as training ground for America’s current training program and it would be an ideal locale to build a real Syrian army. However, Turkey could also conceivably serve that purpose if the Turks were willing.

Clearly, not only is this already being done as admitted by Pollack himself, it is being done on a scale already eclipsing Pollack’s alleged plan – the only difference is it is being done through the use of sectarian extremists – not the imaginary, nonexistent secular professionals Pollack uses as a marketing gimmick to sell this scheme.

More tellingly, Pollack’s plan continues by stating (emphasis added):

In addition to being armed, trained and officered like a conventional military, a new Syrian army would also have to be equipped like one. That would mean not just small arms and crew-served weapons, such as the United States and its allies are already providing, but heavy weapons and logistical support. Like the Croats and Bosniaks, a new Syrian army will need the wherewithal to defeat both the regime and the Islamist extremists. That will require tanks, armored personnel carriers, artillery, surface-to-air missiles and the like to match the regime’s own heavy weapons—and so eliminate the firepower imbalance that the regime’s forces have employed to such advantage so far.

Surely, Pollack’s plan will never materialize in any practical dimension – however it may be possible to use such a marketing ploy to pour more resources into both the ongoing proxy war against Syria and Iran in general, and more specifically into the terrorist battalions already being armed, funded, trained, equipped, and sent off from Jordan and Turkey into Syrian territory. Handing advanced weapon systems into the hands of front groups consisting of intentionally ineffectual, immensely corrupt, incompetent US proxies is as good as handing the weapons directly to ISIS – and of course – this is precisely how the US is building its actual “new opposition army” – namely, in the form of ISIS itself.

Removing Pollack’s rhetoric about secular professionals, and inserting “ISIS” reveals Pollack’s paper as the actual already ongoing plan to overrun not only Syria, but pro-Iranian factions in Iraq, and perhaps even Iran itself. ISIS is a massive mercenary army trained and funded abroad by the US with its support laundered via Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, and Turkey, staged along Syria’s borders in both Jordan and Turkey, and acquiring an impressive arsenal just as what is required in Pollack’s plan to enter into and overthrow the government of Syria – minus eradicating extremists of course.

Even a cursory look at ISIS’ holdings across the region reveal ratlines leading into NATO-member Turkey’s territory and all along the Turkish-Syrian border where news outlets like the New York Times and Washington Post have reported for years the CIA had been operating – unloading billions in aid, gear, weapons, and even vehicles to militants fighting within Syria.

Headlines over the past 3-4 years including, “C.I.A. Said to Aid in Steering Arms to Syrian Opposition,” “First Syria rebels armed and trained by CIA ‘on way to battlefield’,” “Arms Airlift to Syria Rebels Expands, With Aid From C.I.A.,” and “Official says CIA-funded weapons have begun to reach Syrian rebels; rebels deny receipt,” reveal precisely how ISIS acquired its vast resources.

ISIS is organized on a professional level precisely as described by Pollack, most likely the result of US military advisers and their counterparts in Saudi and Qatari special operations. ISIS is also heavily armed precisely as was required by Pollack’s plan. They now possess an impressive and ever growing arsenal of weapons including tanks, missiles of all kinds, artillery, and even a small collection of aircraft including Russian warplanes and American helicopters.

The New York Times, after years of reporting on the CIA’s delivery of weapon systems to “moderate” militants, now laments of ISIS’ possession of advanced anti-air missiles. In its article, “Missiles of ISIS May Pose Peril for Aircrews in Iraq,” it reports:

Syrian rebels have amassed multiple Manpad models since 2012, and the Islamic State has generally had little trouble acquiring any weapon used by Syrian rebels either through purchase or capture, military analysts say.

Iraqi troops – the result of what Pollack claims as an American “success” – have also augmented ISIS with precisely the weapons needed for Pollack’s dream “opposition army.” No less than 30 M1 Abrams main battle tanks have fallen into ISIS’ hands.

Prolific Neo-Conservative propagandist Michael Weiss in the Wall Street Journal attempts to downplay the implications of such weapons falling into ISIS’ hands by stating in his op-ed titled, “Exploiting the ISIS Vulnerabilities in Iraq – The terrorists’ heavy military equipment is hard to maintain, easy to target from the air,” that:

Today, we estimate that ISIS has less than a total of 30 working M1 Abrams tanks and howitzers that are either self-propelled or towed behind trucks (based on our knowledge of how the Iraqi army is equipped and what divisions were in the north). These are the weapons that gave the Islamic State the advantage over the Peshmerga in recent firefights. Yet ISIS does not have the highly trained maintenance crews that are necessary to keep these weapons in good working order. The same problem exists for its armored Humvees and Mine Resistant Ambush Protected personnel carriers. Without maintenance, these captured U.S. vehicles and weapons will break down.

