[This analysis was written for the Unz Review]

We can all thank God for the fact that the AngloZionists did not launch a war on the DPRK, that no Ukronazi attack on the Donbass took place during the World Cup in Russia and that the leaders of the Empire have apparently have given up on their plans to launch a reconquista of Syria.  However, each of these retreats from their hysterical rhetoric has only made the Neocons more frustrated and determined to show the planet that they are still The Hegemon who cannot be disobeyed with impunity. As I wrote after the failed US cruise missile strike on Syria this spring, “each click brings us closer to the bang“.  In the immortal words of Michael Ledeen, “Every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business“.  The obvious problem is that there are no “small crappy little countries” left out there, and that those who are currently the object of the Empire’s ire are neither small nor crappy.

Having now shown several times that for all its hysterical barking the Empire has to back down when the opponent does not cower away in fear, the Empire is now in desperate need to prove it’s “uniqueness” and (racial?) superiority.   The obvious target of the AngloZionist wrath is Iran.  In fact, Iran has been in the cross-hairs of the Empire ever since the people of Iran dared to show the AngloZionists to the door and, even worse, succeed in creating their own, national and Islamic democracy.  To punish Iran, the US, the USSR, France and all the other “democratic” countries unleashed their puppet (Saddam Hussein) and gave him full military support, and yet the Iranians still prevailed, albeit at a terrible cost.  That Iranian ability to prevail in the most terrible circumstances is also the most likely explanation for why there has not been an overt attack on Iran for the past four decades (there have, of course, there has been plenty of covert attacks during all these years).

I won’t list all the recent AngloZionist threats against Iran – we all know about them.  The bottom line is this: the US, Israel and the KSA are, yet again, working hand in hand to set the stage for a major war under what we could call the “Skripal-case rules of evidence” aka “highly likely“.  And yet,  in spite of all this saber-rattling, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has summed up Iran’s stance in the following words “there will be no war and no negotiations“.

First, let’s first look at Iranian rationale for “no negotiations”

The obvious: “no negotiations”

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has been very clear in his explanations for why negotiating with the USA makes no sense.  On his Twitter account he wrote:

The Iranian Supreme Leader even posted a special graphic summary to summarize and explain the Iranian position:

Finally, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reiterated his fundamental approach towards the AngloZionist Empire:

The contrast between the kindergarten-level low-IQ bumbling hot air and threats coming out of the White House and the words of Ali Khamenei could not be greater, especially if we compare the words the two leaders decided to post all in caps;

Trump: To Iranian President Rouhani: NEVER, EVER THREATEN THE UNITED STATES AGAIN OR YOU WILL SUFFER CONSEQUENCES THE LIKES OF WHICH FEW THROUGHOUT HISTORY HAVE EVER SUFFERED BEFORE. WE ARE NO LONGER A COUNTRY THAT WILL STAND FOR YOUR DEMENTED WORDS OF VIOLENCE & DEATH. BE CAUTIOUS!

Khamenei: THERE WILL BE NO WAR, NOR WILL WE NEGOTIATE WITH THE U.S..

Notice first that in his typical ignorance, Trump fails to realize that Hassan Rouhani is only the President of Iran and that threatening him makes absolutely no sense since he does not make national security decisions, which is the function of the Supreme Leader.  Had Trump taken the time to at the very least check with Wikipedia he would have understood that the Iranian President “carries out the decrees, and answers to the Supreme Leader of Iran, who functions as the country’s head of state“.  It is no wonder that Trump’s infantile threats instantly turned into an Internet meme!

In contrast, Khamenei did not even bother to address Trump by name but, instead, announced his strategy to the whole world.

Trump’s ALL IN CAPS meme

Of course, issuing  ALL IN CAPS threats just to be treated with utter contempt by the people you are trying to hard to bully and having your words become a cause of laughter on the Internet will only further enrage Trump and his supporters.  When you are desperately trying to show the world how tough and scary you are, there is nothing more humiliating as being treated like some stupid kid.  Therein also lies the biggest danger: such derision could force Trump and the Neocons who run him to do something desperate to prove to the word that their “red button” is still bigger than everybody else’s.

