and what is reality. The corpo-fascist 'news' monopolies are extremely unreliable, especially on a subject like this--with oil and nuclear technology profiteering at its core--and especially the Washington Post. We need to be VERY skeptical of the corpo-fascist press handling of matters like this, and learn to read between the lines, untwist the spin and distortions, and try to fill in the black holes where information should be.
One good way to begin is to assume that whatever you read in the WaPo (or similar propaganda rags--all of the corporate press), the opposite is true. That gets your head turning in the right direction (toward truth and reality). It's not an infallible rule (sometimes you are reading half-truths), but it is helpful.
In this article, for instance, it's probably true--since the article names names--that Dennis Ross and Jeffrey Bader went on a "special mission" to China but it's only possibly true that the "mission" was about Iran/Israel and Israel's "existential" fears. It was more likely about big nuclear powers carving up 'lesser' countries' oil fields and doling out nuclear technology at a great profit. As to "existential" threats, is there any country on earth more threatened than Iran, with a nuke-armed Israel and a nuke-armed U.S. gunning for its oil, and the example of Iraq right next door as to what happens to oil rich countries,
without nuclear defenses, who disobey U.S./corporate dictates?
Secondly, it is a complete fiction that Israel would do
anything like bombing Iran without U.S. permission. Israel is practically a state of the United States. Like Colombia, with whom it shares many characteristics, it is caught in an endless maze of fratricidal violence and civil war, and is entirely dependent on multi-billions of dollars in U.S. military aid. It is considered militaristic and aggressive and has no friends in its region--much like Colombia--and is run by corrupt war profiteers, like Colombia and like the U.S. itself.
SO, the part about the U.S. warning China that Israel may take independent military action, apart from U.S. wishes, is false. And the "existential" threat to Israel is false in this context. Iran is the country whose existence is immediately threatened. THEY are the ones who DON'T HAVE nuclear weapons with which to deter the fate that Iraq suffered.
Thirdly, IF the "mission" was as stated--to pressure China to side with the U.S. on "Iran's nuclear program" because
Israel might bomb Iran if they don't--it is such a sensitive diplomatic matter that you need to ask, why is it being leaked? This seems to be an "official" disclosure of sensitive diplomatic information, so probably personal motives of leakers (backstabbing? sabotage? corporate rivalries?) are not in play. The U.S. government wanted it to be public knowledge. Why?
Applying the rule that the opposite may be true, and combined with some other suspicions that I have, I get this result, in my own mind: China and Russia threatened the U.S., back in circa 2006, when Cheney-Rumsfeld seemed all geared up to nuke Iran, that they would come into it, on Iran's side. This is what got Rumsfeld ousted (by major power players like Daddy Bush, rescuing Junior from Cheney-Rumsfeld's armageddon, and top military brass, who feared an escalating nuclear war).
Round about that time, I read a small blurb in the news that said that China, Russia and (as I recall) India were meeting to discuss how to curtail the U.S. bully (i.e., slaughtering a million innocent Iraqis to steal their oil, and intending to do even worse to Iran, to steal
their oil). Unfortunately, I didn't save this very short news item. I kept expecting other reports of this meeting, but there were none. (I think the source was Asian.) I wondered what methods they might be considering to curtail U.S. aggression, and when the Bushwhack financial meltdown occurred in Sept. 2008, I suspected--and I still suspect--that calibrated financial ruin (enough to cripple the U.S. but not hurt China too much--a major U.S. debt-holder) was one of two methods chosen. (--the other being the initial threat to retaliate, if the U.S. nuked Iran, intended for Cheney-Rumsfeld; and the latter, more recent, curtailment--financial crash--intended to prevent their return to power and any Democratic notions of attacking Iran).
So--if that speculation is more or less true--then, upfront, the U.S. is in a situation where China (in cahoots with Russia, india and perhaps others) have curtailed the U.S.--i.e., have limited U.S. options as to getting control of Iran's oil--not the other way around--the U.S. threatening China (and its No. 2 oil source ally, Iran). The picture you get from this WaPo story is of someone who is rather weak threatening to unleash his pit bull on someone else ('if you don't do such and such, my dog will rip your kid's throat out!'). But, in reality, the someone who is being threatened is holding an Ak-47 aimed at the pit bull's head. (China and Russia's capability to wipe out Israel, and/or to incinerate U.S. forces in the Middle East.) I don't think China would believe such a threat, nor yield to it. They hold both nuclear retaliation and U.S. debt powers, as their "aces" over the U.S. Whether they got Cheney-Rumsfeld de-fanged by threatening retaliation, or not, and whether they acted in cooperation with others to de-fund the U.S. (making U.S. aggression less possible), or not, they hold those cards.
