General Qasem Soleimani and President Donald Trump
To Athens and Sparta, Xerxes sent no heralds to demand earth, and this he did for the following reason. When Darius had previously sent men with this same purpose, those who made the request were cast at the one city into the Pit and at the other into a well, and told to obtain their earth and water for the king from there.
— Herodotos 7.133.1
General Soleimani was acting under diplomatic authority and it bodes poorly for the U.S' ability to engage in diplomacy in the region for years to come.
With a single act, the U.S violated not only standing and unspoken rules in place for countless centuries, but specific provisions in, for example, Article 31 of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.This is not to say that such timeless rules have not been broken, but that in killing a diplomat one has declared war on the diplomat's homeland.
The plot to assassinate Qassem Soleimani (now Shaheed Soleimani) - a man long described by Khamenei himself as a 'living martyr' - was born, we are informed, from US and Israeli intelligence.
The American intelligence-controlled rag, The New York Times publicly revealed the plot in subtle terms, on January 2nd, as we will discuss below.Soleimani was involved in multi-lateral talks regarding pending legislation in Iraq involving Iraq's intention to end U.S military presence, and demilitarize its embassy. Indeed, despite Soleimani's assassination - and indeed perhaps propelled to certain success because of it - such legislation advanced to the next process of becoming law in Iraq earlier today.
Worse still, Soleimani's diplomatic mission was being carried out
as a result of a request made by the Trump administration to the Iraqi government. These are among the reasons that the US knew Soleimani's precise location at the specific time - and why the US in one fell swoop, lost all remaining diplomatic credibility.
Despite the relatively misleading use of the word 'embassy', the US had been using this and the 'green zone' around it as an unwelcome military base in the heart of Baghdad.
Numerous credible reports detailed that ISIS/Al Qaeda operatives and leaders even had use of the green zone. A decade ago, ISIS-type death squads would leave from the green zone at night to execute social, religious, and political leaders in Iraq opposed to the US occupation.
Soleimani flew on a regular flight and was accompanied by nine men, including Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy commander of Iraq's Popular Mobilization Force. They traveled in three unarmed vehicles on a public road.
Soleimani was carrying a diplomatic message and this elevates him to the level of a diplomatic envoy. This compounds and greatly exacerbates not only the criminality of his assassination, but its consequences.The Americans came to know of Soleimani's exact whereabouts due to the public nature of his flight, combined with aerial intelligence - perhaps from a drone launched directly from the green zone itself.
But what's more - the
NYT revealed to readers just a day before, what the US plan was.
This was revealed in an analysis written by Steven Simon. At a glance,
his NYT article about hypersonic missiles is completely unrelated to the
assassination of General Qassem Soleimani, however, when you get to the 11th paragraph, the content strikes like lighting:
Moreover, hypersonics are a weaponized moral hazard for states with a taste for intervention, because they erase barriers to picking fights. Is an adversary building something that might be a weapons factory? Is there an individual in an unfriendly country who cannot be apprehended? What if the former commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, Qassem Suleimani, visits Baghdad for a meeting and you know the address? The temptations to use hypersonic missiles will be many.
Note that the article was written on January 2, a full day before General Qassem Suleimani was killed by a US drone strike.
The article was written on January 2, 2020
The 11th paragraph, which revealed the US plan to assassinate the late Iranian General
Comment: The Saker provided a handy run-down of the latest
developments, the first of which somewhat supports what FRN writes above:
- Iraqi Prime Minister Adil Abdl Mahdi has now officially revealed that the US had asked him to mediate between the US and Iran and that General Qassem Soleimani to come and talk to him and give him the answer to his mediation efforts. Thus, Soleimani was on an OFFICIAL DIPLOMATIC MISSION as part of a diplomatic initiative INITIATED BY THE USA.
- The Iraqi Parliament has now voted on a resolution requiring the government to press Washington and its allies to withdraw their troops from Iraq.
- Iraq's caretaker PM Adil Abdul Mahdi said the American side notified the Iraqi military about the planned airstrike minutes before it was carried out. He stressed that his government denied Washington permission to continue with the operation.
- The Iraqi Parliament has also demanded that the Iraqi government must "work to end the presence of any foreign troops on Iraqi soil and prohibit them from using its land, airspace or water for any reason"
- The Iraqi Foreign Ministry said that Baghdad had turned to the UN Security Council with complaints about US violations of its sovereignty.
- Iraqi cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said the parliamentary resolution to end foreign troop presence in the country did not go far enough, calling on local and foreign militia groups to unite. I also have confirmation that the Mehdi Army is being re-mobilized.
- The Pentagon brass is now laying the responsibility for this monumental disaster on Trump (see here). The are now slowly waking up to this immense clusterbleep and don't want to be held responsible for what is coming next.
