The USA and Iran: cautious or reckless, war or peace?

[Stavros]

As the President of the USA arrives in Saudi Arabia today (Friday 19th 2017) and on the same day that Iranians elect a new President, there are fears that the USA and its Middle Eastern allies, Israel and Saudi Arabia, are preparing to ditch the cautious attitude of President Obama for a military confrontation with Iran.

The USA is increasing its military presence in the Middle East as it sees violent intervention and confrontation in foreign countries as a virtue, the inaugural speech in Washington last January having long ago been thrown in the waste-paper bin. It has been announced that the President's son-in-law played a leading role in the negotiation of a Billion Dollar arms contract with Saudi Arabia, but no details on any bribes involved in it have been released.
Moreover, with a long list of failures in domestic policy, the US President may view a foreign policy 'adventure' as his way of proving what a tough guy he is compared to the 'wimp' Obama, but while there may be no direct confrontation with Iran, there is now scope for a proxy war: for Israel to attack Hezbollah in Lebanon, while the US supported by Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States attacks 'Iranian' targets in Syria, mostly to cut the land-based supply lines from Iran through Iraq to Syria and Lebanon, thereby weakening Iran's influence, much as the Saudis claim to be weakening Iranian influence in the Yemen, even though it was not particularly strong there.

Thus, the USA's aerial attack in south-eastern Syria a few days ago may have been the first strike in the attack on Iran or Iranian-Syrian joint ops, but also signals the extent to which the promise to 'destroy ISIS' was and remains another fatuous remark by an ignorant President who may be extending the USA's presence on the ground in the Middle East but clearly has no idea how to get out or how Iran will respond -not least if Rouhani loses the Presidency to former Republican Guard Ebrahim Raisi.

Crown Prince Mohammed, son of King Salman and in effect the ruler of Saudi Arabia, has publicly stated that Iran is the biggest threat to peace in the Middle East, to the point where he claims it seeks to dominate the region, an argument that owes more to absurdist fantasies than reality, but one based on Iran's support for the Assad regime in Syria, its support for Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the belief that it supports Shi'a minorities in the north-east of Saudi Arabia, with Shia Muslims dominant in Bahrain where there have been tensions with the ruling Sheiks for decades. It seems incredible that the Saudis claim they are fighting 'extremist ideology' when fighting Iran, given that the Wahabi doctrine the Royal Family follows is one of the most extreme forms of Islam in the world today, but they don't really consider the Iranians to be Muslims anyway, and more importantly, their view is in alliance with the view from Israel that Iran is a threat, and is music to the ears of the US President who is surrounded by people who also loathe and detest Iran and have urged him to do something about it.

There is clearly a strange and twisted history involved here. Presbyterian Missionaries first arrived in Persia in 1834 (see below) but one of the first formal engagements the USA had with the Middle East came with the Treaty of Friendship and Commerce that was signed by the USA and Persia in 1857 at a time when the Qajar Shah was fed up with his 'Empire' being bullied by the Russians and the British who fought over Persia as part of the 'Great Game of Empire' that did not end until in 1905 when they agreed to a 'spheres of influence' arrangement, with the Russians given free reign in the north while the British had the south where oil was discovered in 1908. The Qajar Shahs lost power to a new Shah, Reza Pahlavi in 1921, and he tried to revive the relationship with the USA but the Americans did not want to get involved at a time when the British were dominant.

As is now well known, the USA returned to Iran in 1953 two years after the Nationalist Prime Minister, Mohamed Mosadeq nationalized the oil industry -an action that robbed the British of one of their most lucrative sources of money and oil, but which to the USA was engineered through the influence on Mosadeq of the Soviet-backed Tudeh ('Communist') Party. When the Iranian military with CIA assistance overthrew Mosadeq in a coup d'etat in 1953 absolute power was handed to the Shah (the young son of the first Pahalvi who, having supported the Nazis in 1941 was forced to abdicate and exiled to Johannesburg) who ruled until 1979. Most Americans will know that the revolutionary fervour of the times led to the siege of the US Embassy and a hostage situation that was not resolved until Ronald Reagan became President. Much of the USA's bitterness with Iran dates from these events, as Iran was seen as a key Cold War ally at a time when the USA had lost influence to the USSR in Afghanistan further east, and in Ethiopia to the south.

