I didn’t say the U.S. did it alone, but this was a conversation about U.S. foreign policy and not other nations’ foreign policies. Propaganda or no, one of the key items in the Atlantic charter, echoing Wilson’s post-WWI fourteen points, was that all peoples have a right to self-determination and be free from aggression.
Ahhhh yes. To be charitable, you simply can’t get basic facts straight but don’t care, since you have a babbling “blame America first” partisan ideology and you don’t give a fuck about facts or knowledge or reason or anything other than rationalizing your political prejudice.
And I’m certainly the one who is a fool. Yep.
Then provide cites of America attacking Iran. You can’t, because you’re a liar. And you’ve now switched your lie from America “attacking” Iran to America “threatening” Iran. Which, of course, you couldn’t provide a cite for in any case, because you’re making that up too.
You might want to provide cites for these “covert ops” inside Iran that are, evidently, “constant” and “attacks”. But, come on, we both know you’re lying, why not just save us time and admit it?
Which word is giving you problems? Does your dictionary not have the word “global” in it? What would you call killings from Argentina to Lebanon to Saudi Arabia to TWA flight 84, and so on?
You “missed that”? Ya think? I’m shocked. Shocked!
Here ya go.
I’ve presented these cites again and again and again, and making a dent in the combined ignorance of this board is difficult.
-Based on a five year, 250 man investigation, the FBI came to the conclusion that “based on evidence gathered by the FBI during their five-year investigation, that Iran was responsible for planning and supporting the Khobar Towers attack”
-Based on evidence and expert testimony given in another trial, the judge found that “Hezbollah was formed under the auspices of the Iranian government, was completely reliant on Iran in 1983 and assisted Iranian Ministry of Information and Security agents in carrying out the operation.”
Combined death toll: off the top of my head, 250+ United States servicemen, plus hundreds injured.
But, unsurprisingly, you “missed” it.
I must admit, being able to miss 25 years of history shows talent at willful blindness. Especially if you “miss” 25 years of history on a topic which you’re holding forth on.
Seriously though, you’re outgunned and it’s clear you just like making shit up to rationalize your partisan prejudices, the facts be damned.
Stick to you quoting Python, it seems to be easy enough for you.
I opened this thread because I saw FinnAgain’s name for the most recent post. Expecting to see FinnAgain kick some ass. Thank you, FinnAgain for delivering.
Look, I have no interest in trading insults.
The fact is America has a long history of interfering and attacking Iran.
America overthrew the democratically elected government of Iran to install the Sha who was an American puppet and a murderous dictator. Nothing Iran has ever done comes even close to just this.
Then America supported Iraq in a war against Iran which cost Iran hundreds of thousands of lives and millions of dollars in damages. Nothing Iran has ever done comes even close to just this one thing.
America has invaded and occupied not one but two of Iran’s neigbors and continues to threaten Iran. It has conducted special ops operations inside Iran.
Nothing Iran has ever done to the USA has ever come close to amounting to a tiny fraction of all the injury America has done to Iran over the decades. Nothing. The problem is some of you feel America is entitled to do these things by right and discount them. Anyone who says Iran is the aggressor in this relationship is just a liar.
As chance would have it, the wife and I know someone leaving this weekend for Pyongyang, as one of a 12-member UN team helping conduct a population census of North Korea. She will be there maybe three weeks and does not know if she’ll be only in the capital or somewhere else. If she has anything interesting to say when she comes back, I’ll pass it along.
Interestingly, the UN office in Beijing told her and the other members to take along a bunch of instant noodles, because it was not clear if the North Korean government could or would feed them.
Meanwhile, here are some photos from inside a North Korean amusement arcade.
You certainly implied the US overthrew Hitler, Mussolini etc by itself.
Look, the US were massively helpful to the Allies after they entered World War 2. But the US did that in self-defence, NOT as a principle of 'helping to usher in democratically elected governments '.
The war had been going on for years before that and there had already been millions of casualties (both soldiers and civilians).
I think the US has made terrible mistakes in Chile (overthrowing democracy), Vietnam (trumped-up reason to invade), Iraq (installing Saddam, then over ‘WMDs’).
There has been no US military involvement in Burma (democratic Government overthrown by military) or Tibet (ditto).
It’s great to say “all peoples have a right to self-determination and be free from aggression”, and that "the U.S. also has a long history of overthrowing murderous dictators and helping to usher in democratically elected governments " but can you give examples of the US actually doing this?
N.B. The freeing of Kuwait in Gulf War 1 was fully justified of course.
Nevertheless it was done largely to protect oil supplies (plus Kuwait is technically not a democracy.)
I don’t know about Thailand, but here in Japan, the news programmes frequently show video footage showing the “real” face of North Korea. It’s usually hidden-camera footage of things like homeless children, anonymous soldiers saying they’re starving and fed up, or vaguely distopian images of markets or rural villages.
