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Would Attacking Iran Be Worth It?

Tricky said:
LOL. Who won it? Are you seriously suggesting that the breakup of Russia was due to a single factor? It happened over many years, not because Reagan made speeches on how the US needs to keep building weapons to attack the Evil Empire if necessary... Oh wait. Isn't that what you are afraid Iran is doing? Being too much like us?
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Leadership certainly played a great role. Are you suggesting it was an accident?
You are right I am afraid a bad guy with the same pile of nukes like us.
 
Tricky said:
Gosh, that almost sounds like you don't care why others have different points of view. No wonder you have such a low view of diplomacy.
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I care points of view, not intention statements, which most of time are just lies.
 
D'rok the Lacone said:
There has been no American diplomatic contact with Iran for 27 years until today's scheduled meeting in Baghdad.
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Ya, you are right, but how to have a diplomatic contact with someone who can hold diplomatic staff as hostages?

I am not just talking about US diplomacy, also UN, which has just been kicked out by the Iranian government.
 
D'rok the Lacone said:
Are you seriously trying to assert the Iranian government is behind the Iraqi Sunni insurgency? Or am I mis-interpreting your mangled syntax?
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Some Iranian soldiers got caught in Iraq and the most anti-US Iraqi happen to be someone back from Iran, you don't thing this is just coincident, do you?
 
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yinyinwang said:
Ya, you are right, but how to have a diplomatic contact with someone who can hold diplomatic staff as hostages?
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Not aiding the overthrow their democratically elected governments (Mossadegh) and the installation of a repressive dictator (Shah) would be a start.

I am not just talking about US diplomacy, also UN, which has just been kicked out by the Iranian government.
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My longer post outlines the reasons why Iran is currently less than cooperative with the UN.
 
yinyinwang said:
Some Iranian soldiers got caught in Iraq and the most anti-US Iraqi happen to be someone back from Iran, you don't thing this is just coincident, don't you?
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Can you source that claim about Iranian soldiers in Iraq? You don't mean the consular officials that were there on the invitation of the Iraqi government do you?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_attack_on_Iranian_liaison_office_in_Arbil

About the other thing...I assume that you are talking about al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army. Do you really think that the Shia leaders (such as al-Sadr and al-Sistani) and militias are the insurgency? I think you'll find that they are, relatively speaking, forces of moderation in Iraq. This is in their interests because the American invasion has overthrown the Sunni minority that repressively ruled the country and has handed control of the country to the Shia majority. Al-Sadr wants the Americans out so the Shia can get on with the business of consolidating their power. This is also in Iran's interests. Al-Sistani and al-Sadr are influenced by Iran, but their actions have been primarily political and rhetorical (Najaf being the obvious exception). In fact, al-Sistani has consistently stepped in to broker peace and call for calm whenever tensions have gotten out of hand.

To put it simply, Iranian backed Shia factions in Iraq resist American occupation primarily through political action. The active insurgency consists mostly of the displaced Sunni minority.

Invading Iraq has ultimately served Iran's interests, not America's.
 
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D'rok the Lacone said:
:confused:

No idea what you are trying to assert here. Can you clarify?
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Can you please explain why you dropped in the matter of the Shah coming to power to explain Iran of today? You seem to presume a universal antipathy among Persians, et al, to embrace the modern world with your stab at "causes" of US Iran tension. The news out of Iran suggests otherwise, among a great deal of the public.

I also think you are selectively ignoring a great deal of Islamic Revolutionary rhetoric of the early 1980's.

DR
 
Darth Rotor said:
Can you please explain why you dropped in the matter of the Shah coming to power to explain Iran of today?
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It's the 900 lb gorilla in the room when discussing American/Iranian relations. I'm not assigning complete blame to past American foreign policy for conditions today; I'm simply pointing out a significant factor in the climate of mutual distrust.

You seem to presume a universal antipathy among Persians, et al, to embrace the modern world with your stab at "causes" of US Iran tension. The news out of Iran suggests otherwise, among a great deal of the public.
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Not really. I'm trying - perhaps unsuccessfully - to rationally analyze the actions, rhetoric and behaviour of the Iranian regime...not its people. IMO, whatever grassroots inclinations towards western-style modernity that exist in Iran are not being helped by the current American approach.

I also think you are selectively ignoring a great deal of Islamic Revolutionary rhetoric of the early 1980's.
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How much of this was blowback from the policy of regime change that helped bring the Shah to power? Would these elements of Iranian society have been marginalized had the Mossadegh government been allowed to stand? These are unanswerable questions, but I feel that modernity had a chance to flourish in Iran in the 50's and America played a role in crushing it.
 
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D'rok the Lacone said:
How much of this was blowback from the policy of regime change that helped bring the Shah to power? Would these elements of Iranian society have been marginalized had the Mossadegh government been allowed to stand? These are unanswerable questions, but I feel that modernity had a chance to flourish in Iran in the 50's and America played a role in crushing it.
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The Shah was big on modernization, which is part of what caused social blowback. To pretend that "democracy" was going to sustain itself in the mid 1950's in Iran is to make a lot of assumptions about the character of Iran and its neighbors. The reaction to the speed of modernization that one saw in Iran was called by some "future shock."

