[NYTr] Juan Cole - Reagan and the Ayatollahs: The Real History vs Rudy's

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

[Juan Cole has been covering Rudy Giuliani's bluster about Iran, and
has published several important pieces on his blog and in Salon. See
Informed Comment for full embedded links. - NY Transfer]

Informed Comment - Dec 11, 2007
http://www.juancole.com/2007/12/giuliani-reagan-and-kissing-up-to.html

AND:
http://www.juancole.com/2007/12/cole-in-salon-gops-iran-option-is-off.html


Cole in Salon:

The GOP's Iran option is off the table

My column in Salon.com, "The GOP's Iran option is off the table." The
subhead is: "Rudy Giuliani was counting on Iran as a weapon of mass
distraction in the '08 race. But the flailing Republican right has just
been disarmed." Excerpt:


    ' Republicans have used the alleged nuclear threat posed by Iran to
scare the American public and to turn attention away from Iraq,
economic troubles and Republican scandals. But the NIE findings have
pulled the rug out from under the Grand Old Party.

    Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani initially dismissed
the NIE, but on Sunday he backtracked substantially on "Meet the
Press." He said of Iran, "And of course we don't ... want to use the
military option. It would be dangerous; it would be risky." . . .

    This is, of course, the same Rudy Giuliani who while campaigning
has all but pledged to bomb Iran if elected. It is a "promise" and not
a "threat," he has said, that if Tehran appears close to getting a
bomb, he will "set them back eight or 10 years." While Giuliani hasn't
specified how he would do so, he likely means launching military
strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities such as the one at Natanz. That
message has been accompanied by bluster from Giuliani worthy of a World
Wrestling Federation ham in spandex: "We will not beg to negotiate with
them. We're going to make them beg to negotiate with us." Such Hulk
Hogan-style boasts may play to the Republican base, but Giuliani now
seems more aware of the possibility that the war-weary public may not
embrace his reckless bravado if he wins his party's nomination for the
general election. ' 

Read the whole thing here:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/12/11/iran_08/index.html

                            ***
 
Giuliani, Reagan, and Kissing up to Ayatollahs with fancy Cakes

I just saw this campaign ad for Rudy Giuliani's presidential campaign.
He says that Iran held US embassy hostages for 444 days. Then they were
released within one hour. That was the hour after Ronald Reagan was
inaugurated as president, succeeding Jimmy Carter. Giuliani goes on to
tell us that this incident shows how you deal with "Islamic
terrorists." You get tough on them and don't back down.

The problem with this assertion is that it is not true, and indeed the
opposite is true. Gary Sick showed in "October Surprise" that:

    ' Piercing the shadowy netherworld of international espionage, Sick
has written one of the most controversial and disturbing accounts of
political intrigue to appear in recent years. In 1980, William Casey,
then campaign manager of the Reagan-Bush ticket, without the knowledge
or approval of the legitimate government, arranged a deal with the
Iranian government that in return for military equipment, the Iranians
would not release the 52 American hostages until Ronald Reagan was
safely inaugurated. '


So the hostages weren't released because Reagan was tough on the
Iranian regime. They were released because Casey promised that the
Republicans would sell Khomeini weapons if they kept the hostages for
an extra couple of months and denied Jimmy Carter the sort of
diplomatic coup that might have rescued his presidency.

Not only was Reagan not in fact 'tough' on the ayatollahs in Tehran, he
later on stole Pentagon weaponry from the warehouses, illegally sold
this US military materiel to a terrorist regime (that of Khomeini),
then pocketed the money from the illegal arms sales to 'Islamic
terrorists' and laundered it through shadowy bank accounts, sending it
to far rightwing death squads in Nicaragua.

Besides, they aren't "Islamic" terrorists because Islam forbids
terrorism. They might be Muslim terrorists, but then not very good
Muslims. When will Giuliani denounce the "Catholic terrorism" of some
prominent priests who were active in the Irish Republican Army? Would
he talk about "Jewish terrorism" in regard to the blowing up the King
David Hotel in Jerusalem?

As for Iran-contra, I feel a golden oldie coming on:
http://www.juancole.com/2003/12/rumsfeld-bechtel-and-iraq-well.html

'And, Shultz told both Rumsfeld and Saddam that the US was trying to
curb weapons flows to Iran. Yet it is well known that Israel was
supplying Iran with weaponry in return for Iranian oil. Only a little
over a year later, Shultz double-crossed Saddam by getting on board
with the Iran-Contra weapons exchange, which was suggested by the
Israelis in the first place. The White House illegally sold Iran
hundreds of powerful TOW anti-tank and HAWK anti-aircraft weapons
[which Reagan came on television and told us were shoulder-launched
weapons!], for use against Washington's newfound ally, the Iraqis, who
were being assured that the US was trying hard to "prevent an Iranian
victory....."


These weapons sales contravened US law, under which Iran was tagged as
a terrorist nation. (Even today I can get into trouble for so much as
editing a paper by an Iranian scholar for publication in a US scholarly
journal, but it was all right for the Republicans and Neocons to send
Khomeini 1000 TOWs!) Not only that, but Reagan's team then turned
around and used the money garnered from these off-the-books sales to
support the contra death squads in Nicaragua. In the US Constitution,
how to spend government money is the purview of Congress, and Congress
had told Reagan "no" on funding the death squads. So Reagan's people
essentially stole weapons from the Pentagon storehouses, shipped them
to Israel for transfer to Ayatollah Khomeini, and then took the ill
gotten gains from fencing the stolen goods and gave them to
nun-murderers in Latin America.

Here's the timeline:

"1985

July -- An Israeli official suggests a deal with Iran to then-national
security adviser Robert McFarlane, saying the transfer of arms could
lead to release of Americans being held hostage in Lebanon. McFarlane
brings the message to President Reagan.

Aug. 30 -- The first planeload of U.S.-made weapons is sent from Israel
to Tehran. Two weeks later the first American Hostage is released.

Dec. 5 -- Reagan secretly signs a presidential 'finding,' or
authorization, describing the operation with Iran as an
arms-for-hostages deal.

1986

Jan. 17 -- Reagan signs a finding authorizing CIA participation in the
sales and ordering the process kept secret from Congress.

April -- Then-White House aide Oliver North writes a memo outlining
plans to use $12 million in profits from Iran arms sales for Contra
aid. "

Oh, yeah, that Reagan was tough on Khomeini. Why, he even sent him a
Bible and a cake, to go along with those nice TOW's he gave him. That
will teach those terrorists to mess with the Republican Party!