June 2014
Vol 14, No.06
THE SYRIAN VOTE : THE PEOPLE REJECT REGIME CHANGE If one is sincere about resolving the bloody three year-old conflict in Syria, one would regard the outcome of the presidential election held on the 3rd of June 2014 as an opportunity for working out a viable solution. The election was a genuine endorsement of the leadership of Bashar al-Assad. 73% of eligible voters cast their ballots in the first ever multi-candidate direct presidential election in Syria. Assad secured 88.7 % of the votes. There were no allegations of electoral fraud or manipulation. It is significant that Syrian refugees in Lebanon and Jordan — hosts to the majority of refugees from the on-going war in Syria — voted overwhelmingly for Assad. It is of course true that those parts
By Chandra Muzaffar of the country which are still in rebel hands could not vote. This would be mainly some parts of rural Syria and one medium-sized city. But all the other cities — and they account for the majority of the population — went to the ballot-box. US officials and the Western media have dismissed the election result contemptuously because a portion of the electorate could not vote, ignoring the fact that the vast majority participated enthusiastically in the polls. They have conveniently forgotten that in the presidential election in Ukraine on the 25th of May millions of Russian speaking voters in the eastern part of the country refused to participate and yet the verdict was endorsed by the centres of power in the West. This is yet another example of blatant double standards.
Instead of rubbishing the election result, Western leaders and commentators should try to find out why the Syrian people showed so much enthusiasm for the election and why they gave so much support to Assad. One, for the vast majority of Syrians, the election was their repudiation of the war and the killings that have claimed tens of thousands of lives since March 2011. It was their way of affirming their commitment to peace and stability. The proud and dignified Syrian citizen had chosen the ballot-box to appeal to the world to end the war and to usher in peace. Two, the Syrians know that the Turn to next page
STATEMENTS .THE NAY PYI TAW DECLARATION:
A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION
BY CHANDRA MUZAFFAR......................P3
.BOKO HARAM AND THE POLITICS OF TERROR
BY CHANDRA MUZAFFAR.......................P4
ARTICLES . THE SOUND OF A COUP
. HISTORIC SINO-RUSSIA DEAL BYPASSES US
BY CHAIWAT SATHA-ANAND.............................P 6
DOLLAR BY FAROOQUE CHOWDHURY...........................P 9
. OIC HUMANITARIUMMISSION TO THE CENTRAL
.THE LIES GROW MORE AUDACIOUS BY PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS.....................................P 12
AFRICAN REPUBLIC BY ABDULLAH AL-AHSAN....................................P 7
. THE RED LINE AND THE RAT LINE (FINAL PART)
BY SEYMOUR M. HERSH.......................................P 14
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only leader who can bring peace and stability to their land is Bashar alAssad since he has always commanded the support of the majority of his people. The election proved his popularity. In spite of what the Western and most of the West Asian media have been telling us about how the majority Sunnis are revolting against a minority AlawiteShia leader, most of the Sunnis voted for Assad, as did various minority groups, from Shias to Christians. Assad also has the backing of the armed forces, the public service and the business community. Three, there is also a great deal of appreciation among the people for the way in which the Assad government has managed to ensure that essential goods and services are available to a broad cross-section of the people in spite of the terrible devastation and destruction caused by the war. Four, the election result is also a show of appreciation of the role played by the armed forces which has lost at least sixty-one thousand men in the war and which in the eyes of the people has succeeded in protecting the innocent and preventing some brazen massacres. It in no way justifies, it should be emphasized, some of the excesses committed by the armed forces which a number of us have condemned from the outset. Five, if Assad won so convincingly it is also partly because the opposition is hopelessly divided. The different armed groups are pitted against each other. There is no common platform. They were
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not even able to put forward a common candidate in the election. Six, more than the opposition’s utter disarray it is the barbaric brutality of some of the armed groups revealed in so many episodes in the war that turned a lot of Syrians against them and indirectly increased support for Assad. What has caused even greater revulsion among the people is the claim of these groups that they are the true representatives of Islam.
Seven, since some of these groups are foreign and the foreign hands behind the war are so obvious to most Syrians, rallying around Assad in the election was the people’s response to what they perceive as a massive foreign conspiracy to break Syria’s principled resistance to US helmed hegemony — hegemony that serves the interests of Israel. Ousting Assad is central to the goal of breaking resistance. This is why the people sought through the ballotbox to foil a determined push to achieve regime-change in Damascus. This, in the ultimate analysis, is the real significance of Assad’s electoral triumph. The Syrian people have defeated a violent, aggressive attempt at achieving regime-change as part of that perpetual plan to ensure US and Western hegemony, especially in a
L E A D A R T I C L E region which is pivotal to their quest for global domination. Apart from Israel which launched a number of air-strikes against Syria in the course of the war, some of the West’s other regional allies like Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey have also played a major role in pursuit of this diabolical agenda. Given that the US and some of its allies are democracies, will they now concede that since the Syrian people have spoken, they will respect their wishes and cease their pursuit of regime change? It is most unlikely that they would. After all, hegemony has always taken precedence over democracy. Hegemony trumps everything else. Does it matter to the hegemon and its allies that if they continue along this path, thousands more are going to die or become refugees in some other land? Perhaps one should reach out to ordinary American citizens in the hope that they would persuade their government to put an end to the war and create the conditions for peace in Syria. It may be worthwhile trying this approach. A Pew Research Centre poll conducted in 2013 showed that “70% of Americans oppose arming the Syrian rebels.” Can they now be convinced that arming rebels against a democratically elected president nullifies everything that a democracy stands for? Can we expect American citizens to share the dream of their Syrian counterparts for an end to war in their land? Will they act to make that dream come true? 9 June 2014 Chandra Muzaffar President of the International Movement for a Just World
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THE NAY PYI TAW DECLARATION : A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION The Nay Pyi Taw Declaration adopted by the 10 member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) at the end of the 24th ASEAN Summit at Nay Pyi Taw, the capital of Myanmar, on the 11th of May 2014, may turn out to be one of the regional grouping’s most significant documents. The Declaration spells out, albeit in general terms, a unified position on the contentious issue of the territorial disputes between China, on the one hand, and various ASEAN states, on the other, pertaining to the South China Sea (SCS). It calls upon all parties involved in competing claims on the SCS to exercise self-restraint and to refrain from using force or taking action that will escalate tension. At the same time, the Declaration urges both China and ASEAN to implement effectively the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the SCS (DOC) in accordance with international law. It seeks an early conclusion of the Code of Conduct (COC) in the SCS which is what the DOC is supposed to lead to. A unified position might not have emerged if Vietnam and the Philippines were not incensed by what they perceived as provocative Chinese behaviour in the SCS. China had moved an oil-drilling rig in early May into waters also claimed by Hanoi, off the Paracel Islands. It is alleged that Chinese vessels had then attacked Vietnamese boats. The Philippines had accused China of poaching in waters that are also claimed by the former. 11 crew members of the poaching boat were
subsequently arrested by Philippine maritime authorities. Both the Vietnamese and Philippine delegations at the Nay Pyi Taw Summit lobbied hard for a united stand. It will be recalled that in the 2012 Summit held in Phnom Penh ASEAN leaders failed to come up with a consensus on the maritime issue.
