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TEHRAN, Nov 12_A senior political expert based in the US city of Atlanta described Major turmoil in Iraq will give the US the justification for remaining there “to fight ISIS” regardless of what the Iraqi government says.
TEHRAN, Young Journalists Club(YJC)_"Major turmoil in Iraq will give the US the justification for remaining there “to fight ISIS” regardless of what the Iraqi government says.," Jim W. Dean, the managing editor of VeteransToday.com, told yjc in an interview.
Jim Dean is a regular geopolitical commentator on various media outlets around the world. He and Sr. Editor Gordon Duff have begun their own bridge building campaign with Iranian university youth via Skype conferences. Jim comes from an old military family going back to the American Revolution.
Following is the full text of the interview:
1) Despite Washington’s policy of “maximum pressure” and its most severe sanctions against Tehran, the Islamic Republic has been able to control prices and inflation in the country through adopting certain financial strategies which are in line with the policy of “resistance economy”. What is your take on that? Do you think that the resistance will work in the future?
The resistance policy has worked as it has in other countries, where it has bought time for those who have the educated population and resources to blunt sanctions via domestically produced substitutions. This was hard on the population, as the country had to upgrade its defenses as fast as possible to deter any foolish attack by the usual suspects.
As was proven during the Cold War, ‘mutually assured destruction” worked, and we have not had a major war. Israel’s generals have publicly stated that their policy was to preemptively attack any deemed threat before it reached military parity, an aggressive offensive policy that has continually destabilized the region.
Israel is now faced with the risk that, if it triggers a Mideast War that destroys the Persian Gulf, it will be held responsible for the ensuing worldwide economic devastation from $150 per barrel oil. And if it has over-estimated its ability to defend against a retaliation attack, its government would fall and the politicians would scapegoat its military.
As for the future, we must guard against overconfidence. There is the old saying, “You don’t know what you don’t know”, and always take that into consideration.
2) Since October 17, the Lebanese in Beirut and other cities have been taking to the streets to express their strong discontent with the government’s failure to find solutions to the country’s economic crisis. What are the main reasons behind the ongoing anti-government demonstrations? Can you please name some of the main achievements of the protests so far?
The Lebanese are in a difficult situation, with no magic button available to them to make their problems go away. The challenges are too deep-rooted and the national debt too high. If the economy collapses, the rich will lose some money but can easily relocate.
Because the country is poor, the public at large cannot financially support political parties. The only way for parties to have dependable financial support is to fight over ministries when forming a government so they can fill them with party loyalists who will then loot as much as they can to have the funding to remain in power.
If the protesters push too hard by tearing the country apart with violence, then tourism and foreign investment will dry up, and they will see capital flight that might take the banks down. The people will be in a much worse situation.
Rebuilding Lebanon capital is going to come forward if nothing is done to prosecute the corruption there. What is going to motivate the political parties to investigate and prosecute themselves? Only Hezbollah has a reputation for no corruption.
How can a new government be formed on a promise that it will stop stealing, and thus admit that it was? Lebanon needs a miracle, but my advice to all sides would be to first make sure they do not make the situation worse, and that they give up their old ways that have failed so badly.
3) US President Donald Trump declared Sunday that Daesh leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was dead after a US military raid in northwest Syria over the weekend. In reaction, the spokesman for Iran’s administration, Ali Rabiei, shrugged off the US president’s announcement and said Washington’s policies are the main reason for the emergence of Daesh, adding that the death of Baghdadi does not mean that Takfiri terrorism or “Daeshism” has ended. Do you think the killing of the Daesh leader would play a major role in the fight against terrorism in the region or bring an end to the phenomenon given its root causes?
His death will make no difference at all. The whole event might have been staged, as the Russian Command has gone on the record that it saw no US air operations at the time, and it had provided no assistance as Trump had claimed. Intelligence agencies are well skilled in such theatrical psyops, inventing and disposing of terrorist leaders who often are just puppets themselves for the so-called “anti-terrorism” US coalition.
As the Syrian war outcome has been turned around, we have clearly seen the forces for destabilization refocus onto new or old targets. A color revolution is in play in Iraq right now. There will never be an end to terrorism if major countries use it as a convenient destabilization tool.
The UN, who knows this has been going on for years and has never walked out on strike to stand with the world public on the issue. It loves its paychecks more than leading the public in making the changes that are needed, which would be major international investigations on state-sponsored terrorism, and yes, with NATO, western countries, and of course Israel on the list.
Terrorists now change affiliation as often as actors working in summer theater projects. The retired intelligence professionals have watched this go on for years, but with most too fearful to take any action to stop. People are losing faith in their governments.
The devastating truth about proxy terrorism is that it has worked so well the fighters are treated like sports teams, with new recruits ready to take the place of those who leave or die. There is no powerful enforcement organization to deal with this horrible situation.
What country has been able to launch investigations and prosecutions into its own government organizations aiding and abetting state-sponsored terrorism? I know of none, however there should be a list of a dozen countries just to start.
4) The US claims that it has started the withdrawal of its troops from Syria and says its forces shouldn’t be there. What was the main reason behind the US military operation? What do you think about the developments behind the scenes?
The main reason for the US operation has been to destabilize Syria and make it a failed state like Libya, so it can be Balkanized and asset stripped. For example, the US stole billions in Iraqi oil during its occupation, shipped out mostly through the Turkish pipeline and shared among numerous criminal and political operators that became very rich.
That is the big unipolar power game. When Veterans Today gave the headline address at the 2015 Damascus counter-terrorisn conference, Gordon Duff shocked the audience by telling them that neither political nor religious powers were behind all the devastation that had been going.
He said that all the major international criminal organizations were controlling many of the countries involved in doing the nasty deeds for the sole purpose of creating opportunities for those criminal orgs to make huge amounts of money - enough to buy presidents, political parties, defense and intel chiefs, judiciary, or kill them if necessary.
Trump actually wants Iraq’s oil seized to pay the US back for the Iraq war, when it invaded over fake charges of Iraq having weapons of mass destruction. Now he says he is pulling troops out of Syria, but he wants to “take Syria’s oil”. This is nothing but gangster talk. This is not a foreign policy, it is foreign gangsterism.
5) What is happening in Iraq? Why are people protecting?
Iraq has a huge corruption problem. The Sunnis have looted the country. They live mainly in Dubai and do most of their business there beyond the reach of the Iraqi legal system. Iraq is actually a colony to be exploited for these people. We see moves to re-insert ISIS back into Iraq to begin a new civil war. Iran has already pulled most of its people out to not get blamed for being involved, a good move on their part.
The people know they have been robbed blind, not by cruel occupation forces, but by their own people. This is a huge problem all over the Mideast for hundreds of years.
Major turmoil in Iraq will give the US the justification for remaining there “to fight ISIS” regardless of what the Iraqi government says. The US will claim that Iraq cannot control ISIS so it has to do it. This is the new game. Insert your own proxy terrorists, and then invade to pretend you are fighting them, while working to install a new puppet government for the US.
Interview by Maryam Sadat Ghavami
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