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That is the prevailing argument among all those against the Iran deal that miraculously was agreed upon by the Iranian people and was accepted by American leadership.
Why are we removing sanctions to a Super-Bad country that doesn’t trust us? After all, everyone trusts America; We are a righteous country.
That is why our CIA along with the Brits overthrew Iran’s popularly elected president, Mossadegh in 1953. It would be like China sending a commando team into the White House and killing Hillary Clinton in 2016 and installing S. B. Woo. (Finally, a Delawarean become president.) We did it to Iran because we are a righteous country.
We then went on to support the violently repressive regime of the Pahlavi dynasty. Would be the equivalent of China imposing Idi Amin on us. We did it to Iran because we consider ourselves a righteous country.
After the Iranian revolution, the US supported the Iraqi regime of Sadaam Hussein in a disastrous war against Iran, going so far as to knowingly provide targeting information for the use of illegal chemical weapons by Iraq. That would be like China giving Mexico and Canada targeting information to bomb our major cities along our borders with anthrax. Of course we did it lovingly to them because as you know by now, we are a righteous country.
We also entered into a shooting war with the Iranian navy during the time leading up to the Gulf War. AND then we cheered (there is video) when we shot down a passenger airliner carrying 290 passengers, dropping all of them into the Persian Gulf? Of course. We did it out of love; you know it; because we are a righteous country.
Today our closest ally in the region is led by a right-wing neo-con (Benjamin Netanyahu) who keeps saying he sees no option but to bomb Iran…. he is our closet ally because we love him; we are a righteous country.
Israel has a couple of hundred nukes and has started several “preventive/pre-emptive wars” with first strikes against its neighbors in 1957, 1967 and 1982, not to mention targeted strikes on nuclear facilities in Iraq and Syria. We hold them as our closest ally because we love them; we are a righteous country….
Here at home, our right-wing is festooned with senior leaders who have both joked and threatened in all seriousness to bomb Iran. Again, in all seriousness, …we only threaten because we are a righteous country……
We also managed to prosecute a disastrous war with Iran’s neighbor to the west (Iraq) which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. Our stated goal: regime change.. We were justified of course; we are a righteous countryand right makes might.
America is so good, one simply has to be the opposite, super-bad, to disagree with us.. If you don’t do what we say, you ARE the axis of evil. After all, America is a righteous country… There is no possible reason any nation could ever have to mistrust us…..
Yet despite this gigantic behemoth of mistrust existing between our two countries, the Obama administration was still able to hammer out a deal beneficial for both parties… That is far more of a miracle than the fact that some people out of an ancient Illuminati oath made with Netanyahu, are bent to undo it….
Truth is: we don’t need Israel; they’re nothing but trouble. Always have been; always will be. Longterm peace in the Middle East solely depends on a moderate and engaging Iran!
In World War II there was a contingent primarily in Patton’s Third Army that wanted to turn on the Russians and fight them immediately after the surrender of the Nazis because they were terrible people and could not be trusted…
Likewise all during the cold war there were elements in the Pentagon in control of our nuclear weapons who insisted, that we must strike the USSR first without any provocation. We had to wipe them out or they would do it to us because they were terrible people and could not be trusted…
Then, when the first George Bush stopped at the border of Kuwait and did not invade Iraq to capture Baghdad, the gunslingers were all calling it a grave mistake, stupid to the core, because we had them beat and should have captured their country. They called it treason, and demanded we nuke Baghdad. The Iraqis were terrible people and could not be trusted.
And when news leaked out about Iran’s centrifuges, the US and Israel immediately called for the nuking of that alleged bomb making site…. and Cheney sent 2 nuclear carrying carriers into the Gulf of Sidra creating enough of a crises one General said he would REFUSE to follow Cheney’s order to nuke Iran. Remember that?
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And if we had followed those tacks.
We would fought the Russians for years and they would win… Just like they won against Hitler by absorbing the army deep into it’s interior, cutting it off and killing it. Then pushing back to take all of Europe. There would be no US to stop them. We would have to re-supply across an Ocean, they could simply use rail… They would wind up with the German’s rocket technology; not us.
