Sunday, August 29, 2004

Iran-Contra II? - Part II

Juan Cole has another post on the Israeli spy case. (His earlier post is here.)

It is an echo of the one-two punch secretly planned by the pro-Likud faction in the Department of Defense. First, Iraq would be taken out by the United States, and then Iran.

... Matthew Yglesias has already tipped us to a key piece of information. The Niger forgeries also try to implicate Iran. Indeed, the idea of a joint Iraq/Iran nuclear plot was so far-fetched that it is what initially made the Intelligence and Research division of the US State Department suspicious of the forgeries, even before the discrepancies of dates and officials in Niger were noticed.

...Franklin, Ledeen, and Rhode, all of them pro-Likud operatives, just happen to be meeting with SISMI (the proto-fascist purveyor of the false Niger uranium story about Iraq and the alleged Iran-Iraq plot against the rest of the world) and corrupt Iranian businessman and would-be revolutionary, Ghorbanifar, in Europe. The most reasonable conclusion is that they were conspiring together about the Next Campaign after Iraq, which they had already begun setting in train, which is to get Iran.

But now The Jerusalem Post reveals that at least one of the meetings was quite specific with regard to an attempt to torpedo better US/Iran relations...

...Franklin's movements reveal the contours of a rightwing conspiracy of warmongering and aggression, an orgy of destruction, for the benefit of the Likud Party, of Silvio Berlusconi's business in the Middle East, and of the Neoconservative Right in the United States. It isn't about spying. It is about conspiring to conscript the US government on behalf of a foreign power or powers.


More...

Josh Marshall's take provides the title (Iran-Contra II) from my earlier post.

I expect some developments in this while I'm away this week. You'll most likely be finding the best commentary and analyses at Juan Cole's Informed Comment, and Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo.

There are times when I think the world of intrigue has gotten beyond even the best imagination of Hollywood writers, and that it would be impossible to sort it all out. I wonder if the players themselves ever do. Maybe the game is what is attractive - not to mention the power stakes, of course - but personally, I'd prefer a thatched hut on a Caribbean island, and some books.

Maybe some good bourbon.

And I wish they'd find a way to play the game without turning the world into a toxic wasteland. Somehow, that part never concerns them.

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