Merry Christmas Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20061224/D8M6SRLO0.html

Does this mean anything? Will it result in any change in Iran?

My put, No and No.

Your take?

Merry Christmas Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20061224/D8M6SRLO0.html
Does this mean anything? Will it result in any change in Iran?
My put, No and No.
Your take?I think sanctions are going to be counter-productive. Iran is a signatory to the non-proliferation treaty which gives it the right to develop nuclear power for non-military purposes. Iran claims that it's nuclear program is just that. Whether it is for weapons, or will be in the future, is another matter, and sanctions will just push Iran further towards abandoning the treaty - which will then mean it has the full right of a non-signatory to build nuclear weapons.

But, perhaps that is the intent of this administration.

No real change- both North Korea and Iran will do what they want. Another foreign policy failure; after calling them the axis of evil, we should have prioritized the real dangers, instead of going into Bahgdad.

Better question; what will happen now? Only the really naive believe Iran is building a nuk-ler (OK, bad swipe there) power program; so how to convince them NOT to use the bomb for intimidation? Money? (No- they sell oil.) Pressure? (Cough, cough.) Should we prop up a Shah of Iraq for counterbalance purposes? (Didn't work so well last time.....)

Here is an off the wall idea- lets try a REAL energy program, a la Manhattan project style, and get some kind of a fuel cell that is cheaper than oil. Then give it away, or half price it, or something to that effect. Knock the legs completely out from under the whole mideast geopolitics with one stroke.

Because as long as they have money- they will attempt to buy power and influence with bombs and missiles.

... as long as they have money- they will attempt to buy power and influence with bombs and missiles.As long as they feel threatened and have money, they will attempt to buy power and influence with bombs and missiles.

Does it occur to no-one that the ruling sectors of Iran and North Korea and, indeed, any country, acts according to what they perceive as in their country's best interests? Calling them evil does nothing to change that. In fact, this is the same reason that America and the UK act the way they do - in what they perceive as in their own best interests.

Do we really believe that Ahmedinejad or Kim Jong Il or Assad wake up each morning saying to themselves, "How can I mess with the Americans today?" Of course not. They are concerned with the affairs of their own countries, the wellbeing of their own people, and the success of their own economies. Just like we do.

They wouldn't be looking for these unbelievable expensive weapons if they didn't feel threatened. And by whom do they feel threatened?

Looking around the world today, isn't it obvious?

Might we not serve our own best interests by taking steps so that these countries, who we so flippantly regard as 'enemies,' did not feel threatened by us?

Would you, as an individual, treat me better if I appeared to you to be a threat to your wellbeing? Or would you treat me better if I did not appear to be a threat?

Calling the US "The Great Satan" is not conducive to discussions and good feelings- and I feel the conduct since the overthrow of the Shah of Iran has been hostile, even when Reagan pulled out of the region, and we showed restraint in the Gulf War. There is a hatred of the US, and its culture, as is shown most notably by Iran; but they are not alone in the Mideast. Thanks to w. and his failed stratagy, we lost a couple of decades to intertwine our affairs- and make it "bad" to attack us.

Of course, all countries act in their own best interest- it is just that the free world sees the advantage of pulling along the less fortunate.

IMO, after the overthrow of the Shah, the Iranian Hostage Crisis, and 2 plus decades of their funding terrorism and fomenting conflict in Iraq and elsewhwere, labelling Iran as a member of the Axis of Evil can not be considered a 'flippant' decision.

We have been the 'Great Satan' foil to Iranian expansion for nearly 3 decades, they know who their enemy is, unfortunately, we do not seem to recognize ours.

The UN will fail to prevent nukular proliferation in Iran, just as it did in Libya, and North Korea, and India and Pakistan, only the result will be different.

Libya voluntarily abandoned its WMD programs after the US led ousting of the Taliban in Afghanistan and Saddam Hussein in Iraq, North Korea continues to attempt nukular blackmail, India and Pakistan remain in a tense peace, but Iran will surely transfer nukular weapons technology to non-state actors and the US will wake up to a smoking crater where a major metropolitan center used to be, and then it will be too late.

Both these posts describe an Iran which is more interested in rattling America's cage than in managing their own affairs. I believe that is a mistaken view.

