Public Comment
Iran – who are the villains?
First, a quick historical perspective:
In 1953 the CIA/MI6 orchestrated a coup to overthrow the democratically elected Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in favor of strengthening the monarchical rule of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi on 19 August 1953 and handing over Iran’s oil to Britain who rebranded Iran’s oil company, British Petroleum (BP). By so doing, Britain and America violated one of the most important and basic tenets of Christianity whose teachings they both claim to revere.
Exodus 20:17 17"You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor."
Or, in the modern vernacular, “do not covet or steal another country’s resources!
The blatant theft of Iran’s oil and the brutal rule of the US puppet, the Shah, caused seething resentment leading to the Iranian revolution of 1979 and the rise of Ayatollah Khomeini, the Shi’a cleric.
“This may come as a shock to Americans, who don't like to think of their country as an empire. But what else can you call America's legions of soldiers, spooks and Special Forces straddling the globe?” Michael Ignatieff, New York Times, Jul. 28, 2002
Fast forward to 26, March 2015 when foreign ministers of the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, Germany, France, China, the European Union and the Islamic Republic of Iran signed the nuclear accord limiting Iran’s ability to develop nuclear weapons. The International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) group of scientists made scheduled visits to Iran and confirmed that Iran was in strict compliance. Enter President Trump, the “master deal makers” who vented his racist, anti-Obama anger to the delight of his adoring fans, and declared America was withdrawing unilaterally from the agreement. He imposed crippling sanctions on Iran in a vain and futile attempt to pressure Iran back to the negotiating table to usher a “better deal” and regime change (oh, how America loves regime changes) . War hawks John Bolton, his national security advisor, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Saudi Arabia and Israel prodded the windsock president to do their bidding.
The once mighty independent Britain is once again dancing to US war drums rejecting their commitment to the nuclear accord. Forgotten is their foreign policy blunder accepting US bogus claims of WMD’s leading to the disastrous invasion of Iraq.
Hijacking an Iranian tanker and then expressing outrage when Iran returned the favor. Sadly, Britain has fallen into the tit-for-tat seizure of tankers trap set by US hawks that could easily spin out of control leading into a devastating conflict.
Shortly after British forces seized Grace 1, Spanish Foreign Minister Josep Borrell confirmed the capture of the tanker was carried out under direct orders by Washington.
Despite its earlier misgivings, Britain has been co-opted and is on a collision course with Iran. It’s time for the P5+1 members of the nuclear accord adhere to their earlier commitments and resist the bullying of Trump and his war hawks and stop taking orders from a highly dysfunctional Washington.
