An Enemy of the Empire

The enemy of my enemy is my friend, or so they say. 

Following are quotes from an interview.  I don’t know how concerned I should be that I hold many of these same views.  I will save the identity of the interviewee for last:

…what is absolutely certain is that Western officials are in a state of confusion and their vision lacks clarity. At the same time, they are overwhelmed by a sense of failure concerning the plans they drew and didn’t achieve their objectives.

At the same time, the lies they propagated…have started to unravel. You cannot continue to lie to your people for years. You might do that for a limited period of time. Today, as a result of technological advances in the field of information, every citizen in every part of the world could know part of the truth. These parts have started to come together in the minds of their people, and they have found out that their governments have been lying to them concerning what has happened….

When the West was unable to change [our] policies, they found an opportunity at the beginning of the events of what is called the “Arab Spring”, an opportunity to attack the states whose political line they didn’t like.

When we talk about these states, we are taking about an integrated system. We use the term “Western countries”, but these Western countries have one master, which is the United States. All these countries behave in accordance with the dictates of the American maestro.

That is why when the United States gives the signal, these countries move in a certain direction, but there is usually a distribution of roles.

But if they are talking about democracy, the question begs itself: are the states you mentioned, especially Saudi Arabia, models of democracy, human rights or public participation? In fact, they are the worst and the most backward worldwide; and consequently they have no right to talk about this. As to Erdogan, he is responsible for creating chasms inside his own society, inside Turkey itself. Turkey was stable for many years, but with his divisive language, and his talk about sedition and discrimination between its different components, neither he nor Davutoglu are entitled to give advice to any country or any people in the world. This is the truth, simply and clearly.

…they started in the West and in the regional countries which are subject to the Western agendas, particularly Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia…

These terrorist organizations, whether ISIS, Jabhat al-Nusra or al- Qaeda are mere manifestations of a long and deep perversion in our region and our society. This perversion is at least five decades old; but it practically started two centuries ago with perverse interpretation of Islam. The main manifestation of this perversion is the Wahhabi movement which interpreted Islam in a perverted and, in most cases, contradictory manner with the import of Islam itself.

…the thief [Western countries] cannot be himself the policeman who protects the city from thieves. Similarly, the state which supports terrorism cannot fight it. This is the truth about this coalition we see. That is why, and after more than a year, we do not see any results.

How can the United States and its allies fight terrorism or ISIS in Syria and Iraq while their closest allies in the government of Erdogan and Davutoglu are supporting terrorists and enabling them to cross the borders and bring weapons, money and volunteers through Turkey?

[ISIS] emerged in Iraq in 2006 when the Americans ran most things, if not everything, particularly the security issues in Iraq. It emerged there on their watch; and all ISIS leaders graduated from the prisons which used to be run by the United States, not the Iraqi government.

The fact today is that the most important terrorist leaders in Syria and Iraq are Europeans. Probably the largest number of terrorists comes from Muslim countries, and particularly Arab countries, but most of the leaders come from Europe, and specifically from northern Europe which is relatively far from our region and has a rich and sophisticated society.

Most of those emigrants do not wish to live one single day outside their country, but there are certain circumstances which forced them to do so, on top of which are terrorism and the support of terrorism from outside…. So, if we ask anything of the international organizations or of the states – and I believe every refugee will ask for the same thing – It would be for them to stop supporting terrorism, and to put pressure on countries, especially Turkey, Jordan, Qatar and Saudi Arabia to stop sending terrorists…and providing them with weapons and money.

The war will continue as long as there are those who support terrorism, because we are not fighting terrorist groups inside [our country], we are fighting terrorist groups coming from all over the world with the support of the richest and the most powerful countries.

I suspect by now you have figured out the identity of the interviewee, despite my meager attempts to maintain some mystery.  Here he is.  It is a worthwhile read throughout; whatever evils he might have also committed, he seems like an intelligent man. 

I think about someone in his position – can you imagine the untold billions he would reap if he only went along with empire at only the cost of placing his country and people in permanent subservience?  Yet, he does not.  This means something, I suppose.