It called for turning on our friend after we had killed off our common enemy… Like who does that? (Outside of corporate?)
And if we’d unleashed a massive surprise attack, we would have missed significant silos; we know this from their post-collapse intelligence… They would have wiped out metropolitan America… So we would have engaged nuclear Armageddon without provocation. No winners. All losers. And for a false cause.
And had we gone all the way into Iraq in the First War, violating our own agreement with all our allies saying we’d stop at the border, well, we saw how long the occupation of the 2nd Iraq War lasted. And that was a war we launched planned down to the tiniest detail; not by going in on the spur of the moment by the wing of our pants… Right now, all that blood; all that sacrifice of the 2nd Iraq War which we now know from people who’ve since left office, was just for oil. And we still can’t get our hands on it… (They sell to China).
And had we nuked the deserts of Iran…. we be living insided because of the strontium 90 embedded in our outdoors around the entire world… And the radical Islamic dictator would have been overwhelmingly re-elected and would be fighting us now. Plus the entire world (sans Israel and the US) would smuggle nuclear fissionable material into Iran or just sell them a bomb to provided parity and balance because that is the only way the US can be held in check….
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All of these fears had no truth of facts behind them. The wisdom of not following through with what looked like good common sense, can be seen today by stepping out your front door and looking around… No Strontium 90. No collapsed economies from 60 continuous years of Soviet war. No more Soviet Union, which eventually collapsed because we befriended them and without our threat to coalesce around, they had no further use and disappeared.
We were wise to back down from war….
Children are alive today who would not be here if we’d attacked Russia. Our economy would not be the number one in the world if we’d lost New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston, Boston, Philadelphia, Miami, New Orleans, St. Louis, Seattle, and Newark, New Jersey. We still have democracy which probably wouldn’t have lasted during a 60 year atomic war…
So, dealing with ones enemies is a good thing….
Which is why, we must give the Iran Deal a shot… Everyone knows that when you negotiate for a deal, you don’t send in your clowns. You weigh your best options. The deal is a step just as was Reykjavik… Remember all the gigantic hate the press heaped on Ronald Reagan, for … “negotiating with the Soviets” because they were terrible people and couldn’t be trusted?
Those same people hold Reagan now up to hero status…
In business one always deals with one’s enemies. That is because there is money involved and against money in business, nothing trumps.. Hatred? One can put up with it if making money. Mistrust? One can put up with it if making money. Fear? One can put up with it if making money.
Politics and treaties work the same way… We recognize we are different. We realize that both of us benefit if the deal goes through; and both of us lose if the deal does not…
The naysayers like Chris Coons, are stuck on the silly notion that we can’t be seen to give up more they they do… We have to be the winners and give up absolutely nothing; they have to be the losers and give up all.
That arrangement does not work in marriage. That does not work in raising kids. That does not work in running a business. And that does not work anywhere outside of fictional TV drama, where unfortunately our junior Senator from Delaware and those other Democrats in the thrall of AIPAC, heads all seems to be stuck.
We survived vis a vis against the Soviet Union. We survived vis a vis against Communist China. We can survive vis a vis the really wonderful people of Iran… Do you not even know how marvelous those very civilized people are? Oh. you watch Fox News…. you big fool.
Corporate interests have been attacking education since Bush 2000 said, “No Child Left Behind”… it was a way to get money from public schools into private pockets…
When you hear some stupid fool talk against tenure…. it’s the corporate war on education.
When you hear someone praise Common Core….. it’s the corporate war on education.
When you hear someone praising any Charter School…. it’s the corporate war on education.
When you hear someone praising Shanghai or Korean schools…. It’s the corporate war on education.
When you hear anyone lie that Common Core is not a Federal program,… It’s the corporate war on education.
When you hear that the Smarter Balanced Assessment will fail 70% of Delaware’s children… It’s the corporate war on education.
When you hear that a local school board must do merit pay on teachers… it’s the corporate war on education.
