Understanding the Geopolitics of Terrorism
By Bill Van Auken
June
08, 2017 "Information
Clearing House"
- The latest in a long series of bloody
terrorist attacks attributed to the Islamic
State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) unfolded in Iran
early Wednesday with coordinated armed assaults
on the Iranian Parliament (Majlis) and the
mausoleum of the late supreme leader of the
Islamic Republic, Imam Khomeini. At least 12
people were killed and 43 wounded.
The
reactions of the US government and the Western
media to the attacks in Tehran stand in stark
contrast to their response to the May 22 bombing
that killed 22 people at the Manchester Arena
and the London Bridge attacks that claimed nine
lives last Saturday.
The
Trump White House released a vicious statement
that effectively justified the killings in Iran,
declaring, “We underscore that states that
sponsor terrorism risk falling victim to the
evil they promote,” an attitude that found its
reflection in the relative indifference of the
media to the loss of Iranian lives.
It is
clearly understood that terrorism against Iran
serves definite political aims that are in sync
with those of US imperialism and its regional
allies.
For its
part, Tehran’s reaction to the attacks was
unambiguous. It laid the responsibility at the
door of the US and its principal regional ally,
Saudi Arabia. “This terrorist attack happened
only a week after the meeting between the US
president (Donald Trump) and the (Saudi)
backward leaders who support terrorists,” Iran’s
Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said in a
statement, published by Iranian media. The
attack was understood in Tehran as a political
act carried out in conjunction with identifiable
state actors and aimed at furthering definite
geostrategic objectives.
The
same can be said of the earlier acts of
terrorism carried out in Manchester and London,
as well as those in Paris, Brussels and
elsewhere before them.
The
Western media routinely treats each of these
atrocities as isolated manifestations of “evil”
or religious hatred, irrational acts carried out
by madmen. In reality, they are part of an
internationally coordinated campaign in pursuit
of definite political objectives.
Underlying the violence on the streets of Europe
is the far greater violence inflicted upon the
Middle East by US, British and French
imperialism, working in conjunction with
right-wing bourgeois regimes and the Islamist
forces they promote, finance and arm.
ISIS is
itself the direct product of a series of
imperialist wars, emerging as a split-off from
Al Qaeda, which got its start in the
CIA-orchestrated war by Islamist fundamentalists
against the Soviet-backed government in
Afghanistan. It was forged in the US war of
aggression against Iraq that killed close to a
million Iraqis, and then utilized in the 2011
war to topple Libya’s leader Muammar Gaddafi.
Fighters and arms were then funneled with the
aid of the CIA into the war for regime change in
Syria.
The
latest round of terror has its source in growing
dissatisfaction among Washington’s Middle
Eastern allies and its Islamist proxy forces
over the slow pace of the US intervention in
Syria and Washington’s failure to bring the
six-year war for regime change to a victorious
conclusion.
The
people giving the orders for these attacks live
in upper-class neighborhoods in London, Paris
and elsewhere, enjoying close connections with
intelligence agencies and government officials.
Far from being unknown, they will be found among
the top ministers and government officials in
Damascus if the US-backed war in Syria achieves
its objectives.
Those
who carry out the terrorist atrocities are
expendable assets, foot soldiers who are easily
replaced from among the broad layers enraged by
the slaughter carried out by imperialism in the
Middle East.
The
mass media always presents the failure to
prevent these attacks as a matter of the
security forces failing to “connect the dots,” a
phrase that should by now be permanently banned.
In virtually every case, those involved are well
known to the authorities.
In the
latest attacks in the UK, the connections are
astonishing, even given the similar facts that
have emerged in previous terrorist actions. One
of the attackers in the London Bridge killings,
Yousseff Zaghba, was stopped at an Italian
airport while attempting to travel to Syria,
freely admitting that he “wanted to be a
terrorist” and carrying ISIS literature. Another
was featured in a British television documentary
that chronicled his confrontation with and
detention by police after he unfurled an ISIS
flag in Regent’s Park.
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The
Manchester suicide bomber, Salman Abedi, was
likewise well known to British authorities. His
parents were members of the Libyan Islamic
Fighting Group (LIFG), who were allowed to
return to Libya in 2011 to participate in the
US-NATO regime-change operation against Muammar
Gaddafi. He himself met with Libyan Islamic
State operatives in Libya, veterans of the
Syrian civil war, and maintained close
connections with them while in Manchester.
What
has become clear after 16 years of the so-called
“war on terrorism”—going all the way back to the
hijackers of 9/11—is that these elements move in
and out of the Middle East, Europe and the US
itself not only without hindrance, but under
what amounts to state protection.
When
they arrive at passport control, their names
come up with definite instructions that they are
not to be stopped. “Welcome home, sir, enjoy
your vacation in Libya?” “Bit of tourism in
Syria?”
Why
have they enjoyed this carte blanche? Because
they are auxiliaries of US and European
intelligence, necessary proxies in wars for
regime change from Libya to Syria and beyond
that are being waged to further imperialist
interests.
If from
time to time these elements turn against their
sponsors, with innocent civilians paying with
their lives, that is part of the price of doing
business.
In the
aftermath of terrorist actions, governments
respond with stepped-up measures of repression
and surveillance. Troops are deployed in the
streets, democratic rights are suspended, and,
as in France, a state of emergency is made the
overriding law of the land. All of these
measures are useless in terms of preventing
future attacks, but serve very well to control
the domestic population and suppress social
unrest.
If the
mass media refuses to state what has become
obvious after more than a decade and a half of
these incidents, it is a measure of how fully
the linkage between terrorism, the Western
intelligence agencies and the unending wars in
the Middle East has become institutionalized.
Innocent men, women and children, whether in
London, Manchester, Paris, Tehran, Baghdad or
Kabul, are paying the terrible price for these
imperialist operations, which leave a trail of
blood and destruction everywhere.
Putting
a stop to terrorist attacks begins with a fight
to put an end to the so-called “war on
terrorism,” the fraudulent pretext for predatory
wars in which Al Qaeda and its offshoots are
employed as proxy ground forces, operating in
intimate collaboration with imperialist
intelligence services and military commands.
This article was first published by
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