marr
Worker
Posts: 169
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Post by marr on Dec 17, 2007 14:13:53 GMT -5
Marr Said:
Maybe its the arrogance of the 'west' to assume we have the assertive right to say what countries can and can not do, what techs they can and can not have. The simple truth is there are two options. Embargo or attack. Anything else is morally ambigious.
Last I looked, this conflict was resolved. Cost a few billion, but it was settled.
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marr
Worker
Posts: 169
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Post by marr on Dec 17, 2007 14:21:25 GMT -5
www.iranian.ws/iran_news/publish/article_23694.shtmFrance, the second investor in Iran among industrialized nations, invested at least $29.9 billion during 2000-2007 of which $18.5 billion are in petrochemical, gas and oil industry. French oil giant Total is among major European companies to have undertaken projects in the country's oil and gas sector. French entrepreneurs invested $9.2 billion in banking, finance, export credit agencies; $1.15 billion in construction, power and energy; $480 million in telecommunications and $600 million in the transportation sector. Germany also invested $25.4 billion in Iran during the seven years of which $9.82 billion are in petrochemical, gas and oil fields and $2.14 billion in banking, finance, export credit agencies. *********************************************************************** The other reason there won't be a war in Iran.
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capitalistpig
Settler
Those trying to save you from 1984 are leading you into a brave new world.
Posts: 51
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Post by capitalistpig on Dec 17, 2007 14:35:39 GMT -5
The UN's lack of credibility is its own fault. It is not the responsibility of the United States to give up authority to an organization that places nations in charge of different councils based on alphabetical order rather than merit. How can you take the UN seriously when they place a country like Lybia at the head of its human rights council. The UN is nothing more than a platform for banana republic dictators to recieve applause while they denounce America. The UN cannot be relied upon to accomplish anything. I agree, it should not be America's job to keep nukes out of the hands of Iran, and yet the job falls to us because it is the right thing to do, and there is no one else that will do it. If you saw a woman being mugged on the street would you attempt to stop it, or would you just walk on and think to yourself, gee, I sure hope the police come and stop that guy, because its not my job.
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marr
Worker
Posts: 169
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Post by marr on Dec 17, 2007 14:53:33 GMT -5
But Iran doesn't have nukes Cap. What are you keeping our of there hands?
While were at it, maybe there was also a fourth shooter on the grassy knoll.
War is in Iraq due to faulty intelligance assuming WMD. Trillions of dollars later... Couple billion dolars to get Koreas nukes and it was done peacefully while Iraq never had nukes in the first place.
I wouldn't call this observation humerous at all.
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marr
Worker
Posts: 169
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Post by marr on Dec 17, 2007 15:08:02 GMT -5
@ Whip,
I am still researching your interesting posts of the 12 Imam. Very interesting reading and I wasn't aware of that.
I also recal reading somewhere it is Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who wants nuclear capabilites as 'The source of energy in Iran won't last forever.' The same guy who wants iranian citizens educated and pursing science. The same guy who okays stem cell research.
I know he isn't exactly a reputable person either, as with the President of Iran, but if I recal, hes the one pushing the nuclear reactor.
Try to get some links for ya.
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capitalistpig
Settler
Those trying to save you from 1984 are leading you into a brave new world.
Posts: 51
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Post by capitalistpig on Dec 17, 2007 15:23:49 GMT -5
Marr said: But Iran doesn't have nukes Cap. What are you keeping our of there hands?
Either I am misunderstanding your question, or.... its just a really stupid question. I'm not even really sure it needs an answer, because you kinda answer it yourself.
We went to Iraq for several reasons, one of which was WMDs. WMD does not only refer to nuclear weapons, it also refers to chemical and biological agents, which we know Saddam did possess. Maybe he got rid of them all at the last minute, my guess is that they went to Syria. But the fact remains that we KNOW he DID have them. We know that Iraq's nuclear program was only a few years from completion when we stopped them in the first Gulf War. No amount of reClintoning history can change that. These weapons were used on numerous occasions, and were also seen during several later inspections. During the buildup to the war, Iraq consistently played games with us, telling us where and when we could inspect his facilities in order to insure compliance with the ceasefire agreement that he signed at the end of the first gulf war. He chose to deceive us and block our efforts over the span of 12 years. I suppose liberals think we should have just taken his word for it that he was compliant. Saddam is an honest guy.... right?? Also I am sure that North Korea's nuclear ambitions are done for good right?? Just like when we helped them build their first reactor if they promised not to use it to develop nuclear weapons. Liberals willingness to believe everything that comes out of the mouth of these dictators who have repeatedly lied to them is amazing.
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marr
Worker
Posts: 169
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Post by marr on Dec 17, 2007 15:41:35 GMT -5
Its not my position to believe what a dictator tells me, maybe its something else?
