by Soraya Sepahpour Ulrich
Some final thoughts – the day after
Not the movie about a fictional war between NATO forces and the Warsaw Pact and a nuclear exchange between the United States and the Soviet Union, but the Day After the Implementation Deal of the Iran Nuclear Deal.
Although I said and wrote repeatedly in the past that the US stance toward Iran will not change, by now it should be obvious to all that this is the case. America “thanked” Iran by imposing further sanctions on Iran for its defense capabilities – the ballistic missiles.
If we all share a common dream of some balance in this world, which would hopefully lead to more security for all, here is what must happen. With the nuclear-related UNSC sanctions against Iran lifted, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SC)) must IMMEDIATELY include Iran in the SCO as a full member. The alternative is bleak.
While some Iranian ‘reformists’ have written that ‘America needs Iran’, the truth of the matter is a more just and balanced world needs Iran, foremost Russia and China. The United States has not abandoned its aspirations of becoming a global hegemon. The US has never sought peace. Peace and expansion/domination are incompatible. Only last month it was revealed that Pentagon was planning on more ‘enduring bases’ around the world’s most volatile regions (Pentagon Seeks to Knit Foreign Bases Into ISIS-Foiling Network, NYT, Dec. 10, 2015 ).
In 1941, Isaiah Bowman, a key figure in the Council on Foreign Relations wrote: “The measure of our victory will be the measure of our domination after victory.” True to this, after the Cold War, Prominent Americans such as Wolfowitz and Rustow opined that it was important to contain Russia (the Heartland – Defense Planning Guideline 1992, 1993). It was felt that the domination of the Heartland (Eastern Europe, Russia, Central Asia) would lead to the domination of the World. Events in the past several years confirm the implementation stages of the plan.
As recently as April, 2015, during a speech at the Army War College Strategy Conference, Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work elaborated on how the Pentagon plans to counter the three types of wars supposedly being waged by Iran, Russia, and China. These goals have been facilitated with the Nuclear Deal. Let us consider.
The deal buys America time. Iran’s strength has been its ability to retaliate to any attack by closing down the Strait of Hormuz. Given that 17 million barrels of oil a day, or 35% of the world’s seaborne oil exports go through the Strait of Hormuz, incidents in the Strait would be fatal for the world economy. Enter Nigeria (West Africa) and Yemen.
In 1998, Clinton’s national security agenda made it clear that unhampered access to Nigerian oil and other vital resources was a key US policy. In early 2000s, Chatham House was one of the publications that determined African oil would be a good alternate to Persian Gulf oil IN CASE OF OIL DISRUPTION.This followed a strategy paper for US to move toward African oil. Push for African oil was on Dick Cheney’s desk on May 31, 2000. In 2002, the Israeli based IASPS suggested America push toward African oil. In the same year Boko Haram was ‘founded’.
In 2007, AFRICOM helped consolidate this push into the region. The 2011, a publication titled: “Globalizing West African Oil: US ‘energy security’ and the global economy” outlined ‘US positioning itself to use military force to ensure African oil continued to flow to the United States’. This was but one strategy to supply oil in addition to or as an alternate to the passage of oil through the Strait of Hormuz.
Enter Yemen. To understand the geopolitics of the Saudi war against Yemen, it is imperative to read “The Geopolitics Behind the War in Yemen: The Start of a New Front against Iran” written by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya. Nazemroaya correctly states: “[T] he US wants to make sure that it could control the Bab Al-Mandeb, the Gulf of Aden, and the Socotra Islands. The Bab Al-Mandeb it is an important strategic chokepoint for international maritime trade and energy shipments that connects the Persian Gulf via the Indian Ocean with the Mediterranean Sea via the Red Sea. It is just as important as the Suez Canal for the maritime shipping lanes and trade between Africa, Asia, and Europe.”
In 2012, several alternate routes to Strait of Hormuz were identified which at the time of the report were considered to be limited in capacity and more expensive. However, collectively, the West African oil and control of Bab Al-Mandeb would diminish the strategic importance of the Strait of Hormuz in case of war.
A very important consideration is the stark fact that the fallout from bombing an operating uranium enrichment facility with several hundred kilograms of enriched uranium would create an environmental catastrophe which would dwarf all nuclear accidents to date killing millions of people. The Iran Nuclear Deal greatly reduces the scope of the ensuing disaster should such steps be taken.
All this is of course speculation. There is no doubt that the primary goal of the United States is to install a Washington friendly compliant regime in Iran. But what if it fails? Has Washington spent billions of dollars to undermine and destroy the Iranian revolution, decades in demonizing the people only to change its mind? Isn’t this the same scenario we hoped would be the outcome of the end of the Cold War only to learn that Washington continued a covert war against Russia?
Thank you. I guess it takes a woman to cut through the BS to the truth. Womem have always had the most to lose from men’s inability to govern with love. Remember? Women and children first.
