America's bombs in Iraq - behind the headlines

Washington’s Diabolical Agenda in Iraq: US Pledges “Humanitarian Airstrikes” against US Sponsored IS Terrorists

Implausible Deniability - West's ISIS Terror Hordes in Iraq

Tony Carlucci

Image: ISIS began its invasion into Iraqi territory from NATO-member Turkey, through Syria and riding in Toyota Hilux trucks – identical to those provided to “moderates” by the US State Department as part of multi-million dollar “non-lethal” aid packages. ISIS did not take these trucks from “moderates,” the moderates never existed to begin with. From the beginning, it was the West’s plan to raise a mercenary army of sectarian extremists operating under the banner of Al Qaeda. 

Global Research,

8 August, 2014

The US has pledged assistance for victims of and even possible “airstrikes” against terrorists who have surrounded and threaten to eradicate thousands of religious minorities in Iraq. However, the terrorists themselves are a product of US foreign policy in the Middle East and North Africa, and instrumental in achieving Western objectives across the region. Punitive strikes and aid to the victims of what is essentially a Western mercenary army is part of maintaining plausible deniability. 

The terror hordes originated from NATO territory and have inundated Syria, Iraq, and now Lebanon. The goal of this well funded, heavily armed, professionally organized mercenary force is clearly to supplant pro-Iranian political and military fronts across Tehran’s arc of influence – from Baghdad to Damascus, to Lebanon and Hezbollah along the Mediterranean. In the process, the heavily indoctrinated rank and file have committed horrific atrocities ranging from rape and torture to mass executions and sectarian genocide. While such war crimes have been taking place in Syria since 2011, it is becoming increasingly difficult to cover up similar crimes beyond Syria’s borders under narratives of “civil war” linked to the so-called “Arab Spring.”

Instead, various stories have been used by the West to explain the appearance of ISIS in Iraq, the unprecedented scale of its operations, its convoys of matching vehicles and now military trucks, artillery, and even tanks. While the world is meant to believe ISIS spontaneously rose from the desert and “stole” billions in cash, weapons, and gear, a much simpler and documented explanation exists – Western state sponsorship -and state sponsorship that continues even as the West denounces the monsters of their own creation.

ISIS Origins 

Beginning in 2011 – and actually even as early as 2007 – the United States has been arming, funding, and supporting the Muslim Brotherhood and a myriad of armed terrorist organizations to overthrow the government of Syria, fight Hezbollah in Lebanon, and undermine the power and influence of Iran, which of course includes any other government or group in the MENA region friendly toward Tehran.

Image: ISIS corridors begin in Turkey and end in Baghdad.

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Billions in cash have been funneled into the hands of terrorist groups including Al Nusra, Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), and what is now being called “Islamic State in Iraq and Syria” or ISIS. One can see clearly by any map of ISIS held territory that it butts up directly against Turkey’s borders with defined corridors ISIS uses to invade southward – this is because it is precisely from NATO territory this terrorist scourge originated.

ISIS was harbored on NATO territory, armed and funded by US CIA agents with cash and weapons brought in from the Saudis, Qataris, and NATO members themselves. The “non-lethal aid” the US and British sent including the vehicles we now see ISIS driving around in.

They didn’t “take” this gear from “moderates.” There were never any moderates to begin with. The deadly sectarian genocide we now see unfolding was long ago predicted by those in the Pentagon – current and former officials – interviewed in 2007 by Pulitzer Prize-winning veteran journalist Seymour Hersh.

Hersh’s 9-page 2007 report, “The Redirection” states explicitly:

To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush Administration has decided, in effect, to reconfigure its priorities in the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has coöperated with Saudi Arabia’s government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is backed by Iran. The U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A by-product of these activities has been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda.

“Extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam” and are “sympathetic to Al Qaeda” – is a verbatim definition of what ISIS is today. Clearly the words of Hersh were as prophetic as they were factually informed, grounded in the reality of a regional conflict already engineered and taking shape as early as 2007. Hersh’s report would also forewarn the sectarian nature of the coming conflict, and in particular mention the region’s Christians who were admittedly being protected by Hezbollah.

