There's no public or professional support for the NHS privatisation reforms - and the LSE Study's indicators can't measure quality of patient care

David Cameron’s planned NHS reforms are opposed by more than twice as many people as support them. A YouGov poll this month found 48% oppose them and only 14% support them (1). That’s up from 41% opposing them and 20% supporting them in a June 2011 YouGov poll, showing that as people hear more about the ‘reforms’ they like them less and less (2).   The rest are don’t knows, probably because they don’t understand the reforms, which is no surprise because even Professors of Healthcare funding say they don’t understand how they’re meant to work in practice.

The British Medical Journal reports that ‘Despite 25 years of experience researching health systems, including writing over 30 books and 500 academic papers, Professor Martin McKee from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine says he still can’t understand the government’s plan for the NHS.

In a Personal View published on bmj.com today, he writes: “I have tried very hard, as have some of my cleverer colleagues, but no matter how hard we try, we always end up concluding that the bill means something quite different from what the secretary of state says it does.”’ (3)

Mark Britnell, a former adviser to David Cameron, is now head of the Healthcare division of accountancy firm KPMG told a conference of private healthcare companies that the NHS would be shown “no mercy” in the reforms leading to “big opportunities” for private healthcare firms (4). No wonder Andrew Lansley and David Cameron don’t want people to be clear about what their ‘reforms’ would involve.

Cameron later claimed to have no idea who Britnell was and to have never met him, despite Britnell being the head of the NHS body covering Cameron’s constituency and NHS Oxford documents showing Britnell and Cameron had definitely had at least one meeting. The Financial Times reported that Britnell certainly was in meetings with Paul Bate, Cameron’s special adviser on healthcare, so either way clearly has some input into and understanding of the government’s healthcare plans (5). (The fact that Britnell was a senior NHS official under Labour might ring alarm bells about the right wing of the Labour party too).

The “quite different thing” which the bill will actually involve if it’s passed is likely step by step privatisation, as with the Royal Mail, with the planned end game being to set the NHS impossible tasks to compete with private firms who are cherry picking the profitable business and leaving the expensive work to the public sector, which is then judge to have failed and so to require privatisation (and when I say ‘work’ I mean ‘patient care’ as we ‘dinosaurs’ who don’t see ensuring everyone can afford healthcare as just an impediment to profits for private firms)

he June 2011 poll also showed 71% opposed privatisation of the NHS with only 7% supporting it (6).  So if more understood the reforms include private companies running NHS hospitals, even more would oppose them.

Private healthcare firms like Care UK are reported to have donated money to Health Secretary Andrew Lansley’s office and Paul Ruddock, who, according the the Conservative Home website, donated over £480,000 to the Conservative Party , is one of the major shareholders of Circle Healthcare, the first private company to be given a contract to run an NHS hospital.

The reforms are also opposed entirely by 75% of GPs and 65% of all NHS employees polled ; and many more want them changed. If passed they would result in much of already overworked doctors and nurses’ time being spent on management rather than patient care (7) – (8).

Many studies show increased competition leads to increased death rates among heart attack patients, an internationally accepted measure of patient care (9) – (11).

Some others claim evidence that competition improves patient care – but the indicators they use as supposed measures of ‘efficiency’ , ‘productivity’ and ‘quality of care’ can’t show anything of the kind. For instance the recent London School of Economics study, which supposedly found competition improved care, used how long patients stayed in hospital before and after hip operations as it’s only indicators. Yet shorter stays may mean less preparation for the operation and less post-operative care – i.e poorer care. You might as well try and measure temperature by using the average height of lamp posts as try to measure quality of patient care by how long they were in hospital before and after hip operations (12) – (13).

Professor Steve Field, the GP heading the government’s listening exercise says the plans would destroy key NHS services and that what is needed is not more competition but more co-operation between different hospitals and practices (14).

Cameron and Lansley’s plan would not save the NHS – it would destroy it. It has no support, either among the majority of the electorate or among the majority of healthcare professionals – and there is no evidence that competition improves healthcare provision – only dodgy studies drawing conclusions that can’t follow from the indicators they use.

(1) = YouGov / Sunday Times Survey Results 9th - 10th February 2012 , http://cdn.yougov.com/cumulus_uploads/document/ly9ei68uye/YG-Archives-Pol-ST-results-10-120212.pdf  and http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/archives/4807

(2) = YouGov/ Politics Home 07 Jun 2011 ‘The Politics of NHS Reform Special Report’  page 3, http://www.politicshome.com/documents/articles/NHSReportJune2011.pdf

(3) = British Medical Journal 17 Jan 2012 ‘Does anyone understand the government’s NHS reforms, asks senior professor’, http://www.bmj.com/press-releases/2012/01/17/does-anyone-understand-government%E2%80%99s-nhs-reforms-asks-senior-professor

(4) Observer / guardian.co.uk 14 May 2011 ‘David Cameron's adviser says health reform is a chance to make big profits’,http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/may/14/david-cameron-adviser-health-reform

(5) = Financial Times 03 May 2011 ‘Meeting prompts talk of sidelining Lansley’, http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/b7e17268-75bb-11e0-80d5-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1mx8CBt7q

(6) = YouGov/ Politics Home 07 Jun 2011 ‘The Politics of NHS Reform Special Report’  page 9, http://www.politicshome.com/documents/articles/NHSReportJune2011.pdf

(7) = Channel 4 News 28 Jan 2012 ‘’Don’t derail NHS reforms’ senior GPs warn’, http://www.channel4.com/news/dont-derail-nhs-reforms-senior-gps-warn , ‘ And a Yougov poll in the Sunday Times also shows that 65 per cent of NHS workers want the bill withdrawn, 66 per cent believe it will make the NHS worse, and 84 per cent are concerned about the role of the private sector, Clare Gerada, chair of the Royal College of General Practitioners, pointed out, however, that last time they had surveyed their members, 2,600 had responded and 90 per cent had had serious concerns about the NHS reforms. Dr Gerada said that 56 heads of clinical commissioning groups was small in light of the increasing opposition.’

(8) = guardian.co.uk 12 Jan 2012 ‘Three-quarters of GPs want health and social care bill withdrawn, poll reveals’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/jan/12/gps-health-bill-withdrawn-poll

(9) = Karl Propper, Simon Burgess & Katherine Green (2002)‘Does competition between hospitals improve the Quality of Care : Hospital Death Rates and the NHS Internal Market’, ; ‘We find the impact of competition is to reduce quality. Hospitals located in more competitive areas have higher death rates, controlling for hospital characteristics, actual and potential patient characteristics. The estimated effect of competition is small, but is

robust to different measures of competition and hospital volume. We also find evidence that AMI death rates in small local areas that are served by many hospitals are higher (again conditioning on population characteristics) for all but the wards that are located in the most competitive areas. Whilst the estimated impact of competition on quality is small, what it is not is positive.’ http://www.efm.bris.ac.uk/ecsb/papers/deaths.pdf and http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047272702002165

(10) = Karl Propper, Simon Burgess & Denise Gossage (2003) ‘Competition and Quality: Evidence from the NHS Internal Market 1991-1999 , ‘Payer-driven competition has been widely advocated as a means of increasing efficiency in health care markets. The 1990s reforms to the UK health service followed this path. We examine whether competition led to better outcomes for patients, as measured by death rates after treatment following heart attacks. We exploit differences in competition over time and space to identify the impact of competition. Using data on mortality as a measure of hospital quality and exploiting the policy change during the 1990s, we find that the relationship between competition and quality of care appears to be negative.’ , http://www.rwj.harvard.edu/papers/propper.pdf