Only, ISIS’ Saudi, Qatari, and Jordanian sponsors most definitely do possess the highly trained maintenance crews necessary to keep these weapons in good working order – since these despotic regimes each in turn possess a large number of exactly these weapon systems purchased from the United States itself. If the Saudis in particular, can fund, train, and arm ISIS with small arms and missiles, how difficult would it be to supply them with spare parts and properly trained maintenance crews? Turkey also maintains a number of US weapon systems, and possesses the ability to maintain modern battle tanks if not the M1 specifically – and is already harboring, supplying, and backing ISIS – another inconvenient truth challenging Weiss’ attempts to mislead readers.

In fact, Pollack’s “proposal” appears more like an after-action report. ISIS is the “better Syrian opposition army” the West has sought all along. That is probably why attempts by the US to “fight” ISIS appear half-hearted and why those the US is supposedly “saving” from ISIS see Western intervention as more of a threat than ISIS itself believing it is designed simply to prolong ISIS’ existence in the face of growing and increasingly more formidable indigenous opposition.

Any provisions to build Pollack’s “army” will undoubtedly end up only bolstering ISIS and its affiliates – just as military aid policymakers like Pollack at Brookings advocated for the arming of “moderates” resulted in the creation of ISIS in the first place. While the US desperately attempts to disown responsibility for ISIS’ creation and perpetuation through an unconvincing propaganda campaign, false flag terror strikes against the “homeland,” and a series of increasingly ludicrous, orchestrated strawman victories in Iraq and Syria – Damascus, Baghdad, and Tehran are leading the real fight against ISIS.

The US apparently plans on protecting ISIS for as long as possible under the guise of being the sole force “fighting it,” while ISIS consolidates and moves on Western designated targets. In the process of “fighting” ISIS, the US is managing to destroy Syrian infrastructure and defenses. The US, however, has failed in attempts to exclude Syrian, Iraqi, and Iranian forces from countering the ISIS threat and now the region is witnessing a race between ISIS’ inevitable destruction and America’s attempts to topple Damascus before ISIS vanishes from its geopolitical toolbox.

Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

globalresearch.ca

November 13, 2014 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

The MEK: US War on Iran Takes Bizarre Turn

It is not merely hyperbole when it is said the US created terrorist organizations like Al Qaeda or the so-called “Islamic State.” It is documented fact. The current conflict in the Middle East may appear to be a chaotic conflagration beyond the control of the United States and its many eager allies, but in reality it is the intentional, engineered creation of regional fronts in a war against Iran and its powerful arc of influence.

It is not Western policy that indirectly spurs the creation and perpetuation of terrorist organizations, but in fact, direct, intentional, unmistakable support.

This support would manifest itself in perhaps the most overt and bizarre declaration of allegiance to terrorism to date, US Army General Hugh Shelton on stage before terrorists of the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MEK) and their Wahabist counterparts fighting in Syria, hysterically pledging American material, political, and strategic backing. MEK was listed for years by the US State Department as a foreign terrorist organization, but has received funding, arms, and safe haven by the United States for almost as long.

General Hugh’s speech titled, “Making Iranian mullahs fear, the MEK, come true,” was most likely never meant to be seen or fully understood by Americans. In titled alone, it is clear that US foreign policy intends to use the tool of terrorism to exact concessions from Tehran. If the true nature of America’s support for terrorist organizations like MEK were more widely known, the current narrative driving US intervention in Iraq and Syria would crumble.

MEK Has Killed US Servicemen, Contractors, and Iranian Civilians For Decades

US Has Been Eagerly Supporting MEK Terrorists For Years

Besides providing MEK terrorists with now two former US military bases in Iraq as safe havens, the US has conspired to arm, fund, and back MEK for years in a proxy war against Iran.

Covert support for the US-listed terrorist group Mujahedeen e-Khalq (MEK) has been ongoing since at least 2008 under the Bush administration, when Seymour Hersh’s 2008 New Yorker article “Preparing the Battlefield,” reported that not only had MEK been considered for their role as a possible proxy, but that the US had already begun arming and financing them to wage war inside Iran:

The M.E.K. has been on the State Department’s terrorist list for more than a decade, yet in recent years the group has received arms and intelligence, directly or indirectly, from the United States. Some of the newly authorized covert funds, the Pentagon consultant told me, may well end up in M.E.K. coffers. “The new task force will work with the M.E.K. The Administration is desperate for results.” He added, “The M.E.K. has no C.P.A. auditing the books, and its leaders are thought to have been lining their pockets for years. If people only knew what the M.E.K. is getting, and how much is going to its bank accounts—and yet it is almost useless for the purposes the Administration intends.

