BY DOUG LORIMER
Emboldened by the US military's apparent quick defeat of the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein, the war hawks in and around the administration of US President George Bush are setting their sights on "regime change" in Syria and Iran.
US war secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who warned Syria and Iran on March 28 not to interfere with the US invasion of Iraq, said at a Pentagon press briefing on April 9 the US had evidence that "Syria has been cooperative in facilitating the movement of [officials] out of Iraq into Syria".
In response to a question as to whether Syria was "next", Rumsfeld said ominously: "It depends on people's behaviour. Certainly, I have nothing to announce."
Rumsfeld also accused the government of Syrian President Bashar al Assad of ignoring an earlier US warning to stop supplying Iraq with military equipment like night vision goggles.
"Rumsfeld's recent statement that singled out Syria along with Iran for assisting Iraq surprised not only the White House but also the CIA, which had not reported any major flow of military equipment or fighters from Syria to Iraq", the April 9 Washington Post reported.
While Rumsfeld merely declared that Syria was "being unhelpful" to the US in its drive to conquer Iraq, on April 2 former CIA director James Woolsey, who is a member of the government-appointed Defence Policy Board, which provides policy advice to Rumsfeld, told an audience at the University of California-Los Angeles that the "fascist" government in Syria had to be replaced.
Three days later, US deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz told NBC's Meet the Press program: "There has got to be change in Syria."
"It is clear that the policy group in the defence department is intent on eliminating the present Syrian government as a factor in the Arab-Israeli dispute", Walter Lang, a former Defence Intelligence Agency specialist in Middle East affairs, told the Washington Post.
The war hawks' case for "regime change" in Syria was set out by former Israeli government press officer and New York Daily News columnist Zev Chafets on April 7: "Syria is an inviting target for the United States. Taking down the Assad government would rid the Middle East of an aggressive, anti-American fascist regime and also end Syria's occupation of Lebanon. That, in turn, would enable American forces to go after Hezbollah camps in the Bekaa Valley, just as they went after al Qaeda in Afghanistan. Not only would that weaken international terrorism but the United States hasn't forgotten that it was Hezbollah that murdered 241 American Marines in Beirut in 1983."
While Syria was not included on Bush's January 2002 "axis of evil" hit list, the US State Department includes Syria on its list of countries that support "terrorism" because of its backing for resistance by Hezbollah guerrillas to the 1978-2000 Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon.
The Bush administration is also beginning to increase its propaganda war against Iran. The April 1 San Jose Mercury News was told by a "senior administration official" that when the war ends in Iraq, the Bush administration would give "extremely high priority" to halting Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program.
Even before the war in Iraq has ended, US officials have began threatening Iran. At the end of March, John Bolton, the US undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, told annual conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) — which was attended by about 5000 people, including half the US Senate and a third of the House of Representatives — that the "estimate we have of how close the Iranians are to production of nuclear weapons grows closer each day".
In separate speeches to the AIPAC conference, both Bolton and US national security adviser Condoleezza Rice suggested that the Bush administration views the toppling of Hussein in Iraq as an initial response by Washington to a series of "threats".
"In the aftermath of Iraq, dealing with the Iranian nuclear weapons program will be of equal importance as dealing with the North Korean nuclear weapons program", Bolton said.
Neither Rice nor Bolton said military action against Syria or Iran was being contemplated by the Bush administration. However, the Pentagon is still planning to deploy three tank-heavy army units to Iraq — the 1st Cavalry Division from Fort Hood, Texas; the 3rd Armoured Cavalry Regiment from Fort Carson, Colorado; and the 1st Armoured Division from Germany.
Up to now there has only been one US tank-heavy unit deployed in Iraq — the 3rd Infantry Division from Fort Stewart, Georgia. Most of the 100,000 US troops in Iraq are from lightly armoured infantry units.
Once the war ends, infantry units will be crucial to enforcing US occupation on the Iraqi civilian population. Further tank-heavy units, however, would only be needed if the Pentagon envisages engaging in military action against an as-yet undefeated, well-equipped army such as Syria's or Iran's.
From Green Left Weekly, April 16, 2003.
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