Interview with Mark Dankof, former United States Senate candidate
Foreign forces move into Pearl Square in Manama, March 16, 2011
Bahrain’s turmoil has become extremely critical as political analysts think the Saudi Arabian troops have had the United States’ green light to step on the soil of the Persian Gulf nation.
The following is a rush transcript of a Press TV interview with Mark Dankof, former United States Senate candidate, in which he commented on the role that Washington plays in the events currently taking place in the Middle East.
Press TV: Why should we not believe that the green light was given by the United States to Saudi Arabia to intervene in the crisis in Bahrain? Because based on credible reports, Washington has also recently asked Saudi Arabia to supply weapons to revolutionaries in the Libyan city of Benghazi.
Dankof: I think you are exactly right. I am part of the American Right in this country … that has consistently opposed the type of foreign policy that the United States has been pursuing in the Middle East. Well does it relate to supporting the Zionist state, without question, as it also relates to supporting a series of regimes in that part of the world that clearly do not have popular support, and in the long run, it is simply going to take a foreign policy based in force for this whole status quo to continue.
There is only one problem. Aside from the immorality of this, the United States does not have enough men and enough money to continue this type of an imperial policy any more than their British predecessors did. And when we look at (United States Secretary of Defense) Robert Gates’ history as Ray McGovern chronicles that — Ray of course was Gates’ superior at the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) for a number of years — and when we read what McGovern has said about Gates and the nature of Gates’ relationship with Barack Obama, I think it is entirely reasonable to postulate that, in fact, there was an agreement between Gates and the Saudi regime that they would carry this out either at the behest of the United States or the bare minimum with a green light from the United States to proceed.
And one simply has to look at these pictures on your television network, and some of the coverage that has been on the Australian media in the last day in regard to what has been going on in Bahrain, to see that once again the United States is clearly being linked around the world to these killings. When we start talking about reprehensible governments and American-supplied arms, the blowback from this is going to be absolutely incredible.
Press TV: We can see many inconsistencies in the statements made by the United States, the major one of which standing out being the idea of “restraint.” We see what is going on in Bahrain, and yet we compare the other countries. What is the United States’ stance and why do you think they are coming out with these inconsistencies in their stance?
Dankof: The inconsistencies reflect the inconsistencies in American foreign policy all the way down the line in terms of what we say we stand for as opposed to what our actual agenda is. A classic example of this is when you look at the American and Israeli support of the Mujahedin-e-Khalq, which was killing Americans in Iran back in the 1970’s during the Pahlavi era. But it has certainly become convenient for the United States and Israel to have an alliance with this so-called Marxist terrorist organization as long as these people are doing their bidding in Iran and committing a series of acts which by any definition are criminal, and which have the fingerprints of the American and Israeli intelligence communities all over them. It is also noteworthy that the Saudi Arabian regime has been helping to bankroll this Mujahedin-e-Khalq or MEK organization in their activities around the world, and especially those directed at Iran.
So the United States, on the one hand, claims to be for human rights; for constitutional government; for the protection of the lives of the innocents, and yet of course, when you look at any of these situations that are transpired in recent weeks in Tunisia, in Egypt, in Yemen, in Bahrain and elsewhere, the implication is that we have a problem here, because the folks that we want to keep in power are clearly people who, historically and presently, have not been for any of these things that we say that we believe in. Nonetheless, we will try to help them keep the lid on these mass protests, because ultimately, where American foreign policy is concerned in the Middle East, it is almost about three things: supporting Israel at all costs; supporting international central banking interests at all costs, and it is not an accident of course that Bahrain is home to many international banking institutions; and then of course, the natural gas and oil consortiums. And in the case of Bahrain, fourthly, there is the American Fifth Fleet sitting there, which is part of the enforcement arm that the United States, by implication, would use to try and enforce the interests of these first three constituencies that I have mentioned.
There is a rising perception among the average American in this country, left and right, politically, that their government has involved them in something that is a complete loser. It is a loser in terms of our linkage, as a people, to the deaths and suffering of all of these innocent people in your part of the world. It is a loser as more American money continues to be borrowed from China, Japan and Saudi Arabia to finance these military expeditions in the Middle East. And ultimately more American young men and women will lose their lives in trying to enforce and to perpetuate this older British foreign policy. It is unsustainable. The British found out how unsustainable it was. The United States is, unfortunately, is about to find out, much to its own detriment, and much to a great degree of tragedy, that this whole thing is headed in no good direction for anybody concerned.