Operation commanders of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units have convened to examine recent developments in the country, specifically US assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani and the Iraqi deputy PMU head Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis.
Iraq’s al-Furat news channel reported on Friday that participants of the PMU summit, which also included administrative officials from different parts of the organization, stressed the PMU’s complete readiness to defend Iraq.
The PMU officials said the organization was committed to pursuing its objectives in compliance with the law, respecting the government’s authority and following the orders of the Iraqi military’s chief of staff.
The report did not further elaborate on results of the discussions.
The summit comes after Washington assassinated Muhandis and Soleimani, a formal guest of the Iraqi government, last week.
The assassinations have since led to major anti-American protests across Iran and Iraq and other parts of the region and the world.
Following Iran’s missile strike on the US airbase of Ain al-Assad in Iraq’s Anbar province on Wednesday, various Iraqi groups affiliated with the PMU have also vowed to respond to the American assassination.
During the PMU summit on Friday, participating officials stressed that the legacy of figures such as Soleimani and Muhandis further motivates the resistance organization to pursue its objectives.
The PMU officials also expressed gratitude to mourners for participating in funeral processions held for the assassinated commanders earlier this week.
The officials also thanked Iraq’s clerical establishment, led by Iraq’s prominent Shia cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, for its support and added that the PMU was committed to observing its instructions.
The PMU was formed following a June 2014 fatwa by Ayatollah Sistani calling on Iraqi citizens to volunteer and defend their country against Daesh terrorists who had unleashed a terror campaign across large parts of the country.
Deash was consequently vanquished by the Iraqi forces and is currently limited to dispersed cells operating in more remote areas of the country.
PMU halts Daesh advance near Mosul
In a separate PMU statement, the organization announced that it successfully halted an offensive launched by Daesh forces south of Mosul.
The statement said the operation was conducted by the 25 and 45 Brigades of the Nineveh Operations Command against Deash forces moving in from the direction of the al-Jazira region of Iraq’s north-central Salahuddin province.
January 11, 2020
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Illegal Occupation | Iraq, United States |
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On Friday, two reporters were shot dead in Basra, Iraq by unidentified armed men after filming protests in the country, according to the Journalistic Freedoms Observatory.
Ruptly stringer cameraman Saaf Ghali has been killed in Iraq, according to Sputnik and RT Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan.
The operator was killed after filming a demonstration in Iraq related to the ongoing US-Iran tensions, Teller Report stated.
“In Iraq, unknown armed people killed our stringer cameraman Saaf Ghali. Saaf actively filmed materials for our Ruptly video agency in the region. We will do everything to help his family”, Margarita Simonyan wrote on her Telegram channel.
Ghali was said to have filmed around 30 pieces for Ruptly, a video agency that is a project of RT, while also working for a local TV station Al-Dijla.
It was earlier reported by France 24, citing a statement from the Journalistic Freedoms Observatory (JFO), that Ghali was killed late on Friday in the country’s southern city of Basra after filming anti-government protests. He and 37-year-old correspondent Ahmad Abdessamad, who both worked for Al-Dijla, were reportedly shot while sitting in a car near a police station in Basra when they were approached by unidentified men who opened fire on them.
“Armed men attacked them and sprayed them with bullets on Friday night, which killed Abdessamad. His cameraman was taken to the city hospital, where he died”, the JFO said, as quoted by France 24.
France 24 also stated that hundreds of Iraqis took to the streets of Basra on Saturday to mourn Abdessamad and Ghali’s deaths, while carrying their pictures and symbolic coffins.
The protests in Iraq have been going on for several months, with more than 400 people having reportedly been killed since October. The demonstrators are critical of government policies and the lack of jobs, demanding sweeping reforms.
January 11, 2020
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Full Spectrum Dominance | Iraq |
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Iranian forces launched more than a dozen ballistic missiles against two military bases housing US troops in Iraq early hours of Wednesday morning. The al-Asad airbase in western Iraq was hit by 17 missiles, and 5 targeted at a base in the northern Iraqi city of Erbil. No US casualties were immediately reported.
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called the attack a “slap in the face” of the US, and observers seem to question whether the attack was designed to kill or inflict casualties, or was it carefully orchestrated to produce a closure to a situation which could have escalated into a regional or perhaps world war. Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi said he was informed of the attack by Iran ahead of time, which acted as a safety valve after he informed the US commanders.
The Iraqi militias may now begin attacks of revenge for the US assassination of the Iraqi militia commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, who died alongside Soleimani in the drone strike on Friday. Iraqi militia leader Qais al-Khazali said today his group’s retaliation should be “no less than the size of the Iranian response.” Al-Muhandis was the deputy head of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), an Iraqi militia group that is an official component of the Iraqi armed forces. Previously, the US had attacked Iraqi PMF troops in Qaim and killed 24 Iraqi soldiers and wounded dozens more. The Iraqi military, militias, and government have considered the recent US attacks on Iraqi troops and leaders on Iraqi soil as an act of aggression and more than enough reason to request the US military leave Iraq.
