The Devil We Know

CW: So what we see in Iraq now is America vs. Iran?

RB: See, I don’t think the Americans—including the press—are going to admit to themselves what’s happened in Iraq. When I mention things like the Iranians and that the Iraqis are building a pipeline that goes from Basra to Abadan, they look at me like where did you get that obscure fact? You can get that on the Internet. There are press statements. Or the fact that a lot of families of Shia members of parliament live in Iran. It’s sort of like relations with Canada. The Canadians are not going to let a group hostile to the United States set up in Ottawa or somewhere like that. It doesn’t mean [you] occupy Iran. It’s not worth it to Canada. We’re tied to the hip when it comes to national security. Canada’s not going to go to Vietnam and fight, or to Iraq, but that doesn’t mean that there’s not an enormous amount of influence from the United States over Canada, and Mexico. At the very least, that’s the kind of influence that Iran will insist on exercising over Iraq, and that’s to have a say of what goes on inside Iraqi borders, as well as economically.

CW: Wasn’t it understood before the war that the majority, that a lot of the politicians who were going to come to power in Iraq would be Shia, because America was going to insist on elections, and the Shia have a majority....

RB: No, I think they really truly thought there would be some sort of turnaround. Because it was Saddam that was forcing these ideas of nationalism, or pro-Palestinian [ideas], it was inconceivable that the average Iraqi would [actually] care about Palestine—fellow Arabs, fellow Sunni Arabs, at that. But once we got Saddam then everybody would turn around and say, yeah, alright, we want our iPods and we want to move into the 21st century in lockstep with the United States. And no, we’re not going to mind that the Americans are going to put permanent bases in Iraq. And start production-sharing agreements which have been rejected by everyone in the world. Basically the U.S. can’t understand that the Iraqis didn’t want to turn back the clock and accept a colonial relationship. It came truly as a surprise to Democrats and Republicans alike.

CW: Were you surprised?

RB: No! Why would you want to be occupied? Who wants to be occupied?

Excerpted from an enhanced interview with Robert Baer at The Walrus

Tremendous 38 minute interview of Baer on yesterday's Fresh Air.