made sure the shah stayed in power??? - it was our support that caused the iranian revolution. the cia calls this "blowback". putting the shah in power in the first place is probably the main reason that there is so much animosity from iran. im sorry that you think its ok, but i dont want my government propping up and supporting brutal, murdering dictators. i would like to hold my government to a higher standard. im sorry you feel different. why is it ok for our government to interfere in other countries affairs, but not for other countries to interfere in ours? your last comment seems like a cop-out. you only discuss things that happened in your lifetime? ill remember that and bring it up next time i see you talking about anything before 1953.
When did I ever say that the US has not attacked Iran, that the US was not a threat to Iran, or that Iran had no reason to dislike the US? I was only countering the claim that Iran has never attacked anyone, the US in particular, and that Iran is no threat to the US. Of course the US has done things to hurt Iran. Not only that, but the US has done things to hurt many, many countries around the world. Being a citizen of the US, I am more concerned with what other countries do to hurt us. You cannot put the genie back in the bottle. Well, you can, but it is very, very difficult and has never actually been done to my knowledge. Just because we have not stepped up to stop people in the past, does not mean we should not do so in the future. As for Israel, I do not care one whit about the UN resolutions against them. The UN has been more one sided in that conflict in favor of Palestine than the US has been in favor of Israel. Plus, I think Israel has not done enough against the Palestinians, so I do not agree with those who criticize what measures they have taken. Saudi Arabia would be at or near the top of my **** list if I were running this country, but I do not get to make those decisions. I do not condone America supporting terrorists, both because I do not agree with terrorism, and because it seems to come back to bite us in the ass, both in terms of PR and in terms of the terrorists later attacking us. If Iran developed nuclear weapons, they could half the population of Israel with three. They could give one to terrorists that could be delivered to any major seaport in America and detonated in a large city, possibly killing millions. To deny that Iran poses a threat to Israel or the US is a joke.
I don't want my government propping up brutal murdering dictators. once my government has installed a dictator, I don't want them to let that dictator get overthrown by a bunch of Muslim extremists that are bent on harming America. Sometimes you do not have good choices available. It is fine for other countries to interfere in our government, as long as they are willing to accept the consequences. When did I say that? I only said that I had no say in the US installing the Shah. I did not vote for (or against) the people that made that decision, because (not being born until almost 30 years later) I was not old enough to vote. Obviously I am willing to discuss things that happened before I was born, as I have done so in this very thread. EDIT: sorry for the double post, meant to tack this onto the last one
therein lies your fundamental problem. you are honest enough to acknowledge that our government has done bad things, but you just dont care. you only concern yourself w/ what others do to us, when it is often a cause/effect scenario. kind of a selfish and un-christian way to look at foreign policy. do unto others... does that mean that you also dont care about the un resolutions against iran or iraq (pre-invasion)? did you ever use saddams defiance of un resolutions as a reason to invade? based on your comments here and below it seems like you have a bias towards israel. i disagree. wow. again, i disagree. at the very least dont you think its wrong of our government and especially our president to be so closely aligned w/ such a brutal regime? i think everyone can agree with that. ok. and why would they do that? pakistan "could" also nuke isreal. and right now israel could decimate both entire countries and everything in them in about 5 minutes. but why would they do that? pakistan can do that right now and one could easily argue that they have the more unstable situation right now. plus, their intel agency (isi) are known supporters of the taliban and al-qaeda. one of their generals was the moneyman behind mohammad atta. they made a truce w/ al-qaeda and basically surrendered the northwestern part of their country to them. their president is even less popular there than bush is here and could be overthrown any day now. ...and we give them billions of dollars a year in aid. which country has had more alignment w/ al-qaeda - pakistan or iran? (its a rhetorical question ) pakistan has nukes right now. why would it be more difficult for some "terrorist" to get nukes from pakistan (which actually exist right now) vs. nukes from iran (who our own intel says is 5-10 years away from having any). why isnt our government and media as concerned about pakistan, which has nukes as they are about iran, which has none? and if our government and our president were really concerned about terrorists sneaking a nuke into this country dont you think they would try to do something about the borders? it makes no sense. we are in iraq fighting to prevent the terrorists from setting off a nuke in america, yet we leave our borders wide-ass open and allow illegal immigrants to pour across at will? the mexican military has crossed our border over 200 times while protecting drug runners. they have fired on border patrol and sheriffs and actually reconfiscated siezed drugs at gunpoint. and homeland secretery chertoff said the border patrol and sheriffs were just using scare tactics when they talked about it. that is the joke and its on us. when you think about it the whole thing just seems like a big sham.
