Alastair Crooke
The West is in the throes of at least one, potentially two, crushing defeats at the moment - and so the question arises: Will lessons be learned?
John Kerry, just last week at the World Economic Forum, so clearly blurting out the truth: "Our First Amendment stands as a major block to our ability to be able to hammer [disinformation] out of existence".
Translated: Governing is all about narrative control. Kerry articulates the 'International Order's' solution to the unwelcome phenomenon of an uncontrolled populism and of a potential leader who speaks for the people: Simply, 'freedom to speak' is unacceptable to the prescriptions agreed by the 'inter-agency' - the institutionalised distillation of the 'International Order'.
Eric Weinstein 𝕏 calls this The Unburdening: The first Amendment; gender; merit; sovereignty; privacy; ethics; investigative journalism; borders; freedom... the Constitution? Gone?
Today's reality unhinged narration is that Iran's launch on Tuesday of 200 ballistic missiles - of which 181 reached Israel - were overwhelmingly intercepted by Israel's Iron Dome and Arrow missile defence systems. and with no deaths to show for the assault. It was "defeated and ineffective", Biden pronounced.
Will Schryver however, a technical engineer and security commentator, 𝕏 writes: "I don't understand how anyone who has seen the many video clips of the Iranian missile strikes on Israel cannot recognize and acknowledge that it was a stunning demonstration of Iranian capabilities. Iran's ballistic missiles smashed through U.S./Israeli air defences and delivered several large-warhead strikes to Israeli military targets".
The effect and the substance then lies in 'proven capacity' - the capacity to select other targets, the capacity to do more. It was in fact a restrained demonstrative exercise, not a full attack.
But the message has been erased from sight.
How is it that the U.S. Administration refuses to look truth in the eye and acknowledge what occurred, and prefers instead to ask the entire world, who saw the videos of missiles impacting in Israel, to 'move along' - as the authorities advise, pretending that there was 'nothing substantive to see here'. Was 'the affair' just a nuisance to system governance and 'consensus', as Kerry so branded free speech? It seems so.
The structural problem, essayist Aurelien writes is not simply that the western professional class holds to an ideology - one that is the opposite to how ordinary people experience the world. That certainly is one aspect. But the bigger problem lies rather, with a technocratic conception of politics that is not 'about' anything. It is not really politics at all (as Tony Blair once said), but is nihilistic and absent of moral considerations.
Having no real culture of its own, the western professional class views religion as outdated and sees history as dangerous since it contains components that can be misused by 'extremists'. It prefers therefore not to know history.
This produces the mixture of the conviction of superiority, yet deep insecurity, which typifies western leadership. The ignorance and fear of events and ideas that fall outside the confines of their rigid zeitgeist, they perceive, almost invariably, as innately inimical to their interests. And rather than seek to discuss and understand, that which is outside their capabilities, they use disparagement and character assassination instead to remove the nuisance.
It must be clear to all that Iran falls into all the categories that excite most western insecurity: Iran is the apex of everything that is unsettling: It has a profound culture and intellectual legacy that stands explicitly 'different' (albeit, not at odds) with western tradition. These qualities however, relegate Iran to being unreflectively categorised as inimical to 'International Order' management; not because it is a 'threat', but because it 'unsettles' message alignment.
Does this matter?
Yes, it matters, because it makes Iran's ability to communicate effectively with the International Order's ideological alignment highly problematic.
The West sought and pressured for a mitigated response from Iran - firstly after Israel's April assassination of an Iranian General and his colleagues at the Iranian Consulate in Damascus.
Iran obliged. It launched drones and missiles towards Israel on 13 April in such a manner that sent a short (pre-warned) concerted message of capability, yet did not invite all-out war (as requested by the West).
Subsequent to the Israeli assassination of Ismail Haniyeh (a guest of Tehran participating in the inauguration of the new Iranian President), western states once again pleaded with Iran that it should again refrain from any military retaliation against Israel.
