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Tuesday, September 07, 2010

Pathological Israel-first neocons recycle same game planned used to swindle US into Iraq, now against Iran

From:
Reverse Linkage: Debunked Iraq War Talking Point Is Back (Lobeloge) -- by Eli Clifton --

Last week brought a marked increase in neoconservatives and their allies pinpointing “where the road to peace” leads through. In 2002 and 2003, they argued that road leads “through Baghdad.” In 2010, it now leads “through Tehran.”

On a nearly daily occurrence, neoconservative op-ed columns and blogs are recycling the worn talking point, with hawks reiterating peace talks between Palestinians and Israelis are doomed as long as Iran continues its alleged pursuit of nuclear weapons.

Back in April 2002, a year prior to the invasion of Iraq, Foreign Policy Initiative and PNAC co-founders Bill Kristol and Robert Kagan wrote that Middle East peace would be unattainable unless Saddam Hussein was overthrown...

Looking through the rear view mirror with 20/20 hindsight, it’s hard to detect much truth in Kagan and Kristol’s assertion. Although they called Saddam Hussein “the fundamental problem in the Middle East”, the 2006 Lebanon War, the 2007 Hamas takeover of Gaza and the winter 2008-2009 Gaza War all occurred after he had been removed from power.

Now they want to drive down their newest repaved “road that leads to real security and peace,” because the last road doesn’t seem to have led anyone there. Their utter failure to chart a sound course in the first decade of the century hasn’t stopped the blustering of Iran hawks throughout Washington. Neoconservatives and their allies still employ the thoroughly debunked “road to peace through [insert Muslim capitol]” argument to redirect public attention away from negotiations over borders and towards the Iranian “existential threat.”...

Last month’s 2010 Arab Public Opinion Poll, an annual public opinion survey of residents in five Arab countries conducted by by Shibley Telhami of the Brookings Institution and the Zogby International polling firm, found that 61 percent of respondents cited the Palestinian-Israeli conflict as their biggest policy disappointment with the Obama administration and the percentage supporting an Iranian nuclear weapons program went up from 53 to 77 percent over the past year.

Back in March, David Petraeus, one of the most influential generals in strategic circles inside and outside the Pentagon, made the military’s position on linkage crystal clear...

The reverse linkage argument — where neocons tell the American public not to worry about Arab-Israeli peace but to focus instead on Iraq, Iran or another country yet to be named on their map — has been tried, tested and failed. Reverse linkage looks like it’s here to stay no matter how disastrous and ineffective the notion’s implementation has been. Perhaps the best counterargument against those who promote reverse linkage is in the title of Kagan and Kristol’s 2002 article, “Remember the Bush Doctrine.”...
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