Unsatisfied
in "crippling" Iran with sanctions, the US looks to be set
for active operations there - and already has an in: a group called
the Mujahadin-e Khalq, which in the near future could become the
Persian equivalent of the Free Syrian Army..
RT,
26
October, 2012
On
September 21, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton passed
Public Notice 8050, de-listing the Mujahadin-e Khalq (MEK) from the
State Department’s Specially Designated Global Terrorist list,
effective September 28.
What
is MEK? Mujahadin-e Khalq is an Iranian Islamic militant organization
in exile that advocates the overthrow of the Islamic Republic of
Iran. Since its inception in 1965 in Iran, the group conducted
assassinations of US military personnel and civilians working in Iran
in the 1970s, jubilantly supported the takeover of the US embassy in
Tehran in 1979 and opposed the release of American personnel, calling
for their execution instead, fought against the Islamic Republic
together with Saddam Hussein during the Iraq-Iran War (1980-1988) and
set up headquarters in Iraq at Camp Ashraf.
In
recent years, according to various sources including NBC, MEK
teamed up with the Israeli secret service to kill Iranian nuclear
scientists.
NBC reported that US officials confirmed that “the
Obama administration is aware of the assassination campaign but has
no direct involvement”.
Screenshot from YouTube video by CNN’s Michael Ware
In
1994, the State Department sent a damning 41-page report
to Congress on
why the MEK is a terrorist organization; that designation was enacted
in 1997. The report concluded: “It
is no coincidence that the only government in the world that supports
the Mujahadin politically and financially is the totalitarian regime
of Saddam Hussein.” Well,
the MEK’s mission to overthrow Iran’s leadership has not changed
since, but the US agenda has: In a vertiginous about-face, Washington
became the powerful protector of the Mujahadin-e Khalq.
Over
the past few years, a formidable fundraising operation and campaign
to de-list MEK from the Specially Designated Global Terrorist
register gathered some high-caliber US supporters including General
James Jones, President Obama's National Security Advisor from 2009 to
2010; Bill Richardson, Energy Secretary and UN ambassador in the
Clinton administration and Obama's Special Envoy to North Korea; Tom
Ridge, the first Secretary of Homeland Security; General Wesley
Clark, former supreme commander of NATO; Louis Freeh, former director
of the FBI; three former directors of the CIA – Michael Hayden,
James Woolsey and Porter Goss; Rudolph Giuliani, former Mayor of New
York City; former UN Ambassador John Bolton; General Hugh Shelton,
former Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Mary Robinson, UN High
Commissioner for Human Rights from 1997 to 2002; and many others.
Screenshot from YouTube video by CNN’s Michael Ware
Top
Washington lawyers and lobbyists made the case for the terrorist
group as well: Akin Gump, Strauss Hauer & Feld, Patton Boggs and
others. Robert Strauss, of the firm of the same name, was US
Ambassador to the Soviet Union during the critical months of August
2, 1991, through December 26, 1991. A senior member of the firm Tobi
Gati was also head of the intelligence branch of the US State
Department.
When
speaking about terrorist groups, one might think of MEK as a ragtag
bunch of cutthroats in shreds and tatters, confined to an unsanitary
tent city. The truth is nothing of the sort. Watch this
report by
CNN’s Michael Ware dating back to 2007: You will see a marching
army in crisp brand-new white-and-blue and khaki uniforms, entering a
spacious parade ground framed by sculptures of lions. Camp Ashraf
itself is one of the best-kept military facilities in Iraq and a
sprawling city of 4,000 people, with shopping centers and hospitals,
gardens, monuments, fountains and illuminations quite unexpected in
the war-torn deserts of Iraq. The MEK is also armed with more than
2,000 well-maintained tanks, artillery, anti-aircraft guns and
armored personnel carriers. Its supplies are guarded by US military
police, and the camp itself is guarded by the American military.
Indeed, “The
coalition remains deeply committed to the security and rights of
protected people of Ashraf,” US
Major General Gardner said, according to a Headquarters Multinational
Force Iraq document dated March 11, 2006. Michael Ware calls the
MEK “the
US’ officially protected terrorists.” Another
film of Australian origin shows
Camp Ashraf’s own parliament and hundreds of tanks on the camp’s
parade ground.
Well-versed
in American political mores, the MEK’s leadership says the group is
‘pro-democracy.’ However, even the New York Times disagrees: In
the middle of the 2011 de-listing campaign, it described MEK as “a
repressive cult despised by most Iranians and Iraqis.”
‘Totalitarian
cult’ is
indeed the most frequent label applied to the MEK by people who come
in contact with the group. And American support for MEK is not
limited to military protection. Seymour Hersh, in his New Yorker
piece“ Our
Men in Iran?” revealed
that beginning in 2005, MEK fighters were trained in Nevada by the
Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC).
Screenshot from YouTube video by Journeymanpictures
Why
is Washington backing the MEK? As General Shelton said at
a conference in
February 2011, “When
you look at what the MEK stands for, when they are antinuclear,
separation of church and state, individual rights, MEK is obviously
the way Iran needs to go. … By placing the MEK on the FTO [Foreign
Terrorist Organizations] list we have weakened the support of the
best organized internal resistance group to the most
terrorist-oriented anti-Western world, anti-democratic regime in the
region.”
In
an interview with Germany’s WDR TV back in 2005, ex-CIA operative
Ray McGovern explained the logic: “Why
the U.S. cooperates with organizations like the Mujahadin, I think,
is because that they are local, and because they are ready to work
for us. Previously, we considered them a terrorist organization. And
they exactly are. But they are now our terrorists and we now don't
hesitate to send them into Iran …. for the usual secret service
activities: attacking sensors, in order to supervise the Iranian
nuclear program, mark targets for air attacks, and perhaps
establishing secret camps to control the military locations in Iran.
And also a little sabotage.”
Karen
Kwiatkowski, formerly with the Department of Defense, makes a long
story short for WDR TV: “MEK
is ready to do things over which we would be ashamed, and over which
we try to keep silent. But for such tasks we'll use them.”
Now
is the time for Russia and the world community to take active
political measures preventing the United States from launching
another proxy war in the Middle East. The MEK is much better trained
and prepared for war than the Syrian rebels were at the beginning of
the conflict, or even today. The MEK has all the necessary
capabilities to become the military arm of an American attack against
Iran. This time – unlike in Syria – the world should not ignore
the march to war, and must take steps to prevent it from happening
again.
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