West’s Feigned Concern Vs. Genuine Drive to Divide and Destroy 



Now, as the US feigns concern for religious minorities being slaughtered in front of the eyes of the world, it should be remembered that this conflict was engineered, set in motion, and perpetuated intentionally by the West for at least the last 7 years. The West knew the sectarian genocide now unfolding in Syria, Iraq, and soon in Lebanon was the inevitable result of their efforts to raise this regional mercenary force.

Western concern for religious minorities and the minimal provisions being made to “assist” them, is to maintain an increasingly tenuous plausible deniability. The feigned dithering of the West in the face of their growing mercenary force is to allow it to overrun the Iraqi government if possible, create more havoc within Syria, and spread the chaos to Lebanon.

ISIS is a standing army that requires state sponsorship – billions in cash, gear, weapons, and logistical, intelligence, and political support. While the West claims it has been handing over hundreds of millions to “moderates” in Syria, it has offered no plausible explanation as to who is providing ISIS and other Al Qaeda affiliates with even more resources enabling the extremists to displace these “moderates.” There is no other explanation besides the fact that there were never any moderates to begin with and that the US, UK, France, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and even Israel, have from the beginning, intentionally created a mercenary army composed of Al Qaeda extremists of unprecedented dimensions and capabilities.

The direct war with Iran the West has for so long attempted to sell the world is now clearly being replaced with an immense proxy war. It will feign ignorance to the genesis of ISIS and the fact that no other explanation beyond state-sponsorship exists to explain its continued success on the battlefield. Token airdrops and even “airstrikes” against ISIS positions will admittedly do nothing to disrupt ISIS’ ongoing campaigns across the region.

Depending on ISIS’ ability to achieve the West’s goals by proxy will determine the level of direct intervention the West seeks across the region. “Buffer zones” and “humanitarian interventions” to “relieve” areas plagued by ISIS will conveniently leave terrorist safe havens extending far beyond their current boundaries in NATO-member Turkey, Jordan, and northwest Iraq.

Here are Mark Sleboda's comments on the geopolitical position of the Kurds (quite independent of the the justice of a Kurdish state

They used to ally with Iran during the Iraq-Iran war. Later they worked with the US to destroy Iraq. I can and will blame ANYONE and EVERYONE who works with the Empire. I am also vehemently against the ideology of ethnic nationalism, that every ethnicity has a "right" to their own state. Bloodiest ideology of the last 300 years, hands down that can only be achieved with genocide and ethnic cleansing.

US Airstrikes and the Christening of Kurdish Statehood

Andrew Korybko

RIA Novosti

9 August, 2014

US President Barack Obama has just authorized the military to carry out targeted airstrikes in Northern Iraq to combat ISIL militants there. In the past couple days, the group devastated the Kurdish Peshmerga (armed fighters) and captured several Christian towns, including the largest one in Iraq. 40,000 members of the Yazidi religious minority have fled to a mountain to escape ISIL while the Christian refugees have congregated around Irbil, the Kurdish capital. Obama says that the US will strike ISIL if they move towards Irbil or the Yazidis holed up in the mountains, and that he wants to protect the lives of US forces helping the Kurds. 

A deeper analysis, however, reveals that the shadow motivations for authorizing airstrikes in Northern Iraq are to christen Kurdish statehood and enact military pressure against Syria.

Contextual Background

The US has a habit of siding with minority groups within any civil conflict, and assistance to the Kurds and Christians is no different. The Kurds had been persecuted under Saddam Hussein and even attacked with poisonous gas back in the 1980s. They have been agitating for self-determination, and the recent fracturing of Iraq due to the ISIL invasion has raised their hopes for independence. In fact, they are even preparing a referendum on this issue.

The persecution of Christians, although historic in the region, has re-emerged only recently. Ever since the 2003 War in Iraq, Christians have been leaving the Mideast in droves. This massive Christian exodus and their targeting by extreme Islamic groups such as ISIL have made them an endangered minority group. One can even say that they are undergoing confessional cleansing.

There are also smaller minority groups such as the Turkomen and Yazidis in Iraq that are under threat by ISIL as well.

