[Peace-discuss] Obama "more dangerous than his predecessor"

[C. G. Estabrook]

	Meddling
	By: emptywheel
	Saturday June 20, 2009 9:40 am	

As violence intensifies in Iran and Neocons increasingly demagogue in DC, I 
wanted to say a few words about meddling.

The debate, right now, is being framed on whether to meddle or not to meddle.

In the strongest message yet from the U.S. government, the House voted 405-1 
Friday to condemn Tehran's crackdown on demonstrators and the government's 
interference with Internet and cell phone communications.

The resolution was initiated by Republicans as a veiled criticism of President 
Barack Obama, who has been reluctant to criticize Tehran's handling of disputed 
elections that left hard-liner President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in power.

Rep. Mike Pence, who co-sponsored the resolution, said he disagrees with the 
administration that it must not meddle in Iran's affairs.

"When Ronald Reagan went before the Brandenburg Gate, he did not say Mr. 
(Mikhail) Gorbachev, that wall is none of our business," said Pence, R-Ind., of 
President Reagan's famous exhortation to the Soviet leader to "tear down that wall."

What few want to admit openly is that we have already meddled.

On top of our long history of meddling in Iran, we have, in the last three years 
been intentionally meddling, investing in democracy promotion and covert ops to 
bring about precisely what we're seeing today. In 2006, we did this through the 
State Department.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told Congress this week that the 
administration is seeking $75 million in emergency funding to immediately begin 
ratcheting up support for pro-democracy forces inside Iran. Currently, $10 
million was budgeted for such efforts, and little of that money has been spent.

[snip]

The money will go toward boosting broadcasts in Farsi to Iran, support for 
opposition groups, and student exchanges.

After some pushback from Iranian opposition groups the figure was multiplied and 
given to the CIA.

Late last year, Congress agreed to a request from President Bush to fund a major 
escalation of covert operations against Iran, according to current and former 
military, intelligence, and congressional sources. These operations, for which 
the President sought up to four hundred million dollars, were described in a 
Presidential Finding signed by Bush, and are designed to destabilize the 
country’s religious leadership. The covert activities involve support of the 
minority Ahwazi Arab and Baluchi groups and other dissident organizations.

[snip]

“The Finding was focussed on undermining Iran’s nuclear ambitions and trying to 
undermine the government through regime change,” a person familiar with its 
contents said, and involved “working with opposition groups and passing money.”

Though some of this money undoubtedly funded special forces operations, much of 
this 475 million dollars presumably went into the kind of political opposition 
we see in the streets of Iran right now.

And I've got seriously mixed feelings about that. Support for opposition groups 
and soft power is one of the ways we won the Cold War.  I'd much rather fund 
opposition groups than go to war (we ought to, of course, consider choice "C," 
none of the above). But would it have been necessary if we hadn't overthrown 
Mossadeq in 1953, if we haven't been playing this losing chess game for a half 
century?

In any case, as someone who studied the way Czech dissidents used Radio Free 
Europe to broadcast their own writings back into their country leading up to 
1989, I don't know that US support diminishes the authenticity of opposition action.

That said, this whole debate about meddling, right now, is about war, not about 
a peaceable show of democracy. Pence and Cantor and McCain and Lieberman--and 
people like Michael Ledeen, which ought to raise hackles right away--are trying 
to push Obama to say something that will imply a promise to those protesting in 
Iran that if things get violent (which is already happening and was predictable 
even ignoring the possibility that CIA is funding some of this), we'll come in 
to break up the violence. As Hisham Melhem pointed out on Diane Rehm on Friday 
(just after 40:00, but all guests discuss this in a useful way from 33:30 to 
42:00), we have promised democracy activists in Iraq and Hungary in the past, 
yet not delivered.

You don't call on people to rise up and do nothing when they do that, there is a 
moral responsibility.

[snip]

He cannot and should not go beyond that, especially when he cannot delivery.

The Neocons pushing for some stronger words, I think, don't give a damn whether 
Obama can deliver or not. They'd like to put him in a position where he is 
forced to deliver. And that's why their calls for support now are perfectly 
consistent with their recent calls to bomb Iran. Charitably, both positions are 
about regime change no matter what, and honestly, both positions are likely 
about war in Iran.

http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/06/20/meddling/#more-4333

Ricky Baldwin wrote:
> Is there any evidence - I mean evidence - that "we" are involved in the 
> protests in Iran?  Sorry, I'd like to believe it's just an upwelling of the
> people yearning to be free, but unfortunately you have to wonder ...
> 
> Ricky
> 
> "Speak your mind even if your voice shakes." - Maggie Kuhn
> 
> --- On *Thu, 6/18/09, C. G. Estabrook /<galliher at illinois.edu>/* wrote:
> 
> 
> From: C. G. Estabrook <galliher at illinois.edu> Subject: [Peace-discuss] Obama
> "more dangerous than his predecessor" To: "peace-discuss"
> <peace-discuss at anti-war.net> Date: Thursday, June 18, 2009, 9:30 PM
> 
> "...the new Commander in Chief is still not about to radically change, let
> alone reform, the US’s long-standing role in the Middle East ... Obama is
> simply candy-coating the delivery of US imperialism in the region. Given the
> lack of opposition to Obama’s policies back home, it is becoming clear that
> he may well be more dangerous than his predecessor when it comes to the US’s
> motivations internationally.  Had Bush pushed for more military funds at this
>  stage, the antiwar movement ... would have been organizing opposition weeks
> in advance, calling out the neocons for wasting our scarce tax dollars during
> a recession on a never-ending, directionless war. But since Obama’s a
> Democrat, a beloved one at that, mum's the word ... we are in for many more
> years of war and bloodshed, funded by US taxpayers and approved by a 
> Democrat-controlled White House and Congress."
> 
> June 18, 2009 These Are Obama's Wars Now: Democrat Approved By JOSHUA FRANK
> 
> It’s time to toss those Obama t-shirts in the trash.
> ...