It is critically important for China to understand ASEAN’s unified stand this time. ASEAN is a region that China cannot afford to antagonise. The friendship and respect of its neighbour is vital for China’s emergence as a major global player. It should never give the impression to any of the ASEAN states that it seeks to dominate and control any individual state or the region. It is partly because the Soviet Union dominated Eastern Europe, part of its neighbourhood, during the Soviet era that the states in that region and even those within the Soviet Union eventually threw off the yoke and asserted their independence. Likewise, it is because of the United States’ relentless drive for hegemony over Latin America to the south of its border that a significant number of states in the region have revolted against US power and are now carving out their own collective path
to the future. It would be in China’s own interest therefore to show greater empathy for the position of various ASEAN states in disputes over the SCS and to abide by international law. Just as China needs to empathise with ASEAN, so should ASEAN develop a genuine bond of fraternity with its huge neighbour to the north. It is a bond that should go beyond trade, investment and tourism. Through education, culture and science, ASEAN should endeavour to add depth and breadth to its relationship with China. Malaysia which commemorates the 40th year of its diplomatic ties with China this May, and assumes the Chair of ASEAN next year, should be in the forefront of this mission. While the ASEAN-China bond is crucial, the Nay Pyi Taw Declaration also signals an opportunity to strengthen unity and solidarity within ASEAN itself. Achieving political consensus on controversial and divisive issues facing the grouping has always been a challenge. It has now taken a small but significant step. It should build upon this minor accomplishment. In more concrete language, ASEAN should try to develop a common policy position on its relations with China on the one hand and the US on the other. This is admittedly an arduous task given the differences in attitudes towards the two powers among ASEAN states. Nonetheless, it is imperative that we make the continued next page
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effort. There is no guarantee that the relationship between China and the US will not take a turn for the worse in the future. When the US feels that China’s ascendancy — not just in the economic sphere — is a direct threat to its desire for global hegemony, it may seek to confront China. This may see the ASEAN region which is vital to both China and the US in terms of the assertion of their geopolitical and geo-
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economic power, transformed into a cockpit of conflict. AndASEAN states may be forced to choose between the antagonists. This is why evolving a shared perspective on the role of the US and China in the region which may prevent ASEAN from being torn asunder is of paramount significance. Through sincere dialogue among not only political leaders and government officials but also between other sectors
S T A T E M E N T of society in ASEAN we may be able to craft a common position vis-a-vis the US and China. This is a better path to take than to forge quasi-military alliances and security pacts with one side or the other which will only expedite the very conflict that we want to avoid. Chandra Muzaffar 13 May 2014
BOKO HARAM AND THE POLITICS OF TERROR The heinous abduction of 276 girls from a boarding school in the village of Chibok in the north eastern part of Nigeria on the 14 th of April 2014 falls into a pattern of hideous terror unleashed by the Boko Haram in Nigeria, north Cameroon and Niger for a few years now. B o k o H a r a m ’s t e r r o r, i t i s estimated, has resulted in about 10,000 deaths. Both Muslims and Christians, clerics and nonclerics, Nigerians and nonNigerians, have been the victims. Police stations, government offices, schools, mosques, churches, and tourist sites frequented by Westerners have been attacked at various times. Through acts of violence, Boko Haram, founded in 2002, seeks to oust the Nigerian government and replace it with an “Islamic State” based upon the sharia. Eliminating Western education in particular and a secular way of life in general is central to its notion of an Islamic state. It subscribes to a myopic interpretation of sharia with the
emphasis upon harsh, punitive laws. Many of its rules keep women subservient to male power. Those who do not adhere to its notion of the sharia are categorised as “apostates” who deserve to be put to death. In that sense, Boko Haram is very much a Takfiri movement — a movement which easily condemns fellow Muslims as apostates. A number of leading ulama (Islamic religious scholars) in Nigeria and West Africa have criticised Boko Haram for not only resorting to violence but also for its bigotry and dogmatism. Its attempts to coerce Christians to embrace Islam and to force what are perceived as secular schools to close down have earned the ire of a lot of the ulama and Muslims who constitute half of Nigeria’s total population. They rightly regard Boko Haram as a movement that has shamelessly betrayed Islamic teachings. Indeed, some Muslims inside and outside Nigeria have even begun to wonder if Boko Haram
isn’t the creation of forces that are determined to tarnish the image of the religion ! It is alleged that it is funded by foreign elements though Boko Haram is also known to have staged bank robberies and the like to finance its operations. From its criminal activities it is obvious that the movement is not just about a distorted, perverted interpretation of religion. Boko Haram is essentially about the pursuit for power. Like many other groups, both Muslim and non-Muslim in various parts of the world, it has consciously chosen to manipulate religious emotions as it lusts for power and the glory that accompanies it. H o w e v e r, i f B o k o H a r a m continues to command a constituency, it is partly because of the larger situation prevailing in the country. Nigeria is one of the most unequal societies in the world with an ever-widening gap between the rich and the poor. There is also massive corruption at all levels of society. A weak delivery system has increased the
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burden of the people. All this has fuelled anger and disillusionment with the State. As a movement fighting the State, Boko Haram has been able to tap into some of that frustration. The global environment has also abetted Boko Haram. The unending suffering of the Palestinian people at the hands of Israel, an intimate ally of the United States; the US-led invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq and the massacre and torture of innocent civilians; and the alienation and humiliation of M u s l i m s i n m a n y We s t e r n countries post 9-11, have helped to reinforce the anti-Western sentiments of groups like Boko Haram. These episodes and trends provide justification for militants who try to avenge injustices and indignities perpetrated against Muslims through their own acts of terror. In recent months, the presence of French soldiers in Mali and the Central African Republic has given Boko Haram yet another reason to ventilate its hostility towards the West. In this regard, there are Muslims who ask why Western elites are so concerned about the kidnapped Nigerian schoolgirls now when just two decades ago, Wa s h i n g t o n h a d i m p o s e d sanctions upon Iraq that killed some 650,000 children and when hundreds of deformed babies — the tragic victims of depleted uranium from US military operations —— continue to be born in that blighted land to this
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today? What this shows is that a selective approach to issues of justice in the global arena and the stark double standards of the powerful undermine the battle against violence and terrorism. It is further undermined by the material and political support that the centres of power in the West and in other parts of the world sometimes offer to certain terrorist
S T A T E M E N T S global hegemonic power that can only be sustained through violence which in turn begets violence from terrorist outfits. Two, elites in power and with influence at the state level everywhere should ensure that there is good, honest governance. For elite corruption as we have seen in so many countries, is grist to the mill for groups that seek to remedy the situation through violence. Three, hidden hands that manipulate terrorist groups for their own nefarious agenda at national, regional and international levels should be exposed without fear or favour. This is where the media has a critical role to play.