(11) = Stephen M. Shortell, Ph.D., and Edward F.X. Hughes, M.D., M.P.H. (1988) ‘The Effects of Regulation, Competition, and Ownership on Mortality Rates among Hospital Inpatients’ in New England Journal of Medicine 1988; vol 318: pages1100-1107April 28, 1988 ; ‘ We found significant associations between higher mortality rates among inpatients and the stringency of state programs to review hospital rates (P≤0.05), the stringency of certificate-of-need legislation (P≤0.01), and the intensity of competition in the marketplace, as measured by enrollment in health maintenance organizations’ http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM198804283181705

(12) = guardian.co.uk 20 Feb 2012 ‘NHS reform: competition improves hospitals, report finds’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/feb/20/nhs-reform-competition-improves-hospitals ; ‘Prof Zack Cooper, who led the study team, said …"We found two core findings. Clearly competition between NHS hospitals improves productivity, quality and efficiency. But when they opened up competition to private sector in 2008 it didn't improve results," said Cooper.

 (13) = Zack Cooper, Stephen Gibbons, Simon Jones and Alistair McGuire (2012) ‘Does Competition Improve Public Hospitals’ Efficiency? Evidence from a Quasi-Experiment in the English National Health Service’, Center for Economic Performance, London School of Economics , CEP Discussion Paper No 1125, February 2012 http://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp1125.pdf  ‘The underlying logic for this measure is that if hospitals can maintain quality and deliver care within a shorter period of time, this is evidence of improvements in efficiency. However, rather than improving their efficiency, hospitals could shorten their overall LOS by skimping on quality and discharging patients ‘sicker and quicker’. Likewise, because overall LOS is heavily dependent on patient 3 characteristics (which directly influence recovery time), hospitals could also appear to shorten their LOS by avoiding high risk patients and focusing their care on patients who are likely less costly to treat or alternatively discharging patients before it is clinically appropriate ……….To address these issues and differentiate between genuine productive efficiency gains and quality skimping, we disaggregate LOS into its two key component parts: 1) the time from the patient’s admission until surgery; and 2) the time from the patient’s surgery until discharge.’ (How can this ‘disaggregation” possibly “addresses these issues’?)

(14) = guardian.co.uk 13 May ‘Andrew Lansley's NHS reforms are unworkable, says review chief’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/may/13/andrew-lansley-nhs-reforms-unworkable ; ‘In an interview with the Guardian, Field says Lansley's plan to make the NHS regulator Monitor's primary duty to enforce competition between healthcare providers should be scrapped. Instead it should be obliged to do the opposite, by promoting co-operation and collaboration and the integration of health services…."If you had a free market, that would destroy essential services in very big hospitals but also might destroy the services that need to be provided in small hospitals," says Field.’

Power sharing in Syria could avoid Libyan revenge and civil war – but it and ending Assad’s crimes require a deal with Russia

Assad's government and military in Syria are definitely guilty of torturing and killing civilians, including children, as well as targeting the wounded and doctors. That’s sickening and it needs to be stopped (1) – (4). Accounts by Syrian opposition activists of the killing of whole families are painful to read (5).

That has to be stopped – the question is how to stop it without creating a longer civil war or mass revenge killings and torture of the kind going on in Libya.

We should be wary of believing every claim made by the Syrian opposition. Some of the claims made by the Libyan opposition of Gaddafi ordering his troops to rape women and anti-aircraft guns being used on demonstrators turned out to be false (6).

A look at the results of a rebel victory in Libya or the situation in “liberated” Iraq should throw some serious doubt on the idea that the overthrow of Assad through Arab League and Western government arming and training of the rebels would guarantee an end to torture and murder. It might, as in Libya, lead to fighting among different rebel factions and the torture and murder by them of people even suspected (often wrongly) of having supported the dictatorship. NATO and Arab governments will only care about removing Assad as an ally of Iran, just as they lost all interest in torture and killings in Libya once Gaddafi was overthrown and his enemies were responsible for the crimes. As in Libya though, they are the only source of military support that the opposition have to turn to. However the Russian military presence in Syria (their fleet is allowed to use Syrian ports) would make any direct NATO involvement risk World War Three, which is probably why the US and it’s allies have ruled out direct military involvement – if they intervene it is likely to be covertly by arming and training the rebels with Special Forces, as in Libya. In Syria even that could risk war with Russia though.

A power sharing agreement of the kind suggested in the UN Resolution that the Chinese and Russian governments vetoed may be less bad than a Libyan or Lebanese style civil war – but that would first require an end to the government forces’ attacks on civilians – and then there would be the problem there is how to achieve a balance of power which results in compromise and a transition to democracy rather than a long civil war which neither side can win.

Many minorities in Syria including Kurds and Christians also fear being targeted by Sunni Muslim fundamentalists among the opposition if Assad is overthrown by force, just as black Libyans and African immigrant workers have been lynched and tortured in Libya and Assyrian Christians and other minorities have been killed and ethnically cleansed in Iraq. The Assad family are from the Alawite minority sect of the Shia Muslim religion.

Achieving peace is a lot harder than just overthrowing Assad, which would achieve the aims of the US government and it’s allies without ending the fighting or the torture and killing, just as with overthrowing Gaddafi in Libya. As in Libya it might reduce the scale of the torture and killing, but at the risk of civil war continuing indefinitely.

Getting that agreement will be hard as the sides now have plenty of reasons to hate and distrust one another ; and getting each to make real concessions requires convincing them that they have enough power to force the other to make real concessions to them, but not enough that they can be sure the other won’t defeat them in a fight to the end.

In Libya there are over 8,500 people held without trial by the rebel factions including women and children, many of them tortured using the same methods Gaddafi's forces used, some to death. It's so bad that Medicines Sans Frontieres have pulled out as they were being given hundreds of prisoners to keep them alive in between torture sessions so they could be tortured again. (7) – (10).

The rebel militias have been fighting one another in Tripoli ever since Gaddafi's death right up to present (in one case over control of the airport as NATO flew in planeloads of released Libyan funds in bales of cash - much of which will likely end up disappearing 'unaccounted for' just as with the billions of dollars of Iraqi Oil for Food funds that went missing under Bremer in Iraq ) and creating revolts against their rule by arresting and large numbers of people on suspicion of being Gaddafi supporters, with no trials and torturing or killing many of them (i.e behaving exactly like Gaddafi's forces did towards anyone they suspected of not supporting Gaddafi) (11) – (15).

In Iraq the torture and death squad methods used by Saddam continue to be used by the US trained police commandos and counter-terrorist units - who also kidnap and torture people just in order to extort money from their families (16) – (21).

The Arab League, which backed the UN motions on Libya and Syria is mostly made up of dictatorships that torture and kill their own civilians themselves (the Saudi monarchy, Bahraini monarchy both last year and last month, the Yemeni dictatorship, the Egyptian military) and which the NATO governments continue to back despite this. The Saudis, who have backed the brutal repression in Bahrain which has included shooting unarmed protesters, torturing protesters to death and targeting ambulances, ambulance crews and hospital staff, are the main supporters of the Syrian rebels as part of a US and NATO alliance with Sunni dictatorships against Iran and Shia Muslims. The Saudi and Qatari monarchies, along with the Egyptian military, also provided arms, funding and Special Forces to aid the rebels in Libya. None of them are democracies so promoting democracy is not likely to be their main motive (22) – (30).