More recently, the British Daily Mail published a stunning admission by “US officials” that Israel is currently funding, training, arming, and working directly with MEK. The Daily Mail article states: Seymore Hersh in an NPR interview, also claims that select MEK members have already received trainingin the US.

U.S. officials confirmed today that Israel has been funding and training Iranian dissidents to assassinate nuclear scientists involved in Iran’s nuclear program. Washington insiders confirmed there is a close relationship between Mossad and MEK.

In 2009, an extensive conspiracy was formulated within US policy think-tank Brookings Institution’s 2009 “Which Path to Persia?” report, proposing to fully arm, train, and back MEK as it waged a campaign of armed terror against the Iranian people. In their report, they openly conspire to use what is an admitted terrorist organization as a “US proxy” (emphasis added):

“Perhaps the most prominent (and certainly the most controversial) opposition group that has attracted attention as a potential U.S. proxy is the NCRI (National Council of Resistance of Iran), the political movement established by the MEK (Mujahedin-e Khalq). Critics believe the group to be undemocratic and unpopular, and indeed anti-American.

In contrast, the group’s champions contend that the movement’s long-standing opposition to the Iranian regime and record of successful attacks on and intelligence-gathering operations against the regime make it worthy of U.S. support. They also argue that the group is no longer anti-American and question the merit of earlier accusations. Raymond Tanter, one of the group’s supporters in the United States, contends that the MEK and the NCRI are allies for regime change in Tehran and also act as a useful proxy for gathering intelligence. The MEK’s greatest intelligence coup was the provision of intelligence in 2002 that led to the discovery of a secret site in Iran for enriching uranium.

Despite its defenders’ claims, the MEK remains on the U.S. government list of foreign terrorist organizations. In the 1970s, the group killed three U.S. officers and three civilian contractors in Iran. During the 1979-1980 hostage crisis, the group praised the decision to take America hostages and Elaine Sciolino reported that while group leaders publicly condemned the 9/11 attacks, within the group celebrations were widespread.

Undeniably, the group has conducted terrorist attacks—often excused by the MEK’s advocates because they are directed against the Iranian government. For example, in 1981, the group bombed the headquarters of the Islamic Republic Party, which was then the clerical leadership’s main political organization, killing an estimated 70 senior officials. More recently, the group has claimed credit for over a dozen mortar attacks, assassinations, and other assaults on Iranian civilian and military targets between 1998 and 2001. At the very least, to work more closely with the group (at least in an overt manner), Washington would need to remove it from the list of foreign terrorist organizations.”

Besides US Army General Hugh Shelton, other prominent US politicians to literally stand before crowds of baying MEK terrorists and their supporters include former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Howard Dean, Tom Ridge, John Lewis, Ed Rendell, former ambassador John Bolton, former FBI Director Louis Freeh, retired General Wesley Clark, Lee Hamilton, former US Marine Corps Commandant General James Jones, and Alan Dershowitz. US Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi would also stand in front of MEK terrorists to deliver to them an Iranian New Year “greeting.”

Blind Lust for Global Hegemony is Leading America Over a Cliff

What it says about American foreign policy, to trick US servicemen and women into dying in far off lands to “fight terrorism” when US politicians in the highest positions of power openly pledge support to terrorism – using it as a battering ram against its enemies abroad, and failing to topple them by proxy, using their own terrorist hordes as a pretext for direct military intervention to do so – is that such policy is underpinned by nothing more than blind lust for power, wealth, and influence in senseless pursuit of global hegemony. There is no guiding principles of peace, stability, democracy, freedom, or any confining principles of humanity that prohibit US foreign policy from exercising the most abhorrent practices in order to achieve its goals.

Failure to identify these interests blindly chasing hegemony at the cost of global peace and prosperity leads not only America over a cliff into a ravine of madness, but the entire world as well. That a US general can stand before terrorists even as the US bombs two nations in the name of fighting terrorism, is but a glimpse into this madness.For America and the Western aligned nations and interests caught in its orbit, there is no future. Chasing hegemony for the sake of hegemony alone leaves no room for actual progress. When anything and everything obstructing the path to hegemony is seen as an “enemy” to be destroyed by any means necessary, that includes setting aside resources and attention to solving some of the most pressing issues of our time – health care, infrastructure, education, better jobs, peace, and prosperity. All of these are seen as obstacles toward hegemony, and the very same interests standing before MEK terrorists pledging America’s resources to their campaign of terrorism against Iran, are the same interests calling for and implementing austerity upon the American people to continuously fuel its foreign adventures.

Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

NSNBC.me

October 18, 2014 0 comments

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