so again, you are honest enough to admit that what we did in iran and iraq was wrong, but you would choose to still support the brutal, murdering dictator? thats your opinion, but i must disagree. and would this position mean that you were against the iraq war b/c thats basically what we have done? sometimes you dont have good choices available, but when you put yourself in bad situations you dont stay with it. you learn from your mistakes. whats that saying about 'those who repeat history' again? of course, but why is it wrong when other countries respond in kind? i misinterpreted your comment. i thought you were refusing to comment and using the 'i wasnt born when it happened' excuse - my apologies. we can both pad our post count - we are so much cooler now!
I am just honest enough to admit that I care more about what happens to me and mine than what happens to people I will never meet. That is the same for everyone by the way, I bet you spend more money on yourself than you send to Israelis for example. Self-interest is the single most powerful motivator in the world. UN resolutions serve as an excuse to placate the international community, and little else. Obviously I do, since I said they would be near the top of my **** list. It is their stated intention. They have been attacking Israel by proxy for many years. They would gain tremendous acclaim in the region, which is important to them as they want to become a regional hegemon. They would have struck a decisive blow against the "little Satan". They are anti-semitic. Pick one. The military is in charge of the nukes and the military depends on American support to maintain their control of their country. Nuking Israel means that Pakistan has fallen into the hands of the Muslim extremists. Also, Pakistan does not have the same issues with Israel that Iran does, their bugaboo is India. Because Israel has never been shown to be an agressor. We give them billions in aid to make sure their president is not overthrown, because we don't want their nukes going to terrorists. This is one of those situations where supporting the dictator is the better option than letting the country fall into the hands of the Muslim extremists. Iran prefers other terrorist organizations, shiite terrorists organizations like Hezballah. Recent estimates put Iran having enough enriched uranium to make a bomb in 1 year if they bring all of their centrifuges online. As for why it would be more difficult to get nukes from Pakistan, the guy in charge of Pakistani nukes is the same guy that is getting billions in aid from America. The people in charge of Iran's nuclear program are the same ones that call America the great Satan and Israel the little Satan. It is pretty much impossible to inspect every cargo container that comes into the US. Our chances are much better of stopping the terrorists from ever getting a nuke than they are of intercepting a nuke after they acquire it. I am all in favor of securing the border. Building a wall would be a good place to start. Putting machine gunners on the wall would be a nice second step. I was in favor of the Iraq war, but am not thrilled with the way it was prosecuted. I do like what i am hearing from McCain about having troops in Iraq for 100 years. We need a permanent presence their like what we have had in Germany, Japan, Korea, the Philippines, etc. Letting Saddam get overthrown by al Qaeda would have been a worse option than keeping him in power or overthrowing him ourselves. I would rather continue the bad situation than let it degenerate into a worse one. The Soviets invading Afghanistan was a bad situation. The CIA basically creating al Qaeda to beat them made it worse. Installing the Shah was bad. Letting him fall to Muslim extremists was worse. It is not so much wrong as it is counter to my interests. Any country we meddle in is welcome to fight back. I would prefer they did not, and in most/all cases they would actually be better off if they did not. For some reason they do not consult with me before deciding on a course of action. If everyone in the world just did whatever I said, the vast majority would be a lot better off (and I would be MUCH better off ). Ah well, such is life.
