[rad-green] To Stop Trump’s War with Iran, We Must Also Confront the Democrats Who Laid the Groundwork

http://inthesetimes.com/article/22237/trump-war-iran-democrats-sanctions-ndaa-meddling

*IN THESE TIMES           JANUARY 3, 2020*

<http://inthesetimes.com/article/22237/trump-war-iran-democrats-sanctions-ndaa-meddling>

*U.S. President Donald Trump confers with Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi
(D-CA) while departing the U.S. Capitol following a St. Patrick's Day
celebration on March 14, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Win
McNamee/Getty Images)*
To Stop Trump’s War with Iran, We Must Also Confront the Democrats Who Laid
the Groundwork

*Democratic leaders are feigning outrage, but they’ve supported the
precursors to war.*
*BY SARAH LAZARE AND MICHAEL ARRIA
<http://inthesetimes.com/community/profile/323062>*

These failures are consistent with a troubling pattern: Democrats tee up
the ball for Trump’s aggressive maneuvers, and then express outrage when
his administration takes a swing.

Since President Trump took office in 2017, the leadership of the Democratic
Party has overwhelmingly supported the precursors to today’s dangerous U.S.
escalation towards Iran: sanctions, proxy battles and a bloated military
budget. Yet, now that we stand on the brink of a possible U.S. war of
aggression, Democratic leaders are feigning concern that Trump is leading a
march to  war without congressional approval, and using a faulty strategy
to do so. These objections, however, are grounded in process critiques,
rather than moral opposition—and belie Democrats’ role in helping lay the
groundwork for the growing confrontation.

The U.S. drone assassination of Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, the commander
of Iran’s Quds Force and a ranking official of the Iranian government,
takes confrontation with Iran to new heights, inching the U.S. closer to
the war the Trump administration has been pushing for. While Trump deserves
blame for driving this dangerous escalation, he did not do it on his own.

As recently as December 2019, the House overwhelmingly passed the National
Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2020 with a vote of 377-48
<http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2019/roll672.xml>. Two amendments were stripped
from that bill before it went to a vote: Rep. Ro Khanna’s (D-Calif.)
amendment <https://twitter.com/RoKhanna> to block funding for a war with
Iran barring congressional approval and Rep. Barbara Lee’s (D-Calif.)
amendment to repeal 2001’s “Authorization for Use of Military Force Against
Terrorists
<https://www.thenation.com/article/16-years-ago-barbara-lees-warning-against-the-aumf-was-ignored-nevertheless-she-persisted/>”
(AUMF). That AUMF effectively allows the government to use “necessary and
appropriate force” against anyone suspected of being connected to the 9/11
attacks, and has been interpreted broadly to justify U.S. aggression around
the world. Officials from the Trump administration have suggested
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/01/03/trumps-iran-strike-demands-serious-response-democrats/>
that
the 2001 AUMF may give them authority to go to war with Iran.

Of the 377 Representatives who voted for the $738 billion defense bill, 188
were Democrats. Just 41 Democrats opposed the legislation. The bill cleared
<https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=116&session=1&vote=00400>
the
Senate with a tally of 86-8, with just four Democrats voting against it.
None of the Senators running for the 2020 Democratic nomination were
present for the vote. Before the vote, Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell
(R-Ky.) took to the Senate floor to brag about the fact that “partisan
demands” had effectively been removed from the bill and declared that
“sanity and progress” had won out. “Reassuringly, the past few days have
finally brought an end to bipartisan talks and produced a compromise NDAA,”
said
<https://www.rollcall.com/news/democrats-got-completely-rolled-in-ndaa-talks-critics-say>
 McConnell.