U.S. Defence Secretary Mark Esper, said Monday the United States “has made no decision whatsoever to leave Iraq,” seemingly oblivious to the fact the Iraqi parliament voted on Sunday to oust the 5,200 US troops. Esper has repeatedly reaffirmed that the U.S. was not pulling troops out of Iraq.
The US has around 5,000 troops deployed in Iraq, with plans to send in another 3,800 American paratroopers, and an additional 4,000 troops that may be sent. The US forces withdrew from Iraq in 2011, but returned in 2014 at the invitation of the Iraqi government to fight ISIS; however, that fight is over, and Trump angered the Iraqi government when he said the only reason he was leaving troops in Iraq was to watch Iran. There were anti-US sentiments brewing in Iraq since the 2003 invasion, which perceived the US military to be an occupation force, and unwelcomed, but after the Trump statement about his main mission in Iraq, the calls for “Yankee Go Home” grew louder and included groups who had not previously called for the ouster. The US military has admitted they have sidelined work against ISIS to focus on self-protection of troops.
PM Abdul-Mahdi asked parliament on Sunday to take “urgent measures” to ensure the removal of foreign forces from the country, and on Monday, PM Abdul-Mahdi met with US Ambassador Matthew H. Tueller and stressed the need for the two countries “to work together to execute the withdrawal of foreign troops from Iraq,” and added the situation in Iraq was “critical”. American troops in Iraq are in the country based on a request by the then prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, in 2014. The request can be revoked by parliament. The Iraqi parliament resolution passed 173 to zero, although 156 MPs boycotted it, but clearly, it passed by a majority and united some factions previously at odds. Sajad Jiyad, managing director of Bayan Center, an Iraqi think tank said, “Even people nominally pro-U.S., anti-Iran or neutral are not happy with what the US has done, and believe it’s a dangerous escalation,” and added, “The common denominator is this was an infringement on sovereignty.”
On Monday, PM Abdul-Mahdi received a letter from Marine Brig. Gen. William Seely III, commander of ‘Task Force Iraq’, declaring the US intention to withdraw, and with specific details about the exit. The letter was sent twice, and the copy that Abdul-Mahdi has in his possession is signed, and he added, “It’s not like a draft, or a paper that fell out of the photocopier and coincidentally came to us.” Strangely, Trump said he thought the letter was a ‘hoax’, and his officials Esper and Pompeo denied any letter of the kind was signed, or official. Abdul-Mahdi took to the Iraqi TV to broadcast his exasperation with conflicting U.S. signals, and said: “We have no exit but this, otherwise we are speeding toward confrontation.”
The stated long-term goal of Iran’s reprisals is to remove US troops from the region. Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said “This region won’t accept the US presence. Governments elected by nations won’t accept the presence of the US.” Iranian President, Hassan Rouhani, early today warned that the US forces would be removed from the Middle East, saying: “You cut off Soleimani’s hand from his body, your feet will be cut off from the region.”
Poland evacuated its ambassador in Iraq, and the Philippine government has ordered the mandatory evacuation of Filipino workers from Iraq. Germany has announced they will withdraw troops from Iraq, as well as Spain, Croatia, and Romania. France says they are staying. There are about 2,900 European troops in Iraq. Trump has asked NATO to send more troops to Iraq; however, NATO troops are leaving Iraq.
Trump’s 2016 campaign promise was an “America First” policy, and he promised to reduce US involvement in foreign wars. However, his decision to bomb Iraqi militias and assassinate Iran’s commander Soleimani in a drone strike caught Middle Eastern and European allies unaware and confused. Since then, the US has given off conflicting signals on its intentions to exit Iraq even while it deploys more troops immediately for protection.
The US media uses the phrase ‘Shiite militias backed by Iran’ to identify the PMF; however, this is misleading and verges on propaganda. The PMF is an Iraqi militia and part of the Iraqi armed forces. The fact they are mainly comprised of Shiites should not be a surprise, given the fact that Iraq is overwhelmingly populated by Shiites. Iran is a neighboring country and is also mainly Shiite. Iran supports Iraq, their armed forces, and their militias. Iran supports a ‘resistance’ philosophy: that is resistance to the occupation of Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq. Iran is inside Iraq at the official request of the Iraqi government. The fundamental division between the US and Iran is this ‘resistance’ philosophy, which has become ingrained in the mentality of the majority of residents in the Levant, but which the US fails to recognize or understand. Iraq also has Sunni militias, and they are Al Qaeda and ISIS while Iran, Iraq, and Syria are all fighting those terrorists.