The rate of modernization, which is indeed a problem for many cultures, is not confined to the Persian culture.

DR
 
D'rok the Lacone said:
Can you source that claim about Iranian soldiers in Iraq? You don't mean the consular officials that were there on the invitation of the Iraqi government do you?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_attack_on_Iranian_liaison_office_in_Arbil

About the other thing...I assume that you are talking about al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army. Do you really think that the Shia leaders (such as al-Sadr and al-Sistani) and militias are the insurgency? I think you'll find that they are, relatively speaking, forces of moderation in Iraq. This is in their interests because the American invasion has overthrown the Sunni minority that repressively ruled the country and has handed control of the country to the Shia majority. Al-Sadr wants the Americans out so the Shia can get on with the business of consolidating their power. This is also in Iran's interests. Al-Sistani and al-Sadr are influenced by Iran, but their actions have been primarily political and rhetorical (Najaf being the obvious exception). In fact, al-Sistani has consistently stepped in to broker peace and call for calm whenever tensions have gotten out of hand.

To put it simply, Iranian backed Shia factions in Iraq resist American occupation primarily through political action. The active insurgency consists mostly of the displaced Sunni minority.

Invading Iraq has ultimately served Iran's interests, not America's.
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You don't think kidnapping British soldiers in Iraqi water were just rumors, do you?
The IEDs are highly sophisticated, you don't think a bunch of "displaced" insurgency can do it, do you?
Al Qaeda is operating there too, not just Sunnis.
Iran certainly wants that way and you better wish them good luck.
 
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UnrepentantSinner said:
The more I read threads like this the more convinced I am that there are a lot of people who don't know diddly about:
1. Iran
2. The Middle East
3. International Relations
4. Realpolitik
5. The limitations of American military power

What is most disconcerting is that some of these people are or might wind up making decisions in Washington rather than call talk radio shows or post to the Internet.
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This is most disconcerting? Moreso than Iran having nukes?

Interesting thought process.
 
SezMe said:
It is a simple-minded question. The USSR had been in decline for decades trying to be a super-power while much of the nation existed in third-world conditions. We didn't win the cold war, they lost it - and the distinction is important.
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Containment, combined with ratcheting up the technology to demonstrate freedom-based capitalism can grossly outproduce a command-and-control dictatorship isn't a win?

Surely you don't hold the notion that Reagan saying, "Tear down that wall" really brought the cold war to an end. No, it was years of many complex world factors that lead to its collapse. The same thing would have happened had someone other than Reagan been President.
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No, it would not necessarily have. I can easily conceive a continuation of Carter and the like keeping a lot less pressure on them.
 
yinyinwang said:
You don't think kidnapping British soldiers in Iraqi water were just rumors, do you?
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Non sequitur. Your claim was that Iranian soldiers were captured in Iraq.

The IEDs are highly sophisticated, you don't think a bunch of "displaced" insurgency can do it, do you?
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I'm quite confident that military ordinance expertise exists natively in Iraq. They wouldn't have had much luck in the Iran/Iraq war without it. If you are going to make the claim that some weapons used by the insurgency contain parts manufactured in Iran and therefore Iran is culpable, then the American arms industry has much to answer for - perhaps the Lebanese should blame America when Israel bombards them with American weapons eh? (Hint...the answer is no).


Al Qaeda is operating there too, not just Sunnis.
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Al Qaeda is Sunni.

Iran certainly wants that way and you better wish them good luck.
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Luck has nothing to do with it. Blundering foolishness masquerading as American foreign policy does.
 
Darth Rotor said:
The Shah was big on modernization, which is part of what caused social blowback. To pretend that "democracy" was going to sustain itself in the mid 1950's in Iran is to make a lot of assumptions about the character of Iran and its neighbors. The reaction to the speed of modernization that one saw in Iran was called by some "future shock."

The rate of modernization, which is indeed a problem for many cultures, is not confined to the Persian culture.

DR
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I claimed that democracy had a chance to sustain itself. That chance was extinguished with American help. Perhaps it may have been extinguished without such help, but that does not justify the intervention or make it any less relevant to current relations.
 
D'rok the Lacone said:
I'm quite confident that military ordinance expertise exists natively in Iraq. They wouldn't have had much luck in the Iran/Iraq war without it. If you are going to make the claim that some weapons used by the insurgency contain parts manufactured in Iran and therefore Iran is culpable, then the American arms industry has much to answer for - perhaps the Lebanese should blame America when Israel bombards them with American weapons eh? (Hint...the answer is no).
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They should blame Iran for their money and rockets in Lebanon.
 
Just a tiny reminder.

Iran (or as it used to be known "Persia", is not an Arab country.
The majority language is Farsi, not Arabic.
Most Iranians get at least as annoyed at being called "Arab" as Canadians do at being called "American" or vice versa.
Persia was a rather civilised place not only before America was known to Europe, but also before anyone ever heard of Allah.
 
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