Unreality Check

To Iranazad, you think you can be free? Only as puppets, that's what happened to most of the countries in the world now. Those that have nothing to eat in Iran as you mentioned,are by their own choice. Like drug addicts- nobody forced them to use drug. If really Iranian oil money is being given to those you mentioned, then why are those countries still at the mercy of others? Or you want Iran to again be under another Shah's regime. I think you have lost your Iranian roots and living somewhere else in a very comfortable place with all the luxury. Therefore now you dislike everything pertaining to Iran under the current leadership. Come on... maintain a strong and stable government, and at the same time develop the economy. Iran should not be engrossed in too much politics. If Iran have political turmoil ( this what the others want), then it will forever be unstable and the people will remain poor and the country will be at the mercy of others no matter how free or independent it may seemed.

Iranazad: When on this message board, please try to speak English. It is very difficult for us to translate your comments.

It's not just Israel, but sheesh, I can not count our treaty obligations, in almost every time zone, and now shopping for an offshore command location for a new Command, in Africa. I served on Okinawa, in Germany and Korea... Somalia, we go where the Civilian leadership sent us. As far as the unflagging support of anyone, if they have a ratified treaty in their hand, we die for them. There are people who believe in the Rapture stuff, after all, America was founded by most European Countries heretics and outcasts, my family included. Complete religious freedom makes for an interesting electorate. A lack of religious freedom seems to control the electorate. My Generalizations... Me, I swore an oath to obey the lawful orders of the officers appointed over me. I just want our clean hands image back, and become again that shining city upon a hill... etc. While this war may have provided Israel with huge strategic depth and weakened regional threats against them, I do not believethat was the reason, as much as Oil. We should have let the inspection process work. Our President I also believe in my heart wanted Saddam dead for the plot in Kuwait to kill his father, a Former President. I can not get in his mind to weigh his decisions.

Mr DIckey writes that the mullahs do not really control the man on the street with the iron hand we percieve. He is right. A book the mullahs didn't like got banned and within hours made the street anyhow. News gets through. The people want a future where the US doesn't threaten them, and they have some self-determination. They elect Ahmenijad's in response to living under threat. Their intransigence is precisely about sovereignity. If we back off, they back off. We have to move first, after all, in 53 we took out their government and installed the Shah. We are paying for Cold War calculus long after that era has been gone. The journalism is first person observation of cultural facts. It provides indicators of support for the regime, the gut of the man on the street, their hopes and dreams, etc.
I do not care if Iran uses nuclear power, and actually hoped the Russians would run the fuel cycle and build it out for them. They need modernization and trade for their people as much as anywhere else. They need access to markets. This is especially true in humanitarian terms. They need medicines and other things from the west. Not all embargoes are right or fair. They have tons of oil but have to import finished products, as they refine very little. They need a non-belligerent neighborhood in which to live. They lost a generation in the war with Saddam. We had a hand in that too, and killed an Airliner full of their people in the 80's, I believe. (USS Vincennes)
Behind all of those structural problems, theocratic rule, etc... they still crave information and western books, etc. They are a brilliant people actually. The policy of the United States is what needs review. How do I get Iran to the peaceful atom, and not have a paranoid Israel hammer them. I believe Iran was helping us a lot until the Axis of Evil speech, and since then it has been on like donkey-kong. Hanging evil on someone evokes bad tidings. The Iranian/Persian guy on the street is not evil. He wants to read a good book.

Overall, I agree with the majority of Brae's opinions. However, if Iran becomes a threat to world peace the situation will be resolved quickly. As far as Chavez goes; he is simply another banana "republic" wannabe. Has anyone thought about opening the oil fields in Alaska (temporarily) until we accomplish alternative fuels? By the way, I am not a Bush supporter.

SInglehandedly, no. But Iran is a serious actor in their own backyard, and does use proxies like HAMAS and Nizboallah. They do not need to invade where they can freely enter and leave. Since we stuck ourselves in a rat trap right against their border, Invasion or attack using traditional means isn't necessary. They are behind several hundred attacks against United States Forces. A state of war has existed since the Carter Administration. They have promised to flatten Israel, or the Zionist-Entity... So there is some activity on their part that is unfriendly. The United States Navy has carriers right up against their territorial waters. This sabre rattling keeps oil artificially high. It plays into the hands of leadership on both sides.

The Soviets were Very rational. Otherwise we wouldn't be here right now. None of us, anywhere. Deal with Iran who is messing around in their backyard? Why? They won't be able to shoot us with it. Where is my treaty that made the United States the Protectorate of Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, etc.
Oil. Reduce 3 barrels in 5 by any means now like an Apollo Project. Leadership. Thinking ahead of the problem. Get off that regions output, and off their soil. Let them have it. Stop deploying in support of Halliburton.
The Soviets dissolved not out of some evil, but economics. They were equal in poverty. Gorbachev gave the reins to Yeltsin and logically extended perestroika and Glasnost, after counterrevolutionaries grabbed him at his Dacha friend. They were quite rational, just running a failed model. Kinda like going 9 trillion in the hole over Oil we can easily do without. Let Iran no longer have us as their problem and leave them alone. It is amazing what happens to dictators whose people no longer accept the subjugation. Ask the Romanains what they did with Nikki and his Wife. They died hard brother.
I see the only inertia propping up their regime is our being a convenient excuse.
God Bless ya.