ROCKWELL: Well, good morning. This is the Lew Rockwell Show, and it’s great to have as our guest this morning, Mrs. Sibel Edmonds. You know, we have a lot of great people on this show. We have just a lot of tremendous intellectuals for freedom and people exposing the CIA and other government activities, but Sibel’s a heroine as well as being an important intellectual figure. She was a translator for the FBI. She’s fluent, of course, in English and Turkish and Farsi and Azerbaijani. And she got punished for telling the truth within the FBI. They silenced her for quite a long time. But she wouldn’t allow herself to be silenced. She told the truth about what she discovered about various aspects of 9/11, and it’s in her wonderful memoir, Classified Woman. And we’re, of course, going to link to that. We’re going to link to all her sites. She’s director of the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition. We’ll link to her site, Boiling Frogs, and to her YouTube channel, her Facebook page, Twitter and everything else.
But, Sibel, today I wanted to talk to you — you had some very interesting things to say about the Boston bombing, the Chechnyan connection, and the U.S. role in promoting terrorism, which then it pretends to fight. So talk to us about that.
EDMONDS: Sure, Lew. In fact, about a few days after the Boston terror attack, we put out specific video reports and interviews and analyses pointing out that people keep talking about the FBI angle and a lot of semantics in what took place, and that nobody was talking about the CIA angle. And in our presentation, we brought up everything we have been covering both in the last four years to Boiling Frogs Post, but also during all my interviews in the past 10 years on state secrets privilege and the information that the government, the U.S. government tried to quash, and successfully, within the Congress and the federal courts. And of course, the mainstream media was the angle that dealt with Caucasus and Central Asia. If people were to conduct the research on all my previous articles and interviews, including the interview you and I did on my book about almost a year ago, I believe —
ROCKWELL: Yes. Yes.
EDMONDS: We talked about, and I was emphasizing the importance of Central Asia and Caucasus in my case and how the gag orders and the state secrets privilege, they were designed to basically quash that part of my case, what I blew the whistle on, which never saw the light of day because I talked about the CIA/NATO covert operations in Central Asia/Caucasus, both directly but also via our ally and NATO partner, Turkey. This was the extension of this operation known as Operation Gladio.
A lot of people are familiar with Operation Gladio as the NATO/U.S. covert false-flag operations around the world during the Soviet Union era, during the Communism. You know, basically we went all over Europe, Eastern Europe, in Central and South America, and we created terror attacks and basically blamed that on the Communists and on the Soviet Union. Now, people — and the documents surfaced, and this was after the fall of the Soviet Union. There were some trials and some parliamentary hearings in Italy because Italy, of course, also was and is a NATO ally, and they played a role, not the major role, in these false terror attacks under Operation Gladio. And based on the declassified documents, it’s already a confirmed — it’s not a conspiracy theory. It’s not one of those, you know, unconfirmed reports. It is an operation that, after the fall of the Soviet Union, became known through all these documents that, yes, in fact, for several decades, we carried out — and especially in the 1980s, as this was the height of it, late ’70s until mid ’80s — these false terror attacks under Operation Gladio under the U.S. and NATO.
Now, the false belief is that that operation stopped in 1990, 1991, and that the U.S. and NATO, they shut down the older cells that they had placed in various countries, including Italy, and because the Soviet regime fell and the Communism was gone. And that is not the case. And that has to do with my case, with my whistleblowing because one of the most important partners during the initial phases of Operation Gladio was Turkey; again, a NATO member. And of course, you can see the importance of Turkey strategically where it’s located. And if you look at the map and look at the — you know, Turkey’s neighbors, sharing borders with countries like Georgia and also with the Balkans. The one cell that they did not shut down — and this was U.S. and NATO — was the Turkish cell, the Turkish arm of Operation Gladio. And the reason for that was, again, Turkey’s position in the region and also Turkey’s characteristics, because Turkish people, they speak Turkish, the Turkish language. And this is the language spoken all over Central Asia and Caucasus, OK, when you’re talking about Chechnya, et cetera. Turkey is a Muslim nation. Well, this region, Central Asia/Caucasus, they are Muslim. Also, Turkish people share the same heritage. They are the Turkic race, Turkic people with, again, the people of this region, Central Asia and Caucasus. They are known as Turkic-heritage people. So the reason the United States, NATO, CIA did not shut down the Operation Gladio cell in Turkey was they actually intensified operations through Turkey for this region.
