Posted on 05/26/2008 9:18:47 AM PDT by mak5
Former US President Jimmy Carter urged Washington to establish friendly ties with Tehran, reiterating the need for his country to resume trade relations with Iran, which he described as a "rational" nation.
Speaking at the Hay Festival yesterday, Carter also suggested the US should provide nuclear power technology and fuel to Iran as a show of goodwill.
"What happens if, in three years' time, Iran has a nuclear weapon," Carter asked. "I'm not sure that is going to happen, but if it does, what do we do? They are rational people like all of us in this room. Do they want to commit suicide? I would guess not. So what we have to do is talk with them now and say to them we want to be their friends," the former US president said.
"The United States must let Iran know that we want to give them fuel and everything they need for a non-military nuclear program. Twenty-five years ago we cut off trading with Iran. We've got to resume trading to show Iran we are friends."
Carter also criticized President George Bush, saying it was a "serious mistake and terrible departure" from the actions of previous US presidents not to engage with countries with which they differed.
"The president of the administration in Washington is the first one to have ever done this and I think we close off ourselves from any sort of rational accommodation of the views of other parties in order to reach out on major goals," said Carter, in a further interview with Sky Arts, to be broadcast today.
Here are a couple of articles that will help clarify your questions.
“Shah” really designates a dynastic ruler or a King.
The late Shah was decreed a Shahanshah or Emperor, which in the old days meant he would have had other kings as vassals. He was granted the historcial mantle
In fact Persia was the only country to ever capture a Roman Emperor.
The late Shah’s father, Reza Shah was so fed up with a weak and ineffective Qajar dynasty, whose teenage Shah lived mostly in Paris (Mossadegh was a prominent member of that family and wanted to restore the Qajar dynasty rather than all the altruistic labels attached to him as a nationalist) that Reza Shah wanted to form a Republic and take over as an elected President!!!
The Members of the Iranian Parliament and Senate - energetically supported by the Islamic clergy - absolutely refused and told him he HAD TO take over as the Shah and voted him into power as a Shah. After which he put back a country that had splintered into tribal territorial self-ruled components without any central government control - into one where the Central Government again took charge.
Albeit subject to the influential interference of both the British and Russians, who continued to call the shots till he began to stand up to them.
Luckily he commanded the Cossack Brigades of Iran and had one of the best local fighting forces who were loyal to him and gave him a bit of sting when he demanded something from the British and Russians.
http://noiri.blogspot.com/2004/03/jimmy-carters-illegal-demands-on-shah.html
http://noiri.blogspot.com/2004/03/who-is-ayatollah-khomeini.html
Also check out the food crisis in Iran (and video)
http://noiri.blogspot.com/2008/05/ever-fewer-iranians-can-afford-to-buy.html
Hey Carter... I know you are trying to change your legacy, but its too late.
A box of rocks are smarter than this guy. Russia offered the Iranians all the nuclear energy fuel they wanted but they turned it down. Iran is only interested in weapons grade Uranium.
But there is a great deal of evidence that the CIA tossed Mossadegh, and there was everlasting resentment afterward. It's a pity they couldn't toss Khomeini.
Then you would guess wrong Jimmy, as usual. Those who believe in stuff like returning 12th Imams and virgins as rewards in heaven for killing innocent people are not even remotely rational.
The harder he tries to change his legacy, the more he secures it.
MOssadegh was in the 50’s, Khomeini was 1979. Different ball game, different players.
Yes, the CIA stepped in when Mossadegh decided to hand Iranian oil to the Soviets lock, stock and barrel and the country = thus a path to warm waters, too.
The West would not, could not permit this.
Mossyface supporters say the Shah signed the nationalization of oil from fearfor his safety . In fact, signing it could well have been a death warrant and a certain assassination, not the other way round.
You will see lots of revisionist history.
http://www.AntiMullah.com has a couple of good articles. Do a Mossadegh search on the site to find both. One is a bilingual English & Farsi.
“Khomeinis’ real father,William Richard Williamson, was born in Bristol, England, in 1872 of British parents and lineage. This detail is based on first-hand evidence from a former Iranian employee of the Anglo- Iranian OilCompany (later British Petroleum: BP), who worked with and met the key players of this saga. This fact was supported by the lack of a denial in 1979 by Col. Archie Chisholm, a BP political officer and former editor at The Financial Times, when interviewed on the subject at his home in County Cork, Ireland, by a British newspaper.”
____________________________________________________________________________
That’s one heck of a wild story. Ayatollah Khomeni’s dad actually being a brit who went native (a la Harry St. John Philby of the Magic Kingdom) and bore children of a Kashmiri Indian woman. The statement that Khomeini could barely even speak Farsi is certainly a new one and glaringly obvious if true. I don’t see how that could be covered up or explained away.
“Islam and Revolution” appears to be the only approved writings to be found on Amazon. I am certainly curious to know if his nuttier early tracts can be had in English.
His numerous coldblooded statements over the years are a matter of record, certainly. His willingness to keep the Iran-Iraq war going for years after Saddam offered peace (”The road to Jerusalem runs through Baghdad”) and pour out several hundred-thousand lives pointlessly is also well known.
Wahabism, Salafism, Deobandism, Khomeniism. Baskin-Robbins thirty-one flavors of Theo-tyranny. You may take your pick, you’ll end up in the same cesspit whichever one you follow. I call down the curses of Hell on those State Dept. grandees who insisted Sharia law be included in the new Iraqi and Afghan constitutions. After several years of painstaking, highly-intellectual scholarly study I have come to the conclusion that what Sharia law amounts to is a handful of self-appointed thugs in black turbans and their gangs of bully-boys claiming divine authority to push people around. No more and no less, and I submit that anyone who thinks your average Iraqi, Afghani, Iranian, Saudi or Pakistani actually likes being subjected to this any more than you or I would be is a racist who believes that Middle Easterners are mentally inferior and prefer to live with a boot on their necks.
I think making them do that might actually be a crime against humanity.
I checked the link to make sure this was not a gag website. It appears to be real. He really said these things.
Yet, Carter says, "...So what we have to do is talk with them now and say to them we want to be their friends..."
Sure, we'll talk; be drinking buddies and everything.
Right after Israel and the U.S. shut down Bushehr and Natanz:
"...It's time we recognized the nature of the conflict. It's total war and we are all involved. Nobody on our side is exempted because of age, gender, or handicap. The Islamofacists have stolen childhood from the world." [FReeper Retief]
"...That the totalitarian force pitted against freedom wears a religious makes this civil war among mankind all the more difficult to engage. Loving freedom as we do, it seems reprehensible to deliberate against a religion. But this is no ordinary religion as it demands absolute obedience of all to their religion at the cost of freedom itself." [FReeper Backtothestreets]
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