Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

M.E.K.: The Group John Bolton Wants to Rule Iran

"Don't forget the cult-like MeK's GOP connections, over decades."

Video Explainer
Tensions between the United States and Iran have sharply increased. John Bolton, the national security adviser, has long pushed for regime change in Iran. One of his chosen replacements is the dissident group Mujahedeen Khalq, known as M.E.K. Doug Mills/The New York Times

By Nilo Tabrizy

May 7, 2018

The United States has steadily been ratcheting up the pressure on Iran, including designating the country’s military as a foreign terrorist organization and setting the stage for a potential confrontation in the Persian Gulf.

The man who has reportedly been behind much of this? President Trump’s national security adviser, John R. Bolton.

Mr. Bolton is a longtime Iran hawk who has supported the Mujahedeen Khalq, known as M.E.K. It is a fringe dissident group that calls for regime change in Iran. Mr. Bolton has said he has backed the controversial group for over a decade.

What is the M.E.K.?

The M.E.K. was one of the first organizations added to the State Department’s list of foreign terrorist organizations in 1997 (it was removed from the list .. https://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/22/world/middleeast/iranian-opposition-group-mek-wins-removal-from-us-terrorist-list.html?module=inline .. in 2012). During the 1970s, it was suspected of being behind the assassination .. https://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/08/world/middleeast/republicans-want-iranian-group-mek-off-terror-list.html?module=inline .. of six Americans and the bombings of American companies in Iran. The group’s aim is to the overthrow the current regime in Iran.

Why does Mr. Bolton support this fringe group and what does that mean now that he’s the president’s national security adviser? Our video traces his past statements and breaks down what’s at stake.

Related Coverage

video
Why Trump Hates the Iran Nuclear Deal
Oct. 13, 2017
https://www.nytimes.com/video/us/politics/100000005494905/why-trump-hates-the-iran-nuclear-deal.html?action=click&module=RelatedCoverage&pgtype=Article®ion=Footer

video
Iran’s Top Diplomat Discusses Economic Impact of Nuclear Deal
July 24, 2017
https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/middleeast/100000005289800/irans-nuclear-deal-mohammad-zarif.html?action=click&module=RelatedCoverage&pgtype=Article®ion=Footer

video
Iran Says U.S. Is Not Complying With the Nuclear Deal
July 18, 2017
https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/middleeast/100000005277964/us-iran-nuclear-deal-sanctions.html?action=click&module=RelatedCoverage&pgtype=Article®ion=Footer

video
Why Trump Hasn’t Killed the Iran Deal
https://www.nytimes.com/video/us/politics/100000005661268/trump-hates-the-iran-deal-but-wont-kill-it-why.html?action=click&module=RelatedCoverage&pgtype=Article®ion=Footer

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/07/world/middleeast/john-bolton-regime-change-iran.html

Earlier, also in reply to "Don't forget the cult-like MeK's GOP connections, over decades."

Iraqi premier’s US-Iran mediation credited for averting ‘hell’ of war
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=148907724

In reply there

FM Javad Zarif: We don't want war, and no one can confront Iran
[...]
Saudis say they don't want war with Iran, but will defend themselves
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=148909116

and to that one another opinion

Don’t Fight Iran
How a war in the Middle East would wreck Trump’s grand strategy.
By Ross Douthat Opinion Columnist May 18, 2019
[...]
Sometimes it’s important to write a column about something you’re pretty sure isn’t going to happen. In this case, that thing is war with Iran, which Donald Trump clearly doesn’t want, and which he will therefore probably avoid. But since the president’s current foreign policy is making war more likely, it’s still worth saying clearly that it would be a terrible idea for the United States to enter into a serious armed conflict with the Islamic Republic of Iran.
P - In the past I have argued that there is a certain coherence .. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/29/opinion/trump-doctrine-venezuela-afghanistan.html?module=inline .. to the Trump foreign policy, even if it’s just an accidental synthesis of a chaotic White House’s competing impulses. According to that synthesis, recent American presidents have been overly optimistic about democratic transformation, embracing naïvely utopian hopes in the Islamic world and naïvely accommodating the rise of China. So what is needed instead is a retrenchment in the greater Middle East, an abandonment of occupations and nation-building efforts and a return to kill-your-enemies, back-your-friends realpolitik, which in turn will make it easier for the United States to pivot to a more confrontational approach with Beijing.
P - In practice, this retrenchment has included backing out (or trying to) from the Bush-era military commitment to Afghanistan and jettisoning the Obama-era effort to woo Iran into détente. Spun in realpolitik terms, the Trump White House’s hard line toward Tehran reflects a belief that the mullahs’ enmity is an ineradicable fact, that deals with them in one area inevitably just enable aggression elsewhere .. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/02/what-if-the-iran-deal-was-a-mistake.html , and that it’s better to just back our Sunni and Israeli allies rather than reaching for an unlikely realignment and just reaping more mischief in return.
P - But the (arguable) coherence of this approach has been breaking down as the Trump administration has moved into its “maximum pressure” phase of sanctions against Tehran. Because if you impose maximum pressure on a regional power you are, by definition, no longer trying to maintain a Middle Eastern status quo while pivoting to Asia. Instead, you’re effectively returning to the last two administration’s more dramatic Middle East ambitions: You are assuming either that some great diplomatic coup awaits (so Obama was right to seek détente, just wrong to settle) or that your pressure will lead to regime change and democratization (so Bush was right about the freedom agenda after all).
P - I suspect that Trump is making the first assumption, imagining all this pressure as a prelude to a dramatic deal, while John Bolton and Mike Pompeo are making the second one, imagining the Iranian regime suddenly buckling like the Soviet Union in 1991.
P - But whatever the core assumption, the maximalist approach inevitably increases the risk of war. If the White House is wrong about the Iranian regime’s willingness to make more concessions, then they’re turning a dial that can produce only two policy responses: endurance or armed reaction. And if they’re right that regime change is a possibility, then the regime they’re trying to change will become more likely to lash out the closer it gets to its own breaking point.
P - Either way, there is nothing about the current situation in the Middle East, or globally, that makes the chance of war with Iran worth taking — as hawks as well as doves concede.
.. bit more - https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=148909383