FBI stops Iran assasination attempt on Saudi Amb. to US

[PeZook]

How far are people trying to go with leveling out cultural differences?

Is it somehow wrong to suppose that there may be significant differences between the way different populations can be expected to react to a given stimulus?

Is it really true that we have to dismiss as 'racist' or 'orientalist' any argument along the lines of "well, this government believes some things that we don't believe, and has attitudes we aren't sure we can model, and seems to have less trouble willing to find people to die en masse for it than most societies we're familiar with... maybe they're going to act different when faced with a hugely stressful and dangerous situation, in ways that you or I would not."

You know, Simon, I get what you're saying, but the US has, in fact, made deals with different cultures in the past. You're best buddies with rulers of the KSA, for example: all it took was a sincere desire to get into their good graces, and look here: cultural differences overcome! (to an extent).

Of course the "sincere desire" appeared because the Saudis control a fuckload of oil, and you needed oil. And, of course, Iran has a lot more gripes with the US than the Saudis ever had in the 1940s, so it's going to be proportionately more difficult.

However, that's why you pay all those diplomats all this money, and the start towards fixing your relationship with Iran has to be getting them out of the "bad guys out to destroy us" list,because as long as your nation believes Iranians want to murder everyone, they will be unable to even start considering the problem properly.

Look at how relations between the USSR and US warmed up during detente ; It is, in fact,possible to use diplomacy to start the process of fixing relations between two nations, even between rivals.

[Broomstick]

In case you've forgot, the original point of contention was D13's proposition that even with (working) nukes, Iran (both its citizens and its government) would most likely see nuclear war as a pointlessly suicidal endeavor.

I think the average citizen wouldn't want his/her city bombed, and would not want to start a nuclear conflict - but citizens don't always get a vote. All you need is a government willing to make a large sacrifice (presumably while the decision makers are hidden safely away, or think they are) to get that shit started.

And this isn't like the Great Leap Forward, where part of the society died. We're talking about goddamn nuclear annihilation! That's the scale of the issue.

For Iran, yes, because Iran is far more likely to be entirely wiped out. It depends on response, of course - if the attacked country responds 1 for 1 rather a multi-bomb barrage it's possible some of Iran might survive. We really don't know what would happen in a nuclear exchange because it's never happened before.

Alternatively (and I think this is where Bakustra's ire comes from) you are proposing that Iran's populace (or Muslims in general) is somehow abnormally willing to die for a cause, even a losing one.

Nope, I don't think the general population is like that, but I fear the government might be willing to sacrifice a few million for the government's purposes. I also think religion and culture in Iran makes it easier to recruit martyrs than some other countries. Iran is not unique, just more likely to generate such.

Since you've used Kamikaze pilots as an example; Imperial Japan was crazy enough to think its civilians would pick up bamboo spears and defend the mainland islands, should it come to that.

Yes, the government, or at least a portion of it, believed that. They were even coaching the population to do that. How many would have actually tried to hold off trained and equipped marines with, essentially, pointy sticks we'll never know. We do know that the culture valued death over surrender. Quite a few Japanese actually did choose death over surrender, there were proportionally many fewer Japanese prisoners taken than, say, German or Italian in WWII. Had we invaded the Japanese main islands likely there would have been some civilians charging the invaders and quite a few others committing suicide, survival instincts be damned. They can be overcome.

IIRC, at some of the islands the US stormed Japanese civilians did in fact fight and die. Yet, when faced with nuclear annihilation they still surrendered.

It's not like everyone who survived the bomb meekly bowed their necks to the US. Even after the second one there were still people who wanted to fight the Americans.

It was the government that made the decision to surrender in the end. I'm all for democracy, but citizens don't get a vote to either start or end a war. It's a subset of people, a small group compared to the greater whole, who get to make those decisions and we've seen again and again situations where the rulers make decisions that result in massive death among the general population. Governments can be deposed after a massively bad decision, but that doesn't bring back the dead.

You really think Iran would be any different? Please, by all means, demonstrate this. Please deal in facts, not speculation.

Since Iran has never had an atomic bomb (unless they have one now they aren't telling anyone about) there are no facts to go on and any discussion is by necessity speculation. We can, however, look at how the current regime has acted in other wars.