are you not also intelligent enough to realize that things our government does to others can come back and bite us on the ass? it is a very selfish world view. of course i care more about myself and people in my life than others i will never meet, but that doesnt mean i want to do them harm. horrible analogy - ive never done anything to directly harm israelis. and self-interest is fine and natural, but its extremely hypocritical to get upset at other countries for doing things that we do to them. i agree - the un is a facade. but one of the reasons we invaded iraq was b/c saddam broke all these un resolutions...well israel has broken far, far more, but they are our allies. and did you ever use the excuse that saddam violated un resolutions as a reason to invade, b/c it certainly was one of the dozen or so reasons that the bush administration used. it is irans stated intention to halve israels population? link please. and dont post that silly ahmadinejad quote about destroying the occupying regime. islamic/farsi linguists have already debunked that falsity. and we have been attacking iran by proxy for many years. why is it ok when we do it, but not ok when they do? the only thing iran would gain by attacking israel or the us is total annihilation. pakistan is a far more unstable regime right now than iran and their country and government are infiltrated by al-qaeda. their intel service (isi) are big supporters. one of their generals was the moneyman behind mohammad atta. jesus christ, you cant be serious! . as far as the middle east in concerned, israel has been THE main aggressor over the last 50 years or so. so we give billions to a unpopular military dictator and we wonder why the pakistanis dont like us? well as the old saying goes, you reap what you sow. i would like to see a link for these "recent estimates" b/c everything ive read from our own intelligence estimates put them at 5-10 years away. http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/12/03/america/cia.php National Intelligence Estimate that represents the consensus view of all 16 American spy agencies, states that Tehran is most likely keeping its options open with respect to building a weapon, but that intelligence agencies "do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons." Iran is continuing to produce enriched uranium, the report says, a program that the Tehran government has said is designed for civilian purposes. The new estimate says that the enrichment program could still provide Iran with enough raw material to produce a nuclear weapon sometime by the middle of next decade, a timetable essentially unchanged from previous estimates. But the new estimate declares with "high confidence" that a military-run Iranian program intended to transform that raw material into a nuclear weapon has been shut down since 2003, and also says with high confidence that the halt "was directed primarily in response to increasing international scrutiny and pressure." the guy in charge is incredibly unpopular and could be overthrown any day now. ok, so what the hell are we doing in iraq? do you really think we are stopping any nukes from getting into america by occupying iraq? dont you think that if nukes going off in this country was really the issue that the bush administration would try to seal the border? you said you dont want our government supporting brutal dictators, but once we do we should support them to prevent muslim extremists from taking over - so doesnt that mean that you would have favored keeping saddam in power? you "like" it? you want permanent war? thats disgusting. why dont you go sign up to fight than? im sick of seeing my family getting deployed over and over again. why dont some of you true believers go fight for a cause you believe in? why? just curious - but i guess it doesnt matter - we are building 14 permanent military bases and the largest embassy in the world there so we arent leaving anytime soon. our allies the saudis kicked us out of their country so i guess we have to be somewhere. saddam wasnt going to get overthrown by al-qaeda. those who fail to learn from their mistakes are bound to repeat them. we didnt "let" him fall to muslim extremists. the people got sick of being brutalized, murdered and disappeared by the shah (whom we supported) and bravely rose up against him. again, you fail to see the correlation b/t things our government has done and the current situation. i agree that countries should not meddle in our affairs, but we should not meddle in theirs either. no offense, but i find your position to be hypocritical and selfish.