When you hear teachers get paid too much… it’s the corporate war on education.
When you hear that teachers have too much time off… it’s the corporate war on education……
When you hear inner city schools are failing… it’s the corporate war on education.
When you hear that charters don’t have to be accountable the same way public schools do… it’s the corporate war on education.
When you hear that poverty has nothing to do with low scores; it’s due to bad teaching… it’s the corporate war on education….
When you hear that Arne Duncun is coming to Delaware… it’s the corporate war on education…
When you hear a megalithic charter school is moving into the Bank of America building … it’s the corporate war on education….
When you hear that waivers should be given to failing charter schools, but public schools should be closed if they fail… it’s the corporate war on education….
When you hear that students with disabilities, will now be mainstreamed and put in regular classes,… it’s the corporate war on education….
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You get the idea… It boils down to one thing. If one is concerned about money… they are taking the side of the corporate war on education…
On the other hand, if anyone is primarily concerned about how new policies and old policies affected the children… they are those playing defense for the children in this corporate war on education….
That includes all teachers. Parents. Students (themselves of course), and most district school board members who are accountable not to the Governor or his swaggering Department of Educational Secretary,… but to real people, who work for a living, pay taxes to schools every year, and who have to come home and get their child ready for school the next day….
These people have a different plan. One that worked once before. One that has much more hope and promise than anything we have gotten from those other people do never did like children, but know a business opportunity when they see one…
To fix education and make our students the most qualified in the world…. we need to do 5 things….
- Mandate an 11:1 student/teacher ratio in all schools with more than a 50% level of reduced lunch, for all grades k-5 and across the 9th grade as well….
- Tax the top one percent to pay for any extra expense entailed.
- Remove the high stakes apart from testing. Use testing as a tool to see what a student has missed solely in order to fill the void that students has. Technology can do that. But real information is being covered up by teachers teaching to the test. Students are learning the test, not how to apply what they know to real world situations. Changing that will only happen if we stop firing teachers and closing schools based solely on poverty’s influence upon test scores….
- Fund all Charter Schools by a line item in the state budget. The property tax funding is meant and must go to fund public schools. Not some privateer’s investment portfolio. If a state wants to experiment in education, it must do so out of its General Fund.
- Let teachers teach. Stop telling effective teachers with over 25 years of classroom experience that you know how education works, and they don’t……
Oh sure, now that they are under attack, they want the US back in. But no, while we were there, they did nothing to let us know who was friend or foe… The US can’t help everyone. We should help those who help us; and draw the line against those who cheered when we lost men.
We did our best. We tried to fix your nation. But you, created havoc. You knowingly hid insurgents after they attacked us. You sheltered and condoned their actions.
So suffer bitches…
Oh, we know they are bad guys. That is why we tried to bolster your army and it was, it was trained by the best military in the world.. And what did you do? You sneaked terrorists in in uniform, to blow us up. You knew who they were… You aided and abetted them.
Wars cost money, and in case you haven’t been reading the papers, money is something we don’t have. If we spend it, it needs to be on those who by their actions are worth it…
You made your bed. Now lie in it.. You don’t need or deserve help from us.. Maybe after you see what it is like to have your sons and daughters killed, for nothing, you will have a better understanding of what we and one trillion dollars tried to do…
You could have been so great. But you wouldn’t tell us who was friend and who was foe…
Enjoy your fate. Enjoy your slogans. A lot of good they will do you when you’re dead.
The plural of Vanilla Ice would be pronounced ….. Vanilla Ice’s (or ISIS)…
They ran out of Vanilla in the Syrian desert….
Tough group, aren’t they? If they walked down my street like this, I too would hide….
Throw this in Cheney’s face next time he or anyone associated with the word neocons opens their mouth….
Beside Biden’s this is one of the best predictions ever made of the Mid East……
Although it is too complex to delineate here, after crunching numbers and possibilities there is dominant weight towards the idea that more Russian intrusions are planned for Ukraine…
In the terms of pure power, a language Russia understands, sanctions will not do the trick…Sanctions didn’t work on Saddam. Sanctions didn’t work on Syria. Both were under Russian influence. Therefore in language they understand, we will need boots on the ground in Ukraine.