outfits — in spite of their rhetoric against terrorism. This had happened in Libya in 2011 and is happening now in Syria on a much more extensive and systematic scale. It is this hypocrisy that has compelled analysts to conclude that there are good terrorists and bad terrorists, the former being those who are useful tools in the perpetuation of Western hegemony while the latter are those who oppose that hegemony! Given this scenario, how does one address the terrorism of Boko Haram and other such groups? One, it is the responsibility of everyone — governments, businesses, unions, civil society organisations, media, professionals, academics — to work towards a just and equitable international order where no nation or cluster of nations exercises
Four, the sources of funding of terrorist groups at different levels should be laid bare through more effective intelligence gathering and exchange. There should be no tolerance for attempts to conceal or camouflage terrorist funding, even if it involves the powerful. Five, Muslim intellectuals committed to the universal, inclusive message of Islam should join hands across continents to counter the narrow, bigoted, dogmatic distortions of the purveyors of violence and terror within the ummah. In fact, there should be similar movements within all the other religious communities too, since bigotry and dogmatism often spawning violence is a challenge that has emerged in all religious communities in the 21st century. Chandra Muzaffar 13 May 2014
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ARTICLES THE SOUND
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By Chaiwat Satha-Anand Have you heard the sound of the most recent coup in Thailand? When such a phenomenon takes place in this fair land, the usual responses follow: foreign countries issue warnings as well as expected nominal sanctions, and urge the country to return quickly to the democratic abode of civilization; while journalists provide “analysis” of the situation. Such “analysis”, much of the time, is based on a universal narrative of democratic journey encountering dictatorship. Responses from some patriotic Thais include: “we are too complicated, you don’t understand us”; “it’s none of your business”; or “please understand our situation and pray for us.”
needs to hear the sound of this reset button. If a coup has a sound, and if one tries to listen to that sound, what will be heard? I am certainly not referring to the generous flow of nationalist songs heard again and again by all who cared to eagerly await the next official announcements during the first two days after the coup. I would argue, however, that by listening to its sound, the meaning of this coup staged in the second decade of the twenty first century might be better construed. But to do so sometimes it is better to go back in time. In the seventeenth century, Cardinal
Having been born and growing up much of the time under the spectre of several coups, this most recent coup doesn’t surprise me as another episode in the biography of Thai politics, but it worries me. I am worried about both the degree to which contemporary Thai society and the nature of the coup are understood by those who have staged and supported the coup. Since the former will reveal itself, here I will concentrate on the latter. There are people who think of a coup as a reset button for politics which signifies a new beginning much needed in the context of impasse such as what has transpired in Thai society. Maybe there is some truth in such belief. But silently anyone who pushes the button might hear the sound of failure in the project h/she has worked on. If it’s a computer game we are talking about, usually the reset button comes when one admits, rightly or wrongly, that h/ she cannot win. As a result, there is no point in continue playing. Perhaps, one
Richelieu- the villain made famous by Alexandre Dumas’ The Three Musketeers sent an agent to work in Rome. This agent, Gabriel Naude, later wrote in an interesting book titled: Considerations politique sur les coups d’ Etat (1639) that “…with coups d’ Etat, we see the thunderbolt before we hear it rumbling in the cloud; in coups d’ Etat… everything is done at night, in the dark, in the fog and shadows.” Political science textbooks generally define a coup as a non-constitutional seizure of political control of state institutions. But seen as an element, an event, or a way of doing that does not
submit to the laws, Michel Foucaultthe French thinker- points out in his Security, Territory, Population (2007) that a coup d’etat is “the state acting of itself on itself, swiftly, immediately, without rule, with urgency and necessity, and dramatically. It is therefore not a takeover by some at the expense of others but the selfmanifestation of the state itself. It is the assertion of raison d’etat (reason of state) that the state must be saved, whatever forms may be employed to enable one to save it.” Foucault’s last sentence underscoring both the reason and the methods used importantly crystallizes the ontology of a coup. Despite noble purposes declared and valid justifications given, fundamentally a coup is a military solution used on political problems, characterized by the threat of violence on those who refuse to submit. It goes without saying that the military solution is generally considered as the “last resort” to be used when other methods, diplomatic ones in international affairs or national dialogue in domestic affairs for example, do not work. In this sense, the silent sound of a coup is a sense of despair that existing political process no longer works and a society cannot deal with its problems politically. To embark on a journey out of the coup, apart from effectively solving existing problems plaguing people and crafting a new rule of governance, the first phase as rightly outlined by General Prayuth Chan-Ocha, the leader of the National Council for Peace and Order, on May 30 is to rebuild national peace and unity through reconciliation. And herein lies any coup’s paradox. continued next page
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Rebuilding peace through reconciliation in a badly divided society requires hope in the strength of political society that conflict can be dealt with through the political process characterized by reason and dialogue.
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In order to rebuild national peace and reconciliation, the NCPO has to walk Thai society out of a sense of hopelessness echoed by the sound of the coup. A difficult but necessary task at present is to rekindle new hope that conflicts in Thai society can be dealt with politically and therefore peacefully.
A R T I C L E S 4 June 2014 Dr. Chaiwat Satha-Anand is a political science professor at Thammasat University in Thailand and a member of the JUST International Advisory Panel (IAP).