Complicating matters is the presence of American, Presbyterian Missionaries in Persia, arriving in 1834 to work, mostly, among Assyrians and other existing Christian groups. Unfortunately, these missionaries became involved in a massacre at Urmia in Azerbaijan province in the north-west in 1919 as part of the agitations that followed the First World War when there was briefly an independent 'Soviet Republic' in Azerbaijan (google Admiral Raskolnikov for more on this).

Basicallt, just as the Americans cannot forget (can they forgive?) the siege of their Embassy in Tehran, the Iranians don't forget all the 'crimes' committed against them by the Americans.

Obama found a way of bringing Iran into normal diplomatic relations with the world, it would be a pity if this were all to be thrown away in order for tough guys to walk tall and assume they can bomb and kill their way to some imaginary victory. It would merely be the start of more hostilities, and more killing. And one wonders who will be paying the bills for all this war, and who will be cashing in?

Some links here on the prospects for war, the elections in Iran and a paper on American Missionaries in Persia.

http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/en/o...-rhetoric.html

https://www.theatlantic.com/internat...r-deal/515979/

http://www.mintpressnews.com/inevita...gemony/224644/

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...-a7743666.html

https://www.researchgate.net/publica..._the_Great_War

[alreik]

A direct confrontation -as stated-, no.

However the draining the supply lines strategy, while viable, only benefits Israel, not Saudi Arabia, and while they have been casting Iran as a villain in this they wouldn't want to antagonize them publicly, not with Isis still a real threat, that Israel and Saudi Arabia are yet to come in direct conflict with.

Israel won't attack Hezbollah now with so much going in Syria, it puts them on a collision course with Isis if the situation deteriorates and puts a lot of Arab countries in play, even Turkey is starting to become a player and if Israel hastily pushes the limits in Lebanon, the Lebanese government may just ask for Turkish aid even with so much distaste between the two, factor in how big the Russian agenda is and this would screw a lot of people.

Everything hangs on Syria.

[Stavros]

A direct confrontation -as stated-, no.
However the draining the supply lines strategy, while viable, only benefits Israel, not Saudi Arabia, and while they have been casting Iran as a villain in this they wouldn't want to antagonize them publicly, not with Isis still a real threat, that Israel and Saudi Arabia are yet to come in direct conflict with.

Israel won't attack Hezbollah now with so much going in Syria, it puts them on a collision course with Isis if the situation deteriorates and puts a lot of Arab countries in play, even Turkey is starting to become a player and if Israel hastily pushes the limits in Lebanon, the Lebanese government may just ask for Turkish aid even with so much distaste between the two, factor in how big the Russian agenda is and this would screw a lot of people.
Everything hangs on Syria.

I don't agree with much of your post.

First of all, Saudi Arabia wants to weaken Iran as much as it can, so disrupting supply lines from Iran via Iraq to Syria achieves that, this is a win for Saudi Arabia.

Second, ISIS/Daesh does have the capacity to attack Israel -or any country for that matter- but mostly now through small cell or individual opportunists as the so-called 'Islamic state' has lost a substantial number fighters and is losing the end-game in Mosul while Raqqa looks increasingly vulnerable -remnants have already left anyway to establish themselves in Iraq and Syria to see if they can start all over again in the future, and they could have attacked Israel at any time if they wanted to. Thus the threat from ISIS/Daesh is not so different from the kind of attacks we have suffered in the UK, France, Belgium and Germany.

Third, a key difference between then and now, is that for all its faults on the Middle East, the Obama Presidency was cautious whereas the new President, aside from being ignorant on the Middle East in every sense other than the instinctive prospect of making money out of rich people- is surrounded by militants who have already increased the US troop presence in Syria with thousands more sitting in Kuwait waiting for the order to move in; have launched an aerial bombardment in the form of Tomahawk missiles on a Syrian government target, attacked a convoy entering Syria from Iraq via Iran which may have had Iranian personnel on site and thus constitute an indirect strike on Iran (see the Fisk article below), while the US operation in Yemen which led to the death of Navy SEAL Ryan Owens amounts to US involvement there on Saudi Arabia's side against Iran if you believe this war is about eliminating Iranian influence in the Yemen.