As we discussed during our last interview a year ago, Lew, if you look at this region, you’re looking at the future of the energy resources. You’re looking at this region, including Azerbaijan, you know, on the Caspian Sea, the vast reserves of natural gas, oil and minerals. And as I have emphasized during our interview last time — and maybe you would provide a link for people when you post this interview —
ROCKWELL: I sure will.
EDMONDS: Thank you.
That in the next 15, 20 years, the focus is going to be completely shifted; it’s just going to shift from the Middle East to Central Asia/Caucasus. You know that there’s limited reserve basically with Saudi Arabia, Iraq. What you’re going to be seeing, what we’re going to be seeing — and this is going to include the mainstream media at that point — is going to be Central Asia/Caucasus.
So the CIA and NATO, U.S., they did not shut down this Gladio Operation, the Turkish cell, and, in fact, they intensified. And the goal was — and this is what the operation was geared towards — was to use both Turkey, OK, with the Turkish language and Islam, and penetrate these states, both the former bloc, former states like Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, but also the Caucasus region — and you’re looking at Abkhazia, you’re looking at Chechnya, you’re looking at Dagestan — and promote radical Islamism and also the Turkic nationalism. Later, they dumped the Turkic nationalism angle because it did not really work. So the focus by 1995, 1996, was placed on radicalization and the recruitment of these people through Islam, OK, and through various Turkish imams, and sponsoring the building of mosques and madrassas in Central Asia and Caucasus. And not only that, training and arming these radical Islamists that we were — United States and CIA and NATO through Turkey in this region. So one of the factions in this region that we recruited and started arming and training and orchestrating attacks through was the Chechnya group, and as you see, with Russia.
Now, the FBI files, the major investigation that I was translating for, which included both real-time information — I was hired after 9/11 — but also the file itself started in 1996 and continued all the way to February, 2002 — was the U.S. angle of these operations. And that is not because the FBI had any territory or authority for what’s happening, taking place through U.S. actors in that region, but because of what was taking place in the U.S. with some of the Turks who were actually on the most-wanted list, on the Interpol list, to carryout these attacks. Because some of these people that we brought into the United States, because we also have a cell here — it was in Chicago and Washington, D.C., with the Turkic actors and some of the leaders from these factions included, you know, the people on the terrorists list, which were also on the FBI’s list. So by investigating what was happening in the U.S. with these actors, by default, these FBI files contained a lot of the information that dealt with our operations in that part of the region, because that’s exactly what those cells in the U.S. and these individuals were doing, together with their U.S. handlers.
So if you look at some of the major Chechnyan terrorist attacks against Russia between 1996 and 2002, I can tell you with 100% confidence, because of what we have in the FBI, that these were actually directed and carried out and managed through our partner Turkey and through the CIA operatives against Russia. Again, to get those people on our side and to be able to have this penetration, these channels into the Russia territory. And this also — and I’m going to put a parenthesis here — includes the western part of China, this area that people refer to as Xinjiang area. Another name for Xinjiang area — and this is a small Muslim Turkish community within the Russia borders. And that’s not the Russian/Chinese border. And, again, you look at what has been taking place since 1996, you’re going to see a lot of Islamic terrorist attacks against China in that region, Xinjiang. And the other name for Xinjiang is Turkestan. Why? Because they have the same Turkish heritage. They speak the Turkish language and they are Muslims. Another name for it — some people know the region as Uyghurstan because they are also referred to as Hui Uyghurs.
So this operation continued until February 2002, and I was fired in April 2002. And that was the main reason for the state secrets privilege. So after my termination and all the whistleblowing journey for the past 11 years, I’ve been talking about look at this region, Central Asia/Caucasus. And in this region, all the way until 9/11, three months past — after 9/11, we did work — we, the United States — with Bin Laden and Ayman Zawahiri, al Zawahiri, in the region, because we worked with other Islamic factions that we were recruiting and we were channeling to this region. And some of them were Pakistanis, Saudi individuals, people from Afghanistan in this arming and training of the factions in Central Asia and Caucasus. And of course, mainstream media never printed a single word of this. In fact, in some cases, the journalists with the mainstream media, I mean, they were ignorant. I mean, they wouldn’t even know. They couldn’t even point out the region on the map. If you were to open the map and say, “Show me where is Dagestan located, or Kyrgyzstan,” they would say, “What does it have to do? We are focused on the U.S. stuff and she is referring to Central Asia/Caucasus.” In other instances, it was completely intentional because the United States government, especially with the State Department, has been keeping this very tight closed lid on any information from that part of the world to be printed in the United States, being covered with the U.S. media.
