Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Robert Parry — Neocons’ Ukraine-Syria-Iran Gambit

Some highlights:
... the neocons have succeeded in estranging U.S. President Barack Obama from Russian President Vladimir Putin and sabotaging the pair’s crucial cooperation on Iran and Syria, which may have been the point all along....
Last September, as the prospects for a U.S. military strike against Syria were fading thanks to Putin, NED president Carl Gershman, who is something of a neocon paymaster controlling more than $100 million in congressionally approved funding each year, took to the pages of the neocon-flagship Washington Post and wrote that Ukraine was now “the biggest prize.”
But Gershman added that Ukraine was really only an interim step to an even bigger prize, the removal of the strong-willed and independent-minded Putin, who, Gershman added, “may find himself on the losing end not just in the near abroad [i.e. Ukraine] but within Russia itself.” In other words, the new hope was for “regime change” in Kiev and Moscow....
Some neocon defenders have challenged my reporting that U.S. neocons played a significant role in the Ukrainian putsch. One argument is that the neocons, who regard the U.S.-Israeli bond as inviolable, would not knowingly collaborate with neo-Nazis given the history of the Holocaust (and indeed the role of Ukrainian Nazi collaborators in extermination campaigns against Poles and Jews).
But the neocons have frequently struck alliances of convenience with some of the most unsavory – and indeed anti-Semitic – forces on earth, dating back to the Reagan administration and its collaboration with Latin American “death squad” regimes, including work with the World Anti-Communist League that included not only neo-Nazis but aging real Nazis.
More recently in Syria, U.S. neocons (and Israeli leaders) are so focused on ousting Assad, an ally of hated Iran, that they have cooperated with Saudi Arabia’s Sunni monarchy (known for its gross anti-Semitism). Israeli officials have even expressed a preference for Saudi-backed Sunni extremists winning in Syria if that is the only way to get rid of Assad and hurt his allies in Iran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah.
Last September, Israel’s Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren told the Jerusalem Post that Israel so wanted Assad out and his Iranian backers weakened, that Israel would accept al-Qaeda operatives taking power in Syria....
There’s also the certainty that congressional war hawks and neocon pundits will press for increased U.S. military spending and aggressive tactics elsewhere in the world to punish Putin, meaning even less money and attention for domestic programs or deficit reduction. Obama’s “nation-building at home” will be forgotten.
But the neocons have long made it clear that their vision for the world – one of America’s “full-spectrum dominance” and “regime change” in Middle Eastern countries opposed to Israel – overrides all other national priorities.
Consortiumnews.com
Neocons’ Ukraine-Syria-Iran Gambit
Robert Parry

7 comments:

Ryan Harris said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Unknown said...

The neocons etal have and are testing the extreme limits with a very weak hand.

Russia is not Grenada and there is absolutely no way, that they will ever cede to an outside power, West or otherwise.

They lost over 28 million of their own during WW2 ..... who else can attest to that gruesome number.

The US backed crowd that carried out the coup of Yanukovych, a corrupt, yet nonetheless the legitimately elected (democratically) leader are a bunch of Neo-Nazi, Fascists.

Good luck to everyone.

googleheim said...

Just like Chile and 9/11/1973

Install a new dictator?

The Rombach Report said...

US escalates sanctions, unfriends Putin on Facebook

Doctor Paul Craig Roberts Calls Rand Paul A Neocon

http://bit.ly/1gNIggB

Russia Annexing Crimea is the Cost of US/EU intervention in Ukraine -Mike Scheuer

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article37979.htm

Peter Pan said...

I'm surprised that Rand Paul would jump on this bandwagon.

Anonymous said...

Yes, in addition to the geopolitical agendas of ideologues like the neocons, we also have to keep in mind that every so often the US security establishment elevates some new supposed threat to drive even more defense appropriations their way. If it wasn't Putin, it would be China or something else.

If nothing else, these events have reminded me what an f-ing lunatic HRC is.

The Rombach Report said...

"I'm surprised that Rand Paul would jump on this bandwagon."

Yes. It's created quite an uproar in libertarian circles. Purists are denouncing Rand Paul, while pragmatists are saying he's going neocon on this issue to garner favor with centrist segments of the GOP to have a better chance of being nominated. If so, that is a very risky gambit that's likely to backfire.