OIC HUMANITARIAN MISSION TO THE CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC By Abdullah Al-Ahsan A delegation headed by Ambassador Fouad Maznaie, a representative of the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation’s (OIC) Humanitarian Affairs Department, is reported to have arrived Chad on May 14, 2014. The Mission aims at assisting refugees displaced by the recent violence in the Central African Republic (CAR). The mission includes representatives from the Islamic Development Bank (IDB), the Islamic Solidarity Fund, the International Islamic Relief Organization in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Red Cross, IHH and Doctors Around the World from Turkey, the Charity Foundation from Qatar, and Islamic Relief and Muslim Aid from Britain. The Mission has already announced a donation of US$5 million comprising urgent humanitarian assistance which include building of tents for displaced persons and refugees, truckloads of food and medicine and sinking of wells. A plane load with shipment of medicine from Turkey is expected to arrive in the Sar region of Chad on 25 May 2014. Earlier the OIC had held an
emergency ministerial Executive Committee meeting at its General Secretariat in Jeddah on 20 February 2014 in which it was decided that a high-level delegation would be dispatched to the CAR in order to assess the prevailing situation on the ground and to show solidarity with the Muslim community who have become victims of gross human rights violations. The meeting also had decided to appoint an OIC special envoy to the Central African Republic. OIC Secretary General Iyad Amin Madani then appointed a former Senegalese foreign minister, Cheikh Tidiane Gadio, as special envoy with the assignment of visiting the Central African Republic and neighboring states to lay the groundwork for the delegation’s visit. This delegation now is expected to prepare a report on how to extend urgent humanitarian assistance to the displaced persons and refugees and to obtain first-hand information by visiting displaced persons’ camps in the Central African Republic and refugees camps in Cameroon and Chad. The Mission is mandated to assess and recommend aid for food and shelter, and the medical and
educational needs for the refugees. Background Why has the OIC undertaken this mission? Clearly this is because almost all these refugees happen to be Muslim and all media reports during the past few months have highlighted the fact that Muslims were deliberately targeted and many parts of CAR have already been ethnically cleansed. Now the question is why and how Muslims have become victims in this conflict although officially the CAR is only 15 percent Muslim. The conflict has almost turned out to be a Christian-Muslim conflict in support of the clash of civilizations thesis. And this is a very serious development in current international politics and must be examined carefully. According to Think Africa Press (26 Feb 2014) the problem was never religious, rather it originated from the ethnic orientation of government policies during the last three decades. It says, “[In] the CAR, we can see there has been a trend towards the politicisation of ethnicity, not religion. For example, former president André Kolingba
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(1981–93) explicitly rewarded his ethnic group, the Yakoma from southern CAR, with patronage and support. His successor, Ange-Félix Patassé (1993–2003) in turn dismissed the Yakoma and rewarded his own supporters from the northwest, mostly Sara-Kaba, with government positions and patronage. And Bozizé, who deposed Patassé and also came from the northwest, gave clear preferential treatment to the Gbaya. Kolingba, Patassé, and Bozizé all favoured different groups and politicised identity, but awarded privilege based on ethnic not religious terms. After all, all three were Christian.” Earlier the French colonial administration established a political culture where force, rather than popular consent, was the source of authority. The French also cultivated commercial allies, and exploited the territory’s resources, not to advance the native population’s wellbeing but their own and that of France. By setting up its authoritarian administration, colonial France transformed cultural groups, ethnic or religious, into state managed political categories. As with all colonial regimes, this strategy of divide and rule was meant to undermine the common political project of the African people and to prolong French dominance. France continued to have a significant role in CAR military affairs and often called the shots, directly or indirectly, through its military capabilities, including using its local allies. Discrimination against Muslims The CAR got independence in
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1960 and within a short period the country’s politics turned to be ethnic based. The former colonial ruler France began to patronize authoritarian military personalities. The Muslim community, which was mainly a trading and farming community and survived under the colonial rule, increasingly became the victim of discrimination. They became an easy target of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) which was active in neighboring countries. According to Aljazeera, “for thirty years, the Lord’s Resistance Army has terrorised the rural population.” In its 2012 statement on
International Religious Freedom in CAR the US State Department reported that, “Muslims continued to face discrimination in access to government services when lowlevel bureaucrats reportedly created informal barriers. The constitutional provision prohibiting religious intolerance was widely perceived as designed to protect Muslims; however, implementing legislation did not support the provision.” In March 2103 a coalition force known as Seleka in the local language overthrew the last authoritarian government of General Francios Bozize. A significant number of these rebels happened to be Muslim. Immediately the French dominated media depicted the conflict as a Christian-Muslim religious conflict and declared that Christians were under siege. The
A R T I C L E S Seleka forces collapsed within months when they came under the combined attack of the militia belonging to ethnic groups who had enjoyed power under the earlier authoritarian regimes. Within months over a million Muslims in the country came under heavy assault and were almost totally cleansed. Most took shelter in neighboring countries. In December 2013 France secured a UN Security Council resolution (2127 of 2013) to dispatch peace keeping troops to CAR. Unfortunately French troops took a partisan position in favor of the Christian militia and the armed forces under the former authoritarian regimes that were mainly Christian. With more than a million displaced persons, the situation has reached a catastrophic stage. The OIC initiative to undertake this humanitarian mission is timely and must be commended. This will definitely help to contain Muslim frustration. This is important because such frustrations rouse extremism and provide ammunition to groups such as Boko Haram next door. However the international community must do more. The Chicago based body Justice for All, an interfaith group, after visiting the affected areas, has reported that the Muslim Imam Oumar Layama of Bangui has taken refuge at the house of the Archbishop. But they have also reported that a Christian politician has been assassinated because of his public support for Muslim victims. What Must be Done to Ensure Peace and Security First of all one must recognize that the
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conflict in the CentralAfrican Republic is a huge security threat to international peace and it is not an isolated incident. The proponents of the clash of civilizations thesis and the Islamophobic elements, particularly in the media, seem to be encouraging and patronizing it. Therefore, the international community including the OIC must do the following: 1.The little effort undertaken by the local community under the leadership of the Archbishop and the Imam of Bangui
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must be encouraged and wholeheartedly supported. 2.The effort of the Chicago based interfaith group Justice forAll must also be supported and advanced; 3.Distinguished Christian individuals and groups must come forward to condemn extremist groups such as the LRA and other Christian militias in the region; 4.The UN peace keeping operations must not be led by troops from former
A R T I C L E S colonial powers; 5.The OIC must convince its memberstates to participate more actively in UN peace keeping operations.
22 May 2014 Dr. AbdullahAl-Ahsan is a professor at the International Institute for Islamic Thought and Civilization (ISTAC), International Islamic University Malaysia. He is also the Vice-President of JUST.
HISTORIC SINO-RUSSIA DEAL BYPASSES US DOLLAR By Farooque Chowdhury In a symbolic, but historic blow to the hegemony of US dollar, China and Russia have concluded an agreement with far-reaching significance. The deal bypasses US dollar in part of the two emerging powers’ trade. According to the agreement, two financial institutions of the two countries will pay each other in domestic currencies. However, major western news agencies and media outlets have ignored the news. It will not be surprising if any south Asian country enters into similar agreement in future with either of the two powers. Moreover, there are indications that China is going to widen security dialogue and cooperation in Asia. The approach carries possibilities of alternative to the US approach in the Asia-Pacific region. The widening possibility carries bargaining space for geographically smaller countries like Bangladesh. At the same time, there is suggestion
from academic circle that the US should accept the rise of China.
countries.” The report said:
An Al-Jazeera report (May 20, 2014) by Michael Pizzi said: “In a symbolic blow to US global financial hegemony, Russia and China took a small step toward undercutting the domination of the US dollar as the international reserve currency on [May 20, 2014] when Russia’s second biggest financial institution, VTB, signed a deal with the Bank of China to bypass the dollar and pay each other in domestic currencies.