- It is time to pull the A-10’s back out of retirement and put them in place inside of Ukraine.
- As soldiers return from Afghanistan, we will need to extend their tours a little longer and put them in Ukraine.
- We need to be clear our armies are defensive and not offensive. We can do that thorough our logistics which they can read.
- We need Americans on the ground inside those Russian territories most prone to invasion, and they will need to be on their best behavior to win friends and influence people…. Since they will no longer have to abide by Shari Law , I don’t think that will be a problem…
If the orders or plans have not yet been drawn, they need to be done ASAP.
This should be seen as a non aggressive force, but a deciding one. Sort of like how bouncers gather around a shouting match in numbers to help convince both parties that they really, really, really, really, don’t want to come to blows….
But if left alone as two voices in a vacuum, the fight will break out and it becomes much harder to then establish the peace.. Which is why , right now, we need boots on the ground somewhere in Ukraine’s Russian Territories… It is past time to realize the verbal assurances we have been given simply could be a stall for time… That is usually how it is done when you hear words but fail to see the actions accompanying them, in this case, the backing down of troops along the border.
As with a bar fight, the fastest and quickest way to ensure a lasting peace, is to have a solid physical threat close at hand, very visible to the perpetrators, so the fallout from their actions is readily assessed both scaring them and giving them the will to back down…Bringing in the Chinese would again, be the smartest thing. It is time for China to become a world player and with their future economic status briefly on shaky ground, I imagine they would appreciate the gesture and opportunity….
Plus it would take their eye off the China Sea for a while as well.
Finally, we can use this as a reason to ram higher taxes past the Republicans, by appealing to the patriotism of the American people, they won’t pay, the top 1% will… We earmark the tax increase to the military, and we paint all those Republicans who balk as being weak and unpatriotic Americans, willing to squander our troops in the face of a Russian threat…. If we play our cards correctly, we can pass that high rate of taxation, by calling it a war tax, sunset it after 10 years, and slip in marginal rates as high as up to 90 or 100%… We did the last big war… Tell America that this time, they won’t have to fight a war on a deficit. Our wealthy will happily pay our way in advance….
Domestically we should see great economic movement as we race to restaff defense plants, and get those contracts passed and rolling to upgrade our defense force, perhaps before October of this year…
But it all starts with boots on the ground in Ukraine… This we must do quickly.
Courtesy of the Economist (since removed)
There is an old saying I’m fond of repeating….
It takes great courage to stand up to one’s enemies. It takes even greater courage to stand up to one’s friend….
Chris Coons, Delaware’s Junior Senator who happens to be up for election this year, apparently lacks that amount of courage. (The Senior Senator, with more experience, does not seem to lack that courage (maybe from all those flights in a C-135…))
The bill known as the Schumer-Kirk-Menendez Bill is a poison pill designed to break the sanctioned negotiations with Iran. It was written, paid for, and lobbied by Israel. It has only one purpose and one purpose only; to put limitations on the President and Secretary of State in their negotiations over Iran’s non-proliferation….
(It is now dead btw. It does not have enough votes to override a Presidential veto…)
Sadly it shows we have kooks in our Senate running our foreign affairs, and unfortunately for Delaware, one of ours is one…. By kooks, I mean people who sign on to a bill without reading it, (probably not one’s regular definition of kook).
But a kook he is….
Benefit for signing on? A) money for campaigns and B) protection from the whacky Christian right (think O’Donnell)… If the bill were dead in the water, if it were just for a show, I could see some sensibility in trying to look good to a certain “whacky” constituency. After all, sad to say, that is political reality. One has to do, what one has to do….
But this bill would do severe damage. This bill would allow the nuclear process of Iran to continue. This bill would keep the sanctions in place, ensuring the nuclear process would indeed be the only option Iran would have at its disposal.
