The Great Game
by Uri Avnery
Some weeks ago, something curious happened: Israel discovered that Iran is
the Great Satan. It happened quite suddenly. There was no prior sensational
news, no new discovery. As if by the order of a drill-sergeant, the whole
Israeli phalanx changed direction. All the politicians, all the generals,
all the enlisted media, with the usual complement of professors-for-hire,
all of them discovered overnight that Iran is the immediate, real and
terrible danger.
By wondrous coincidence, at exactly the same moment a ship was captured
that, allegedly, carried Iranian arms to Arafat. And in Washington Shimon
Peres, a man for all seasons and the servant of all masters, accosted every
passing diplomat and told him stories about thousands of Iranian missiles
that have been given to the Hizbullah. Yes, yes, Hizbullah (included by
President Bush in the list of "terrorist organizations") is receiving
horrible arms from Iran (included by President Bush in the "Axis of Evil")
in order to threaten Israel, the darling of the Congress.
Does this sound mad? Not at all. There is method in this madness. On the
face of it, the matter is easy to explain. America is still in a state of
fury after the Twin-Towers outrage. It has won an amazing victory in
Afghanistan, hardly sacrificing a single American soldier. Now it stands,
furious and drunk with victory, and does not know whom to attack next. Iraq?
North Korea? Somalia? The Sudan? President Bush cannot stop now, because
such an immense concentration of might cannot be laid off. The more so, as
Bin-Laden has not been killed.
The economic situation has deteriorated, a giant scandal (Enron) is rocking
Washington. The American public should not be left to ponder this. So here
comes the Israeli leadership and shouts from the roof-tops: Iran is the
enemy! Iran must be attacked!
Who has made that decision? When? How? And most importantly - where?
Clearly not in Jerusalem, but in Washington DC. An important component of
the US administration has given Israel a sign: Start a massive political
offensive in order to pressure the Congress, the media and American public
opinion.
Who are these people? And what is their interest? A wider explanation is
needed. The most coveted resource on earth is the giant oil field in the
Caspian Sea region, that competes in scale with the riches of Saudi Arabia.
In 2010 it is expected to yield 3.2 billion barrels of crude oil per day, in
addition to 4850 billion cubic feet of natural gas per year. The United
States is determined (a) to take possession of it, (b) to eliminate all
potential competitors, (c) to safeguard the area politically and militarily,
and (d) to clear a way from the oil fields to the open sea.
This campaign is being led by a group of oil people, to which the Bush
family belongs. Together with the arms industry, this group got both George
Bush senior and George Bush junior elected. The President is a simple
person, his mental world is shallow and his pronouncements are primitive,
bordering on caricature, like a second-rate Western. That is good for the
masses. But his handlers are very sophisticated people indeed. It's they who
guide the administration. The Twin Towers outrage made their job much
easier. Osama Bin Laden did not comprehend that his actions serve American
interests. If I were a believer in Conspiracy Theory, I would think that Bin
Laden is an American agent. Not being one, I can only wonder at the
coincidence.
Bush's "War on Terrorism" constitutes a perfect pretext for the campaign
planned by his handlers. Under the cover of this war, America has taken
total control over the three small Muslim nations near the oil reserves:
Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. The whole region is now completely
under American political-military domination. All potential competitors -
including Russia and China - have been pushed out.
For a long time, the Americans have been arguing among themselves about the
best route for piping this oil to the open sea. Routes that may be under
Russian influence have been eliminated. The 19th century deadly
British-Russian competition, then called the "Great Game," is still going on
between America and Russia. Until recently, the western route, leading to
the Black Sea and Turkey, seemed most feasible, but the Americans did not
like it very much, to say the least. Russia is much too near. The best route
leads south, to the Indian Ocean. Iran was not even considered, since it is
governed by Islamic fanatics. So there remained the alternative route: from
the Caspian Sea, through Afghanistan and the western part of Pakistan
(called Beluchistan), to the Indian Ocean. To this end, the Americans
conducted, ever so quietly, negotiations with the Taliban regime. They bore
no fruit. Then the "War on Terrorism" was started, the US conquered all of
Afghanistan and installed their agents as the new government. The Pakistani
dictator, too, was bent to the American will. If one looks at the map of the
big American bases created for the war, one is struck by the fact that they
are completely identical to the route of the projected oil pipeline to the
Indian Ocean.
That would have been the end of the story, but the appetite grows with the
eating. The Americans drew two lessons from the Afghani experience: (a) that
every country can be subdued by sophisticated bombs, without putting any
soldiers in harm's way, and (b) that by military might and money America can
install client governments anywhere. And so a new idea came up in
Washington: Why lay a long pipeline around Iran (through Turkmenistan,
Afghanistan and Pakistan) if one can lay a much shorter pipeline through
Iran itself? One has only to topple the Ayatollah regime and install a new
pro-American government.
In the past, that seemed impossible. Now, after the Afghani episode, it
looks eminently practicable. One has only to prepare American public opinion
and to acquire the support of the congress for an attack on Iran. For this,
Israel's good services are needed. It has an enormous influence in the
Congress and the media. It works like this: Israeli generals declare every
day that Iran is producing weapons of mass-destruction and threatens the
Jewish State with a second Holocaust. Sharon announces that the capture of
the Iranian arms ship proves Arafat is a part of the Iranian conspiracy.
Peres tells everybody that Iranian missiles threaten the whole world. Every
day some newspaper tells its readers that Bin Laden is in Iran or with the
Hizbullah in Lebanon.
President Bush knows how to reward those who serve him well. Sharon got a
free hand to oppress the Palestinians, imprison Arafat, assassinate
militants and enlarge the settlements. It's a simple deal: You deliver the
support of the Congress and the media, I deliver the Palestinians on a
platter.
This could not happen if America was still in need of allies in Europe and
the Arab world. But in Afghanistan, the Americans learned that they don't
need anybody anymore. They can spit in the eyes of the pitiful Arab regimes,
that are always begging for money, and disregard Europe altogether. Who
needs the negligible armies of Britain and Germany, when America alone is
mightier then all the armies of the world combined?
The idea of American-Israeli cooperation against Iran is not new for Sharon.
On the contrary, in 1981, when he was just appointed Minister of Defense, he
offered the Pentagon a daring plan: in the event of Khomeini's demise, the
Israeli army would immediately occupy Iran, in order to forestall the Soviet
Union. The Israeli Defense Forces would turn the country over to the
slow-moving Americans, once they arrived. For this purpose, the Pentagon
would stockpile in advance the most sophisticated arms in Israel, under
American control, to be used in this operation. The Pentagon did not accept
the idea at that time. Now, the cooperation is being established against a
different background.
Uri Avnery is a leading israeli journalist who for decades has worked for a
just Israeli-Palestinian peace.
Back to Peace Talk Index, Spring, 2002