(Part 2) Best iran history books according to redditors
We found 295 Reddit comments discussing the best iran history books. We ranked the 78 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the products ranked 21-40. You can also go back to the previous section.
>was already heading towards this trajectory
No, sorry but the statistcal facts don't support this view. In fact Iran's Human Development Index prior to the revolution was low, and not at all rising:
https://photius.com/rankings/human_developement_index_1975-2005.html
And Iran's decision to try to topple Saddam since he was a continuing threat, was in fact vindicated by subsequent events when even the US sought to topple him. Had the Saudis, Kuwaitis and US listened to Khomeini when he warned them that Saddam would turn on them too. Imagine how much death and suffering would have been avoided there.
And this book refutes the claims of the likes of Milani
A Social Revolution: Politics and the Welfare State in Iran
https://www.amazon.com/Social-Revolution-Politics-Welfare-State/dp/0520280822/ref
Since you seem to be into air warfare, there's little else but older stuff like:
Mind: these three were published in 2002-2004 period, and could all need a great deal of 'overhauls and upgrades'. The publishing of the first one caused a small 'publishing revolution' in Iran in particular, thus there is plenty of new info.
Here are few examples for diverse 'updates':
Much newer, and then providing 'the other side's point of view' would be such like:
For ground warfare, there's meanwhile an entire series suitably titled Iran-Iraq War. This was sold out, but a 2nd edition is due out in early 2019.
Finally, for better understanding of all the possible rumours about (supposed) Iranian acquisitions of Russian weapons (all of which rarely materialize), and the reasons for generally sad condition of the IRIAF in particular (also why diverse projects like F-14AM always stop at 'one prototype only'), see: Iran is Too Much of a Mess to Acquire Russian Weaponry.
Similarly, reasons why at least 'rumours' on specific missile-related projects should be taken seriously, are described in a four-part series of articles starting here: Iran Is Building Air Defenses Against Stealth Aircraft
Израиль созывать бесполезные говорильни в ООН не будет. Раздраконят если возникнет такая необходимость без всяких предупреждений и увещеваний.
Как раз сейчас читаю Rise and Kill First про Моссад и спецоперации по ликвидации врагов еврейского народа. Реальная история ярче любого художественного фильма.
To the extent that by 1978/9 it was widely (and accurately) believed in Iran that the US and Britain's secret agencies had influenced the 1953 coup, it surely had an effect on the outcome of the 1979 revolution against the Shah. The Pahlavi regime was viewed as dictatorial, capricious, overly luxuriant and un-democratic by its critics (among whom were both members of socially conservative anti-Imperialist Islamic groups and leftist/communist movements like the Tudeh (Masses) party). The Pahlavi regime after '53 largely relied on patronage systems, fueled by oil wealth, and viciously repressive police tactics (headed by the infamous SAVAK agency) to maintain its hold on power -- and its ability to do so was seen by many as conditioned by Western interests in keeping oil flowing, cheaply, out of Iran. The fact that M. Reza Pahlavi was originally harbored by the United States in the midst of the revolution fanned those flames. So if, by this question, you mean to ask whether the memory and after-effects of '53 had an influence on '79, then the answer (at least according to most of the scholarship on the issue) is an unequivocal yes.
If you mean something else by this question, then please clarify and I'll be happy to answer to the best of my ability.
Some further reading:
Nikki Keddie Roots of Revolution
Ervand Abrahamian Iran Between Two Revolutions
And you'll find a couple interesting sources on this in Akram Fouad Khater's Sources in Modern Middle East History
Terminei semana passada um livro sobre o Mossad (basicamente a CIA de Israel) em que vai em detalhes sobre os assassinatos mais notórios pelo grupo especial formado na instituição. Não consegui largar o livro, tem relatos detalhados desde eles perseguindo nazistas exilados aqui na América Latina, à retaliação do ataque nas olimpíadas de Munique ao assassinato de líderes de terroristas.
Depois de ler esse comprei outro do mesmo assunto que soube por uma thread no /r/worldnews. Este entra em mais detalhes sobre toda a questão de Israel e Palestina, e dos assassinatos da Mossad. Terrorismo mútuo, e violência que só gera mais violência.
