AlterPolitics

Despite what has been described as a full-court press by the Obama Administration to convince Israel not to attack Iran, the Wall Street Journal reports that the U.S. is now in fact preparing for such an attack.

The Administration fears a range of possible Iranian reprisals directed at American targets, including “assaults by pro-Iranian Shiite militias in Iraq against the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, according to U.S. officials.”

As a deterrence, the U.S. has deployed 15,000 troops to Kuwait, and has now ordered a second aircraft carrier strike group to the Persian Gulf.

The Obama Administration had most recently begun to engage in a more diplomatic tact with Iran, hoping to diffuse the situation:

The U.S. and Iran, however, have taken steps in recent days apparently designed to ease tensions. Iran has agreed to host a delegation of United Nations nuclear inspectors this month. The U.S., meanwhile, has twice this month rescued Iranian sailors in the region’s seas.

But today, The Guardian reports that Iran’s Foreign Ministry sent a diplomatic letter to the Obama Administration citing “evidence and reliable information” that C.I.A. agents provided “guidance, support and planning” to those who lobbed a magnetic bomb at the car of 32-year old Iranian nuclear scientist, Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan, killing him in Wednesday morning’s rush-hour traffic.

The U.S. not only denies the charges, it has forcefully condemned the civilian assassination: 

The assassination drew an unusually strong condemnation from the White House and the State Department, which disavowed any American complicity. The statements by the United States appeared to reflect serious concern about the growing number of lethal attacks, which some experts believe could backfire by undercutting future negotiations and prompting Iran to redouble what the West suspects is a quest for a nuclear capacity.

“The United States had absolutely nothing to do with this,” said Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for the National Security Council. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton appeared to expand the denial beyond Wednesday’s killing, “categorically” denying “any United States involvement in any kind of act of violence inside Iran.”

“We believe that there has to be an understanding between Iran, its neighbors and the international community that finds a way forward for it to end its provocative behavior, end its search for nuclear weapons and rejoin the international community,” Mrs. Clinton said.

The Israelis have not denied their own involvement. The Israeli Defense Force Spokesman stated on Facebook, as reported by ABC:  “I don’t know who settled the score with the Iranian Scientist, but I am certainly not shedding a tear.”

A bombshell story broke yesterday, written by Mark Perry for Foreign Policy Magazine, which appears to shed light on these assassinations, as well as the Iranians’ insistence the C.I.A. was involved.

It reveals that the Israeli Mossad, has been engaged in a false-flag operation, in which they posed as C.I.A. agents right “under the nose of U.S. intelligence officers, most notably in London,” and recruited members of the anti-Iran militant group, Jundallah, to commit terrorist attacks against the Persian nation. Jundallah, a Pakistan-based Sunni terror group, “according to the U.S. government and published reports, is responsible for assassinating Iranian government officials and killing Iranian women and children.” 

The revelations in Perry’s article were garnered from a series of C.I.A. memos, written in the final years of the Bush Administration. These memos show that U.S. intelligence officials were barred from “even the most incidental contact with Jundallah, …[though] the same was not true for Israel’s Mossad.” The U.S. intelligence community was described as “stunned by the brazenness of the Mossad’s efforts.” 

These intelligence memos found their way to the highest levels of the Bush Administration, who became infuriated that their supposed ally was putting American lives at risk:

According to one retired CIA officer, information about the false-flag operation was reported up the U.S. intelligence chain of command. It reached CIA Director of Operations Stephen Kappes, his deputy Michael Sulick, and the head of the Counterintelligence Center. All three of these officials are now retired. The Counterintelligence Center, according to its website, is tasked with investigating “threats posed by foreign intelligence services.”

The report then made its way to the White House, according to the currently serving U.S. intelligence officer. The officer said that Bush “went absolutely ballistic” when briefed on its contents.

“The report sparked White House concerns that Israel’s program was putting Americans at risk,” the intelligence officer told me. “There’s no question that the U.S. has cooperated with Israel in intelligence-gathering operations against the Iranians, but this was different. No matter what anyone thinks, we’re not in the business of assassinating Iranian officials or killing Iranian civilians.”

Israel’s relationship with Jundallah continued to roil the Bush administration until the day it left office, this same intelligence officer noted. Israel’s activities jeopardized the administration’s fragile relationship with Pakistan, which was coming under intense pressure from Iran to crack down on Jundallah. It also undermined U.S. claims that it would never fight terror with terror, and invited attacks in kind on U.S. personnel.

“It’s easy to understand why Bush was so angry,” a former intelligence officer said. “After all, it’s hard to engage with a foreign government if they’re convinced you’re killing their people. Once you start doing that, they feel they can do the same.”

As furious as the Bush Administration and the Intelligence Community became with its largest foreign aid recipient, they feared political backlash by the Israel Lobby, and thus, did absolutely nothing:

A senior administration official vowed to “take the gloves off” with Israel, according to a U.S. intelligence officer. But the United States did nothing — a result that the officer attributed to “political and bureaucratic inertia.”

“In the end,” the officer noted, “it was just easier to do nothing than to, you know, rock the boat.”

Had they actually exposed the Israeli false-flag op, we wouldn’t have Iran — now on war-footing — blaming the C.I.A. for aiding and abetting terrorist bombings which continue to target their civilians.

An unnamed Senior Israeli government official, today, issued a statement to Ha’aretz, calling the U.S. intelligence report “absolute nonsense.” But in 2010, the Mossad was exposed for conducting similar false-flag operations against their European allies, when they assassinated a Hamas member in Dubai, while using forged passports from various European countries and Australia.

With all of this now out in the open, it should come as no surprise that a recent internal C.I.A. poll revealed U.S. intelligence officials consider Israeli spies to be the very worst U.S. allies — dead last on the list — among friendly spy services.