Even if the human minesweeper instances were somewhat staged to be less hazardous than initial appearance would indicate, it still shows a cavalier attitude towards the lives of people. (The basiji were not regular army during the Iraq/Iran war, they were underage boys, older men, and women though they did receive some training if I recall correctly). There are other ways to clear mines. As I said, you can run livestock over them, which also gives you the benefit of afterwards having something to feed your army with. Using people for such tactics just shows that the government regards their lives as easily expendable, more so than some other countries that would not use human beings in that manner.

So, would the Iranian government view the loss of a city as a fair trade for getting something it wants, such as the elimination of what is perceived to be an enemy nation? Well, no one really knows, do they? But given their cavalier attitude towards human life I think it's a possibility.

[Shroom Man 777]

Iran more likely to recruit more martyrs to die for the government? The same Iran that's wracked with protests and divisions and factions and all sorts of people already pissed at the regime and demonstrating in public while getting oppressed and beaten with sticks and shot? What?

[PeZook]

Broomstick, Soviet Russia also used penal batallions for mine clearing. Were they very eager to lose cities in futile nuclear exchanges?

[Flagg]

Iran is totally unreasonable and the US can never have dealings with them. I mean it's not like 25 years ago a US President and his Administration committed high treason by selling them weapons in order to fund South American death squads or anything.

[Shroom Man 777]

Hey, yeah, Oliver North could make a good point man for the whole US-Iran dialogues to solve Destructionator and Simon's communications conundrum.

[Broomstick]

Broomstick, Soviet Russia also used penal batallions for mine clearing. Were they very eager to lose cities in futile nuclear exchanges?

The basiji were NOT penal! They were volunteers. A bit of a difference.

[Broomstick]

Iran more likely to recruit more martyrs to die for the government? The same Iran that's wracked with protests and divisions and factions and all sorts of people already pissed at the regime and demonstrating in public while getting oppressed and beaten with sticks and shot? What?

Since when does everyone in a nation have to be in agreement?

Iran had war protesters back in the early 1980's when fighting Iraq. At the same time, they also had tens of thousands volunteering for stupidly dangerous missions.

It's already been noted that there is a marked difference between the young, hip, urban Iranians and the much more conservative rural Iranians.

Because people are individuals and having differing opinions and viewpoints even when brought up in the same culture they don't always agree and don't act in lockstop. Is this news to anyone? Just because a culture or religion makes recruitment for martyrdom more likely doesn't mean everyone will be recruitable.

The US culture is pretty anti-suicide, but in addition to mentally ill people offing themselves we, too, have a certain number of potential fanatics that could be recruited for suicide missions, should the government choose to go that route. Of course, public reaction to that in the US is likely to be different than some other places, in that's seen as pretty skeevy given our culture. Noble self-sacrifice to save one's comrades, yes, that's courageous, but strapping on a vest of dynamite and detonating in a crowd of civilians? Not so much. Such a person is far more likely to be reviled by the general public in the US, rather than venerated as suicide bombers are some other places. That is, very much, a cultural difference.

[Broomstick]

Iran is totally unreasonable and the US can never have dealings with them.

I wouldn't actually call them insane or unreasonable... but that doesn't mean their goals and viewpoint are compatible with someone else's.

It's a chronic problem in the mid-east that Israel has a goal of continued existence and some other groups have a goal of removing them from the map. Both sides may be sane and rational, but their goals are completely at odds with each other. Given that, it's a wonder there isn't more violence in that region.

It may be that the current US and Iranian governments can not work together. You need the right individuals to make progress to bridge such deep divisions and I'm not sure we have them on either side right now. Ahmadinejad's words have sure pissed off a lot of people at this point, that makes it hard to either approach him, or take him seriously if he does the approaching, and right now he's the public face of Iran.

Ahmadinejad's predecessor, Mohammad Khatami, was quite different and emphasized reconciliation with other nations over past disagreements, approaching not only European nations but making a few overtures to the US in regards to improving relations between the two. There was, of course, still a deep level of mistrust but given more time the US and Iran could have made some progress towards better relations under Khatami. As soon as he got into office Ahmadinejad reversed all that.

The Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei is on record, frequently, as being opposed to the United States pretty much in all things, however, he also stated that relations between Iran and the US may change for the better in the future. He also condemned the 9/11 attacks on the US, as opposed to Ahmadinejad who minimized them almost to the point of non-existence. I'm not fully conversant with all his views, and it may be there are some things about the US he finds completely incompatible with how he feels a country or culture should be, not to mention long simmering resentments about prior meddling in Iranian affairs. Certain conflicts are not "fixable", and agreeing to disagree is easier said than done.

Well, it seems the government of Iran isn't entirely a monolithic block, although of course there is broad agreement on most topics within government.

I don't foresee any improvement in US and Iran relations while Ahmadinejad is still in office. If we got another Khatami in office I'd be much more optimistic. Khamenei is, of course, not going away any time soon (unless the next assassination attempt is successful - he's survived at least one) and he does not like the US at all, which would make things difficult for a Khatami, so we might have to wait for a more moderate successor to Khamenei to make progress. Well, things were pretty damn chilly between China and the US for decades, and now we're major trading partners to each other, Chinese are learning English and Mandarin speakers are in demand in the US for both government and private business. Things can and do change. It took Nixon to go to China and open the door, but who's going to be the Nixon to bridge the US-Iran canyon of distrust? Certainly not Ahmadinejad. He's far too confrontational at this point.

[Shroom Man 777]

Note that Ahmadinejad came into power after the USA started its "Axis of Evil" rhetoric and invaded two countries right beside Iran.

You know, America threw an epic bitch fit and went all paranoid after a certain power placed some military shits on some island off shore to Florida. Imagine how the American reaction would be if, for example, Mexico and Canadia were all occupied by a nation that also said that America was an axe of evil. Ya think the US would be all fine and dandy and reasonable towards the nation that did the invasionizing, occupationing and freedomization of two nations right beside it?

I don't know though. Them Fundamentalist Muslimistic Muslimists are all complicated and their thoughts aren't the same as ours, so who knows what made them act all like that.

[K. A. Pital]

No, you have the gist of it Shroom. Islamistic Mohammad Jihads see that they're being colonized and fucked over by the West. They cannot win militarily (preposterous a thought!), but they seek comfort in the extremities of their reigion, religion becomes the banner of anti-Western, anti-colonizer, anti-imperialist resistance.

Irish Catholics might not have been so radically devout weren't they fucked over to such extent that religion basically merged with class conscience, became an important part of their identity.

When you fuck people over, they would grasp at straws. Religion is one of the last straws accessible to them; one of the things that they can say "Look we're different from those Heretic Crusaders".

[Shroom Man 777]

If I had an unstoppable nuclear armed superpower nation support a regime in my nation, and after I ousted that regime, the unstoppable nuclear armed superpower nation ended up funding my dictator neighbor who attacks me with nerve gas, and then block my attempts at getting the UN to declare a resolution against the use of WMDs against my own people, and then that unstoppable nuclear armed superpower nation ended up invading two nations right beside me while calling me an axe of evil (and look at what happened to the other nation that got evilly axed), I sure as hell would start praying to god.

And I'd also, uh, look into ways to make that unstoppable nuclear armed superpower nation reconsider any aggressive attacks towards me. By, for example, getting some kind of respectable and undeniable defense system that would make even the unstoppable nuclear armed superpower nation take pause.

[Bakustra]

Nope, I don't think the general population is like that, but I fear the government might be willing to sacrifice a few million for the government's purposes. I also think religion and culture in Iran makes it easier to recruit martyrs than some other countries. Iran is not unique, just more likely to generate such.

The basiji were NOT penal! They were volunteers. A bit of a difference.

So which is it? Is it the government being willing to kill a small percentage of its own citizens in time of war, or is it that the people of Iran are more likely to martyr themselves for a cause? You're saying, as a response to me, that you're not saying that the people of Iran are uniquely different, but you constantly bring up volunteering for suicide missions.

But neither works as a justification for actively working to deny them nuclear weapons. If you go by the government, the USSR did the exact same thing, and they never launched a pre-emptive nuclear strike on anybody, and they only started their nuclear weapons program in response to the US doing the same.

If you go by the people, then you're stuck with having to define Iran as having a "culture of death-seeking", such an insubstantial boogeyman that has only ever been used for Orientalist arguments to justify the use of force. And then you have to explain away all the people that partake in suicidal efforts for higher causes, and all the people that risk their lives for higher causes, in places that are not Iran. And that's not very convincing.

