In a move certain to drive up tensions in the Middle East and around the world, Trump Administration Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo announced on Monday that exemptions to the United States sanctions on buying Iranian oil will be completely and unilaterally halted as of May second. This ratcheting up of economic sanctions on the main buyers of Iranian oil, including India and China is meant to completely cripple the ability of Iran to sell oil on world markets. As Pompeo stated, the move is intended to bring Iranian sales to "zero." In a move that can only be described as provocative, undeclared economic warfare on Iran and one that pushes that governments leadership into a corner from which it is far more likely to lash out in defense, the Trump Administration is signalling that it is seeking nothing less than yet another disastrous regime change with no thought to the unintended consequences of it's actions. In his speech, Pompeo implied that by completely shutting off Iran's ability sell oil, which it has every right to do as a sovereign nation, the administration hopes to cause such economic suffering that the Iranian people will revolt and throw off the regime in favour of something more palatable to the neo-conservative war-hawks now making policy in Washington. Previous attempts at regime change have failed completely and tragically and caused untold human suffering in places as disperse as Iraq, Libya and Syria but this has not deterred neo-conservatives in the administration who seem to be itching for yet another American sponsored war in the Middle East. While the stepped up sanctions will cause untold suffering of ordinary citizens in Iran as they have done on all other nations where they are imposed, they are unlikely to break the Mullahs hold on power as the position of hardliners that the US is an unreasonable and unreliable player on the international stage is proven once again correct. This plays exactly into the hardliners position that Iran must improve it's defensive capabilities in order to prevent yet another unprovoked attack from an America that has given itself the right to dictate terms of conduct to all other nations in the world for it's own benefit with no concern for the global economy or the suffering of civilians. And make no mistake, this move of economic warfare, brings the world much closer to a real shooting war in the region which has every potential to spread to other regions as well. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/22/world/middleeast/us-iran-oil-sanctions-.html Both India and China announced that they will not back down on purchasing oil from Iran and other nations are indicating that they will try to put together a mechanism to bypass the provocative and aggressive US action. This latest tactical blunder by an administration that has shown itself to be wholly and completely incompetent on the international stage is not in the interest of the American people and yet again shows that the US under it's current leadership is incapable of diplomacy and compromise and sees itself as beholden to nothing or no-one as it staggers around the world seeking to impose it's will on friend and foe alike. It remains to be seen how India, China, Russia and Iran react to the economic aggression against Iran which seems destined to further isolate the US from world opinion and create greater and greater animus against a country who simply cannot refrain from telling other countries what to do despite international agreement and law. One thing is certain, these countries will respond in their own interest and the world just became a far more dangerous place. https://www.dw.com/en/defiant-china-to-soften-blow-of-trumps-iran-oil-decision/a-48449904 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...all-leaves-iran-oil-buyers-with-a-costly-bill
This looks bad. I'm puzzled why there is no big discussion about that at PF. Anyway, Iran has been "a pain in the ass" for a long time. I wonder what would they do?
Yah! This is a very dangerous development. I'm not sure why this is getting so little discussion. Maybe because this is the only thread and I'm on ignore is some circles. Still, this is an alarming and potentially catastrophic development. We saw this same kind of ratcheting of tension leading up to Iraq.
Pompeo is falling down on the job. Republicans require another needless trillion dollar invasion, to feel "safe" or to make more money. And the Trumpers love their chaos, don't they? I wouldn't pizz on one if he was on fire.
Yup! War profitteering is big money and business has never been better. You can see the rhetoric heating up to prepare the public. Fox, CNN and MSM will go along for the ratings ride. And if Iraq was any indication, Republicans can go into 2020 with a wave of patriotism - bringing peace and democracy to yet another sh×%hole country. (love your avatar btw)
It doesn't seem to matter who is President... the deep state wants Middle East wars and that is what it gets. Obama broke off some action in Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc... and Trump appears to be continuing the tradition (although he explicitly ran against it). At this point, we can say that the American voter have zero impact on American foreign policy. No matter who we vote for, we are going to be in the Middle East bombing somebody. Even though it is completely brain dead and harms American interests, there are too many 0.01%ers making too much money for America to ever withdraw. Do they even bother coming up with excuses for our actions anymore? It certainly doesn't help when you have a warmongering MSM that has never ran into a conflict it didn't support American intervention in. Given that it is mostly conservatives (like my relatives in the military) who die in these counter productive interventions, you will find that support amongst conservatives is not strong for intervention in the Middle East. This is especially true when conservatives witness the flood of refugees coming into Western countries as a result of Western intervention. This is how Middle East conflicts represent an existential threat to the West..... when we allow their refugees into our countries in the millions. Why would conservatives want to contribute to this flow of Muslim immigrants? The answer is that they would not.
Well it's not good that Iran supports Hamas and the war in Yemen …. but we have lost any moral high road. And before Trump, we persuaded other countries that the world could be a better place … now we try and order them, and ironically Russia and China will only agree to sanctions if we make it economically worth their while and not because it's the safer and most humane thing to do. https://www.politico.com/story/2019/04/22/graham-libya-trump-1286385
I think Trump wants a war, he is hoping to provoke North Korea or Iran so that he can claim they started it
"War profiteering" that is really where most of our debt has come from sense Bush jr started these two 10 year wars
Iran and Iranians never attacked the US, and we did overthrow one democratically elected govt, and they perceive (incorrectly) we were going for no. 2. Obama was no great shakes, but he did correctly realize that threatening Iran was not going to achieve positive results, and if we could find a way to make it in Iran's interest to not ferment unrest, we might see more positive results. But now there's more than just baseless suspicion that Trump's support of the Saudis is as much based on personal enrichment as anything else, and we are supporting a war in Yemen that none of the previous four presidents would have supported.
Bingo. There is a reason that Trump's first foreign visit was to the Wahhabi kingdom. Besides the 50 billion and counting in weapons purchases. And who is it that wants to use the US military power as a big stick to destroy it's regional enemy? And how is that in the interest of the American people?
