Why Cheney Hates Iran

In a speech to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy in Landsdowne Virginia, Dick Cheney said the following:

The Iranian regime's efforts to destabilize the Middle East and to gain hegemonic power is a matter of record.

That is certainly extraordinary coming from an American politician. That the United States has been attempting to destabilize the Middle East and gain hegemonic power there is not only a matter of record which goes back at least as long as I can remember, but is legendary.

The 1953 CIA led campaign to overthrow Mossadegh, the then democratically elected Iranian Prime Minister is just such a case in point. In fact it was at the behest of the British that the Americans started to poke their noses in their and at the time, the Americans were trusted by the Iranians. It was the British the Iranians could not stand. But ultimately it was the United States that paid Mullahs to openly denounce Mossadegh who, through his insistence and belief in a free press, refused to quash the movement which was completely artificial and which was being conducted by agents paid by the CIA.

The reason for this legendary overthrow was the nationalization of Iran’s oil by Mossadegh. The Shah was installed in his place and there started a reign of terror and brutality which was certainly notable, but no one in the West took notice because it served their purpose.

If anyone sees a parallel with Hugo Chavez privatizing Venezuelan oil and the raised level of invective against him by the State Department then it is not surprising. But let us return to the Middle East because the meddling in South America and the attempts at destabilizing that continent by the United States is well documented as are its hegemonic attempts and plans.

It’s not like we have to go back in history very far to see evidence of attempted manipulation of events in the Mid-East. The Iraq war, overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the Gulf War, events in Lebanon, double dealings with Saudi Arabia, the pressure on Syria. It’s all an attempt to juggle and keep seven or eight spinning knives in the air simultaneously only no one at the State Department has had the intelligence to realize that it isn’t working.

Cheney is effectively calling for a hard line if not all out war against Iran. He sees Iran as the lynchpin to stability in the region. If only Iran fell…… It’s so naïve and devoid of rationale that it’s hard to believe that Cheney was CEO of a company let alone that he’s Vice-President of the United States. But there we have it in Technicolor: Iran should be attacked because it does in the region it occupies what the United States has been trying to do for decades and that’s what really sticks.

Iran is successful at manipulating the forces in the region to its own ends and America has been horrible, embarrassingly unsuccessful. Iran is President Bush’s biggest nightmare because they don’t obey the US State Department. Iran is bad because Muslims and Arabs trust it more than they trust the US and lastly, Iran is the enemy because it does the job of gaining power in the Middle East successfully and without deploying a single soldier – by supporting its neighbors. And that’s why it has to be destroyed.