In 1957, joint plans by the CIA and MI6 to destabilize Syria by means of staged border incidents and special forces assassinations of key political figures were approved by UK PM Harold Macmillan and US President Eisenhower.
by Felicity Arbuthnot dated 2012/02/07Subjects: CIA, MI6, Syria
Source: Dandelion Salad
Wikispooks Comment
For anyone in two minds about what is really going on in Syria, and whether President Assad, hailed a decade ago as “A Modern Day Attaturk”, has become the latest megalomaniacal despot, to whose people a US-led posse of nations, must deliver “freedom”, with weapons of mass, home, people, nation and livelihood destruction, here is a salutary tale from modern history.
CIA-MI6 Intel Ops and Sabotage
"The very concept of objective truth is fading out of the world. Lies will pass into history.” - George Orwell
Have the more recent sabre rattlings against Syria* been based on US-UK government papers, only discovered in 2003 – and since air brushed (or erroneously omitted) from even BBC timelines, on that country?
In late 2003, the year of the Iraq invasion, Matthew Jones, a Reader in International History, at London’s Royal Holloway College, discovered “frighteningly frank” documents:1957 plans between then UK Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, and then US President, Dwight Eisenhower, endorsing: “a CIA-MI6 plan to stage fake border incidents as an excuse for an invasion (of Syria) by Syria’s pro-western neighbours.”
At the heart of the plan was the assassination of the perceived power behind then President Shukri al-Quwatli. Those targeted were: Abd al-Hamid Sarraj, Head of Military Intelligence; Afif al-Bizri, Chief of Syrian General Staff: and Khalid Bakdash, who headed the Syrian Communist Party.
The document was drawn up in Washington in the September of 1957:
“In order to facilitate the action of liberative (sic) forces, reduce the capabilities of the regime to organize and direct its military actions … to bring about the desired results in the shortest possible time, a special effort should be made to eliminate certain key individuals. “Their removal should be accomplished early in the course of the uprising and intervention, an in the light of circumstances existing at the time.”
In the light of President Assad’s current allegations of foreign forces and interventions, cross border incursions (as Colonel Quaddafi’s before him, so sneered at by Western governments and media – and so correct) there are some fascinating, salutary phrases:
“Once a political decision has been reached to proceed with internal disturbances in Syria, CIA is prepared, and SIS (MI6) will attempt to mount minor sabotage and coup de main (sic) incidents within Syria, working through contacts with individuals. Incidents should not be concentrated in Damascus … care should be taken to avoid causing key leaders of the Syrian regime to take additional personal protection measures.”
Further: a “necessary degree of fear .. frontier incidents and (staged) border clashes”, would “provide a pretext for intervention”, by Iraq and Jordan – then still under British mandate.Syria was to be: “made to appear as sponsor of plots, sabotage and violence directed against neighbouring governments … the CIA and SIS should use … capabilities in both psychological and action fields to augment tension.”
Incursions in to Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon, would involve: “sabotage, national conspiracies, and various strong arms activities”, were, advised the document, to be blamed on Damascus.
In late December 2011 an opposition “Syria National Council” was announced, to “liberate the country”, representatives met with Hilary Clinton. There now seems to be a US – endorsed “Syrian Revolutionary Council.”
The Eisenhower-Macmillan plan was for funding of the: “Free Syria Committee” and “arming of political factions with paramilitary or other actionist capabilities”, within Syria.
CIA-MI6, planned fomenting internal uprisings and replacing the Ba’ath-Communist-leaning government, with a Western, user-friendly one. Expecting this to be met by public hostility, they planned to: “probably need to rely first on repressive measures and arbitrary exercise of power.”
The document was signed off in both London and Washington. It was, wrote Macmillan in his diary: “a most formidable report.” A Report which was: “withheld even from British Chiefs of Staff …”
Washington and Whitehall had become concerned at Syria’s increasingly pro-Soviet, rather than pro-Western sympathies – and the Ba’ath (Pan Arab) and Communist party alliance, also largely allied within the Syrian army.
