Just finished "The Persian Puzzle" by Kenneth Pollack

[Sal316]

..and all I can say is Oh. My. God.

This book tied together alot of seemingly stray elements in a coherent, simple, and easy to understand way. It also opened my eyes to how much the fear of Communism played into US foreign policy. I always knew alot, but was surprised at how much.

This book rocks. I've recommended it to everyone I know who's even slightly politically aware.

For more on the book and the author, look here


<snip>

Kenneth Pollack: Absolutely. I think if you could remove all of the baggage—all of the ideology, the history, whatever else—and look in purely geostrategic terms, I think it's hard to figure out why the US and Iran would necessarily be in conflict. In fact during the shah's era, before 1979—recognizing that there were all kinds of other problems—the US and Iran worked together splendidly at the strategic level.

But the source of the problem is this history—our support for the Shah, the CIA coup in 1953—has become infused into the Iranian political discourse. The regime that came to power in 1979 during the Iranian revolution actually defined itself as anti-American, and that's now a critical ingredient in the Iranian domestic political debate. That really is the source of our problems—the regime in Tehran continues to see itself as opposing the US. In their eyes, everything the US does is directed at them in a very malevolent way, and therefore they have to fight back against it.

<snip>

[whistle]

1. In a nutshell, America is a terrorist regime

[SlipperySlope]

2. It isn't correct for me to say this...

It isn't correct for me to say this, especially the way things in the middle east are right now, but I've long thought the US made a mistep in handling the Iranian revolution.

I don't think that there would be nearly the tension there today that there is if Iran hadn't been fostering it for the past decades.

[Sequoia]

3. Sure it's correct. You can say it.

Read "Overthrow" by Stephen Kinzer too. We've always been bullies.

Thanks for the book tip above.

[Bobbieo]

4. We've always been bullies!!!

Didn't we inherit that trait from our English ancestors?

[Sequoia]

6. If your ancestors came from there, sure.

But Spain was pretty awful too. That Inquisition stuff ya know and what they did to Mexico.

[Hamlette]

7. We haven't always been bullies. Read All the Shah's Men by Kinzer

Kermit Roosevolt (Teddy's grandson) was our CIA agent in Iran and wanted to overthrow the democratically elected Mossadegh because Mossadegh had the gall to tell the British they couldn't keep ripping off Iran's oil. (Prior corrupt Iranian kings/shahs sold the Brits the rights to all of Iran's oil. The agreement provided that the British company pay to Iran a small percentage of the profits. Mossedegh, and all of Iran, thought they should get 50% which is what the US paid counties we were ripping off and he wanted to right to audit the books. British company said no, Mossedegh said get out. In a nutshell.)

Kermit and the Brits wanted to invade/put in a puppet (the old Shah) but Truman said no way! He took the Mossadegh's side saying he was right. As soon as Eisenhower was elected, we overthrew Mossadegh and put the corrupt Shah in power.

Quite a read. I was shaking my head through the last half of the book.

Anyway, point being, Truman was an honorable guy and refused to be a bully....in Iran.

[Sal316]

5. It's an extremely complex issue...

I don't think that there would be nearly the tension there today that there is if Iran hadn't been fostering it for the past decades.

I agree.

One sentence that stuck out to me was 'no matter what the US had done in Iran, we always end up hurting those we are trying to help'.

This guy pulls no punches and excoriates Truman, Eisenhower, Johnson, Nixon (in a big way), Carter, Reagan, and the Bushes. The only Presidents he think did any good were Kennedy, Johnson (a little), and Clinton. He faults Gingrich over his public campaigning for $18m for 'covert operations' directly leading to the Khobar bombing. In fact, evidence from Khatami and the Saudis (oh is there dirt on them, too!) show that that operation wasn't ordered until Gingrich opened his big mouth.