Trump Is Back Under Bolton’s Thumb

July 22, 2019

President Trump might be his own man, but not when it comes to John Bolton and Israel.  Trump is their man and is again being manipulated into starting a fisticuffs with Iran.

Someone in Washington, most likely Ziocon warmonger Bolton, got the UK to commit an act of piracy on the high seas and seize an Iranian oil tanker, Grace 1, on the grounds that Iran intended to deliver the oil to Syria in violation of US sanctions.

Iran’s leader, Khamenei, denounced Washington’s British stooge for “maritime banditry” and said there would be consequences.  Today there were. Iran detained two British tankers. The Tyranny of Good In... Paul Craig Roberts, La... Best Price: $6.96 Buy New $8.95 (as of 07:10 UTC - Details)

This is what Bolton and Netanyahu wanted.  They used it to wind up Trump’s fulminations against Iran. The trouble that the idiot British started with Iran is no concern of ours, but Trump’s threats are nevertheless issuing at a rapid pace.

The British call Iran’s response to their banditry “an escalation” that requires “further protection for merchant vessels . . . to ensure enhanced security to guarantee free flow of trade in the region.”  Of course, the British did not think their act of banditry caused a need for “enhanced security to guarantee free flow of trade in the region.”  It is quite alright for Britain to seize ships but not for Iran.

The British Foreign Secretary offered Iran the release of Grace 1 if Iran guaranteed it would not breach Washington’s sanctions on Syria by delivering oil.  Washington’s sanctions, of course, are totally illegal and devoid of any basis in international law, as is the British enforcement of Washington’s illegal sanctions.  One wonders why Russia doesn’t stop this escalation by taking over the delivery of oil supplies to Syria.  

The Best of Paul Craig Roberts

Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration, associate editor and columnist for the Wall Street Journal, Business Week’s first outside columnist, columnist for the Scripps Howard News Service, contributor to the editorial page of the Los Angeles Times, and columnist for the main French and Italian newspapers, and for Creators Syndicate in Los Angeles. He served in numerous academic appointments in US universities and was  appointed to the William E. Simon Chair for Political Economy at Georgetown University’s Center for Strategic and International Studies where his colleagues were Henry Kissinger, Zbigniew Brzezinski, James R. Schlesinger (one of his former professors), and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Thomas Moorer. His article, “How the Law Was Lost,” was published in the January 1999 Cardozo Law Review.