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Von: „Martin Zeis“ <Martin.zeis>
Datum: 20. April 2015 12:44:54 MESZ
An: gc-special-engl%Martin.zeis
Betreff: William BLUM: The US Will Eventually Bomb Iran As It Bombed Other Countries; Globalresearch, Apr 19, 2015

Global Research, April 19, 2015 — http://www.globalresearch.ca/us-will-eventually-bomb-iran-as-it-bombed-others-foreign-policy-expert/5443818

The US Will Eventually Bomb Iran As It Bombed Other Countries: William Blum
By William Blum

Obama’s time as leader of the US is coming to an end – his term concludes next year. Wannabe presidents have already joined the race to the White House. And as President Obama goes through the final year of his rule, Washington suddenly changes its tone – now Iran is an appropriate nation to talk to, and it’s okay to meet with Cuban and Venezuelan leaders. But what is in that change?
Has Washington finally dropped its previous policies? What does Obama want to achieve? And will the new, as yet unknown, leader of America make any difference? We pose these questions to prominent historian, author of bestsellers on US foreign policies, William Blum, who is on Sophie&Co today.

TRANSKRIPT (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2sFfu3_tDg; 24:04 min)

Sophie SHEVARDNAZE (RT) interviews William BLUM

— full transcript attached (6 pages) —

William Blum: I don’t think US foreign policy will change at all, regardless of who is in the White House, Bush or Clinton, or who else is running. Our policy does not change… I can add Obama to that. It wouldn’t even matter which party it is, Republican or Democrat, they have the same foreign policy.

SS:Why do you think it’s the same policy for both parties? Why do you think they are not different from each other?

WB: Because America, for two centuries has had one basic, overriding goal, and that is world domination, at least from 1890s if not earlier, one can say that. World domination is something which appeals to both Republicans and Democrats or Liberals or Conservatives. The idea that we’re the exceptional nation and have something very important to impart to the rest of the world, our marvelous values, American exceptionalism… Each party believes in that very strongly. They don’t argue about that at all, except through their campaign debate, they’ll take certain opposing views just to appear different. But, in power, they have the exact same policy – world domination.

(…)

SS: You’ve mentioned Cuba and Venezuela in the beginning of the programme. Now, we witnessed several historic meetings recently, between President Obama and Cuba’s President Raul Castro, also Obama’s meeting with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro – why is Obama now talking with states the US has long considered arch-enemies?

WB: You must keep in mind, first of all, that nothing whatsoever has changed, as of this moment nothing has changed. We have to wait and see what happens, and I’m very sceptical. For example, with Cuba, the main issue is the US sanctions which have played havoc with Cuban economy and society. That has not changed, and I don’t think it is going to change even in my lifetime. So, you can’t apply some kind of changes taking place. Why Obama is saying these things he’s saying now may have to do with his so-called “legacy”. He knows his time is very limited, and he knows he has many enemies amongst progressives in the US and elsewhere. He may want to cater to them for some reason. I don’t know, neither do you know, no one knows exactly why he’s saying these things – but they don’t mean anything yet. Nothing has changed whatsoever.

SS:So you’re saying there’s really no substance in those meetings… Now, looking back, what would you call Obama’s biggest achievements of his two terms – I mean, people say there’s been a reconciliation with Cuba, with Iran, there’s an earnest attempt to end US deployment in Iraq and in Afghanistan, he didn’t move troops into Syria. Would you disagree with all of that?

WB: Yes, all of that. There’s no accomplishment whatsoever. He didn’t move troops into Syria because of Russia, and not because of him making any change. He was embarrassed in that. John Kerry made a remark about “it would be nice if Syria would get rid of its chemical weapons – but that’s not going to happen” he said, and then foreign minister Lavrov of Russia jumped in and said “Oh really? We’ll arrange that” – and they arranged Syria to get rid of chemical weapons. That was, yes, a slip of the tongue by John Kerry, and he was embarrassed to challenge Lavrov. We can say the same thing about any of the things you’ve mentioned. There’s no substance involved in any of these policies. The US has not relented at all over Syria. As I’ve mentioned before, they are bombing Syria’s military assets, they are killing civilians every day. Syria is still a prime target of Washington, and they will never escape. (…)

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BLUM-William-RT-interview150419.pdf