US imperialism controls foreign policy: Schoenman

Press TV has conducted an interview with Ralph Schoenman, author of the “Hidden History of Zionism”, about Israel lobbying US Congress for new anti-Iran sanctions as the administration of President Barack Obama is trying to convince lawmakers that any new sanctions against Iran would be viewed as “bad faith.”

What follows is an approximate transcription of the interview.

Press TV: Now this is yet another example of the Israeli influence on US policy. What do you make of it?

Schoenman: Well ,there is of course a definite demand on the part of both the Israelis and the Saudis that these negotiations not proceed. But it is important to understand that the very sanctions that are in place are method of coercion based upon a lie namely that Iran is actively pursuing a nuclear weapons capacity, somewhat hypocritical for the United States to complain and not to mention the Israelis when they rely on the nuclear capacity and the dissemination of those weapons to any who they want to pressure and to intimidate and terrorize other people.

But fundamentally it should be understand that this is strong element of what we call [hard cup, soft cup] in these congressional activities because these are leaders of the Democratic Party and the Republican Party in both the House and the Senate. The House Foreign Affairs Committee, leaders of both Democratic and Republican Congress people were demanding new increase in sanctions, the same people who work very closely with Kerry and Obama.

So there is a strong element of play acting involved in this as well. It is pressure on Iran, it is further demands upon Iran and one has to be aware that even after a tentative agreement may be reached, it should be reached, the escalation of new demands will immediately follow upon that because the fundamental objective of US imperialism is to undermine the sovereignty of Iran and other countries in the region and to establish hegemony of United States and its subordinates Israel and Saudi Arabia and the imperial actors in the region to sustain exploitation and denial of sovereign rights to the people of that region.

Press TV: So Mr. Schoenman, then it is safe to say that the American foreign policy is neither independent nor is it in the interest of the average American voter?

Schoenman: Well I would say this that the foreign policy of the United States is in under the control of US imperialism and of the huge corporate conglomerates that control both Houses of Congress, both political parties that fund the entire political process and dominate it.

It is a military industrial complex as Dwight Eisenhower once said famously, a military industrial complex that dictates policy not in the interest of the American people, not in the interest of peoples(sic.) anywhere but in the interest of exploitation and domination on the part of a handful of oligarchs who have hegemony and power in United States both economic and political.

And so I say yes there are tactical divisions but they are united in the strategic objectives of undermining the sovereign authority of any government in the region that can thwart their demand and their objective of dominating economic and national policies of every state in the region.