January 11, 2020
Posted by aletho |
Illegal Occupation | Iraq, Middle East, PMF, United States |
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TEHRAN (FNA)- The Islamic resistance groups are standing on alert for likely imminent attacks on the US military positions in the region after Thursday attacks on Eastern Syria.
Sources close to the Resistance Front said the resistance groups are preparing for pending response to last night’s attack on Syria and other terrorist actions of the US government.
The local media reported on Thursday night that a strong explosion occurred near Iraq’s border with Syria in the town of al-Qaem. Reports said the blast came after the recent US airstrikes on Syria.
On Wednesday, the IRGC Aerospace Force launched heavy ballistic missile attacks on US Ein Al-Assad airbase in Southwestern Iraq near the border with Syria and a US operated airbase in Erbil in retaliation for the assassination of General Soleimani.
Ein Al-Assad is an airbase with a 4km runway at 188m altitude above sea level, which is the main and the largest US airbase in Iraq. Early reports said the radar systems and missile defense shields in Ein Al-Assad had failed to operate and intercept the Iranian missiles. Unofficial reports said the US army’s central radar systems at Ein Al-Assad had been jammed by electronic warfare.
Some 80 US army personnel were killed and nearly 200 more wounded in Iran’s Wednesday missile attacks, informed sources said.
The second IRGC reprisal attack targeted a US military base near Erbil airport in Iraqi Kurdistan Region in the second leg of “Martyr Soleimani” reprisal operation.
All flights were cancelled at Erbil airport.
Iraq said the attacks had not taken any toll from its army men stationed at these two bases. The US army had blocked entrance into Ein Al-Assad to everyone, including the Iraqi army.
IRGC officials said none of the missiles had been intercepted.
Following the attack, the IRGC issued a statement immediately after the attacks, declaring that it had fired tens of ground-to-ground missiles at “the airbase occupied by the terrorist and aggressive army of the United States known as Ein Al-Assad” in reprisal for the martyrdom of IRGC Qods Force Commander Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani.
The IRGC warned the US to avoid retaliating the Wednesday attack or else “it will face a more painful and crushing response”.
The IRGC Statement also warned “all the US allied states where the terrorist army has a base, any territory that becomes the origin of any hostile and aggressive action against the Islamic Republic of Iran in any way will be targeted”.
“We believe that the Zionist regime by no means stands aside from the criminal US regime in these crimes.”
The IRGC also called on the American nation to pressure the White House to pull their troops out of the region to avoid further damage and not allow the US rulers to endanger the lives of their military men through increasing hatred.
All Iranian underground missile towns were on alert.
The missile attack came hours before the body of General Soleimani was laid to rest.
January 10, 2020
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Illegal Occupation | Iraq, Syria, United States |
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Caretaker Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi has asked the United States to send a delegation to Iraq to begin preparing for a troop pullout, his office said on Friday.
In a phone call late on Thursday with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Abdul-Mahdi “requested that delegates be sent to Iraq to set the mechanisms to implement parliament’s decision for the secure withdrawal of [foreign] forces from Iraq,” AFP reports.
Some 5,200 US soldiers are stationed at bases across Iraq to support local troops preventing a resurgence of Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS). They make up the bulk of a broader US-led coalition, invited by the Iraqi government in 2014 to help combat the jihadists.
The deployment was based on an executive-to-executive agreement that was never ratified by Iraq’s parliament. On Sunday, the parliament voted in favor of rescinding the invitation and ousting all foreign troops.
January 10, 2020
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Illegal Occupation | Iraq, Middle East, United States |
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Baghdad has reached out to Moscow again after it suffered American bombings on its soil, a high-ranked lawmaker revealed, saying the resumed deal focuses on the time-tested S-300 air defense systems.
The US attacks on Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), known in Arabic as Hashd al-Shaabi, prompted the Iraqi government “to resume negotiations regarding the S-300 deal,” Mohammad Ridha, chairman of Iraqi parliament’s Security and Defense Committee, told Sputnik on Thursday.
The US military have launched the air strikes against the PMU units in late December, blaming them for an attack that killed an American civilian contractor. The Shia militia force, backed by Iran, later said it lost 25 fighters.
It started a vicious chain of events, beginning with fiery anti-American demonstrations near the US Embassy in Baghdad. Though no one from the US diplomatic staff was hurt, the Pentagon responded with brute force, killing a top Iranian general, who they said masterminded the unrest, and ratcheting up tensions around Iran.
Now, Ridha said he’s unaware of the stage the talks are currently in, but mentioned the deal was greenlighted by Iraqi leadership. In his view, the prospective purchase won’t sit well with the Americans: “We await US opposition on this issue.”
Washington has piled enormous pressure on nations that have bought Russian-made air defense systems, or considering buying them. Turkey has been targeted with an array of US penalties for procuring the S-400, while India, another prospective operator of the system, faces similar ramifications.
