Iran's Ahmadinejad says Israel should be moved to Europe

You reference a book from Amazon, while this is not my area such a work is typically a secondary source compiled by someone trying to construct an argument using historical evidence to back up assertions. This I would class as a secondary source. A primary source would be a journal article or in politics I guess a memo or an interview with a politician at the time or something. Although mostly sources seem to be a whole host of websites which in my experience are a terrible source of information they are often biased and poorly written sometimes ive found them just plain wrong.

However the main point I was trying to make was, whether any of it was relevant. Is how Iran got to where it is now in any way relevant to whether it should have nukes? To me a far more pertanent point is whether or not they will use them. My question is this; if one argument is right does this mean that Iran shouldnt have nukes and if the other side is right they should? Especially if it would start a nuclear war between Iran and Israel which is far from impossible.

 

You expect me to buy a book from online to substantiate your argument, and even then your argument is somewhat moot as I agreed that the Shah should have never been put in place anyway.

Your suggestion that this reflects how Iranian people will react to US prevention of Irans nuclear program is also fairly irrelevant. Middle Eastern culture has always been somewhat resistant to foreign political interference.

If Sweeden took the leading role in negotiations for Iran's nuclear program, the goals would need to be the same, and Iranian people would be just as suspicious.

You seem to find the only argument in which you can find any ground is debating historical aspects of Iranian politics while only vaugly approaching that we should approach Irans nuclear program with caution. These are the reasons 'Neo-cons' would call your foriegn policy apathetic... because you've yet to define how we should approach Iran.

Once again, Balbus, you've never pointed out how the rise of the Shah will effect how we deal with Iran presently except that we should approach with caution.

Of course we should approach with caution, Iran is a very complex issue, But we certainly can't tread on eggshells with a hostile potentially nuclear power.

The reason these 'Neo-cons' would refer to you as apathetic in foreign policy is because I have yet to hear you come up with an alternative.

When the US invaded Iraq, war was already a pretext and sanctions were never mentioned.

I agree with what your article said about not being sure whether the new presidents rhetoric marks a definite shift in Iranian policy, But not being sure is certainly not a sufficient policy background to effect how we deal with a dangerous, terrorist sponsoring, viahament governments aquisition of nuclear weapons.

Sanctions our not only our best hope for slowing down Irans nuclear ambitions and causing a gradual shift in Iranian policy. Irans young population loves western culture, and is very opposed to the preisthood, it's complicated, but slowing down their nuclear program is our best hope for a peacful resolution to this.

If inspectors aren't allowed, we can stop the Russians from nuclear deals with them. The US and Eu have enough economic leverage with the Russians and China to prevent such an incident from continuing.

Note I've never said that our nations past histories with Iran aren't irrelevant, I've just said in this issue it doesn't effect how we approach Iran nuclear program, which once again, you've only barely touched.

 

Tony

You tell us what secondary and primary source material is but don’t seem to answer the question.

You said that the evidence was secondary and speclative and seem to imply by this that lodui’s and my own information was of equal validity. You give as an example “the exchanges about the US envolvement in the rise of the Shah I just see the same situation seen through different tinted specs”


I said at first that - Iran and the US, have a history, an Anglo-American plot overthrow the legitimate government and installed the rather brutal regime of the Shah. The US supported that regime in all it torture and murder. A popular revolution overthrow the Shah and (unluckily) the mad mullahs gained power.

Lodui said – “Balbus, the US wasn't responsible for the rise of the Shah, Iran had one of the longest reigning monarchies in the history of the world. In 1941 the British and Russians forced the elder Shah to give the monarchy to his son”

I pointed out – “I think you will find that most historians admit to the US involvement in the overthrow of the elected government lead by Dr. Mohammad Mossadegh and the establishment of the Shah. Even US citizens that were involved are on record as to the part they, and the US played.”

To which he said - I'm not denying the CIA's involvment in the overthrow of Iran's PM, I was simply saying the Shah was already present in Iran prior to his consolidation of power by overthrowing the PM.

Now Tony can you see how that went?

I gave a prises of the history Lodui seemed to be trying to imply that the US hadn’t an involvement, when pulled up on the mistake by me he then turns around and agrees with me.