The motives for intervention among the Arab League and western governments are as much about their own power in the Middle East, rather than democracy or human rights, as the Russian and Chinese governments’ are. Syria provides Russia with a naval base in the Mediterranean, while Bahrain provides the US with a naval base in the Persian Gulf, the main export route for Middle Eastern oil to the net oil importing NATO governments. That’s why Russia had blocked intervention to stop the massacres in Syria and has even sent arms shipments to Syrian forces as they commit these crimes; and why the US and it’s allies did nothing about the massacres in Bahrain (except for the Saudis, who sent troops to ensure it would continue and prevent any concessions to the protesters from the king of Bahrain) (31).

Amnesty International have now found that the Obama administration have begun arms sales to Bahrain again while killings of protesters and their deaths by torture after arrest continue (32) – (34).

Having seen what happened in Libya, i am sickened by what Assad's forces are doing, but a complete rebel victory might lead to similar brutality against anyone known or suspected to have supported Assad. The Libyan rebels may not be killing as many civilians as Gaddafi’s forces were, but they’re still torturing and murdering plenty of people on suspicion of being Gaddafi supporters.

What's needed is a balance of power between the two sides so neither feels it can torture and murder the supporters of the other.

The UN Resolution that the Arab League backed was a good peace plan for power sharing and reconciliation before elections and is still the best plan despite the Russian and Chinese vetoes.

Unless the US and it’s allies want to risk ending up at war with Russia any peace deal will require a deal between the US and it’s allies and the Russians and theirs.

After Iraq and Libya it's not hard to see why Russia and China, apart from their own self-interest, didn't trust NATO governments to not go much further than the Resolution allowed them to, but that doesn't make the main parts of the plan in the Resolution they vetoed any less valid.

The problem is that the Syrian government has to fear foreign sanctions and/or support for the rebels enough to make a real deal with the rebels, but the rebels have to fear losing enough to be willing to compromise with a government that they have very good reasons to hate; and both have to believe they’re strong enough that the other side will be forced to make genuine compromises, but not so strong that they could defeat it completely. That will be a very difficult balance to achieve. The sad truth is that whatever governments outside Syria do now, there is a high risk of a long civil war. Ending the current civil war without either creating a longer one or letting whoever wins take brutal revenge on anyone suspected of having supported the losing side should be the aim now.

That first requires an end to the massacre in Homs though – which requires Assad’s regime to fear intervention by outside powers - and it’s hard to see how that can be done at all, since direct military intervention on the side of the rebels could lead to all out war with Russia. The Assad-Russian side may have a point that attacks by rebels would also have to end for any ceasefire and power sharing deal to happen, but no-one can believe their claims that all violence is the result of attacks by armed enemies of Assad’s government any more.

(1) = Amnesty International UK  24 Oct 2011 ‘Syria: Hospital patients subjected to torture and ill-treatment - New report’, http://www.amnesty.org.uk/news_details.asp?NewsID=19770

(2) = Amnesty International 01 Feb 2012 ‘Security Council: Russia must not block efforts to end atrocities in Syria ’, http://www.amnesty.org/en/news/security-council-russia-must-not-block-efforts-end-atrocities-syria-2012-02-01

(3) = Human Rights Watch 03 Feb 2012 ‘Syria: Stop Torture of Children’, http://www.hrw.org/news/2012/02/03/syria-stop-torture-children

(4) = Medicines Sans Frontieres 08 Feb 2012 ‘Syria: medicine used as a weapon of persecution’, http://www.msf.org.uk/Syria_repression_20120208.news

(5) = guardian.co.uk 07 Feb 2012 ‘Syrian siege of Homs is genocidal, say trapped residents’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/07/syrian-homs-siege-genocidal-say-residents

(6) =  Independent 24 Jun 2011 ‘Amnesty questions claim that Gaddafi ordered rape as weapon of war’, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/amnesty-questions-claim-that-gaddafi-ordered-rape-as-weapon-of-war-2302037.html

(7) = Guardian 24 Nov 2011 ‘Libyan rebels detaining thousands illegally, Ban Ki-moon reports’ , http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/24/libya-illegal-detentions-un-report , ‘Libya's former rebels have illegally detained thousands of people, including women and children, according to the United Nations secretary general….Many of the 7,000 prisoners have been tortured, with some black Africans mistreated because of their skin colour, women being held under male supervision and children locked up alongside adults, the report by Ban Ki-moon found.’

(8) = BBC News 26 Jan 2012 ‘Libyan detainees die after torture, says Amnesty International’, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-16741937 , ‘More than 8,500 detainees, most of them accused of being loyal to former Libyan leader Col Muammar Gaddafi, are being held by militia groups in about 60 centres, according to UN human rights chief Navi Pillay.’

(9) = Independent 27 Jan 2012 ‘Free' Libya shamed by new torture claims’,http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/free-libya-shamed-by-new-torture-claims-6295394.html

(10) = Amnesty International 26 Jan 2012 ‘Libya: Deaths of detainees amid widespread torture’, http://www.amnesty.org/zh-hant/node/29388

(11) = Reuters 01 Feb 2012 ‘Rival Libyan militias fight gunbattle in capital’,http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/01/us-libya-tripoli-battle-idUSTRE81029420120201 ; ‘Rival militias fought a two-hour gunbattle over a luxury beach house being used as a barracks in the Libyan capital Wednesday…Militias have carved up Tripoli and the rest of Libya into competing fiefdoms, each holding out for the share of power they say they are owed.’

(12) = guardian.co.uk 17 Dec 2011 ‘Libyan scramble for £100bn in assets fractures the peace at Tripoli airport’,  http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/dec/17/libya-tripoli-airport-assets-un

(13) = CNN 31 Aug 2005 ‘Audit: U.S. lost track of $9 billion in Iraq funds’, http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/01/30/iraq.audit/

(14) = Reuters 24 Jan 2012 ‘Anger, chaos but no revolt after Libya violence’, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/24/libya-idUSL5E8CO2HB20120124 , ‘elders in the desert city…dismissed accusations they wanted to restore the late dictator's family to power or had any ambitions beyond their local area…."When men from Tripoli come into your house and harass women, what are we to do?" said Fati Hassan, a 28-year-old Bani Walid resident who described the men of May 28th as a mixture of local men and outsiders, former anti-Gaddafi rebels who had turned into oppressors when given control over the town….."They were arresting people from the first day after liberation. People are still missing. I am a revolutionary and I have friends in The May 28th Brigade," said Hassan, who said he urged them to ease off. "The war is over now."….."On Friday, the May 28th Brigade arrested a man from Bani Walid. After Bani Walid residents lodged a protest, he was finally released. But he had been tortured…."This caused an argument that escalated to arms.’

(15) = BBC News 24 Jan 2012 ‘Libya: Competing claims over Bani Walid fighting ’, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-16702044 , A source within the Libyan government, speaking on condition of anonymity, told the BBC the fighting broke out after a group of former rebel fighters, the 28 May Brigade, arrested one person.

The fighting was "more a clash between local people regarding a difference of who this [arrested] person was," the source said. "But of course now other people seem to be involved as well. The situation is not very clear who is who. It's still confused."

