You sure ask a lot of questions for someone from Free Republic!
The Iranian people are not happy with the Mullah-led government. Read 1984.
Yep. Dingbat running the country wants to hurry the Muslim Apocalypse, provoke a showdown between "Good and Evil."
Yes... they are thanks to the 24/7 message of weakness and division transmitted by the libs. They know any military action will be a tough sell.
Additionally, the Dems will now claim we can't take on the "real threat" of Iran due to being bogged down in Iraq. We have the country surrounded for pete's sake.
"Is it just me or does it seem like Iran is picking a fight? If so, what is their motivation?"
Iran is following Saddam's playbook with the international community. It needs time and space to develop and test its nukes, and knows that the Euroweasel diplomats are easily cowed into submission.
It seeks nukes to become a regional power. Baghdad and Tel Aviv are its first targets, but just the *threat* of a nuclear strike will increase its influence in the region.
Today a shooting incident was reported among Iranian and Iraqi border patrols.
My thoughts are that if ONE MORE jerk gets on TV and spouts the "We are not prepared for war with Iran......we are overextended....blah blah blah" I'm going to lose it!
It's just you...
They are establishing the political ground work to attack Israel, much as the Third Reich did against Poland.
They know that in the current geoppolitical environment, the world's media organizations will not contenance an attack on Iran for any reason, so they probably figure now is the time to push the envelope of their tyranical ways as far as they can.
...it's all about the $$$$$$$
You sure ask a lot of questions for someone from Free Republic!
Maybe,
I'll bet many in their government would love to throw out a couple of their bosses, set them selves up for leadership positions in the "new" government, benefit from hundreds of billions of American tax dollars, and ultimately cut some sweetheart deals with "foreign investors" for their cut the "oil profits."
It's a no brainer.
For lack of a better word, "macho" carries alot of weight in the ME. Iran (leadership) prolly wouldn't care if half their country turned into a sheet of glass, if they got in a good hit to Israel or the US first. They would see themselves etched in big letters in the muslims vs jews islamofascist history book. They've already shown as a culture(arab/muslim) they are nihilistic enough to off themselves at the drop of a hat. I'm not speaking of the Iranian students and others who are fighting for change- but they seem to be still too outnumbered as yet.
The bombs are already here.
They will wait for us to move against them before the detonate them.
It doesn't matter to their leadership if we nuke them back. They will have done something to us that's never been done.
It's not just you.
Bluster and puffery is the mass-murdering savages ultimate weapon. The modern version of the wild yell.
Saddam tried it, "The mother of all battles".... blah blah blah.
Unfortunately, muslims are slow learners, and as the Iran-Iraq war taught us plainly, they have no problem losing a hundred thousand soldiers to play their game ineffectively.
On the other side, human nature hasn't changed that much since the 8th century. If a horde of screaming savages approach, most modern countries would wet their pants, then the able-bodied will run, even though, today, they are unlikely to be sent to Baghdad or Istanbul to be sold at the slave market.
Then there is the political dimension; the abstract form of "he'll eat me last". Every cowardly nation will turn against the victim, as we have seen in the last couple of generations. Even the U.S., to our shame, has pressured Israel not to punish evil and mindless murder, but to negotiate with it. Why then, are we surprised that the fat, comfortable and made-to-be-slaves Euroweenies have viciously turned against the U.S., actively and covertly aiding the mass murderers?
Nuclear weapons will be used. I would rather it not be by the mass murdering cult from the 7th century first.
If history is a teacher, islam will be allowed to raise its ugly head again in two or three hundred years.
Personally, I would pre-empt that possibility this time around.
Hmmm. Tricky, this one.
How much of the bullsh*t that Ahmadinejad is spouting on the tribulations preceding the "coming of the 12th imam" does he really believe? Hard to say. If he's a true fanatic, then he could be extremely dangerous.
Then again, power is diffused through the Iranian system, so how much power would he really have to make the decision to make a nuclear first strike on Israel? I suspect that, despite the loony rhetoric, Ahmadinejad and the Iranian leadership very much want to keep on living. Suicide bombing is great when somebody else - preferably some deluded Palestinian teenager - does it.
My guess is that the Iranians will def go for a nuke, no matter what. President Bush has made it very clear that regime change in Iran is what we want and the only thing that might stay our hand is nukes in the hands of the mullahs. To them, nukes=regime survival. To us, Iranian nukes is the most compelling reason for regime change.
Which is why a head-on conflict with Iran and Israel and the US is, IMO, inevitable.
via Belmont Club, 322 pages:
http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/PUB629.pdf
However, they obviously do not think the "new management" makes any difference.