Posted on 04/05/2007 4:30:05 AM PDT by IrishMike
It’s probably a good rule to do the opposite of anything the Iranian theocracy wants. Apparently, this government is now doing its darnedest to be bombed. So, for the time being, we should not grant them this wish. In the last three years, the ranting adolescent theocrats in Tehran have alienated the United Nations’ Security Council to the point of earning trade sanctions. That’s a hard thing to do, given the U.N.’s bias toward the former third world and the way China and Russia value petroleum and trade above all else.
Prior to capturing last month 15 British military personnel, Iran had for years misled and embarrassed Britain, Germany, and France, who all tried to negotiate a peaceful end to Iranian nuclear proliferation. And as a rule, these are European nations that will suffer almost any indignity to talk a problem away.
It is also nearly impossible to offend the Russian government on any matter of law — except squelching on debts. Still, Iran even accomplished that. Moscow is withdrawing from the country its nuclear technicians, who are critical to Tehran’s efforts to obtain the bomb.
There is no need to mention Israel, which top Iranians have promised to wipe off the map — despite the fact that Israel is a nuclear power with a long record of military prowess. The Iranian leadership’s efforts to promote a radical Persian Shiite Islam have terrified nearby Sunni Jordan, Egypt, and the Gulf monarchies that now detest Iran as much as they do Israel.
Our beef with Iran, of course, goes back well before George W. Bush’s presidency. “The Great Satan” as a slur for America was coined when Jimmy Carter was president. In 1979, student gangsters stormed the American embassy in Tehran and took hostages.
(Excerpt) Read more at article.nationalreview.com ...
where are the men of character and resolve on the world political scene today?
truly, are there any left?
LOL. Well put.
Na, only in the movies.
the first warrior hero that sets foot on the global stage to lead and defend the west, and (unlike bush) willing to directly confront the socialist left, will be followed like a messiah
“Instead, if the EU would cease all its trade with Iran, and if the West would divest entirely from the country — that is, boycott all companies that do any business with Tehran — the theocracy would face bankruptcy within months”
Won’t happen.
If it happens, the USA will have to do it. Then we would be blamed for every terror attack where ever it occurs.
I like VDH, but this reads like Pennsylvania Dutch, “mama from the train a kiss” stuff.
“I’m a nut in a dinner jacket” knows that the west does not have the stomach for a fight. They watch our evening news everynight here just like we do. They are laughing as the most powerful nation on earth is brought to it’s knees by political correctness (without them ever havng to fire a shot). Pat Buchanan’s book “The Death of The West” is ever so appropriate now.
Semper Fi’
Jarhead
The British soldiers who were captured were on a UN mission.
I dont know what Britain will do now,but after the way the UN stood up for the Brits that were captured,the UN would have to find someone else to do their missions.
VDH writes intelligently again.
But this line:
“Even if further escalation were warranted, we could at some future date enforce a naval blockade of the Iranian coast that alone would determine what goods would be allowed into this outlaw regime.”
contradicts the point of this article, that we should not bomb Iran because that’s what they want us to do in order to garner sympathy.
Surely if we set up economic sanctions and a naval blockade, it would only take two photographs of skinny children to garner all they sympathy in the world — including the sympathy of the American moderates who up to this point, as VDH points out, have supported negotiations but who are now demonstrably silent.
Interesting and good point.
“”And as a rule, these are European nations that will suffer almost any indignity to talk a problem away.””
LOL, you put Britain on the same level as France and Germany?
Did Britain ‘talk away’ the war in Afghanistan, or do they in fact have troops fighting and dying there?
Did Britain ‘talk away’ Saddam Hussein and WOMD or do they in fact have troops fighting and dying there? Only yesterday, another 4 British toops were killed there.
You are talking out of your nose IrishMike. You are probably the kind of beaut who was dipping down your pockets to send the IRA some terrorism money a decade or two ago. Suddenly post 9/11 terrorism means something different to you doesn’t it?
Pathetic plastic paddy.
But as Britain refused to apologize for the behavior of its boarding party, continuing to insist that they were operating in Iraqi waters – not inside Iran’s territorial waters, as Tehran alleged – some of Khamenei’s advisers began to have second thoughts.
Adding to those doubts were reports that the USS Nimitz was steaming toward the Persian Gulf – making it the third Carrier Strike Group in the area.
The Nimitz is expected to join the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower and the USS John C. Stennis, both currently in the Persian Gulf, in the coming weeks.
On Friday, March 30, Khamenei’s top advisers met in an emergency session of the Supreme Council on National Security, chaired by Ali Larijani. Larijani is the regime’s top nuclear negotiator, and is a confidant of the Supreme Leader, while maintaining close ties to President Ahmadinejad.
At that meeting, Revolutionary Guards commander Maj. Gen. Rahim Safavi reported that the deployment of the Nimitz suggested that a U.S. military invasion of Iran was being prepared for early May. He urged the Council to order the release of the British hostages as a gesture to defuse the tension in the region.
The next day, however, the head of the Political and Cultural bureau of the Revolutionary Guards, Dr. Yadollah Javani, called Safavi a “traitor” for proposing the release of the hostages.
While this internal dispute raged, Revolutionary Guards intelligence officers in charge of guarding the hostages continued intense debriefings, aimed at eliciting “confessions” from the British captives that were aired on Iranian television.
The intention was to build a legal “case” against the captives and haul them before a Revolutionary court. During the trial, the regime intended to use forced “confessions” from some of the hostages who alleged they had personal knowledge of British government support for Iranian separatist groups operating in Arab-dominated Khuzestan along the Iraqi border and in Sistan-Balouchestan province, next to Pakistan.
The first inkling that the faction urging release of the hostages was winning appeared on Tuesday evening, when the influential Baztab Web site, run by former Revolutionary Guards commander Gen. Mohsen Rezai, reported that the British captives would soon be released.
“It can now be said that the politicians who are for continuing relations with London have got the upper hand,” Baztab reported. Fars News Agency also reported on Tuesday that a prominent cleric, Hojatt-ol eslam Ghorbanali Najafabadi, was urging the public prosecutor not to pursue a legal case against the British sailors, but to solve the hostage crisis “through international diplomatic channels.”
For now, Tehran’s leaders have backed down. Why? My bets are on the Nimitz
Well almost. Change "talk a problem away" to "talk a current problem into a problem to be solved later".
Well, from what I remember reading about this character...
He did it all for Frodo...He was only the protector of the one who would save the world...
I think that is a noble cause to fight and possibly die for...
And he became King for that effort...And he certainly earned it...
Its a neat story, and something to think about from time to time...
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