PCG's Gerald Flurry Denounces Dealings with Iran

So it's time for PCG to unleash another issue of their recruitment magazine and Gerald Flurry launched yet another polemic demonizing Iran. (Gerald Flurry, America’s Deadly Nuclear Deal With Iran, October 2016.)

Let's take a look at what he says.

America’s worst foreign-policy debacle ever just paved the way to a nuclear World War III.

Armstrongites have constantly insisted that national destruction will soon befall the United States since the 1930s. Flurry is merely continuing that tired tradition of theirs.

Earlier this year, the United States implemented its nuclear deal with Iran. “Implementation Day” fell on January 16, an interesting date on which several major world events have occurred.

This is an allusion to his January 16 superstition. Early on Flurry proclaimed that prophetically important events were destined to occur on January 16 because of HWA's death on January 16, 1986.

On January 17, a day later, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani called the deal a “golden page” and “turning point” for his nation. How true that is! Iran was hemorrhaging financially because of Western sanctions. But the nuclear agreement gave Iran access to $150 billion as the U.S. released its frozen assets.

Flurry neglects to mention that many Iranian civilians were being negatively affected by these sanctions with some people even being unable to access medicines. Furthermore back in the 1980s Iran endured a cataclysmic war with Iraq and despite that Iran maintained itself.

This nuclear deal did the opposite of advancing America’s national security! It didn’t make the world more secure, but far more dangerous!

It made Flurry's world more dangerous because if there is peace with Iran then this will discredit Flurry since in 1994 he proclaimed Iran to be the King of the South. He is squirming that this agreements makes it harder to get his followers scared, upset and fearful of Iran.

For some reason, even though Iran is a sworn terrorist-sponsoring enemy, the Obama administration aggressively wanted this deal. To ensure nobody interfered with it, Mr. Obama and his administration used the National Security Agency to find out what members of Congress were thinking and saying and trying to do. They also spied on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. They wanted to make certain nobody stopped them from removing the crippling sanctions that were causing Iran such trouble and slowing down its nuclear activities.

Flurry leans far to the right. So far to the right he has cocooned himself within a right wing information bubble buttressed by his own predetermined views. So it is quite possible that he has never bothered to try and understand why the Obama Administration would seek such a political deal with Iran. If he just tries to think about he could conclude that somehow the Obama Administration concluded that they had more to gain by negotiating instead of making bellicose preparations for all eventualities. Perhaps President Obama does not want Americans to fight and die in a war with Iran. In contrast Flurry seems to quite enjoy the possibility of going to war with Iran and seems displeased that the possibility is fading away.

Ben Rhodes, one of the president’s speech writers, bragged about how he had deceived journalists and policy wonks, whom he called “the Blob” in an interview with the New York Times. The White House was determined to ram the nuclear deal through without Senate approval or even public support, and it devised and executed an elaborate propaganda campaign to do so. This all came to light months later, but people don’t seem to care just how deceitful and lawless this administration is!

In other words Flurry is moaning that it is not as easy to sell the fear of Iran as it used to be.

President Obama also said in that January 17 speech, “Whereas Iran was steadily expanding its nuclear program, we have now cut off every single path that Iran could have used to build a bomb.” That is absolutely false. Since “Implementation Day,” Iran has accelerated its nuclear activities. The deal allows Iran to build a bomb openly within 15 years, and a secret provision actually opens the door even earlier than that.

How did Iran supposedly accelerate its nuclear activities after implementation day? Even if they did Flurry neglects to tell his readers.

But all this assumes that Iran intends to make a nuclear bomb in the first place. What if that was not the case? Back in 2003 Iran's Supreme Leader Khamenei issued a fatwa declaring that possessing nuclear weapons as un-Islamic.

Flurry then discusses the payment of certain debts to Iran as part of tying loose ends with Iran that was also used as leverage to get Iran to release several Americans.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the cash payment was the first installment of a $1.7 billion settlement that the Obama administration had agreed to pay Iran. The settlement was designed to resolve a dispute in the United Nations International Court of Justice over a failed arms deal that took place before the 1979 Iranian Revolution, when Iran’s current Islamic radical regime overthrew the regime of Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. Iran had paid $400 million for those arms, but the U.S. did not supply them because of the revolution. It also did not return the $400 million. The Obama administration says the $1.7 billion includes this $400 million and $1.3 billion in interest. It claims Iran initially demanded $7 to $8 billion in interest, but eventually settled for $1.3 billion, thus making it a good deal for taxpayers. The Obama administration denied that the cash was a payment for the release of the four prisoners.

Why would money being sent to Iran to resolve a debt issue from before the events of 1979 be equated with a ransom payment? Normally a ransom payment is not a payment for resolving an argument concerning debt from the late 1970s but for returning the hostage alone. But discussing such nuances does not make people scared of Iran so Flurry minimizes that.

Flurry hysterically insists that this money sent to resolve an old debt issue somehow funds "Iran's nuclear aspirations," which seems a bit of an odd turn of phrase considering how loosing one could use the word aspiration.

