Above Photo: Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Imran Khan leaves after appearing at the Supreme Court in Islamabad on July 26, 2023. Aamir Qureshi/AFP/Getty Images.
American writer and political commentator Daniel Patrick Welch says there was never any serious doubt that the United States was behind the toppling of the democratically-elected government of Prime Minister Imran Khan in Pakistan in April 2022.
He added the United States will stop at nothing to maintain its global hegemony, as actions in other theaters show.
Welch made the remarks in an exclusive interview with the Press TV website on Thursday, August 10, a day after The Intercept published a classified document, revealing Washington pushed for the removal of Khan from office over his neutrality on the Ukraine war.
According to the document published by The Intercept, US State Department officials used threats and promises to encourage Khan’s removal as the prime minister.
The US State Department encouraged the Pakistani government in a March 7, 2022, meeting to remove Khan as prime minister over his independent foreign policy regarding Russia, according to the text of the Pakistani cable, produced from the meeting by the Pakistani ambassador and transmitted to Pakistan.
The classified cable, known internally as a “cypher,” reveals both the carrots and the sticks that the State Department deployed in its push against Khan, promising warmer relations if Khan was removed, and isolation if he was not, The Intercept reported.
Welch said, “So this recent discovery of the secret cable that was leaked to The Intercept and published by them is big news today, or for the moment, at least.”
“But it’s interesting how The Intercept goes into great detail on how they can’t really verify it because they can’t get the corroboration from someone inside the Pakistani military, and on and on,” he added.
“But the funny part is that in many ways it’s not really news at all. For Pakistani citizens and anyone with a conscience in the rest of the world, this is like getting the foreign language subtitles to a great home movie that everyone has been watching for over a year,” he stated.
“There was never any serious doubt that the US was behind this ouster of Imran Khan. Look, I’m not in court. We are not required to prove this beyond the shadow of a doubt. They create doubt! They even have a phrase for it — it’s called plausible deniability. So they can come out at every turn and say ‘Well this is all false. This has always been false,’” Welch emphasized.
“So why do I say ‘At every turn…?’ Because it’s the same thing! Ukraine isn’t about Ukraine. West Africa isn’t about West Africa. And this isn’t about Imran Khan. This is about the West—specifically, the US—and its desire to flex its muscle and keep its hold on the world, and nothing can get in their way,” he added.
“The interesting part for me is that the analysis seems to be vetting the US vs. Russia, that it’s about Imran Khan’s statements about Ukraine — a position that most of the world’s population firmly believes, and not what the West is trying to sell as ‘isolation,’” Welch said.
“That is the reason that Russian flags show up at protests in Haiti, In Senegal, in Mali, in Niger, in Burkina Faso, everywhere, is that they stood up and said No ‘Way! Get out of here!’ To the West. And that is as much symbolic as it is ideological and political,” he said.
“I mean, this is Lula! This is Brazil. They have another popular politician who is saddled with some ridiculous, made-up crap about corruption. They put him in jail and give him this fake, trumped-up sentence that is going to prevent him from running. Like they did—they, meaning the US, the CIA—for Bolsonaro. And, now, for whoever they appoint to run Pakistan,” he explained.
‘It’s about China, not Russia’
Welch said that the problem is that the Pakistani military is being “shortsighted if they are thinking that they are taking the US side against Russia. Because it’s not.”
“It’s about China. Why is China a threat? The US ruling class is right—they are! Because the US, it’s death merchants and billionaires, have spent what? SIX TRILLION dollars in the last twenty years, to destroy everything, to murder millions and line the pockets of their already rich billionaires and the politicians they also own,” he noted.
“They are the only ones who have profited from this. Most of the world is in shambles because of it. And at the same time, the Chinese have spent trillions as well. Building up—not destroying. Building up railroads from Laos to China,” he said.
“The Belt and Road Initiative is unbelievable. Just incredible. Raising people out of poverty—their own 800 million or whatever it was. And starting to teach and help the rest of the world that they don’t need to live in this yoke of oppression that the West imposes,” Welch added.
“And China is also much more savvy and slower on the trigger. They’re very close to Pakistan. They don’t have to do this tomorrow. But they will. Those economic levers. Those diplomatic levers. That the West uses to dissociate from any popular politician or movement. Or any sort of progress—anything, really outside that political sphere,” he observed.
“They [China] do much more quietly and much more aptly, I think. And whether or not they [West] are successful in stopping the populist impulse—the right side of history—at this time, Lula eventually became president of Brazil. Not Bolsonaro. So we’ll see. We. Shall. See,” he concluded.
Daniel Patrick Welch is a writer of political commentary and analysis. He lives and writes in Salem, Massachusetts, US, with his wife. Together they run The Greenhouse School. He has traveled widely, speaks five languages and studied Russian History and Literature at Harvard University.