The horrible truth about Iran

Read all of Patrick Cockburn's piece on who is winning the war in Iraq. The following paragraph would be particularly shocking to those who eat the U.S. Media's and George Bush's dog food.

The main supporters of Nouri al-Maliki’s government are the US and Iran. This has never been admitted by Washington but from the Iranian point of view the present Shia-Kurdish government in Baghdad is as good as it is going to get. It does not want to overthrow Maliki, but it does want to reduce American influence on him. The fighting in Basra and Sadr City between the Mehdi Army and the Iraqi government backed by the American army between March and April was in each case brought to an end by Iranian mediation. This has become very public. To arrange the ceasefires in Basra and Baghdad President Jalal Talabani twice went to see Qassem Suleimani, the head of the Quds brigade of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard on the Iraq-Iran border, though President Bush has denounced the Quds brigade as terrorists orchestrating attacks on US forces in Iraq. Iranian influence in Iraq is stronger than ever and the Iranians are increasingly willing to flaunt it. When the Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad visited Baghdad this years his visit was announced in advance and he drove through the city by car. When President George W Bush comes to Baghdad it is a kept a secret until the last moment, he moves only by helicopter and he has never ventured outside the Green Zone.

People (maybe even me) have mocked McCain for saying that Iran was supporting al-Qaida, and having Jiving Joe Lieberman tell him to say "insurgents" instead. But according to this, Lieberman was just as delusional as McCain. Iran is supporting the GOVERNMENT of Iraq, not insurgents.

I think our whole Iran policy must be Bush's dyslexia turning into global foreign policy disasters. He must think that the old phrase is really "The friend of my friend is my enemy", not "The enemy of my enemy is my friend."