Dilip Hiro ("The Iranian Labyrinth" and "Blood of the Earth"), joins Mark Dankof's America Tuesday, June 26,2007, on the Republic Broadcasting Network. Listen live from 7-10 am Central time in the United States via Internet hookup through the Republic Broadcasting Network web site, or after the fact through the online archives of the Network, based outside Austin, Texas. Access the Republic Broadcasting Network by clicking here.

Tom Englehardt's TomDispatch.com has Dilip Hiro's latest article on the subject to be covered with Mark Dankof by Mr. Hiro tomorrow. See "Nuclear Weapons Programs Are About Regime Survival: The Iranian Bomb in a MAD World" by clicking here.

The US media consensus is that "the United States faces its greatest threat of a terrorist assault since the September 11 attacks" (USA Today, 12 February 2006) The American Homeland is threatened by " Islamic terrorists", allegedly supported by Tehran and Damascus.

America is under attack" by an illusive "outside enemy".

Concepts are turned upside down. War becomes Peace. "Offense" becomes a legitimate means of "self-defense". In the words of President Bush:

"Against this kind of enemy, there is only one effective response: We must go on the offense, stay on the offense, and take the fight to them." (President George W. Bush, CENTCOM Coalition Conference, May 1, 2007)

The intent is to seek a pretext to wage a preemptive war.

A "terrorist attack on America" could be used to justify, in the eyes of an increasingly credulous public opinion, on "humanitarian grounds", the launching of a major theater war directed against Iran and Syria.

SINCE JUNE 8, 1967, when Israeli air and naval forces deliberately attacked the American intelligence ship USS Liberty, Israel and its American supporters have lied about what happened.

The facts are simple and straightforward. Israeli forces reconnoitered the ship for hours in daylight with unlimited visibility, correctly reported the ship’s identity to their headquarters, then attacked the clearly marked and defenseless American ship by air and sea for more than 75 minutes, killing 34 men and wounding more than two-thirds of the 297-man crew.

GAZA, (PIC)-- Palestinian MPs accused the mutiny trend's leader in Fatah faction MP Mohammad Dahlan of involvement in the assassination of the late PA chief Yasser Arafat, and in the shooting at the motorcade of PA premier Ismail Haneyya as well as the Egyptian security delegation in Gaza.

"Hamas obtained serious documents conclusively proving Dahlan's involvement along with his band in the assassination of the late PA chief Abu Ammar," Faraj Al-Ghoul, chairman of the legal committee of PLC, charged in a press statement to the Sharjah-based Khalij newspaper.

"The documents convict Dahlan of corruption, and establishing death squads. In addition, we have confessions of the leaders of the preventive security apparatus who have been arrested in Gaza recently", Ghoul revealed, calling for a fair trial for Dahlan and his partners and an honest investigation into the evidence and documents.

For his part, the spokesman of the Hamas-affiliated change and reform bloc in the PLC, Mushir Al-Masri confirmed to the same newspaper, that Dahlan and his group were behind the shooting at the Egyptian security delegation in Gaza and the motorcade of PA premier Ismail Haneyya last February.

Masri also stated that Hamas welcomed the formation of "a fact-finding committee" by the Arab League, and underlined that the Egyptian security delegation is "fully informed of what happened and is happening" in the Gaza Strip.

In the fall of 2003, a piece of Rupert Murdoch’s sprawling media empire was in jeopardy.

Congress was on the verge of limiting any company from owning local television stations that reached more than 35 percent of American homes. Mr. Murdoch’s Fox stations reached nearly 39 percent, meaning he would have to sell some.

A strike force of Mr. Murdoch’s lobbyists joined other media companies in working on the issue. The White House backed the industry, and in a late-night meeting just before Thanksgiving, Congressional leaders agreed to raise the limit — to 39 percent.