January 9, 2020
Posted by aletho |
War Crimes | Iraq, Russia, United States |
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IRGC Aerospace Force Commander Brig. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh Thursday briefed the media outlets on the Iranian missile strike on US military base in Iraq, stressing that it managed to undermine US awe.
General Hajizadeh stressed that since WWII there has not been any attack on a US target that keeps unanswered, adding that Iran managed to eradicate this horror formula.
General Hajizadeh pointed out that the Iranian forces fired 13 missiles at Ain Al-Asad base and had been able to fire hundreds of others had the US forces responded.
The Iranian missiles hit the command chamber and positions used to prepare the combat helicopters at the US base, according to General Hajizadeh, who added that Iran decided to strike the US base in Iraq that is the largest and the farthest from the Iranian border.
“Unlike the Americans, we are not criminals; we could have struck the dormitory areas of the US troops at Ain Al-Asad base and killed 500 of them had we decided that.”
General Hajizadeh stressed that the missile strike left US human losses, adding that nine jets moved the injured US soldiers to the Zionist entity.
General Hajizadeh emphasized that the US existence in the region is in danger, calling on Washington to learn from what happened and start a voluntarily withdrawal.
General Hajizadeh addressed the Gulf countries, reiterating that the US forces may never protect them.
“The Iranian forces planned to strike the US bases in the Gulf countries.”
General Hajizadeh stressed that the assassination of General Suleimani will cause a tsunami that will expel the US forces from the region.
On January 3, a US drone attack targeted a vehicular convoy for the head of the IRGC Al-Quds Force General Qassem Suleimani and the deputy chief of Hasd Shaabi Committee Abu Mahdi Al-Muhandis, claiming both of them in addition to a number of their companions.
On January 8, the Iranian rocketry forces responded by firing 13 ballistic missiles at the US military base of Ain Al-Asad in Iraq’s Anbar, causing heavy losses upon it.
January 9, 2020
Posted by aletho |
Illegal Occupation | Iran, Iraq, Israel, Middle East, United States |
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Iraqi Foreign Minister Mohammad Ali al-Hakim has stressed the need for US and other foreign troops to leave Iraq as a backlash grows over the recent American assassination of a top Iranian general in Baghdad.
The top Iraqi diplomat made the appeal during a joint press briefing with his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu in Baghdad on Thursday.
Hakim and Cavusoglu strongly condemned the US assassination of Iran’s Lt. Gen. Qassem Soleimani and senior Iraqi commander of the Popular Mobilization Units Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, both key figures in the fight against Daesh and other Takfiri terrorists in the Middle East.
“Iraq insists on maintaining its sovereignty and territorial integrity and the complete withdrawal of foreign forces,” the top Iraqi diplomat said.
He added that talks with his Turkish counterpart focused on the need to respect Iraq’s sovereignty from all sides.
“Iraq condemns the attacks on Iraqi land, which harms the sovereignty of our country as well the security of Iraqi people. They are against the international law,” the Iraqi minister said.
Hakim added, “”We have discussed with the minister that Iraq wants all foreign forces are removed out of the country through dialogue. We also discussed with the minister on cooperation areas. We have agreed to alleviate the Iran-US tension in the region.”
The two sides also discussed bilateral relations at all levels, including cooperation on fighting terrorism, al-Hakim said.
The top Iraqi diplomat said any escalation of tensions in the region could result in the re-emergence of Takiri terrorist groups.
The Turkish foreign minister, for his part, said Ankara does not want Iraq to become a battleground for foreign forces.
Cavusoglu added that Iraq was not alone and Turkey was there to overcome difficult days together.
Turkish foreign minister also spoke with his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif Wednesday after Tehran fired dozens of missiles at two military bases hosting US troops in Iraq. The missiles were fired at the Ain al-Asad base in Anbar province and another base in Erbil.
PMU leader denies role in rocket attacks
In another development, Qais al-Khazali, the leader of Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq movement, a subdivision of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units, known by its Arabic name as Hashd al-Sha’abi, denied any involvement in the recent firing of rockets at Baghdad’s Green Zone where the US embassy is located.
Two Katyusha rockets struck Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone on Wednesday, landing near the US embassy but causing no casualties, according to the Iraqi military.
Al-Khazali also said it was time for an Iraqi response to the recent US assassination, adding the reaction will be “no less in size” than Tehran’s missile strikes on two American bases in Iraq.
On Sunday, Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi called the US airstrike “a political assassination”. He also underlined the need for a timetable to withdraw all foreign troops “for the sake of our national sovereignty.”
January 9, 2020
Posted by aletho |
Illegal Occupation | Iraq, Middle East, Turkey, United States |
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Just like that, it was over. General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff called it ‘a kerfuffle’. A letter was sent to their Iraqi peers that the U.S was repositioning troops out of Iraq in accordance with legislation from Iraq ending the U.S military presence in the war-torn country, and suddenly then it was retracted by higher-ups. Running interference, Mark Esper backed Milley and said it was ‘an honest mistake’. It all went down within a day of the irrational assassination of Iran’s Soleimani.
