Incendiary Iran (Oliver North)

Creators Syndicate ^ | December 2, 2011 | Oliver North

[jazusamo]

MARINE CORPS BASE QUANTICO, Va. — Our Fox News crew is here wrapping up our 100th "War Stories" documentary — with some of the "stars" of previous episodes. Though most of the Marines here are recent veterans of combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, their present focus is on the next trouble spots. Thanks to inept national security planning in Washington, there are more vulnerabilities today than there were just three years ago. At the top of the list: Iran. Few of the young Marines we meet here are old enough to remember what happened to the U.S. Embassy in Tehran 32 years ago this month. But the "old guys" do. That's why senior officers and noncommissioned officers here had a déjà vu moment when images of Iranian "students" sacking the British Embassy in Tehran flashed around the world this week. Iranian regime officials, the ayatollahs' propaganda organs and most of the Western media described the perpetrators as students. But those who stormed and trashed the British diplomatic mission weren't really scholars at all — unless matriculating in mayhem, mass intimidation and murder is considered a legitimate academic pursuit in today's Iran. According to expatriate Iranians with whom I have spoken, the entire event was planned and carried out by members of the Basij militia — the "civilian auxiliary" of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. These aren't students. They are Islamist thugs supported and directed by the regime in Tehran. In 2009, they were the primary mechanism for brutally suppressing popular discontent after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-elected to the presidency after widespread voting irregularities. Then, Western media outlets were barred from covering the massive street protests. Visual documentation of the confrontations — as with those taking place in Syria today — was generally limited to what could be captured by protesters using cellphones, small hand-held cameras and social media outlets. That's not what happened at the British Embassy in Tehran this week. Iran's state-controlled television network cameras and reporters arrived before the so-called students and their government handlers began shouting "Death to Britain." Government security personnel and police — responsible for providing security for diplomatic facilities — initially did nothing to prevent waves of berserkers from breaking in to the compound, smashing their way into buildings, dumping documents from broken windows and burning a diplomat's vehicle. It was only after the interlopers seized six British diplomats inside the embassy that the police intervened. Though the six Britons were released within six hours, the reaction in London was immediate. After withdrawing all remaining official government personnel from Iran, Prime Minister David Cameron expelled every Iranian diplomat — giving them just 48 hours to vacate British soil. Washington's response was, well, flaccid. Our president, apparently speaking without the aid of a teleprompter, made the unusual demand that the Iranian regime should "hold those responsible to task." Whatever that means. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, speaking at an international aid conference in Seoul, South Korea, carried the tough talk even further. She described the invasion of the British Embassy as an "affront" and condemned the attack "in the strongest possible terms." Meaningless words such as those have become the Obama administration's default position for a string of egregious acts committed by the theocrats in Tehran over the past three years. The O-Team's limp reaction to the latest International Atomic Energy Agency report showing significant advances in Iran's nuclear weapons program was so tepid that Republicans and Democrats in the U.S. Senate are actually working together to toughen unilateral U.S. sanctions against Iran's Central Bank. None of this bodes well for a region of the world where U.S. influence and presence diminishes every day. There are now fewer than 12,000 U.S. troops remaining in Iraq — and all of them are due to be out by the end of the year. That's why the Marines here are constantly asking questions that begin with the words "What if." Thinking ahead is a hallmark for members of our armed forces. No one in uniform wants to be assailed for preparing to re-fight the "last war." But it's difficult to be ready for the next fight when all of our military services are facing potentially catastrophic budget cuts. None of the Marines we spoke with at this "Crossroads of the Marine Corps" is predicting they will have to fight a ground war in Iran. But they also know that the theocrats in Tehran are completely unpredictable.

[jazusamo]

OLIVER NORTH PING!

Please Freepmail me to be added to the Ollie North ping list.

[MagUSNRET]

OLiver “William B. Goode” North....
GOD Bless this warrior! (for those that understand this obscure reference......congratulations ;-)

[jazusamo]

BUMP!

[Gene Eric]

>> Washington’s response was, well, flaccid.

Perhaps the Admin doesn’t disapprove.

[jazusamo]

Perhaps the Admin doesn’t disapprove.

No doubt about it in my view. You might say Obama is flaccid when it comes to our real enemies.

[odds]

I don’t regularly follow Oliver North’s articles. Though what I’ve read so far here, he is very often on the mark.

Yes, they weren’t ‘students’. It is despicable that the media has frequently applied the generic term “students” to any protests that occur in Iran - most often to rent-a-crowd-of-thugs, who are, in fact, pro-regime Bassij.

The other point to remember is that in mullah-ruled Iran, Real Students, regardless of their personal or political beliefs, can Only belong to an Islamic Association at universities. No other option is available.

