<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">This was posted to the AWARE fb page with the remark, "Paleoconservatives - not soi-disant liberals and conservatives - see what is happening in the Mideast."<div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><br class=""><div><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On May 12, 2018, at 9:25 AM, Dianna Visek via Peace-discuss <<a href="mailto:peace-discuss@lists.chambana.net" class="">peace-discuss@lists.chambana.net</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class=""><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml><o:OfficeDocumentSettings><o:AllowPNG/><o:PixelsPerInch>96</o:PixelsPerInch></o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]-->
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" class=""><div class=""><div style="font-family:times new roman, new york, times, serif;font-size:16px;" class=""><div class=""><span class=""><h2 class="ydp5885fb09no-border ydp5885fb09article-title">Are Bibi and Bolton in the Wheel House Now?</h2></span><span class=""><p class="ydp17ace04cdate">Friday, May 11, 2018</p><p class="">
Brushing aside the anguished pleas of our NATO allies, President Trump
Tuesday contemptuously trashed the Iranian nuclear deal and reimposed
sanctions.
</p><p class="">
Prime Minister Theresa May of Great Britain, President Emmanuel Macron
of France and German Chancellor Angela Merkel were put on notice that
their ties to Iran are to be severed, or secondary sanctions will be
imposed on them.
</p><p class="">
Driving the point home, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin ordered Airbus
to cancel its $19 billion contract to sell 100 commercial planes to
Iran.
</p><p class="">
Who is cheering Trump's trashing of the treaty?
</p></span><div class=""><span class="">
The neocons who sought his political extinction in 2016, the royals of
the Gulf, Bibi Netanyahu, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The
IRGC had warned Iranians that the Americans were duplicitous. <br class=""></span></div><div class=""><span class=""><span class=""><p class="">
When Trump finished speaking, Bibi launched strikes on Iranian bases in
Syria, and flew to Moscow to persuade Vladimir Putin not to give the
Iranians any air defense against Israeli attacks.
</p><p class="">
Iranian forces responded with 20 missiles fired at the Golan, which
ignited a massive Israeli counterstrike Thursday night, a 70-missile
attack on Iranian bases in Syria.
</p><p class="">
We appear to be at the beginning of a new war, and how it ends we know
not. But for Bibi and National Security Adviser John Bolton, the end has
always been clear -- the smashing of Iran and regime change.
</p><p class="">
Tuesday, Trump warned that Iran is on "a quest for nuclear weapons," and
"if we do nothing ... in just a short period of time, the world's worst
sponsor of state terror will be on the cusp of acquiring the world's
most dangerous weapon."
</p><p class="">
And where is the evidence for this Bush-like assertion?
</p><p class="">
If Iran is on a "quest" for nukes, why did 17 U.S. intel agencies, "with
high confidence," in 2007 and 2011, say Iran did not even have a
nuclear weapons program?
</p><p class="">
Saddam Hussein could not convince us he had no WMD, because the
nonexistent WMD were the pretext, the casus belli, for doing what the
War Party had already decided to do: invade Iraq.
</p><p class="">
We were lied into that war. And how did it turn out?
</p></span><span class=""><p class="">
Why has the Foreign Relations committee not called in the heads of the
U.S. intelligence agencies and asked them flat out: Does Iran have an
active nuclear bomb program, or is this a pack of lies to stampede us
into another war?
</p><p class="">
If Iran is on a quest for nukes, let the intel agencies tell us where
the work is being done, so we can send inspectors and show the world.
</p><p class="">
Efforts to pull us back from being dragged into a new war have begun.
</p><p class="">
The Europeans are begging Iran to abide by the terms of the nuclear
deal, even if the Americans do not. But the regime of Hassan Rouhani,
who twice defeated Ayatollah-backed candidates, is in trouble.
</p><p class="">
The nuclear deal and opening to the West were the reasons the children
of the Green Movement of 2009 voted for Rouhani. If his difficulties
deepen because of reimposed U.S. and Western sanctions, his great
achievement, the nuclear deal, will be seen by his people as the failed
gamble of a fool who trusted the Americans.
</p><p class="">
Should Rouhani's regime fall, we may get a Revolutionary Guard regime
rather less to the liking of everyone, except for the War Party, which
could seize upon that as a pretext for war.
</p><p class="">
What happens next is difficult to see.
</p><p class="">
Iran does not want a war with Israel in Syria that it cannot win.
</p><p class="">
Iran's ally, Hezbollah, which just swept democratic elections in
Lebanon, does not want a war with Israel that would bring devastation
upon the nation it now leads.
</p><p class="">
The Russians don't want a war with Israel or the Americans.