(16) = NYT magazine 01 May 2005 ‘the way of the commandos’, http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/01/magazine/01ARMY.html

(17) = The Nation 22 Jun 2009 ‘Iraq's New Death Squad’, http://www.thenation.com/article/iraqs-new-death-squad

(18) = BBC News 27 Jan 2005 'Salvador Option' mooted for Iraq’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/4209595.stm

(19) = Times 08 Aug 2005 ‘West turns blind eye as police put Saddam's torturers back to work’, http://www.infowars.com/articles/iraq/west_turns_blind_eye_saddams_torturers_at_work.htm

(20) = Amnesty International Annual Report 2011 – Iran,http://www.amnesty.org/en/region/iran/report-2011#section-64-6

(21) = Guardian 16 Jan 2012 ‘Corruption in Iraq: 'Your son is being tortured. He will die if you don't pay'’,http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan

(22) = BBC News 13 Jan 2012 ‘ Shia protester 'shot dead' in Saudi Arabia’, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-16543013 ‘At least one person has been killed and three others injured in clashes between security forces and Shia protesters in eastern Saudi Arabia, activists say.Issam Mohammed, 22, reportedly died when troops fired live ammunition after demonstrators threw stones at them in al-Awamiya, a town in the Qatif region.’

(23) = Amnesty International Annual Report 2011 – Saudi Arabia, http://www.amnesty.org/en/region/saudi-arabia/report-2011#section-121-5 and http://www.amnesty.org/en/region/saudi-arabia/report-2011#section-121-11

(24) = CNN 27 Jan 2012 ‘4 killed in protests in Bahrain, opposition group says’, http://articles.cnn.com/2012-01-27/middleeast/world_meast_bahrain-unrest_1_bahrain-center-bahraini-police-wefaq?_s=PM:MIDDLEEAST

(25) = See sources listed and linked to in this post and this one on Egypt, Bahrain, Saudi and Yemen

(26) = CNN 04 Feb 2012 ‘Death toll climbs after Egypt soccer protests’, http://edition.cnn.com/2012/02/04/world/africa/egypt-soccer-deaths/index.html

(27) = Independent 07 Mar 2011 ‘America's secret plan to arm Libya's rebels  - Obama asks Saudis to airlift weapons into Benghazi ’, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/americas-secret-plan-to-arm-libyas-rebels-2234227.html

(28) = Al Jazeera 03 Apr 2011 ‘Libyan rebels 'receive foreign training'’,http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2011/04/201142172443133798.html ; US and Egyptian special forces have reportedly been providing covert training to rebel fighters in the battle for Libya, Al Jazeera has been told….An unnamed rebel source related how he had undergone training in military techniques at a "secret facility" in eastern Libya.

(29) = Guardian.co.uk 23 Aug 2011 ‘Libya: battle for Tripoli – live blog – 5.50pm’,http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/middle-east-live/2011/aug/23/libya-battle-for-tripoli-live-blog#block-11 ; ‘Defence expert Robert Fox is telling the BBC special forces from Qatar and the UAE, with US, British and French training, are responsible for the successful attack on Tripoli. "It has been a genuine Arab coalition ... I think it was the Qataris that led them through the breach." He said William Hague was "dissembling" in his comments just now.’ ;

(30) = Go to the post on this link and see sources 7 to 14 on it

(31) = Amnesty International 01 Feb 2012 ‘Security Council: Russia must not block efforts to end atrocities in Syria ’, http://www.amnesty.org/en/news/security-council-russia-must-not-block-efforts-end-atrocities-syria-2012-02-01

(32) = Amnesty USA blog 30 Jan 2012 ‘U.S. Arms Sales to Bahrain: 4 Questions for the Obama Administration’, http://blog.amnestyusa.org/middle-east/u-s-arms-sales-to-bahrain-4-questions-for-the-obama-administration/

(33) = Amnesty International 26 Jan 2012 ‘Bahrain’s use of tear gas against protesters increasingly deadly’, http://www.amnesty.org/zh-hant/node/29403 ; ‘A Bahraini human rights group has reported at least 13 deaths resulting from the security forces’ use of tear gas against peaceful protesters as well as inside people’s homes since February 2011, with a rise in such deaths in recent months.

“The rise in fatalities and eyewitness accounts suggest that tear gas is being used inappropriately by Bahraini security forces, including in people’s homes and other confined spaces,” said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Deputy Director.’

(34) = CNN 27 Jan 2012 ‘4 killed in protests in Bahrain, opposition group says’, http://articles.cnn.com/2012-01-27/middleeast/world_meast_bahrain-unrest_1_bahrain-center-bahraini-police-wefaq?_s=PM:MIDDLEEAST

Eight current and former heads of Mossad and Shin Bet are against attacking Iran – the dangerous, aggressive nuclear armed government is in Israel

Warnings from current and former Israeli intelligence chiefs and statements by Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Defence Minister Ehud Barak suggest the biggest danger from a rogue government armed with nuclear weapons comes not from Iran, but from Israel. The intelligence and history show that Iran would not use nuclear weapons except as a deterrent even if it developed them and that Israel’s fear is not a nuclear strike but Iranian political influence and it’s conventional military alliance with Israel’s Arab enemies. Even Barak admitted in a speech in 2010 that Iran’s nuclear programme does not threaten to destroy Israel which is a regional “superpower” which won't be destroyed(1).

Barak and Netanyahu have been trying to persuade other Israeli government ministers to support their plan for military attacks on Iran and have already persuaded their Foreign Minister Avigdor Leiberman (2).

Barak recently cited India not responding militarily to Pakistani military intelligence involvement in the Mumbai terrorist attacks because Pakistan has nuclear weapons as evidence that Iran’s response to Israeli attacks would be ‘muted’, as Israel has nuclear weapons already (3).

Barak’s bizarre reasoning ignores the fact that if Iran would be deterred from responding to Israeli attacks by Israel’s nuclear arsenal, then it would also be deterred from using any nuclear weapons it developed itself against Israel for fear of a massive nuclear or conventional response from the much stronger forces of Israel or the US and it’s allies, making the planned attack pointless.

That's unless the aim of the plan to bomb Iran isn't to avert a threat to Israel, but so Iran can't prevent Israel bombing it or threatening to bomb it in future by getting it's own nuclear deterrent.

My last post quoted the current head of Mossad, Tamir Pardo, saying Iran developing nuclear weapons would not be an ‘existential threat’ to Israel (4). Pardo and the current head of Shin Bet Yoram Cohen are against attacking Iran, as is the Israeli military’s Chief of Staff Benny Gantz (5). Pardo and Cohen were appointed by Netanyahu because of opposition to his plan to go to war on Iran from the previous heads of Mossad and Shin Bet (Israeli Military Intelligence) Meir Dagan and Yuval Diskin, who were sacked for leaking those plans to the media (6).

Dagan (pictured in the photo at the top of this post) says Iran won’t have nuclear weapons till 2015 (partly due to sanctions and Israeli assassination campaigns), assuming it wants them; and that bombing Iran would lead to retaliation, by both Iran and Iranian armed Hezbollah, Hamas and Syria, costing many Israeli lives, so should be a last resort if all other pressure fails (7) – (8). Dagan is no soft-line liberal. He was appointed as head of Mossad under serial war criminal and hard liner Ariel Sharon and also served under Olmert during the brutal ‘Gaza War’– neither Prime Minister had any complaints about him.

