Michigan’s Rep. Scholten and Senator Slotkin both release statements condemning Iran as the US attacks that country
The Trump Administration has unilaterally decided to attack the sovereign nation of Iran, with the support of Israel. Most US news stories provide some context for why Israel is involved, but there is limited information on why the US has such a contentious relationship with Iran.
A Brief History of the US and Iran
The Iranian people and the Iranian government as early as 1951 wanted to nationalize the oil that was being pumped from the earth on Iranian land. Such an action was a major no no, since the oil interests (both British and US) were not in favor of allowing Iranians to benefit from domestic oil production.
The British initiated an economic blockade on Iran once they announced that Iranian oil was for Iranians. However, the Iranian government under the leadership of the democratically elected government of Mohammad Mosaddegh was able to weather the economic blockade and continued to use oil production to benefit Iranian society. US strategists working with the CIA began developing a plan to oust the Mosaddegh government and put in his place the Shah, who would dismantle the law that said Iranian oil for Iranians.
In the summer of 1953, the CIA initiated a coup and then installed The Shah of Iran who became an important ally of the US in the Middle East until 1979. During the Shah’s reign he suppressed dissent, was very anti-Islam and created his own secret police known as SAVAK. According to Blum:
“The notorious Iranian secret police, SAVAK, created under the guidance of the CIA and Israel, spread its tentacles all over the world to punish Iranian dissidents. According to a former CIA analyst on Iran, SAVAK was instructed in torture techniques by the Agency. Amnesty International summed up the situation in 1976 by noting that Iran had the “highest rate of death penalties in the world, no valid system of civilian courts and a history of torture which is beyond belief. No country in the world has a worse record in human rights than Iran.”
The brutality of the Shah of Iran is what eventually led to the Iranian revolution in 1979, which was led by Islamic clerics who had nothing but contempt for the US, primarily because of the decades long US support of the Shah.
In an attempt to destabilize Iran the US was providing weapons to Iraq throughout the 1980s to go to war against Iran, resulting in 1 million dead. When the US attacked Iraq in 1991 with the so-called Gulf War, it provided the US another opportunity to monitor Iran. In 2003 the US invaded Iraq and began to establish military bases which was one of the goals, in order to have more permanent military presence that was closer to Iran. (reflected in the map above) Every US administration since 1979 has treated Iran as a terrorist state, even though Iran has not invaded another sovereign nation.
For more insights into the history of US/Iranian relations check out the US government declassified documents put together by the National Security Archives. https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/project/iran-us-relations
Scholten and Slotkin statements
Rep. Scholten begins her statement with “The Iranian regime posses a profound threat to US interests, Israel, our Gulf partners and global security.” Scholten doesn’t begin with the fact that the Trump administration bombed Iran without Congressional approval, but goes out of her way to make Iran the bad actor in this situation. Scholten then continues to demonize Iran making all sorts of claims without providing any evidence.
Senator Slotkin doesn’t begin her statement by demonizing Iran, but she does say at one point:
“As a former CIA officer who served three tours in Iraq, I have no love lost for the Iranian government. They’re a state sponsor of terror, responsible for the deaths of Americans. I saw it up close in Iraq and elsewhere.”
Again, an elected official making claims without providing evidence to substantiate such claims.
Both Slotkin and Scholten make it a point to criticize the Trump Administration’s failure to get Congressional approval, but they both make it a priority to demonize Iran and avoid talking about how Israel fits into the US attack on Iran.
For those wanting to investigate beyond the headlines I would recommend the following independent news and analysis sites:
Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy 
Comments are closed.