</p><p class="">
But as Putin came to the rescue of a Syria imperiled by ISIS and
al-Qaida, to save his ally from a broad insurgency, he is not likely to
sit impotently and watch endless air and missile strikes on Syria.
</p><p class="">
Trump has said U.S. troops will be getting out of Syria. But Bolton and the generals appear to have walked him back.
</p><p class="">
There are reports we are reinforcing the Kurds in Manbij on the west
bank of the Euphrates, though President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has
demanded that the Kurds vacate all Syrian border towns with Turkey.
</p><p class="">
Americans are also reportedly on the border of Yemen, assisting Saudi
Arabia in locating the launch sites of the rockets being fired at Riyadh
by Houthi rebels in retaliation for the three years of savage Saudi
assault on their country.
</p><p class="">
Meanwhile, the news out of Afghanistan, our point of entry into the Near
East wars almost a generation ago, is almost all bad -- most of it
about terrorist bombings of Afghan troops and civilians.
</p>
Is the foreign policy that America Firsters voted for being replaced by
the Middle East agenda of Bibi and the neoconservatives? So it would
appear.
</span><br class=""></span></div><div class=""><br class=""><span class=""><span class=""></span></span></div><div class=""><div class=""><span class="">A Commentary By Patrick J. Buchanan</span></div><div class=""><span class=""><br class=""></span></div><div class=""><span class=""><a href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/political_commentary/commentary_by_pat_buchanan/are_bibi_and_bolton_in_the_wheel_house_now" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" class="enhancr_card_6308623079">Are Bibi and Bolton in the Wheel House Now?</a></span><div class=""><br class=""></div><div id="ydpb90d1e28enhancr_card_6308623079" class="ydpb90d1e28ymail-preserve-class ydpb90d1e28ymail-preserve-style ydpb90d1e28yahoo-link-enhancr-card ydpb90d1e28yahoo-link-enhancr-not-allow-cover" style="max-width:400px;font-family:"Helvetica Neue", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;" data-url="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/political_commentary/commentary_by_pat_buchanan/are_bibi_and_bolton_in_the_wheel_house_now" data-type="YENHANCER" data-size="MEDIUM" contenteditable="false"><a href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/political_commentary/commentary_by_pat_buchanan/are_bibi_and_bolton_in_the_wheel_house_now" style="text-decoration: none !important;" class="ydpb90d1e28yahoo-enhancr-cardlink" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><table class="ydpb90d1e28yahoo-ignore-table ydpb90d1e28card-wrapper" style="max-width:400px;" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0"><tbody class=""><tr class=""><td width="400" class=""><table class="ydpb90d1e28card ydpb90d1e28yahoo-ignore-table" style="max-width:400px;border-width:1px;border-style:solid;border-color:rgb(224, 228, 233);border-radius:2px;" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0"><tbody class=""><tr class=""><td class=""><table class="ydpb90d1e28yahoo-ignore-table ydpb90d1e28card-info" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); background-repeat: repeat; background-attachment: scroll; background-image: none; background-size: auto auto; position: relative; z-index: 2; width: 100%; max-width: 400px; border-radius: 0px 0px 2px 2px; border-top: 1px solid rgb(224, 228, 233);" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0"><tbody class=""><tr class=""><td style="background-color:#ffffff;padding:16px 0 16px 12px;vertical-align:top;border-radius:0 0 0 2px;" class=""></td><td style="vertical-align:middle;padding:12px 24px 16px 12px;width:99%;font-family:"Helvetica Neue", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;border-radius:0 0 2px 0;" class=""><h2 class="ydpb90d1e28card-title" style="font-size:14px;line-height:19px;margin:0 0 6px 0;font-family:"Helvetica Neue", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;word-break:break-word;color:#26282a;">Are Bibi and Bolton in the Wheel House Now?</h2><p class="ydpb90d1e28card-richinfo-primary" style="font-size:12px;line-height:16px;margin:0 0 4px 0;color:#979ba7;">Rasmussen Reports</p><div style="font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px; margin: 0px; color: rgb(151, 155, 167); word-break: break-word;" class="">Brushing aside the anguished pleas of our NATO allies, President Trump Tuesday contemptuously trashed the Irania...</div></td></tr></tbody></table></td></tr></tbody></table></td></tr></tbody></table></a></div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><br class=""></div></div><span class=""><span class=""><div class=""><span class=""></span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div></span></span><span class=""><span class=""></span><span class=""></span></span></div></div></div></div>_______________________________________________<br class="">Peace-discuss mailing list<br class=""><a href="mailto:Peace-discuss@lists.chambana.net" class="">Peace-discuss@lists.chambana.net</a><br class="">https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace-discuss<br class=""></div></blockquote></div><br class=""></div></body></html>