US’ Iran regime-change plan: hit economy, orchestrate protests, engage MEK cult to chant “Democracy”
While
the hard-hit Iranian economy is likely to continue reeling, driving
more protesters into the streets, one shouldn’t mistake their pain
for a desire to subject themselves to a totalitarian cult with hardly
a fraction of the support enjoyed by the Shia clergy helming the
Islamic Republic.
by
Elliott Gabriel
Part
3 - The “Iranian Resistance” wags the dog in Washington
In the
U.S. capital, the group was enormously successful in its efforts to
recruit an auxiliary brigade of highly influential top politicians to
its cause. Even the far-right Washington Times, owned at the time by
charismatic cult leader Reverend Sun Myung-Moon, issued glossy
“special report” inserts hailing the militaristic group as the
bringers of “freedom” to Iran. The publication included words of
praise from Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), House Minority Leader Nancy
Pelosi (D-CA), the late Saudi Prince Turki bin Faisal al-Saud, and
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), among many, many, others.
A brief
list of these MEK supporters in the Republican Party reads like a
who’s-who of anti-Iran officials from the neoconservative
administrations of Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump:
- In
2000, future Bush administration attorney general and Republican
then-Senator John Ashcroft intervened on behalf of MKO military
commander Mahnaz Samadi, who has been detained by immigration
authorities due to her failure to disclose past terrorist ties —
hailing the former anti-Iran combatant as a “highly regarded
human-rights activist” and a “powerful voice for
democracy.”
- Former
Pennsylvania Governor and first U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security
Tom Ridge praised the National Council of Resistance in Iran as “the
single most visible, most credible, and most effective democratic
movement with a clear and specific program to bring a democratic Iran
to existence,” led by the “steady hand and inspiring
leadership” of cult leader Maryam Rajavi.
-
Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Miami, Florida, who served as
Chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has been a major leader
in legislation calling for regime-change measures against Cuba, Iran,
Syria, and Venezuela, and even called for Fidel Castro’s
assassination in 2006. In 2003, she came out in defense of MEK as a
group that “loves the United States” and is an ally in the
“war on terrorism.”
- Tea
Party leader, Bush confidante and former House Majority Leader Dick
Armey promoted the MEK while working for lobbying firm DLA Piper.
Armey also represented Saeid Ghaemi, an Iranian expatriate in the
U.S. who paid almost $910,000 to the lobbying firm “for Armey’s
services bringing issues relating to Iran to the attention of
Congress, the State Department, the Department of Defense, the White
House, the National Security Council and the Department of Treasury.”
And then
we have the top luminaries from President Donald Trump’s circle,
including:
- Former
New York City Mayor and top White House lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who
co-signed a letter along with various bipartisan officials urging a
newly-inaugurated Trump to “establish a dialogue” with NCRI, and
was revealed to have been a paid advocate for the removal of MEK from
the State Department terror group list. Giuliani has been an almost
annual guest at MEK functions in Paris and a regular anti-Iranian
voice on television. In 2015, Giuliani stood before a crowd of MEK
supporters in Paris and shouted: “The ayatollah must go! Gone!
Out! No more! I will not support anyone for president of the United
States who isn’t clear on that slogan behind me. What does it say?
It says regime change!”
- Trump
adviser and GOP elder Newt Gingrich, who ripped on former President
Obama for bowing to the king of Saudi Arabia, but was caught on
camera bowing to Maryam Rajavi – whom the conservative
ultra-patriot sees as an Iranian version of U.S. founding father
George Washington.
-
Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, the elite Taiwanese-American
wife of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has received
honoraria in the amounts of $50,000 and $17,500 to speak for MEK
front groups like the Iranian-American Cultural Association of
Missouri and the NCRI. At the same Paris event attended by Giuliani,
Chao sat as guest of honor alongside “president-elect” cult
leader Rajavi before delivering a feminist-themed speech slamming
Iran’s government.
And
then, of course, there’s John Bolton, a ravening ultra-hawk with a
nearly obsessive hatred of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Speaking to
Foreign Policy magazine, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
senior fellow Karim Sadjadpour commented: “I suspect Bolton’s
interactions with the MEK were above all motivated by financial
interests … The MEK may be a backward cult with little to offer,
but they are the enemy of his enemy. And they pay handsomely.”
The same
can likely be said about the rest of the elected
“representatives”-for-hire in Washington, whose belief in the
MEK’s ability to lead a post-IRI Iranian state is no doubt on par
with their trust in the late Rev. Moon’s claims to be the one and
only messiah.
While
the hard-hit Iranian economy is likely to continue reeling, driving
more protesters into the streets, one shouldn’t mistake their
social demands or financial pain for a desire to subject themselves
to a totalitarian cult with hardly a fraction of the support enjoyed
by the Shia clergy helming the Islamic Republic — no matter the
extent to which Washington and the Saudis attempt to foist the Rajavi
group on the Iranian nation.
Yet
despite the group’s dearth of political legitimacy, the
congressional aide who spoke to FP understands why they remain a
mainstay in the U.S. Capitol: “They’re useful as provocation …
They’re useful as a signal to the Iranian government that we’re
coming to get you.”
***
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