Reddit reviews Treacherous Alliance: The Secret Dealings of Israel, Iran, and the United States

Treacherous Alliance: The Secret Dealings of Israel, Iran, and the United States,

http://www.amazon.com/Treacherous-Alliance-Secret-Dealings-Israel/dp/0300120575

>"[I]t wasn’t Iran that turned the Israeli-Iranian cold war warm – it was Israel . . . The Israeli reversal on Iran was partially motivated by the fear that its strategic importance would diminish significantly in the post-cold war middle east if the then president (1989-97) Hashemi Rafsanjani’s outreach to the Bush Sr
administration was successful."

And so,

>Israeli politicians began painting the regime in Tehran as fanatical and irrational. Clearly, they maintained, finding an accommodation with such “mad mullahs” was a non-starter. Instead, they called on the US to classify Iran, along with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, as a rogue state that needed to be “contained.”

Iran had been making better compromise offers years ago. The US ignored them, in favor of a regime-change agenda. They were using the exaggerated "Iranian nuclear threat" as a pretext for imposing regime-change there, just as they used the "WMDs in Iraq" lie as a pretext to invade and topple that country.

This is what the IAEA Director ELbaradei said years ago

>I have seen the Iranians ready to accept putting a cap on their enrichment [program] in terms of tens of centrifuges, and then in terms of hundreds of centrifuges. But nobody even tried to engage them on these offers. Now Iran has 5,000 centrifuges. The line was, "Iran will buckle under pressure." http://www.newsweek.com/elbaradei-iranians-are-not-fanatics-80021

And this is what he concluded

>“They weren’t interested in a compromise with the government in Tehran, but regime change – by any means necessary, http://news.antiwar.com/2011/04/20/elbaradei-us-europe-werent-interested-in-compromise-with-iran/


In fact the Iranians had been making BETTER compromise offers for years that the US ignored in favor of a regime-change agenda

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/17/AR2006061700727.html

http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Iran_Nuclear_Proposals

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/05/opinion/05iht-edzarif.html?_r=0

But the Israelis weren't happy that the US and Iran may get along. Rather the Israelis had been pushing to start a war between Iran and US to suit themselves http://www.uscatholic.org/culture/war-and-peace/2008/06/iran-spam

It is important to note that even the US doesn't accuse Iran of making nukes, rather it accused Iran of "seeking thecapability" to make nukes and having engaged in "nuclear studies" until 2003 --
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/25/world/middleeast/us-agencies-see-no-move-by-iran-to-build-a-bomb.html

Israeli intelligence actually agrees that there is no nuclear weapons program in Iran
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/mossad-cia-agree-iran-has-yet-to-decide-to-build-nuclear-weapon-1.419300

And contrary to the hype, the Israels don't "Feel threatened" by Iran's nonexistent nukes http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/livni-behind-closed-doors-iranian-nuclear-arms-pose-little-threat-to-israel-1.231859

What they feel threatened about is that the US and Iran may start to get along, leaving Israel the third man out. http://www.amazon.com/Treacherous-Alliance-Secret-Dealings-Israel/dp/0300120575

The "capability" to make nukes is not uncommon nor special to Iran as the former IAEA inspector points out

>And so, clearly Iran has mastered many technologies in the uranium-handling and enrichment areas, such that if they wanted to go ahead, they probably could do it. That would make them a threshold state. We can name any number of other states in the world with the same level of technology and expertise. It's the intent that you have to worry about. We don't see intent to this case. http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=13286


Contrary to the US intelligence assessment, the IAEA said there was never any evidence of a weapons program in Iran, ever existing (not before 2003, not after)

>With respect to a recent media report, the IAEA reiterates that it has no concrete proof that there is or has been a nuclear weapon programme in Iran. http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/09/17/us-nuclear-iaea-iran-sb-idUSTRE58G60W20090917

And the evidence for these claims is quite sketchy and disputed by nuclear experts http://www.sipri.org/media/expert-comments/the-iaea-and-parchin-do-the-claims-add-up

And former IAEA Director Elbaradei dismissed them as hype http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/09/02/us-iran-nuclear-elbaradei-idUSTRE5811V120090902


The Israelis outright accused the IAEA DIrector Elbaradei of being "an iranian agent" for his refusal to endorse the claims against Iran http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4146150,00.html

