Category Archives: Middle East

Arab Neoconservatives For The Missionary Position In Middle-East

Anti-Semitism, Foreign Policy, Iraq, Israel, Middle East, Neoconservatism

There are plenty Arab neoconservatives who want to see the US adopt the missionary position vis-a-vis the countries in the Middle East, on top, of course. Some of these neoconservatives were once close to Bush, but have reinvented themselves as perfectly legitimate (because not Jewish) agitators for US intervention in that part of the world.

Today the affable Zhudi Jassar, a Syrian Arab, was on “Money With Mellisa Francis” (a smart lady who, nevertheless, posts nothing but silly banter on Facebook) to shout down all opposition to striking Syria. Zhudi, understandably, wants to improve the lot of people he cares about back home (home, being Syria).

Fouad Ajami, another Arab neocon, once even called for a Marshal Plan for the Arab countries. Now he contends himself with advocating (eloquently) that the US lead from above, behind, on top; who knows?

The local chalabies, if you will.

Ahmed Chalabi agitated on American TV for American intervention in Iraq. In the ramp-up to war, Chalabi fed Judith Miller,the New York Times’ birdbrain now perching at FoxNews, with the pro-invasion “intelligence” she presented to the public.

When American Jews advocate for Israel by erroneously and cunningly conflating American and Israeli interests—the usual suspects are ready with derogatory comments implicating the Zionist lobby, treason, disloyalty, etc.

The same libertarians, so obsessed with the Jewish lobby, don’t seem as eager to convict influential Arab neoconservatives of similar “sinister” motives when these Arabs urge intervention in the Middle East.

UPDATE III: Shock ‘N Awe For Syria? (Senators Say Onward To Syria)

Foreign Policy, Just War, libertarianism, Media, Middle East, Neoconservatism, Propaganda, Republicans, War

“A non-interventionist does not pretend that he is all knowing,” explained the great, much-missed Ron Paul to the war mongers on CNN (cheerleader Christian Amanpour is seriously aroused at the prospects of shock ‘n awe). Given the US’s dismal record in detecting WMD in faraway lands about which we know NOTHING, Dr. Paul rightly doubts the evidence as to the use of chemical weapons by the Syrian government. Syria is immersed in a civil war, observed Paul, we know nothing about the dynamics there—who’s fighting whom—and Uncle Sam killing more Syrians just because the factions in that country are killing one another will accomplish nothing good.

Van Jones, a former Obama lackey (whom I might just begin to respect on some limited level), seconded Ron Paul’s sentiments. (This just highlights how serious was the failure of Mitt Romney and his surrogates to adopt the libertarian foreign policy so as to galvanize both libertarains and the left to his candidacy.)

Little daylight exists between the Republicans and Democrats in the halls of power. This, in my opinion, will be patently evident in the vote in Congress for Obama’s so-called “strategic” strafing of Syria, as if daisy cutters can be lobbed judiciously.

UPDATE I: Debate, Or Self-Aggrandizing Disquisitions? The “debate” conducted by members of the “Senate Committee Foreign Relations,” better described as the delivery of self-aggrandizing disquisitions, confirms the unanimity of opinion among the people’s so-called representatives—even as most Americans oppose the strike.

If you have any sense, you’ll see that going into Syria, an adventure whose costs our people will shoulder, demonstrates again that is us against them, where them constitutes “The Comitatus—”the sprawling apparatus that encompasses the ministries of government, the lawyers, the diplomats, the adjutants, the messengers, the interpreters, the intellectuals”

Lest you forget, the D.C. hood is also home to your favorite, oh-so gritty media personalities, who gather inside or near the Bubble to reap “the benefits of being at the center of the Imperium.” This means rocking the ship of state just enough to retain street cred with “the folks.”

UPDATE II: ONWARD TO SYRIA. As was predicted in this post, “they” would win; “we” would lose. BBC NEWS is first to report that “US senators’ draft backs limited action.”

The measure to be voted on next week sets a time limit of 60 days on any operation. The draft document also bans the use of any ground forces in Syria.

Secretary of State John Kerry said the US had to act after the Assad regime’s “undeniable” chemical weapons attack.

The Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, John Boehner, endorsed Mr Obama’s call for military action.

According to a copy of the draft resolution obtained by AFP news agency, the senators wish to restrict the operation to a “limited and tailored use of the United States Armed Forces against Syria”.

The resolution states that “the president may extend” a 60-day operation “for a single period of 30 days” if he obtains further specific Congressional approval.

“The authority granted… does not authorise the use of the United States Armed Forces on the ground in Syria for the purpose of combat operations,” the statement added.