There was this one video, which was evidently shot from a briefcase camera, and showed the owner of the briefcase walk into a restaurant and order some food. The place was completely empty and seriously run down. The waitress, who was sleeping when the man walked in, seemed even surprised that he was there to eat. The food he ordered wouldn’t even pass in the cheapest and crapiest Korean restaurants here. And yet, commentators pointed out that the amount of money he paid would be completely out of regular people’s means. You’d have to be a member of the Party to be able to afford to eat in a place like that.
This means that with the exception of a pocketful of leaders who eat lobster every day, even people who are well off have a standard of living that would be considered poverty in first world countries.
I’ll skip over your wild rhetoric.
First, I’ll ask you a simple question:
Do you believe that any state has the basic right of self-defense? Or do you believe only the US has that right (and maybe their current allies, under certain circumstances)? Or that only some states (those that are “good” ones) have that right?
Please note, I’m not asking you how you feel emotionally about a dictatorship having dangerous weapons; that’s a seperate issue.
If you believe only the US (and maybe their allies) have that right, then you’re a hypocrite, because you have one set of values and rights for yourself, and one for the rest of the world.
If you believe that every state has the same basic rights - then the question of whether Iran has state-sponsored terrorism or not is a later point.
If you believe that a state that sponsors terrorist acts should not have nuclear weapons - then that applies to the US, too. The CIA is sponsored by the US govt. and has committed terrorist acts like overthrowing other governments (e.g. Chile) and helping terrorist organisations (e.g. in Afghanistan during the 80s).
I would like a cite for that. First, are you talking Bush sr. or jr.? Second, because I don’t remember exact dates, I looked at Wikipedia for a start, and found:
The only acceleration of the nuclear programme I heard about on the news was after Bush jr. attack on Iraq after Saddam had complied with all sensible conditions was that Iran announced their wish to have nuclear weapons to defend themselves from aggresion by the US.
A program for the civil use of nuclear energy can be changed or accelerated because of the aggresive course of Bush jr. later, without that being bombast or obfuscatory. (And it could go back to a civil program again with a different president and different approach).
Before the Gulf War against Iraq after the attack on Kuwait, there was the mid-80s war between Iraq and Iran, where Hussein was armed and assisted by the US. Maybe you don’t see that as threatening, but I can quite understand that the Iranians felt that way.
And Saddam was pursuing a nuclear weapons program before the First International Gulf War. (which was stopped when the Israelis bombed it, and completly destroyed during the occupation after the First Gulf War.
First, the Iranian trained, backed etc. attacks aren’t relevant, unless you also count the CIA backed, trained etc. attacks on other states during that time. Or do those not count because the US are the good guys and allowed to destabilize other govt.s? Maybe you believe that, but outside observers don’t, they measure the same yardstick for everybody.
No, the fault is that the US under Bush jr. with the unprovoked attack on a non-threatening Iraq, and after the neocons had made speeches and detailed lists on which countries they wanted to attack in order to control, directly threatened Iran as next on the list; and the only defense they saw that worked wasn’t complying with US demands (hadn’t worked for Saddam) or applying for int.l right and fairness (which the US doesn’t recognize) but having nuclear weapons - which had worked for both the USSR and North Korea.
Is this still too difficult for you to grasp that the US is not allowed to do whatever it likes because it’s “good” and that those who you call “bad guys” at this moment are stripped of any rights?
Because if it is, say so and I will stop useless arguing.
Cry me a river with all those terrorist plots, once you stop doing themselves. Once you start assassinating people as sound military strategy. Once you stop bombing everything no matter how many civilians suffer in order to protect one American soldiers life, since one American life is worth thousands of foreigners lifes.
Maybe because Saudi Arabia, despite a bunch of the 9/11 terrorists coming from there, despite Osama Bin Laden being from there, is good enough personal friends with the current admin? I haven’t read the full strategy paper of the neocons, or their reasons for which countries they want to attack. But if the Saudis stop wanting to go along, stop being the good puppets for US interests they currently are, I expect them to be attacked, too.
I’m not hysterical, I’m appalled. But maybe you can’t understand the reason for that. I’m not reassured that the only reason you won’t attack another country isn’t because it’s wrong and uncalled for, but because you currently are overstretched. Esp. as a lot of troops might soon be withdrawn from Iraq. Or that before the invasion of Iraq, experts were already saying that doing so would overstretch the military already in Afghanistan (which has been conveniently forgotten, so instead of properly rebuilding the country, it continues being a mess without headlines.)
Nobody said so directly, true. But Americas aggressive behaviour in the past is an explanation and justification for countries to keep their weapons as defense.
No, history shows that the US only follows self-interest. It didn’t care about overthrowing dictatorships during WWII until the Japanese attack (itself a reaction to the extreme sanctions by the US, though the militaristic Japanese govt. might have started it anyway).
The US attacked Vietnam for selfish reasons, overthrew Chile’s democratic govt. for selfish reasons, etc.
Now, this would have been a reasonable question for a good debate: if direct humanitarian aid like food is sidetracked for non-humanitarian purposes, how do we deal with it? Do we stop giving aid altogether, until we make sure it won’t be misused? Or do we keep on giving, on the hope that some of it will get through, and because it’s not the population’s fault they have a dictator who diverts aid?