Obviously, since I have already pointed out several instances where it has happened. That doesn't mean we should never take action for fear of it biting us in the ass down the line. We do what we want and accept the consequences, just like everyone else. It's not hypocritical at all. I certainly expect other countries to get upset when wew do things to them, so I don't see why I can't get upset when they do them to me. I get upset when the Jazz beat the Rockets, but not when the Rockets beat the Jazz. It is called self interest. I think it is a handy tool to point to when someone b****es about the war being illegal, but I certainly would not call it the reason to invade, otherwise I would be in favor of an American invasion of Israel, which I obviously am not. It is the stated intention of the Iranian government to wipe Israel off the map, or if you prefer the (biased) insistence of the Iran apologists, to get rid of the Zionists (which is the non-native born Israelis). I don't know why everyone finds it so hard to believe that the rest of the middle east wants to destroy Israel, they all say it all the time. Check out the PLO charter, the Hamas mission statement, the Hezballah charter, etc. See the people calling for death to the great Satan and the little Satan. It is "OK" when either/both do it. As an American that is pro-Israel (our allies) and anti-Iran (our enemies), I prefer the people attacking Iran to the people attacking Israel. BTW, any evidence of the US attacking Iran by proxy, preferably something besides the Iran-Iraq war where we were supplying both sides. The only thing Japan would get by attacking Pearl Harbor is the complete destruction of their empire. Oops. Hence our support of the guy at the top, the one that is at least somewhat on our side. Hmm, Six Day War, started by the Arabs, Yom Kippur War, started by the Arabs, Palestinian attacks initiated by the Arabs. When exactly did Israel launch an attack again? That one time that Iraq was building nuclear weapons? Yeah, they are definitely the aggressors . They did not like us before. We just give aid to the elements in that country that are most pro-US. Seems like a pretty reasonable policy to me. Yep, just like Iran is reaping what they sowed. Now you are getting it. I read an article a few days ago about their new centrifuges, many of which they have not activated yet (but still have available). If you want to look for it you are welcome to. I don't really feel like running it down for you. Hence the American support. I don't think one thing has anything to do with the other. Do you think we are stopping nukes from getting into America by doing highway maintenance? It turns out that not every single thing we do is attributable to one goal. Nope. I think we should have removed Saddam from power and then helped moderates come to power in the new government, perhaps even prop up the Kurds as the central government. Because I do not have to. If your family did not want to fight wars, then joining the military was probably the wrong occupational choice. We left Saudi Arabia to try to appease the Muslim extremists. That worked really well. we should have a permanent presence because it is harder to have a safe haven for terrorists when there are thousands of US troops around. It is also a good strategic position from which we can go to Iran, the arab states, support Israel, go into the Med or the Gulf, etc. Ideally, we would have a permanent presence in every country (hard to fight offensive wars against nations that have large military presences on your home soil). I never said he was, though i suppose you could reasonably infer that from what I wrote. I meant only that an al Qaeda or similar overthrow of Saddam would have been less desirable than leaving him in power, not that it was necessarily going to happen. If the only options were Saddam or Muslim extremists, then we should have left Saddam in power. I do not believe those were the only options. If at first you don't succeed, try try again. We did "let" him fall to Muslim extremists, unless you think the US did everything in its power to prevent it from happening. Just because we were at least a partial cause of the extremism, doesn't mean that we could not have kept the Shah in power. I have no trouble drawing the connection between what we did and the current situation. I am just saying that the connection is irrelevant. I find your position to be naïve and foolish. I will give you an illustrative example that relates to Iran. Many argue that since Israel has nukes, they should have no problem with Iran having nukes. Under your reasoning, that is a logical argument. that philosophy would say the best situation is either no one having nukes, or everyone having them. I say the best situation to be in is to have nukes while your enemies do not have nukes. There is no rule that says all the countries have to be equal, and I would prefer America and our allies are in the best position possible relative to everyone else.