The immediate termination of Chewning and Sweeney, at the same time as the assassination of Soleimani and Iran’s response raises some big questions. In the near future it will be of critical importance to get to the bottom of any possible relationship that Esper and his subordinates Chewning and Sweeney – who both served as Defense Secretary Esper’s Chiefs of Staff – had to the assassination of Soleimani. The assassination and any number of possible Iranian responses, can push the U.S into a broad and open military conflict with Iran. Such a war would also be Trump’s undoing.
We might otherwise be led to believe that Chewning and Sweeney’s sudden departure has something to do with Ukraine and the recent release of unredacted emails relating to L3Harris Technologies and funding in Ukraine. These of course also relate to the case against Trump and any possible impeachment. But the timing and symbolism of these as concurrent with the provocation against Iran and the blowback, as well as Esper’s backing of the ‘Kerfuffle theory’, lends strong credence to an Iran connection.
The connection to impeachment cannot be denied, but the necessity of uncovering its potential relation to Iran is tremendously important because it directly relates to larger constitutional and practical questions of the president’s ability to have a Department of Defense that works either for or against U.S strategy as formulated and executed by its democratically elected leadership, as opposed to its permanent bureaucratic administration. This is what Trump and his supporters quite rightfully refer to as the ‘Deep State’.
Were elements in the defense department working towards a heightened brinksmanship that the president did not really want? It would be far from the first time in history that such was the case.
Because the proverbial excrement rolls down-hill, was Esper involved in ordering Soleimani’s assassination which Trump was not informed of until it was too late, or until after? Chewning and Sweeney’s fate may be understood here. The ‘kerfuffle’ which was the withdrawal statement would then be a simple ruse to distract from the actual reasons that Chewning and Sweeney were terminated – acting without orders, insubordination, and even treason.
Trump’s Balancing Policy on Iran and America’s leadership crisis
One undeniable point is that a war with Iran works entirely against Trump’s middle-east policy and his prospects for re-election.
What the Trump administration seeks most now is a de-escalation with Iran. Given that Trump has fueled a rumor mill including the possible ending of sanctions if Iran doesn’t respond, or that there will be no further attacks if Iran’s response is ‘reasonable’, all exists in the unspoken framework that Trump inherently recognizes the ‘guilt’ of the U.S in its irrational act, while it is nevertheless politically impossible to frame it overtly as such.
Impeachment against Trump has now been used several times to push him to act aggressively in the middle-east, contrary to his policy and self-interest. On all the ‘impeachment threat – then strike’ occasions, Trump ordered strikes on predictable targets – targets so predictable and oddly executed, that Syrian and Iranian forces barely felt them. There appears to be at the very least an ‘unspoken communication’ at play, where strikes are made to assuage political needs but not to inflict serious damage. If Trump really wanted an excuse to strike Iran, he’s had it before.
There was precisely such an opportunity when subversives in government hatched a plan to push Trump into a war with Iran, when two planes were sent to violate Iranian airspace – one manned, the other unmanned – flying in close proximity. This created the chance that Iran’s downing of either plane could be used as a pretext for a major war-creating strike on Iran.
Despite Trump’s acting reasonably, government actors and media attempted to create a sensation where Trump was ridiculed for ‘calling off’ a planned retaliation in the aftermath of the downed drone. The same liberal media and Democratic Party establishment that attacked Trump’s de-escalation then from a hawkish perspective, today manifest as doves who suddenly oppose Trump’s reckless hawkishness.
Here, in the aftermath of the drone incident, a Trump policy was formulated – and it’s a policy that figures prominently in de-escalation in the aftermath of the assassination of Soleimani and Iran’s measured response.
The policy is this – if Iran kills Americans, then the U.S escalates. If the U.S does something provocative, then Iran is actually allowed to respond militarily, so long as American personnel are not killed.
Iran’s striking of the al-Asad airbase was predictable. That Trump has decided to officially declare that there were no U.S casualties has indicated his real stance. In all reality, the predictability of the target was such that American soldiers would have been repositioned out of that base, so that Iran could assuage its own popular-democratic needs in terms of legitimacy, without forcing the U.S. to respond again further.
Between an AIPAC rock and an Anti-War Hard-spot
A war with Iran would push the anti-war sentiments of independent voters away from Trump, and towards a more revitalized and mobilized Democrat Party anti-war base. Trump needs an anti-war base to be re-elected, and war with Iran pushes that base towards nearly any Democrat candidate.
At the same time, Trump also needs the continued support from America’s Christian Zionist evangelical ‘Israel Firsters’, as well as the infamous AIPAC, not only to be re-elected, but to maintain the support in the senate against impeachment.