However, even political concerns, were trumped by Syria then controlling a main pipeline from the Western bonanza of Iraq’s oil fields, in those pre-Saddam Hussein days.
Briefly put: in 1957, Syria allied with Moscow (which included an agreement for military and economic aid) also recognized China – and then as now, the then Soviet Union warned the West against intervening in Syria.
Syria, is unchanged as an independent minded country, and the loyalties remain. It broadly remains the cradle of the Pan Arab ideal of Ba’athism, standing alone, since the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime.
In 1957, this independent mindedness caused Loy Henderson, a Senior State Department official, to say that:“the present regime in Syria had to go …”
Ultimately, the plan was not used, since, British mandate or not, neighbouring countries refused to play. However, the project, overtly, bears striking similarity to the reality of events over the last decade, in Syria – and the region.
In a near 1957 re-run, Britain’s Foreign Minister, William Hague has said President Assad “will feel emboldened” by the UN Russia-China vote in Syria’s favour.
Hilary (“We came, we saw, he died”) Clinton, has called for: “friends of a democratic Syria”, to unite and rally against the Assad government:
“We need to work together to send them a clear message: you cannot hold back the future at the point of a gun”, said the women filmed purportedly watching the extrajudicial, illegal assassination of may be, or may be not, Ossama Bin Laden and others – but certainly people were murdered – by US illegal invaders – at the point of lots of guns.
Supremely ironically, she was speaking in Munich (5th February) historically: “The birth place of the Nazi party.”
The Russia-China veto at the UN on actions against Syria, has been condemned by the US, varyingly, as: “Disgusting”, ‘shameful”, “deplorable”, “a travesty.”
Eye opening, is the list of US vetoes for Israel. Jaw dropping double standards can only be wondered at (again.).
Perhaps the bottom line is: in 1957, Iraq’s oil was at the top of the agenda, of which Syria held an important key. Today, it is Iran’s – and as Michel Chossudovsky notes so succinctly: “The road to Tehran is through Damascus.”
(All emphasis, the writer’s.)
References
The United States has had destructive tendencies for a while now
“I want to go on record as saying that this is the stupidest, most irresponsible action a diplomatic mission like ours could get itself involved in, and that we've started a series of these things that will never end.” US State Department official Deane Hinton on a CIA coup to manipulate Syria & its government, 1949
1916- Sykes-Picot Agreement, Syria ‘given’ to France, Iraq to Britain.
1920- French defeat an independence movement in Syria.
1925- France defeats a second independence movement in Syria, shells Damascus.
1936- France grants Syria independence, but French parliament refuses to ratify.
1941- Syria declares independence.
1944- Jewish irregular armed units operating independently of Jewish Agency control (but at times with its tacit approval) launch a campaign of terror against British personnel and Arab civilians in Palestine.
1945- France tries to stop independence movement, shells Damascus, kills 400.
1946- Independence from France, Syrian President is Shukri al-Quwatli.
1947- The Promised Land extends from the River of Egypt up to the Euphrates, it includes parts of Syria and Lebanon—UN testimony by Rabbi Fischmann, member of the Jewish Agency for Palestine.
1948- Israel created out of Palestine, Arab-Israeli War.
1948- Syria participates in Arab wars against Israel in 1948, 1967 & 1973, earning U.S. enmity.
1949- CIA-sponsored coup under Truman over oil pipeline through Syria, see Deane Hinton quote.
1949- Two more coups, CIA man overthrown in the second, another returned in third.
1954- Fourth coup, CIA-supported Adib Shiskali overthrown.
1955- Shukri al-Quwatli re-instated (see above, 1946).
1956- CIA under Eisenhower tries to overthrow al-Quwatli with ‘Operation Straggle.’
1957- Eisenhower implements ‘Operation Wappen,’ another coup attempt.
