Pentagon supports joint military force with Arab countries

Iran Press TV

Tue Mar 31, 2015 9:26AM

US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter has announced that the Pentagon is supporting and cooperating with the Arab League over the creation of a joint military force.

"The willingness of the parties there to step up and do more for stability in the Middle East is a good thing," Carter told reporters during a visit to Fort Drum in New York on Monday.

"These are partners and security allies of ours, and when they act in a way that we regard as in our interests as well as theirs we will continue to partner with them as we have been in other matters," he added.

Last week, the Arab League member states unanimously agreed to set up a joint military force against what they call threats against Arab states.

Arab League Secretary General Nabil al-Arabi said on Thursday that the bloc's foreign ministers agreed during their meeting in Egypt on a draft resolution to establish the force.

'This is the first time that a force will be created and work under the name of Arab states,' he said during a joint press conference with Egypt's Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry in Sharm el-Sheikh.

In an interview with Press TV on Friday, an analyst said the United States has a primary goal in the Middle East and that is to control the oil resources in the region.

"Because the Middle East has two-thirds of the world's known oil reserves, the US desperately wants to control it," said Phil Wilayto, an editor at Virginia Defender Newspaper.

Wilayto also said that the US has "been systematically targeting any country whose leadership opposes US hegemony in the area," adding "it destroyed the governments in Iraq, in Libya, and now it's targeting Syria, Iran, (and) the Palestinians."

"There is no solutions to the problems in the Middle East until the US changes its fundamental policy of striving for hegemony, for control, and that won't happen until the [anti-war] movement here in the United States is stronger; the anti-war movement is weak today," he stated.

AGB/AGB