FACEBOOK THREAD. It amazes me how immoral people the world over are (US politicians included) about demanding American blood and treasure. As I wrote in The Titan is Tired, “We Americans have our own tyrants to tackle. We no longer want to defend to the death borders not our own—be they in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, [Syria], wherever. And we don’t need our friends looking to us to do so.” And I added, “This column has been consistently polite about—but disinterested in—the putative push for freedom across the Middle East. Dare I say that such a stance, and not slobbering sentimentality, is the proper, libertarian position? I promised, accordingly, that when liberty deprived peoples the world over supported patriots stateside, I’d return the favor. The same goes for Israel.”

UPDATED: Bravo Britain (Neocons For Total War)

Barack Obama, Britain, Foreign Policy, Middle East, Neoconservatism, War

BBC News fails to lead its Internet page with the magnificent news that Parliament, for once, has executed the will of the people, and that the UK will be staying out of Syria.

Instead, the left-liberal interventionist at BBC News (people of Samantha Power’s ilk) have buried the item in an article about “I, Obama” (America’s imperial president), and his administration’s various ahistoric, idiotic pronouncements.

The lead in question reads: “US led by ‘best interests’ on Syria.”

BBC News makes only veiled allusions to the “unexpected outcome in the parliament,” to “British MPs [ruling] out London’s involvement in any US-led strikes against Syria,” and to “British members of [parliament’s rejection] of the principle of military action against Damascus in a 285-272 vote.”

UPDATE (8/30): TOTAL WAR.

“The BBC footage is grisly; the British media have been far more invested in the Syrian civil war than their U.S. colleagues,” confirms Mark Steyn.

This week, David Cameron recalled Parliament from its summer recess to permit the people’s representatives to express their support for the impending attack. Instead, for the first time since the British defeat at Yorktown in 1782, the House of Commons voted to deny Her Majesty’s Government the use of force. Under the Obama “reset,” even the Coalition of the Willing is unwilling. “It’s clear to me that the British Parliament and the British people do not wish to see military action,” said the prime minister. So the Brits are out, and, if he goes at all, Obama will be waging war without even Austin Powers’s Union Jack fig leaf.

Steyn here advances the staid neoconservative tack (in dazzling style, as always). When neocons lose an argument for war, they just regroup and renew their efforts.

“What the British people are sick of, quite reasonably enough,” claims Steyn, “is ineffectual warmongering.”

Yeah, give us total, all-out war and we’ll march in goose step with Chuck Krauthammer.

Actually, re-reading “An Accidental War,” I can’t quite tell what Steyn advocates (all in dazzling style, of course).

UPDATE II: So Said Ban Ki- Moon (Saving Presidential Face)

Barack Obama, Foreign Policy, Middle East, Neoconservatism, UN, War

Secretary of State John Kerry has “watched the videos — the videos that anybody can watch in the social media,” and based on “the videos,” he will likely invade Syria. Kerry admitted, in his address today, that his sources are not quite sure who’s doing what to whom in Syria, but meddle he and Obama must.

Ban Ki- moon said last week, the U.N. investigation will not determine who used these chemical weapons, only whether such weapons were used, a judgement that is already clear to the world.

The US government has no constitutional authority to police the world. The castrates in Congress ought to have a say, for what that’s worth, in the decisions of the imperial president. And as Patrick J. Buchanan put it,:

… who deputized the United States to walk the streets of the world pistol-whipping bad actors? Where does our imperial president come off drawing “red lines” and ordering nations not to cross them?

Neither the Security Council nor Congress nor NATO nor the Arab League has authorized war on Syria.

Who made Barack Obama the Wyatt Earp of the Global Village?

Moreover, where is the evidence that WMDs were used and that it had to be Assad who ordered them? Such an attack makes no sense.

Firing a few shells of gas at Syrian civilians was not going to advance Assad’s cause but, rather, was certain to bring universal condemnation on his regime and deal cards to the War Party, which wants a U.S. war on Syria as the back door to war on Iran.

Why did the United States so swiftly dismiss Assad’s offer to have U.N. inspectors – already in Damascus investigating old charges he or the rebels used poison gas – go to the site of the latest incident?

Do we not want to know the truth?

Are we fearful the facts may turn out, as did the facts on the ground in Iraq, to contradict our latest claims about WMDs? Are we afraid that it was rebel elements or rogue Syrian soldiers who fired the gas shells to stampede us into fighting this war?

UPDATE (B/27): Saving Presidential Face. The ponce-in-chief drew a red line in the sand; he ran his mouth off, as an anti-interventionist on CNN suggested. So now the US must make even more of a mess of Syria, if that’s possible, so as to save presidential face.

UPDATE II: “In an amazing and unsettling coincidence,” quips my former colleague Vox Day, “it seems the recent massacre in Syria, which we are supposed to believe was committed by the Assad regime just as it had taken control of the civil war …” (The rest of the sentence is not clear to me.)

What’s interesting is that Assad might have been winning, which means a heavy-handed calm might have been restored to that country soon.