At the time of the bill’s passage, 31 organizations, including Yemeni
Alliance Committee and the National Iranian American Council Action, put
out a joint statement condemning the NDAA as a looming disaster destined to
be abused by the Trump administration. “The NDAA is a massive blank check,”
reads
<https://www.rootsaction.org/news-a-views/2158-31-orgs-fy-2020-ndaa-a-blank-check-for-trumps-reckless-foreign-policy->
the
statement. “The authorization of $738 billion is obscene. Further inflating
the Pentagon’s overstuffed coffers does not make us safer—it perpetuates a
system that treats military intervention as the solution to all world
problems.” Despite these concerns, Democrats did not put up much of a
fight, and the Congressional Progressive Caucus declined to whip the vote
against the NDAA.

Democrats’ complicity doesn’t stop with bloated war budgets. In July 2017,
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) was the only lawmaker in both the House
<http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2017/roll413.xml> and the Senate
<https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=115&session=1&vote=00175>
who
caucuses with the Democrats to vote against a bill
<https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=115&session=1&vote=00175>
that
bundled together sanctions on Iran, Russia and North Korea. Proponents of
the bill, meanwhile, used anti-Russia rhetoric to ram it through Congress.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) told
<https://theintercept.com/2017/07/27/with-the-european-union-livid-congress-pushes-forward-on-sanctions-against-russia-iran-and-north-korea/>
 the *Intercept *at the time, “I just looked at the sanctions, and it’s
very hard, in view of what we know just happened in this last election, not
to move ahead with [sanctions].”

Sanders was clear
<https://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/sanders-statement-on-new-iran-north-korea-russia-sanctions>
that
he opposed the bill because of his opposition to sanctions on Iran, but
supported sanctions against Russia and North Korea, which are also
aggressive and harmful to the people of those countries. Still, he was
demonized by some in the Democratic establishment. As we previously reported
<http://inthesetimes.com/article/21129/Iran_Deal_Donald_Trump_Chuck_Schumer_war_Russia_North_Korea>,
Adam Parkhomenko, former Hillary Clinton aide and founder of the Ready for
Hillary PAC, said
<https://twitter.com/AdamParkhomenko/status/890705013303111680> on Twitter
at the time, “Feel the Bern? Bernie Sanders voted against Russian sanctions
today. 98 Senators voted for Russian sanctions today. Sanders voted the
same way anyone with the last name Trump would vote if they were in the
Senate. No excuses―stop making them for him.”

When Trump—surrounded by hawkish advisors—pulled out of the Iran nuclear
deal in May of 2018, the Democratic establishment roundly criticized him,
often citing the supposed threat posed by Iran, even though the country has
no nuclear weapons program, according to U.S. intelligence agencies’ own
assessments
<https://fair.org/home/iran-doesnt-have-a-nuclear-weapons-program-why-do-media-keep-saying-it-does/>.
“The president's willingness to shatter the international consensus, forged
over years of arduous negotiations, on how to constrain Iran's nuclear
program only makes sense as part of a campaign to erase his predecessor's
legacy, regardless of the consequences to our national security,” Rep. Adam
Schiff (D-Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence
Committee, said
<https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/democrats-pan-trump-s-withdrawal-iran-deal-senseless-disturbing-dangerous-n872421>
at
the time.

Yet, Democrats’ previous support for sanctions already violated the Iran
deal, whose benefits for the Iranian people were almost entirely premised
on relief from devastating sanctions. In December of 2018, high-profile
Democrats, including Elizabeth Warren, called for
<https://www.niacouncil.org/warren-proposes-return-jcpoa-senate-hearing/> the
United States to return to the Iran nuclear deal. While such a move would
certainly constitute a de-escalation, these calls were bereft of
accountability for the role that Democrats played in emboldening Trump to
impose even more sanctions
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-certifies-that-iran-is-meeting-terms-of-nuclear-deal/2017/07/17/58d0a362-6b4a-11e7-b9e2-2056e768a7e5_story.html>—and
ultimately walk away from the agreement.

