Iran Is Just Another American Diaster

[tabs]

In 1919 Ho Chi Minh attended the Versailles Peace Treaty negotiations in France. Ho along with the Arabs among others, were there to promote recognition and freedom from colonial rule for their peoples. His role model was Thomas Jefferson and the Declaration of Independence. Their efforts were for naught. In 1940 France fell to the Germans and as a result the Japanese occupied French In-do China. After WW2 the US supported French claims to their former colony in return for French support against the Soviets in Europe. The US with regards to Ho Chi Minh saw him as being "red" and failed to see that he was a nationalist first and a "commie rat" second. As such Uncle Ho had no choice but to ally himself with the only other hedge against American power, the Soviets. This misinterpretation eventually led to the US involvement in Vietnam with its unfortunate consequences.

In 1898 the US started a "glorious little war" that ran Spain out of Cuba and the Philippines. The US soon instituted a banana republic style government in Cuba which for the next 50 years did the bidding of US corporations and increasingly organized crime. To relieve Cuba of the corruption of US influence, Castro had no choice but to rid Cuba of American influence. To that end the only power that could countervail US power was the Soviets. Again this misinterpretation of nationalism for communism led to the Bay of Pigs and near armageddon of the Cuban Missile crisis.

For centuries the Russians have coveted Persian (Iranian) territory and tensions have existed between the two. In 1954, in fear of a Democratically elected government in Tehran turning "red," the US instituted a coup that installed the Shan of Iran. For the next 20 odd years the Americans influenced Iranian national affairs. The only real political opposition to the Shan was the religious faction of the Ayatollah Khomeini. The only way that the Iranians could take back their country from the meddling of the Americans was by kicking them out of the country and institutiong a radical Islamic state. Thus the state of affairs that exists today.

The conclusion that can be made about Iran is that Iran is deathly afraid of American economic and military power being able to meddle in her affairs. To maintain an independent state of affairs, Iran has to be oposed to American influence and power in the region. As an act of survival Iran has to destabilize American efforts in the region so that America is not able to consolidate her power, which they fear will then be turned against Teheran. . That in turn makes Tehran appear to Washington as a "rogue state."

[Panzer909]

Oh would you please just STFU. Who asked for your opinion on the matter, anyways?


How do I know that by reading your posted vomit, you never put on a uniform & served your country. "But Panzer909, America only has itself to blame!!" Lemme guess - the 4th of July is just another stupid little American holiday, right?

[Dottore]

Agree 100%.

US overseas adventurism is a long and sorry story of good intentions gone wrong.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Yep.

Our resources and military are needed HERE, not anywhere else.

Most of Europe saw the folly in imperialism decades ago, I guess we're just playing catch-up in that department. Sooner we start worrying about what's going on at home rather than everyplace else (and using our OWN resources), the better off we're gonna' be.

[m21sniper]

Originally Posted by Dottore

Agree 100%.

US overseas adventurism is a long and sorry story of good intentions gone wrong.

Heh, i'm not really sure how many of the intentions were 'good', but i sure agree many of them have gone wrong.

But then the same is true of almost all world powers. Christ, look at the misadventures France and the UK have created across the globe to date.

And all of us put together aren't as bad as what Spain did in it's heyday, i suppose.

[DARISC]

Originally Posted by m21sniper

Heh, i'm not really sure how many of the intentions were 'good', but i sure agree many of them have gone wrong.

But then the same is true of almost all world powers. Christ, look at the misadventures France and the UK have created across the globe to date.

And all of us put together aren't as bad as what Spain did in it's heyday, i suppose.

I keep reading all the words you string together, waiting for you to actually SAY something!

[m21sniper]

Clearly you must be mentally challenged if you didn't get the obvious message in my post.

Ie, "All world powers make mistakes on the global stage, regularly- the US is no exception."

If you really want to boil my post down to it's simplest form, it's "We're all human and make mistakes."

I think you're probably just very slow cuz.

[Dottore]

Originally Posted by m21sniper

Ie, "All world powers make mistakes on the global stage, regularly- the US is no exception."

Some seem to make more mistakes than others.

Guess how many of the following countries the US has meddled in militarily since WWII?

Afghanistan
Angola
Brazil
British Guiana
Cambodia
Chile
Congo
Cuba
Dominican Republic
East Timor
El Salvador
Greece
Grenada
Guatemala
Haiti
Iran
Iraq
Italy
Laos
Lebanon
Lybia
Nicaragua
Panama
Philippines
Somalia
Yugoslavia
Venezuela
Vietnam

[Mule]

Originally Posted by Dottore

Agree 100%.

US overseas adventurism is a long and sorry story of good intentions gone wrong.

In your oh so aloof & worldly view, has the USA ever done anything good or right?

[Mule]

Originally Posted by Dottore

Some seem to make more mistakes than others.

Guess how many of the following countries the US has meddled in militarily since WWII?

Afghanistan
Angola
Brazil
British Guiana
Cambodia
Chile
Congo
Cuba
Dominican Republic
East Timor
El Salvador
Greece
Grenada
Guatemala
Haiti
Iran
Iraq
Italy
Laos
Lebanon
Lybia
Nicaragua
Panama
Philippines
Somalia
Yugoslavia
Venezuela
Vietnam

They seem to accept our money pretty well so do you have a point, other than you hate the USA? And I would think someone as worldly & sophisticated as yourself would be able to spell Libya.

[Joeaksa]

Originally Posted by Panzer909

Oh would you please just STFU. Who asked for your opinion on the matter, anyways?