Da minha área estou lendo o livro de um Promotor chamado Roberto Livianu, corrupção e Direito Penal que trata das dificuldades no processamento de crimes de colarinho branco no Brasil.
Any good one-stop information shops on them? Ancient Iran: Cosmology, Mythology, History is on my reading list, but who knows when I'll get to it.
If you want to read up on the history of combat aviation in Iran's Air force, I recommend you talk to /u/x_tc_x. Who is he?
He is an Austrian military aviation author and co-author of these books:
1
2
3
4
He is pretty active on reddit and comments on the Syrian Civil war conflict almost everyday.
Edit: I read the 3rd book and while it mostly focuses on the Arab-Israeli wars, it taught me some things that surprised me and fell in place quite nicely given other things that I knew of these wars. So, I definitely recommend all 4 books. I only skimmed through the 2nd and 4th books.
This is pretty much the definitive book on Iran-Contra scandal.
The author was the Independent Counsel appointed to investigate the affair.
The one Mueller and co. hopefully write. I recently bought Firewall, written by the Iran-Contra prosecutor and really dig these inside looks at the process. They're meticulous in laying out the details.
https://www.amazon.com/Century-War-Anglo-American-Politics-World-ebook/dp/B005Y4EZWQ
Not specifically on them, but includes them in the picture and describes the outcomes of their mandates
I don't know but I can suggest a source
https://www.amazon.com/Social-Revolution-Politics-Welfare-State/dp/0520280822
It is really amazing if you think about it -- the countries that developed fastest were 1- Communist China and 2- Islamic Iran
All the theories of capitalism and foreign aid and economic development etc didn't help the other countries catch up as fast as them.
You are on the right track and are getting the rough outlines. And yes, there is a lot of evidence. Start here first:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K20fm2166WM
And then read this book:
http://www.amazon.com/Big-Their-Bankers-Persian-Gulf/dp/1453757732
Also, check out the https://www.corbettreport.com/. You can learn A TON from that guy.
That's a good start!
it was an attempt to codify within law something that already existed in the upper echelons of ottoman society. It wasn't like the type of gayness that we see today, it was more along the lines of the ancient greek and romans where older men would pair with males who quite a bit younger than them. Of course that is still pretty backwards by today's standards but what is significant is how these relationships were tied into islam and poetry at the time, wheras now any type of homosexuality is very illegal and quite hated in many parts of the former empire. I know of a book that has way more info and I'll admit that I haven't really read it but it does explore the subject in length and it has an extensive bibliography so all of the information is sourced.pdf link to anyone who wants it
Start here:
Treacherous Alliance: The Secret Dealings of Israel, Iran, and the United States,
http://www.amazon.com/Treacherous-Alliance-Secret-Dealings-Israel/dp/0300120575
>"[I]t wasn’t Iran that turned the Israeli-Iranian cold war warm – it was Israel . . . The Israeli reversal on Iran was partially motivated by the fear that its strategic importance would diminish significantly in the post-cold war middle east if the then president (1989-97) Hashemi Rafsanjani’s outreach to the Bush Sr
administration was successful."
And so,
>Israeli politicians began painting the regime in Tehran as fanatical and irrational. Clearly, they maintained, finding an accommodation with such “mad mullahs” was a non-starter. Instead, they called on the US to classify Iran, along with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, as a rogue state that needed to be “contained.”
That is indeed what most likely happened. The devil we know is an interesting read by an ex-CIA agent, Robert Baer.
Iran had been making better compromise offers years ago. The US ignored them, in favor of a regime-change agenda. They were using the exaggerated "Iranian nuclear threat" as a pretext for imposing regime-change there, just as they used the "WMDs in Iraq" lie as a pretext to invade and topple that country.