As we all know, we are supporting the dictators there. We are giving them billions of dollars, whether it’s in Azerbaijan or whether it’s in Kyrgyzstan. For example, with the Bakiyevs, the family, and the former prime minister — or the president in Kyrgyzstan, who is now in exile. Where? In the United Kingdom. That is just a little bit of background, why I’m familiar with this case.
And when the Boston terror attack took place and the word started coming out, for the first time, the Americans were really hearing about Chechnya and Dagestan. And the people there, they were always portrayed in the U.S. media, until this Boston terror attack, as the “freedom fighters” against Russians, that the Russians were the ones, the bad guys who were repressing them. They wanted to have their own nation, even though they are within Russian territory; they are within Russian borders. So that’s how we have been portraying these people — our media — up until this Boston terror attack. The Boston terror attack — suddenly, all of them — and this is the U.S. mainstream media — they discovered this region, Chechnya. And suddenly, Chechnya went — the Chechnyans — from “freedom fighters” to the radical Islamists to “terrorists,” the usual titles. And then the U.S. government started talking about the region, the Dagestan/Chechnyan region as one of the hottest al Qaeda and Islamic radical terrorism nests.
So I invited people, I urged people to pause for a second and say let’s look at the geopolitical aspect of what took place, and why suddenly the mainstream media is taking their dictation from the State Department. They went, our allies and the people we were sympathizing with, the — just like Mujahadeen in the 1980s in Afghanistan, the same al Qaeda/Taliban people there, the radical Islamists in Afghanistan during the war with the Soviets, were our friends. And how did we portray them during the 1980s when we were arming them, training them against Russia, against the Soviets? They were the “freedom fighters.” They were incredible people. Then 9/11 takes place and, bam, those same people who worked for us, under us, our allies, the ones we portrayed for two decades as “freedom fighters,” overnight, with 9/11, the story switched and they became the radical Islamist terrorists; and, of course, the invasion of Afghanistan and all of the wars that we have been carrying out since 9/11.
Well, thinking with this Boston terror event, within one day, suddenly, it became Chechnya and Dagestan and even Kyrgyzstan and being the hottest terror cells and the terror bed and Islamic radicals. And amazing. And you look at it, in the last two weeks now, everybody in the U.S., they know the name Chechnya and Dagestan, and all they think right now is the hot terror cells, and these are the radical Islamist terrorists.
So within the first two, three days, I came out and I said you’ve got to look at the parallels, you’ve got to look at the geopolitical aspects of it, and you must — and these people — we must look at the CIA connection because this carries more of the CIA M.O., modus operandi, than the FBI.
And, of course, none of this was ever printed or mentioned within the U.S. media. So we started, at Boiling Frogs Post, analyzing and putting out videos, interviews and articles, and inviting people to take a look at this entire event from that angle and broaden the picture instead of getting lost in some of the semantics, which are very, very disturbing, the unanswered questions and what really took place during the event. And as part of that, we were emphasizing the role of the CIA in the region.
Well, we started doing that, and within two days after we started putting out these interviews and analyses, low and behold, it became public that the suspects, the brothers, attended the CIA-linked Jamestown Foundation’s training and conferences in that part of the world. Jamestown Foundation — and this was leaked from the Georgian intelligence agencies. And again, this was not printed in the mainstream media. The documents surfaced. And if you look at some alternative outlets, you will see that it’s a slam-dunk documented case that they were active at Jamestown Foundation in that part of the world. And Jamestown Foundation is known to be connected — an extension of the CIA.
ROCKWELL: It’s openly a CIA front, virtually.
EDMONDS: Exactly. So again, you won’t find traces of this being pounded in the mainstream media because — Why? Because the State Department and the CIA, they are controlling the official narrative on what took place in Boston.
Now, two days after analysis, this information came out. Then, after we put further analysis — and this was only about four days ago — other documents surfaced that are absolutely — I would call them exclusive — and that is the fact that — you know the infamous uncle for the suspects?
ROCKWELL: Yes. Of course, yes.