A third former head of Mossad, Efraim Halevy, says Iran is “far from posing an existential threat” to Israel and has also warned military attacks on Iran would result in heavy casualties in Israel, as has former Shin Bet (Israeli military intelligence) head Shlomo Gazit, who says Israel would likely be greatly weakened by such a war. They estimate that Israel would lose at least a third of whatever air forces it sent to attack Iran and would take further losses in Israel itself from retaliatory missile attacks (9) – (10).

Dagan, Halevy, Gazit and another former Shin Bet head Yakov Perry all warn that air strikes or threatening to attack Iran can’t prevent it eventually getting nuclear weapons – and may even make them decide to make nuclear weapons and put more resources into making them more quickly even if they weren’t planning to make them already. Perry has said that the Iranian and US governments should be talking directly with the Iranian government but so far haven’t done so (11).

Israeli military historian Martin Van Creveld and former US commander in the Middle East General John Abizaid both say Iran would only want nuclear weapons as a deterrent against attack (12) – (13).

Retired Major General Uzi Dayan, another former head of Shin Bet and a former adviser to Ariel Sharon has also said that "While not an existential threat, Tehran's nuclear program is an unacceptable threat,”, but believes sanctions can dissuade the Iranians from building nuclear weapons (14).

The only former Mossad or Shin Bet head believing that if Iran got nuclear weapons it might destroy Israel and supporting attacking Iran is Danny Yatom, who was only head of Mossad for two years under Netanyahu from 1996 to 1998 and had a long political career as a hardliner. Yatom is working with his mentors and allies Barak (who he was an adviser and spokesman for for several years after having served under him in the Israeli army) and Netanyahu, to try to blackmail the US and its allies into attacking Iran on Israel’s behalf (15) – (19).

Former Israeli Foreign Minister Shlomo Ben Ami also says Iran would only want nuclear weapons to deter attacks from the US and Israel – and that if Israel wants to reduce growing Iranian influence in the Middle East the best way to do it would be to make a comprehensive peace with it’s Arab enemies – especially the Palestinians (including Hamas) , Hezbollah and Syria, so that they will no longer look to Iran for arms, funding and support against Israel (20).

Even Ehud Barak himself admitted in a speech on Holocaust Remembrance Day in 2010 that “We are a strong country to which the whole world attributes nuclear capabilities, and in regional terms we are a superpower.” He also said he disliked people comparing Iran’s nuclear programme to the Holocaust , “because it cheapens the Holocaust and stretches current challenges beyond their proper place. There is none that will dare to destroy Israel.” (21)

Yet the Obama administration are so influenced or cowed by the Israel lobby in the US that they have repeatedly said that “no option is off the table” on preventing Iran getting nuclear weapons and that this “includes military action”.  British Foreign Secretary William Hague has dutifully parroted the American line, saying in mid-January that the UK may go to war on Iran too (22) – (24). As in Iraq sanctions may well be not an alternative to war but part of the propaganda to prepare for it, by saying ‘we tried sanctions and they didn’t work’.

We should make it clear that the UK will take no part in any military attack on Iran and will not give political approval for an Israeli or US attack either. Even most of those Israeli intelligence heads and former heads who support military strikes to try to prevent Iran getting nuclear weapons do not believe Iran would risk it’s own destruction by Israeli or US forces by using nuclear weapons on Israel. They fear a shift in the balance of power in the Middle East that would make it impossible for Israel to make direct attacks on Iran in future and might make Iran less worried about supporting proxy wars on Israel through further arming Hezbollah or Hamas with conventional weapons.  

If some hot-headed, trigger happy, Israeli politicians want to attack Iran for their own ends, which are about Israeli power in the Middle East, not Israel’s survival which is guaranteed by it’s own military and economic strength and it’s ally the US, they must be made to realise that they will be left to deal with the disaster that would result themselves and must take full blame for it.

They should not be allowed to blackmail the US, the UK and France into attacking Iran out of fear that Israel will if they don’t. British soldiers and British civilians should not die to help Israel and the US dominate the Middle East, nor to secure profits for oil or arms firms or to get control of oil reserves we could buy anyway if we lifted sanctions on Iran.

(1) = Project Syndicate 03 May 2010 ‘The Abuse of History and the Iranian Bomb’ by Shlomo Ben-Ami’, http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/benami41/English

(2) Haaretz 02 Nov 2011 ‘Netanyahu trying to persuade cabinet to support attack on Iran’, http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/netanyahu-trying-to-persuade-cabinet-to-support-attack-on-iran-1.393214

(3) = Independent 28 Jan 2012 ‘Israel warns time is running out before it launches strike on Iran’, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/israel-warns-time-is-running-out-before-it-launches-strike-on-iran-6295931.html

(4) = Israel National News 29 Dec 2011 ‘Mossad Chief: Nuclear Iran Not an Existential Threat’,http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/mossad-chief-nuclear-iran-not-necessarily-existential-threat-to-israel-1.404227

(5) = Ynet News (Israel) 28 Oct 2011 ‘Amos Gilad: Iran is massive threat that must be dealt with’, http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4140625,00.html , ‘According to a Nahum Barnea article in Yedioth Ahronoth, published on Friday, the heads of the armed forces – Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz, Mossad Chief Tamir Pardo, Military Intelligence Chief Maj.-Gen. Aviv Kochavi and Shin Bet Chief Yoram Cohen share the opinion of their predecessors and are opposed to taking action against Iran at this time.’

(6) = Guardian.co.uk 03 Nov 2011 ‘Israeli PM orders investigation into Iran leak’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/03/israeli-pm-investigation-iran-leak

(7) =  Reuters 7 Jan 2015 ‘Israel: No Iran bomb before 2015’, http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/01/07/us-iran-nuclear-israel-idUSTRE70612X20110107 , ‘Israel believes Iran will not be able to produce a nuclear bomb before 2015 and a top Israeli official has counseled against pre-emptive military strikes, intelligence assessments published on Friday said…."Iran will not achieve a nuclear bomb before 2015, if that," Dagan said ….Dagan, who in June 2009 told Israeli lawmakers that Iran could have its first nuclear warhead by 2014, attributed his valedictory timeline to a variety of factors including domestic ferment in Iran and the bite of international sanctions….Iran's enrichment drive has also suffered...foreign sabotage in incidents such as …the Stuxnet computer worm….Western intelligence agencies similarly say Iran could make a bomb by the middle of the decade, should it choose to…..Dagan, a former general whose eight-year tenure as spymaster ….said any Israeli military action against Iran should be last-ditch only…..Such attacks could spur Iran to pull out of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and pursue its program entirely free of U.N. inspections, he said."’

(8) = Ha’aretz (Israel) 01 Dec 2011 ‘Former Mossad chief: Israeli attack on Iran must be stopped to avert catastrophe’, http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/former-mossad-chief-israeli-attack-on-iran-must-be-stopped-to-avert-catastrophe-1.399046 ; ‘Former Mossad chief Meir Dagan warned Thursday against an Israeli attack on Iran, saying such a move would likely lead to a regional war involving Hezbollah, Hamas, and Syria.." …."I have to assume that the level of destruction, paralysis of every-day life, and Israeli death toll would be high." ….Dagan said he was worried about Barak's past comments on Iran, saying Barak believes Israel has less than a year to carry out an military strike. …"I am very concerned," he said. "My understanding of Barak's comments is that Israel must act within this timeframe, but I don't believe this is accurate."