This is what the IAEA Director ELbaradei said years ago
>I have seen the Iranians ready to accept putting a cap on their enrichment [program] in terms of tens of centrifuges, and then in terms of hundreds of centrifuges. But nobody even tried to engage them on these offers. Now Iran has 5,000 centrifuges. The line was, "Iran will buckle under pressure." http://www.newsweek.com/elbaradei-iranians-are-not-fanatics-80021
And this is what he concluded
>“They weren’t interested in a compromise with the government in Tehran, but regime change – by any means necessary, http://news.antiwar.com/2011/04/20/elbaradei-us-europe-werent-interested-in-compromise-with-iran/
In fact the Iranians had been making BETTER compromise offers for years that the US ignored in favor of a regime-change agenda
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/17/AR2006061700727.html
http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Iran_Nuclear_Proposals
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/05/opinion/05iht-edzarif.html?_r=0
But the Israelis weren't happy that the US and Iran may get along. Rather the Israelis had been pushing to start a war between Iran and US to suit themselves http://www.uscatholic.org/culture/war-and-peace/2008/06/iran-spam
It is important to note that even the US doesn't accuse Iran of making nukes, rather it accused Iran of "seeking thecapability" to make nukes and having engaged in "nuclear studies" until 2003 --
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/25/world/middleeast/us-agencies-see-no-move-by-iran-to-build-a-bomb.html
Israeli intelligence actually agrees that there is no nuclear weapons program in Iran
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/mossad-cia-agree-iran-has-yet-to-decide-to-build-nuclear-weapon-1.419300
And contrary to the hype, the Israels don't "Feel threatened" by Iran's nonexistent nukes http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/livni-behind-closed-doors-iranian-nuclear-arms-pose-little-threat-to-israel-1.231859
What they feel threatened about is that the US and Iran may start to get along, leaving Israel the third man out. http://www.amazon.com/Treacherous-Alliance-Secret-Dealings-Israel/dp/0300120575
The "capability" to make nukes is not uncommon nor special to Iran as the former IAEA inspector points out
>And so, clearly Iran has mastered many technologies in the uranium-handling and enrichment areas, such that if they wanted to go ahead, they probably could do it. That would make them a threshold state. We can name any number of other states in the world with the same level of technology and expertise. It's the intent that you have to worry about. We don't see intent to this case. http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=13286
Contrary to the US intelligence assessment, the IAEA said there was never any evidence of a weapons program in Iran, ever existing (not before 2003, not after)
>With respect to a recent media report, the IAEA reiterates that it has no concrete proof that there is or has been a nuclear weapon programme in Iran. http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/09/17/us-nuclear-iaea-iran-sb-idUSTRE58G60W20090917
And the evidence for these claims is quite sketchy and disputed by nuclear experts http://www.sipri.org/media/expert-comments/the-iaea-and-parchin-do-the-claims-add-up
And former IAEA Director Elbaradei dismissed them as hype http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/09/02/us-iran-nuclear-elbaradei-idUSTRE5811V120090902
The Israelis outright accused the IAEA DIrector Elbaradei of being "an iranian agent" for his refusal to endorse the claims against Iran http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4146150,00.html
So the US and Israel started attacking the IAEA Director and had him replaced with someone who had sworn loyalty to the US
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A57928-2004Dec11.html
http://www.theguardian.com/world/julian-borger-global-security-blog/2010/nov/30/iaea-wikileaks
And the new IAEA Director started promoting questionable claims against Iran by the US that the former Director had dismissed as hype http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/09/02/us-iran-nuclear-elbaradei-idUSTRE5811V120090902
Once the full text of the allegations were released by the new IAEA Director, experts pointed out that the allegations against Iran were not new and were actually "thin"
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2011/1109/Iran-nuclear-report-Why-it-may-not-be-a-game-changer-after-all
There was also plenty of fraud and outright misrepresentation in the media for example the infamous "AP Graph" that supposedly proved Iran was working on nukes ... but was fake http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/nov/29/ap-iran-nuclear-program-graph-explanation
The US also started framing the issue in terms of vague "capabilities to do things in the indefinite future", because there was no actual evidence of a nuclear weapons program in Iran http://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Most-U-S-tips-fingering-Iran-false-envoys-2646358.php nor could any IAEA inspectors prove that Iran could NOT make nukes one day (naturally, since no one can see into the future)
The US also cooked up a "laptop computer" that supposedly was stolen from Iran and which supposedly contained all sorts of evidence of "nuclear studies" that the US never made fully available to Iran OR the IAEA but which now the IAEA demands that Iran disprove, even though it has never been allowed to see the documents fully, http://mepc.org/journal/middle-east-policy-archives/iran-nuclear-alleged-studies-documents?print
The "Capability" to make nukes something 40 nations already have, since it is inevitable in having a nuclear energy program, and is not illegal nor a violation of the NPT http://old.seattletimes.com/html/nationworld/2002041473_nukes21.html
But these countries don't make nukes, becase nukes really aren't that useful in real life http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/ten-reasons-iran-doesnt-want-the-bomb-7802
Nor can we just assume that Iran necessarily wants nukes, to supposedly protect itself: Iran suffered over 100,000 casualties from US-backed Iraqi chemical warfare back when the US was friends with Saddam, and refused to respond in kind with its own chemical weapons, on moral grounds, and instead suffered the casualties. http://foreignpolicy.com/2013/08/26/exclusive-cia-files-prove-america-helped-saddam-as-he-gassed-iran/ So when they say they consider WMDs immoral and against Islam, they've already proven it with a lot of blood.
