Freedom Under Attack – Part 1
| By: Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin (retired); ©2012 |
| Given events happening in the Middle East, is America especially vulnerable to attack? |
Introduction
As we approach the American Presidential election, our next president will not only have to deal with an economic crisis, but also with the rise of militant Islam in 22 countries in the Middle East, and Islamic terrorists infiltrating our southern border here in America.
Benjamin Netanyahu: If you look at what has happened politically, not economically, to the world, but what has happened politically to the world, you see a clear trajectory of the rise of militant Islam.
William Boykin: Those young Muslims out there today that may be very peaceful, that want nothing to do with jihad are encouraged to come into the Brotherhood, to come into Hezbollah, Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, or any of these other terrorist organizations because their theology is being played out right now.
Netanyahu: You see it not only taking over countries, which it has, but also extending its sway over many people. But their goals are unlimited. Whatever their successes so far, they don’t intend to stop.
My guest today is retired three-star general William G. Boykin, former commander of Delta Force, who later became commanding general of all US Army Special Forces around the world. He also served at the CIA in clandestine missions, and for four years he served as Undersecretary of Defense.
John Ankerberg: Is this going to have risks for our safety of Americans here in this country?
Boykin: There’s no question about it. The number one priority for the President of the United States is to defend the nation. You know, even our southern borders are being infiltrated right now. And you can say that’s an invasion of America. We’re finding prayer rugs, we’re finding terrorist training manuals. We’re finding all kinds of paraphernalia that relates directly back to terrorist groups. So they’re coming across our borders and they’re setting up cells in America.
Join us for this special edition of the John Ankerberg Show.
Dr. John Ankerberg: Welcome to our program. Two weeks ago, folks, I had the privilege of hearing Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin speak at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. General Boykin is one of America’s elite warriors. He was chosen in 1978 to make up the first unit in America’s ultra-secret and deadly Delta Force. He later became the commander of the unit, and then later still he became the commander of all US Army Special Forces. He had a role in almost every recent major military operation over the past four decades. And he has also served a tour at the Central Intelligence Agency, and retired in June 2007 after serving his last four years in uniform as Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence.
General, after you spoke in Washington, I wanted the folks in our television audience to hear what you had to say, especially about what’s happening in the Middle East. After hearing you talk, I couldn’t help but think America is in trouble. And we’ve got an election in nine days, and Christians need to realize, this presidential election is going to have an impact on whether America itself remains safe, or whether we’re going to open ourselves to attack. And let me ask you to begin today with looking at the Middle East and talking specifically about what is happening, and how you analyze Iran and Israel and where we’re at.
General William Boykin: Well, thanks, I’m glad to be with you. First of all, let me say to your audience, do not use Western logic to try and analyze what’s happening in the Middle East right now, particularly with Israel and Iran. We have a man that is in charge of Iran who is a hard-core Twelver, or he is one who believes that the Messiah, or the Mahdi, or the twelfth Imam, will only return when the whole world is in an atmosphere of bloodshed and chaos. Now, he also hates the Jews; he hates the nation of Israel; and his single greatest enemy is the Jews. He has made multiple statements with his intentions, saying that he would wipe them off the map, that he would destroy them; imagine a world without Israel.
Now, this is not the rantings of a madman—that’s what they said about Hitler and people just sort of blew him off—this is the rantings of a man that is a very committed theologian to the Shia theology, which says that the Messiah will return when the world is in bloodshed and chaos. And there is no better way to bring about that bloodshed and chaos that would usher in the reign of the Messiah, than to use a nuclear weapon on Israel.
Western logic says that if he destroys Israel, Israel will respond with their nuclear weapons, but that does not hold up when you look at it through the prism of the theology of Shia Islam. Because even if Israel destroys Tehran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the Supreme Council still win, because all of the Iranians that are killed go straight to heaven as martyrs. He ushers in the reign of the Messiah, and creates the global Caliphate that the Messiah will bring sharia to. So, this is not something that we can understand easily if we think of it in terms of Western logic.
Ankerberg: Now, folks, what the General just said is very similar to what Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, told me in a private press conference that we had some time ago. And I want you to listen to what Netanyahu said. Listen.
Benjamin Netanyahu: The militant Sunnis that bombed New York, and have bombed Washington, and have bombed the other targets that al-Qaeda has bombed from Bali to the European capitals, the militant Shiites in Iran are openly racing, and boasting that they are racing to develop nuclear weapons with the explicit announced goal of wiping Israel from the face of the earth, re-establishing the Caliphate, of course under militant Shiite Iranian rule—the Caliphate includes the territories from Iran to Spain—developing long-range ballistic missiles, first that are targeted to every European capital, and within a decade to reach the eastern coast of the American mainland.
Ankerberg: General, when I heard the Prime Minister of Israel say those words it brought chills up my spine; it still does, because it’s more true now than when he said it. Why do you believe, along with Netanyahu, that Iran, right now, is a real threat, not only to Israel, but to the European capitals and even to America?