It is important to note here that making negotiations impossible is something the Trump administration seems to have adopted as a policy.  This is best illustrated by the conditions attached to the latest sanctions against Russia which, essentially, demand that Russia admit poisoning the Skripals.  In fact, all the western demands towards Russia (admitting that Russia is guilty for the Skripal case, that Russia shot down MH-17, that Russia hand over Crimea to the Ukronazis, etc.) are carefully crafted to make absolutely sure that Russia will not negotiate.  The sames, of course, goes for the ridiculous Pompeo demands towards the DPRK (including handing over to the USA 60 to 70 percent of its nukes within six to eight months; no wonder the North Koreans denounced a “gangster-like” attitude) or the latest US grandstanding towards Turkey.  Sadly, but the Neocon run media has successfully imposed the notion that negotiations are either a sign of weakness, or treason, or both.  Thus to be “patriotic” and “strong” no US official can afford to be caught red-handed negotiating with the enemy of the day.

Under these conditions, why would anybody want to negotiate with the US?

Frankly, the “no negotiations” approach makes perfectly good sense, and while the Iranians are the only ones who have openly said so, the Russians have hinted to the same on many occasions (see their words about the US being “non-agreement capable” or about US diplomats confusing Austria and Australia).  To any objective observer it should by now be completely obvious by now that a) the US cannot negotiate (due to intellectual, cultural and political limitations) and b) the US has no desire to negotiate.  This is, of course, a highly undesirable and dangerous situation, but it would only make things worse to pretend that civilized negotiations with the USA are possible.

So, if both sides agree on “no negotiations”, what about war?

The not so obvious: No war?

This is where Ali Khamenei’s stance is more puzzling, at least to me: when he says that there will be no war, does he mean that the US threats are not credible or does he mean that Iran has the means to deter a US attack?  His words make it sound like he is quite certain that there will be no war.  How can he be so sure?  I am especially amazed by the apparent Iranian confidence that the AngloZionists will not attack them when I compare it with the obvious Russian policy of actively preparing for war since at least 2014 (also see here, here, here, here, here and here).  Of course, Iran has been preparing for war with the USA since almost 40 years now whereas the Russians only woke up to reality comparatively recently.  I see several potential explanations for Ali Khamenei’s statement (there might be more, of course):

  • Political: Iran is trying to demonstrate that it will do everything possible to avoid a war so that if a war should break out, it would be absolutely clear to everybody that Iran did not want it, Iran did not trigger it and the responsibility for the consequences fall entirely and solely upon the US and Israel.
  • Deception: Iran knows that a war is coming but is trying to pretend like it won’t to better conceal the war preparations and lure the Empire into a sense of complacency resulting into an ineffective/costly attack.
  • Intelligence: the Iranians might have intelligence indicating to them that all the US threats are just hot air spewed in order to appease the Israel Lobby and to look “patriotic” in preparation for the upcoming elections this Fall.
  • Miscalculation: the Iranians might underestimate the level of hubris, arrogance and stupidity of the US leadership and mistakenly conclude that since an attack on Iran makes no sense and the US cannot “win”, such an attack will therefore not happen.

Personally, every time I think of a possible US attack on Iran I think of the Israeli attack on Lebanon in 2006 which happened in spite of the fact that it was plainly visible to everybody that the Israelis were waltzing straight into a conflict which they could not win and which, in fact, resulted into one of the most abjects defeats in military history.  Conversely, while Hezbollah did win a truly historical victory, it also remains a fact that Hezbollah leaders did not expect the Israelis to launch a full-scale ground offensive.  Finally, history is full of examples of wars which were started in spite of all objective factors indicating that they would end up in disaster.

It seems to me that in purely military terms (not in political ones!) Israel could be seen as a stand-in for the USA and Hezbollah as a stand-in for Iran and that the outcome of any future US-Iranian war will be very similar to the outcome of the war in 2006, albeit on a much larger (and bloodier) scale.  I am confident that the folks in the Pentagon realize that, but what about their Neocon bosses – do they even care about Iranian or, for that matter, US casualties?  I highly doubt it: all they care about is their power and messianic ideology.