EDMONDS: Well, the uncle was the first one who came out — because all the friends from the universities, for the suspects, they said they didn’t see any radicalism. They were driving with some, you know, wealthy Turkish students and businessmen in Boston in BMWs and Mercedes Benz. The older guy, the older brother was going to night clubs. He was drinking. So none of these, you know, fit a portrait of a radical Islamist guy. Well, who was the first one who came and actually said, yes, they were radical — and, in fact, ended up being their own biological uncle. And immediately this man, this uncle, became the U.S. media’s darling. If you go and look at all the footage archives, you will see CNN, NBC, CBS constantly, around the clock putting this guy, the uncle of the suspects, under the spotlight, and this guy saying how they were radicalized, how they were fanatic Muslims, how they were terrorists, how he had written them off as his, you know, nephews, and constant coverage of this man, right? Well, three days ago, four days ago, these documents surfaced. These are solid documents, OK, that this man, the uncle of these suspects, the terror suspects, the two brothers, he was married (sic) to one of the top CIA operatives in that region, Central Asia/Caucasus region. That CIA operative — he’s a despicable man — is Graham Fuller. Graham Fuller retired from the CIA about 10 or 15 years ago but he has still been working as a contractor with the CIA.
Now, I mean, if people believe in coincidences, even those people right now would pause and say, first, they expose that the brothers were active in the Jamestown Foundation, CIA front. Then comes the fact that the uncle, who was the first person — and that would make it very legitimate — even their own uncle comes out and says these guys are radical Islamists, right? Well, that uncle happens to be the ex-son-in-law of one of the top CIA operatives in the region. Now, even people who believe in coincidences would pause and say, “There can’t be. There’s no way that you would have this kind of coincidence.” Well, even though the documents surfaced, even though we have the coverage, you will not see this being covered or played out in the U.S. mainstream media because the uncle is part of the official narrative.
Now, as with Graham Fuller — this is very interesting, Lew, because about six, seven years ago, I released a list of about 15, 20 Americans, U.S. officials, both from elected — elected officials but also appointed individuals, and these individuals with their names appeared in other sites, but I just put their pictures. I said, well, the state secrets privilege puts a gag order and says I cannot talk about the FBI targets, OK, in terms of the U.S. persons, officials involved in the terror activities, including the stuff with bin Laden and 9/11. However, I’m just putting these pictures out and I’m putting a name, and I’m going to name it my “State Secrets Privilege Gallery.” Well, anybody who was familiar with my case, anybody who was following the case with all the gag orders, they knew immediately this was one way to put out there and for people to know who were the people involved in my case and why the state secrets privilege invocation. This was in 2007 — end of 2007, early 2008 that the documents went out to people. If you look at that list, you will see Graham Fuller there, OK? Now, Graham Fuller’s name just came out and nobody in the U.S. has ever really heard of him, except for some of the books he’s written, talking about how actually moderate Islam can be very good in that part of the world, et cetera, which is his fund, because he’s also active within the academia here in the United States. But nobody has really seen this guy’s significance.
Now, I put out this name and people look and say, “Why would she put this guy from the CIA, Graham Fuller”? Well, guess what? Graham Fuller happens to be the ex-father-in-law of the uncle for the Boston terror attacks.
After we put out this information, and some alternative sources, Graham Fuller went to the media and said, “Yes, he was married to my daughter and they got divorced, but to say that there is any link between these suspects and the CIA would be absolutely absurd.” Well, of course, that’s what he would say.
Now, further documents surfaced yesterday showing that not only that, the uncle lived with him — and this is Graham Fuller — in Graham Fuller’s Maryland house for over one year, in Rockville, Maryland, OK? So it was not just a casual, “He was the son-in-law and then they got divorced.” No. Even after the divorce, this man lived at Graham Fuller’s address, in his house, and used Graham Fuller’s address as his official address in 1990, OK? Again, you won’t see this being mentioned at all within the mainstream media.
So this is — I know I’ve been talking non-stop here, and I’m going to pause and let you ask questions. This is why the CIA angle and the importance of this, and this little bit of background and explanation, why you won’t be seeing this in the U.S. mainstream media.
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ROCKWELL: Sibel, hasn’t the U.S., for very many years, deliberately backed the most radical form of Islam and terrorist aspects, too? I mean, as you say, we could look at the Mujahadeen they organized and funded against the Russians. I would say even the hatred of Nasser, who was a secular dictator. They don’t like secular dictators. That’s why they’re trying to overthrow Assad right now. That’s why they overthrew Saddam Hussein and then overthrew Gadhafi. These are obviously not good guys but they want them — but they are seculars, and they want them replaced with Al Qaeda types, if I can use that phrase. Because it makes trouble, right? “De verdade emperor.” It’s the way that empires — it’s the sort of trouble empires like to make in order to run things, so — in cahoots with Saudi Arabia, too, of course. For a very long time, the Saudis have been very, very close. I mean, all of us remember the pictures of the Saudi prince and George W. Bush kissing each other and holding hands and hugging and so forth on Bush’s ranch in Texas when he made a visit. I mean, the Sauds are very, very close to the American power elite. And of course, Obama bowing to the Saudi prince and so forth. And I guess if somebody were giving me millions of dollars, I’d bow to them, too. So I guess that’s sort of — (laughing) — understandable.