Boykin: Well, remember that the Iranians have a problem that has existed for hundreds of years with most of the Gulf states. There is animosity between Saudi Arabia, for example, and Iran. So what you see is the Iranians are developing a nuclear program because they are predominately Shia, and that is only about 12% of the total global Islamic population are Shia. They’ve never been in a position of superiority, but a nuclear weapon would give them a position of power. Now, all the Gulf states are aware of that, and they fear that. So what you’re going to see is you’re going to see the beginning of a nuclear arms race in the Persian Gulf. That in itself is a huge problem.
Secondly, the Iranians have already said that whatever kind of conflict occurs in the Persian Gulf region they will shut down the Straits of Hormuz. Now they can’t keep them closed for very long, but that’s not the problem. Thirty-five percent of the oil that is transported by sea comes through the Straits of Hormuz, globally. And so, can you imagine what oil prices are going to be and what that’s going to do in terms of wreaking havoc on the European economy, the Asian economy, and most importantly, the American economy? Just the fact that they do go in there and start trying to shut them down. The US Navy will reopen it, but that’s not the point. The point is there is going to be a huge rise in oil prices.
Now the final thing is, once conflict starts in that part of the world, it will spread very rapidly. Other nations will be drawn into it. We know that Russia is very supportive of Iran. We know that other countries in the region there, like Syria, are very supportive of Iran. And then you will have, to some extent, a Shia-Sunni war, and you’ll also have an Arab-Persian conflict going on. So the potential for this thing to just explode into literally a global conflict is very high.
Ankerberg: Let me ask you the big question. How close do you think that Iran is to getting the bomb?
Boykin: Well, I’ve said this publically before, but I think that Iran has a warhead already. I will tell you why. This whole program started under Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini who came back in ‘79 and started the Islamic revolution. He directed his people there to build a nuclear bomb. Now, they’ve been working for between 25 and 30 years on a nuclear warhead with the help of the Russians, the Chinese, the North Koreans and the Pakistanis. It would be unlikely that they haven’t developed a nuclear weapon. The problem is, they don’t have a delivery capability, and I think that’s due largely to Israeli covert action. A number of scientists have been killed. They tried to put a warhead on a missile and it blew up; they had a virus in their network, their computer network. That’s all Israeli covert action. But that’s coming to an end. Now Israel is being forced into a position, they’re going to have to take different action than what they’ve done in the past. I think they have it. If they don’t have it, they are within 90 days of being able to produce it. And even the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency] is saying that now.
Ankerberg: When you were working at the CIA and you were looking at intelligence, how did you evaluate the tentacles that Iran has all around Israel and in the Middle East?
Boykin: Iran built Hezbollah. Hezbollah now inhabits south Lebanon. They have tens of thousands of missiles there. Iran has helped to fund, actually, believe it or not, helped to fund some of the activities of Hamas, which is actually Sunni, because they will work together. Sunnis and Shias will work together. So Iran’s network is extensive, and Iranian influence in Syria today and in south Lebanon is incalculable. And that’s obviously something that Netanyahu is looking at as well. And if you remember in 2006 when the Israelis went into south Lebanon, they went in there and fought against Hezbollah that had been supplied with thousands of missiles and rockets and explosives from Iran. Iran’s influence is heavy.
Ankerberg: Yeah, Netanyahu told us at that time that they went into Lebanon because they had 6,000 missiles on the Lebanese border. He says now after the peace keeping and the UN has stations and all this kind of stuff, they’ve got 60,000 rockets on that border right now, so that if something does take place between Iran and Israel, Israel has also got to consider you have got 60,000 rockets pointed at you from right across the border. Israel is only 174 miles, you know, in height if you want to go this way, and 74 this way and five at some of the smallest points. So you can fly over this thing in just a heartbeat. And all of these things, it would be like having downtown pointing missiles right at where we’re at right now, which is like 20 minutes away from here. So, you know, when you’re there traveling in Israel, as you’ve done and as I’ve done, the fact is, you say, man, this is really, really close.
We’re going to take a break here. When we come back, I’m going to ask you to tell the folks how you think Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu looks at the situation. He looks at Iran, he looks at Hezbollah, he looks at Gaza, he looks at what’s happening in Egypt, and then we’ve got our American president. Alright, we’re going to talk about all that when we come right back.
BREAK
Ankerberg: Alright, we’re back. We are talking with Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin, and he has been involved in many of the skirmishes around the world, covertly, and even in some of the things that have been overt. We’re asking the General for his opinion on what’s going on in terms of the Middle East. And when we come to Iran and Israel, now you come to the prime minister of Israel. You’ve met him; you’ve watched how this has developed through the years. You know their capabilities and you know what they’re facing. I want you to describe for the people, if you’re Benjamin Netanyahu, how do you see the scene right now?
Boykin: I did a program recently with one of my favorite rabbis, Rabbi Daniel Lapin, who made the point that Benjamin Netanyahu and the leadership of Israel understand the theology of the Shia president better than Americans do. They know how serious the threat is. Netanyahu cannot allow him to get a nuclear weapon that he can and will use against Israel. So Netanyahu now has to calculate, “When is the best time for me to preempt this?”