(9) = Ynet news (Israel) 04 Nov 2011 ‘'Iran far from posing existential threat'’, http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4143909,00.html, ‘Former Mossad Chief Ephraim Halevy warned against an Israeli strike on Iran, saying that the results of a confrontation could be devastating for the Mideast. "The State of Israel cannot be destroyed," he told Ynet on Friday. "An attack on Iran could affect not only Israel, but the entire region for 100 years."… The former head of the Israeli secret service said Thursday during an army boarding school reunion that while Iran should be prevented from becoming a nuclear power, its capabilities are still "far from posing an existential threat to Israel."

(10) = Maariv (Israel, Hebrew) 10/06/2011 ‘What will Israel look like the day after an attack on Iran?’ , Ephraim Halevy, former head of the organisation [Mossad…In an interview with the magazine "Time" in July 2008, he held a military strike will result in devastating consequences in the long run. "It can affect us in a hundred years, it will have a negative impact on the Arab world opinion. We need to attack only as a last resort." … This week he says to Mosfsbt that "my opinion has not changed. You may quote my remarks to Time magazine as if it were made ​​today. ..such an attack would impact for generations rather than a hundred years. " ….Shlomo Gazit, former head of Military Intelligence, agrees with Halevy. "Attacking Iran's nuclear reactors will bring the destruction of Israel. We cease to exist after such an attack. The result we were hoping to achieve such an attack, sabotage of Iran's nuclear program, would be exactly the opposite. …."Iran will publicly a nuclear state, and we will be victims of missiles coming at us from Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah. Iran even switch the oil weapon to the UN Security Council would impose on us a decision to return to the '67 borders, and the Security Council will have to impose on us such a decision would include, of course, Jerusalem ". http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART2/248/965.html ,  Translated version in English via Google Translate at http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=iw&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nrg.co.il%2Fonline%2F1%2FART2%2F248%2F965.html&act=url

(11) = Jerusalem Post 20 Dec 2012 ‘Talk of Iran strike may speed-up nuclear program’, http://www.jpost.com/LandedPages/PrintArticle.aspx?id=250159 , ‘Dagan said that…“With the threat of a military attack, they may opt to cross all the red lines and instead of going carefully [toward nuclear capability], go very swiftly to obtain nuclear potential,” he said…. former Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) head Yaakov Perry, said Israel should try to open up some kind of lines of communications with Iran. Perry bemoaned that neither Israel nor the US have a channel of communications with Tehran, something he said could increase the chances of a tragic miscalculation.’

(12) = CNN 18 Jun 2007 ‘Retired general: U.S. can live with a nuclear Iran’, http://articles.cnn.com/2007-09-18/world/france.iran_1_nuclear-weapon-nuclear-program-nuclear-fuel?_s=PM:WORLD

(13) = Forward (Jewish Daily) 24 Sep 2007 ‘The World Can Live With a Nuclear Iran’ by Martin Van Creveld, http://www.forward.com/articles/11673/#ixzz1kQQdA2qR

(14) = Israel National News (Arutz Sheva 7) 25 Nov 2011 ‘Former Mossad Head Yatom: Israel Can't Afford Not to Strike Iran’,http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/150093#.TyXBiIHGCuI ; ‘Yatom also doubted that sanctions or covert operations could stop the Iranians. "We have only two options: to let Iran get the bomb, or to use military force against their military nuclear program. I think that force will have to be used. But I don't think Israel should lead. This is, after all, a global problem’

(15) = McGeough, Paul (2009) ‘Kill Khalid - The Failed Mossad Assassination of Khalid Mishal and the Rise of Hamas’. Quartet Books, p 229.  (Yatom was head of Mossad from 1996 to 1998 under Netanyahu’s Prime Ministership and resigned over the Netanyahu government’s failed attempt to assassinate Khaled Meshal, a senior member of Hamas, in Jordan)

(16) = Jerusalem Post 30 June 2008 ‘Barak loses another ally as Yatom quits politics’, http://fr.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1214726161693

(17) = BBC News 29 Jan 2001 ‘Barak election hopes fade’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/1142483.stm , ‘Mr Barak's security adviser, Danny Yatom, called Mr Arafat's speech "bellicose, inflammatory and intolerable".’

(18) = Haaretz 30 June 2008 ‘Labor MK Danny Yatom slams government, resigns from politics’,  http://www.haaretz.com/news/labor-mk-danny-yatom-slams-government-resigns-from-politics-1.248756 , ‘Defense Minister Ehud Barak's Labor Party suffered a blow on Monday when MK Danny Yatom resigned from the Knesset due to Barak's decision last week not to quit Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's coalition….Yatom, 63, served under Barak in the army and then as his chief of staff during the latter's tenure as prime minister.’

(19) = Independent 28 Jan 2012 ‘Israel warns time is running out before it launches strike on Iran’, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/israel-warns-time-is-running-out-before-it-launches-strike-on-iran-6295931.html

(20) = Project Syndicate 09 April 2007 ‘A Grand Bargain with Iran’ by Shlomo Ben-Ami, http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/benami9/English

(21) = Project Syndicate 03 May 2010 ‘The Abuse of History and the Iranian Bomb’ by Shlomo Ben-Ami’, http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/benami41/English

(22) = ABC News 18 Nov 2011 ‘Clinton on GOP Criticism on Iran Policy: ‘Iran Cannot Be Permitted to Have a Nuclear Weapon; No Option Is Off the Table’,http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2011/11/clinton-on-gop-criticism-on-iran-policy-iran-cannot-be-permitted-to-have-a-nuclear-weapon-no-option-is-off-the-table/

(23) = The Hill (Washington D.C, US) 08 Jan 2012 ‘Panetta says all options are on the table for dealing with Iran’ , http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/202951-panetta-all-options-on-the-table-for-dealing-with-iran ‘The United States is not ruling anything out when it comes to dealing with Iran, including military options, according to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta.’

(24) = Guardian.co.uk 15 Jan 2012 ‘Iran could face UK military action over nuclear programme, says Hague’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/15/iran-could-face-uk-military-action

When even the head of Mossad doesn't believe Iran would use nuclear weapons on Israel , will we fall for the same lies as on Iraq all over again?

The rhetoric coming from the US, British and Israeli governments is that all the sanctions being imposed are about bringing Iran to the negotiating table, because we supposedly could not risk the “threat” that Iran would pose if it developed nuclear weapons, despite the fact that not even the head of Mossad believes Iran would use nuclear weapons against Israel if it developed them.

(Map of US military bases and allies around Iran from The Peoples Voice blog)

Apart from US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta saying Iran is not currently developing a nuclear weapon ; and the fact that we’ve been being told Iran was about to develop a nuclear weapon for 20 years, including among many, many others, some CIA claims in 1992 and Israeli intelligence claims in 1995 that Iran would have them in 5 years and US State Department claims that they’d have one within 16 days in December 2006; not even the current head of Mossad thinks Iran would use nuclear weapons on Israel if it developed them (1) – (5).

Last month he told ambassadors that Iran developing nuclear weapons would not be an “existential threat” to Israel (6). Former US General John Abizaid, US Central Command (Middle East) commander under Bush agrees with Israeli military historian Martin Van Creveld that if Iran does develop nuclear weapons it will be as a deterrent against attack, not to launch nuclear Armageddon (7) – (8).

As Condoleezza Rice wrote in Foreign Affairs in 2000, before she began participating in war propaganda, ‘if they ["rogue states"]do acquire WMD, their weapons will be unusable because any attempt to use them will bring national obliteration’ (9).