EDMONDS: Absolutely.
ROCKWELL: But the U.S. backs this sort of terrorism and hates the secular, non-Islamic fundamentalist regimes and tries to toss them out. So what does that say about their actual dealings and their actual motives?
EDMONDS: No, absolutely. First of all, this started even before the United States, with the British Empire, the United Kingdom. They always were known to — their modus operandi in their empire building to use religion, OK? This happened in Iran, OK? This is even long before Mossadegh. It was the Brits who always utilized the fanaticism and the radical Islamism in countries, in nations for their own nation building and for their empire purposes. And this continues with the United States. Now, during the Cold War, it was against the Soviet Union. So the United States basically adopted the British Empire model. And if you look at a lot of the key figures and advisors in drafting out foreign policy during this era, you’re going to keep coming across very well known Brits. And that is very, very interesting. I mean, I know Israel has always, starting with Kissinger, their influence in — or actually direct control over our foreign policy, but you will see a lot of British/U.K.-based think tanks and fronts that actually guided and shaped our foreign policy because that’s where we took. This is what we modeled after.
Basically, it was that, OK, with Russia being Communists, the Soviet Union, what is the best way to protect our turf and get countries on our side. Well, then, you look at the Middle East, the region, you’re looking at Islam. Because one of the major preventers in, let’s say, for countries like Iran, countries like, of course, NATO-allied Turkey — and then you can just go through the whole region from actually turning and aligning themselves with the Soviet regime, with the Communism — was Islam. And you’re looking at 99% Muslim populations, OK? Who are they going to align themselves with? With the atheists, Communists, or are they going to be — even though it’s a Christian nation, is it going to be the United States? So that was our modus operandi; that was our tactic during the Cold War.
Well, after the Cold War — people say, well, the Cold War ended. Well, to a certain degree, yes, it ended. But we still have this very intense competition over resources of the world, OK? And that is both geostrategically — my favorite journalist, Pepe Escobar, refers to it as “Pipeline-istan,” and that is all the region that the pipelines have to travel and go through to get to Europe and to the United States, et cetera, and also the nations that have the resources, OK? And if you look at the resources, you are looking at the Middle East, you know, Iraq, Saudi Arabia. And of course, we talk about the one that hasn’t fallen. The last piece in dominoes to fall is Iran. But then, you’re also looking at all these Central Asia/Caucasus and, of course, the Balkans because of the pipeline and the pipeline angle of it. So the competitors being who? The competitor being, A, Russia; competitor being, B, China, OK? And even though the Cold War ended and even though the U.S. media really doesn’t cover it, there has been this intense competition over the resources, especially in Central Asia and Caucasus.
The Chinese modus operandi has been, you know, we go there, we make these business deals with these guys, whether it is in Kyrgyzstan or if it’s Turkmenistan, to basically have 10, 15, 20 years of control over their natural gas and have a pipeline, and we basically finance it, and have a pipeline for this natural gas to be built that goes from either Kyrgyzstan or Turkmenistan or any of the “stans,” all the way to Russia. Because their need for energy has really tremendously increased. They depend — they need — their survival depends on that energy, and that is natural gas and oil and, of course, minerals. And of course, these pipelines have to travel through the region and go through the Xinjiang area to reach China. And we talked about the importance of Xinjiang. That section, Xinjiang, is a small Muslim Turkish minority over there, OK? So that has been the Chinese modus operandi.
With the U.S., we don’t do that. We like to do this cowboy style. It’s not only business deals. We say not only do we want the business deal, we want to put our base, military base in your country. What you’re looking at, Manas Air Base, you know, Kyrgyzstan. You’re looking at Azerbaijan that is becoming a NATO member in the next couple of years. They have been under NATO training. And now they have fulfilled all their requirements, so now they’re going to be officially a NATO member. Georgia is in line to become a NATO member, another hot issue between Russia and the United States. So we say we’re going to put a military base, OK? And we want to put our pocket guys there, whether it’s Bakiyev, the tool of revolutions that would be brought about in that region, and we give them money. You know, we basically protect their turf as dictators. We put our military base. But it’s not only business deals to us, the United States. We are not doing only business deals. We want militarily to take over. We want to have our regime to be installed there, which is a different style than China, OK? So that has been going on. The Chinese trying to go and making their own business deals, with us trying to go and grab them and make them NATO members, put our military bases there.