We have been cold enemies with Iran a long time. This negotiation is the equivalent of Ronald Reagan’s reaching out to Gorbachev earlier in our lifetimes. Imagine if upon Ronnie’s return from Reykjavik, the US Congress bought and paid for by then Communist China, had passed a resolution saying that no thaw could occur until the Soviets dismantled everyone of their nuclear missiles and silos, and destroyed everyone of their Atomic submarines…. We’d still be at war with Russia.
That is the equivalent stupidity of what this piece of legislations does. AND CHRIS COONS SIGNED ON TO IT! HAS HE LOST HIS FREAKING MIND?
Many of you may not remember but when Ronnie came back, there were a few hawks in the Senate who said exactly what I mentioned above. BUT WE ALL KNEW THEY WERE KOOKS….
Like the pontifications of Ted Cruz today, nobody, nobody, nobody of any import, took them seriously. Reagan was instead encouraged by the majority to go forward and meet with Gorbachev again…
Unlike those fine statesmen of the 80’s, our Senate is bought and paid for and according to Diane Feinstein, has apparently sworn to AIPAC put the cause of Israel above our own interests! And it is not to all of Israel’s interests they subscribe … it is strictly the war-mongering Conservative Hawks in Israel to whom they subscribe… Close to fifty percent of Israel is not Conservative!…. Simon Peres who recently passed, once led the other half of Israel, the half which sees progress involving cooperation and diplomacy. Israel’s Conservatives only get power when there is a crises involving war. That is behind their drumbeat for war with Iran. If in the middle of constant conflict, they can keep their hold of the Knesset. But once cooperation appears fruitful…. oops… out they go….
And so somehow they get Chris Coons to sign on to derailing the negotiations…. They got all the Republicans and a number of Democrats. At one point they gloated they had 77, a veto proof majority….
The bill argues for the US to declare war on Iran, if Israel attacks it..
REALLY CHRIS COONS? YOU SAID WE WRONGLY WENT TO IRAQ FOR 9/11. NOW YOU COMMIT US TO ANOTHER, VERY MAJOR, AND AGAINST A SMART ENEMY, A 1000 TIMES MORE POWERFUL THAN THE AFGHANISTAN TALIBAN, JUST IF ISRAEL SENDS A MISSION INTO IRAN?
If Chris had not listened to AIPAC, and listened to Allan Loudell of WDEL he probably would have known that Iran is at the negotiation table because the Iranian people demand it, by voting for the one candidate who promised to try to end their isolation. They want to be on more friendly terms with the West. A more cooperative Iran could yield any number of real benefits, including help in stabilizing Afghanistan (which we will need on the way out), the possibility of tamping down the civil war in Syria, and perhaps above all as positive role model of a modernizing and democratizing Islamic state—something of clearly global historical significance. Not to mention economic benefits for U.S. companies…..
SO CHRIS COONS… WE HAVE A BREAK-THROUGH FOR PEACE WITH VERY TANGIBLE BENEFITS BECAUSE A DEMOCRATIC NATION THREW OUT THEIR TOTALITARIAN, AND WE GET LOCKED INTO GOING TO WAR IF THE CONSERVATIVES OF ISRAEL FEEL THE NEED TO CHALLENGE IRAN, THEN STEP BACK WHILE WE GO IN TO DO ALL THE FIGHTING? AGAINST A DEMOCRATICALLY ELECTED REGIME?
What was it I said above? Yes. ARE YOU FREAKING OUT OF YOUR MIND?
Lots of love back at you. Just don’t let it happen again, ok?
I’m a little late, but I wanted to mark down mostly for myself but sharing it as well, the accomplishments being made as a direct result of last year’s elections…. Some of the conclusions are superfluous, but are perceived to be a result of the election’s consequences, and since perception is nine tenths of reality, they too are a force with which to be reckoned..
Remember this is general and is being painted with a broad brush….
The economy is number one. Some taxes were raised which boosted the economy almost immediately. This has been the most consistent trend over the past year. The economy has benefited the same people it benefited before. It has not seemed to help those who were not helped before. If you are an investor, this has been a great year. Stock Market has never been higher.