Finally, Khamenei has given his exact reasons for feeling the US and Iran cannot have normalized relations. It is because the US acts in an imperial way when dealing with the Middle East.

*snip*

Have you ever looked at these arguments about culture? They are entirely focused on how it is impossible to deal normally with these barbarians, whether they be Japan in the 1940s, or Iran today. They present these cultures so very conveniently, as though to justify the preference of force over diplomacy when dealing with such countries. In other words, I am suspicious of such arguments because, not only are they Orientalist, but they seem carefully constructed to encourage violence in the future. That is to say, the argument that Iranians will launch nuclear weapons first because they don't care to preserve their lives seems entirely built as the thin end of the wedge to lead us onward to more military actions. So I am suspicious because it is blatant propaganda, designed to get us ready to have a couple thousand of our soldiers die, and probably close to a million Iranians, at the minimum.

[PeZook]

Broomstick, Soviet Russia also used penal batallions for mine clearing. Were they very eager to lose cities in futile nuclear exchanges?

The basiji were NOT penal! They were volunteers. A bit of a difference.

Yes,but they were thrown away on mineclearing nonetheless, so their government was ready to do pretty much the same thing as Iran. This did not translate to Soviet Russia being ready to sacrifice millions in a nuclear war: in fact, they were quite rational with their nukes.

[Hillary]

Broomstick, I understand what you are saying about Ahmadinejad maybe not being someone that the US could talk to but these things aren't always so cut and dried.

Back in the days before the Good Friday agreement, the idea that Martin McGuinness and Ian Paisley would work together in a Northern Irish government would have been laughed out of the window. The 'Loyalists' were determined that Northern Ireland remain a part of the UK; the 'nationalists' determined it should become part of Ireland. 30 years of fighting and bombing (plus countless more years of history and religious rivalries) had left both sides as firmly entrenched as you could imagine. It's not exactly flowers and champagne now (they actually have 'peace walls' dividing parkland to keep the different communities apart in some areas) but they talked. And despite everyone saying it was a waste of time and force was the only answer, we now have a type of peace going on. Personally, the heads of Sinn Fein and the DUP actually get on extremely well (I guess they are two sides of the same coin after all) - it's a strange situation, but 99% of the people of Northern Ireland are much better off because some brave people decided to give the chin wagging a try.

Compared to the cost of fighting and bombing, it's a fairly cheap strategy to attempt, even if it does come to nothing. The US's meddlings in the Middle East have certainly been a contributing factor to the situation there and the terrorism being waged upon it (in the same way that the UK government was somewhat culpable in Northern Ireland). It does, I think, owe it to the area to at least try and sort out the mess.

Just talk to them. Find a man who both sides have no great gripes with and use him to make contact, to find the areas of commonality, to see what each side is prepared to compromise on and what they are not. Who knows what may come of it.

[Simon_Jester]

I'm all in favor of diplomacy. So is Broomstick, I think. But let us not be stupid, or naive, about how we go about it. It's possible to have meaningful diplomacy with a nation even when you are worrying that they might attack you. And it's not so much the idea of diplomacy that I dissent from; it's the idea that all the things people worry about in the context of Iran must be immaterial and the only reason that the US can't be Iran's friend is because the US is just plain too much of a dick.

You know, Simon, I get what you're saying, but the US has, in fact, made deals with different cultures in the past. You're best buddies with rulers of the KSA, for example: all it took was a sincere desire to get into their good graces, and look here: cultural differences overcome! (to an extent).

Listen, I never said diplomacy was impossible, or impractical. At this point, I'm talking about nuclear doctrine: D-13 and Bakustra and so on asserting that an Iranian nuclear arsenal is no problem at all, nothing to worry about even a little, because everyone knows no one would ever consider using a nuclear arsenal.

Or that's what it seems to boil down to.

That's what strikes me as colossal intellectual arrogance- being so unable to imagine people who don't think like yourself that even when the stakes are tremendous, you don't make any allowance for the idea that they may honestly look at the same question as you and see a different answer. It especially bothers me when this arrogance is justified by calling anyone who disagrees with it a racist, or an "Orientalist" or something like that. As if you have to be an orientalist to think that different governments respond differently to the same crisis- you can get this within the same damn country, with one government being willing to start a war that a government by a different political party would not.