- For the first time in the history of Iran, a Red Flag was hoisted over the Holy Dome Of Jamkaran Mosque, Iran. This indicates that the blood of martyrs has been spilled and that a major battle will now happen. The text in the flag says "Oh Hussein we ask for your help" (unofficial translation 1) or "Rise up and avenge al-Husayn" (unofficial translation 2)
- The US has announced the deployment of 3'000 soldiers from the 82nd Airborne to Kuwait.
- Finally, the Idiot-in-Chief tweeted the following message, probably to try to reassure his freaked out supporters: "The United States just spent Two Trillion Dollars on Military Equipment. We are the biggest and by far the BEST in the World! If Iran attacks an American Base, or any American, we will be sending some of that brand new beautiful equipment their way...and without hesitation!". Apparently, he still thinks that criminally overspending for 2nd rate military hardware is going to yield victory...
On point #6, Nasr al-Shimri, the deputy-Secretary General of the al-Nujaba movement, made the following statement:
- Washington has failed to shake Iraq's relations with its strategic ally Iran
- Iran is a strategic ally that stood with Iraq in the most difficult of times
- the blood of General Soleimani and the leader al-Muhandis foiled all the American plans against Iraq
- not one day have we felt any reassurance towards American behavior in Iraq
- the American aggression against the PMU on the borders signaled the beginning of the war on the resistance
- we will wage a war against the American military presence at every point in the region that is within our reach
- the pain that we will cause the United States will be equal to the (value of the) blood of our martyrs
- the high-level leaders of the Iraqi resistance are preparing to meet to form a united front against the American presence in the region
- the leaders of the Iraqi resistance will gather today or tomorrow to announce a united front against the US (military) presence
- we are ready to fight the United States and the martyrdom of some of us will not change any of the existing equations
Regarding point #7, here are the
details:
Days before Soleimani was targeted, US senior military officials reportedly offered to Trump the option of killing him. The Washington Post broke the news on Saturday, citing sources, that top Pentagon officials were "stunned" when the US president picked the most extreme option as a response to recent Iranian-led violence in Iraq.
According to the media report, senior military officials did not think Trump would take it, citing a practice reportedly introduced after the 11 September 2001 attacks which enables the US Department of Defence to offer improbable options to presidents just to make other more peaceful scenarios appear more palatable.
Trump reportedly became infuriated with media images showing Iranian-backed attacks on the American embassy in Baghdad, The Washington Post said, citing sources. The aggressive protest - which came as a response to the US strike against Kataib Hezbollah's forces killing about two dozen of its fighters - triggered the extreme option.
Senior US officials said, cited by the media outlet, that Trump authorized the assassination of Soleimani despite dispute in the administration about the significance of received intelligence warning of alleged threats to American assets in the Middle East.
US officials were reportedly divided, as some sources claimed that Soleimani had allegedly completed a tour - checking his proxy forces in Syria, Lebanon and Iraq - and was planning an attack that could claim hundreds of lives, according to The Washington Post. Others reportedly doubted a direct strike against Soleimani as other intelligence indicated that the top Iranian general's recent traveling amounted to "business as usual".
Idiot Pompeo reportedly was
instrumental in pushing for the assassination:
On 29 December, Pompeo, Esper and Milley reportedly traveled to the president's private club in Florida, where the two defense officials offered possible option responses to Iranian aggression, including the targeted killing of Soleimani, senior US officials said.
...
Trump's decision to approve the killing of Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' (IRGC) Al Quds commander Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani was the culmination of determined urging by Mike Pompeo and Vice President Mike Pence, the officials are cited as saying on condition of anonymity.
A significant factor cited was the "lockstep" coordination for the operation between Pompeo and Esper, both graduates in the same class at the US Military Academy, who deliberated ahead of the briefing with Trump.
Pence was claimed to have also endorsed the decision, while not attending the meeting in Florida.
"Taking out Soleimani would not have happened under [former secretary of defense Jim] Mattis. Mattis was opposed to all of this. It's not a hit on Mattis, it's just his predisposition. Milley and Esper are different. Now you've got a cohesive national security team and you've got a secretary of state and defense secretary who've known each other their whole adult lives," the official is quoted as saying.
Pompeo reportedly first spoke with Donald Trump about killing Soleimani months ago, when the US President declined to retaliate militarily against Iran after the downing of a US surveillance drone that Tehran claimed violated its airspace - a fact Washington had denied. Tensions between Iran and the United States nearly escalated into a dangerous direct confrontation as President Donald Trump approved airstrikes against Tehran following the incident, but abruptly backtracked on his decision.
U.S. forces claim Iran's missile forces are at a
heightened state of alert.
Neocon shill (and ex-CIA director)
Petraeus is naturally ecstatic about the killing.
See also:
Pompeo and Pence and anyone else similarly advising the President are equally culpable for this murder. The Pentagon cannot be blameless when the killing was on the list. Yes it was the most violent respons, but it was on the list.