Iran's nuclear program is actually quite legal, and Iran's position is widely backed in the world community despite what the media tells you
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/jun/09/iran-nuclear-power-un-threat-peace
http://indianexpress.com/article/news-archive/web/india-with-nam-in-slamming-iaea-report-on-iran/
It remains to be seen if the US has now genuinely changed its agenda to topple the govt there, or whether they've just changed tactics and are still just looking for exaggerated excuses to topple Iran's govt
I read "Genesis 1948" by Dan Kurzman this summer and thoroughly enjoyed it. I feel like the 48 war is the largest event in Israel's history that I know the least about and Kurzman did a great job of getting perspectives from all sides - the Americans, the Israelis, the Jordanians, the British, the Palestinians, the Syrians, the Egyptians, etc.
If you're in Israel you can find it at Sefer V'Sfel for 50 NIS. They did a reprint a few years ago that they never finished selling. In the US, amazon.
Works mentioned:
The Iran–Iraq War 1980–1988 - Efraim Karsh
Is there a part of the world you'd like to focus on? Fiction v. non-fiction?
I personally have always enjoyed reading Robert Kaplan and Michael J. Totten especially (Totten lived in Beirut in the 2000s).
The Persian Puzzle: The Conflict Between Iran and America
by Kenneth M. Pollack
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1400063159
Here are all the local Amazon links I could find:
amazon.co.uk
amazon.ca
amazon.com.au
amazon.in
amazon.com.mx
amazon.de
amazon.it
amazon.es
amazon.com.br
amazon.nl
amazon.co.jp
amazon.fr
Beep bloop. I'm a bot to convert Amazon ebook links to local Amazon sites.
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Tuchman has a chapter on the international anarchist movement of the late 19th century in her book The Proud Tower. It's more or less forgotten now but was the template of the original terrorist movement and the 'propaganda of the deed'.
This book I read recently and it gives some insights into the current islamist terrorist movement:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001FSL2KI/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1
Finally, for fun but also for thought, consider this article:
http://decider.com/2015/12/11/the-radicalization-of-luke-skywalker-a-jedis-path-to-jihad/
And consider that from the POV of the islamic terrorists, they're essentially the rebellion vs. the empire. They have the same tropes as the writers of Star Wars.
So you link 3 links about how Afghanistan was a major Poppy grower. Implying that the CIA was making money off of Heroin and thats why the US supported the Mujahideen
Your argument hinges on the first link which has an except from this book
http://www.amazon.com/Big-Their-Bankers-Persian-Gulf/dp/1453757732/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1352651842&sr=1-1&keywords=big+oil+%26+their+bankers+in+the+persian+gulf
Lets look at the description:
>Big Oil... pulls back the covers to expose a centuries-old cabal of global oligarchs, whose control over the global economy is based on hegemony over the planet's three most valuable commodities: oil, guns and drugs- combined with ownership of the world's central banks. Henderson implicates these oligarchs in the orchestration of a string of conspiracies from Pearl Harbor to the Kennedy Assassination to 911. He follows the trail of dirty money up the food chain to the interbred Eight Families who- from their City of London base- control the Four Horsemen of Oil, the global drug trade and the permanent war economy
Now you're pulling conspiracy theories out of your ass.
You're adorable.
I explain that by oil of course, an increase in wealth. And yes there was 'a rise' in life expectancy -- as would be natural from 1950 to 1970 and it happened everywhere else in the world too -- but again, the point is that Iran didn't just continue to experience "a rise" but DOUBLED THE WORLD AVERAGE in improving living standards after the revolution.
