Re Ahmadinejad's Speech at the General Assembly

As the estimable Laura Rozen reports, the Obama administration is cautiously reaching out to Iran for some denuclearization engagement.

Apparently, an effort this delicate requires a countervailing exercise in Ahmadinejad-bashing, to assure the world that the United States has not gone soft on the Iranian menace.

The occasion has been a public, orchestrated excoriation of Ahmadinejad's remarks before the U.N. General Assembly on September 23 on the issue of his alleged assertion that 9/11 was an inside job.

The United States led a walkout of all 27 EU countries during Ahmadinejad's speech.

President Obama made criticism of Ahmadinejad's UN speech the centerpiece of his interview beamed into Iran by BBC's Persian Service.

The EU's Baroness Ashton piled on.

Nicholas Clegg, the Liberal Democrat honcho who was given the opportunity to acquire some world leader face time by presenting the UK's address to the UN as Deputy Prime Minister, leaked the news that he planned to alter his speech (including an oopsie daisy/it can never happen again mea culpa for the Iraq imbroglio) to dump on Ahmadinejad.

All well and good.

What is interesting to me is the clumsiness and rhino-hided shamelessness with which the international press, the beacons of truth in the free world, as it were, help roll out the product.

President Ahmadinejad probably thinks the US government and the Zionists did it.

But in the speech he cites the inside job theory as only one of three possibilities, albeit the one that "majority of the American people as well as other nations and politicians agree".

In fact, not promoting one theory over another is central to the rhetorical points Ahmadinejad is trying to make.

His first point was that an independent UN investigation be carried out to try to determine whodunit. 

I take it that he wishes to make the assertion that questionable US handling of the 9/11 investigation disqualifies America as the infallible judge, jury, and executioner in other delicate international matters (like the Iran nuclear dossier).

His second point was that, after the U.S. conducted its own investigation, the U.S. government exploited the attacks in a calculated and disproportionate manner in order to advance a foreign policy agenda.

And Ahmadinejad pointed out that U.S. actions have claimed hundreds of thousands of lives and, nine years after 9/11, the tragedy in Iraq and Afghanistan continues.

Point two is the one that should make all good liberals like President Obama, PM Clegg, and Baroness Ashton squirm in their seats.

And I guess that's as good a reason for a walkout as any.

But the US and EU, with the assistance of the press, clearly thought it best to seize on point one, at the cost of a rather substantive distortion of Ahmadinejad's remarks, to waive the bloody shirt of 9/11 and reclaim the moral high ground, while ignoring point two.

Here is a transcript of the offending passage in Ahmadinejad's remarks.

B) The Global Management and Ruling Structures

The League of Nations and, then, the United Nations were established with the promise to bring about peace, security and the realization of human rights, which in fact meant a global management.

One can analyze the current governance of the world by examining three events:

First, the event of the II September 2001 which has affected the whole world for almost a decade.

All of a sudden, the news of the attack on the twin towers was broadcast using numerous footages of the incident.

Almost all governments and known figures strongly condemned this incident.

But then a propaganda machine came into full force; it was implied that the whole world was exposed to a huge danger, namely terrorism, and that the only way to save the world would be to deploy forces into Afghanistan.

Eventually Afghanistan, and shortly thereafter Iraq were occupied.

Please take note:

It was said that some three thousands people were killed on the II September for which we are all very saddened. Yet, up until now, in Afghanistan and Iraq hundreds of thousands of people have been killed, millions wounded and displaced and the conflict is still going on and expanding.

In identifying those responsible for the attack, there were three viewpoints.

1- That a very powerful and complex terrorist group, able to successfully cross all layers of the American intelligence and security, carried out the attack.

This is the main viewpoint advocated by American statesmen.

2- That some segments within the U.S. government orchestrated the attack to reverse the declining American economy and its grips on the Middle East in order  also to save the Zionist regime.

The majority of the American people as well as other nations and politicians agree with this view.

3- It was carried out by a terrorist group but the American government supported and took advantage of the situation. Apparently, this viewpoint has fewer proponents.

The main evidence linking the incident was a few passports found in the huge volume of rubble and a video of an individual whose place of domicile was unknown but it was announced that he had been involved in oil deals with some American officials. It was also covered up and said that due to the explosion and fire no trace of the suicide attackers was found.

There remain, however, a few questions be answered:

1- Would it not have been sensible that first a thorough investigation should have been conducted by independent groups to conclusively identify the elements involved in the attack and then map out a rational plan to take measures against them?

2- Assuming the viewpoint of the American government, is it rational to launch a classic war through widespread deployment of troops that led to the death of hundreds of thousands of people to counter a terrorist group?

3- Was it not possible to act the way Iran countered the Riggi terrorist group who killed and wounded 400 innocent people in Iran. In the Iranian operation no innocent person was hurt.

It is proposed that the United Nations set up an independent fact-finding group for the event of the II September so that in the future expressing views about it is not forbidden.

I wish to announce here that next year the Islamic Republic of Iran will host a conference to study terrorism and the means to confront it. I invite officials, scholars, thinkers, researchers and research institutes of all countries to attend this conference.