We need to support Israel in the Middle East, as explained by Obama... On Israel Ensure a Strong U.S.-Israel Partnership: Barack Obama strongly supports the U.S.-Israel relationship, believes that our first and incontrovertible commitment in the Middle East must be to the security of Israel, America's strongest ally in the Middle East. Obama supports this closeness, stating that that the United States would never distance itself from Israel. Support Israel's Right to Self Defense: During the July 2006 Lebanon war, Barack Obama stood up strongly for Israel's right to defend itself from Hezbollah raids and rocket attacks, cosponsoring a Senate resolution against Iran and Syria's involvement in the war, and insisting that Israel should not be pressured into a ceasefire that did not deal with the threat of Hezbollah missiles. He believes strongly in Israel's right to protect its citizens. Support Foreign Assistance to Israel: Barack Obama has consistently supported foreign assistance to Israel. He defends and supports the annual foreign aid package that involves both military and economic assistance to Israel and has advocated increased foreign aid budgets to ensure that these funding priorities are met. He has called for continuing U.S. cooperation with Israel in the development of missile defense systems. You can't be a pimp and a prostitude too... http://www.barackobama.com/issues/
i dont have a link, but this was posted in another board i frequent. -------------------------- The U.S.-Iranian Negotiations: Beyond the Rhetoric February 12, 2008 | 1943 GMT By George Friedman Tehran has announced that Iran and the United States will hold a new round of talks on the future of Iraq at some point next week. The Iranians said that the “structure of the discussions have been finalized but the level of participation has not yet been agreed.” Meanwhile, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is expected to visit Iraq before March 20, the Iranian New Year. The United States has not denied either of these reports. There thus appears to be some public movement occurring in the U.S.-Iranian talks over Iraq. These talks are not new. This would be the fourth in a series of meetings; the most recent meeting happened last August. These meetings have been scheduled and canceled before, and because who will attend this go-round remains unsettled, these talks may never get off the ground. More significant, no Iranian president has visited Iraq since the Khomeini revolution. If this visit took place, it would represent a substantial evolution. It also is not something that would happen unopposed if the United States did not want it to; by contrast, the Iraqi government lacks much of a say in the matter because it does not have that much room for maneuver. So we can say this much: Nothing has happened yet, but the Iranians have repositioned themselves as favoring some sort of diplomatic initiative from their side and the Americans so far have not done anything to discourage them. U.S.-Iranian negotiations are always opaque because they are ideologically difficult to justify by both sides. For Iran, the United States is the Great Satan. For the United States, Iran is part of the Axis of Evil. It is difficult for Iran to talk to the devil or for the United States to negotiate with evil. Therefore, U.S.-Iranian discussions always take place in a strange way. The public rhetoric between the countries is always poisonous. If you simply looked at what each country says about the other, you would assume that no discussions are possible. But if you treat the public rhetoric as simply designed to manage domestic public opinion, and then note the shifts in policy outside of the rhetorical context, a more complex picture emerges. Public and private talks have taken place, and more are planned. If you go beyond the talks to actions, things become even more interesting. We have discussed this before, but it is important to understand the strategic interests of the two countries at this point to understand what is going on. Ever since the birth of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Iraq has been the buffer between the Iranians and the Arabian Peninsula. The United States expected to create a viable pro-American government quickly after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and therefore expected that Iraq would continue to serve as a buffer. That did not happen for a number of reasons, and therefore the strategic situation has evolved. The primary American interest in Iraq at this point is a negative one — namely, that Iraq not become an Iranian satellite. If that were to happen and Iranian forces entered Iraq, the entire balance of power in the Arabian Peninsula would collapse. Whatever the future of Iraq, U.S. policy since the surge and before has been to prevent a vacuum into which Iran can move. The primary Iranian interest in Iraq also is negative. Tehran must make sure that no Iraqi government is formed that is dominated by Sunnis, as happened under the Baathists, and that the Iraqi military never becomes powerful enough to represent an offensive threat to Iran. In other words, above all else, Iran’s interest is to avoid a repeat of the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war. Obviously, each side has positive goals. The United States would love to see a powerful, pro-American Iraqi government that could threaten Iran on its own. The Iranians would love to see a pro-Iranian government in Baghdad and the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq. Neither side is in a position to achieve these goals. The United States cannot create a pro-U.S. government because the Iranians, through their influence in the Shiite community, can create sufficient chaos to make that impossible. Through the surge, the United States has demonstrated to the Iranians that it is not withdrawing from Iraq, and the Iranians do not have the ability to force an American withdrawal. So long as the Americans are there and moving closer to the Sunnis, the Iranians cannot achieve their positive goals and also must harbor concerns about the long-term future of Iraq. Each side has blocked the other’s strategic positive goal. Each side now wants to nail down its respective negative goal: avoiding the thing it fears the most. Ever since the 2006 U.S. congressional midterm elections, when President George W. Bush confounded Iranian expectations by actually increasing forces in Iraq rather than beginning a phased withdrawal, the two countries have been going through a complex process of talks and negotiations designed to achieve their negative ends: the creation of an Iraq that cannot threaten Iran but can be a buffer against Iranian expansion. Neither side trusts the other, and each