The US’ Three-Way Balance of Power Game in Iraq

The US is engaged in a very risky and high-stakes balance of power game in Iraq, seeking to equally manage the Sunni, Shia, and Kurdish groups so none of them are predominant in the shattered state. Since the Shia have been strongest in Iraq before the recent destabilization, the US wanted to empower the Sunnis and Kurds as a counterbalance to retain influence there.

The US doesn’t directly control ISIL, but it does exert indirect influence over its activities. It wanted to shepherd ISIL from afar and guide its actions to help achieve the grand strategic goals of overthrowing the Syrian government and adjusting the balance of power in Iraq. Alas, one cannot shepherd wolves, as ISIL’s numerous victims in Syria and Iraq can woefully attest, and this hazardous attempt has resulted in much ruin and suffering and has largely escaped the management of the US.

One should note that Iraq had previously asked the US for airstrike assistance in the past but it was rejected. It was feared that ISIL would advance on Baghdad, but Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Martin Dempsey said that the US didn’t have enough intelligence to strike, nor did it know what the aftereffects of such a strike would be. What the US in effect wanted was for ISIL to pressure the Shia-led Iraqi government to the point where President Maliki would tweak his administration to make it more inclusive to pro-American Sunni and Kurdish representatives, thereby extending US influence over the state. As a result of the US’ refusal to help the Iraqi government, Iraq struck an emergency deal with Russia to provide it with aircraft (which the US had been procrastinating to do) to turn the tide against the militants and save the country from capitulation.

It is interesting to note what has changed in the month and a half since then and what has not. ISIL is still active in the same barren and exposed deserts that they were before, making them just as much of a target now as they were in June, and it is still just as obviously important why they need to be defeated as it was then. The game-changer, however, has been that the ISIL wolves are now attacking the US’ Kurdish lamb, which Washington absolutely will not allow to happen. Besides the balance of power considerations, this is also because Israel has already anointed Kurdish statehood through Peres and Netanyahu’s statements on the matter. Also, the circumstantial combination of persecuted minorities (Christians, Kurds, and Yazidis) and US lives supposedly at stake in Irbil provides the public with a plausible humanitarian cover for a military intervention aimed at shadow purposes.

The Shadow Motives

Besides safeguarding the previously mentioned minority groups, the US is also aiming to achieve strategic shadow objectives that are hidden from the public eye. Irbil is not only the place where the recent Christian refugees are sheltering, but it is also the Kurdish capital. Obama is being misleading when he says that the US is helping the Iraqi Army in this region. De-jure the Kurdish Peshmerga are part of the Iraqi military since they haven’t yet declared independence, but de-facto the unified Iraqi military fled south over a month ago and only the Kurdish forces remain in this area. What the US is really doing is helping to lay the foundations for an independent Kurdish state in Northern Iraq by strengthening its armed forces and assisting with overall backend logistics. This operation is endangered by ISIL, so the US may resort to a spectacular humanitarian intervention as it did in Kosovo in order to christen the birth of the new Kurdish state. This would be a geostrategic outpost of strong Western influence that can epitomize the US’ regional balance of power stratagem.

A dual shadow effect of US airstrikes in Northern Iraq, besides securing Kurdish independence, would be to pressure the Syrian government. US bombings in this region would be the most significant demonstration of US military force near Syria’s borders since the destabilization in that country began in 2011. Also, since they will be conducted under the pretext of attacking ISIL, they can dangerously result in characteristic US mission creep that may see America expanding the war into the ISIL-controlled portions of Syria. In this manner, Kurdistan, Iraq, ISIL, and Syria are all wound up into the same geopolitical nexus, and the actions of or against one cannot be separated from the rest in this Gordian context.

Concluding Thoughts

The US is considering carrying out a humanitarian intervention to protect the Christians, Kurds, and Yazidis in Northern Iraq, but doing so would also advance certain geopolitical imperatives. The pretext of such an operation is plausible enough to garner significant public and, potentially, international support, but observers should not be surprised when this results in collateral political aftereffects. The US has a strong interest in midwifing Kurdish independence and finding a backdoor justification for military involvement in Syria, and first and foremost, these should be seen as the country’s true guiding motivations for any military involvement in Northern Iraq.