The number of private sector jobs has consistently grown across 2013…..
One of the marvelous trends is the fact that once the solid line is crossed in the year 2010, it never drops below… That means we have consistently been growing private sector jobs… Since 2010 we have never had a negative month… one where we actually lost jobs. However Unemployment has not fared so well. Even though we are growing jobs, we still have a ways to go. In one of the most amazing graphs… so amazing I’m rather surprise it has not been featured until now, one sees all employment across this century….
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What is fascinating is first, the constant rate of growth. the pitch of the line never changes. But what is freaky, is exactly how that pitch mirrors the employment growth of the Bush years… Not even Republicans can fault George W. Bush’s employment growth up until 2007. Obama’s rate mirrors his rate exactly.
It needs more quantified research, but initial speculation would be that since the tax rates were similar (The Bush Cuts were carried over) that factor pretty well determines the maximum rate at which our nation’s economy is able to grow. Furthermore it shows us that if consistency prevails, and since it has for the past 10 years there is little likelihood it wouldn’t, then we will have grown into employment levels which we had just before the crash in fall of 2014……
So investors have done well; the middle class hasn’t.
Consumer spending is exactly the same level as of the first of the year. It’s low was reached during the sequester fight (Jan 28) and its high, was on August 18th. As for now, we are were we were Christmas Day 2012.
Consumer Confidence is right where it was in January. We had some peaks over summer, but he shutdown lowered us back to where the threat of a shutdown held us hostage as the year began…..
Only since 2013 have we made progress on hammering down the deficit. The national debt is still huge. it will take multiple budget surpluses to whittle it down, and to achieve that, we need to again tax more than we spend. But we are not spending a trillion dollars in deficits anymore. we are only over spending by 600 billion which may become less by years end than 2003’s deficit….
Enough economics.
On the world front:
- We have a possible solution to Iran’s giving up on being a nuclear power.
- We have Syria dismantling their chemical weapons.
- We are on course to leave Afghanistan.
- We have Iraq begging us to please, please come back.
All of these would have gone completely the opposite way if you remember what Romney was promising during the debates.
- Attack Iran with shock and awe.
- Attack Syria with shock and awe,
- Attack Iraq with shock and awe… oh wait, that was Rumsfeld. Instead, Iraq was that we should never leave, and we should also stay in Afghanistan indefinitely. But we should have never gone into Libya. My goodness, can you image the shambles the world would be in if he had ever been elected?
Not to mention, his pushing of tightening up the money supply. Just the anticipation of such, sends our stock market into a panic.
Domestically we have weathered Benghazi, more a Republican talking point than anything important. We worked through the IRS scandal which it was revealed to be a forward thinking sound policy and not a scandal after all.. Political groups friendly to the president were swept up in the nets as well.
The Common Core package fortunately seems to have stalled. It was always a low priority, and with the drying up of TARP and Stimulus funding, it seems like most state’s enthusiasm is drying up as well. The program does not seem to be able to get past the roadblock that the tests themselves create. There is enough opposition by enough parents so that this program maybe salvageable in part, but dead in the water as a whole.
It would be nice to have a viable program in its place. One that aims to put an 11:1 student/teacher ratio in troubled public schools.
But, the most notable event and the one with the biggest blowout, was the revelations by one Edward Snowden which were made last July. America is collecting huge amounts of data. Since then the leaks have only become worse. Americans have compromised the entire Internet. They have broken into banks, they have spied on foreign competitors, they have become a service offering “information for hire…. ” And although too early to tell, implications are that is may have been done secretly even keeping the president and his officers completely in the dark….
Which is really scary. Cheney’s shadow government is alive and well……
If true, this is our greatest threat. Simply because unlike the economy, unlike unemployment, unlike Syria, Iran, or Israel, unlike the Republican yellow journalistic scandals…. this one is against us. It violates our Constitution. It is against all we purport to be…..