“Demand for the dollar, which has long served as a safe and reliable reserve currency in international transactions, has allowed the US to borrow almost unlimited cash and spend well beyond its means, which some economists say has afforded the United States an outsize influence on world affairs.” The report headlined “Russia, China sign deal to bypass U.S. dollar” said:
“The so-called Agreement on Cooperation — signed in the presence of Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is on a visit to Shanghai — was followed by the long-awaited announcement on [May 21, 2014] of a massive natural gas deal 10 years in the making.
The BRICS countries — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, a bloc of the world’s five major emerging economies — “have long sought to diminish their dependence on the dollar as a means of reshaping the world financial and geopolitical order. In the absence of a viable alternative, however, replacing it has proved difficult.”
“‘Our countries have done a huge job to reach a new historic landmark’, Putin said on [May 20, 2014], making note of the $100 billion in annual trade that has been achieved between the two
The report cited Michael Klare, a professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College: “For its part, China sees the dominance of the dollar in international trade transactions
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continued from page 9 as a remnant of American global dominance, which they hope to overthrow in the years ahead. This is a small step in that direction, to reduce the primacy of the dollar in international trade.”
The report cited Chris Weafer, a founding partner of Macro-Advisory, a consultancy in Moscow: “Breaking the dominance of the U.S. dollar in international trade between the BRICS is something that the group has been talking about for some time. The Ukraine crisis and the threats voiced by the U.S. administration may well provide the catalyst for that to start happening.” The deal is a symbolic step. Citing Liza Ermolenko, an emerging markets economist at Capital Economics in London, the report said: The deal was still “a very small one, in the grand scale of things”. It wouldn’t change Russia’s reliance on the dollar “overnight.” Russia’s most oil and gas export contracts are still priced in dollars, Liza Ermolenko noted, and “on a wider scale, replacing the dollar with the ruble is much too risky to even consider.” The report added: The “bank deal is another indicator that Russia and China are in the middle of a wider rapprochement, which analysts say is premised not on ideological alignment but on a mutual desire to undercut the US in their respective spheres of influence. “Both countries are wary of president Barack Obama’s “pivot east,” a recalibration of US foreign policy away
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from decades of war in the Middle East and toward the fast-growing economies of the East. Cynical observers have interpreted the shift as an effort to contain China. “‘This is a marriage of mutual strategic interests, not a marriage of love’, said Klare. ‘China wants energy and weapons from Russia, and Russia wants diplomatic backing and cash. It’s a quid pro quo.’” China, Russia’s biggest trading partner, has already concluded similar dollarbypassing deals with a number of economies in Asia and Europe. On May 21, 2014, China, the world’s second-largest economy, signed a landmark deal to buy Russian natural gas worth about $400 billion, a figure greater than the GDP of South Africa, giving a boost to Russia president Vladimir Putin and expanding Moscow’s ties with Asia. Gas is due to begin flowing to China by 2018.
A R T I C L E S development of a gas center on the Pacific will allow Russia to export to prosperous markets in Japan and South Korea. Alexander Lukin, a deputy head of the Russian Diplomatic Academy under Russian foreign ministry, was quoted by the Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency. “We will be able to show to Europe that we have other customers”, Lukin said. Alexei Pushkov, head of the international affairs committee of the Russian parliament’s lower house, said on Twitter: “The 30-year gas contract with China is of strategic significance. Obama should give up the policy of isolating Russia: It will not work.” The Sino-Russian partnership is strategic in the perspective of US-EUJapan global dominance. Putin was in Shanghai for an Asian security conference.
Only hours before the signing of the Sino-Russian gas deal a number of famous western news outlets amazingly reported that Putin has failed to make the deal.
In the conference, China’s president called for a new model of Asian security cooperation based on a regional group that includes Russia and Iran and excludes the US.
Russian government-controlled Gazprom will supply state-owned China National Petroleum Corp. with 38 billion cubic meters of gas annually. The quantity would represent about a quarter of China’s current annual gas consumption of nearly 150 billion cubic meters.
Meanwhile, Chinese president Xi Jinping has sent a veiled warning to Washington.
Under the agreement, Russia will invest $55 billion while China will invest $22 billion. There are plans for building a pipeline to link China’s northeast to a line that carries gas from western Siberia to the Pacific port of Vladivostok. The
“To beef up a military alliance targeting a third party is not conducive to regional common security”, Xi said without mentioning the US while delivering a keynote speech at a regional security forum in Shanghai on May 21, 2014. Provocation and escalation of tensions for selfish interests should be opposed, he told participants at the fourth Summit of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building
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continued from page 10 Measures in Asia (CICA). China is actually suggesting the US to get used to China’s rise. Citing a Kazakh proverb Xi said: “Someone who tries to blow out another’s oil lamp will set his beard on fire”. The US provocative role in the AsiaPacific region is a disturbing development in the region. Pang Zhongying, professor of international affairs at Renmin University of China, said: “It is time to tell the US it is not justified in interfering in Asia’s affairs, which have nothing to do with the country.”
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each other and work together,” Xi said. Asian nations have the capacity to realize security in Asia by cooperating among themselves, he added. The summit was a gathering of representatives from 47 countries and international organizations, mainly from Asia, concluded on May 21, 2014. Xi said countries must “completely abandon” the old security concepts, while advocating a new one pursuing cooperative and sustainable features, to create a security cooperation pattern of openness, equality and transparency.
The comment is a reflection of attitude towards the Empire, which is experiencing a decline in its global influence and power. China’s president Xi also said: “No country should attempt to dominate regional security affairs or infringe upon the legitimate rights and interests of other countries.” He said: Security problems in Asia should be solved by Asians themselves. The Chinese president said: If Asian countries speak with a common voice they have the capacity to solve Asian problems themselves. The statement shows China’s desire to have a collective approach in Asia. Xi was speaking to reporters with president of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev and Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu after a summit of CICA. “Asian countries must collaborate with
A R T I C L E S Xi has indicated that China is going to take “steps to strengthen security dialogue and cooperation with other parties, and jointly explore the formulation of a code of conduct for regional security and an Asian security partnership program”. China’s tone to its neighbors is still not “do it”, which a number of Asian countries have experienced from the Empire. The Empire often “forgets” the concept of mutual respect. With a win-win approach China has already indicated that it is willing to discuss with regional countries the creation of an Asian forum for security cooperation in law enforcement and an Asian security emergency response center. Beijing is getting involved in regional cooperation processes that include SAARC and ASEAN. China is also trying to play a role to ensure development and security in Asia.