One leader of the Congressional movement to limit ownership was Senator Trent Lott, Republican of Mississippi. But in the end, he, too, agreed to the compromise. It turns out he had a business connection to Mr. Murdoch. Months before, HarperCollins, Mr. Murdoch’s publishing house, had signed a $250,000 book deal to publish Mr. Lott’s memoir, “Herding Cats,” records and interviews show.

Mark Dankof's guest in the last two hours of Mark Dankof's America on the Republic Broadcasting Network for Friday, June 15th, was Dr. John Dominic Crossan, author of the HarperSanFrancisco book, "God and Empire: Jesus Against Rome, Then and Now." Dr. Crossan is a professor emeritus at De Paul University, and widely regarded as the foremost historical Jesus scholar of the century. His web site may be found by clicking here.

My good friend, Dr. Paul Gottfried of Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania, goes a long way toward explaining the real agenda of the American “Christian” Right in his latest effort for The American Conservative, entitled The Giuliani-Driven Christians.

Dr. Gottfried notes that Quinnipiac polls indicate Giuliani’s present status as the most popular Presidential candidate among Protestant evangelicals, and that Hizzoner’s present lead in the polls in key swing states, especially Florida, is directly attributable to “white Evangelical voters.” The Washington Post has chimed in, reporting in February that Giuliani is “surging among white Evangelicals.”

The implications of this burgeoning phenomenon are as striking as they are demonically draconian. Hizzoner, after all, is a leading advocate of abortion-on-demand, even as he chides Islamic societies in Fox News-sponsored Presidential debates for attitudes and policies allegedly detrimental to the rights and dignity of women. And aside from the Big Apple Mayor’s publicized liabilities in personal life and conduct, it seems incredible to the point of the outrageously satirical to contemplate Giuliani’s adulation by the likes of Religious Right mogul Cal Thomas, given Hizzoner’s strident support of the militant homosexual rights constituency. That support, symbolically expressed by Rudy’s past personal appearance in Costume Drag in New York for a Gay Pride parade, suggests that all things are now possible in the increasingly comfortable alliance of the “Christian” Right with the globalist, Rockefeller wing of the Republican Party. What is next, a Giuliani campaign appearance at a National Prayer Breakfast in Babylon-By-The-Potomac with Pat Robertson, John Hagee, Billy Graham, Al Goldstein, and Barney Frank?

Sometimes it really is déjà vu all over again. Those who have hoped for a peaceful resolution of the outstanding issues between the United States and Iran must have been discouraged to watch the June 5 Republican presidential candidates' debate. With the honorable exception of Ron Paul, the Republicans lined up firmly in support of a policy to stop Iran's acquisition of a nuclear weapon using whatever means are necessary to do so, including the American nuclear arsenal. All except Paul derided Iran as the main source of terrorism in the world. Rudy Giuliani repeated the now familiar "you shouldn't take any options off the table" when asked about the possible use of nuclear weapons against Iran and stated that he even opposes Iran's acquisition of "nuclear power." Duncan Hunter said flatly that he "would authorize the use of tactical nuclear weapons" against Iran. The top Republican candidates united in their view that the Democrats would be soft on the issue of Iran, a charge that lacks validity as the leading Democratic candidates for president are as bellicose as the Republicans when it comes to Tehran's ambitions.

These are the "birth pangs" of a "new Middle East," said Condi Rice last summer, as Israel pounded Lebanon. Unfortunately, the new Middle East may make us all pray for the return of the old.

Giuliani, Ron Paul, and Operation Ajax: Or Is It Operation Blowback?

Book Review: The CIA in Iran: The 1953 Coup and the Origins of the U. S.-Iran Divide

Edited by Christopher J. Petherick

American Free Press Books

ISBN: 0-9785733-2-3153 pages, $20

by Mark Dankof for the American Free Press

Rudy Giuliani’s now infamous exchange with Ron Paul in the Fox-sponsored Republican Presidential debate revealed the former’s inadvertent—or willful—ignorance of the obvious connection between American foreign policy and insidious “blowback,” both in the Middle East and elsewhere.