How do I know that by reading your posted vomit, you never put on a uniform & served your country. "But Panzer909, America only has itself to blame!!" Lemme guess - the 4th of July is just another stupid little American holiday, right?

Ahhh, have you ever entertained the option of drinking decaf?

No one forces you to click open these threads. If you do not like Tabs postings, then frigging do not open them!

[Hugh R]

Originally Posted by Panzer909

Oh would you please just STFU. Who asked for your opinion on the matter, anyways?


How do I know that by reading your posted vomit, you never put on a uniform & served your country. "But Panzer909, America only has itself to blame!!" Lemme guess - the 4th of July is just another stupid little American holiday, right?

WTF is wrong with you? Drinking make you cranky or something? BTW, what part of what Tabs wrote is incorrect? I really have no respect whatsoever for people who get on this board and hurl insults, as opposed to informed debate. You're 32, but you're acting like you're 16. Go to Rennlist or some other place if you need to have that kind of attitude.

[tabs]

The point is to learn from your mistakes in JUDGEMENT so that one has a clear and accurate appraisal of the situation so that one does not make the same kind of mistake again. The highlighted mistakes were due to American IGNORANCE about the real motives of the people in the nations involved. The United States tends to view things only from the hubris of our own perspective. If one stops and thinks about the other guys motives for acting as they do then you can hopefully avoid costly mistakes. In war the party that has superior knowledge of the enemy is at an advantage. Just ask ole Robert E Lee about that one.

[livi]

I am impressed by most of you! It actually seems many of you have considered the possibility that some American political decisions of war could maybe, possibly have been less than awesome..

[Hugh R]

I used to work for a then Honeywell-owned company called Tetra Tech, based in Pasadena, CA. We had a number of government contracts for doing coastal seafloor mapping with side scanning sonar. Our ships were under contract to the US Navy. We did surveys off the coast of Iran before the fall of the Shah, Chile before the fall of Allende, Haiti before the fall of Papa Doc, Nicaragua before the fall of Ortega, are you starting to see a trend here? We were the US equivalent of a Russian fishing trawler of the coast of the United States, for those of you who are old enough to remember that. I know for a fact that we were the "bag man" for the CIA in Oman and Jordan. The US, and other countries as well, have a very, very long history of meddling in the affairs of other sovereign nations. To deny it is just being naive.

Why do we still have US troops in about 75 other countries anyway?

[David]

I'm dumb struck by the number of Americans that don't correlate terrorism directly to our meddling with other countries.

People in others countries are doing exactly what we'd do in the same situation... fight!

They can't fight us on the same level so they resort to terrorism.

I agree that some of the thinking in these countries is 100's of years behind the times and human rights records are bad, but if someone marches into your country and tries to tell you what to do, what would you do? Fight!

Our actions in many of these countries have given zelots the enemy they need to create terrorist groups and states.

This issue is one of my biggest reasons for voting for Obama over McCain.

[silverc4s]

Although everything Tabs has put forward is accurate, I am not in agreement with the premise that our (USA) mistakes give Iran a free pass in today's world.

It is always possible to take today's information and make an analysis of past actions and show that serious errors were made. The US was wrong to have allowed (encouraged) slavery, the Crusades were wrong, the Moorish invasions westward as far as Spain & Portugal were wrong, the European colonization of half the world was wrong, the Papal Inquisitions were wrong, all middle eastern artifacts taken and now resting in western museums are an affront to those civilizations. The list could go on forever.

In my view, no one gets a free pass to threaten all of civilization (terrorism defined), regardless of the injustices they suffer or feel they have suffered. Especially over injustices suffered by long dead ancestors, by long dead ancestors of someone else.

I think that all man's conflicts REALLY boil down to one groups desire for land, wealth, and/or food in the posession of another group. Like competing anthills. Sadly we are not much better than that, yet.

[m21sniper]

Originally Posted by Dottore

Some seem to make more mistakes than others.

Guess how many of the following countries the US has meddled in militarily since WWII?

Afghanistan
Angola
Brazil
British Guiana
Cambodia
Chile
Congo
Cuba
Dominican Republic
East Timor
El Salvador
Greece
Grenada
Guatemala
Haiti
Iran
Iraq
Italy
Laos
Lebanon
Lybia
Nicaragua
Panama
Philippines
Somalia
Yugoslavia
Venezuela
Vietnam

A list of British and French flubs would be equally long (if not longer).

For the British, you can start with the Americas.

For the French, they can claim as much stake to disaster in Vietnam as we can. More in fact, they were outright militarily defeated there.

PS: How was Panama a mistake? For that matter, how the hell do you list Italy (Churchill's idea, btw), Greece, Grenada or Venezuela as mistakes? Nicuragua was a mistake? Libya was a mistake? The Phillipines was a mistake?

I mean, the Congo? What are you kidding?

You have quite an unusual outlook on things....

[m21sniper]

Originally Posted by tabs

In war the party that has superior knowledge of the enemy is at an advantage. Just ask ole Robert E Lee about that one.

You can ask any military officer or NCO about that one.

[m21sniper]

Originally Posted by 125shifter

I'm dumb struck by the number of Americans that don't correlate terrorism directly to our meddling with other countries.

I'm dumbstruck by the number of -people- who don't correlate 'meddling' with the necessities of real world geo-politics.

Everything that's done is done by the powers that be at the time for what appears to be sound and reasoned logic. It is the law of unintended consequences that typically makes a disaster of things. People don't start out to step on their own dick.

It just happens. To everyone.