As for the UK, will repeat my earlier comment in another thread: “For example, look at the UK. They’ve been not only negotiating w/ terrorist mullahs, but appeasing them for over 30 yrs. One wonders why the UK didn’t anticipate recent attacks on its Embassy? When one makes deals w/ the devil, sooner or later one should expect the same to come collect some. That said, am glad the UK finally shut down its embassy in Iran & “downgraded” diplomatic relations.. better late than never ..” — http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2813632/posts?page=32#32 - good to see William Hague standing resolute on IRI & mullahs!

[jazusamo]

Valid points and it’s very good the British are pulling their embassy people out of there, there was no plus side to it in the first place.

[rockinqsranch]

Insanity prevailed back in the sixties under Johnson, but it was the sanity inherent in the military system itself that kept us strong, and focused.

That inherent sanity will benefit these guys, and gals out there through these times as well.

It’s up to us to step up to the plate, and restore sanity to D.C., for us, for them.

Thanks for the ping jaz.

[jazusamo]

Very well said, rqsr.

The first step is to get rid of the imposter in the WH!

[odds]

Read thru this: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/nov/30/william-hague-iranian-diplomats — it’d be good to see William Hague & the British gov’t keep up the pressure on IRI. Provided it is & continues to be genuine pressure to isolate *the Regime*. In the past, it been mostly a Façade against the Iranian Regime.

AS for some of the Iranians (shopkeepers & others in Guardian link) - some almost next door to the Iranian Embassy in London - I’d say, tough, do w/out your mullah sponsored money for a while. Am sure the pregnant woman, also, can do w/out her mother visiting from Iran too.

But, the British gov’t must come thru & successfully see its current efforts to fruition regarding the Regime in Iran. Otherwise, it will lose credibility Very Fast.

[PhilDragoo]

Col. North had to fight Ortega in covert fashion due to Democrat treason--Democrats always support their brother Communists.

Carter betrayed the Shah and enabled the installation of Ayatollah Khomeini.

Zbigniew Brzezinski and Robert M. Gates coauthored the 2004 Council on Foreign Relations paper "Iran: Time for a New Approach" calling for negotiations with the Islamic "Republic."

The lying 2007 National Intelligence Estimate claimed Iran was not working on nuclear weapons.

In 2009 when Rat Boy shot and beat the students, Barry the Closet Queen would not lift a manicured finger.

Iran now has the support of Russia and China.

The so-called Arab Spring has been a systematic removal of secular regimes to enable the Muslim Brotherhood (Sunni) and/or the Iranian stooges (Shi'ia) to form a caliphate or imamate in opposition to Israel and the U.S.

Per Melanie Phillips' nightmarish Londonistan Britain has assumed the role of dhimmi hoping the crocodile will eat it last.

Everyone's talking about sexual abuse. How about Daniel Ortega whom Tom Harkin and John Kerry found delicious. Daughter-in-law Zoilamérica Narváez swore to a 40-plus-page deposition to his vileness: Zoilamerica Narvaez 48-page testimony about sexual abuse (in English) . It's a pdf which shows the real "glorious leader" to be beneath contempt--something in common with our own edition.

[Former Fetus]

Washington’s response was, well, flaccid

What do you mean? The president apparently spoke "without the aid of a teleprompter"!!! It doesn't get any tougher than that! /s

[jazusamo]

Not a bad article from the Guardian.

I think 52-year-old shopkeeper Reza Sheedy is either living in la la land or he’s an Iranian agent and if the pregnant woman is so worried about her mother not being able to visit she shouldn’t be living in Britain. Like you said, just tough.

Yep. the British absolutely have to see this through, Iran comes out on top if the British back down.

[jazusamo]

Well said, Phil. Things are going to hell in a hand basket fast and the peanut farmer is the turkey who started the ball rolling.

[Tax-chick]

Our president, apparently speaking without the aid of a teleprompter, made the unusual demand that the Iranian regime should "hold those responsible to task." Whatever that means.

LOL! Col. North, the cutie-pie, gets a *snicker* for his delicately indicative use of "flaccid," a word with which I once won a spelling bee.

And it's helpful of him to point out that Zero's comment meant absolutely nothing, as is typical of anything he says unscripted. In English, those words in that sequence don't mean *anything* - they're just not used. So not only was he off-teleprompter, but the battery must have been dead on his Content-Free Sentence Generator.

Perhaps Hillary was using it, since she appears to have emitted one or more grammatically-adequate, but content-free, sentences on the subject. Ne zot, I despise these people.

[jazusamo]

Great post and all true, especially about the idiot in the WH.

And it's helpful of him to point out that Zero's comment meant absolutely nothing, as is typical of anything he says unscripted.