It was 12 years ago today. Historians will register that, according to the official narrative, 19 Arabs armed with box cutters and minimal flying skills pledged to a transnational Terror Inc turned jets into missiles to attack the US homeland, fooling the most elaborate defense system on Earth.

Fast forward to 2013. Here's a 15-second version of the President of the United States (POTUS) address on Syria, one day before the 12th anniversary of 9/11:

Our ideals and principles, as well as our national security, are at stake. The United States is "the anchor of global security". Although the United States military "doesn't do pin pricks", we still carry the burden to punish regimes that would flout long-held conventions banning the use of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.

That's why I have decided to pursue an unlimited, targeted military strike against Washington DC.

For countless global citizens, this alternative version predictably sounds as far-fetched as the official version of what happened 12 years ago. The fog of war obscures in mysterious ways. But the fact remains that the current, "reluctant" (farcical) Emperor continues to stake his – and his nation's – "credibility" on a "limited", "kinetic" operation to reinforce his self-defined red line against chemical weapons.

Lose face, will travel
In theory, the Russian plan of having Damascus surrender its chemical weapons arsenal works because of its inbuilt Chinese wisdom; nobody loses face – from Obama and the US Congress to the European Union, the UN and the even more farcical "Arab" League, which is essentially a Saudi Arabian colony.

Although Obama is on a media blitzkrieg stealing the credit for it, Asia Times Online has confirmed that the plan was elaborated by Damascus, Tehran and Moscow last week – after a visit to Damascus by the head of the national security committee of the Iranian Majlis (parliament), Alaeddin Boroujerdi. US Secretary of State John Kerry's now famous "slip" provided the opening.

So, essentially, it's this "axis" – Damascus, Tehran and Moscow – that is helping Obama to crawl out of his self-inflicted abyss. Needless to say, that is absolutely unbearable for the plutocrats in charge of unleashing the new Syria (lethal) production. A brand new propaganda/manufactured hysteria campaign must be unfurled to justify war. And that's exactly what the Anglo-French-American axis is working on.

No wonder the French proposal for a new UN Security Council resolution falls under the UN's Chapter 7 – which would explicitly allow the use of force against Damascus in case of non-compliance. As it is, this resolution will inevitably be vetoed by Russia and China. And that will be the new pretext for war. The (farcical) emperor may easily invoke plausible deniability, stress he made "every effort" to avoid a military conflict, and then convince skeptics in the US Congress this is the only way to go.

And to think that a perfectly sound development of the Damascus-Tehran-Moscow plan is at hand. Syria's chemical weapons may be transferred to Russian – or European – supervision. Syria joins the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and ratifies the Chemical Weapon Convention (CWC). OPCW inspectors start working in coordination with the UN. Every expert knows the whole process will take years.

Damascus has already declared it's ready to join the OPCW and abide by the CWC. So Damascus does not need a UN Security Council resolution forcing it to do what it wants to do. Any serious, comprehensive UN resolution on chemical weapons across the Middle East would have to include Israel's chemical weapons. Note that nobody, absolutely nobody, is talking about Israel's vast arsenal of chemical, not to mention nuclear weapons.

The sound path, though, will not be followed – because Washington and its barking poodles afflicted with Sykes-Picot wet dreams, London and Paris, are already blocking it.

Fly me to the (war) moon
There are no signs that the Obama administration is prepared to even reconsider the yo-yo "Obama doctrine" all across the Middle East. This would imply dumping the Saudi-Israeli axis and making a concerted effort for the success of the Geneva II conference, the only possible diplomatic solution for the Syrian tragedy.

I have argued before that the (farcical) emperor is just a paperboy – a docile employee. Those who are paying for the upcoming lethal production, as in the House of Saud, or cheering in the sidelines, as in the Israel lobby, simply won't give up.

The House of Saud wants regime change, now. The Israel lobby/AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) and its masters in Tel Aviv want a massive spillover of the Syria war into Lebanon to entangle Hezbollah. Financial Masters of the Universe, significant sectors of the industrial-military-security Orwellian/Panopticon complex, and Western-propped petro-monarchies want an independent, secular Arab republic profitably integrated in their monopoly.

The problem is the unilateral "kinetic" whatever may be too "limited" to satisfy the Saudi-Israeli axis and most of all the financial Masters of the Universe, and illegal enough to qualify as a war crime.

At least there is a counter-power. Asia Times Online has confirmed that an outstanding meeting will take place later this week in Kyrgyzstan, during the annual summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). Picture Chinese President Xi Jinping, Russian President Vladimir Putin and new Iranian President Hassan Rouhani together, in the same room, discussing their common position on Syria. Iran is an SCO observer – and may soon be admitted as a full member. This is what the Anglo-French-American axis is up against.

And that brings us back to 12 years ago – and the myth that aluminum jets are able to penetrate the thick steel perimeters of the Twin Towers and kerosene is capable of instantaneously melting steel perimeters and steel cores into fluffy steel dust. Check this out and draw the necessary conclusions.

As for that "evil", transnational Terror Inc, it didn't even have a name when Jihad International hopefuls were being recruited in the early 1980s by assorted Islamic charities, and then trained and funded by the CIA and Saudi Arabia. One day the database was finally named – by the US – as "al-Qaeda". Or, more appropriately, "al-CIAeda". They were elevated to Ultimate Evil status. They did 9/11. They reproduced like rabbits from Mali to Indonesia. Now the CIA works side-by-side with them – as it did in Libya. And eagerly they await the US Air Force to clear their road to Damascus. Hey, it's just (war) business. Allahu Akbar.

Pepe Escobar is the author of Globalistan: How the Globalized World is Dissolving into Liquid War (Nimble Books, 2007), Red Zone Blues: a snapshot of Baghdad during the surge (Nimble Books, 2007), and Obama does Globalistan (Nimble Books, 2009).  

Pepe Escobar (born 1954) is a Brazilian journalist and geopolitical analyst. His column "The Roving Eye" for Asia Times regularly discusses the multi-national "competition for dominance over the Middle East and Central Asia."


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