Fourth, Syria is now just a playground for international bullies with bad intentions. With the exception of King Abdullah of Jordan, I don't think a single leader of the states who are or have been involved in Syria cares what happens to the Syrian people, they have shown no interest so far in spite of the murder of -200,00? 500,00?- and the displacement of 13 million people with widespread destruction of Aleppo and many small towns. Nobody has a clue how to or even where to re-build Syria when this is over, but plenty are keen to make money and cause people misery from war. One should however note that casualties from the war have been treated in Israeli hospitals, and while Netanyahu is not a humanitarian he can see how a deteriorating Syria could harm Israel.

Step back and look again: ever since Ibn Saud emerged from the Nejd to challenge the Hashemite rule of Mecca and TransJordan in 1921, it has been clear that the Saudi view themselves as the natural successors to the Ottoman Empire in the Arab lands of the Middle East. They retain this romantic vision, even if they know they cannot rule in places like Beirut and Baghdad. Ideologically, they loathe and detest Iran and see all Shi'a communities as a threat to their hegemony. Recruiting the USA into their war is an essential part of the more aggressive strategy Saudi Arabia is pursuing with Crown Prince Mohammed in charge, and now they have found a US administration that shares a desire for war as a spectacular solution to the region's problems, but a strategy that will in fact prolong war and misery even as it puts money in the pockets of arms dealers. And let's face it, Saudi Arabia, for all the billions it has spent on armaments, has never won a war, and performed badly in the field.

Cautious or reckless? At the moment US policy is incoherent and contradictory -when the US Commander-in-Chief met with Sergei Lavrov and Ambassador Kyslyak in the White House there was an agreement or an understanding that the US would support the current Russian-sponsored peace talks on Syria being held in Astana, both to acknowledge the Russian role in this war, and to sideline the UN as an organization. But at the same, the attack at al-Tanf in Syria was an attack on Russia's allies there, and the 'joint operations' against Daesh that were discussed in the White House cannot have led to a joint attack as al-Tanf is in a different part of the country, and it is not clear who- Russia or the US- can claim credit if and when Daesh loses power in Raqqa.

Again, when Erdogan arrived in the White House, he was advised by his aides to heap adulation and praise on the Commandante to feed his insatiable vanity, so the Turkish President began by praising the 'legendary triumph' of the Commandante's White House career so far, before demanding the extradition of the man -his former close associate- he blames for the attempted coup last year -Ferthulla Gulen, and insisting the US cannot give military or political support to the Kurds fighting Daesh because they 'terrorists' and terrorists cannot shape political outcomes in the region. The US position is to ignore Turkey on this, but it does maintain the incoherence of US policy, because what do the Kurds in Syria get out of the demolition of Daesh if not the Kudos for being the one political group who did more to fight them head-on in both Syria and Iraq? And, to be candid, what the Kurds want is their own independent state -like the independent Kurdistan that the US vouched for in 1919 before Wilson lost the US election and the US departed from the Versailles conference system.
But if what the Kurds are doing is 'terrorism' it cannot be rewarded with either a de jure state or even an autonomous region though it looks possible in Syria as it has been in Iraq. Turkey will not accept an autonomous Kurdish region on its southern border, though it may have to in the short to medium term.

Fundamentally, the Russians became involved in Syria to protect the Ba'ath Government from being overthrown in a regime change orchestrated/supported/funded from outside the country. If Iraq was a warning signal, Libya was regime change too far. The Russians, in essence, want the US to back them on this aspect of international relations, but although the new Presidency appeared to back off international adventures, it has been lured back into the Middle East with Saudi money and the caution that existed under the Obama Presidency now runs the risk of running out of control.

Two final points: it looks like Rouhani will win a second term in Iran. Normally this would be a great opportunity for the US to mend its relations with Iran and begin a new era of friendship and co-operation, but that now seems hopeless as the US obsession shows no sign of abating. However, Rouhani as a moderate is more likley to restrain Hezbollah in Lebanon and thus prevent them from doing anything to encourage Israel from attacking -and, given that Hezbollah is now better armed than in 2006 and more embedded within the Lebanese armed forces and in towns and villages across southern Lebanon, a new war would in effect be a war against Lebanon, so 2017 may not see a new war there. But, again, if Iran restrains Hezbollah, will Israel's generals be able to restrain Netanyahu?