The idea China is highlighting is a challenge to the US approach to the Asia-Pacific region, which is maintaining and strengthening of its dominance. The Chinese president said: “China and Russia jointly initiated an AsiaPacific security and cooperation initiative”. Already the US has experienced unexpected developments in Europe. Moscow’s response to US meddling in Ukraine is strong, which the US has not expected. It’s natural that US standing is making its appearance as unreliable ally to its European partners. Probably, the Empire is going to face a situation spread over two fronts: Europe, and its much-desired AsiaPacific. It, the possible “two fronts” reality, will be difficult for the Empire.
China, the emerging global power, plans to develop an economic belt along the Silk Road and a 21st Century maritime silk road. The country has already initiated the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, an alternative to the Asian Development Bank. Countries like Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal can benefit from these initiatives. These will also provide the countries vital space for cooperation and expansion in the areas of economy, finance, diplomacy, security and the all inclusive politics.
22 May, 2014 Farooque Chowdhury is Dhaka-based freelancer. Source : Countercurrents.org
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THE LIES GROW MORE AUDACIOUS By Paul Craig Roberts If there were any doubts that Western “leaders” live in a fantasy make-believe world constructed out of their own lies, the G-7 meeting and 70th anniversary celebration of the Normandy landing dispelled the doubts. The howlers issuing from these occasions are enough to split your sides. Obama and his lap dog Cameron described the Normandy landing on June 6, 1944, as “the greatest liberation force that the world has ever known” and took all the credit for the US and Britain for the defeat of Hitler. No mention was made of the Soviet Union and the Red Army, which for three years prior to the Normandy landing had been fighting and defeating the Wehrmacht. The Germans lost World War II at the Battle of Stalingrad, which was fought from August 23, 1942 until February 2, 1943, when most of the remnants of the powerful German Sixth Army surrendered, including 22 generals. Nineteen months previously the largest invasion force ever assembled on planet earth invaded Russia across a one thousand mile front. Three million crack German troops; 7,500 artillery units, 19 panzer divisions with 3,000 tanks, and 2,500 aircraft rolled across Russia for 14 months. By June 1944, three years later, very little of this force was left. The Red Army had chewed it up. When the so-called “allies” (a term which apparently excludes Russia) landed in France, there was little to resist them. The best forces remaining to Hitler were on the Russian front, which collapsed day by day as the Red Army approached Berlin. The Red Army won the war with Germany. The Americans and the British
showed up after the Wehrmacht was exhausted and in tatters and could offer little resistance. Joseph Stalin believed that Washington and London stayed out of the war until the last minute and left Russia with the burden of defeating Germany. Hollywood and popular writers have, of course, buried the facts. Americans have all sorts of movies, such as “A Bridge Too Far,” that portray insignificant events, however heroic, as turning points in the war. Nevertheless, the facts are clear. The war was won on the Eastern front by Russia. Hollywood’s movies are fun, but they are nonsense. Russia is again on the outs with “the world community,” because Obama’s plan to seize Ukraine and to evict Russia from its Black Sea base in Crimea has come a cropper. Crimea has been a part of Russia for as long as the US has existed. Khrushchev, a Ukrainian, stuck Crimea into the Ukrainian Socialist Republic in 1954 when Russia and Ukraine were part of the same country. When the Washington-imposed stooge government in Kiev recently declared that it was abolishing the use of the Russian language and arresting Ukrainians who had dual Russian citizenship and began tearing down Russian war memorials consecrated to the liberation of Ukraine from the Nazis, the people in Crimea used the ballot box to disassociate from Washington’s stooge government in Kiev, first voting their independence and then voting for reunification with their mother country. Washington, and the other G-7 countries following Washington’s orders, described this Crimean act of selfdetermination, which is exactly comparable to the act of self-
determination declared by Britain’s American colonies, to be a case of “Russian invasion and annexation.” Similar efforts to disassociate from Kiev are underway in other former Russian territories that today comprise eastern and southern Ukraine. Washington has equated self-determination in eastern and southern Ukraine with “terrorism” and has encouraged its stooge in Kiev to use military violence against protesting civilians. The reason for branding separatists “terrorists” is to make it OK to kill them. It is extraordinary to any learned person that the President of the United States and the titular heads of state of the Western European countries would publicly declare such blatant lies to the world. The world has historians. The world has peoples whose knowledge vastly exceeds that of the “mainstream media,” a.k.a., the Ministry of Propaganda, or, as Gerald Celente brands them, “the presstitutes.” Whatever name we use, the Western media is a collection of well paid whores.They lie for money, dinner party invitations, and speaking invitations with large honorariums and book contracts with large advances. I know. They tried to recruit me. Notice how narrowly Washington defines “the world community.” The “world community” consists of the Group of 7. That’s it. Seven countries make up the “world community.” The “world community” consists of six white countries and Washington’s puppet state of Japan. The “world community” is the US, Canada, Britain, Germany, France, Italy, and Japan. The other 190 countries are not part of Washington’s “world community.” In the neocon doctrine, they are not even part of humanity. continued next page
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The “world community” doesn’t have the population of single excluded countries, such as China or India. I haven’t done the calculation, but probably the land mass of Russia itself exceeds the land mass of the “world community.” So, what is this “world community?” The “world community” is the assemblage of US vassal states. Britain, France, and Germany were important on the 20th century scene. Their histories are studied in universities. The populations had a decent standard of living, although not for all citizens. Their past is the reason for their present importance. In effect, these countries were propelled forward by history, or by the history important to the West. Japan, being an appendage of Washington, has tried to become “western.” It is extraordinary how such a proud, war-like people became nothing. As I have finally stopped laughing at the presumed non-role of Russia in the defeat of Hitler, let’s return to the G-7 meeting. The Big Happening of this meeting was Russia’s exclusion and the shrinkage of the G-8 to the G-7. This was the first time in 17 years that Russia was not allowed to participate in the meeting of which Russia is a member. Why? Russia is being punished. Russia is being isolated from the 7 countries that the White House Fool thinks constitute “the world community.” Obama is angry that his National Security Council and the morons he appointed to the State Department and UN were so poorly educated that they did not know
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that much of the Ukraine consists of former Russian provinces inhabited by Russians. These ignorant Obamaappointed morons thought that they could grab Crimea, evict Russia, and leave Russia without access to the Mediterranean, thus unable to hold on to its naval base in Tartus, Syria, the easier for Washington to invade Syria. Crimea has been part of Russia since Russia completed the reconquest from the Tartars. I remember the Tarter, or Tater, ethnics from my visit to Tamerlane the Great’s (Timur as he was also known) tomb in Samarkand 53 years ago. Today
A R T I C L E S government that Washington overthrew, put in office by a fake vote in which turnout was a small percent of the population. Putin is supposed to kiss this corrupt Oligarch on both cheeks, pay Ukraine’s natural gas bills and forgive its debts. In addition, Russia is supposed to repudiate the Crimean people, evict them from their re-unity with Russia and hand them over to the neo-Nazi Right Sector to be eliminated as retribution for Russia’s victory over Nazi Germany, for whom some Western Ukrainians fought. In exchange, Washington and NATO will put anti-ballistic missile bases on Ukraine’s border with Russia in order to protect Europe from nonexistent Iranian nuclear ICBMs. This is supposed to be a win-win deal for Russia.