**

Shall we take another Tony? –

Lodiu claimed – “And you make it seem like Iran's populist government was somehow superior to the Shah. It wasn't, it was ruled by the priesthood”

I then had to point out that – “Dr. Mohammad Mossadegh was something of a socialist and a secularist. He had the support of some religious groups just as he had support from communist groups”

Since that is correct lodui didn’t contest the facts, his opinion didn’t seem to fit the history.

**

So Tony want another? –

Lodui claimed that “Human Rights weren't any better under the Mossagegh government” than they were under the Shah and that the two were “morally equivalent”

I had already mentioned a report from Amnesty International that had claimed that the Shah’s regime had the worst human rights record on Earth (in 1976).

Lodui seem to be trying to back up his own claim of Mossagegh abuses on that level with the Times opinion piece, which said nothing equivalent about the Mossagegh governments human rights record, in fact a record that most historian seem to believe was reasonable.

Lodui answered with a snide remark but no fresh evidence of the Mossagegh government’s moral equivalence to the Shah’s regime.

**

I could go on, but hey Tony have you noticed a trend? Like how Lodui’s opinions never seem to stand up to even the smallest amount of scrutiny?

But Tony if you have any information that supports lodui’s viewpoints and completely demolishes what I’ve read so far on the subject do please tell us.

 

Try this -

America and Europe should listen to a whispered message from Isfahan

Visiting Iran, I found a regime wedded to violence and a society eager for peaceful change. We must address both