Always foolish to predict events in the region, but the absence of restraint by certain parties does not make the future look better with the people currently involved.

Some links:
Robert Fisk on the US strike in south-eastern Syria-
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...-a7744091.html

US and Turkey
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...n-united-front
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...ror/101738542/

Israel and Hezbollah
http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/orig...s-war-idf.html

[alreik]

I agree with the info you provided, however the point remains that the USA can't venture to make any kind of over the top confrontation against Iran nowadays (not until the Syrian situation settles for better or worse) for multiple reasons:

- The Obama administration did well yes, out of necessity more than anything, the war on Iraq left the region severely harmed, and harmed the relationship between the U.S and most of the Arab and Muslim populace if not the regimes. Also it put a drain on the US economy itself and is still very much a loathed decision in and out of the country.

- Related to the above point, most Arab states, don't and won't trust in any kind of American intervention again, part of why the Obama administration refused to do anything antagonistic that would be viewed as imperialistic.

- For the same reasons, while Saudi Arabia is keen on casting Iran as a villain in the region, this view is shared by very few else in the Arab and Muslim world, and Saudi Arabia's claim to be the leaders of the Islamic world would be severely decimated if they are in apparent collusion against a major Islamic power for personal gain, like you said, some of the gulf countries who are in economic coalition with S.A share similar ideologies with Iran or don't find a cause for animosity, however hard S.A is trying to make it a Sunni vs Shiaa or convince these countries that Iran is coming for them, the rest of the region would openly mock the Saudis if they participate in any form of open warfare, specially in collusion with Israel and the USA, especially after the Iraq war leave little cause for trust in the US intentions, as much as they mock their -S.A- attempts to make Iran look like a tyrant state now.

- Egypt!!!!!

Egypt is a huge - Arab, Muslim, military, strategic- player, one that the US counts as an ally, one that helped militarily in the first Gulf War, and strategically in the second even against their own population's wishes. The Egyptian media still plays a huge deal in the region, and While Trump can coerce El Sisi with US support for his rule, and S.A with financial support, the situation in Egypt is very complicated, the military still retains a lot of its power, but hardly control over the nation, and the economic crisis and the lack of solutions found for it other than turning Egypt into a plethora of military controlled institutions, make it nigh impossible for El Sisi to plunge the country in a war he'll find very few causes for, historically other than the post-Pahlavi-Sadat relations and how Iran gloated about Sadat's assassination -The Islambouli st. etc- Egypt and Iran's relations are very much on the mend, and they -like the USA did and should- find it better this way, especially with the state of the country.

- The region works in waves, and this is simply not the time for any kind of overt intervention, not by the US, and surely not by most Arab states who can't afford to be called traitors for their fellow muslims and give rise to the same radical ideologies that spawned Isis against them in other countries, or give due cause for the same ideals to rise in the minds of their own citizens if they see their government openly colluding with US and Israel against a major Islamic power, remember that SA and Isis share a lot of the more severe interpretations of Islam there is, and pan Islamism is core to these.

- It isn't in the best interest of the US to antagonize Iran tbh, no reason at all rather than Israeli and SA dreams of power in the region, let them compete peacefully and the US should only play moderator for peace, it's absolutely foolish to do, especially with so many parties in play in Syria and no status quo there established, Trump may be a baby but he won't play the bully-child with the generals and foreign advisors ( bec. he knows nothing about either but has to respect them), any of whom would tell that an incursion against Iran is a folly.

- Trump is keen - for a reason or another - to not antagonize Russia, and Russian interest is that the US doesn't antagonize Iran or interfere with Syria, simply as that.

That's the whole thing, US wouldn't by any logical or rational means engage Iran in a hostile manner, it's just senseless, if they do, I'm going to Canada lol

[Stavros]

I agree with the info you provided, however the point remains that the USA can't venture to make any kind of over the top confrontation against Iran nowadays (not until the Syrian situation settles for better or worse) for multiple reasons:
- It isn't in the best interest of the US to antagonize Iran tbh, no reason at all rather than Israeli and SA dreams of power in the region, let them compete peacefully and the US should only play moderator for peace, it's absolutely foolish to do, especially with so many parties in play in Syria and no status quo there established, Trump may be a baby but he won't play the bully-child with the generals and foreign advisors ( bec. he knows nothing about either but has to respect them), any of whom would tell that an incursion against Iran is a folly.
- Trump is keen - for a reason or another - to not antagonize Russia, and Russian interest is that the US doesn't antagonize Iran or interfere with Syria, simply as that.