Tamerlane’s city is refurbished as a tourist site. 53 years ago it was a desolate place in ruins, overgrown with trees growing out of the tops of the minarets. As Obama’s plan to seize Ukraine failed, like every one of his other plans has failed, Washington’s spokesmen for the vested private interests have seized on the opportunity to demonize Putin and Russia and to restart the Cold War. Obama and his Group of 7 puppets or vassals used the occasion to threaten Russia with real sanctions, in place of the present propaganda sanctions that have no effect. According to Obama and his British lap dog, Putin must somehow prevent the Russian populations of eastern and southern Ukraine from protesting their subservience to a neofascist government in Kiev backed by Washington, or else. Putin is supposed to embrace the Oligarch, a former minister of the
The Obama regime used its well-paid NGOs in Ukraine to overthrow an elected, democratic government, a government no more corrupt than those in Western or Eastern Europe or Washington. The political morons who have England, France, Germany, and Italy in their hands are wagging their fists at Russia, warning of more, this time real, sanctions. Do these morons really want their energy supplies cut off? There is no prospect, despite the propagandistic claims, of Washington supplying the energy on which Germany industry depends and on which Europeans depend so that they do not freeze in the winter. Sanctions on Russia will wreck Europe and have little, if any, effect on Russia. Russia is already moving, with China and the BRICS, outside the dollar payments mechanism. As the demand for dollars drops, the dollar’s exchange value will drop. Initially, Washington will be able to force its vassals to support the dollar, but
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eventually this will become impossible. What the White House Fool, the neoconized National Security Council, the presstitute media, and subservient Congress are doing is to support and uphold the policies based on hubris and arrogance that are leading the US into the abyss. An abyss is like a black hole. You don’t get out. Washington’s lies are so blatant and transparent that Washington is destroying its own credibility. Consider the NSA spying. Documents released by Snowden and Greenwald make it completely clear that Washington spies not only on government leaders and ordinary people but also on foreign businesses in order to advance US commercial and financial interests. That the US steals Chinese business secrets is not in doubt. So what does Washington do? Washington not only denies what the documents prove but turns the charge around and indicts five Chinese generals for spying on US corporations. The only purpose of these indictments
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hyped by the US attorney general is propaganda.The indictments are otherwise totally meaningless, not merely false. China is not about to turn over five Chinese generals to the liars in Washington. For the presstitute media the story is a way to move the NSA’s spying out of the spotlight. China is substituted for the NSA as the guilty party. Why doesn’t China, Brazil, Germany and every other country issue arrest warrants for NSA’s top officials, for Obama, and for the members of the congressional oversight committee? Why do other countries always allow Washington to control the explanation with propaganda first strikes? Americans are very susceptible to propaganda. They seem to have a special taste for it. Consider the hate whipped up against Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, a US soldier just released by the Taliban in a prisoner exchange with the US. The hatred and bloodlust that the presstitute media have whipped up against Bergdahl has caused his hometown to cancel the celebration of his release. The press engineered hatred of Bergdahl has spilled over into threats against Hailey, Idaho.
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A R T I C L E S What is the basis for the attacks on Bergdahl? Apparently, the answer is that Bergdahl, like pro-football star Pat Tillman who turned down a $3.6 million contract to join the Army Rangers and go to defend freedom in Afghanistan, came down with a case of doubts about the war. Originally Pat Tillman’s death was attributed to his heroic action and enemy fire. Then it emerged that Tillman was a victim of “friendly fire.” Many concluded that he was murdered, because the government did not want a sports hero speaking out about the war. As Bergdahl is off the battlefield, he has to be murdered in the press–like Russia, China, Iran, Putin, Assad, Crimeans, and the Russian-speaking population in Ukraine. In America hate and the cultivation of hate is alive and well. But not a single moral virtue is. 7 June, 2014 Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy and associate editor of the Wall Street Journal. Source : Countercurrents.org
THE RAT LINE (FINAL PART)
By Seymour M. Hersh This is the final part of this article. The first and second parts appeared in the April and May issues of the Commentary - editor There was no public sign of discord when Erdoðan and Obama met on 16 May 2013 at the White House. At a later press conference Obama said that they had agreed that Assad ‘needs to go’. Asked whether he thought Syria had crossed the red line, Obama acknowledged that there was evidence such weapons had been used, but added, ‘it is important for us to make sure that we’re able to get more specific information about what exactly is happening there.’ The red line was still intact.
An American foreign policy expert who speaks regularly with officials in Washington and Ankara told me about a working dinner Obama held for Erdoðan during his May visit. The meal was dominated by the Turks’ insistence that Syria had crossed the red line and their complaints that Obama was reluctant to do anything about it. Obama was accompanied by John Kerry and Tom Donilon, the national security adviser who would soon leave the job. Erdoðan was joined by Ahmet Davutoglu, Turkey’s
foreign minister, and Hakan Fidan, the head of the MIT. Fidan is known to be fiercely loyal to Erdoðan, and has been seen as a consistent backer of the radical rebel opposition in Syria. The foreign policy expert told me that the account he heard originated with Donilon. (It was later corroborated by a former US official, who learned of it from a senior Turkish diplomat.) According to the expert, Erdoðan had sought the meeting to
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demonstrate to Obama that the red line had been crossed, and had brought Fidan along to state the case. When Erdoðan tried to draw Fidan into the conversation, and Fidan began speaking, Obama cut him off and said: ‘We know.’ Erdoðan tried to bring Fidan in a second time, and Obama again cut him off and said: ‘We know.’ At that point, an exasperated Erdoðan said, ‘But your red line has been crossed!’ and, the expert told me, ‘Donilon said Erdoðan “fucking waved his finger at the president inside the White House”.’ Obama then pointed at Fidan and said: ‘We know what you’re doing with the radicals in Syria.’ (Donilon, who joined the Council on Foreign Relations last July, didn’t respond to questions about this story. The Turkish Foreign Ministry didn’t respond to questions about the dinner. A spokesperson for the National Security Council confirmed that the dinner took place and provided a photograph showing Obama, Kerry, Donilon, Erdoðan, Fidan and Davutoglu sitting at a table. ‘Beyond that,’ she said, ‘I’m not going to read out the details of their discussions.’) But Erdoðan did not leave empty handed. Obama was still permitting Turkey to continue to exploit a loophole in a presidential executive order prohibiting the export of gold to Iran, part of the US sanctions regime against the country. In March 2012, responding to sanctions of Iranian banks by the EU, the SWIFT electronic payment system, which facilitates cross-border payments, expelled dozens of Iranian financial institutions, severely restricting the country’s ability to conduct international trade. The US followed with the executive order in July, but left what came to be known as a
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‘golden loophole’: gold shipments to private Iranian entities could continue. Turkey is a major purchaser of Iranian oil and gas, and it took advantage of the loophole by depositing its energy payments in Turkish lira in an Iranian account in Turkey; these funds were then used to purchase Turkish gold for export to confederates in Iran. Gold to the value of $13 billion reportedly entered Iran in this way between March 2012 and July 2013.