The idea that sanctions are going to work, I think everybody recognizes now is just a specious notion. So he has to determine when to strike. There’s no guarantee that his strike will set this back for any lengthy period, probably a year to 18 months at the most, because he can’t destroy the program, but he has to buy time. And he’s talked about a red line, and I think that he has to be calculating right now, “How do I get US support? What is the best chance I have of getting US support?”
First of all, he knows that the current administration under Barack Obama does not support Israel. They have done everything they can to either compromise the plans that Israel has been making by leaking information, or to discourage Israel from doing it. At the same time, he has looked at an old friend of his, Mitt Romney, who made a very bold statement in Jerusalem when he said “I’m in Jerusalem, the capital of Israel,” and then went on to say that it was imperative and a moral issue for America to stop Iran. So where does he think he’s going to get the best support?
Well, obviously, he thinks he will get it out of Mitt Romney. The question is whether Mitt Romney will be the next president or not. So I think Netanyahu is trying to make a calculated decision as to whether he gets the best US support prior to or after November 6, and we’re coming up very quickly on that.
Ankerberg: You said in Washington that it seemed like the attack might come before the election, but if it doesn’t come before the elections, you can have a good Christmas and then you had another period where you said you need to start to worry. Tell the folks about that.
Boykin: Well, first of all, I don’t think that Netanyahu believes the US polls. I think Netanyahu is much smarter than our polling, so I think he’s watching very closely to see if there is a high probability that Obama will be re-elected. Now, if he believes that Romney has a very good chance, I think that he will wait until after the election. But then he will have to wait until after the 20th of January when Romney would be president. On the other hand, if it looks like, in his calculations, that Obama will be re-elected, I think he will actually strike, you know, within probably within days of the election. And that would be because that would be his best opportunity to get US support under Barack Obama, because the American public is still largely supportive of Israel. And, John, I was there at the joint session of Congress when Benjamin Netanyahu spoke, and I’ve never been at a more historic or emotional event in my life as he got 27 standing ovations. And so the US Congress is still supportive of Israel, not all, but Congress in general. And that would force the Obama administration, I think, to provide the necessary support. So that’s the way I calculate it.
Ankerberg: Let’s talk just briefly, we’ve only got a few minutes here; if a strike happens, how does the scene across the world fall down? How do the pieces fall down?
Boykin: Well, the first thing that happens is Hezbollah and Hamas open a reign of terror on Israel. They begin to fire thousands and thousands of rockets and missiles. The good news is, the Israelis have built some air defense capabilities, or missile defense capabilities, to protect against that. And I think what they’ll wind up doing is leveling, making a parking lot out of south Lebanon and probably the Gaza Strip. Now, that said, then they try to shut down the Straits of Hormuz. As we speak, there is a 25-nation coalition out in the Persian Gulf exercising, naval task force, 25 nations, to demonstrate that we will reopen the Straits of Hormuz.
The problem is that oil prices are going to go up, and they’re going to go up substantially. And that’s going to affect a very fragile global economy. And then what I think you’ll see is you’ll see a reign of terror inside the United States. We know we’ve been infiltrated. They’re coming across the southern border. There are sleeper cells in America. And they will come out from their hiding places and they will start attacks on what I believe will be infrastructure targets here in the United States, economic targets, oil refineries, transportation nodes and that type of thing. Now, I don’t think that they will in any way stop us from being able to carry on a normal life, but I think that they will kill some people and I think that they will also have an impact on our economy.
Ankerberg: We’ve only got a few days before the election. We’re supposed to have 100 million born-again Christians in America. The election has never been more than 10 million votes between the winner and the loser, okay. And I think the Christians have to get off the couch and get into the game. Why should they get into the game? Why should they vote?
Boykin: First of all, it’s scriptural; it’s biblical that they are supposed to be involved in the nation where God has placed them. Jeremiah 29:5 says that we are to be involved, seek the peace and prosperity, “seek the welfare of the nation in which I have placed you.” But I will say something else. I get angry and frustrated with Christians that don’t vote. And that is because I spent 36-plus years in the Army. If you don’t care about anything else in this nation, get out to the polls and vote for these soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines to have a Commander-in-Chief that cares about them. That’s our sons and daughters. So at least show enough concern to get out and get a Commander-in-Chief there that cares about our military.
Ankerberg: Alright, next week I’m going to ask the General about the different Islamic groups in the Middle East who all have as their goal to establish a worldwide Islamic Caliphate. There are different power blocs. There is Turkey, which is in the news even as we’re doing this program. You have Iran, which wants to do their thing. You’ve got the Pakistanis. You’ve got now the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. You’ve got the Saudis on the other side. I’m going to ask the General, you’ve got these different power blocs, to analyze these different power blocs and tell us why this is one big problem that’s coming to a head.
Notes