My recent radio guest on the Republic Broadcasting Network, Dr. Jerome Corsi of both Human Events and WorldNetDaily, displayed a similar discomfort with acknowledging the connection between actions of the United States Government around the world, and predictable acts of retaliation and retribution on the part of past recipients of these American military and covert intelligence operations. Dr. Corsi rightly pointed out that the latter phenomenon is not justified by the former. But neither did Ron Paul indicate such, either in the Fox Presidential debates or in any other forum in which the Texas Congressman has participated over the course of many years.

See Mark Dankof's revamped blog of articles at Al Bawaba, the Middle East Gateway in Amman, Jordan. Click here.

The war in Iraq is lost. This fact is widely recognized by American military officers and has been recently expressed forcefully by Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the commander of US forces in Iraq during the first year of the attempted occupation. Winning is no longer an option. Our best hope, Gen. Sanchez says, is "to stave off defeat," and that requires more intelligence and leadership than Gen. Sanchez sees in the entirety of our national political leadership: "I am absolutely convinced that America has a crisis in leadership at this time."

More evidence that the war is lost arrived June 4 with headlines reporting: "U.S.-led soldiers control only about a third of Baghdad, the military said on Monday." After five years of war the US controls one-third of one city and nothing else.

A host of US commanding generals have said that the Iraq war is destroying the US military. A year ago Colin Powell said that the US Army is "about broken." Lt. Gen. Clyde Vaughn says Bush has "piecemealed our force to death." Gen. Barry McCaffrey testified to the US Senate that "the Army will unravel."

Several thousand Turkish troops crossed into northern Iraq in pursuit of Kurdish guerrillas early yesterday. The incursion, though limited in scope, gives the crisis in Iraq a new twist.

"It is not a major offensive and the number of troops is not in the tens of thousands," said an official in south-east Turkey where there has recently been an upsurge in activity by the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) Turkish Kurd guerrillas.

Nevertheless, the US will be worried that its entanglement in Iraq is about to become even more complicated if American troops and aircraft are asked to counter even a limited Turkish assault.

The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) controls the corporate American media. What is their agenda? Click here.

Greg Felton, author of the new book, "The Host and the Parasite: How Israel's Fifth Column Consumed America," was Mark Dankof's guest on the latter show's for the Republic Broadcasting Network in the last two hours of the Monday, June 4th broadcast.

The book is published by Dandelion Books. Click here.

Mr. Felton's personal web site may be accessed by clicking here.

The march to war in the Middle East is well underway. Outgoing Prime Minister Tony Blair has said that diplomacy is the best way forward with Iran, but appends his statements by saying that he can not “absolutely predict every set of circumstances,” which means that war can not be ruled out. In this regard, Gordon Brown is no different. The man scheduled to be the next British Prime Minister once Tony Blair steps down (June 27, 2007), has refused to rule out war against Iran and its allies.

The war dossiers against Iran and Syria, the last two bastions of independence in the Middle East, are being built. General Wesley Clark, the former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO in Europe , has confimed that the White House has been plotting a course based on a major military roadmap in the Middle East, Central Asia, and East Africa that would start in Afghanistan and Iraq and end with Iran. Clark has stated that, after Afghanistan, seven additional nations were on the the Pentagon’s list to be attacked and invaded over a five-year period: Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and finally Iran.

The geographic boundaries for these wars all fall within the military jurisdiction of United States Central Command (CENTCOM). This five-year period began with the invasion of Iraq in mid-2003 and, if the American former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO in Europe is correct, it should end approximately in mid-2008 or the last war could be initiated by this point in time. It should be noted that the second presidential term of George W. Bush Jr. ends in January of 2009. Is it possible that in 2001, when the Pentagon outlined this military roadmap, that the re-election of President Bush Jr. to a second term in office in 2005, had already been envisaged, in relation to these war plans?

