This is a good post by a friend Mike, a former BusinessMirror columnist, in our viber group Oplas Perspectives. Reposting with his permission, thanks Mike.
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by Michael "Mike" Alunan
April 20, 2024
America must learn a lot from numerous lessons in history, otherwise it is bound to repeat past mistakes, to paraphrase a famous quote from George Santayana. As early as the time of the Greeks, the collapse of its civilization was a result of the internecine destructive 28-year war among the Greek city states mainly because of hubris or arrogance and envy among each other. The US is in the same situation, so we are seeing increasingly Pax Americana (US Empire) on the decline. And may implode in the long-run with the financial bubble building up again that could burst and result in crisis worst than 2008.
Between 1947 and 1989, or the cold war alone, the US thru its CIA tried regime change 72 times (See
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/12/23/the-cia-says-russia-hacked-the-u-s-election-here-are-6-things-to-learn-from-cold-war-attempts-to-change-regimes/).
This excludes the dozens of involvement in post-cold war military activities like Serbian -Croatia war from1991-95, Iraq war from 2003 to 2011, Afghanistan war from 2001 to 2021 fall of Khadafy in 2011, Maidan coup on Ukraine in 2014, and many more. In fact, ever since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, or after the so-called "Cold War" the CIA has been involved in many covert operations, supporting mass movements and opposition groups and color revolutions, and in Eastern Europe were partly responsible for the 5 waves of conversions of most Eastern European states to NATO. Once joining NATO, the US sets up military bases and ballistic missiles, This is fully documented in a book in 2021 by M. E. Sarotte entitled "NOT ONE INCH: America, Russia, and the Making of Post-Cold War Stalemate" – Cold War.
Let's not forget the CIA has been behind the "terrorsist groups," ethnic groups and freedom fighters like Mujahideen which evolved into what is now Al Qaeda, and other terrorist groups like ISIS, Al Nustra, Kurds etc, all involved now in the continuous campaign towards regime change in Syria. I am not in favor of Iran and its Islamic theocracy, but let's face it, It is Iran that has been fighting these terrorists like ISIS and Al Qaeda, backed indirectly by the CIA.
A great source too of updated geo-political analyses are the You Tube interviews of prolific book author intellectual and deep ex-CIA intelligence officer Scott Ritter, who has about 10 published books to his name, and is fairly objective in making his updated analyses on the recent Ukraine and Iran-Israel conflicts.
On the recent Iran-Israel conflict, which could potentially and dangerously trigger a global economic crisis or possibly escalate into a nuclear war, we hope not, Scott Ritter, who has a full grasp of facts and privileged intel information, says Iran is not after a war with Israel, for many reasons, and has thus kept its cool and strategic patience the past few years and decades, and avoided DIRECT confrontation, despite getting hit the past years and decades by a series of Mossad assassinations of its top officers, nuclear scientists, its top general Sulahmeini, et al. Of course, just like the US and Israel, Iran also funds proxy wars like the Houthis of Yemen, Hezbollah and Hamas. Recently, it is Israel and US, which now appear like rogue states, compared to Iran, owing to their actual actions.
Iran is more serious at building peace and development and has made peace with its arch rival Saudi Arabia after fighting for 7-8 years in a proxy war over Yemen, following a peace settlement brokered by China. Both Iran and Saudi have also joined BRICS, along with Egypt, Ethiopia, and United Arab Emirates. About 31 or 41 more countries have signified their interest of joining BRICS, many because of fears they can also be victims of US sanctions like what US did in freezing Russia's $300 Billion assets or Afghanistan's $9 Billion, and other forms of pressures and sanctions, triggering jitters and the current shift to de-dollarization, the increasing interest in BRICS, etc. Jeffrey Sachs, a world-known economist, is also a good source of updates on economic and geo-political trends. Iran and Russia are also developing an alternative. Iran is also building together with Russia alternative multi-modal transport alternatives to the Suez Canal, only as a result of the sanctions, etc.
Iran only struck directly at Israel last April 14, in retaliation of Israel's April 1 fighter jet attacks on Iran's consular office in Damascus, Syria, killing 2 generals and other top level officials. This obviously violated Article 51 of the UN Charter and Geneva and Vienna conventions, which make the Damascus consulate a sovereign territory and justifying an appropriate retaliation vs. Israel. Iran was not serious with harming Israel, or killing Israelis, as it even sought UN Security Council response on Israel's violations of international law, but got no positive response over its complaint over Israel's violation of international law and even Western world's self-imposed "Rules-Based Order." It also gave Israel and the US 72 hours prior warning on its plan to attack Israel, giving the latter ample time to prepare and move valuable assets. On top of this 72 hours, Iran gave another 5 hours warning before its actual attack sending initially its drones, which took 4 hours to travel, giving time for Israel, US and other allies to prepare and shoot down the drones. The missiles followed and hitting two Israeli bases, but not causing major damages. Except a girl as collateral damage. Iran had no intentions of killing people, otherwise it should not have given series of prior warnings.
With his apparent failure at his Gaza genocide project, Netanyahu believes his only way to cling to power is to widen the war in the Middle East and forcibly bring US to its rescue. Otherwise, Netanyahu will be toppled from power, along with his zealot Zionist Knesset cabinet. We do not condone Hamasy Before the Oct. 7 attack of Hamas.
We do not condone Hamas' Oct. 7 attack on Israel, but we grossly detest Israel's disproportionate response towards a genocide on Gaza. Before this event, there were hundreds of thousands protesting against Netanyahu over charges of corruption and other crimes. So it seems Netanyahu;s defense is to go offense, and drag everyone down, including the US, as he capitalizes on the strong Zionist lobby, which actually also includes some 70 Million Christian Zionist. Many Jews are distancing themselves from the Zionist, which is a racist oligarchic and militarist ideology, making use of twisted biblical tales.
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See also:
Unrest in MidEast-Africa 9: Gaddafi falldown, August 24, 2011
Unrest in MidEast Africa 10: Israel-Hamas War 2012, November 26, 2012
MidEast Africa 11: Egypt, Arab Spring and Capitalism, July 05, 2013
MidEast Africa 12: US-Iran conflict, June 21, 2019
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