See if you actually had set foot in Iran before and after the revolution, you'd know that there was a massive difference. Before the revolution, Tehran had huge shanty towns and slums, of the sort found in Manila. Just 20 minutes outside of Tehran, there was no clean running water or electricity. Not so anymore. Read this book then come back and argue.
http://www.amazon.com/Iran-Between-Revolutions-Princeton-Studies/dp/0691101345
But since you probably wont', here's the gist of it:
>The [Islamic] Republic’s constitution -- with 175 clauses -- transformed these general aspirations into specific inscribed promises. It pledged to eliminate poverty, illiteracy, slums and unemployment. It also vowed to provide the population with free education, accessible medical care, decent housing, pensions, disability pay and unemployment insurance....In the three decades since the revolution, the Islamic Republic -- despite its poor image abroad -- has taken significant steps toward fulfilling these promises. It has done so by giving priority to social rather than military expenditures, and thus dramatically expanding the Ministries of Education, Health, Agriculture, Labor, Housing, Welfare and Social Security. http://www.merip.org/mer/mer250/why-islamic-republic-has-survived
Iran has oil. And acts scary towards Israel. But mostly we're still pissed off at the Iranians for deposing the puppet we installed back in the 50s.
Read The Persian Puzzle for more details. Your local library should have a copy. In short, the problem is that Iranians can't forget the crap we did to them, while we in the US can't remember the crap we did to them.
I'm not suggesting that Saddam was a generally great guy. He was oppressive, and his Baath party was fueled largely by Sunni supporters, but that's only one part of the story.
The Baath party was intentional secular, which by nature limits the amount that religious sectarian violence could be a theme. Saddam, compared to other dictators in other states with similar social and political circumstances, was surprisingly even handed, though obviously not completely so. He did favor Sunnis--but more than anything else he favored loyalty and family, and most of his family were Sunnis. During the peak of his reign, he did elevate the standard of living across the country to a great extent, including Shiites.
There was the massacre of Dujail, and there was the Kurdish attacks, but the Dujail massacre was also immediate following an assassination and coup attempt that he narrowly survived. What dictator do you know that wouldn't make a scapegoat of a marginalized group after a failed attempt to remove him from power?
In fact, Saddam's choices were almost entirely political regarding the religious differences. Saddam did a great job of using his secular party to dampen tensions that were rising with Ayatollah Khomeini's influence. He was expelled from his exile in Iraq in 1978 after urging Iraqi Shiites to overthrow Saddam, came to power in 1979 in Iran, and by 1980 was at war with Iraq. Yet despite that, Saddam managed to mostly contain the sectarian violence to a bare minimum, including directly courting Shiite support by including them more directly in the Baath party, against the wishes of the established party members, leading up to the war.
It's pretty clear to see that Saddam was brutal and oppressive, but also very good at minimizing outright sectarian violence that ballooned after the US botched the occupation. Oppression is a scale, not a binary, and for all Saddam's faults, he created a stable coalition between Sunni and Shia while also raising the standard of living across the country until he was bankrupted by war and sanctions.
Further, Bremer has been disgraced after his performance in Iraq and hasn't had a signficant position since. His time in Iraq was so disastrous it tanked his career to the point he had to work as a ski instructor for a period of time. His flagship policy of de-Baathification was soundly rejected by numerous sources at the time and since and was eventually reversed in 2008. There is no defense of this policy.
By contrast, the plan created in the State Department which advised a more similar policy to that which was taken after WW2, worked fantastically not just in Germany, but in Japan as well. No one is suggesting simply copy and pasting everything exactly as it was in Germany, but the point stands that Bremer had sufficient knowledge to know that his plan was going to fail in exactly the way it did, but he took that action anyway.
