[FreeKeys]

In either case, there was absolutely no reason for the U.S. government to basically help serve as the guarantor of British Petroleum's investments in the Middle East.

That makes sense. But you don't see ANY truth to the suggestion that Iran had become our strongest ally in the Muslim world? Or that Iran was showing more modernity than the rest of the Muslim world? At all? Do you think past mistakes, Ike's or whoever's, absolves Carter of his?

[Alberta's Child]

Iran was "showing more modernity" than the rest of the Muslim world because the combination of British colonialism and Persian culture made the country more conducive to modernity.

Do you think past mistakes, Ike's or whoever's, absolves Carter of his?

Carter was really in a no-win situation on this particular issue. Do the Clinton administrations blunders in the 1990s absolve the Bush administration of its responsibilities for 9/11? I think they do, for the most part.