What may be really going on is that China has agreed to side with the U.S. in admonishing Iran about its nuclear program, and perhaps advising them to yield up some of their nuclear energy development program to U.S. nuclear energy profiteers (added sugar), in order to bolster up the Obama administration, as part of the larger project of preventing a return of the Bushwhack warmongers. China was obdurate with the Bushwhacks in power. They are kinder to Obama. They won't likely go for sanctions. Iran is their ally. But "wise advice" to a friend, a slap on the hand, Iran yielding on some things, especially as to filthy lucre into U.S. pockets--those are smart things to do, not to fend off an attack by Israel, but to help keep Dick Cheney or comparable madmen (or women) out of the White House.
The other aspect to the story--which WaPo does mention--is the "carving up" of the world's remaining oil reserves. It's kind of an odd item in the article. It says that helping China to become "less dependent" on Iranian oil was part of the discussion--that, for instance, Saudi Arabia might send more oil to China. (You really got a laugh at the U.S. fuss and bother about Iranian democracy--given the sort of CLOSE allies the U.S. has: the filthy rich sheiks of araby, the fascist narco-thugs running Colombia--but I digress...). Why China would care about this--getting off Iranian oil, and becoming dependent on a close US ally for oil--I don't know. Because the U.S. wants it--and, when the U.S. wants oil, big trouble follows? Or because the U.S. wants total political control of the Middle East--with no outlier sovereign nations with their own ideas--and wants another "Shah" in charge of Iran, as essential to that purpose, and China should yield to that desire...why? Nope, I can't think of a good reason.
I haven't finished analyzing this article or this situation. I just want to say that, given all of the above, the reason for the U.S. disclosure of this sensitive diplomatic matter (the U.S. delivering the threat of
Israeli bombing of Iran to China)--the kind of thing that can cause a big diplomatic flap--may be to bolster the Obama administration with the Israel Lobby, which is important to keeping Obama in power (and the Bushwhacks out)--important to both China and of course to the Obama administration. In other circumstances, I would say that China could be very angry about such a disclosure. It is a diplomatic no-no. But the disclosers must have felt confident that China would not be offended. Obama needs to be seen as attending to Israel's interests--as being able to accomplish things, on Israel's behalf, that the Bushwhacks couldn't--in order to be approved for another term. This is a feather in Obama's cap, even if it doesn't go very far (China agreeing to sanctions).
I kept thinking, somebody's sabotaging Obama. But I can't get past that this is a White House disclosure. They want this narrative to be out there. So does China (which has never before been inclined to sanction nor even admonish Iran--so it's NOT "cover" for them to do so now--that Iran is under threat from a "rogue" Israel, ergo China needed to do this to
protect Iran). What both the U.S. and China apparently wanted was the perception of U.S. strength, in defense of Israel. That's the narrative, anyway. Reality: Neither the U.S. nor Israel will be nuking (or bombing) Iran, largely because of China's aces--its nuclear capability (as to fending off threats to Iran), and its huge economic club over the U.S. (the U.S. debt paper).
More reality: The U.S. wants to insure that only Israel will have nuclear weapons in the Middle East, in order to insure U.S./corporate oil interests in Iraq and elsewhere, and to keep Iran weak, if not to install a U.S. friendly government (not very likely). Its interest in curtailing and demonizing Iran, and preventing it from manufacturing nuclear weapons, has nothing to do with democracy whatsoever (look at Saudi Arabia! --the U.S. would prefer king-tyrants everywhere, if they toady to U.S. corporate/war profiteer interests). And U.S. corporations want, not to stop proliferation of nuclear technology (whether for weapons or energy) but to control it, and above all to profit from it. (They have no loyalty to anyone or anything--neither to the U.S. nor to Israel, nor to democracy.)
China wants an uninterrupted and untroubled flow of oil for its current Great Leap Forward (the greatest "leap" of all), and is at least currently committed to a peaceful world. It does not want to have to contend with the U.S. war machine. So it has to help Obama be successful.
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Here are both the Jerusalem Post and the (original) Washington Post articles:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article24067.htm 
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