US President Donald Trump’s administration capitalized on developments in Saudi Arabia’s losing war in Yemen, as well as a missile test conducted by the Iranian government, to portray Iran as ungrateful for a diplomatic deal the administration’s now resigned National Security Adviser Michael Flynn suggested should never have been made in the first place.
The Guardian’s article, “Trump administration ‘officially putting Iran on notice’, says Michael Flynn,” would state:
The Trump administration has said it was “officially putting Iran on notice” in reaction to an Iranian missile test and an attack on a Saudi warship by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen but gave no details about how Washington intended to respond.
And while Flynn’s comments before his abrupt resignation sound like the genuine, if not hypocritical stance of Trump presidency, those who have followed the actual brokers of US foreign policy recognize the very familiar script Flynn is reading from – and it is a script written not by the Trump administration, but by unelected corporate-financier funded policy think tanks, years before “President Trump” took office.
Flynn’s resignation will have little impact on this policy, since it has been planned, and systematically implemented years before Donald Trump even began his presidential campaign. The fact that Flynn’s stance on Iran is reflected by those remaining in Trump’s administration is proof enough of this.
Brookings’ “Superb Offer” Circa 2009
The Brookings Institution paper titled, “The Path to Persia: Options for a New American Strategy toward Iran” (.pdf), would explicitly lay out America’s regime change conspiracy arrayed against Tehran, stating (emphasis added):
...any military operation against Iran will likely be very unpopular around the world and require the proper international context—both to ensure the logistical support the operation would require and to minimize the blowback from it. The best way to minimize international opprobrium and maximize support (however, grudging or covert) is to strike only when there is a widespread conviction that the Iranians were given but then rejected a superb offer—one so good that only a regime determined to acquire nuclear weapons and acquire them for the wrong reasons would turn it down. Under those circumstances, the United States (or Israel) could portray its operations as taken in sorrow, not anger, and at least some in the international community would conclude that the Iranians “brought it on themselves” by refusing a very good deal.
Brookings’ “superb offer” was clearly presented to both the public and Tehran in the form of the so-called Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) or the “Iran Deal” in 2015. And while Washington attempted to convince the world it sought rapprochement with Tehran, even as it pursued this deal, it poured money, weapons, and even direct military support into the attempted overthrow of Iran’s ally, Syria – another prerequisite enumerated by the 2009 Brookings report ahead of war with Iran.
The deal then, was disingenuous from its inception, its betrayal all but inevitable when Washington felt the political and strategic climate was optimal for portraying Tehran as duplicitous, and justifying a wider confrontation – particularly with both Syria significantly weakened after 6 years of war, and Iran significantly tied up financially and militarily in Syria’s fate.
Trump Battered Saudi Arabia on the Campaign Trail, Defends it on the War Path
Dopey Prince @Alwaleed_Talal wants to control our U.S. politicians with daddy’s money. Can’t do it when I get elected. #Trump2016
Now as president, Trump’s stance regards Saudi Arabia as a friend, and is implying wider confrontation with Iran for allegedly arming and training fighters in Yemen who attacked a Saudi warship. The Trump administration and the media at large fail to mention that Saudi Arabia has – for years – been waging full-scale war on Yemen, by air, land, and sea – both directly, and through terrorist proxies – from Saudi territory and international waters, and within and above Yemeni territory itself via land invasion and airstrikes.
The prospect of the US reversing diplomatic rapprochement with Iran over Yemeni forces fighting against Saudi Arabia’s extraterritorial military aggression against their nation alone transgresses both international law and the interests of the American people.
However, considering Saudi Arabia’s admitted ties to terrorism in Yemen, across the region – particularly in Syria and Iraq in the form of Al Qaeda, its various affiliates, and the so-called Islamic State (ISIS) itself – and around the world, the US declaring Saudi Arabia a “friend and ally” and accusing Iran of “destabilizing behavior across the Middle East,” makes it clear that the US either condones Saudi Arabia’s state sponsorship of terrorism, or is directly involved in it itself.
Of course, Flynn, previously the director of the US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), was aware of the DIA’s 2012 memo in which the creation of a “Salafist” (Islamic) “principality” (State) was sought after by not only the Persian Gulf monarchies, but also NATO-member Turkey, Europe, and the US itself. So was the rest of the Trump administration.
The memo read:
If the situation unravels there is the possibility of establishing a declared or undeclared Salafist principality in eastern Syria (Hasaka and Der Zor), and this is exactly what the supporting powers to the opposition want, in order to isolate the Syrian regime, which is considered the strategic depth of the Shia expansion (Iraq and Iran).
The DIA memo then explains exactly who this “Salafist principality’s” supporters are (and who its true enemies are):
The West, Gulf countries, and Turkey support the opposition; while Russia, China, and Iran support the regime.
Iran is specifically stated as opposed to “the opposition” which included the then nascent Islamic State, as well as designated terrorist organization Jabhat Al Nusra (now Jabhat Fateh al-Sham).
In a display of surreal deception, the Trump administration attempts to portray themselves as “fighting terror” while edging closer to confrontation with Iran currently fighting it region-wide. The US does this in defense of Saudi Arabia, admitted by the US itself as sponsoring terrorism region-wide.
President Trump’s hypocrisy defies explanation unless the Brookings Institution paper is brought back to light, and current events put into the context of the conspiracy and continuity of agenda the paper represents.
The US media has attempted to portray President Trump’s hypocrisy toward Saudi Arabia as a personal and business-related conflict of interest. The US media apparently expects the public to believe it is just a coincidence the Trump administration is continuing decades of US foreign policy and a truly duplicitous relationship with Riyadh that has transcended multiple presidencies, left and right, Republican and Democrat, including the recently departed Obama administration.
To understand the geopolitical trajectory of global events, particularly in regards to US-Iranian relations, observers, analysts, and the general public alike would serve themselves well to read US policy papers instead of entertaining theories from the US media, or speeches and statements from the Trump administration.
Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine“New Eastern Outlook”.