Then on the other hand, we have Russia, OK? Now, Russia is a major player in both supplying everywhere, including Europe, with also oil and natural gas and their pipeline interests in the region. And you’re also looking at their territory. I mean, you’re looking at these regions — I just mentioned Azerbaijan and Georgia. OK, again, I encourage people to open up the map and look at it. Azerbaijan, a NATO member basically already, and Georgia is in line, OK? We had that five-day war between Georgia and Russia in 2008, and still the area is very volatile because Russia is not stupid. They know what we are doing and they don’t like it. And then you look at the new fashionable region that we’re talking about with al Qaeda and terror bed, Dagestan and Chechnya. You would see that Dagestan and Chechnya lie right at the border of Russia, Georgia and Azerbaijan, right attached to that region. So this is why not only that we are taking over Georgia and Azerbaijan through our military bases and NATO training, but now — and not only now but for the last two decades, we’ve been trying to put our foothold in that Dagestan/Chechnya region. What better foothold than what we are doing, and that is taking the radical Islamists there in Chechnya, the minorities there, and in Dagestan, train them, arm them and say, you know, go and create terror attacks in Russia, and get Russia bogged down with this radical Islamic terror internally, but also have them as a buffer zone in our territory. And I call it “our territory” because Georgia and Azerbaijan have already become our territory. And this is the buffer zone. This is exactly — it’s within Russia borders but it’s attached to the Georgia and Azerbaijan region.
So the Cold War ended but the Cold War did not end. And, again, this is something that most Americans are not aware of. And, again, I will go back to Operation Gladio, Phase 2, and that is: target this region, which is Central Asia and Caucasus, radicalize, arm, train and create terrorists, and actually orchestrate terror events in that region.
Now, within that light and under that angle, now we should look at the Boston terror and say, what are the ultimate — or what could be — and that will better, because we’re still talking about hypotheses. So much information has not been released. And everyday, the story evolves both in terms of what took place in Boston two weeks ago but also what other geopolitical developments we are witnessing since the attack, the terror attack in Boston. We have to look at those simultaneously and then we can have educated guesses, predictions and hypotheses on what could be major objectives in having this pretty much scripted event in Boston.
ROCKWELL: You know, just to back up for just a second and your point about China and oil, no coincidence that in Libya there were 80,000 Chinese oil workers and — they signed all kinds of — China had signed all kinds of contracts to develop Libyan oil. And of course, the minute that Gadhafi was overthrown and the U.S.-installed so-called rebels came into power, they immediately abrogated all of these contracts and ordered the Chinese out of the country.
EDMONDS: Exactly. And that’s an excellent example to look at the objectives, you know, talking about Gadhafi, dictator, and our involvement and, you know, promoting democracy. And of course, we see what’s happening in Libya. But what you just mentioned, that is the real reason of what took place in Libya. And, again, you won’t see that within the mainstream media.
And the same thing with what now we are witnessing, the recent developments with Syria. And the predictions that I put out there is based on what has been happening in the region, especially in the past couple of years, the CIA’s role in the Boston terror, and what could be possibly the consequences, possible outcomes of what took place. Well, of course, one of the main issues we should right away look at would be Syria, OK? We went there and, in a few months, we basically took over Libya, as you just mentioned. Now, with Syria, the whole thing has been dragging. You know, it’s been going now for a year and a half, two years. It’s just been dragging. Why? Because Russia has been the biggest obstacle, the roadblock for us to go, you know, and invade, take over, just as we did with Libya. Because, with Libya, we didn’t have that obstacle. With Syria, Russia has been, you know, stepping in and saying no, OK?
So what would be a possible, you know, implication for that particular issue, which I will explain, and then maybe an educated hypothesis of the likely result of this. The other issue, of course, is what we are doing in the region with Georgia and Azerbaijan. And another hot issue, of course, is Iran.