This is certainly the case, as even if Iran wiped out Israel in a sudden nuclear strike (the supposed threat), it would then face either a counter-strike or a massive invasion from the US and it’s allies which no senior Ayatollahs or Revolutionary Guard commanders would survive.

The past decisions of the Ayatollahs and Revolutionary Guard commanders also show they don’t wish to commit national suicide. In 1988, fearing the US military was joining the Iran-Iraq war on Saddam’s side, they persuaded Khomeini to negotiate peace (10) – (11).

The issue can’t be democracy or “Iranian aggression” either, when our governments continue to support and sell arms to the Saudi monarchy whose troops have invaded Bahrain in British Aerospace Systems vehicles to ensure there are no concessions to democracy protesters; only jail, torture or death for them (12). Saudi forces killed their first ‘Arab Spring’ protester in their own country earlier this month (13). Bahrain and Saudi were still invited to arms fairs in London. Hyping up the Iranian “threat” may be helping boost western arms sales to the gulf emirates though.

The Iran “nuclear threat” is as phony as the Iraq “WMD threat”. Saddam was not prepared to risk nuclear retaliation or being overthrown by a US invasion by using WMD when he did have them, in 1991 , either. His chemical warheads for his scuds were never used in attacks on Israel or Kuwait – only conventional warheads. (14).

The current campaign of sanctions and ‘covert action’ including assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists may well be designed to try to provoke Iran’s rulers into retaliation that can be used as a pretext for war (15) – (17).

The huge cost in lives of sanctions and war against non-existent threats

The story that sanctions or war will do less harm and carry less risks than maybe letting Iran get it’s own nuclear deterrent is the opposite of the truth. Sanctions on Iraq killed millions due to shortages of food and medicines, including over 500,000 children, according to the two heads of the sanctions programme who resigned in protest (18) – (19).

Iraq is now full of not only Al Qa’ida terrorists, but also US trained police commando and ‘counter terrorist’ death squads, ( modelled on the notorious ones trained by US forces in El Salvador in the 1980s), using the same torture methods as under Saddam – rape, electrocution, beatings, breaking bones, pulling out nails – and additionally kidnapping people to torture to extort money from their families (20) – (25). Arab Spring demonstrations against the government led to protesters being shot dead (26).

War on Iran would lead to the kind of chaos there has been in Iraq since the invasion (and the same massive increase in terrorism ) or the kind of chaotic civil war that is going into it’s second round already in Libya, as rebels imprison, torture or kill many thousands of people on suspicion based on the colour of their skin or what tribe they belong to, leading to renewed fighting in Bani Walid  (27) – (29).

In Iraq, far from securing arms dumps or suspected WMD sites the US invasion and occupation allowed huge amounts of conventional weapons and ammunition, hundreds of tonnes of explosives and machinery which could potentially be used to make chemical weapons or nuclear components to be looted. Much of the conventional arms and explosives likely used by insurgents and terrorists afterwards (30) – (34).

In Libya Gaddafi’s armouries weren’t secured either in an “intervention” which supposedly “would not repeat the mistakes made in Iraq” - and Al Qa’ida may now have it’s hands on surface to air missiles as a result (35) – (36).

By far the most likely way terrorists could get their hands on nuclear material would be if Iran was collapsed into chaos by war or civil war, Iraq or Libya style. No government, religious (e.g Pakistani military, military fundamentalist since General Zia) or secular, democracy or dictatorship(e.g China and North Korea as one party states with nuclear weapons), has ever given WMDs to terrorist groups, because it would have lost control of incredibly dangerous weapons by doing so.

The threat of WMD attacks by terrorist groups is also greatly exaggerated though. Massive amounts of nuclear material went onto the black market when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990 – and smaller amounts in the chaos in Iraq after the invasion. Yet no terrorist group has used any of this material in any attack in the 21 years since the USSR collapsed or the 8 years since the invasion of Iraq.

Same Old Lies – To the Same Old Tune ‘It’s different this time’

We’re seeing a re-run of the sanctions and UN resolutions on Iraq, on Iran – a combination of a means of weakening a country with a lot of oil reserves that won’t obey orders; and for show to say that we tried sanctions and diplomacy, but they didn’t work, so we have “no choice” but to go to war against a non-existent threat from a minor power. Iran is supposedly threatening Israel, the strongest military (and nuclear) power in the Middle East, which has the greatest military and nuclear power in the world (the US) as it’s ally, plus the rest of NATO (the UK, France, Germany, Australia, Canada), by getting it’s own nuclear deterrent to deter those powers from attacking it (37).

Of course it also provides a useful distraction from mass unemployment, made worse by austerity policies at home, which take jobs and benefit money from the majority, the poor, the disabled and the unemployed, but never result in an end of government subsidies for the wealthiest or arms companies.

Whether Iran is actually developing nuclear weapons or not does not matter to the Israeli or US or British governments, let alone whether they would actually use them or not.

With Iraq we were told that if it allowed inspections and disarmament, there would be no war. In fact when UNMOVIC head Hans Blix reported twice to the UN Security Council that weapons inspectors that they were making more and more progress in destroying what little WMD remained (relatively small quantities of nerve gas and chemical mortar rounds) along with destroying those of Saddam’s missiles which had a range of over 150 kilometres  (38) – (39).

Bush invaded anyway, because whether Saddam had WMDs and whether he would use them were only ever pretexts designed to fool the gullible and those who wanted to believe their country and it’s government must be in the right.

Will we really fall for exactly the same lies twice, played to the same old tune of ‘it’s different this time’?

Sources

(1) = USA Today 08 Jan 2012 ‘Panetta: Iran not building bombs yet’,http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/story/2012-01-08/iran-nuclear-weapons/52451620/1

(2) = NYT 21 Aug 2004 ‘Sharon on the warpath : Is Israel planning to attack Iran?’ by Martin Van Creveld, http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/21/opinion/21iht-edcreveld_ed3_.html ‘On the other hand, the claim that Iran is working on nuclear weapons and would have them within three years has now been floating about for almost a decade and a half and, so far, has always proved false.’

(3) = Forward (Jewish Daily) 19 Aug 2009 ‘With Each New Assessment, Iran’s Nuclear Clock Is Reset’http://www.forward.com/articles/112468/ , ‘The senior Israeli official’s tone was dire. In only a few years, the Iranians would be ready to launch a nuclear bomb. He minced no words. “If Iran is not interrupted in this program by some foreign power, it will have the device in more or less five years.”......The year this apocalyptic prediction was made: 1995. …. In 1992, Robert Gates, then director of the CIA, pointedly upended conventional thinking about Iran’s nuclear progress when he gave a much shorter time span for attainment of the bomb. “Is it a problem today?” he asked at the time, “probably not. But three, four, five years from now it could be a serious problem.”’

