US-UK regime change policy can ignite nuclear war: Lawrence Freeman

An analyst says the dangerous game that US President Obama is playing of trying to bring about regime change as seen in Libya and now targeting Syria could lead to an “escalating nuclear war.”

The comment comes as US Secretary of State John Kerry says Washington will not ‘stand in the way’ of Europeans if they decide to arm the militants fighting against the Syrian government.

“President (Barack) Obama has made it clear that the United States does not stand in the way of other countries that have made a decision to provide arms, whether it’s France or Britain or others,” top US diplomat John Kerry said Monday.

Kerry’s comments come prior to an EU leaders meeting later this week, in which they plan to discuss easing an EU arms embargo.

Press TV has conducted an interview with Lawrence Freeman with the Executive Intelligence Review weekly magazine in Baltimore to further discuss the issue. What follows is an approximate transcription of the interview.

Press TV: Many thanks for joining us here on Press TV Mr. Freeman. If the United States is indeed as dedicated to the goal of achieving regime change in Syria as it claims. Why is it asking countries like Britain and France to get directly involved in the conflict there as opposed to arming the Syrian rebels themselves?

Freeman: What you have to understand is that the main author of this policy is the British and Tony Blair. So they have advocated regime change for countries throughout the entire region and we’ve seen that in Libya; we’re now seeing that in Syria; there is policies and plans for that in Iran.

So who does what at any particular point is less interesting than what the overall goal is. Obama has been following all along Tony Blair’s policy and you heard Senator Kerrey say that we are interested in regime change; in getting Assad out which the foreign minister of Russia [Sergei] Lavrov has said is a violation of the international law.

So the policy is on, the US does support it and it is a very very dangerous policy because the Russians have made clear to many different sources including us that they know the goal, the target is them and it could lead to an escalating nuclear war and that’s a dangerous game that President Obama is playing at this point.

Press TV: Looking at the wars in Afghanistan, the invasion of Iraq which was spearheaded as you’ve mentioned by Tony Blair, the US has been very hands on with regards to what takes place in these countries as far as regime change goes. What’s so different about Syria, especially considering the US according to reports has already decided to use drone warfare in a post-Assad Syria?

Freeman: I wouldn’t rule out that the US would use drone warfare before that. As I said there are different parts that each player has and right now Obama is playing this game of saying we are not ready for regime change but we’ve given the OK for the al-Qaida opposition to be armed; we know they’ve been armed by Qatar; we know they’ve been aided by Saudi Arabia.

We have continued to block any investigation President Obama has of Saudi Arabia’s role in the 9/11 attack on our country in 2001. There are 28 pages that have been kept classified which if they were released would show that the Saudis were involved in that activity; were supporting the terrorists in that area even though we say the terrorist al-Nusra is on the terrorist list.

So there are all kinds of civil games that are going on. The direction is clear. Obama is behind this. This is Tony Blair’s policy. Cameron, the Prime Minister of England is going to go ahead with this and they are going to cause one bloody mess in this region which could escalate to nuclear war and so Obama’s role may change from time to time but he is behind this a hundred percent as Senator Kerrey said it’s OK if you let other people move in.

Obama may have particular domestic political reasons for holding back at the moment but this is his policy and this is British policy.

Press TV: And just very quickly if you can what do you say to those who assess the situation with regard to the US involvement in the Syrian conflict as that of not wanting to get his hands dirty the way he did with regard to Afghanistan; it armed the Mujahedin, it trained the Mujahedin and then those weapons were turned against it?

Freeman: Well, there is a problem because the US has placed al-Nusra which is the leading fighting force in Syria. It is an al-Qaeda operation against Assad. We have declared al-Nusra to be a terrorist group. So there is a little bit of fudging going on but we have maintained that other countries can aid the al-Qaida forces and we have backed them on it including most specially Saudi Arabia.

I wouldn’t get too hung up in what the particulars are at the moment. The main thing is that Obama is behind this policy and this policy is going to lead to much more dangerous confrontation with Russia and other super powers as a result.