Now, the hypothesis that we put in our analysis out there — and we supported it with, again, all of the geopolitical developments immediately before and after the Boston terror attack — and that is — this happens a lot, you know, the dirty international politics. And even with our enemies or with our competitors, we make deals, OK? The deals are always made behind the scenes. Most of the time, people never find out about these deals. Because when you look at it at the surface, it looks like, wow, Russia, it’s so big, why would we make deals and come and actually form some sort of a partnership on the issue of, let’s say, Syria? That just doesn’t make sense. But actually, that occurs all the time within the international politics arena. And one possible outcome is that we made a deal, back-door deal behind the scenes with Russia, OK? And as part of the deal, we said, you know, with this Boston terror, “Here is what we’re going to do. We want you to step back and let us take care of Syria, OK? And we will set up that narrative and we will make it so you won’t look too bad, OK? And as a result, we’ll” — because we switch hats all the time. And I’m just going to — this is just a little side note here. For example, during the Balkans war, up until the Balkans war began, we had KLA listed with the State Department as a terrorist organization, correct? During the Balkans war, the State Department, they said they were going to remove the “terrorist” label from KLA, OK? They became our allies. And we said we are no longer going to call them “terrorists”; they are the “freedom fighters,” right?
ROCKWELL: Yeah — (laughing).
EDMONDS: After we were done with the Balkans, we went back — and this is the State Department — and they put the labels back again on KLA, saying now we are going to go ahead and consider them “terrorists” again.
Another example of that would be the Mujahadeen that we just talked about — Mujahadeen, al Qaeda. They were “freedom fighters,” our allies. Then we put the “terrorist” label on them. Then we have Mujahadeen-e-Khalq, MEK. Some people refer to them as MKO. You know —
ROCKWELL: Yes.
EDMONDS: — against Iran, we’ve been using them. They used to be “terrorists.” There was lobbying, saying we need to lift the “terrorist” label because now we want to work with them. And at some point, they will go again under the “terrorist” label. So this kind of plays out all the time, this story within the geopolitical — (laughing) — theater.
Now, with Chechnyans, they have been working for us, these factions, the radical Islamists that we created, armed, trained. We are looking at Graham Fuller. We are looking at Elliott Abrams. We are looking at Mort Abramowitz. These people are part of Gladio Operation, Phase 2, and they all were stationed in Turkey — how amazing is that — in the 1990s, when we began the Phase 2 of Gladio Operation.
Now, with Chechnyans, we say, OK, we created them, they are ours, but for a while, OK, for Russia’s benefit, we’re going to put them under the light of they are the big, bad, boogeyman terrorists; they are totally tied to al Qaeda; they must be destroyed; they are terrorists, OK? And for a while, let Russia do some housecleaning. Because even though it is within Russian territory, Russia has been exercising a lot of restraint in going and doing, like, major housecleaning, meaning, you know, going, executing them and having operations, and round them up with these radical groups in Chechnya and Dagestan and the Abkhazia area, OK, right there, which Russia didn’t want. And also, the international bad rep: Here’s the repressive, fascistic Russians going after these poor minorities, right? Because that’s how we’ve been depicting them. They’re the “freedom fighters,” minorities and blah, blah.
Now, for Russia to go and do some housecleaning and lead the Western world, especially with the United States being in league, portray that as a great counterterrorism support from Russia. “Look, Russia is supporting our war on terror. They are going to this region that, now, suddenly, overnight, after the Boston terror attack, we declared as the hot terrorist bed, and they are killing and rounding up these terrorists. Good for Russia.” In fact, we would applaud them, right? No longer the bad rep internationally. And we would also restrain any kind of major conflicts or direct confrontation from the Azerbaijan or Georgian side. And Russia would get that, because they’ve been really trying to get into that region, even though it’s their own region, and do housecleaning. As a result, Russians would back off on this whole Syria and say, “Fine, just write down a good narrative that we won’t look bad, OK? And you go in and invade Syria and we’ll step aside.”
Low and behold, a couple of weeks, a week, 10 days after the Boston terror attack, now we have the Syrian WMD story, a la Iraq, OK? Bam. And not only that, Putin and Obama have been sitting and discussing and saying, well — and this is what Putin and Russians, they have been already preparing, their exclusion, their stepping aside. They are saying, “Well, if we prove somehow, someway that the Syrian government used chemical weapons or the chemical weapons are present, there are indicators on the ground that shows that they were used, under the Geneva Convention, then we are obligated to step aside and let this be the problem of the U.S., NATO, the United Nations.” And they say, “Look, you know, because the Geneva Convention here is playing out, that is why we are no longer supporting Assad’s regime.” You see, they had a way out to save face. We have a way to get in there, OK, with WMD.