Marr Said:
Maybe its the arrogance of the 'west' to assume we have the assertive right to say what countries can and can not do, what techs they can and can not have. The simple truth is there are two options. Embargo or attack. Anything else is morally ambigious.
In the first gulf war, it was because Saddam invaded kuwait, not because of nuclear weapons, lets try not to confusion the issue.
Further, the universal double standard... Stopped the madman Suddam, but what about the bosnians? Why nothing there?
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Post by DrShot on Dec 17, 2007 17:18:36 GMT -5
'The Natanz Uranium Enrichment Facility is located about 17 miles northwest of the town of Natanz, or 130 miles south of Tehran. According to GlobalSecurity.org, Iran's uranium enrichment production facility is now completely buried with only a small tunnel entrance visible above ground. Much of Natanz has now become an underground facility covered with layers of fill dirt and reinforced concrete.' Go here to see the actual satalite view. www.space.com/php/multimedia/zoomviewer/index.php?display_img=Natanz_Iran
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Post by whiplash on Dec 17, 2007 17:25:05 GMT -5
Further, the universal double standard... Stopped the madman Suddam, but what about the bosnians? Why nothing there? What, equating Suddam with Bosniaks? I don't understand your comparison. Besides the US did give Bosnia a lot of help in their fight for independance from the former Yugoslavia. For some reason Clinton turned against the Serbs (who were US friends and allies going back to WWI) and assist the Muslim Bosniaks, same thing later with Kosova. We even bombed Belgrad.
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Post by DrShot on Dec 17, 2007 17:37:13 GMT -5
Of all the committes to release documents or notifications of importantce the credentials of the 3 person panel that head this group, NIC, are laughable. Do a simple search for yourself, you would not believe me if I told you anyway: the most qualified one is a business major. Fourth person on the grassy knoll? I didn't know there was a second or 3rd even ( not going into the first!). That pig and whiplash pointed out most every point I would have brought up. WMD:'None were found. This is my absolute favorite. I'll tell you what. I'll give you a few weeks notice, the resources of an 'army' and you take something you could fit in a few cargo containers or less and a desert the size of California to hide them. Think you could do it? Saddam himself is said to have been a WMD by many, true but we know that is not what was ment. If you could find any khurds left you could ask them to elaborate on the joys of mustard gas. Last I checked the UN had deemed mg a no-no also, a lot of good that did. The UN:Self serving agencey of slackers. I had a T-Shirt that said 'The UN' above their logo with skull superimposed 'peace through terror' under logo. The shirt fell apart because I wore is so often over the years. BTW , I got it from a gun show ;D Energy:This could go in a few directions. In the US coal is used to supply about 50% of our power. I reckon it is similar in the cold place north of us, no? It might be more equitable to sell oil than use it for fuel, dunno. The US used to have several more refineries. Sadly slowed interest groups have shut down many. Don't complain about the price at the pump plz. Report Card:Marr: you get an A- for effort, you really do try. Your research has improved B- Discussion/debate A- you are able to listen (usually) and do not resort to personal, unjustified attacks. Overall C+ How do 2 A's and a B equal a C you ask? well yer heads still up yer arse. The semester is not over, keep at it!
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Post by thegreatsatan on Dec 18, 2007 8:33:05 GMT -5
Don't be fooled by Iran. Reagan made them our enemies, they will not soon forget how he helped Saddam with intelligence to invade their country. The Mahmud A. guy is extremely dangerous. He knows how to twist words with ease, he's cunning, intelligent, and should not be underestimated. I know i maybe wrong Z but I think Iran hated america before reagan. If I remeber right, they had like a 100 american "guest" staying there till Reagan beat JC in in 1981ish. I'm sure capitalistpig or Mr.whip can enlighten us on this.
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Post by thegreatsatan on Dec 18, 2007 8:58:26 GMT -5
Of all the committes to release documents or notifications of importantce the credentials of the 3 person panel that head this group, NIC, are laughable. Do a simple search for yourself, you would not believe me if I told you anyway: the most qualified one is a business major. Fourth person on the grassy knoll? I didn't know there was a second or 3rd even ( not going into the first!). That pig and whiplash pointed out most every point I would have brought up. WMD:'None were found. This is my absolute favorite. I'll tell you what. I'll give you a few weeks notice, the resources of an 'army' and you take something you could fit in a few cargo containers or less and a desert the size of California to hide them. Think you could do it? Saddam himself is said to have been a WMD by many, true but we know that is not what was ment. If you could find any khurds left you could ask them to elaborate on the joys of mustard gas. Last I checked the UN had deemed mg a no-no also, a lot of good that did. The UN:Self serving agencey of slackers. I had a T-Shirt that said 'The UN' above their logo with skull superimposed 'peace through terror' under logo. The shirt fell apart because I wore is so often over the years. BTW , I got it from a gun show ;D Energy:This could go in a few directions. In the US coal is used to supply about 50% of our power. I reckon it is similar in the cold place north of us, no? It might be more equitable to sell oil than use it for fuel, dunno. The US used to have several more refineries. Sadly slowed interest groups have shut down many. Don't complain about the price at the pump plz. Report Card:Marr: you get an A- for effort, you really do try. Your research has improved B- Discussion/debate A- you are able to listen (usually) and do not resort to personal, unjustified attacks. Overall C+ How do 2 A's and a B equal a C you ask? well yer heads still up yer arse. The semester is not over, keep at it! Doc, I think an A- for debate is a bit much. He skipped me. I can understand why. Marr said... To which I said this.... I think this is a powerful statement, IMO. I think I make a good comparison here that gets ignored. Infact, I blast him point by point and he doesn't defend his original statements. I do agree that he is trying hard so the A- for effort is earned. Marr, being a liberal, probly thinks letter grades are a bit harsh and un PC. I think he'd repond better if you gave him a Effort......... Research.... Debate....... Over All.......