These failures are consistent with a troubling pattern: Democrats tee up
the ball for Trump’s aggressive maneuvers, and then express outrage when
his administration takes a swing. The Trump administration has been on a
course towards towards confrontation with Iran for three years. He’s hired
notorious Iran-war fanatics Gen. James Mattis, John Bolton and Elliot
Abrams. His biggest donor is anti-Iran radical billionaire Sheldon Adleson.
His State Department appears to have staffed out
<https://lobelog.com/fdd-aligned-with-state-department-to-attack-supporters-of-iran-diplomacy/>
some
of its Iran policy to the pro-Israel, rightwing think tank Foundation for
Defense of Democracies. He’s signaled from day one his goal was to march
the United States towards war. Yet, Democrats still padded his war budgets,
voted for his appointments, baited him to have a tougher stance against
Iran’s most important ally, Russia, and did nothing to curb his support for
anti-Iran forces in the Middle East. Democrats have, for the most part,
been not only unwilling to spend their political capital trying to change
this course, but have actively encouraged it through their support for
proxy battles against Iran in Syria and Iraq. And we must not forget that
it was President Obama who, in 2014, sent troops
<https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/17/barack-obama-sends-troops-back-to-iraq-as-crisis-worsens>
back
to Iraq as part of the war against ISIS.

Although many Democrats were quick to criticize Trump’s deadly drone
strike, most of the statements were qualified with assertions about the
murderous nature of Suleimani. “No American will mourn Qassem Suleimani’s
passing,” begins Joe Biden’s statement
<https://twitter.com/Olivianuzzi/status/1212947945169018882?s=20>. “He
deserved to be brought to justice for his crimes against American troops
and thousands of innocents throughout the region. He supported terror and
sowed chaos.” Initial statements from Sens. Elizabeth Warren
<https://twitter.com/ewarren/status/1212951889060470788?s=20> and Amy
Klobuchar <https://twitter.com/amyklobuchar/status/1212970771292868609?s=20>
began
with similar declarations. The first statement that has even referred
<https://twitter.com/CaraKorte/status/1212961215707844608?s=20> to the
killing as an “assassination” has been from Bernie Sanders. Warren later
followed up her initial statement with remarks
<https://twitter.com/ewarren/status/1213147366469058561> that also used the
language of assassination.

Some Democrats who voted for the NDAA and handed the Trump administration a
blank check suddenly expressed concern about the President’s powers.
“Soleimani was an enemy of the United States. That’s not a question,”
tweeted Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Ct.)—who voted or the bill. “The
question is this - as reports suggest, did America just assassinate,
without any congressional authorization, the second most powerful person in
Iran, knowingly setting off a potential massive regional war?”

Other Democrats are also expressing concern that Trump is deploying the
wrong strategy against a dangerous enemy, while accepting the premise that
intervention could be justified. This approach is reflected in presidential
hopeful Pete Buttigieg’s statement
<https://twitter.com/PeteButtigieg/status/1213139943901614080>, released
today: “Before engaging in military action that could destabilize an entire
region, we must take a strategic, deliberate approach that includes
consultation with Congress, our allies, and stakeholders in the Middle
East.” This statement presumes that a destabilizing war of aggression could
be justified, conceding Trump’s moral justifications, even as Buttigieg
handwrings about the method.

We can’t stop a war with Iran unless we recognize U.S. aggression is not
the product of failed strategy, or the Republican Party alone. It’s the
product of a system where it’s normal bipartisan politics to lay the
building blocks of war with no public account of the profound harm that is
being done. And then, on the eve of said war, those Democrats who have been
setting its course feign outrage and shock—if a Republican is in the White
House, that is. We saw this script play out with the Iraq War, and we’re
seeing it again now. In a U.S. political establishment where killing people
abroad comes with little political cost, the politicians who contributed to
the U.S. climate of belligerence are never forced to face the consequences.
It costs nothing to to jockey for war, but everything to stand against
it—including war’s precursors, such as sanctions, bloated military budgets
and CIA meddling. Our only hope is to change this.

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