America continues to fund Iran’s nuclear aspirations—this time by secretly airlifting a cash payment in the middle of the night. One commentator said you could take that $400 million ransom money and buy four atomic bombs!

And who was this commentator? Flurry neglects to say.

Flurry then talks about North Korean nukes and an Israeli airstrike on Syria. After that he indulges in more scare mongering about Iran. Note how he uses a quote from the Iranian Foreign Minister below.

Iran has already tested illegal missiles. According to the nuclear deal, it was to wait eight years before it could have anything to do with ballistic missiles. But it is test-firing ballistic missiles that are capable of carrying nuclear warheads.

As the Iranians violate even the few restrictions the deal does impose, America just watches, doing nothing. 

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif tweeted July 4, “There are no more red lines left for terrorists to cross. Sunnis, Shiites will both remain victims unless we stand united as one.” Iran has great ambitions. It controls radical Islam, it has received billions from the Obama administration. It is improving its nuclear enrichment process. It is testing nuclear-capable missiles that could wipe out Israel in an instant and could strike even Europe. It is showing that America has no power left in the Middle East. It is terrifying America’s allies in the region and its other neighbors into either allying with it or into building up alliances, weapons and nuclear bombs of their own.

Minister Zarif's tweet is presented without its context being mentioned. That tweet was made in response to a series of terrorist attacks in Saudi Arabia by suspected ISIL sympathizers on July 4, 2016. That context is not explained.

Iran has received $400 million from America for four hostages who weren’t even guilty. Would a real superpower let another nation treat it like that? Would a real superpower prop up a terrorist-sponsoring regime and help it obtain nuclear weapons?

Flurry seems to really loath the thought of the United States and Iran getting issues resolved peacefully.

Flurry then insists that the United States is falling apart trying to make his readers fall into despair.

Since that deal, Iran has taken more hostages. America’s weakness is exposed, and Iran will continue to capitalize on that. Where is the pride in our power? There is no fighting spirit in the American people. America has proved itself willing to be pushed around. It is faint of heart.

When readers fall into despair they look for help. PCG's "solution" is to pay three tithes to PCG's 1% for the rest of one's life with the expectation of fleeing to Petra once the Great Tribulation starts. That is no solution at all.

Flurry then goes back to promoting his January 16 superstition and presents what is possibly his most detailed promotion of this superstition.

The Trumpet has watched January 16 as a significant date for 30 years. It was on this date that the U.S. launched Operation Desert Storm (1991); the German parliament repealed the constitutional right to privacy, and U.S. law enforcement questioned White House intern Monica Lewinsky about her affair with President Bill Clinton (1998); the prosecution for the impeachment of President Clinton ended (1999); Space Shuttle Columbia was fatally damaged upon launch, 16 days before disintegrating upon reentry and killing the crew of six Americans and one Israeli (2003); Germany announced the deployment of 250 combat troops to Afghanistan and Israel’s strategic affairs minister resigned over Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s appeasement policies (2008); Israel agreed to unilaterally withdraw from the Gaza Strip, and Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Germany’s Angela Merkel met to discuss Ukraine and gas supplies (2009); President Obama announced one of America’s largest-ever rebuilding projects in Haiti, one year into the Great Recession (2010); Europe’s bailout fund was stripped of its AAA credit rating (2012); President Obama issued a series of executive orders on gun control after the Sandy Hook massacre, and Germany began withdrawing its gold holdings from Paris and New York (2013); and the U.S. Supreme Court announced it would hear arguments on same-sex “marriage” (2015).

Even though thousands of Americans soldiers have bravely fought in Afghanistan and Iraq since 2001 with thousands making the ultimate sacrifice Flurry disgustingly and absurdly insists that the United States is too weak to fight a war with Iran.

Iran is pushing and pushing its foreign policy. It is about to push so hard and so aggressively that it will launch a massive war! But it won’t be with the United States, which is now too weak to even fight such a war. Instead, it will be against a new superpower with a fierce leader who will strike Iran and its radical Islamic allies like an overwhelming tornado.

Does he think negotiating with Iran is a sign of weakness? Is this another reason for his vehement opposition to the deal with Iran? If so it is very good that he was never entrusted with governmental power over foreign affairs. And yet he says that he and his followers will soon rule the world after Christ's return.

Flurry then allows his sick imagination free rein on the printed page.

These nations’ fearsome ballistic missiles and their horrifying payloads are finally going to be used. Huge explosions will scorch entire cities, right down to the blades of grass in the parks. The ground will be trembling beneath, and the sky will be dark above. You see America’s pitiful weakness; you see it aiding and abetting an ideological terrorist empire; you see Iran pushing aggressively at America and also very forcefully against Europe; you see Europe suffering economic danger, mass immigration, terrorism; you see Europeans crying out for unity and a strong leader; you see the very real threat of war; you see the very imminent threat of nuclear bombs eliminating millions of people. You can see these things on your nightly news!

It is just disgusting how Gerald Flurry continues to try to peddle fear and despair to his readers despite his many false prophecies. Many of his readers have no idea of the severe authoritarianism present within PCG according to many reports.