Unless we take the patrix blinders off our eyes and the male armor from our hearts, and regain our womamly amor, we can kiss our assets good-by. And there’s no pie in the sky for our killery here below.
Don’t be fooled. Patrix men have turned women into femen. Look past the body to the energetics.
Russia better look to Mother Russia as far as values and realize the fathers never finished their task of restoring the earth to its original plan. The Fall of Man is precisely that. I’m no feminist but I can tell a feman from a man and a man from a male.
removed. No attacking/baiting other commentersMod TR .lol
Sophy Co show today along same lines.removed – please stop the tone of your post – if you carry on – your posts will go to the trash.
You make no sense, countries with patriarchy & their original non abrahamic values are fine.
Countries with abrahamic values, are moving along the same direction as Abraham :
Ie marrying their sisters & then pimping them.
Having women secure the household & children, while men secure the environment makes sense.
Some cuck fantasy where no one knows who his father is, because females sleep freely with whoever furthers the Jewish agenda. All identities except their’s destroyed.
It’s not coincidence that Israel follows Saudi around. Issac was younger brother to Ishmael..
We may call our motherland Bharat Mata, but the name Bharat is of the first Chakrvartin or emperor a Ksytria of the lunar dynasty.
All Abrahamisms are imbalanced, Islam too much towards the male. Your what it means religion of love christianity too much towards the female.
Religion of peace & love have simple formula :
Kill all those who don’t love/agree with you & there will be love & peace. xD
Your descendents will all be Sikhs, remember that.
Patriarchy might have been the first step by the Controllers to divide and conquer, which was followed, over the centuries and millennia, by zillions of similar ugly schemes to undermine and turn nonfunctional man’s higher chakras.
The bad news is: the Parasites were hugely successful in keeping human’s potential exactly that – a forever unexpressed potential.
And the good news? Human DNA is wired in such a way, that if the will is there, the trust and the dedication, anyone’s DNA can light up instantly in never before experienced higher configurations.
All it needs is the ‘spiritual practice’ of detox, deconditioning, non-identification.
I don’t know about Rouhani, but it seems Khamenei understands the threat that the US poses to Iran. Its so true that the world needs a strong and independent Iran, standing side to side with Russia and China. I’m sure SCO will do the necessary as both Putin and Xi understand what is at stake.
I hope we see more of Ms Sepahpour-Ulrich’s posts here in the Saker’s Vineyard.
“I hope we see more of Ms Sepahpour-Ulrich’s posts here in the Saker’s Vineyard”
Fully agree!
Ms. Ulrich makes excellent points. I personally don’t believe that the US is on its way in developing a true relationship with Iran. I hope the US stands by its commitment in implementing the JCPOA – Iran has given in tremendously when in fact it didn’t need to as a signatory to the NPT. Looking at all those countries who appeased the US we now see what destiny was awaiting for them.
I agree that Iran should definitely join the SCO as a permanent member – Iran needs to be protected in case of an attack.
China and Russia must work together to ensure that Iran is brought into the SCO in the shortest possible time. With UN sanctions now gone- so is the excuse to keep Iran out of the SCO.
If Pakistan and India can be admitted then so should Iran be admitted.
Membership in the SCO will help to bolster Iran’s international credentials and serve as a slap in the face to the US and Israel.
The Chinese president is due in Tehran shortly and I am expecting some ambitious announcement to be made as it relates to Iran and China deepening their bilateral relationship ……
Thank you very much for your article.
You are very right about West Africa – apart from Boko Haram also look at the outbreak of Ebola (never been in that region – ever – Russia has scotched those plans with their new vaccine) and the sudden surge in attacks in several countries simultanously – esp. hotels/foreigners – obviously to help justify “going in”. The destruction of Libya in the North to allow terrorists and arms to flow south. There is a lot of oil and gas in that whole region hence the removal of Laurent Gbagbo in Ivory Coast who was turning to – Russia and China. The US/France put in their puppet and Gbagbo and his wife are locked away in the Hague. Gaddafi dead and Libya destroyed. Look at all the African countries who supposedly joined the Saudi coalition.
Yemen destroyed whilst the Saudi’s get their stooges Sudan, Somalia, Dijibouti to end diplomatic relations with Iran – look where those 3 countries are. Kenya is under constant pressure too. There is a very much bigger picture here.
In regard to the SCO – Russia and China were waiting for the sanctions to be lifted. Iran can now become a full member – they better hurry though.
Thanks for this high-quality analysis Soraya.
I’ve read Rouhani does not envisage much of a trade role for the US: Iran appears to be looking to the EU, Russian and China.
So this latest (and entirely predictable) round of sanctions looks to be ‘signalling
‘ rather than substantive. Obviously at Israeli instigation.