The programme quickly became a cash cow for corrupt politicians and traders in Turkey, Iran and the United Arab Emirates. ‘The middlemen did what they always do,’ the former intelligence official said. ‘Take 15 per cent. The CIA had estimated that there was as much as two billion dollars in skim. Gold and Turkish lira were sticking to fingers.’ The illicit skimming flared into a public ‘gas for gold’ scandal in Turkey in December, and resulted in charges against two dozen people, including prominent businessmen and relatives of government officials, as well as the resignations of three ministers, one of whom called for Erdoðan to resign. The chief executive of a Turkish state-controlled bank that was in the middle of the scandal insisted that more than $4.5 million in cash found by police in shoeboxes during a search of his home was for charitable donations. Late last year Jonathan Schanzer and
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Mark Dubowitz reported in Foreign Policy that the Obama administration closed the golden loophole in January 2013, but ‘lobbied to make sure the legislation … did not take effect for six months’. They speculated that the administration wanted to use the delay as an incentive to bring Iran to the bargaining table over its nuclear programme, or to placate its Turkish ally in the Syrian civil war. The delay permitted Iran to ‘accrue billions of dollars more in gold, further undermining the sanctions regime’. * The American decision to end CIA support of the weapons shipments into Syria left Erdoðan exposed politically and militarily. ‘One of the issues at that May summit was the fact that Turkey is the only avenue to supply the rebels in Syria,’ the former intelligence official said. ‘It can’t come through Jordan because the terrain in the south is wide open and the Syrians are all over it. And it can’t come through the valleys and hills of Lebanon – you can’t be sure who you’d meet on the other side.’ Without US military support for the rebels, the former intelligence official said, ‘Erdoðan’s dream of having a client state in Syria is evaporating and he thinks we’re the reason why. When Syria wins the war, he knows the rebels are just as likely to turn on him – where else can they go? So now he will have thousands of radicals in his backyard.’ A US intelligence consultant told me that a few weeks before 21 August he saw a highly classified briefing prepared for Dempsey and the defense secretary, Chuck Hagel, which described ‘the acute anxiety’ of the Erdoðan administration about the rebels’ dwindling prospects. The analysis warned that the Turkish leadership had expressed ‘the need
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to do something that would precipitate a US military response’. By late summer, the Syrian army still had the advantage over the rebels, the former intelligence official said, and only American air power could turn the tide. In the autumn, the former intelligence official went on, the US intelligence analysts who kept working on the events of 21 August ‘sensed that Syria had not done the gas attack. But the 500 pound gorilla was, how did it happen? The immediate suspect was the Turks, because they had all the pieces to make it happen.’ As intercepts and other data related to the 21 August attacks were gathered, the intelligence community saw evidence to support its suspicions. ‘We now know it was a covert action planned by Erdoðan’s people to push Obama over the red line,’ the former intelligence official said. ‘They had to escalate to a gas attack in or near Damascus when the UN inspectors’ – who arrived in Damascus on 18 August to investigate the earlier use of gas – ‘were there. The deal was to do something spectacular. Our senior military officers have been told by the DIA and other intelligence assets that the sarin was supplied through Turkey – that it could only have gotten there with Turkish support. The Turks also provided the training in producing the sarin and handling it.’ Much of the support for that assessment came from the Turks themselves, via intercepted conversations in the immediate aftermath of the attack. ‘Principal evidence came from the Turkish post-attack joy and back-slapping in numerous intercepts. Operations are always so super-secret in the planning but that all flies out the window when it comes to crowing afterwards. There is no greater
vulnerability than in the perpetrators claiming credit for success.’ Erdoðan’s problems in Syria would soon be over: ‘Off goes the gas and Obama will say red line and America is going to attack Syria, or at least that was the idea. But it did not work out that way.’
The post-attack intelligence on Turkey did not make its way to the White House. ‘Nobody wants to talk about all this,’ the former intelligence official told me. ‘There is great reluctance to contradict the president, although no all-source intelligence community analysis supported his leap to convict. There has not been one single piece of additional evidence of Syrian involvement in the sarin attack produced by the White House since the bombing raid was called off. My government can’t say anything because we have acted so irresponsibly. And since we blamed Assad, we can’t go back and blame Erdoðan.’ Turkey’s willingness to manipulate events in Syria to its own purposes seemed to be demonstrated late last month, a few days before a round of local elections, when a recording, allegedly of Erdoðan and his associates, was posted to YouTube. It included discussion of a false-flag operation that would justify an incursion by the Turkish military in Syria. The operation centred on the tomb of Suleyman Shah, the grandfather of the revered Osman I, founder of the Ottoman
Empire, which is near Aleppo and was ceded to Turkey in 1921, when Syria was under French rule. One of the Islamist rebel factions was threatening to destroy the tomb as a site of idolatry, and the Erdoðan administration was publicly threatening retaliation if harm came to it. According to a Reuters report of the leaked conversation, a voice alleged to be Fidan’s spoke of creating a provocation: ‘Now look, my commander [Erdoðan], if there is to be justification, the justification is I send four men to the other side. I get them to fire eight missiles into empty land [in the vicinity of the tomb]. That’s not a problem. Justification can be created.’ The Turkish government acknowledged that there had been a national security meeting about threats emanating from Syria, but said the recording had been manipulated. The government subsequently blocked public access to YouTube. Barring a major change in policy by Obama, Turkey’s meddling in the Syrian civil war is likely to go on. ‘I asked my colleagues if there was any way to stop Erdoðan’s continued support for the rebels, especially now that it’s going so wrong,’ the former intelligence official told me. ‘The answer was: “We’re screwed.” We could go public if it was somebody other than Erdoðan, but Turkey is a special case. They’re a Nato ally. The Turks don’t trust the West. They can’t live with us if we take any active role against Turkish interests. If we went public with what we know about Erdoðan’s role with the gas, it’d be disastrous. The Turks would say: “We hate you for telling us what we can and can’t do.”’ 4April 2014 Seymour M. Hersh is an American investigative journalist and author based in Washington D.C.
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