So the US and Israel started attacking the IAEA Director and had him replaced with someone who had sworn loyalty to the US

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A57928-2004Dec11.html

http://www.theguardian.com/world/julian-borger-global-security-blog/2010/nov/30/iaea-wikileaks

And the new IAEA Director started promoting questionable claims against Iran by the US that the former Director had dismissed as hype http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/09/02/us-iran-nuclear-elbaradei-idUSTRE5811V120090902

Once the full text of the allegations were released by the new IAEA Director, experts pointed out that the allegations against Iran were not new and were actually "thin"


http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2011/1109/Iran-nuclear-report-Why-it-may-not-be-a-game-changer-after-all

There was also plenty of fraud and outright misrepresentation in the media for example the infamous "AP Graph" that supposedly proved Iran was working on nukes ... but was fake http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/nov/29/ap-iran-nuclear-program-graph-explanation

The US also started framing the issue in terms of vague "capabilities to do things in the indefinite future", because there was no actual evidence of a nuclear weapons program in Iran http://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Most-U-S-tips-fingering-Iran-false-envoys-2646358.php nor could any IAEA inspectors prove that Iran could NOT make nukes one day (naturally, since no one can see into the future)

The US also cooked up a "laptop computer" that supposedly was stolen from Iran and which supposedly contained all sorts of evidence of "nuclear studies" that the US never made fully available to Iran OR the IAEA but which now the IAEA demands that Iran disprove, even though it has never been allowed to see the documents fully, http://mepc.org/journal/middle-east-policy-archives/iran-nuclear-alleged-studies-documents?print

The "Capability" to make nukes something 40 nations already have, since it is inevitable in having a nuclear energy program, and is not illegal nor a violation of the NPT http://old.seattletimes.com/html/nationworld/2002041473_nukes21.html

But these countries don't make nukes, becase nukes really aren't that useful in real life http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/ten-reasons-iran-doesnt-want-the-bomb-7802

Nor can we just assume that Iran necessarily wants nukes, to supposedly protect itself: Iran suffered over 100,000 casualties from US-backed Iraqi chemical warfare back when the US was friends with Saddam, and refused to respond in kind with its own chemical weapons, on moral grounds, and instead suffered the casualties. http://foreignpolicy.com/2013/08/26/exclusive-cia-files-prove-america-helped-saddam-as-he-gassed-iran/ So when they say they consider WMDs immoral and against Islam, they've already proven it with a lot of blood.

Iran's nuclear program is actually quite legal, and Iran's position is widely backed in the world community despite what the media tells you
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/jun/09/iran-nuclear-power-un-threat-peace

http://indianexpress.com/article/news-archive/web/india-with-nam-in-slamming-iaea-report-on-iran/

It remains to be seen if the US has now genuinely changed its agenda to topple the govt there, or whether they've just changed tactics and are still just looking for exaggerated excuses to topple Iran's govt

Ok. I don't have a lot of time. I especially do not have enough time to cover every instance over the decades, so I'm going to go with the most recent event - the current Iran-Israel-US issue. I will use reposts.

Typing it now....

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>US strategy in the Middle East (and indeed all over the world) is predicated on establishing security so that other nations do not have to, the idea being that it is better if there is one powerful military guaranteeing everyone's interests rather than several powerful militaries looking to individual state interests. The US plays the role of security guarantor in the Middle East (ensuring the flow of the oil supply, protecting sea lanes, etc.) to prevent European, Indian, and Chinese (areas which all rely heavily on the Middle East for oil, whereas the vast majority of oil used by the US comes from the Western Hemisphere which we can easily secure from others) from having to do so. Preventing Arab nations from uniting (which would not happen regardless of any foreign power's involvement in the region today) is absolutely not on the agenda.

>It's not a narrative; it's established US strategy. That strategy is currently in flux because the transition in the international environment away from unipolarity, but that's what it has been since the Cold War.

To start this informal reply, there is going to be a serious inherent flaw when trying to look at one narrative as a monolithic strategy that spans decades. Theres considerable push and pull within the US government that needs to me accounted for. As promised, this will only focus on the current Iranian issue. I'm low on time, so..

