‘Obama will have to back Iran strike to get re-elected’

After the fiascos of Iraq and Afghanistan, America’s next catastrophic mistake is likely to be a war with Iran, former US Attorney General, lawyer and peace activist Ramsey Clark has told RT in an exclusive interview.

Clark believes Israel is pressing the US to make an urgent assault on Iran simply because it wants the operation executed before presidential elections in America.

The fact that the Obama administration is resisting does not mean they are favoring Iran in any way – the issue has simply become “a domestic political matter,” Clark said.

Clark agrees that America won’t stand for yet another war, but says that people “do crazy things, that’s why the world is such a mess.”

It is not Obama’s choice to side with Israel for a pre-emptive strike on Iran. However Ramsey Clark believes that Obama will have to support the military operation against Iran for fear that “if he does not join Israel, that will be too costly at election, and he will lose it.”

“You have to see the American system – they [the Obama team] are nervous,” explains the peace activist. “If he [Obama] loses this election, he is a failed president. All his major decisions will be primarily conditioned by how they impact on the upcoming election.”

Ramsey Clark has put partial blame for the murder of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi on the American people who “let their government do it.”

Naturally, the American government is not in the habit of consulting the public before taking important foreign policy decisions.

“I would call it manipulation. The government tries to manipulate public opinion to support its policy, whatever it is, particularly looking towards a military action,” Ramsey Clark said, adding that the American public is not concerned about the wider world, except if it is about to take “a vacation trip or something like that.”

“All those countries have been victims of American aggression because of US geopolitical and economic interests,” Ramsey Clark said. “Our foreign policy is overwhelmingly driven by the economic power the US has,” he added, comparing military operations to “business exportation.”

‘Assad is a gentle person’

Asked about the situation in Syria, Ramsey Clark confirmed that “Syria is a part of the effort to eliminate every government independent of US control.” Brutal regimes are perfectly acceptable, if they are dominated by the US.

In any case, the outcome will be very tough for the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, predicts Clark.

”I don’t know whether he will make it or not,” he admitted.

“Right now he tries to save his country as he sees it. That is a rough business,” Clark said, calling Assad “a gentle person.”

Speaking on domestic policies in the US, Ramsey Clark defined America as a “military-dominated society and the people are unaware of it.”

In the opinion of Clark, who has been at the center of American politics for half a century, the US has become much stronger on a federal level, while the states have become less powerful.

Ramsey Clark believes the Occupy Wall Street movement has “enormous potential” if it tries hard to define its objectives and become less selfish by pursuing more general interests, because simply wanting to have a bigger stake in the economy is a selfish interest.

US to pump weapons into Syrian war zone!