The problem with your post, and I understand your points, is that the US is intervening on the ground at a higher level than it was under the Obama administration, which was accused of 'abandoning' Iraq even though the troop withdrawals that took place had been agreed between the government of Iraq and the US when George W. Bush was President.
And, as I pointed out in my post, the US has in fact directly attacked Irania armed forces IF you believe Robert Fisk's report that Iranian service personnel were on the convoy that was attacked near al-Tanf in south-eastern Syria. And again, if the US does not want to antagonise the Russians, then that attack also hit arms for Russia's ally, the Syrian government, which is why I suggested the current policy of the US is incoherent. And yet again, there is a mental block when it comes to Iran, and until the US can get over losing the Shah in 1979 I don't see how they can move on and not take secondary actions to antagonise Iran.

Morally you have to wonder -yes, Iran is a cruel country that executes people in public, but it has a sophisticated culture and some brilliant film-makers, but the Mullah's are still in charge and there is an evident split between the cultured city dwellers and the less well-educated rural communities; and yet Iran is more open to modernizations and change than Saudi Arabia, where people are also executed in public -beheadings that the US President will not be taken to see- or flogged to within an inch of their lives. Not much of a choice on that level, but if a state is going to deal with one without making human rights an issue, why one and not the other?

It is not about a direct attack on Iran, but a proxy war, such as the one Saudi Arabia is -or was- already engaged in via the Assad regime in Syria, given the Kingdom has switched most its resources to the Yemen. I find it hard to believe that neither GW Bush nor Tony Blair were told that regime change in Iraq would be a major boost for Iran in the region, though in Blair's case we know from the Chilcot Enquiry he ignored the advice of experts on Iraq at the time and both he, and Jack Straw who was Foreign Secretary at the time, have claimed to be 'shocked' at the implosion in Iraq that followed the fall of Saddam Hussein. Even if one accepts that there are limits to what the Shi'a communities of the Middle East can achieve, there are no limits to the attempts the Wahabi fanatics in Saudi Arabia will make to maintain their fantasy of restoring the Caliphate, one of the reasons they have been so outraged by the new pretenders in Mosul and Raqqa.

The problem is that while the Saudis can pay others to be effective wreckers -as they did in Syria, as they have done in Pakistan, Kashmir and Afghanistan-, their own military is next to useless, unless you think destroying homes and businesses, creating famine and population displacement as an achievement. Indiscriminate bombing achieves that. The Saudis and the Egyptians fought a war for the best part of eight years in the Yemen between 1962-1970 at the end of which the Imams they backed lost out to the Nationalists, even if the further consequence was the division of Yemen into a nationalist and the so-called 'socialist' South Yemen. In the first Gulf War of 1991 there was an infamous report of a Saudi pilot screaming 'target destroyed, target destroyed' as proof they were engaged, but the US commander in the field, Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf in his memoirs made the most telling point about the Saudi contribution to the 'coalition of the willing' when the bill for the war came in and the Saudi king or whoever it was, opened the cheque book, raised a pen and asked 'How much?'

Thus the new US administration can crow about the $20 billion worth of investment in the US infrastructure that has been agreed, presumably because the efforts of the Obama administration to do the same domestically were scuppered by the Republican Congress; and by-passing Congress is a dream come true, if it can be done. The $100 billion deal on arms is not so much an arms contract as a welfare programme to maintain jobs in the US arms industry just as it does in the UK.

If there is a difference between the two, any claims of bribery involved will be more aggressively investigated in the US, whereas in the UK in 2006 when the Serious Fraud Office opened investigations involving BAE Systems as part of the giant al-Yamama contract signed by Mrs Thatcher in the 1980s, Tony Blair intervened to order the Attorney General to shut it down, and it was. The claim was that public exposure of the claims would damage Saudi Arabia's co-operation on intelligence and security issues, but what was not asked was why would the Kingdom refuse to co-operate just because some of its sons had their hands in the pot? As if we didn't know that is how deals are done in Saudi Arabia!
Whatever, the money is rolling in, and the killing goes on.

http://www.thecornerhouse.org.uk/res...-investigation
https://www.ft.com/content/0ff015e8-...f-0000779e2340

[alreik]

Sir, I find it hard to realize where your post contradicts mine.