I'm not presenting Chandrasekaran as some master statesman who knows better than everyone else. I'm presenting his argument that there were other government officials giving alternate advice that understood a more nuanced understanding of the situation and had superior plans with previous success in other situations. Bremer was not some diplomat with a long successful career behind him either--director of the CPA was his most prestigious title by a long shot and he blew it in stupendous fashion.
https://www.pri.org/stories/2013-03-20/saddam-husseins-legacy-sectarian-division-iraq
https://www.thenation.com/article/how-saddam-husseins-execution-contributed-to-the-rise-of-sectarianism-in-the-middle-east/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sectarian_violence_in_Iraq#cite_note-efraimkarsh-1
https://www.amazon.com/Iran-Iraq-War-1980-1988-Essential-Histories/dp/1841763713
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Bremer#%22De-Ba'thification%22_of_the_Iraqi_civil_service
EDIT: Here's another one written by Bremer himself. He specifically likens the Baath party to the Nazis and suggests a similar remedy would have been appropriate but he botched the execution. I would suggest that there was key additional information ignored that would have made that execution less of a failure, but that's neither here nor there. My point is that Bremer himself believes the similarity between the Baath party and Nazi party is significant: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/06/iraq-war-aftermath-paul-bremer
Don't make up facts to fit your argument.
https://www.amazon.com/Iran-Iraq-1980-1988-Schiffer-Military-History/dp/0764316699
4 star average. The most negative written review (3 stars):
>The book could have definitely used proofreading before being published. It's loaded with grammar and punctuation errors. It also uses many abbreviations that are not in the abbreviation glossary. Otherwise it is loaded with incredibly detailed factual information, which surely must have been a challenge to obtain. I wished it had more personal/first hand accounts from the pilots, but it didn't. I liked it though because it covered a subject I'm interested in, which is otherwise not covered in such detail, or at all, by other authors and publishers. I found the coverage of U.S. assistance to both Iran and Iraq to especially interesting.
The four-volume series he contributed to has one negative review for all four volumes:
>Very bad with little maps for battle and how battle evolve
https://www.amazon.com/Iran-Iraq-War-Khuzestan-September-1980-May/dp/1911096567
His two books about Iranian aircraft:
https://www.amazon.com/Iranian-Tomcat-Units-Combat-Aircraft/dp/1841767875/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1491686344&sr=1-6&keywords=tom+cooper+iran
https://www.amazon.com/Combat-Aircraft-37-Iranian-Phantom/dp/1841766585/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1491686344&sr=1-7&keywords=tom+cooper+iran
Ok. I don't have a lot of time. I especially do not have enough time to cover every instance over the decades, so I'm going to go with the most recent event - the current Iran-Israel-US issue. I will use reposts.
Typing it now....
--------
>US strategy in the Middle East (and indeed all over the world) is predicated on establishing security so that other nations do not have to, the idea being that it is better if there is one powerful military guaranteeing everyone's interests rather than several powerful militaries looking to individual state interests. The US plays the role of security guarantor in the Middle East (ensuring the flow of the oil supply, protecting sea lanes, etc.) to prevent European, Indian, and Chinese (areas which all rely heavily on the Middle East for oil, whereas the vast majority of oil used by the US comes from the Western Hemisphere which we can easily secure from others) from having to do so. Preventing Arab nations from uniting (which would not happen regardless of any foreign power's involvement in the region today) is absolutely not on the agenda.
>It's not a narrative; it's established US strategy. That strategy is currently in flux because the transition in the international environment away from unipolarity, but that's what it has been since the Cold War.
To start this informal reply, there is going to be a serious inherent flaw when trying to look at one narrative as a monolithic strategy that spans decades. Theres considerable push and pull within the US government that needs to me accounted for. As promised, this will only focus on the current Iranian issue. I'm low on time, so..
Basically, you have a large fight that occurs between the oil interests you mention and people with ideological leanings with Israel. You simply cannot view even our current issues with Iran simply through your lens as it omits a massive portion of US foreign policy. There are clear breaks with oil interests and changes in US foreign policy. Sanctions are a key point during the change in policy in the mid 1990's to now. American companies were pushed out of Iran from the AIPAC sanctions when they were the biggest customers by far. Cheney, in the 1990's was against the neoconservative plan for invasion in the 1990's, he was fighting to drop the Iranian sanctions, as much of the companies were. Cheney changed his position later. Repost. look for links and a bunch of expanded points. Luckily, I have some important excerpts of Parsis book here that should help start you off. This is another short PDF you should read, as it also covers how oil interests came to dominate US policy, and then lost out to Israeli interests in the mid 1990's. During Clintons second term, Clinton shifted back to oil interests to an extent.