It's very easy, now, to blame Iran for the animosity between the two countries, but Iran did not attack the United States - America attacked Iran. Following the downfall of the despotic Shah (an American puppet) in a popular uprising of the people, America has made itself Iran's enemy. Almost immediately, the American government arranged with Saddam Hussein to attack the new theocratic regime in Iran. And he did.

One would have thought that a popular uprising by the people against a monarch, would be something America would support, considering her own history! But the opposite took place. Had America followed the lessons learned from her own history, we would have a much better world today.

Still, besides the mistakes of the past, what of the present situation. As long as we continue to look upon Iran as having nothing better to do than antagonize America, and as long as America chooses to continually antagonize Iran, we cannot expct anything better than we have.

I repeat my questions, that went unanswered by both BL and KG - Might we not serve our own best interests by taking steps so that these countries did not feel threatened by us? Would you, as an individual, treat me better if I appeared to you to be a threat to your wellbeing? Or would you treat me better if I did not appear to be a threat?


To comment on a couple of points raised: "The UN will fail to prevent nukular proliferation in Iran" - Absolutely - because the UN is currently *pushing* Iran towards proliferating nuclear weapons, at America's behest.

"Calling the US "The Great Satan" is not conducive to discussions and good feelings" - likewise calling Iran part of an Axis of Evil. The sooner we all stop the stupid namecalling, the better. And we could start!

"There is a hatred of the US, and its culture" - Or, do you think it might be a hatred of what the US does and is doing in their world?

Spider, the origins of the Iran-Iraq war have nothing to do with America other than for the tinfoil-hat wearing conspiracy theorists.

The conflict between Iran and Iraq over the Khuzestan (Arabistan) area dates back to the beginings of recorded history and is seen with Sumerians (25th century BC), between Persia and the Ottomans (16th through 20th centuries), and notably between modern Iraq and Iran in 1959, again in 1969, when diplomatic relations between the two were broken in 1971, and when the US prompted Iran (yes Iran) to attack Iraq in 1975 which led to a short resumption of diplomatic relations but also created Iranian supported attempts to destabilize Iraq, and ultimately the Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988), initiated by Saddam Hussein against the Islamic Republic of Iran (led by Ayatollah Khomeni) - or AFTER the fall of the Shah, and AFTER the Hostage Crisis.

America never attacked Iran.

You have fallen hook line and sinker for the past 3 decades of Iranian 'America is the Great Satan' rhetoric and fail to look to history or to the current situation in Iran, where again there are calls for regime change, where there are dissident student groups and opposition political parties who see the failure of the Islamic Revolution to improve the situation in Iran (standard of living and earnings have gone DOWN since the revolution).

What would have the US do in support of democratic reform seekers in the Islamic Republic today?

You suggest that America is influencing the UN to create a nukular Iran (quite a feat of diplomatic machiavellian maneuvering, for an admitedly diplomatically challenged administration don't you think?) - and yet you refuse to take Ahmadinejad's word (Iran is going nukular), choosing rather the beaurocrats who say they need highly enriched weapons grade uranium (as discovered recently by IAEA inspectors) for 'peaceful power generation'. It is a display of cognitive dissonance that fails the test of Occam's Razor (simplest explanation is usually correct).

And in the coup-de-grace, you suggest America should make sure Iran does not feel threatened by US? Hmmmmmmm.

We are not the ones suggesting Iran will be burned by an unimaginable fire.

We are not the ones threatening the destruction of Iran or of her allies.

We are not the ones overtly and covertly supporting terrorism against Iranian troops and attempting to throw another nation into civil war.

Methinks thou dost protest too much.

But Merry Christmas anyway.

I don't have the interest or inclination to research all those 'facts' but do not accept them as presented. I see them as diversionary tactics to avoid the points I raised.

I know that as soon as we get to labelling opposing ideas as tin-foil hat conspiracy theories, that rational thought has ended. I choose not to procede along those lines.

I have not 'fallen ..for.. Iranian 'America is the Great Satan' rhetoric' and to make such a statement is clearly intended to reduce this polite political discussion to a personal level. I will not fall for that, either.


I hope you are having a Merry Christmas, too. Thank you for your good wishes.