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Post by zzZhenon on Dec 18, 2007 13:35:17 GMT -5
Don't be fooled by Iran. Reagan made them our enemies, they will not soon forget how he helped Saddam with intelligence to invade their country. The Mahmud A. guy is extremely dangerous. He knows how to twist words with ease, he's cunning, intelligent, and should not be underestimated. I know i maybe wrong Z but I think Iran hated america before reagan. If I remeber right, they had like a 100 american "guest" staying there till Reagan beat JC in in 1981ish. I'm sure capitalistpig or Mr.whip can enlighten us on this. The Iran-Iraq War was 1980 to 1988.
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Post by whiplash on Dec 18, 2007 13:55:41 GMT -5
Yeah, the Iranian hostage taking had nothing to do with the Iran-Iraq War. The hostages were grabbed in 1979. American support of the overturned Shah was the primary trigger.
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Post by thegreatsatan on Dec 18, 2007 15:19:20 GMT -5
Yeah, the Iranian hostage taking had nothing to do with the Iran-Iraq War. The hostages were grabbed in 1979. American support of the overturned Shah was the primary trigger. thx Mr.Whip. U da man If you or capitalistpig could give me (all of us) a brief education on Iran/American relations, that would be cool. I guess I could research it myself but I got a face in research back in my old schoolin days. Heres what I do know. From what I understand, Iran is persian which is diferent from arab. They used to hindu or somethin like that but where concoured by the religion of peace, but I'm not sure when that was. I do know that Iranian people don't all hate america and that the islamic goverment is on shaky ground. I also know they faught a big long war with Saddam and we helped Saddam win. But other then that, I'm kinda clueless. Hook a brotha up
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Post by whiplash on Dec 18, 2007 15:45:33 GMT -5
LOL, I'm not gunna do any internet digging for you; but I'll give you what I know off the top of my head.
Yes, Persians are ethnically distinct from Arabs. Historically Iran did not get along with the Russians. During the cold war the US became very friendly with Iran and sold/gave them lots of weapons to piss off the Russians, just like we did in a lot of other places. At the time, there was a contest between the US and USSR to find/bribe as many nations as they could to become allies. During that time of friendliness between the US and Iran their country was lead by the Shah. The Shah was secular and leaned toward Western ideas and was quite popular with Americans. During his reign he had frequent trouble in his country caused by Muslims. He banished their leader, the Ayatollah Komeni. The Ayatollah lived in exile in France for 14 years. Well the Muslims in Iran rattled the Shah's cage enough to force the Shah to abdicate. This opened the door to the Ayatollah's return in what was essentially a bloodless coup.
The Muslims absolutely hated the Shah and since America was the Shah's buddy they hated us too. After the Shah's abdication he came down with cancer and asked Jimmy Carter to be allowed treatment at the Mayo Clinic in Rocherster Minnesota and Carter obliged.
After grabbing the hostages in 1979 Iran found themselves in a war with their neighbor, Iraq. Under the circumstances of the sour relationship with Iran, the US helped Saddam in that conflict. Also during this period Iran started getting cozy with Russia even though they are traditional enemies.
The Iran-Iraq war went on for 8 years. It was during this conflict that Saddam was said to use weapons of mass distruction agains his own people. What actually happened is the Kurds were just in the way and Chemical Ali let go with the artillary laced with nerve gas. The actual targets were Iranians. American haters like to charactize this as the US helpin Saddam commit atrocities.
As you your comment about the history of Muslim conquest resulting in Persians becoming Muslims, that's true of just about every Muslim country today.
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Post by TheBadSeed on Dec 18, 2007 17:13:07 GMT -5
Little more follow up from what I know of the Shah and his downfall.