1957- Turkey masses 50,000 troops on Syrian border after the latter was claimed to be a ‘Soviet Satellite’ with ‘not more than 123 Russian MIGs’ (fighter planes). Reporter Kennett Love later said that "there were indeed 'not more than 123 Migs'. There were none."
1960s- Frequent coups, military revolts, civil disorders and bloody riots.
1970- Minister of Defense Hafez al-Assad seizes power in a bloodless coup.
1979- Syria earns increased animosity of the U.S. government by supporting the Iranian revolution.
1980- National Security Council urges Secretary of State Zbigniew Brzezinski to identify “possible alternative regimes to Syria’s Hafez al-Assad government.
1982- “Israel must become an imperial regional power, and must effect the division of the whole area into small states by the dissolution of all existing Arab states.” from ‘A Strategy for Israel in the 1980s’.
1996- American Report: “Israel can shape its strategic environment by weakening Syria.” A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm. The document proposed regime change in Iraq primarily as a “means” of “weakening, containing, and even rolling back Syria. As Pat Buchanan put it: “In the Perle-Feith-Wurmser strategy, Israel’s enemy remains Syria, but the road to Damascus runs through Baghdad.”
2003- Israel launches a missile attack on Syria, the first strike into Syrian territory in 30 years. President Bush immediately condoned the attack.
2004-. Labeling Syria “an extraordinary threat, US Congress passed sanctions against the country.
2006- Cable from William Roebuck, chargé d'affaires at the US embassy in Damascus published later by Wikileaks. The cable outlines strategies for destabilizing the Syrian government.
2007- We need to do everything possible to destabilize the Syrian regime. Cheney’s Middle East adviser David Wurmser.
2009- US blocks Syrian efforts to join the World Trade Organization, which along with sanctions negatively impacts the Syrian economy.
2012- From Defense Intelligence Agency document: “The West, Gulf Countries and Turkey support the Syrian opposition…There is a possibility of establishing a Salfist Principality in Eastern Syria.”
2012- CIA known to be funneling weapons to Syrian opposition.
2016- 320,000 Syrians killed since open warfare began in 2011, with 12 million refugees (out of a total population of 22 million), and the human and ecological infrastructure of the country largely destroyed.
References
Jump up↑ http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/washingtons-long-history-syria-8717
Jump up↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sykes%E2%80%93Picot_Agreement
↑ Jump up to:a b c d e https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Syria
Jump up↑ http://www.coldwarstudies.com/2012/12/04/palestine-israel-timeline-1942-1948/
↑ Jump up to:a b c d http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/washingtons-long-history-syria-8717
Jump up↑ http://www.globalresearch.ca/greater-israel-the-zionist-plan-for-the-middle-east/5324815
Jump up↑ http://www.nmhtthornton.com/mehistorydatabase/arabisraeliwars.php
↑ Jump up to:a b https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_activities_in_Syria
Jump up↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Syria_relations
Jump up↑ NSC (1980) ‘Syria July 16, 1980’, National Security Council, 4203XX, Memorandum for Zbigniew Brzezinski, declassified document.
Jump up↑ http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article1025.htm
Jump up↑ http://scotthorton.org/fairuse/2014/01/27/a-clean-break-a-new-strategy-for-securing-the-realm-by-david-wurmser-1996/
Jump up↑ http://edition.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/05/11/us.syria/
Jump up↑ US Embassy Damascus (2006) ‘Influencing the SARG in the end of 2006’ - Cable to US State Department, Wikileaks, 13 December
Jump up↑ http://original.antiwar.com/dan_sanchez/2015/06/29/clean-break-to-dirty-wars/
Jump up↑ Sadat, Mi H and Daniel B Jones (2009) ‘U.S. Foreign Policy Towards Syria: balancing ideology and national interests’ - Middle East Policy Council, Summer, Volume XVI, Number 2
Jump up↑ http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/21/world/middleeast/cia-said-to-aid-in-steering-arms-to-syrian-rebels.html?_r=0
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