[R-G] [BillTottenWeblog] The 'Great Satan' Strike Out

[Bill Totten]

by Robert Scheer

TruthDig.com (March 04 2008)


Are the media dumb or just out to lunch? Sorry to be intemperate, but
how else can one explain the meager attention paid to the truly historic
visit of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Iraq? Not only is he
the first Mideast head of state to visit the country since its alleged
liberation, but the very warm official welcome offered by the Iraqi
government to the most vociferous critic of the United States speaks
volumes to the abject failure of the Bush doctrine.

On Tuesday, Condoleezza Rice reiterated the administration's position
that Iran is behind the turmoil that has engulfed the Mideast from
Beirut to Baghdad and, most recently, Israel, where what she claims are
Iranian-supplied rockets have totally destroyed the belated Bush peace
plan. There is also the matter of Iran's nuclear program, which
President Bush condemned once again over the weekend. But what leverage
does the United States have over Iran when, as the image of Ahmadinejad
holding hands with the top leaders of Iraq demonstrated to the world, we
have put the disciples of the Iranian ayatollahs in power in Baghdad?
There is no face-saving exit from Iraq without the cooperation of
Tehran, and the folks who call America the "Great Satan" now hold the
high cards.

How interesting that Ahmadinejad, unlike a US president who has to be
airlifted unannounced into ultra-secure bases, was able to convoy in
from the airport in broad daylight on a road that US dignitaries fear to
travel. His love fest with Iraq President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd who
fought on Iran's side against Iraq and who speaks Farsi, even took place
outside of the safety of the Green Zone, adding emphasis to
Ahmadinejad's claim that while he is welcome in Iraq, the Americans are not.

Nor did the Iraqi leaders take exception to Ahmadinejad's insistence
that the US has only brought terror to the region and that the continued
American presence is the main obstacle to peace. On the contrary, Prime
Minister Nouri al-Maliki pronounced his talks with fellow Shiite
Ahmadinejad "friendly, positive and full of trust". Video of Talabani,
who asked that Ahmadinejad call him "Uncle Jalal" after holding hands
and exchanging kisses with the Iranian president, was broadcast
throughout the region.

Saddam Hussein went to war with Iran, but George W Bush has given his
Iranian foes a Shiite-run ally. Iran is now a major trading partner of
Iraq that has offered a $1 billion loan, the border is increasingly
porous as religious pilgrimages have become the norm, and many
investment projects supervised by Iranians are in the works. Instead of
isolating the "rogue regime" of Iran, the Bush administration has
catapulted the theocrats of Tehran into the center of Mideast political
power. There can be no peace, whether in Lebanon, Gaza or Iraq, without
the cooperation of the ayatollahs of Iran. If that was the intention of
the neoconservative cabal that led Bush into this folly, its members
should be tried for treason.

That was, however, obviously not what the neocons expected from the
invasion of Iraq, which they engineered in the wake of 9/11 with a much
rosier scenario in mind. The saying that there is no need to attribute
to mendacity what can be explained by ordinary stupidity aptly defines
the neoconservative folly. Clearly the neocons were conned by the likes
of Ahmed Chalabi, the rogue banker accused by the CIA of slipping US
secrets to Tehran, into believing that a "liberated" Iraq would advance
democracy in the region, not to mention the security of Israel. That the
opposite has occurred is no big problem for them as they emerge with
their careers intact.

The leading neocon publicist, William Kristol, has even been rewarded
for never getting it right with a premier spot on the New York Times
opinion pages, so yes, in the punditry business, one does fail upward.

But for Bush, his signature issue, the battle against terrorism, is a
shambles. The terrorists are very much on the rise in Afghanistan and
Pakistan, which Bush neglected for an Iraq sideshow that has cost over a
trillion dollars and tens of thousands of lives. But the long-run price
will be far higher, with the blowback from the massive instability that
he has engendered in the region.

When Bush has finally retired to that ranch, cutting sagebrush to his
heart's content, his all-consuming smugness might ever so subtly be
troubled by the memory of a father who knew best, and who warned against
the terminal foolishness of seizing Baghdad.

_____

Robert Scheer is editor of Truthdig.com and a regular columnist for The
San Francisco Chronicle.

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080304_the_great_satan_strike_out/


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