Timothy Garton Ash
Thursday November 24, 2005
The Guardian

The young lecturer in Isfahan was visibly frightened. "Keep your voice down," he muttered to his friend as we talked politics in one of that magical city's many teahouses. Mahmoud, as I shall call him, went on to blame his people's troubles on American and European skulduggery - an old Iranian pastime. So what, I asked him, did he think America and Europe should do about Iran? Mahmoud gulped. There was a long silence as he communed with his tea-glass. Then, leaning towards me and lowering his voice, he said with quiet intensity: "Stick together. Understand what is happening in Iran. Have a consistent policy."
As the board of the International Atomic Energy Agency meets again to consider the Iranian nuclear programme, we need to work out what to do about Iran. The crunch will not come quite yet, mainly because the Bush administration has so many other problems on its plate. The last thing Washington needs is another Iraq. But some sort of a crunch will probably come in the first half of next year, perhaps with Iran being referred to the UN security council. So, don't be scared - be prepared. And that whispered message from Isfahan is a good place to start our preparation.
First, understand what is happening in Iran. This is much easier for Europeans than Americans. We have embassies there. We do business there. We can travel there. As senior American officials freely admit, there is no country in the world they have less contact with. So there's a particular obligation on us Europeans to go there, to look and listen, and then to share our findings with our American friends. The weakness of western policy is so often that it does not start from a realistic analysis of the country the west is trying to change. That's why I travelled round Iran for two weeks earlier this autumn, having many uncensored conversations with people like nervous Mahmoud. (My longer report is on www.nybooks.com).
If you see it at first hand, you will have no doubt that this is a very nasty and dangerous regime. I will never forget talking in Tehran to a student activist who had been confined and abused in the prison where Iranian-Canadian journalist Zahra Kazemi was beaten so severely that she later died of her wounds. Half the Iranian population are subjected to systematic curtailment of their liberty simply because they are women. Two homosexuals were recently executed. The backbone of the political system is still an ideological dictatorship with totalitarian aspirations: not communism, but Khomeinism. The Islamic republic's new, ageing-revolutionary president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a subordinate but still important part of that power structure, has just revived Ayatollah Khomeini's call to wipe Israel off the map. According to an official spokesman, some 50,000 Iranians have signed up in a recruitment drive for "martyrdom-seeking operations". Elements connected to the regime have almost certainly supplied weapons across the frontier into southern Iraq, where they are used to kill British soldiers. And, yes, the mullahs probably are trying to get nuclear weapons.
So, as this argument about Iran develops, let's have none of those confused and/or dishonest apologetics on the European left that, out of hostility to American policy, try to pretend that the other side (Pol Pot, Brezhnev, Saddam) is not half as bad as Washington says it is. Taking our lead from George Orwell, it's entirely possibly to maintain that Saddam Hussein ran a brutal dictatorship and that the invasion of Iraq was the wrong way to remove him. Now it's right to say that the Iranian mullahs run a very nasty regime and that it would be a huge mistake to bomb them.
For the second thing you find if you go there is that many Iranians, especially among the two-thirds of the population who are under 30, hate their regime much more than we do. Given time, and the right kind of support from the world's democracies, they will eventually change it from within. But most of them think their country has as much right to civilian nuclear power as anyone else, and many feel it has a right to nuclear arms. These young Persians are pro-democracy and rather pro-American, but also fiercely patriotic. They have imbibed suspicion of the great powers - especially Britain and the United States - with their mother's milk. A wrong move by the west could swing a lot of them back behind the state. "I love George Bush," one young woman told me as we sat in the Tehran Kentucky Chicken restaurant, "but I would hate him if he bombed my country." Or even if he pushed his European allies to impose stronger economic sanctions linked to the nuclear issue alone.
Our problem is that the nuclear clock and the democracy clock may be ticking at different speeds. To get to peaceful regime change from within could take at least a decade, although president Ahmadinejad is hastening that prospect as he sharpens the contradictions within the system. Meanwhile, the latest US intelligence assessment suggests that Iran is still a decade away from acquiring nuclear weapons. But significant, non-military action to prevent that outcome clearly has to come sooner; for as soon as dictators have nukes, you're in a different game. Then, as we have seen with North Korea and Pakistan, they are treated with a respect they don't deserve.
This is where we need to hear the other half of the message from my friend in Isfahan: stick together and be consistent. If Europe and America split over Iran, as we did over Iraq, we have not a snowball's chance in hell of achieving our common goals. To be effective, Europe and America need the opposite of their traditional division of labour. Europe must be prepared to wave a big stick (the threat of economic sanctions, for it is Europe, not the US, that has the trade with Iran) and America a big carrot (the offer of a full "normalisation" of relations in return for Iranian restraint). But the old transatlantic west is not enough. Today's nuclear diplomacy around Iran shows us that we already live in a multipolar world. Without the cooperation of Russia and China, little can be achieved.
And we have to be consistent. Consistent in our policy to Iran, embedded in a kind of Helsinki process for the whole region. Consistent in advocating an international set of rules governing the use of nuclear power, not just for Iran but for others as well. Consistent, too, in recognising that our policy must be addressed as much to the people as the regime. For every step we take to slow down the nuclearisation of Iran, we need another to speed up the democratisation of Iran. At every stage, we need to explain to the Iranian people, through satellite television, radio and the internet, what we are doing and why. Isfahan is not just the increasingly notorious location of a nuclear processing plant; it's also a beautiful city where many critical citizens live. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a reckless leader, but there are many other Mahmouds in Iran. We must listen to them. In the end, it's they, not we, who will change their country for the better.

 

Lodui

Ok here we go again!

The reason why I suggested the book was that it was obvious from your comments that you had little knowledge of the subject. This was clear from your opinion of the government of Mohammed Mossagegh, I was just trying to help if I see someone in such distress my instincts are to give assistance. If you wish to remain ignorant that is totally up to you I’m not forcing you to read the damn book.

**

But my argument was about how the Iranian people see the US, as friend with their best interests at heart or foe in pursuit of its own agenda with little or no consideration of them.

This is as much about perception as ‘reality’ most people that know about the Shah despises his regime, while many believe that that of Mossagegh had a potential that was cut short by US aggression.

You claim that - “If Sweeden took the leading role in negotiations for Iran's nuclear program, the goals would need to be the same, and Iranian people would be just as suspicious”

“Just as suspicious”?

We don’t know yet Sweden and Iran do not have a history of dislike for each other and a feeling of mistrust. The fact is that European negotiators have been trying to work for a deal and I hear that they were disappointed by the Bush admin’s anti- Iranian comments, as they made their work harder.

“Just as suspicious”?

If someone beat you up, would you be suspicious of them, what if they then helped someone else beat you up? What if you then went to get a gun and the guy you had beaten you up twice then told you that you didn’t need to and shouldn’t, would you accept their advice as reasonable or with suspicion?

**

“I have yet to hear you come up with an alternative.”

An alternative to what?