Then (repost)
>“Indecision 2000”had deprived the Bush administration ofmore than six badly needed weeks to organize the administration and fill key posts in the State Department and elsewhere.More than three months into his presidency,Bush still had not found many ofthe people who would head his government agencies, including those who would be responsible for policies on Iran.AIPAC’s machinery, however,was in great shape.The pro-Israel lobby began laying the groundwork for ILSA’s renewal on Capitol Hill,and by mid-March—before Bush had even formulated a position on ILSA—AIPAC had gathered more than three hundred cosponsors in the House (the bill needed only 218 votes to pass).Though the sanctions had failed to change Iran’s foreign policy,AIPAC still hailed ILSA as a great success.AIPAC Executive Director Howard Kohr urged the House International Relations Committee to renew ILSA because it had “met the test and proven its effectiveness over time”and because “Iranian behavior demands it.” The pro-Israeli Washington Institute for Near East Policy argued that ILSA’s renewal would help Iran’s “real moderates”and hurt the “so-called moderates”around President Mohammad Khatami,who shared the “anti-Israel policies set by Iran’s hard-line clerical leadership.” The Bush administration was quickly outmaneuvered; through its preemptive work on Capitol Hill,AIPAC checkmated Bush and saw the sanctions bill pass with overwhelming numbers in both chambers.Still,cautious optimism characterized Iran’s approach to the United States during the first months of the Bush administration,and a lull reigned in the war ofwords between Tehran and Tel Aviv. All that was to change on the morning of September 11,2001
View the parsi link above for an expansion of what occurred between 2001 and now. If people forget whey the sanctions are relevant today, Remember that the Obama administration just recently, expended a chunk of political capital on releasing oil from the strategic oil reserves to drive down prices to help boost the economy. In come the AIPAC sanctions, and Obama pleads to ease the impact of the penalties to avoid driving up oil prices. He loses. Oil prices go up over the nonsense that occurs afterwards, negatively affecting the US economy. Bonus? China gets cheaper Iranian Oil as the U.S. Pays for the expensive Hormuz patrols. A varied group of other people, with the run up to the Iraq war fresh on their minds, arent too happy with this and with the televison media coverage. For example, check out Robert Baer and Richard Engel on Hardball talking openly about how Israel is escalating hostilities with Iran to provoke an attack that will justify a military response. Baer is figure with some gravitas on this subject, and covering this on Hardball is very significant. Heres more.
More links
The delay and the sensitive negotiations over language may presage tensions with Democrats as AIPAC leads the drive among pro-Israel groups to ratchet up pressure on Iran this year.
As U.S. and Israeli officials talk publicly about the prospect of a military strike against Iran's nuclear program, one fact is often overlooked: U.S. intelligence agencies don't believe Iran is actively trying to build an atomic bomb.
AIPAC and the Push Toward War
Bibi or Barak: Who will plunge us into Mideast war?
I have to wrap this up. Even looking at just the most recent US issue in the middle east highlights how this perspective you bring does not cover decades of US foreign policy because it simply is not monolithic. People could have made this argument during the cold war, but even this was starting to erode by the Early 1990's.
So they're looking for a new explanation in the form of a new common enemy. And so they've invented one, which we're going to hear a great deal more about in the future, and that is Islamic fundamentalism, which they say is the great wave that's threatening the West.
-George Ball 1993
We needed some new glue for the alliance [with America].
And the new glue . . . was radical Islam.And Iran was radical Islam.
-Efraim Inbar, Begin-Sadat Center
i somehow missed this the first time around so sorry for the late reply, but assuming you were asking this question in good faith then it's pretty much an essential part of the historiography of sexuality in the islamic world. read any academic book or article about the subject. read this.
>Observably incorrect. A look at pew data on regional beliefs shows this to be blatantly false. In fact, the opposite is true.
i didn't mean this european influence is a present phenomenon, or that european muslims exhibit more homophobia than muslims elsewhere, obviously. you would know this if you had read the comment you were responding to:
> the legacy of 19th century european colonialism that cut into the power of islamic states and pressured them to "modernise", which included the criminalisation and/or pathologisation of same-sex attraction.