That conflict between Trump’s two greatest populist strengths – between Trump’s anti-war base and his Christian Zionist base – largely defines his weakest political spot. That’s why it’s the best place to attack him.
Trump for his part, has a frenemy relationship with AIPAC, and has worked hard to build his profile with Christian Zionist voters even to the extent that this might limit AIPAC’s influence on them. He has purchased a lot of AIPAC support along the way by tearing up the JCPOA and recognizing the Golan Heights and Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. This is capital he will have to spend to maintain support in the Senate.
All together this means that while Trump may or may not have personally sought the assassination of Soleimani, he must take credit for it for any number of reasons. In brief, these relate again to the Zionist base and AIPAC, as well as needing to appear in control of the very country that he is nominally the president of. When Trump refused to go to war over the downing of the un-manned drone, the liberal media monopoly accused him of being soft on Iran and indecisive.
Israel for its part is not tremendously happy with either of the two competing U.S policies. They have been pushing a ‘bomb Iran’ line for years, so that Israel’s conquest of Iraq may come to be. They are also not happy that the U.S presence in the region will come to an end. Trump may or may not have green-lit Soleimani’s assassination, but in either event its result will be the purchase of political capital that he can use towards ending the anti-ISIS campaign in Iraq. The reality is that the U.S is being pushed out either way. Soleimani’s assassination has only strengthened that resolve.
Simultaneously, the anti-war sentiment in the U.S. is one that both led to Trump’s election and can lead to Trump’s undoing. Americans love sabre rattling and posturing. They also hate war.
To wit, in the immediate aftermath of the Soleimani assassination, the well-known American communist group – the PSL – and its anti-war front organization ‘ANSWER’ have already received incredible donations from deep-pocketed Democrat Party sponsors at the local party level, to stage the first significant anti-war demonstration since the Bush presidency. While PSL/ANSWER members and activists have been laudable in their consistent opposition to all American wars for capital and empire, they only seem to magically receive the funds for permits, advertising, organizing, and staging anti-war marches when a Republican is president. The secondary slogan of these mobilizations was ‘Dump Trump’. ‘Dump Obama’ was never a slogan seen at the non-existent mass mobilizations against the Libyan, Ukrainian, and Syrian wars. Trump’s refusal to take the Democrat-laid war bait, means he can pull off an end-run around the Democrat and deep-state plot.
Democrats also don’t want war with Iran, they only want that Trump loses the anti-war vote. They can force him into these compromised positions by coordinating with the ‘permanent administrative military-intelligence bureaucracy’, by coordinating with AIPAC. The Democrat’s plan is therefore pretty simple: use impeachment to force him to strike at Iran (or get Trump to take credit for a strike that the deep-state pulled off), and then use that entanglement to tank his re-election prospects. Then Democrats ride in on an anti-war ticket, restart JCPOA, and move towards integrating Iranian elites into the EU economy. Israel could ultimately guarantee its piece of Iraq and its Greek pipeline deal in due course, with a reformed and EU friendly Iran, ready to make major compromises with Israel. Maybe this is what Biden means by ‘restorationist’ – restoring the traditional left/right political divide which has empowered the Atlanticist status quo.
A Backroom deal? Iran’s Measured Response and Trump’s face-saving
The successful attack on the US’s al-Asad airbase in Iraq was characterized by Iran’s Supreme Leader Khamenei has characterized as a ‘slap’.
Interestingly, Khamenei’s language used is strategic, and uses a sleight of hand to take the steam from possible opponents. It is clear that Khamenei has said today that while the attack on the airbase is just a slap, and that Iran’s full response will come in the future, he has in fact set up that the solution will be political and diplomatic. He did so in a creative way which appeals to hardliners, saying that any solution could not simply be political and diplomatic, but rather more than this. This sort of double-speak does not reflect any moral lapsus, but is necessary for Iran’s greater geopolitical aims and serves the greater good.
De-escalation requires that both parties save face, and can come away with tangible minor victories and agree that the real underlying dispute is resolved in the future.
This reluctance to engage militarily is beyond the mere politics of justifying American casualties, but points to broader considerations of U.S power projection in the region in the aftermath of the failure of the Obama administration policy of overthrowing the government of Syria.
To understand the events at play requires a multi-dimensional and realist understanding of motivations and relationships, and how relationships work at the level of statecraft. And so in a way that would be popularly understood – as in Game of Thrones – just because you’re invited to the banquet or receive a high-honored appointment, doesn’t mean that are you indispensable or even a friend. Trump’s ‘GoT’ relationship with Israel and even his own cabinet, needless to say any number of Pentagon bosses, is precisely this. Bolton and Pompeo are such frenemies, as have been any number of ‘here today, gone tomorrow’ members of the Trump administration, more or less foisted and forced upon the chief executive by Trump’s opponents in the permanent administration and his partisan opposition, and within the Republican Party itself.