The White House and US State Department are considering arming Syria's rebels, claiming ongoing reports of government crackdowns would legitimize their actions. But it remains unclear what form the assistance would take.
Both US bodies made statements yesterday saying that new tactics would have to be adopted in order to curtail Regime forces’ bombardment of the city of Homs.
White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said that the US did not want to “take actions that would lead to the further militarization of Syria,” while at the same time signaling that “additional measures” would have to be adopted if the international community fails to reach an agreement on a resolution.
The press secretary did not elaborate as to the nature of these so-called “additional measures.”
State department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland echoed these sentiments, saying that if Assad did not "yield to the pressure that we are all bringing to bear, we may have to consider additional measures.” She then said that no possibilities “had been taken off the table.”
The statements hint at a shift in US policy where before the Obama administration had categorically ruled out the possibility of military aid.
There is a strong contingent in the US congress pushing for the arming of the Syrian opposition, with Senator John McCain once again calling for military aid on Monday, although he emphasized that the US should not do so directly.
Meanwhile, the opposition Syrian National Council (SNC) said on Wednesday it was coming to the view that military intervention is the only solution to the nearly year-old crisis that has killed thousands in Syria.
"We are really close to seeing this military intervention as the only solution. There are two evils, military intervention or protracted civil war," Basma Kodmani, a senior SNC official, told a press conference in Paris.
However, General Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the US joint chief of staff warned against support until US intelligence had more information on the opposition forces at work in Syria.
"I think it's premature to take a decision to arm the opposition movement in Syria, because I would challenge anyone to clearly identify for me the opposition movement in Syria at this point," he said to news agency CNN.
RT’s Gayane Chichakyan investigated the possible consequences of the US push for regime change in an interview with former US presidential candidate Pat Buchanan. He cited the possibility that the addition of military aid could be the catalyst that pushes Syria into chaos.
“I’m against putting weapons in and aiding the anti-Assad resistance, because an all-out war there could be a disaster that leads to a failed state there,” Buchanan told Chichakyan.
Friends or foes of Syria?
The US and other UN members are due to meet in Tunisia on Friday in a Friends of Syria group forum. The group is pushing for the removal of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and representatives of the Syrian opposition will be in attendance at the meeting. The possibility of military intervention is unlikely to be discussed with humanitarian aid and possible sanctions on Damascus taking central stage at the forum.
Russia will not attend the meeting as it believes the Friends of Syria group to be biased in favor of the opposition. Aleksey Pushkov, head of the Foreign Affairs Committee in Russia's Lower House of Parliament explained Russia’s stance on the meeting to RT.
“The sole purpose of that conference is not to find a way out of the current situation, but to promote the idea that the conflict can only be resolved if Assad leaves,” said Pushkov.
He went on to say he had met with President Assad and representatives of two opposition organizations and that he did not get the impression that it was “the people vs. Assad in this conflict”.
“A faction of the people is opposing the regime, while another part supports Mr. Assad, while yet another faction does not want Syria to fall into chaos,” Pushkov said.
China’s presence at the Friends of Syria forum is also unconfirmed. The Asian nation vetoed a previous Security Council resolution on the Syrian conflict along with Russia on the basis it was unbalanced.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said that Beijing was “currently researching the function, mechanism and other aspects of the meeting.”

America’s crusade ‘utterly utopian’ - Pat Buchanan

Islamic wars have brought questionable benefit to the US over the last 20 years, former US presidential advisor Pat Buchanan, author of Suicide of a Superpower, shared with RT.
A new war in the Middle East will be a disaster for the US and for the world economy, he says.
“I opposed the Desert Storm operation in 1991 cleaning Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait because, I said, ‘This would only be the first Arab-American war.’”
Looking at the number of conflicts in the Islam world that America is taking part in now, one cannot but admit that Buchanan was right 20 years ago.
“You cannot replicate the Middle West in the Middle East,” Pat Buchanan concluded.
From the time of the Cold War the US has military bases all over the world.
Today, running a budget deficit of 10 per cent of its GDP, America simply cannot afford to continue “to carry this enormous burden, defending 40 or 50 countries around the world,” Buchanan says, “We have to bring troops home.”
Getting rid of these bases essentially means dismantling the American Empire to help the US survive beyond 2025.
America’s crusade under the banner of ending tyranny in the world is “utterly utopian”.
“What the US should do in its foreign policy is to build a defense establishment strong enough to protect our vital interests and vital allies,” he says. “When problem arises in Zimbabwe or somewhere else – the people there have got to deal with their own problems.”
Pat Buchanan truly believes that, as long as those regimes do not threaten America’s vital interests or threaten and kill Americans, “The fact that they rule or misrule certain countries is none of our business.”
Pat Buchanan believes no American wants to intervene in Syria “they don’t understand anything about.”
US has no vital interests in Syria
Speaking about the deadlock situation in Syria, the author shared that since President Bashar Assad was ruthless in suppressing the uprising in the country – he had better go and let the country have a more democratic government.
Actually, the US does not have vital interests in Syria, Pat Buchanan told RT.
The real Syrian question is: if the Assad regime is overthrown, “who comes to power in Damascus?” questions Buchanan.
The Muslim Brotherhood and Al-Qaeda that are infiltrating into Syria will bring nothing good in the region for the US.
“We’ve got to ask ourselves: is the devil we know preferable to the devil we don’t know?”
Al-Qaeda is doing its best and it always finds ‘failed states’ like Yemen, Somalia and Afghanistan under the Taliban to prey on it and civil war in Syria seems to be a good environment for terrorists.
According to Buchanan, Syria is a potential disaster where the world might have a proxy war between Sunni and Shia Muslims, with ethnic conflicts Kurds and Druze on the way.
“This is why I’m against putting weapons and aiding the anti-Assad resistance” Buchanan said, explaining that taking sides in the conflict might end up with failed state in Syria.
“There are a number of people that want a war in Iran”
Commenting on the Iranian nuclear program, Pat Buchanan said there are neo-cons and Israel lobby politicians in the US that support Tel Aviv’s wishes for America to smash Iranian nuclear facilities.