Real aid agencies (like Red Cross, UNHCR/UNICEF, Medicines sans frontiers, World Food Programme, etc. = that is, agencies interested in helping the people without doing it for PR about how wonderful they are, or what conditions must be fulfilled, as bargaining chip) struggle with this question all the time. That’s why they stopped giving money, as too much was diverted by dictators generally to buy weapons instead of food, and try to insist on certain rules about the distribution. But it’s a difficult decision: if they stop giving, the dictator can blame them for not caring; if they continue despite problems of aid being misused, they help prop up the regime that caused the problem in the first place.
In most cases, they will help (on the basis that even a little help is better than none), but if their ground rules are being violated (no control at all and safety of their own aid workers), they will withdraw and wait for a change before returning.
Could the OP please provide a link to whatever prompted this thread?
Instead, you could not be totally full of shit and show how one single fact, factoid or interpretation I presented was in any way, shape or form, wrong.
Or you could remain full of shit and just call the facts “wild rhetoric”.
Your call.
No, you wouldn’t, you’re full of shit
I know this, because I already provided just such a cite.
And, much like your compatriot in ignorance, you’re happy to go on with your screed without even knowing the basic facts. Color me surprised.
Well, of course, you’re lying and Iran never did any such thing and has, in fact, steadfastly maintained that their nuclear program is strictly peaceful. Do you wonder why it is that you, and the person who has been hanging on your coattails, can only make your positions if you invent and manufacture an alternate reality?
In point of fact (as opposed to you simply making up stuff because if fits with your political prejudices), the NIE judged with a high level of confidence that Iran suspended its nuclear weapons program after we attacked Iraq, they didn’t “accelerate” it. Although, of course, the report went on to state that they could only state with moderate confidence that Iran hadn’t resumed its nuclear weapons program in the years following. This was a moderate instead of a high level of confidence because intel was " not of sufficient quality or corroborated sufficiently to warrant a higher level of confidence. " and was not, in fact, based on “based on high-quality information, and/or that the nature of the issue makes it possible to render a solid judgment.”
The NIE, again in point of fact, found that they could state with a high degree of confidence that Iran had in fact been working on a nuclear weapons program. Not a “civil” energy program.
Seems you’ve been inventing facts yet again.
:smack:
The US really got involved in that war after Iran had already pushed Iraq out if its territory, and begun to invade Iran. After Sadaam called for a ceasefire. While the UN was demanding a ceasefire. And Iran kept waging an optional war of conquest against Iraq. The war itself largely broke out due to the political tensions caused by Iran’s efforts to spread Khomenism.
In addition, Iran suffered such severe casualties while they were invading another sovereign state that had already sued for peace, largely because they showed such a low value for their own soldiers’ lives that they launched "human wave’ attacks and sent young children to clear minefields by walking through them.
And not only did the US provide weapons to Iraq, we also provided them to Iran. Maybe go a bit beyond Wikipedia and google “Iran-Contra”, eh?
I’d also point out that Iran-Contra happened largely because Iran’s forces in Lebanon had been capturing Americans, and we were trying to negotiate to get them back. For a bit of context, of course, this is the time period in which Iran was attempting to export Khomenism, via bloodshed. It founded, armed, trained and directed groups like Hezbollah which, as no coincidence, offers its ultimate allegiance to Khomeni in its founding document.
You do understand that tu quoque is a fallacy, not a way to ‘score points’, eh?
But, of course, you again reveal yourself as a partisan whore, because your response to Iran murdering United States non-combatant peacekeepers, murdering and kidnapping civilians and attempting to install theocracy in Lebanon is… to get angry at the United States.
Yeah. It’s not the massive political/economic leverage that they have when they deal with us. It’s that they’re good personal friends. Mmm hmmm.
“Bandar? Why don’t you come over and we’ll toss the pigskin around. What? Oil? Naw, I use a great exfoliating cream, why do you ask?”
Please explain what part of exporting one of the the most virulently anti-american, anti-western, anti-secular, militantly theocratic doctrines in the world is “being a good puppet”. Refusing to actually crack down on terrorist financing, and only giving us window dressing? Refusing to help when we’ve asked them to modify details of their oil production/sales? Explain how getting us to give them nuclear technology shows that we’re the ones who’re in control?
Yeah, the Saudis are sure our “puppets”, and, by gum, our “vassals” too!
Now if only they’d stop exporting Wahabism to every corner of the globe they can reach, including America. Yeah… Wahabism sure shows that the Saudis are being our “good puppets”
Whoops, cut and paste error. That should’ve read “begun to invade Iraq.”
Ah well.
Follow-up: Our friend just returned from North Korea. My wife talked to her today, so all I know is what she told me.
The friend was both in Pyongyang and upcountry, although I don’t know where upcountry. She said she expected to see starving Koreans but that really, the ones she saw all looked pretty healthy. Electricity outside of Pyongyang was often intermittent or nonexistent, and the UN issued each of the members on her team a flashlight.