Halliburton's former engineering and construction subsidiary has a contingency contract with the Department of Homeland Security to construct detention facilities in the event of a national emergency, according to WND columnist Jerome Corsi.

As Corsi reported last week, President Bush recently signed a little-reported National Security and Homeland Security Directive granting extraordinary powers to the president in the event of a declared national emergency, apparently without congressional approval or oversight.

Dear Democratic Congress,

Hello, my name is Cindy Sheehan and my son Casey Sheehan was killed on April 04, 2004 in Sadr City , Baghdad , Iraq . He was killed when the Republicans still were in control of Congress. Naively, I set off on my tireless campaign calling on Congress to rescind George's authority to wage his war of terror while asking him "for what noble cause" did Casey and thousands of other have to die. Now, with Democrats in control of Congress, I have lost my optimistic naiveté and have become cynically pessimistic as I see you all caving into "Mr. 28%".

The Bush administration has admitted that covert actions of an aggressive nature were applied against Iran and Syria. The stated objective was to wreck the countries' economies and currency systems. The infamous Iran-Syria Policy and Operations Group (ISOG) created in early 2006, integrated by officials from the White House, the State Department, the CIA and the Treasury Department, had a mandate to destabilize Syria and Iran, and bring about "Regime Change" :

"The committee, the Iran-Syria Policy and Operations Group [ISOG], met weekly throughout much of 2006 to coordinate actions such as curtailing Iran's access to credit and banking institutions, organizing the sale of military equipment to Iran's neighbors and supporting forces that oppose the two regimes." (Boston Globe, 25 May 2007)

ISOG had also been providing undercover assistance to Iranian opposition groups and dissidents. The group's propaganda ploy consisted in feeding disinformation into the news chain and "building international outrage toward Iran". (Boston Globe 2, January 2007)

Dr. Kaveh Farrokh, author of the new "Shadows in the Desert: Ancient Persia at War," will be on Mark Dankof's America on the Republic Broadcasting Network tomorrow (Wednesday, May 30th). It is the definitive work in its field, and is replete with wonderful maps and pictures. Dr. Farrokh's appearance covers the last two hours of the broadcast, which will be archived at the Republic Broadcasting Network site for later listeners.

For Biblical students, "Shadows in the Desert" has a tremendous section on the Persia of the 6th century B. C. and the ancient Achaemenid Empire period so important to the Old Testament, including Isaiah, Daniel, Esther, Ezra, and Nehemiah. Farrokh's research subsequently covers the Parthian and Sassanian Empires, the Islamic conquest of Iran and its aftermath.

BATR Review of "Shadows in the Desert: Ancient Persia at War" available by clicking here.

Osprey Publishing's biography of Kaveh Farrokh available by clicking here.

Republic Broadcasting Network's site available by clicking here.

The US Congress and the White House have been at odds over the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq for months, but brief historical reflection suggests that the only option left for Washington is to link forces with Iran. Starting in the mid-1950s, the US maintained stability in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf by establishing bilateral relationships with Israel, Iran and Saudi Arabia, and preventing any one country from overwhelming another. Even after the Iranian Revolution in 1979, presidents recognized that restoring ties with Tehran could minimize US military costs. George W. Bush, however, disrupted the delicate balance with the invasion of Iraq. Unless the US can convince Iran to play a cooperative role, the chaos in Iraq will spread to neighboring countries.

In this article, William Odom, a former director of the US National Security Agency, contends that a rapprochement with Iran is the key to restoring regional stability as the US withdraws from Iraq. However, the US must follow up on Monday’s meeting with Iran in Baghdad and abandon its current “all sticks” policy for stopping Tehran’s nuclear-weapons program. Iran cannot help but realize that its influence in Iraq faces limits when US troops leave, and Washington must take advantage of many mutual goals to establish a sustainable relationship with Iran and restore stability throughout the Middle East. – YaleGlobal