“There are many Americans that generally believe that Iran is moving toward a nuclear weapon and, if it is, they would favor a military action to prevent it,” he said, though he refused to acknowledge that Iran is a nuclear threat.
Pat Buchanan recalled the Cuban missile crisis, when the US and the USSR had thousands of weapons “to destroy each other in the afternoon” and that was “genuinely terrifying.”
Today’s Iran has neither the nuclear bomb, nor the means of delivering it.
“Iran does not frighten me and it should not frighten the American people,” Buchanan declared, while “Israelis have 300 atomic bombs. Who presents the existential threat to whom?”
But Iran’s ayatollahs and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad “always help hawks with some insane statements every couple of months” and if Iran destroys someone the US will have to get on the case, said Buchanan.

Pakistan-Iran-Afghan talks ‘a message of defiance’ to the US

With trilateral talks between the leaders of Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan underway in Islamabad, one question arising is what each side has to gain. Political analyst Ahmed Quraishi says Pakistan is sending a message of defiance to the US.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Afghan President Hamid Karzai arrived in Pakistan for a trilateral summit aimed at addressing how Islamabad should facilitate negotiations between Afghanistan and the Taliban. Many see the move as a defiance of US will by two traditional American allies – Pakistan and Afghanistan – who are now seeking to include Iran, a stated adversary of the US, into the negotiation process.
Ahmed Quraishi, the President of the Paknationalists Forum, believes each side is pursuing its own goals.
“Washington considers Iran as some sort of an enemy,” he told RT, “and Pakistan is sending a message that Pakistani policy – for quite some time, actually – would be independent and that Pakistan would pursue its interest even if those interests do not fall within the larger, strategic plan of the United States in the region.”
Quraishi noted that Iran timed the visit specifically because of rising fears brought on by war rhetoric coming from the US and its allies. He noted that Iran’s principal aim was to ensure that it would not become encircled by Washington's allies.
“They’re worried about the rhetoric and drums of war – the psychological warfare, and I think they’re very keen to ensure that at least two neighbors – Pakistan and Turkey – will not join the pro-US encirclement of Iran,” Quraishi noted. “Pakistan continues to be the weak link because there are people within the Pakistani power structure who would probably support US use of Pakistani territory against Iran.”
As for Afghanistan, Quraishi said the country’s leadership isn’t keen on pursuing the American method of fighting the Taliban, and is now willing to include the Taliban in the national power structure. That, according to Quraishi, is Karzai’s main goal in Pakistan
“He’s meeting with key Pakistani political and religious leaders, Islamic leaders who have maintained traditionally very close ties to the Afghan Taliban and other Afghan resistance groups,” he remarked. This move, Quraishi says, is a major shift for Afghanistan, as it had previously shunned those groups.
The analyst said he does not believe President Karzai is really thinking of fighting the Afghan Taliban, but that he is looking toward integrating them and opening his own direct talks. "And I think everybody is,” he added.