Iran?

[Pangloss]

It's funny you should mention that, because it kinda points out the fact that while Iranians aren't a semetic people, arabs are. Which is the sort of thing that really makes all these old enmities look really silly. Why aren't the Arabs and Jews allied against their ancient Persian enemy? The randomness of some of these modern grievances is almos as absurd as the irrelevence of them.

[jeskill]

It's funny you should mention that, because it kinda points out the fact that while Iranians aren't a semetic people, arabs are[/i']. Which is the sort of thing that really makes all these old enmities look really silly. Why aren't the Arabs and Jews allied against their ancient Persian enemy? The randomness of some of these modern grievances is almos as absurd as the irrelevence of them.

 

Religion and the quest for power. Iranians are proud of their Persian heritage and like to be seen as distinct from the Arabs, but the fundamentalists are bound with the fundamentalist Arabs by their religious zealotry and distrust of the western world's economic and cultural power.

[jeskill]

But they're nevertheless very critical of their own government' date=' which is crucial. The existence of strong dissent makes extreme decisions far less likely. The only necessary condition needed to foil a plot to use a nuclear weapon is for somebody necessary to carrying it out to have some rational capacity. For, it can have only one result, and that is their own annihilation.

 

I don't think we should not be wary, or that we shouldn't be prepared to act. (We are probably not prepared to act, incidentally, because of the massive resource waste that is Iraq.) I just think it is very unlikely that we would actually need to. I suspect an internal government overthrow is more likely than a war with Israel, conventional or otherwise.

 

I also wish to draw attention back to the Iranian president's choice of words. He never said he would use nuclear weapons, only that Israel ought to be destroyed. This might seem like a petty difference, but it's actually quite important. For example, there are plenty of people I think ought to be killed, who deserve to die and whose deaths would make the world a better place. However, I'm not about to go out and shoot them all myself, or any of them.[/quote']

 

Are you saying that you think it's mostly a bunch of empty threats from the Iranian President? Would would convince him that uttering those threats would be beneficial to his country? Do you think he's trying to muster up some support from other countries (for invasion of Israel or some other unknown political reason)?

[Sisyphus]

Not beneficial to his country. Beneficial to him. He's a politician, remember? There are few easier ways to build popular support than to appeal to popular racism, nationalism, or religious fervor. He's doing all three, using a target that is still quite safe just about anywhere in the Middle East. Not only that, but he's being openly confrontational and defiant at a time when most Middle Eastern Muslims probably feel humiliatingly bullied into political correctness by the powers that be, like the U.S. Openly saying that Israel should be wiped out is also, in effect, saying that Iran cannot be dominated by foreigners.

[Helix]

Absolutely not. SFN is a web-based science information forum, and as such has neither the right nor the capability of invading a sovereign nation. We find it difficult to collaborate on musicals and novels, much less a military offensive of this nature.

 

That's possibly the funniest thing I've heard all day.

 

 

To answer the poll, Iran is a threat, but we won't invade them. Bush is under intense fire from the Democrats and Republicans alike for his pretenses for the war in Iraq and the way he handled the post-9/11 landscape. Maybe he thought he could rally the nation behind him, and for a while he could. But after Abu Ghraib and over 2,000 casualties people are losing faith. It would be extremely unwise, and he knows it, to invade yet another country. And also, Congress has to approve a war and by the way they have been acting towards the Patriot Act and the war on/in Iraq, I cannot see that approval happening.

 

Also, why would we want to further the opinion, in the minds of many (read: all) Arabs that we are complete a**holes? We already have serious problems in Iraq by our "Speak Loudly and Carry a Rifle" policy, invading another soverign nation would further that hatred. So, no, we will not invade Iran. Canada, possibly, but Iran, no.

[ecoli]

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/664108.html

 

apparently, Israel is not planning any military action against Iran. At least, not yet.