The Iran Crisis and Israeli Nukes

Yesterday upon the stair I met a man who wasn’t there He wasn’t there again today Oh, how I wish he’d go away – William Hughes Mearns, 1899 One of the most uncommented on ironies today…

The Turkish Riddle

In the tea houses of Istanbul the mood is generally optimistic as customers listen to the news of the European economic crisis. “Turkey doesn’t need Europe,” says one tea drinker.  “Look at Greece – it…

«Shoot First, Ask Questions Later»

The news of a plea deal for US Marine squad leader Frank Wuterich charged in connection with the killing of 24 Iraqi civilians in 2005 neither caused a sensation nor even grabbed the headlines for…

The War on Iran is Already Underway

If the conflict with Iran takes the shape of a protracted bombing campaign and comes as a prologue to the occupation of the country, the US will need to strengthen its positions in adjacent regions, meaning that Washington will be trying to draw the Caucasian republics (Georgia, Azerbaijan) and those of Central Asia into the orbit of its policy and thus tightening the “Anaconda loop” around Russia. The opposition mounted to the plans underlying the military scenario by China, Russia, and India seems to hold the promise of an alliance of countries seeking to tame US hegemony and raging unilateralism. The morally charged concepts of humanitarian interventions and war on terror had just as well been invoked to legitimize downright aggressions against Yugoslavia, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Matthew H. Kroenig from the Council on Foreign Relations recently went so far as to warn that Iran would some day pass its nuclear technologies to Venezuela. The motivation must be to somehow bundle all critics of the US foreign policy.

The Human Rights “Success” In Libya

It quickly became ossified conventional wisdom that NATO’s war in Libya to aid rebel factions in overthrowing Moammar Gaddafi was a clear human rights victory. But the reality in post-Gaddafi Libya has long been in…