One interesting parallel…. Long, long, long ago, the city state of Rome was also a viable democracy, and like us, it too expanded its empire across the known world… Until Julius Caesar marched his armies into Rome, took over the reins as dictator, done in order to bypass the quagmire in which it’s Congress had become bogged down… It was originally supposed to be a temporary solution…. For the next 400 odd years, Rome never went back… Instead one bad Caesar followed another, often at the point of a sword (there was no NRA back then)…
Looking the other way at a scandal of this proportion, especially if it was done as a rogue element of which the White House now even barely has a clue as to how deep it goes… and what is has been doing, then we already have a Caesar, and whoever it is, they are not elected by us, We, The People….
This can be fixed quietly, internally, and we may never hear of its resolution. Or it could get worse. Much worse…
The final solution is to cut off the NSA from its unlimited sources of money…. Even shut it down, or better, let a more porous government agency, even that of the CIA take it over….
Spying on American citizens is simply put…. un American. It has never been who we are. We’ve always chose the other way. It does not represent what we want ourselves to be…. Any person could spy on their neighbor if they wished. Any person could hide in his neighbor’s bushes and watch them get undressed… Most of us would be so creeped out at just the idea, we would never, ever consider doing such a thing.
The fact that most of us would never consider something that creepy, has always been what has made Americans so special, so likable, and so loved the world around…. We were different from those Communists…. Well, not any more.
As each new NSA revelation comes out, one just can’t shake the creepy feeling that somewhere Voldermort, somehow is pulling all the strings……
This took place early August. Was not recorded in American media. Was big news in the Mid East…
The arrival of Prince Bandar was secret, shuttled in and out of Russia without fanfare. The meeting went like this.
Bandar relayed the Saudi king’s greetings to Putin and the king’s emphasis on the importance of developing the bilateral relationship. He also told Putin that the king would bless any understanding reached during the visit. Bandar also said, however, that “any understanding we reach in this meeting will not only be a Saudi-Russian understanding, but will also be an American-Russian understanding. I have spoken with the Americans before the visit, and they pledged to commit to any understandings that we may reach, especially if we agree on the approach to the Syrian issue.”
Bandar: ““There are many common values and goals that bring us together, most notably the fight against terrorism and extremism all over the world. Russia, the US, the EU and the Saudis agree on promoting and consolidating international peace and security. The terrorist threat is growing in light of the phenomena spawned by the Arab Spring. We have lost some regimes. And what we got in return were terrorist experiences, as evidenced by the experience of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and the extremist groups in Libya. … As an example, I can give you a guarantee to protect the Winter Olympics in the city of Sochi on the Black Sea next year. The Chechen groups that threaten the security of the games are controlled by us, and they will not move in the Syrian territory’s direction without coordinating with us. These groups do not scare us. We use them in the face of the Syrian regime but they will have no role or influence in Syria’s political future.”
Putin: ““We know that you have supported the Chechen terrorist groups for a decade. And that support, which you have frankly talked about just now, is completely incompatible with the common objectives of fighting global terrorism that you mentioned. We are interested in developing friendly relations according to clear and strong principles.”
Then Bandar discussed the potential cooperation between the two countries if an understanding could be reached on a number of issues, especially Syria.
Bandar: “Let us examine how to put together a unified Russian-Saudi strategy on the subject of oil. The aim is to agree on the price of oil and production quantities that keep the price stable in global oil markets. … We understand Russia’s great interest in the oil and gas present in the Mediterranean Sea from Israel to Cyprus through Lebanon and Syria. And we understand the importance of the Russian gas pipeline to Europe. We are not interested in competing with that. We can cooperate in this area as well as in the areas of establishing refineries and petrochemical industries. The kingdom can provide large multi-billion-dollar investments in various fields in the Russian market. What’s important is to conclude political understandings on a number of issues, particularly Syria and Iran.”
Putin: “Your proposals about oil and gas, economic and investment cooperation deserve to be studied by the relevant ministries in both countries.”
Bandar covers the Syrian misunderstanding.
