UK: Blair Slanders Iran after Prisoner Release

“Given the dishonesty of the Bush and Blair regimes, the claim that Iran is sending weapons to Iraq is just another neocon lie and attempt to fool the public into supporting another war for Israeli interests.”

by James Buchanan

I could barely believe this one. Only hours after the British sailors were released, Bush’s poodle, Tony Blair, held a press conference in which he accused the Iranians (again) of supplying the Iraqi rebels with weapons and made a weaselly attempt to hint that the Iranians may have been responsible for a recent attack that killed four British soldiers.

Those four British soldiers died because Blair didn’t have enough backbone to pull all the British soldiers out of Iraq immediately, which is what the British public wants.

Every nation has a right to defend its borders and to lock up anyone who trespasses. The Iranians can lock up any British sailors, who cross into their territory and their government can make the decision if these people are locked up for weeks, months or years. Releasing the British sailors only a couple weeks after violating their maritime border was an extremely gracious act by the Iranians especially considering that Bush and Blair continue to lie about Iran and continue to beat the drums for war.A recent http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=aMmErP75PN_E reports “U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair mixed his welcome of the safe return of 15 sailors and Marines who had been held by Iran with a warning to the country to drop its support for terrorism in Iraq. Speaking as the plane carrying the troops, who were captured on March 23 in circumstances disputed by the two countries, landed at London’s Heathrow airport, Blair said he was “grieving and mourning’’ for four U.K. soldiers killed by a roadside bomb in Basra, southern Iraq, earlier in the day. `It’s far too early to say that the particular terrorist attack that killed our forces was an act committed by terrorists who were backed by any elements of the Iranian regime, so I make no allegation,’ Blair told reporters outside his Downing Street, London, residence. `But there are elements of the Iranian regime that are backing and financing terrorism in Iraq.’ ”

The Iraqi rebels hid away millions of weapons and artillery shells after the fall of Saddam. They don’t need any weapons from Iran or Syria. The continued attempt by Bush and Blair to pretend that the Iraq insurgency is being kept alive by smuggled Iranian weapons is baloney. If our military is so incompetent that it can’t shut off the Iraqi border with Iran, maybe we shouldn’t be doing occupations.

Blair also called the Iraqi insurgents “terrorists.” We are fighting “insurgents” in Iraq, not “terrorists.” It’s bad enough we illegally invaded their country, destroyed their infra-structure and our soldiers repeatedly shoot down innocent people by mistake at road side check points, we don’t need to add more dishonesty to this fiasco by calling Iraqi insurgents “terrorists.”

Given the dishonesty of the Bush and Blair regimes, the claim that Iran is sending weapons to Iraq is just another neocon lie and attempt to fool the public into supporting another war for Israeli interests.

2007-04-06