Replies

Oops, sorry, almost forgot to answer you . . . I do think a scenario like yours is likely to play out eventually; i.e., it's going to take an intervention by U.S. military forces to make a change. But I see no reason to believe a secular democracy could ever work in Iran longterm. I hope I'm wrong (everyone here seems to think so -- so that's a good sign, lol!), but the problem, as always, is islam: There AIN'T NO WAY islam is going to allow a secular democracy to exist in its midst.

"But I see no reason to believe a secular democracy could ever work in Iran longterm."

I don't think you're wrong. Is a secular democracy is achieved, the question will - and should - be : how long until the next revolution brings a new Ayatollah? That's another part of the reason we can't use military intervention in Iran. Along with Carter's destruction of the Shah, their hatred of us during their revolution, US alliance with Iraq in the hopes Iraq would defeat Iran (revenge by proxy in the face of near universal Iraqi and Iranian hatred for us). Combined with Iranian hatred for us, which continues to this day.

Iraqis don't love us either. They may be happy to be free, they welcome us, but they do not love us. They don't even trust us. We're a tool for them to get what they want, nothing more. In general this is the way the entire Arab world sees us. It's a form of arrogance and disdain on the order of the way Old Europe feels about us...and the UN. Now the Iraqis have got what they wanted, and they want us out...especially the Iranian backed tools of the mad mullahs so recently returned from Iranian 'exile' to Iraq.

The assurances coming out of Defense were little more than hype I hope.

I know for a fact the US plans no military aid for student dissidents in Iran unless something happens...hopefully nothing short of massacre, which the UN will be forced to take notice of.

Please no one get me wrong : I don't WANT innocent Iranian kids massacred by their nutzo government...but US interests should be our number one interests. Iran got itself into this, and for now it's in US interests for Iran to get itself out.

We wish them luck, we support their cause, but we're not going in. It would be stupid right now, it won't stop the terrorism, it would weaken our resolve and weaken us militarily. We need to concentrate on securing Iraq, while supporting the insurgants as much as we can.

look i agree that radical jihadism in the ME makes secular democarcy tough to instill.

but take it from me, Iran is an entirely separate case that can not be simply thrown in with the rest of the arab mideast.

first, as you know iranians are not arabs. they are mostly persians with azaris etc making up the rest of the populace. Persia has a long and impressive history BEFORE jihadism was forceably imposed on it by the invading arab armies. many persian scholars still bristle at the arabs for this and as you know before '79 iran and the arabs werent too chummy.

i will leave you with a personal anecdote from the mid 80's when i was youngster 6 or 7 playing soccer in the streets of tehran with my buddies. I was the only Jewish kid on the block and the rest were muslims, with some bahais and christians, zorastarians. we lived in a middle class neighborhood. and while most people were devout in the religious belief, THEY were not jihadi. its hard to uinderatnd unless you have seen it for yourself, the kids I played with couldnt give a rats ass about the filastin indoctrination at school, they were more captivatred by the "thriller album" that was just out.

dont get me wrong, after 9/11 we should NEVER let our gaurd down against that part of the world, back stabbing is routine there. but at the same time, we hinder our own interests if we assume ALL of them are jihadis.
they are not, and we should exploit this fully to our advantage.

"There AIN'T NO WAY islam is going to allow a secular democracy to exist in its midst."

Turkey did....for a long time. Turkey was the only secular Islamic democracy. Thus, it was ignored by the Arab world - and most of the West, which preferred holding up IRAN as a symbol of Islamic democracy. No telling what the government of Turkey might morph into now. IIRC, the public voted in Sharia law. We can HOPE they'll retain most of their original legal and social structure.