A more in-depth analysis of the shift to Nigeria (perhaps Saudi is being thrown under the bus?)
would be greatly appreciated: this angle is not being explored enough. Eg Is Israel planning to take over Saudi oil production while the Houthis do the hard work?
Would love to know what Iranian Intel suspects.
eimar, you are quite correct. The US Treasury Department at its upper levels, and the bullying thugs of the sanctions apparatus in particular, is dominated by Zionazi Jews. They were the vermin who double-crossed Iran when the sanctions were supposed to omit medicines, and found a way to block those as well, causing much human suffering and even deaths, in a nice example of Zionazi ‘moral values’.
Mulga,
The key to understanding the real ‘threat’ Iran poses: the adoption of Islamic banking as the basis for regulating economic activity, most especially, the eschewal of compound interest – the basis of all Western bankster ‘wealth’ and supranational control:
http://www.webofdebt.com/articles/war-with-iran.php
I think The Saker needs to do a series of articles on this issue, beginning with a guest post by Ellen Brown.
German CIA Asset News Reporter Admits All News is Fake and Reporters are Bought Off
Posted on 01/18/2015
http://globalelite.tv/2015/01/18/cia-asset-news-reporter-admits-all-news-is-fake-and-reporters-are-bought-off/
Very interesting article. But I think it’s based partly on a premise which could easily be out of date. America no longer really needs Middle Eastern oil. Without the current oil price collapse, America was well on the way to being self-sufficient in oil again. What with fracking and the greater development of off-shore and Arctic oil, America (even more if you include Canada) has plenty of oil. At a price, certainly, but what about the cost of Middle Eastern involvement? Continued US Middle Eastern involvement is either (a) because it must defend Israel or (b) irrational – and probably both.
Mike, thanks for your comment. It would be accurate if one believed that the flow of oil from the Middle East and elsewhere is for American consumption. Only a fraction of Middle East oil is destined for America. What is far more important to the political elite in the US is the CONTROL of the system (in this case oil) which enables them to exercise their domination over other countries, particularly Europe. One could write a whole article about this, but the comment section is not the place. As an example, during the Cold War, another front for the U.S. ‘Containment’ policy was Europe. The creation of Marshall Plan in 1947 to give aid to war-torn Europe had already pumped $13 billion dollars in aid by 1953. This deterrence had the added benefit of helping American businesses. While showcasing American generosity, Europe had to turn to the U.S. for its goods which in turn had to be shipped on board American vessels. American economy prospered and communism was kept at bay. This win-win situation was boosted by the resources that flowed through the Persian Gulf to Europe. Japan is the biggest importer of Saudi oil. African oil is not destined for America per se, but again, the control of the oil flow to Europe. As of July, 2015, 38% of Nigerian crude exports went to Europe and 35% to Asia. As for shale oil, while it may seem like a boom to most, I think it important to read up on it from a variety of sources. it takes virtually as much energy to extract it as it does to produce it. The environmental damage from the extraction is simply unacceptable, above all the chemicals that find their way to water – a resource on which all life depends (interestingly, prior to the Kiev coup companies were lining up for extracting shale oil in Ukraine – I guess they though the environmental damage won’t matter there!). As for protection of Israel, you are absolutely right. But again, virtually all US foreign policy serves Israel. The US has a MOU with Israel which guarantees it oil even before American needs are satisfied. At the moment though, oil is the least of their worries (Israel) since they have stolen Palestinian oil wells as well as oil in the Golan.
And the Zionazis intend stealing as much of the Eastern Mediterranean’s gas, certainly that off-shore from Gaza. After all, Yahweh told Bibi that it belongs to the ‘aristocrats of humanity’, as, indeed, does the world.
Soraya, you and Mulga are two real smart persons! I applaud your remarks.
Many years to you both!
Regarding Soraya’s comment that “…What is far more important to the political elite in the US is the CONTROL of the system (in this case oil) which enables them to exercise their domination over other countries, particularly Europe. ”
In the early 1990’s, after the first Gulf war against Iraq, General Norman Schwarzkopf said in then secret testimony to the US Congress, “We control access to 70 per cent of the earth’s oil. Forty years from now, we will still control access to 70 per cent of the earth’s oil.”
I read that comment over ten years ago in some newspaper article about declassified testimony from those hearings. Wish I could remember more. But that quote stayed in my mind because Schwarzkopf’s statement explained much about American foreign policy to me.
Why is the fact that India and Iran are dealing in Rupee and Iran and Russia barter. These are the BRICS in the Multi-Polar World. The Deal is Done. China just bought into Aramco and is negotiating with Afghanistan and Pakistan. Consider TAPI a done deal. The American Experiment has to go back to the drawing board. It is bankrupt and no one in the world wants to finance it’s debt. As James Morrison said, ” When the Party is Over, Turn Off the Lights”
RR