Did Trump make a backroom deal with Iran? Probably not – there was a high public dimension to Trump’s offers, and a recent history where an unspoken language was developed. Iran has demonstrated a high level of intelligence, restraint, intuition, and strategic thinking in its several thousand year-old civilization. There is no reason to think that they wouldn’t have understood and inferred everything explained in this article, and much more, without needing a direct conversation with Trump which no doubt would have led to yet another impeachment fandango.
January 9, 2020
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | Donald Trump, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Middle East, United States, Zionism |
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By Paul Antonopoulos | January 9, 2020
When U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani, he certainly had not expected that Iran would respond in the way it did by bombarding two U.S. military bases in Iraqi territory. It is likely that his advisers had convinced him that no country in the world had the courage to attack the U.S. so blatantly as no one else had since the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor during World War II. The Iranians did of course, as was expected by those who understand the ideology of the Islamic Republic that has a deeply ingrained martyrdom complex that stretches back to 680AD when Imam Ali Ibn al-Husayn was killed in Karbala, Iraq.
Trump has claimed that there were no American casualties while Iran has claimed there were at least 80. With the Erbil and Ain al-Assad bases bombarded and several U.S. aircraft, drones and helicopters destroyed, it is unlikely that there were no U.S. casualties – however there is no way in knowing at this time whether there were 80. We can expect Washington to keep the true number of casualties a secret, in complete opposition to Iran who openly celebrate their martyrs.
The Ain al-Assad military base is the largest and most equipped U.S. base in the region, and one of a few U.S. special bases around the world, at the size of about half of Lebanon. The fact that the Americans have deployed their most sophisticated radar systems in Iraq, many of which have been destroyed, demonstrates the ineffectiveness of the Patriot missile defense system. This was despite U.S. forces in the region being put on high alert. This will only be in Russia’s favor as it continues to offer the S-400 system to potential buyers.
Not only did the attack on the Ain al-Assad military base expose the ineffectiveness of the Patriot system, Iran also targeted the Erbil base in Iraqi Kurdistan. This base was a center to try and encourage the Iraqi Kurds to rebel against the central government in order to put pressure on the central Iraqi government. The attack on the Erbil base was a warning that even a U.S. withdrawal into Kurdistan does not make them safe.
It was expected by most commentators that Iran’s retaliation for the martyrdom of Soleimani would be in the form of utilizing its regional paramilitary allies on U.S. positions. By directly attacking U.S. forces brazenly and openly, Tehran has demonstrated that the U.S. are not safe in any part of the region. However, Iran had no choice but to retaliate as not doing so would demonstrate the country’s leadership only had empty rhetoric in defending itself. The U.S. would certainly be more inclined to carry out further attacks against Iran and its allies if Tehran did not respond.
If there is a war going on in Iraq between the U.S. and Iran, it probably will not be limited to one country and will engulf the whole region, and potentially, across the world. Washington cannot be counted on to abide by international laws and regulations. The countries in the region, particularly the Gulf States, should also bear in mind that the presence of U.S. bases on their land will not only fail to provide security, but will also endanger their national security as all states who assist the U.S. in any aggression against Iran will become legitimate targets, as Tehran has already warned.
Rather, the murder of Soleimani has only united Iranians, including those who have been protesting across the country since November, blaming the government for the increased fuel prices and difficult economic situation, ignoring the crippling U.S. enforced sanctions. The major demands of the Iranian people are now for the expulsion of the U.S. military from the region, something that the Islamic Republic’s leadership has loudly and clearly demanded as well.
Since Iran has made its first response to the U.S. so directly, Trump for now is refusing to respond militarily and will impose greater sanctions against Iran. However, Iran has already made the demand that the U.S. withdraw from the region. To achieve this without directly provoking Trump again, Iran is likely to employ the militias it backs in Syria and Iraq to target U.S. military installations. With any Israeli involvement in this war effort, Iran can use Hezbollah and various Palestinian militias to pressure the Jewish state internally and externally.
Therefore, since Iran has already promised to expel the U.S. from the region, the next phase of the anti-U.S. war effort will be asymmetrical warfare by Iran. If Iran engages in asymmetrical warfare, the return of dead and wounded American soldiers will severely hamper Trump’s re-election campaign this year as he originally ran on the ticket of criticizing wars in West Asia when he was competing for the presidency against Hillary Clinton years earlier. The Iranian leadership are now in control of the future of the West Asia and have demonstrated they are willing to retaliate against the U.S. who is seeking to maintain the unipolar hegemonic world order that emerged with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Iran has once again shown that the 21st century is not one of unipolarity that Washington hopes to maintain, but rather multipolar with several strong middle and Great Powers.