As I have already pointed out your ideas (of increased aggression by the US) are unrealistic and liable to be counterproductive.

**

“But not being sure is certainly not a sufficient policy background effect how we deal with a dangerous, terrorist sponsoring, viahament governments aquisition of nuclear weapons”

What is the ‘policy’ the US is using and just how is it ‘dealing’ with the situation?

As I’ve pointed out US aggression only seem to stiffen the Iranian leaderships resolve.

**

“Note I've never said that our nations past histories with Iran aren't irrelevant, I've just said in this issue it doesn't effect how we approach Iran nuclear program, which once again, you've only barely touched.”

But that is it, the history should have effected how the US approached Iran, a lot of the problems we are having now is that the US didn’t take it into account.

 

Well im certainly learning; my knowledge of contemporary history is expanding, I dont think I really know enough to add anything intelligent to the argument. While this is quite interesting, genuinely, i'm not sure how its important. Im not for a second suggesting we invade Iran or do anything forceful as I think that this would set them further against us. The US and UK telling Iran they cant have nukes is definately the pot calling the kettle black and this does need to be addressed. Whether Bush should be allowed to control all those nukes is again a very good question. However Iran vs. Isreal is beginning to look like the most likely nuclear face off in coming years and as such should probably be dealt with first. I may not know politics but i do know nuclear physics and I think that countries have a responsibility to stop any other country from firing one in anger. If I had my way id take degree certificates away from people who go into nuclear weapon design as they obviously didnt understand their nuclear physics module.

 

Tony

While this is quite interesting, genuinely, i'm not sure how its important.

I’m not sure how much clearer I can be. Given the history in my opinion the Bush administrations aggressive Iranian policy has been counterproductive.

**

Im not for a second suggesting we invade Iran or do anything forceful as I think that this would set them further against us.

Actually I don’t think the US has the ability at this time to successfully invade and occupy Iran and while the Iranian people might not be sure I think the Iranian hard-line leadership know it. So US threatening behaviour is counterproductive because it increases the desire for a bomb while at the same time allowing them the time to build one.

**

However Iran vs. Isreal is beginning to look like the most likely nuclear face off in coming years and as such should probably be dealt with first.

Israel has over 200 unmonitored and some would claim illegal nukes plus US backing, I don’t believe the Iranian leadership is suicidal.

I may not know politics but i do know nuclear physics and I think that countries have a responsibility to stop any other country from firing one in anger.

The non-proliferation treaty says that states with nuclear weapons should be working to get rid of them many claim that none of those that have such weapons are seriously doing so and some are developing new types. Israel, Pakistan, and India have not signed the treaty.

If I had my way id take degree certificates away from people who go into nuclear weapon design as they obviously didnt understand their nuclear physics module.

Oh that will scare them, but seriously, the thing is that most of those that developed nuclear weapons did so because they believed their was a genuine threat. The US thought the nazis were close, the soviets and Chinese feared the US, India and Pakistan feared each other, Israel feared the Arabs and so on. The point I’m making is that the Iranian feel threatened (rightly or wrongly) and believe that having the bomb will protect them (rightly or wrongly)

**

The neo-con faction in the Republican party and Bush Administration, had a plan for dominating the Middle East. It was a fantasy but they ignored anyone that disagreed with them. The first step was to be Iraq which was meant to be a ‘cake walk’, the US would then be in a position to put pressure on Iran and Syria. This would be covert and overt and include diplomatic, military and financial factors. The goal was to be the quick overthrow of the two ruling regimes.

Iraq did not turn out as they had believed or advertised and so the rest of the plan has only limped along.

Syria –

US intelligence would have known that many Iraqi Ba’athests would fee to Ba’athest Syria and so could have used that to beat Syria with diplomatically.

Events in the Lebanon have been used (some would say orchestrated) by the admin to get at the Syrian leadership.

While these have taken place because of the Iraqi situation the US has been constantly distracted by fighting insurgence in Iraq and dissidents to their Iraqi policy in America.

The same is true for Iran.

The neo-cons talked aggressively and are trying to build a diplomatic coalition against the Iranians but the Iraq Adventure has made that all the more difficult.

**

The policy was stupid from the start and has been counterproductive just as many predicted.