Trump advisor admits: War on Iran targets China, seeking ‘US global dominance’

The war on Iran aims to “weaken China” and ensure “US global dominance”, said Donald Trump’s former national security advisor, Michael Flynn.

He admitted that the United States is giving Israel substantial intelligence, weapons, and training, helping it to wage this war.

Flynn, a retired US general, emphasized that the goal of this joint US-Israeli war is regime change: to overthrow Iran’s government.

“A positive US relationship with a [new] Iranian regime, so whatever the regime is that rises up out of the ashes, if we have a positive relationship with that regime, that really benefits the United States of America, particularly against China, and it weakens China”, he argued.

“A victory by Israel establishes the perception, if not the reality, of US global dominance, and certainly Israeli dominance in that region”, Flynn added with pride.

“We’re involved” in war on Iran, says retired US General Mike Flynn

“We’re involved”, Mike Flynn stressed. “People need to understand that we’ve been in the Middle East my entire life, my entire military career”.

Flynn helped oversee “counter-terrorism” operations in the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. During the Barack Obama administration, he served as the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). Trump appointed Flynn as his national security advisor at the beginning of his first term, in 2017.

“We’re involved [in the war on Iran]”, he repeated. “We provide intelligence capabilities, certainly, to Israel… We provide all kinds of weapons systems. We provide all kinds of training support”.

Flynn made these remarks in a 17 June interview with Steven Bannon, who was one of the most important figures in Trump’s first presidential term. Bannon served as Trump’s chief strategist and was CEO of his 2016 presidential campaign.

Bannon was previously chairman of the far-right political website Breitbart. He now hosts the ultra-conservative talk show Bannon’s War Room.

US-backed war on Iran targets China

Steve Bannon is an extreme China hawk. In 2018, the former Trump chief strategist declared, “We’re at war with China”.

In his interview with Mike Flynn, Bannon stressed that China is the main target of the US empire. He demonized the Communist Party of China as a so-called “existential threat”.

“One of the basic philosophies we had, and the reason, quite frankly, you were chosen [as Trump’s national security advisor], given your expertise in this area, was the pivot to Asia”, Bannon said.

This was a reference to the Barack Obama administration’s policy to move US troops and military resources out of West Asia (the so-called Middle East) and to East Asia, to prepare for conflict with China.

“Remember, one of the biggest things was to pivot to Asia”, Bannon reiterated. “Talk about a strategic pivot out of the Middle East, sir, to actually confront the existential threat to the country, the Chinese Communist Party”.

Flynn agreed. “We need to be focused on the principle 21st century adversary, and I’ll call them an adversary, and that’s China”, he said.

“So China, China, China — that’s what I want your audience to understand”, Flynn added.

The retired US general emphasized that, if Washington and Tel Aviv can overthrow Iran’s government, then the US empire can focus all of its resources and energy on containing China in the new cold war.

“We have to allow Israel to finish the job”, Flynn implored. “When it does, as it does, as it is in the midst of finishing this job — and it’s going to take a little bit — it will allow the United States to fully shift to focusing on China”.

Israel is doing the West’s “dirty work”

Mike Flynn argued that Israel is “protecting Western civilization” in its war on Iran.

“Israel is fighting their war, and we are in fact supporting it. And it’s really protecting Western civilization”, he insisted in his interview with Steve Bannon.

Flynn is a very extreme political figure. He is a Christian nationalist who has proudly declared that US conservatives are waging a “spiritual war”.

This is an idea that is shared by Pete Hegseth, who serves as defense secretary in Donald Trump’s second term.

Hegseth, a former Fox News host, is a fellow Christian nationalist. In 2020, he published a book titled “American Crusade”, in which he wrote that the US right is waging a “holy war” against China, the international left, and Islam — and in particular the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Although these top figures in the Trump administration have far-right political views, they share many of the policies of the neoliberal centrists in Europe.

Germany’s Chancellor Friedrich Merz has strongly supported the war on Iran, stating with approval that Israel is doing the “dirty work” of the West.

Donald Trump and other Western leaders have made it clear that their goal in Iran is to violently overthrow the government created by the 1979 Iranian revolution.

In 1953, the CIA sponsored a coup that overthrew Iran’s democratically elected prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh, and installed a king, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. This brutal dictator, who was notorious for torturing dissidents, was propped up by the United States for decades, until the 1979 revolution ousted him and established a truly independent government in Tehran.