would love to take advantage of the situation to achieve its own more ambitious goals. But the reality on the ground is that each side would be happy if it avoided the worst-case scenario. Again, ignoring the rhetoric, there has been a fairly clear sequence of events. Casualties in Iraq have declined — not only U.S. military casualties but also civilian casualties. The civil war between Sunni and Shia has declined dramatically, although it did not disappear. Sunnis and Shia both were able to actively project force into more distant areas, so the decline did not simply take place because neighborhoods became more homogeneous, nor did it take place because of the addition of 30,000 troops. Though the United States created a psychological shift, even if it uses its troops more effectively, Washington cannot impose its will on the population. A change in tactics or an increase of troops to 150,000 cannot control a country of 25 million bent on civil war. The decline in intracommunal violence is attributable to two facts. The first is the alliance between the United States and Sunni leaders against al Qaeda, which limited the jihadists’ ability to strike at the Shia. The second is the decision by the Iranians to control the actions of Iranian-dominated militias. The return of Muqtada al-Sadr — the most radical of the Shiite leaders — to ayatollah school and his decision to order his followers to cease fire dramatically reduced Shiite-on-Sunni violence. That would not, and could not, have happened without Iranian concurrence. If the Iranians had wanted the civil war to continue unabated, it would have. The Iranians cannot eliminate all violence, nor do they want to. They want the Americans to understand that they can resume the violence at will. Nevertheless, without the Iranian decision to limit the violence, the surge would not have worked. If the prime Iranian threat against the United States was civil war in Iraq, the prime American threat against Iran was an air campaign against Iranian infrastructure. Such a campaign was publicly justified by the U.S. claim that Iran was developing nuclear weapons. With the Iranians having removed the threat of overwhelming civil war in Iraq, the United States responded by removing the threat of an air campaign. The publication of the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) stating that Iran does not have a nuclear program at present effectively signaled the Iranians that there would be no campaign. There was intense speculation that the NIE was a “coup” by the intelligence community against the president. Though an interesting theory, not a single author of the NIE has been fired, none of the intelligence community leaders has been removed, and the president has very comfortably lived with the report’s findings. He has lowered the threat of war against Iran while holding open the possibility — as the NIE suggests — that the Iranians might still be a threat, and that a new NIE might require airstrikes. The Iranians reduced Shiite violence. The United States reduced the threat of airstrikes. At various points, each side has tested and signaled to the other. The Iranians have encouraged small-scale attacks by Shia in recent weeks, but nothing like what was going on a year or two ago. During Bush’s trip to the region, the United States triggered a crisis in the Strait of Hormuz to signal the Iranians that the United States retains its options. The rhetoric remains apocalyptic, but the reality is that, without admitting it, each side has moved to lower the temperature. Clearly, secret negotiations are under way. The announcement that an agreement was reached on the structure and subject of a public meeting this week by definition means that unpublicized conversations have been taking place. Similarly, the announcement that Ahmadinejad will be visiting Iraq could not have come without extensive back-channel discussions. We would suspect that these discussions actually have been quite substantial. The Iranians have made clear what they want in these negotiations. Mottaki was quoted in the Iranian media as saying, “We did express our readiness for entering into negotiations with the U.S. when the talks were held by the five Security Council permanent members plus Germany over Iran’s nuclear program.” He also said that, “Revising its policies toward Iran, the U.S. can pave the way for us to consider the circumstances needed for such talks to be held.” Since talks are being held, it must indicate some movement on the American part. It all comes down to this: The United States, at the very least, wants a coalition government in Iraq not controlled by Iran, which can govern Iraq and allow the United States to draw down its forces. The Iranians want an Iraqi government not controlled by the United States or the Sunnis, which can control Iraq but not be strong enough to threaten Iran. Iran also wants the United States to end sanctions against Iran, while the United States wants Iran to end all aspects of its nuclear program. Ending sanctions is politically difficult for the United States. Ending all aspects of the nuclear program is difficult for Iran. The United States can finesse the sanctions issue by turning a blind eye to third powers trading with Iran and allowing U.S. companies to set up foreign subsidiaries to conduct trade with Iran. The Iranians can finesse the nuclear issue, maintaining limited aspects of the program but not pursuing all the technologies needed to build a weapon. Rhetoric aside, we are therefore in a phase where there are ways for each side to get what it wants. Obviously, the political process is under way in both countries, with Iranian parliamentary elections on March 14 and the U.S. presidential race in full swing. Much domestic opposition is building up against Ahmadinejad, and an intensifying power struggle in Iran could be a fairly large distraction for the country in the short term. The Iranians also could wait a bit more to see how the U.S. presidential campaign shapes up before making any major decisions. But then, a political process is always under way. That means the rhetoric will remain torrid; the public meetings few and low-key; the private discussions ongoing; and actions by each side sometimes inexplicable, keyed as they are to private discussions. But it is clear from this week’s announcements by the Iranians that there is movement under way. If the Iranian president does visit Iraq and the United States makes no effort to block him, that will be the signal that some sort of accommodation has been reached. The United States and Iran will not recognize each other and will continue to condemn and even threaten each other. But this is truly a case where their rhetoric does not begin to reflect the reality.