The Shah was a monarchal ruler, who had been in power since the early 40's, succeeding after his father. He enjoyed great popular support, until around the late 60's, and early 70's in Iran. Much of the decline in support stemmed from the fact that the Shah had been building a very large military, at the expense of social and economic programs. In 1963, the Shah put down a revolt led by the Ayatollah Khomeni, and had him exiled.
As the Shah's political popularity declined, in the late 60's the Ayatollah's grew, as people often begin to throw support behind the enemy of their enemy. The Shah was friendly to the US, and to Western culture in general, as people began to hate him, they began to hate all he stood for.
Jimmy Carter made, in my opinion, the biggest foreign policy blunder ever at about this time. He personally told the Pentagon to have the Shah's military commanders acquiesce, and not fight the Ayatollah's army. They did as they were told, and were summarily put to death after the Shah fled the country. More than 150 military commanders were the initial casualties of this coup, the losses afterword are staggering.
The Shah came to America for cancer treatment, which prompted the Ayatollah Khomeni to incite anti-America rallies in Iran, which ended in the taking of the American Hostages.
A power vaccuum engulfed the middle east after the Shah abdicated power. The Ayatollah was a religious leader, not an economist or a politician. The secular westernization of Iran was immediately halted and reversed. A Modern Theocracy took over, complete with a large military force and a zealot at the helm. This power vaccuum and lack of sane leadership led to much of the destaballization of the middle east. It opened the door for the USSR to invade Afghanistan, it laid the groundwork for the Taliban regime, and the basis for Al Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden to emerge. This was also the basis for the Iran/Iraq war. Saddam Hussein was a secular ruler in Iraq, the last thing he wanted to deal with was a loose cannon theologist running the show next door, and influencing the primarily Muslim population in Iraq. So, he invaded Iran, with the blessings of the United States government, and the weapons of the US military.
As time pressed on, the US started to see that Saddam was a bad person who waged a dirty war, using nerve agents not seen in a 50 years, and explicitly forbidden by the Geneva conventions, so at that time, the leaders decided it was better to keep these two fighting rather than let one win and dominate the middle east, so we began to supply Iran with weapons and money as well, funded through some crazy network of connections involving the Rebels in Nicaragua.
After Iran and Iraq finally came to a cease fire, neither having won any ground, and killing millions between the two of them, the countries were broke. Iraq was still the military powerhouse of the Middle East. Saddam had massive debts to Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, as well as many other Arab countries. When Kuwait and other Arab countries refused to forgive the debts that Iraq had incurred, and Saddam was worried that he wouldnt have enough money to pay his army, he turned to Kuwait. His invasion of the westernized country with massive oil reserves was enough for us to take a much more active interest in the conflict.
The story from there is pretty well known. The fall of The Shah in a 'bloodless' coup that left the Ayatollah in power and undamaged was the match that lit the powder-keg in the middle east.
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Post by whiplash on Dec 18, 2007 17:29:41 GMT -5
That's basically what I said with more elaboration.
I thought about bashing Carter in my post but didn't. I agree with TGS that Carter's blunders played a huge role in all of this.
One thing I always wondered about though; why did the American hostages get released within hours of RR taking office after a yean and a half of captivity? I have some theories, but don't really know.
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Post by TheBadSeed on Dec 18, 2007 19:35:59 GMT -5
I've heard a lot of theories, including that the senate had actually negotiated the release of the hostages months before, but they didnt want to disrupt the election process by having a massive public relations victory go to a very unpopular president on the eve of the election. I prefer not to put too much faith into conspiracy theories, so these are my thoughts.
I would say it had mostly to do with the very weak understanding of the American political process by the religious leaders in Iran. They viewed the American political scene through their own particular lens.
The Iranian government had just come into power by a massive populist movement. They were driven by people who hated the old government, there were no elections, just a sweeping change in leadership. They had no means of understanding the different American mindset, which allows for argument and discord without having the system fall apart. From the Ayatollah's perspective, having Jimmy Carter, a staunch supporter of the Shah, out of power meant that the United States would no longer support any of his policies. A change in leadership in Iran meant a complete reversal of policies from the old leadership. From their perspective, why wouldnt it be the same in America? A goodwill gesture to the new leader of America would undoubtedly make the Ayatollah appear to be a reasonable man, at least in the mind of the zealots, therefore, the United States might resume its once friendly relations with Iran.
It did, in fact, work to a degree. There have been no direct military incursions against Iran by the United States since that time, though the saber rattling continues.
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Post by whiplash on Dec 19, 2007 7:00:24 GMT -5
Message to the new Iranian leader with the funny hat:
Look, after I'm elected I'm not gunna fart around like that peanut farmer did. I want those red, white, and blue diplomats home pronto. If you don't do it, Teran will be a cinder. This will be my first act as President.
Release the hostages and everything will be cool.
Ronald Reagan.
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