Has the US Learned Nothing?

One would think that the US Government would have learned a valuable lesson by now in its support of "terrorist" groups to oust governments all over the world that the US deems unfit to rule. Take the support of rebels in Afghanistan when the US wanted to oust the Russians. We trained and supplied Bin Laden's group, only to turn around years later and consider them a terrorist group. The same happened when Saddam was supplied with weapons to defeat the Iranians. And now, the US wants to use a group that is already on their terrorist alert list to help bring down the Iranian government. Here are a few quotes from this report:

The controversial plan involves offering financial and military backing for a terrorist organisation that is outlawed by the US State Department, as well as intelligence collaboration and other support for dissident student bodies and resistance groups.

Influential Pentagon figures are arguing that the terrorist status accorded by the US to the armed Mujahideen e Khalq group (MEK) in 1997 should be removed, allowing the group - which has been based in Iraq - to play a similar role to the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan.

"There are some who see the overthrow of the regime as the only way to deal with the danger of Iran possessing a nuclear weapon," said one government official with close links to the White House. "But there's not going to be another war. The idea is to destabilise from inside. No one's talking about invading anywhere."

The MEK, whose ideology blends Islamism and Marxism, has regularly mounted armed incursions into Iran against the regime and was previously funded by Saddam Hussein. Its camps within Iraq were bombed by the US military during the recent war until a ceasefire was agreed.

The MEK's military expertise and discipline has impressed the Pentagon, which has suggested it could be renamed and operate with clandestine American help.

"We want a regime that reflects the will of the Iranian people," said a senior administration official, who referred to the current government as dominated by "thuggish mullahs".

Another Smokescreen?

Remember when Bush declared victory in Afghanistan back in 2001 and then promptly moved on to Iraq? Americans began to forget all about the promises made to Afghanis as the Bush Administration began making its case for a regime change in Iraq. We forgot that there were still soldiers in Afghanistan fighting on a daily basis, that the interim government we set up there was weak and needed constant US protection, and that aide to the Afghanis was slow to trickle into the region. We forgot all about Bin Laden, Al Qaeda, and the Taliban. Our focus was on Iraq and the constant news coverage of WMD and the atrocities of Saddam. Some polls even suggested that Americans were confusing Saddam with Bin Laden.

Now that Bush has declared victory in Iraq, we are once again forgetful because suddenly the shift has been focused on Iran and the WMD there and the need for a regime change. It doesn't seem to matter that our military is still in Iraq AND Afghanistan, fighting opposition forces in both places. It doesn't seem to matter that aide has been slow to reach Iraqis, just as it was in Afghanistan. Nor does it matter that the US cannot seem to set up a stable government in Iraq. All that matters is that Iran is the new threat and must be dealt with immediately.

The case against Iran appears more solid than the skewed information against Iraq. The Bush Administration has accused Iran of building WMD, supporting terrorist organizations like Hezbollah (which Iran admits to supporting fully) and for allowing refuge to key Al Qaeda members who the US claims were involved in the recent bombings in the Sudan.

What really bothers me the most about this sudden shift towards Iran is that we do not have a victory in either Afghanistan or Iraq, neither country is stable yet and our military is still fighting on both fronts. Shouldn't we be working to clean up those messes before we move on to another "regime change"? Or, is this just another smokescreen to take our minds off of the still-failing economy here in the US? You decide.