ok. but it also doesnt mean that we should take unjustified action against other countries. and again, if this is your position than you have no right to criticize other countries for doing the same thing. why is it wrong when other countries do it, but right we we do? i want my government to act in a just manner - are my standards too high? this is akin to a bully beating the crap out of some kid for no reason, the kid gets mad and fights back and lands a punch and the bully freaks out and starts crying "why did you hit me!". and basketball has nothing to do w/ this. please stop with the silly analogies! link? and i already said not to post that silly ahmadinejad quote which has already been debunked by farsi linguists as meaning that he was calling for an end to the occupying regime. i think its wrong no matter who is doing it. you dont see how our support of a brutal dictator might come back to harm us? and you dont have a moral problem w/ your government propping them up? wasnt the 6 day war started by israel? and what about lebanon last year? and the forced removal of palestinians in favor of jewish settlers, who some of the more extreme sound like nazis - "we will not share this land - it is for jews only!". this kind of policy has come back to bite us in the ass before. its very shortsighted. well if you read it a few days ago it should be easy for you to track down. your refusal to provide a link is either laziness or dishonesty on your part. i posted an article that goes against what you are saying so you are going to have to do better than "i read an article, but i dont feel like looking it up - you do it". you asked for info on the us attacking iran by proxy and i provided it. the least you can do is provide proof of your claims, as i have done. i dont think one thing has anything to do with the other either, but why does our government keep telling us that it does? and again, please stop with the silly analogies - they are totally out of context. isnt this what we tried to do? and you call me naive and foolish! so its their fault for joining the military? they should expect to be constantly deployed over and over again for the next 100 years? its mighty cowardly to saber-rattle for a war which you are too scared to fight and than chide others who did. my two cousins have been in the military since the 90's - they didnt join after the war started and even if they did, that doesnt give our government the right to treat them as they have. that is such a chicken-**** excuse - "they shouldnt have joined if they dont like it". try doing 3 year long deployments since 2003 and see how you like it. we left saudi b/c the royal family kicked us out (they were the ones trying to appease the muslim extremists). but im glad that you admit that the bush administration has given into the terrorists on this issue. one of bin ladens reasons for 9/11 was our presence in saudi. and after 9/11 we left! mission accomplished! that is total insanity. ive honestly never heard ANYONE advocate this position - you want us to be the sole empire which runs the world. you want a troop presence in every country? that would take millions. we are stretched thin as it is. this would require a draft/conscription. again, if you really feel this way you should join the military - they need true believers like yourself. and how would you like it if we were an occupied country? i wouldnt like it - i would go all red dawn on anyone who tried it. me and swayzee. that was your implication. so than why even bring it up? that seems to be our foreign policy regarding the middle east - how has that worked out over the last 55 years or so? no, actually what happened is that when our government realized that the shah was about to get overthrown we dropped our support of him and helped the revolution. so not only did we help prop up the brutal, murdering dictator, but when he was no longer useful to us we threw him under the bus. thats some pretty gangster type stuff. i disagree and i would argue that your failure to recognize the connection is your main problem. again, its a selfish and hypocritical view.