If it weren’t for it’s nuclear arsenal, the USA could be dismissed as a particularly obnoxious country lead by ignorant leaders with bloated and mostly ineffective armed forces.  Alas, the US nuclear arsenal is very real (and still very capable) and we know that top-level US Neocons have already considered using tactical nuclear weapons against a non-nuclear state’s conventional force in the past.  In a twisted way, this makes sense: if you are a megalomaniac infused with a sense of messianic superiority then international or even civilizational norms of behavior are of no interest (or even relevance) to you.  Listening to US Presidents, pretty much all of them (but especially Obama and Trump) it is pretty clear that these folks consider themselves to be the Kulturträger and the Herrenvolk of the 21st century and their messianism is in no way less delusional than the one of their Nazi predecessors (or, for that matter, the one of the Popes of the past 1000 years).  And why would the people who nuked two Japanese cities under the (entirely fallacious) pretext of “shortening the war” (almost a humanitarian operation!) not do the same thing in Iran?

Of sure, they probably realize that using nukes will result in a massive political backlash, but they are confident that no matter what happens in the end, they will always be able to say “screw you!” to the rest of the planet.  After all, this is something which Israel and the USA have been doing with almost total inpunity for decades already – why would they stop now?  As for the fact that the Persian people have been dealing with all kinds of invaders since no less than 2500 years will not stop the AngloZionists from trying to crush them.  After all, having laid waste to a country which many see as the cradle of civilization, Iraq, why not do the same thing to Iran?  Iraq, Iran – what’s the difference, they are all just “sand niggers” and our red button is bigger than theirs, right?

Standing up to Shaytân-e Bozorg (almost alone?)

It would be a big mistake to dismiss the USA because of its incapable military or moral bankruptcy.  The truth is that in terms of aggregate national power, the USA still remains the most powerful country on the planet (even if we don’t include nuclear weapons).  Anyone doubting that needs to look how how the currencies of the countries the US is singles out for attack suddenly began slipping: the Russian ruble (which has since bounced back), the Iranian rial, the Venezuelan bolivar, the Turkish lira, etc.) or how little time it took Trump to bring the (admittedly spineless) Europeans to heel.  As for Russia, for all her military might, she remains only a semi-sovereign country in which the pro-US/pro-Israeli “Atlantic Integrationists” continue to try to sabotage (often successfully) everything Putin and his supporters are doing.  I would not place big hopes in China either, especially considering the lack of meaningful Chinese action in Syria where Russia and Iran did all the heavy lifting.  Sadly, but the only ally Iran can truly count on is Hezbollah.  And while Hezbollah is considered a “non-state actor”, it has a formidable capability to strike at the USA’s colonial masters, especially in terms of missiles.  This will not protect Iran, but it could serve as a very real deterrent to the Israelis, especially since Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah he has made it clear that Hezbollah more than capable of taking on Israel.  For the time being, the Israelis are already preparing for a re-match against Hezbollah and they are massing forces in the north to prepare for a war against Hezbollah.

Does that look to you like there will be no war against Iran?

I hope so.  But to me it very much looks like an attack is pretty much inevitable.  I have been predicting such an attack since 2007 and, so far, I have been completely wrong (and thank God for that!).  The very first article I ever wrote for my blog was entitled “Where the Empire meets to plan the next war” ended with the following words:

So count with yet another imperial war of aggression, a barrel of crude at over 100$ and oil shortages, rocketing inflation, job losses, a stagnant real estate market and stock exchange, and a national debt and government deficit which would make even Reagan proud. And plenty of dead Americans (nevermind the Iranians, right?).  But don’t worry: there will still be a huge supply of Chinese-made US flags to wave!

And yet, 11 years later, the AngloZionist attack which looked so imminent in 2007 has not happened yet.  Could it be that this time again an attack on Iran can be avoided?  Ayatollah Ali Khamenei appears to be very confident that it will not happen.  I am not so sure, but I fervently hope that he is right.

The Saker