U.S. vs. Iran: Don’t Be Fooled, It’s About the $$$

Originally posted by Nadir at LastChocolateCity.com

Rumor has it that the US Navy is considering a buildup of forces in the Persian Gulf in anticipation of a strike against Iran.

The AP reports it like this: “Speaking on condition of anonymity because the idea has not been approved, [a Defense Department] official said one proposal is to send a second aircraft carrier to the region amid increasing tensions with Iran, blamed for encouraging sectarian violence in neighboring Iraq as well as allegedly pursuing a nuclear weapons program.”

Yeah, right. Don’t be fooled. Iran’s nuclear program is not a threat to the United States. Iran says their uranium enrichment is for peaceful purposes. Even if they are lying, US intelligence agencies admit that Iran won’t be capable of making a bomb for another 5-10 years.

“Encouraging sectarian violence in Iraq”? According to Bush’s own Iraq study group the majority of the violence in Iraq is being caused by Iraqis, not by foreign fighters.

So what is the real deal? Check out this headline that is running in the foreign press, and a couple of US financial outlets, but is so far being ignored by America’s mainstream media:

Iran to replace dollar with euro: “The Iranian central bank is to convert the state’s foreign dollar assets into euros and use the euro for foreign transactions.”

Reports say the Iranians began converting their assets in 2003, a year after Bush’s “Axis of Evil” speech and after the US invasion of Iraq was in motion. Dollar assets have been increasingly difficult to obtain for Iranian banks because of US government pressure on financial institutions in the US and Europe. According to an Iranian spokesperson, US pressure is forcing their hand.

“The government has ordered the central bank to replace the dollar with the euro to limit the problems of the executive organs in commercial transactions,” Gholam Hossein Elham, a government spokesman, said on Monday.

“We will also employ this change for Iranian assets [in dollars] held abroad.”

But here is the real dagger:

Elham implied that the move to the euro would also apply to Iran’s oil revenues.

“Foreign income sources and oil revenues will be calculated in euros and we will receive them in euros in order to put an end to our dependence on the dollar,” Elham said.

The US dollar has been dropping like a rock on international currency markets for some time now. Despite reports by mainstream financial analysts that the US economic outlook is bright and rosy, the Internet and commodities markets have been abuzz with warnings about US government insolvency and the worthlessness of the dollar. A post titled “Last Warning! Three-Pronged Collapse… Stocks, Bonds, Real Estate” from UK site The Market Oracle is typical of the recent speculation.

Today I want to give you one final warning on the crisis I see coming. I’ve told you some of this before, but I feel it’s so important that it needs to be repeated one last time. Gold’s rally back over $600, and recently to more than $640 an ounce, is telling us — in no uncertain terms — that a financial crisis of major proportions is about to strike.

The dollar is telling us the same thing — that the “full faith and credit” of the U.S. Government is plunging … that all is not well. Just look at how the dollar has been falling against many of the world’s currencies …

The dollar used to be worth more than six British pounds; now, it’s worth about half of a pound. A greenback used to be worth three Swiss francs; today, the two are almost equal. The U.S. currency has already lost nearly 30% against the euro, which is barely six years old.

And the dollar is at a nine-year low against the Thai baht, a country that recently experienced a military coup!

Right now the only thing keeping the US dollar afloat is the fact that oil is purchased on international markets in dollars. Other countries have to hold some assets in dollars so they can buy oil. If oil markets switch to a different currency, there will be a sharp selloff of US greenbacks.

The US economy has already been weakened by a sagging real estate market, loss of manufacturing jobs, a spiraling trade deficit and tons of debt from the war in Iraq. An Iranian shift to the euro could start a chain reaction that would cause the US economy to tank.

Time for a quick history lesson from the February 16, 2003 edition of The UK’s Guardian newspaper:

A bizarre political statement by Saddam Hussein has earned Iraq a windfall of hundreds of million of euros. In October 2000 Iraq insisted on dumping the US dollar - ‘the currency of the enemy’ - for the more multilateral euro.

The changeover was announced on almost exactly the same day that the euro reached its lowest ebb, buying just $0.82, and the G7 Finance Ministers were forced to bail out the currency. On Friday the euro had reached $1.08, up 30 per cent from that time.

See the date? That article appeared just one month before the US invasion of Iraq and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. As of this post, the euro is at $1.32. If the US hadn’t invaded, Saddam would have profited another 30% by now.

Hugo Chavez has talked about only taking euros for his oil. The US has stepped up pressure on his administration by sponsoring a coup and a recall vote in attempts to get him out of office.

Iran has announced they are making the switch. They won’t get the profits that Iraq got because the dollar is barely worth the paper it is written on right now. But you can bet your bottom dollar the US will use every means - including its military might - to protect its national (financial) security.

What does this mean to brothers and sisters here in the Last Chocolate City?

Financial analysts are encouraging their clients to buy gold because it will gain in value as the dollar drops. So all those gold chains, gold rings and gold teeth we’ve been wasting our money on all these years will actually prove to be a great investment. Buy more bling… And stay out of the US military!!