(4) = Bloomberg 12 Apr 2006 ‘Iran Could Produce Nuclear Bomb in 16 Days, U.S. Says (Update2)’, http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aduNTcpDuDd4&refer=germany

(5) = Haaretz (Israel) 29 Dec 2011 ‘Mossad chief: Nuclear Iran not necessarily existential threat to Israel’, http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/mossad-chief-nuclear-iran-not-necessarily-existential-threat-to-israel-1.404227

(6) = Israel National News 29 Dec 2011 ‘Mossad Chief: Nuclear Iran Not an Existential Threat’,http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/mossad-chief-nuclear-iran-not-necessarily-existential-threat-to-israel-1.404227

(7) = CNN 18 Jun 2007 ‘Retired general: U.S. can live with a nuclear Iran’, http://articles.cnn.com/2007-09-18/world/france.iran_1_nuclear-weapon-nuclear-program-nuclear-fuel?_s=PM:WORLD

(8) = Forward (Jewish Daily) 24 Sep 2007 ‘The World Can Live With a Nuclear Iran’ by Martin Van Creveld, http://www.forward.com/articles/11673/#ixzz1kQQdA2qR

(9) = Rice, Condoleeza (2000) in Foreign Affairs January/February 2000‘ - 'Campaign 2000: Promoting the National Interest' http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20000101faessay5-p50/condoleezza-rice/campaign-2000-promoting-the-national-interest.html - cited in Chomsky, Noam (2003) 'Hegemony or Survival' , Penguin Books , London & NY 2004, pages 34 & 260 citing Mearsheimer, John & Walt, Stephen (2003) in Foreign Policy Jan/Feb 2003

(10) = Takeyh, Ray (2006), ‘Hidden Iran - Paradox and Power in the Islamic Republic, Times Books, New York, 2006 , pages 170-174

(11) = Pollack, Kenneth M.(2004), ‘The Persian Puzzle', Random House, New York, 2005 paperback edition, pages 231-233

(12) = Financial Times (ft.com) 12 Sep 2011 ‘Bahrain and Saudi offered slots at arms fair’, http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/65a7634e-dd27-11e0-b4f2-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1kQT7iY9p ‘Bahrain and Saudi Arabia have both been invited to the UK’s largest arms fair this week, in spite of the two countries’ roles in suppressing pro-democracy movements earlier this year…..This year Saudi Arabia used Tactica armoured vehicles made by BAE to send its National Guard into Bahrain to suppress pro-democracy protests.’

(13) = BBC News 13 Jan 2012 ‘ Shia protester 'shot dead' in Saudi Arabia’, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-16543013 ‘At least one person has been killed and three others injured in clashes between security forces and Shia protesters in eastern Saudi Arabia, activists say.Issam Mohammed, 22, reportedly died when troops fired live ammunition after demonstrators threw stones at them in al-Awamiya, a town in the Qatif region.’

(14) = Nye , Joseph S. & Smith , Robert K. (1992), ‘After the Storm, Madison Books , London , 1992 , hardback edition, pages 211-216

(15) = BBC News 11 Jan 2012 ‘Iran car explosion kills nuclear scientist in Tehran’, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-16501566

(16) = guardian.co.uk 11 Jan 2012 ‘Iran nuclear scientist killed in Tehran motorbike bomb attack’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/11/iran-nuclear-scientist-killed

(17) = Haaretz (Israel) 29 Dec 2011 ‘Mossad chief: Nuclear Iran not necessarily existential threat to Israel’, http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/mossad-chief-nuclear-iran-not-necessarily-existential-threat-to-israel-1.404227  ‘According to three ambassadors present at the briefing, the intelligence chief said that Israel was using various means to foil Iran's nuclear program and would continue to do so, but if Iran actually obtained nuclear weapons, it would not mean the destruction of the State of Israel.’

(18) = BBC News 30 Sep 1998 ‘UN official blasts Iraq sanctions’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/183499.stm

(19) = Guardian 29 Nov 2001 ‘The hostage nation’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2001/nov/29/iraq.comment

(20) = NYT magazine 01 May 2005 ‘the way of the commandos’, http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/01/magazine/01ARMY.html

(21) = The Nation 22 Jun 2009 ‘Iraq's New Death Squad’, http://www.thenation.com/article/iraqs-new-death-squad

(22) = BBC News 27 Jan 2005 'Salvador Option' mooted for Iraq’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/4209595.stm

(23) = Times 08 Aug 2005 ‘West turns blind eye as police put Saddam's torturers back to work’, http://www.infowars.com/articles/iraq/west_turns_blind_eye_saddams_torturers_at_work.htm

(24) = Amnesty International Annual Report 2011 – Iran,http://www.amnesty.org/en/region/iran/report-2011#section-64-6

(25) = Guardian 16 Jan 2012 ‘Corruption in Iraq: 'Your son is being tortured. He will die if you don't pay'’,http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/16/corruption-iraq-son-tortured-pay

(26) = BBC News 25 Feb 2011 ‘Protesters killed in Iraqi 'day of rage'’,http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12576613

(27) = Independent 24 Jun 2011 ‘Amnesty questions claim that Gaddafi ordered rape as weapon of war’, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/amnesty-questions-claim-that-gaddafi-ordered-rape-as-weapon-of-war-2302037.html ; ‘Rebels have repeatedly charged that mercenary troops from Central and West Africa have been used against them. The Amnesty investigation found there was no evidence for this. "Those shown to journalists as foreign mercenaries were later quietly released," says Ms Rovera. "Most were sub-Saharan migrants working in Libya without documents."….Others were not so lucky and were lynched or executed. Ms Rovera found two bodies of migrants in the Benghazi morgue and others were dumped on the outskirts of the city. She says: "The politicians kept talking about mercenaries, which inflamed public opinion and the myth has continued because they were released without publicity."’

(28) = Guardian 24 Nov 2011 ‘Libyan rebels detaining thousands illegally, Ban Ki-moon reports - An estimated 7,000 detainees being held, including women, children and black Africans tortured for skin colour’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/24/libya-illegal-detentions-un-report

(29) = Independent 27 Jan 2012 ‘'Free' Libya shamed by new torture claims’, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/free-libya-shamed-by-new-torture-claims-6295394.html

(30) = Times 28 Oct 2004 ‘350 tonnes of high explosive looted in Iraq’,http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article498870.ece

(31) = AP 31 Oct 2004 ‘2nd Site With U.N.-Sealed Arms Was Looted, Inspectors Report’,http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/31/international/middleeast/31chemical.html

(32) = Washington Post 11 May 2003 ‘Iraq nuclear sites reportedly looted’, http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2003-05-11/news/0305110454_1_nuclear-bomb-looted-iraq

(33) = AP Worldstream 31 Oct 2004 ‘Iraq Looted Chemical Site’, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-101900373.html

(34) = NYT 13 Mar 2005 'Looting at Weapons Plants Was Systematic, Iraqi Says', http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/13/international/middleeast/13loot.html

(35) NPR 27 Jan 2012 ‘U.S. Fears Terrorists Could Acquire Looted Weapons’, http://www.npr.org/2011/09/12/140388721/fears-terrorists-could-land-looted-gadhafi-weapons

(36) = CNN 07 Sep 2011 ‘Missiles looted from Tripoli arms warehouse’, http://articles.cnn.com/2011-09-07/world/libya.missing.arms_1_igla-s-surface-to-air-missiles-shoulder-launched-missiles?_s=PM:WORLD

(37) = Arms Control Association – ‘Nuclear Weapons : who has what at a glance’, http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Nuclearweaponswhohaswhat

(38) = Briefing of the Security Council, 14 February 2003: An update on inspections, Executive Chairman of UNMOVIC, Dr. Hans Blix, http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/pages/security_council_briefings.asp#6

(39) = Briefing of the Security Council, 7 March 2003: Oral introduction of the 12th quarterly report of UNMOVIC, Executive Chairman Dr. Hans Blix,http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/pages/security_council_briefings.asp#7