Diplomats: Iran processes uranium gas _____ So what is the big deal if Iran develops a low grade fission bomb? They'll never use it and they won't give it away for some terrorist group to use after they spend billions developing the thing. If they decide in the future and figure out how to actually deliver it accurately to Jerusalem -- the thermonuclear retaliation would be massive - effectively ending Iran as a nation. The Iranian nuclear threat, waterboarding, Roger Clemens -- it's all so over the top.
They actually already have a long range ICMB program capable of delivering a reasonably sized bomb to Israel. They are much futher along in the delivery part than the warhead part. My belief is that the reason that there has been no Arab/Islamic-Israeli war since 1973 is that that is when Israel developed 'the bomb' - the threat of nuclear retaliation prevents countries from attacking Israel. It is further my belief that many countries Arab/Islamic would provoke a full conventional war in the ME with the intention of eradicating Israel if they could do so free from fear of this nuclear retaliation. Finally, it is my belief that this is what Iran is doing - producing a nuclear arsenal in order to counter the Israeli arsenal, which would enable them to start this war. I think there is a good model for this in the Pakistan-India conflict. After India developed weapons, there was a long lull. Almost as soon as Pakistan developed its weapons to counter India, however, the Kargil War occurred. Furthermore, the Kargil War is a good example of how easily things can spiral out of control. From many documents I’ve read, without the explicit permission of the Pakistani government, front line Pakistani forces were deploying weapons with the intent to use when the war ended. Genuinely, from all I understand we were very close to a Kashmir nuclear conflict. I think the development of nuclear weapons by Iran almost guarantees a full scale traditional regional war in the ME, and makes a full scale nuclear war a legitimately possibility. Both of these results are not good.
They are far away from having a warhead small enough to stick on the top of one of their sketchy missile systems. Iran doesn't the tech to miniaturize a fission device on their own and they don't have the infrastructure to build one if the plans for a modern weapon were handed to them. They don't have any heavy bombers so it will be a one and done shock the world test (see N. Korea) or they will have to deliver it by freight train or oil tanker.
You manage to make alot of vague accusations laden with sarchasm (sketchy missles, deliver by freight train or oil tainker), but your comments are light on fact. The truth is the Shahab-3 is supposed to be a very capable and accurate missle and it is capable of carying a moderately large payload. 1000 kg = 2204 lbs. That weight is significantly less than the frontline ICMB warheads that the US was using in the early 1950's. (Mk.7 warhead was introduced in 1952 and weighed 1600 lbs, or 725 kg according to globalsecurity.org.) You can make all sorts of claims about the shabbiness of their missles, but there is not credible source which I can find which is in agreement with you on this. [rquoter] The Iranian Shahab-3 ballistic missile means Meteor-3 or Shooting Star-3 in Farsi [alternatively designated Zelzal (Earthquake)] is derived from the 1,350-1,600 kilometer range North Korean No-dong missile. The Shahab-3 reportedly has a range of between 1,350 and 1,600 kilometers and is capable of carrying a 1,000-760 kilogram warhead. [/rquoter] http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/content/?cid=5031
The Iranian Shahab-3 ballistic missile means Meteor-3 or Shooting Star-3 in Farsi [alternatively designated Zelzal (Earthquake)] is derived from the 1,350-1,600 kilometer range North Korean No-dong missile. The Shahab-3 reportedly has a range of between 1,350 and 1,600 kilometers and is capable of carrying a 1,000-760 kilogram warhead. _____ Is this info from US intelligence or is this self reported from North Korea and Iran? The No-dong's track record and missiles based on this NK tech would land in the 'sketchy' category IMO. I'm sorry for coming off so sarcastic -- I was just trying to add a bit of color to a quickly typed post. I don't mean to make a big debate out of this -- right now my opinion is that the nuclear threat coming out of Iran is being overblown for political reasons.
I am about 80% committed to voting for Barack Obama in the next election, but Iran is one of the issues I fear he is not capable of handling. The Iranian leadership from mullahs to bureaucracy are natural born liars, and I fear Obama will trust them to keep their word. Of course, agreements to their benefit would be kept. Those that didn't simply don't exist. I would hope that Obama understands that. My big fear is that he doesn't.
