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Scott Ritter, a former UN weapons inspector and U.S. Marine intelligence officer, has analyzed and criticized the role of the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) in the context of U.S.-Iran relations. As Washington once again raises the prospect of confrontation with Tehran, questions about U.S. intentions—and the limits of American power—have returned to the center of debate in West Asia. In an exclusive interview with the Tehran Times, Scott Ritter, discussed how Washington views talks with Iran, what it hopes to achieve with the country, as well as the growing risk of military escalation.

Ritter believes that the United States is using diplomacy less as a route to agreement than as a tactical tool to buy time, apply pressure, and shape the conditions for confrontation. In his remarks to the Tehran Times, he outlined what he sees as the real thinking behind U.S. and Israeli demands, warned against misreading Iran’s deterrence, and described the potentially catastrophic consequences of a war for the region in which the MEK, the monarchists and the separatist groups take part.

“The United States, on its own admission, orchestrates a currency collapse in Iran,” Scott Ritter told Tehran Times about the recent protests in Iran. “People went to the streets in legitimate protest, which the Iranian government did not violently suppress. Then that protest was hijacked by the CIA, by Mossad, with agents inside who created violence.”

Ritter believes that Israel and the U.S. are fomenting unrests to lead a regime change project in Iran besides military invasion. He explains: “So, when we bomb Iran—and I unfortunately believe that we will bomb Iran—we will be seeking to suppress the regime’s ability to respond to civil unrest. We will encourage uprisings and suppress the government’s capacity to respond. The objective, therefore, is to have the government collapse.”

According to this prominent critic of U.S. foreign policy,  this is American’s vision about Iran following a US-Israeli invasion on this nation: “you’re going to have ISIS-type trucks running through your cities, with gunmen from the Mujahedin-e Khalq and gunmen from the monarchists, who are going to run in and say, “We’re now in charge.”

Ritter believes that the Iranian government needs to capture the emotion of the Iranian nation and use it to weaponize itself, to make itself invulnerable to efforts by outside powers to divide it.

As an American, he says: “That’s what we try to do. We support the MEK, we support the monarchists, we support the Kurds, we support Azeri separatists, we support the Baluch, and we exploit economic divisions in the mainstream Iranian population. The United States, Israel, and others are looking to fracture Iran, to break it apart, to cause it to collapse from within.”

He suggests that the Iranian government and the Iranian people have to find a way to unify themselves. “If not, then we’ve just told you what we look for: the divisions, and we exploit the divisions,” he states.

Ritter has previously written on the role of the MEK as operatives of the US intelligence in Iran. In 2005, Ritter revealed that the MEK had begun receiving training from the CIA. In a 2006 interview, Ritter described the MEK as a “cult” and a “terrorist” group, accusing elements in the U.S. government of using them to destabilize Iran. Ritter has also noted that the MEK has often acted as a source of intelligence for Western and Israeli officials regarding Iranian nuclear sites.