Basically, you have a large fight that occurs between the oil interests you mention and people with ideological leanings with Israel. You simply cannot view even our current issues with Iran simply through your lens as it omits a massive portion of US foreign policy. There are clear breaks with oil interests and changes in US foreign policy. Sanctions are a key point during the change in policy in the mid 1990's to now. American companies were pushed out of Iran from the AIPAC sanctions when they were the biggest customers by far. Cheney, in the 1990's was against the neoconservative plan for invasion in the 1990's, he was fighting to drop the Iranian sanctions, as much of the companies were. Cheney changed his position later. Repost. look for links and a bunch of expanded points. Luckily, I have some important excerpts of Parsis book here that should help start you off. This is another short PDF you should read, as it also covers how oil interests came to dominate US policy, and then lost out to Israeli interests in the mid 1990's. During Clintons second term, Clinton shifted back to oil interests to an extent.

Then (repost)

>“Indecision 2000”had deprived the Bush administration ofmore than six badly needed weeks to organize the administration and fill key posts in the State Department and elsewhere.More than three months into his presidency,Bush still had not found many ofthe people who would head his government agencies, including those who would be responsible for policies on Iran.AIPAC’s machinery, however,was in great shape.The pro-Israel lobby began laying the groundwork for ILSA’s renewal on Capitol Hill,and by mid-March—before Bush had even formulated a position on ILSA—AIPAC had gathered more than three hundred cosponsors in the House (the bill needed only 218 votes to pass).Though the sanctions had failed to change Iran’s foreign policy,AIPAC still hailed ILSA as a great success.AIPAC Executive Director Howard Kohr urged the House International Relations Committee to renew ILSA because it had “met the test and proven its effectiveness over time”and because “Iranian behavior demands it.” The pro-Israeli Washington Institute for Near East Policy argued that ILSA’s renewal would help Iran’s “real moderates”and hurt the “so-called moderates”around President Mohammad Khatami,who shared the “anti-Israel policies set by Iran’s hard-line clerical leadership.” The Bush administration was quickly outmaneuvered; through its preemptive work on Capitol Hill,AIPAC checkmated Bush and saw the sanctions bill pass with overwhelming numbers in both chambers.Still,cautious optimism characterized Iran’s approach to the United States during the first months of the Bush administration,and a lull reigned in the war ofwords between Tehran and Tel Aviv. All that was to change on the morning of September 11,2001

View the parsi link above for an expansion of what occurred between 2001 and now. If people forget whey the sanctions are relevant today, Remember that the Obama administration just recently, expended a chunk of political capital on releasing oil from the strategic oil reserves to drive down prices to help boost the economy. In come the AIPAC sanctions, and Obama pleads to ease the impact of the penalties to avoid driving up oil prices. He loses. Oil prices go up over the nonsense that occurs afterwards, negatively affecting the US economy. Bonus? China gets cheaper Iranian Oil as the U.S. Pays for the expensive Hormuz patrols. A varied group of other people, with the run up to the Iraq war fresh on their minds, arent too happy with this and with the televison media coverage. For example, check out Robert Baer and Richard Engel on Hardball talking openly about how Israel is escalating hostilities with Iran to provoke an attack that will justify a military response. Baer is figure with some gravitas on this subject, and covering this on Hardball is very significant. Heres more.

More links

The delay and the sensitive negotiations over language may presage tensions with Democrats as AIPAC leads the drive among pro-Israel groups to ratchet up pressure on Iran this year.

As U.S. and Israeli officials talk publicly about the prospect of a military strike against Iran's nuclear program, one fact is often overlooked: U.S. intelligence agencies don't believe Iran is actively trying to build an atomic bomb.

AIPAC and the Push Toward War

Bibi or Barak: Who will plunge us into Mideast war?

I have to wrap this up. Even looking at just the most recent US issue in the middle east highlights how this perspective you bring does not cover decades of US foreign policy because it simply is not monolithic. People could have made this argument during the cold war, but even this was starting to erode by the Early 1990's.

So they're looking for a new explanation in the form of a new common enemy. And so they've invented one, which we're going to hear a great deal more about in the future, and that is Islamic fundamentalism, which they say is the great wave that's threatening the West.

-George Ball 1993


We needed some new glue for the alliance [with America].
And the new glue . . . was radical Islam.And Iran was radical Islam.

-Efraim Inbar, Begin-Sadat Center