Across the last decade I've lived in Egypt ( time of the revolution ), Lebanon, S.A (last year at the peak of the Yemeni conflict) and Iran, plus visits to the UK and US where I live, so what I can tell is pertaining to what I've seen and lived. So let's dissect the countries involved:

S.A, (government not the country), are worried about the future:

- The last of the line of direct descendants of Saud is Salman who is pretty senile, his son has delusions of grandeur/ grand plans, depending on which Saudi you speak to -behind closed doors obviously-

- Those plans are about S.A becoming the leader of the Muslim world, in a Sunni vision, they're worried because the UAE and Qatar have both made huge strides in making themselves a model of an advanced modern gulf country (at least compared to S.A) and becoming powers in the region. S.A is languishing mostly because of their strict laws as much as they are trying to lax them

- The Syrian Alawites, have been a big thorn in S A's side, in any attempt at evoking a conflict with Iran, Iranian influence wasn't usually a huge threat since Saddam was keeping Iran busy, however with the Iraqi chaos, and Iranian involvement in the Yemini conflict, Syria emerged as a problem for S.A. Now with their apparent turmoil, SA is trying to hasten into making the whole Syrian situation, a war of good Muslims vs the Bad ones and sucker people (western governments) into it. Something the Obama administration didn't fall for.

- Saudi Arabia has no military power (as you stated), their army is pretty much mercenary like in structure, all of their modern wars have been made in proxy, something that infuriates M ben Salman the heir apparent, who is attempting to modernize the army and introduce a lot of tech, but still the personnel are abysmal.

- These proxy wars are mostly made through, Egypt, who suffer a huge economic crisis right now, yes their military is still the powerhouse it is http://www.businessinsider.com/the-w...itaries-2017-3, but there is no apparent reason for them to fight in Iran, especially with the military regime there striving to keep control of the country, a country that if the government tries to go to war for no other reason but financial support from S.A, will enter a state of open revolt, since the average Egyptian in a military mandatory draft in wartime is very unlikely to get anything from these financial aides, moreso now with the economic crisis.

- So, the Saudi government is trying to find another proxy, and since the rest of the region has no interest in a conflict with Iran, the economic gulf countries enjoying their relative prosperity in a more modern fashion, and Egypt and Iraq in turmoil, S A is trying to push the agenda that a Syrian resolution, where the Assad regime isn't in power, is only achievable if Iran is to be neautralised, something that again the rest of the world has no interest in and has -wisely- avoided.

- Again, S.A can't stake a claim to be the leading Islamic state, when they instigate a war against a major Islamic state, whatever their faction is, much less with all the distrust in the Arabic and Islamic countries' populations about the motives in USA and Israeli intentions after the Iraq war.

The USA:

- Absolutely nothing to be gained, Iranian relationships are on the mend and rise, since Obama's administration, which also pushed Saudi interests to the side, but kept good relations at least, at the time of Obama's latest visit, most of the Saudi populace were happy or indifferent about it, the rulers were cautious or a bit hostile since he was paying no heed to their agenda.

- The increased ground forces are made in an effort to stem the rise of Isis, and hopefully to defeat the Assad regime, a regime that the US doesn't want for two reasons: it champions Russian power in the region, and it's a dictatorial regime that people have revolted against, which naturally champions US cause, a defeat of Assad is a win for the US, and SA too, but the US is not on a collision course with Iran on it, the US doesn't have a problem with Shia'a or not, they are there for Assad and Isis only.

- Strategically let's look at this, how do you make war on Iran?
Naval/ Aerial route : incredibly useless on the long term, just look at Iran's map, a very narrow way to fight them through the persian gulf, a gulf full of oil that many other countries share, countries that may share Iranian ideologies, and Pakistan won't ally itself with the US vs Iran.

Land route: through where: Afghanistan? not enough if feasible, Iran has very strong relations with the rest of central Asia, so that's East and North and South, which leaves only the Western side, so how are you gonna navigate through Syria, Isis, and Iraq again to land in Iran?

- Strategic ramifications: if Iran is attacked by the US, Russia will intervene, this is simply an intro into WWIII, something the US government and army will want to not happen, even if it means deposing Trump altogether.