Now, to prove the presence of WMDs, the chemicals being used, it’s going to be an extremely easy set up, because all we have to prove — because a lot of people being so ignorant — is that there were detectors. U.N. people ran tests and chemical weapons were present in a high degree. Well, we have been in the past six months supplying these chemical weapons to our al Qaeda in Syria, to the Syrian rebels. And Syrian rebels, they have been using it. So if you have inspectors going there, at least they’re going to come out saying, “There is a high degree of chemical weapons residues, et cetera, present in the region.” And we are going to say — the United States and NATO — “Here we go. Didn’t we tell you? They used the chemical weapons.” Under the Geneva Convention, Russia is going to say, “That is basically the last straw and we’re no longer going to support Assad, OK”? And we are going to invade Syria, which I believe is going to happen very, very soon. But for the majority who is only looking at the U.S. media or the quasi-alternative, it’s going to be, well, we basically found the chemical weapons and it got to a point where the Russians had no way but to accept that this had to take place, the invasion.
But if you look at behind the scenes, you see Boston terror and then you see the Chechnya and with Dagestan. And, again, to prove this hypothesis as a likely outcome, about less than a week after the Boston terror attack, there was this headline within Russian newspapers and even R.T., which was not played out here in the United States, that Russians carried out this major operation. This was the biggest operation since 2002, Lew. They rounded up 142 radical Islamic terrorists that were of Chechnyan and Dagestan origin. This is the biggest operation Russia has carried out since 2002. Again, people are saying that is a coincidence that they had this major operation taking place. And of course, the Western nations would applaud. They have been applauding. And then the Syria WMD and Russia backing off, people will say, well, that’s a coincidence. The fact that the major CIA dirty operative, Graham Fuller, happens to be the father-in-law of the Boston terror suspects’ uncle, that’s coincidence. The fact that the Boston terror suspects, they were active, they were participating in Jamestown Foundation’s conferences and events, that’s coincidence. Well, it is sad because you would think there’s no way anybody would buy that all these things that we are putting within this big picture could be true coincidences, you know? But unfortunately, as a nation, we have become so numb, and we lack critical thinking ability that we readily buy into it. And of course, the mainstream media being the major player in this in packaging and selling what is given to them by the U.S. officials.
ROCKWELL: Sibel, I can’t thank you enough for bringing us up to date on what’s actually going on and the sort of dirty business that underlies intelligence and empire building and all the various activities of the U.S. state.
I’d love one more question answered. We don’t have too much time, but just tell us quickly, what’s going to happen with poor Iran?
EDMONDS: What’s going to happen to Iran — and, again, I’m even careful not to call it a theory because so far we have seen so many experts who come up and they make these definitive predictions. It really gets on my nerves when people do that because things are volatile. Things evolve and they evolve. They change. But I believe, if I’m correct with these back-door deals between Russia and the United States, which includes Russia doing what they want to do in that region and the U.S. taking over Syria, while Syria is not as big of a deal for Russia — it’s a big deal but not as big of a deal as Iran. I believe that back-door deals between the U.S. and Russia also includes hands off Iran at least for the next couple of years. I don’t believe we are going to see any kind of — unless something really evolves, if something unexpected surfaces, which I doubt it will, I believe we have also given our word to Russia that, “Yeah, we’ll play the rhetoric and everything, but we’re going to go milder on Iran. We’re not going to do anything in Iran.” Because there is no way Russia is going to back off on the Iran issue. There is no way. I mean, you are looking at the Caspian Sea. You’re looking at a Russian neighbor right there. And of course, Iran’s extreme importance — it’s not the same deal as Syria. So I believe as one of the deal principles that we make with Russia is that there’s going to be a hands-off approach with Iran for the next, at least, couple of years. So I believe we’re not going to see anything with Iran. And that’s going to be partly with the deals struck between Russians and U.S. officials.
ROCKWELL: Sibel, it’s great to talk to a real expert. And of course, we’re going to link to your book, to your website, YouTube, Twitter, everything you’ve got. And all I can say is keep on doing what you’re doing. Write another book and —
(LAUGHTER)
— keep speaking the truth.
EDMONDS: Thank you very much. Any time. Thank you, Lew.
ROCKWELL: Bye-bye, Sibel.
EDMONDS: Bye.
ROCKWELL: Well, thanks so much for listening to the Lew Rockwell Show today. Take a look at all the podcasts. There have been hundreds of them. There’s a link on the upper right-hand corner of the LRC front page. Thank you.
Podcast date, April 30, 2013