Paul Antonopoulos is a Research Fellow at the Center for Syncretic Studies.
January 9, 2020
Posted by aletho |
Militarism | Iran, Iraq, United States |
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The inside account of how the now infamous “phony” letter announcing complete US troop withdrawal from Iraq after seventeen years details astoundingly how the “posting of the letter online unleashed a mad, behind-the-scenes scramble at the Pentagon, the White House, and on Capitol Hill, as elected officials, policymakers, military advisers and journalists sought to understand whether the letter intended to communicate what its plain language suggested.”
As different departments and levels within the Pentagon bureaucracy attempted to account for it, the story changed multiple times. In a matter of a couple hours it went from “authentic” to “phony” to part of an effort to sow “active disinformation” — and finally according to a confused press briefing by Gen. Milley and Defense Secretary Mark Esper an “unauthorized draft” and “an honest mistake”.
This after The Washington Post and a host of other major outlets “confirmed” it as “authentic” — in the words of WaPo’s Beirut Bureau chief Liz Sly.
At Monday’s Pentagon briefing itself which attempted to assess the origins of the mysterious draft letter, The Dispatch summarized the atmosphere: “Was the United States really moving to remove its remaining troops from Iraq? Nobody seemed to know.”
And ultimately no definitive answers came, other than the Pentagon and administration denying than an Iraq pullout is happening, as to just how a “draft letter” which had been making the rounds at CENTCOM came to be in the hands of the Iraqis, after which it was posted online.
As The Dispatch notes, the letter wasn’t merely announced by some Iraqi politician in Baghdad, but was released via America’s enemies:
The news was a propaganda coup for the Iranians and those in Iraq who support them. The story broke on the television channel of an Iran-backed Iraqi militia, Asaib Ahl al-Haq (AAH), after it was leaked by the Iraqi prime minister’s office, according to Liz Sly, Beirut bureau chief for the Washington Post, who noted that the leader of AAH is a U.S.-designated terrorist and his militia is responsible for the deaths of dozens of Americans.
The letter soon made its way into the American media.
Initially, there was this statement out of the Pentagon policy office in conjunction with Operation Inherent Resolve: “OIR has confirmed with us at the working level that this is active disinformation.” The Pentagon was “fairly certain that this is a fake” according to that early media statement.
But then this later at the Pentagon press briefing:
They didn’t declare the letter a fake but they couldn’t offer much of an explanation of its provenance or meaning, either. Esper pleaded ignorance. “I don’t know what that letter is,” he said. “We’re trying to find out where that’s coming from, what that is. But there has been no decision made to leave Iraq, period.” He declined to confirm its authenticity. “No, I can’t.”
Gen. Milley couldn’t verify that the letter was real, either. “I do know that it’s not signed,” he said. “But I just looked at it right there; it’s not signed.”
So even the attempts to account for what may or may not be a “draft” letter which originated within the Pentagon itself and then leaked to the Iraqis remain contradictory.
The final word from the Defense Department seems to be a shoulder shrug and that it was “an honest mistake”.
What remains is that the whole embarrassing and bizarre episode does indeed appear a “propaganda coup for the Iranians and those in Iraq who support them.”
January 8, 2020
Posted by aletho |
Illegal Occupation | Iraq, United States |
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The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation has offered Iraq Tuesday the option to purchase the world’s most advanced missile defense system to protect its airspace, reported RIA Novosti.
According to the report, the Iraqi Armed Forces could purchase the Russian S-400 Triumf air defense system, which RIA points out, can “ensure the country’s sovereignty and reliable airspace protection.”
“Iraq is a partner of Russia in the field of military-technical cooperation, and the Russian Federation can supply the necessary funds to ensure the sovereignty of the country and reliable protection of airspace, including the supply of S-400 missiles and other components of the air defense system, such as Buk-M3, Tor -M2 “and so on,” said Igor Korotchenko, Russian Defense Ministry’s Public Council member.
For the last several months, Iraq has considered purchasing Russian air defense and missile systems, including the S-400, however, it has been met with fierce pressure from the US.
But with a political crisis between the US and Iraq underway, thanks partly to the US assassination of Iran’s Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, Russia could profit as Iraq attempts to decouple from the US.
A recent U.S. intelligence assessment indicated that at least 13 countries had expressed interest in purchasing the S-400s.
Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Algeria, Morocco, Egypt, Vietnam, and Iraq have all be in discussions with Russia to purchase the missile defense system in the last several quarters.
Meanwhile, China, India, and Turkey have already signed agreements with Russia.
The S-400s can strike stealth bombers, aircraft, cruise missiles, precision-guided projectiles, and ballistic missiles, some military experts have even said the Russian missile defense system is far superior than the US’ MIM-104 Patriot.
January 8, 2020
Posted by aletho |
Aletho News | Iraq, Russia, United States |
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Aletho News 