Washington, March 08: In what appears to be an effort to try a “new pressure track” on Iran, a top US commander fires a barrage of angry rhetoric at the Tehran government over last year’s post-election incidents in the country.
US Central Command Chief General David Petraeus, claimed in a Sunday interview with CNN, claimed that the Islamic Republic’s conduct in dealing with the Western-promoted violence following last June’s presidential election showed that the country has gone “from being a theocracy to a thugocracy”.
The offensive remarks by the American general, whose command stretches from Egypt to Pakistan and includes Iran, came two weeks after he threatened the country with what he described as “a new pressure track” to subvert Iran’s enrichment activities.
“I think that no one at the end of this time can say that the United States and the rest of the world have not given Iran every opportunity to resolve the issues diplomatically,” the CENTCOM head claimed on February 21.
The general regularly visits Israel in reported efforts to discuss and coordinate policies with Tel Aviv’s officials.
“That puts us in a solid foundation now to go on (with) what is termed the pressure track. That’s the course on which we are embarked now,” he told the NBC TV broadcast news.
Petraeus used the February comments to caution that any attack on Iran’s nuclear sites, as threatened by Israel and the US in the past, could backfire by boosting “nationalist tendencies” in the country.
The abusive rhetoric by Petraeus comes amid the fact that the US has been the prime sponsor of many autocratic regimes, especially those in the Persian Gulf region, despite its vocal advocacy of democracy and freedom in selected countries that do not share US worldviews and interests.
Observers insist that the American general’s undiplomatic rhetoric reflects his rage about Iran’s growing achievements in various fields as well as its rising popularity in the region as a positive force for promoting regional security and stability.
The also add that Petraeus happens to represent a country that has brought many dictatorships to power by sponsoring coups against popular governments, and a country that has emerged globally notorious for sanctioning secret prisons and torture chambers in oppressive countries in the name of ‘national security’ and ‘fighting terrorism’.
——–Agencies