- Again there is no basis or benefits to a conflict in Iran, especially since great diplomatic efforts helped with monitoring the nuclear threat, other than the oil fields, a lot of the people in the world have learned the lesson from Iraq.

[alreik]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...-a7747741.html

Apparently this moron is hellbent on erasing anything good Obama did for some billions of dollars, what a joke. The world just keeps surprising you..

[Stavros]

Apparently this moron is hellbent on erasing anything good Obama did for some billions of dollars, what a joke. The world just keeps surprising you..

But there are no surprises as the whole point of this administration is to reject everything the USA used to stand for, and to promote greed and violence everywhere, and bury human rights and individual liberty in the graveyard of liberal fantasy.

So the Oaf of Office crawled on his hands and knees to suck dick in Riyadh and in exchange for a billion dollars excused the Saudi family business of any involvement in 9/11, the creation of the Mujahideen in Afghanistan -the crucible of al-Qaeda- thousands of extremist madrasas in Pakistan, Kashmir and Afghanistan, perpetrator of disgusting anti-Jewish diatribes in the 'educational literature' available to children in Saudi-funded schools in the UK, and on and on and on. It does not even matter that he condemns Iran for supporting the Assad regime when in fact its most crucial backer is Russia, a state beyond criticism -for what reason?
So distorted was this worthless rubbish that as Robert Fisk has asked, also in the Independent-
“We are adopting a principled realism, rooted in common values and shared interests,” Trump told the Saudis and the leaders of another fifty Muslim nations on Sunday. But what on earth are those values? What values do the Americans share with the head-chopping, misogynist, undemocratic, dictatorial Saudis other than arms sales and oil?
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/...-a7747856.html

But do not be surprised at all, because it is almost 40 years exactly -minus one day- since President Carter at Notre Dame University on the 22nd of May 1977 re-affirmed the USA's belief in human rights-
Carter promised change, and during an address at Notre Dame University on May 22, 1977, he sketched out his vision for the future of American diplomacy. He began by noting the “great recent successes” in nations such as India, Greece, and Spain in bringing about democratic governments. These successes had renewed America’s confidence in the strength of democracy and would now “free” the United States from the “inordinate fear of communism” that once led America to ally itself with brutal dictators who agreed to help fight the communist menace. What was needed in the “new world” that America faced was “a policy based on constant decency in its values and on optimism in our historical vision.” Carter then outlined the steps he was taking to strengthen this “commitment to human rights as a fundamental tenet of our foreign policy.” America’s foreign policy, he concluded, should be “rooted in our moral values, which never change.”
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-h...o-human-rights
https://history.state.gov/milestones...0/human-rights

Yet again, the world is ashamed of the USA. But not surprised.

[alreik]

I hope beyond hope that this is actually just massaging the egos of the Sheikhs and robbing them blind, I hope that the hawks and generals have done their homework and know this to be foolish or at least let the Arabs and Israel fight Iran in proxy, a direct conflict is the start of WWIII, no way Russia will let the US have a beachhead on the Caspian or such a presence in Central Asia.

[Stavros]

The problem with proxy wars, indeed wars in general, is that once the fighting starts, it creates its own agenda, and thus departs from the political aims that started it. Once external powers decided to promote their own agenda in Syria, Syria itself was lost, nobody in the country had control of the war or the political agenda, just as Syria cannot survive in the interim without Russian military support, and for the longer term, nobody knows. I also think the point about proxy wars or limited wars, as sometimes called, is that it prevents a 'World War III' -the two previous world wars were so called because of their geographical reach, but they were also total wars which consumed entire economies and populations, whereas these days the armies of the USA and Russia, for example, are a small proportion of the population as a whole who go about their business unaffected by war regardless of where their troops are fighting.

What is different this time is that the USA has explicitly abandoned human rights as an international cause, even as an aspiration. Stephen Miller wrote the speech, we are told, and it is thus part of the 'new order' that we are led to believe was ushered in last January. Yet the same people who coined phrases like 'radical Islamic terrorism' and who told us Saudi Arabia was the bad guy, when face to face with the people they despise, rolled over on their backs and made a mockery of everything they claim to believe, in the process discarding decency at all levels to dance with dictators and grab their money.