The new President has said publicly, that European and American officials offered Iran the removal of substantive sanctions on the Iranian Republic and a guaranteed ceasefire in Gaza in line with Hamas' terms - if Israel was not attacked.
Iran held fire, accepting to appear weak to the outside world (for which it was harshly criticised). Yet western action shocked the inexperienced new President, Pezeshkian:
"They (the western states) lied", he said. None of the promises were kept.
To be fair to the new Reformist President, Iran did face a real dilemma: It hoped to pursue a policy of restraint in order to avoid a damaging war. That is one side to the dilemma; but the other side is that this restraint could be misinterpreted (perhaps maliciously), and used as pretext for escalation. In short the flip side is that, 'want it or not; war is coming to Iran'.
Then followed the 'pager assault' and assassinations of the Hizbullah leadership, including the iconic figure of its leader, Seyed Hassan Nasrallah, amidst huge civilian collateral deaths. The U.S. Administration (President Biden) said simply that this was 'justice' being done.
And once again, the West importuned, and threatened Iran against any retaliation towards Israel. But on this occasion, Iran launched a more effective ballistic missile attack, though one which deliberately omitted targeting Israel's economic and industrial infrastructure, or the Israeli people, focusing instead on key military and intelligence sites. It was, in short, a demonstrative signal - albeit one with an effective component of inflicting damage on air bases and military and intelligence sites. It was yet again, a limited response.
And for what?
Open sneering from the West that Iran was deterred/ too frightened/ too divided to fully respond. In fact, the U.S. - knowing well that Netanyahu is looking for the pretext for war with Iran - offered Israel full support of the U.S. for a major retribution against Iran: "There will be severe consequences for this attack and we will work with Israel to make that the case", Jake Sullivan said. "Make no mistake, the United States is fully, fully, fully supportive of Israel", Biden said.
The moral of the story is plain: President Pezeshkian was 'played' by the West - shades of the West's deliberate 'Minsk deceit' of President Putin; shades too, of the Istanbul II Accord's knife in the back. Restraint that the International Order insists upon, invariably is broadcast as 'weakness'.
The 'professional permanent class' (the western deep state) eschews any moral underpinning. It makes a virtue of its nihilism. Perhaps the last leader capable of real diplomacy that springs to mind was JFK during the Cuban Missile Crisis and in his subsequent dealings with the Soviet leaders. And what happened?... He was killed by the system.
Of course, many are angry in Iran. They ask whether Iran projected weakness too readily, and question whether that manifestation in some way contributed to Israel's readiness to strike Lebanon so ruthlessly and without limitations, as in the Gaza model. Later reports suggest that the U.S. has COL. Douglas Macgregor : Iran Hits Israel. What’s Next? (not available to Israel) that pinpointed Sayyed Nasrallah's whereabouts, and was supplied to Israel, which led to his assassination.
If the West insists to so demean Iranian restraint - wrongly attributing restraint to impotence - is the European and U.S. world order 'uni-party' ever capable of cold realism? Can they make a sound assessment of the consequences should Israel launch war on Iran? Netanyahu has made it clear that this is the Israeli government's aim - war with Iran.
Hubristic misperception of an adversary, and the misperception of his hidden strengths, is so often the precursor to wider war (WW1). And Israel is awash with fervour for war to establish its ' New Order' for the Middle East.
The Biden Administration is ' more than willing' - laying the 'revolver on the table' - for Netanyahu to pick it up and discharge it, whilst Washington pretends to stand aloof from the act. Washington's ultimate target is of course Russia.
That in diplomacy the West is not to be trusted is understood. The story's moral, however, has wider implications. How exactly, in such circumstances, can Russia bring an end to the Ukraine conflict? It would appear that many more will needlessly die, simply because of the uni-party's rigidity and its incapacity to 'do' diplomacy.
Just as many more Ukrainians have perished since the Istanbul II process was trashed.
The West is in the throes of at least one, potentially two, crushing defeats at the moment - and so the question arises: Will lessons be learned? Can the right lessons be learned? Does the professional world order class even accept that there are lessons to be learned?