Bandar: “The Syrian regime is finished as far as we and the majority of the Syrian people are concerned. [The Syrian people] will not allow President Bashar al-Assad to remain at the helm. The key to the relations between our two countries starts by understanding our approach to the Syrian issue. So you have to stop giving [the Syrian regime] political support, especially at the UN Security Council, as well as military and economic support. And we guarantee you that Russia’s interests in Syria and on the Mediterranean coast will not be affected one bit. In the future, Syria will be ruled by a moderate and democratic regime that will be directly sponsored by us and that will have an interest in understanding Russia’s interests and role in the region.”
Putin: “Our stance on Assad will never change. We believe that the Syrian regime is the best speaker on behalf of the Syrian people, and not those liver eaters. During the Geneva I Conference, we agreed with the Americans on a package of understandings, and they agreed that the Syrian regime will be part of any settlement. Later on, they decided to renege on Geneva I. In all meetings of Russian and American experts, we reiterated our position. In his upcoming meeting with his American counterpart John Kerry, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will stress the importance of making every possible effort to rapidly reach a political settlement to the Syrian crisis so as to prevent further bloodshed.”
On Egypt:
Bandar: “We said so directly to the Qataris and to the Turks. We rejected their unlimited support to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and elsewhere. The Turks’ role today has become similar to Pakistan’s role in the Afghan war. We do not favor extremist religious regimes, and we wish to establish moderate regimes in the region. It is worthwhile to pay attention to and to follow up on Egypt’s experience. We will continue to support the [Egyptian] army, and we will support Defense Minister Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi because he is keen on having good relations with us and with you. And we suggest to you to be in contact with him, to support him and to give all the conditions for the success of this experiment. We are ready to hold arms deals with you in exchange for supporting these regimes, especially Egypt.”
Putin: “We are very concerned about Egypt. And we understand what the Egyptian army is doing. But we are very cautious in approaching what’s happening because we are afraid that things may slide toward an Egyptian civil war, which would be too costly for the Egyptians, the Arabs and the international community. I wanted to do a brief visit to Egypt. And the matter is still under discussion.”
On Iran:
Bandar: “About Iran’s role in the region, especially in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Yemen, Bahrain and other countries. We hope that the Russians would understand that Russia’s interests and the interests of the Gulf states are one in the face of Iranian greed and nuclear challenge.”
Putin: “We support the Iranian quest to obtain nuclear fuel for peaceful purposes. And we helped them develop their facilities in this direction. Of course, we will resume negotiations with them as part of the 5P+1 group. I will meet with President Hassan Rouhani on the sidelines of the Central Asia summit and we will discuss a lot of bilateral, regional and international issues. We will inform him that Russia is completely opposed to the UN Security Council imposing new sanctions on Iran. We believe that the sanctions imposed against Iran and Iranians are unfair and that we will not repeat the experience again.”
Regarding Turkey.
Putin: “Turkey is also a neighboring country with which we have common interests. We are keen to develop our relations in various fields. During the Russian-Turkish meeting, we scrutinized the issues on which we agree and disagree. We found out that we have more converging than diverging views. I have already informed the Turks, and I will reiterate my stance before my friend Erdogan, that what is happening in Syria necessitates a different approach on their part. Turkey will not be immune to Syria’s bloodbath. The Turks ought to be more eager to find a political settlement to the Syrian crisis. We are certain that the political settlement in Syria is inevitable, and therefore they ought to reduce the extent of damage. Our disagreement with them on the Syrian issue does not undermine other understandings between us at the level of economic and investment cooperation. We have recently informed them that we are ready to cooperate with them to build two nuclear reactors. This issue will be on the agenda of the Turkish prime minister during his visit to Moscow in September.”
Concluding remarks.
Bandar: “In light of the course of the talks, things are likely to intensify, especially in the Syrian arena, although we appreciate the Russians’ understanding of Saudi Arabia’s position on Egypt as well as their readiness to support the Egyptian army despite their fears for Egypt’s future. The dispute over the approach to the Syrian issue leads to the conclusion that there is no escape from the military option, because it is the only currently available choice given that the political settlement ended in stalemate. We believe that the Geneva II Conference will be very difficult in light of this raging situation.”
More analysis can be found here….
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