So this refusal even to countenance the idea that nuclear proliferation is a problem, or that Iran with its history might make the neighbors nervous and provoke a nuclear arms race in the region... it seems ludicrous to me. It's not unprecedented; rational nations have touched off nuclear arms races before. The US having The Bomb pushed the Soviets to work harder on nuclear weapons, the Soviets pushed the Chinese, British, and French, the Chinese provoked the Indians, the Indians provoked the Pakistanis. It's been a constant of the past sixty-five years that the presence of one country with nuclear weapons usually pushes its peer competitors to try and get nuclear weapons of their own.

Similarly, the question of decisions to use the bomb- not unprecedented. There were American policymakers all in favor of using nuclear weapons first and often, and American policymakers opposed. In the US, the policymakers opposed to using nukes won, but is this somehow preordained? Can I count on it being preordained, with the kind of 99.9+% confidence that I'd need to be comfortable playing cavalier with something that could kill millions?

But no, I must be a racist for thinking there is even a small chance of the Iranian government deciding to use nuclear weapons, or for worrying about arms races, because all of us, including powerful government figures in autocratic nations, think exactly alike under the skin- a victory of nature over nurture, I guess it must be.

[Shroom Man 777]

On the tangent of Iranian WMDs - and Iranian suicidalness - as discussed between Broomstick and the others:



Looking at Iran's history (had a regime propped, got attacked with nerve gas by US-backed Saddam in a war that killed a whole lot of people, is now surrounded by two nations that just got invaded by a hypermilitarist nuclear-armed unstoppable USA that killed a whole lot of people, was labeled as a member of the axes of terror which basically means "you're next and we'll kill a whole lot of your people! americafuckyeah!"), and looking at how global powers treat nuclear-armed nations so delicately, could it be possible that the case is the exact opposite of what Broomstick brought up?

Rather than acquiring nuclear weapons because they want to go on a crazy war that will get their peoples killed, maybe the Iranians want a nuclear weapon because they DON'T want the USA to go on a crazy war in Iran that will get their peoples killed?

Looking at the US-backed Saddam's use of nerve gas on Iranians, it could be argued that Iran has just as much to fear from WMD-attacks from other nations as other WMD-threatened nation like America.

People say that Iranians think differently from Americans?

I think they have common grounds though.

1.) Both Iranians and Americans have the equal reason to fear an invasion.

2.) Both Iranians and Americans have equal reason to fear being subjugated by a puppet regime.

3.) Both Iranians and Americans have equal reason to fear being WMDed.

4.) Both Iranians and Americans have equal reason to fear being geopolitically surrounded by hostile nations.

5.) Both Iranians and Americans have equal reason to fear being dicked over by nations much more powerful than they.

Oh wait. No. They DON'T have common grounds because Iran has more reason to fear an invasion, Iran has more reason to fear the prospects of being subjugated by a puppet regime, Iran has more reason to fear being WMDed, Iran has more reason to fear being surrounded by hostile nations, and Iran has more reason to fear being dicked over by nations much more powerful than they, because ALL OF THESE HAVE ALREADY HAPPENED TO IRANIANS.

Whereas conversely, the Americans have considerably LESS reason to fear any of these things at all. Considering what happened to Iran, and considering what happened to America, no shit their mindsets are fucking different. It's like how a triple-amputee burn victim whose face has been bit off by a rabid dog will have a different mindset from some jock douche star quarterback who enjoys eating raw beef and has a pet pitbull in his backyard that he likes to abuse and release every once in a while.

[Bakustra]

Do you know what the term "Orientalist" means in this context, Simon?

But you're misrepresenting the argument- the argument is that the chance that the Iranian government would wish to commit mass suicide is so improbable, based on every other nation that has nuclear weapons of some kind, that it is practically nonexistent. You're basically presuming that Iran is creating its nuclear weapons in a vacuum while you're arguing that its much poorer and less developed neighbors are going to build up their own nuclear arsenals because of Iran. They have 60 years of experience behind them, which universally says that nukes are there to exist, not to be used. Departing from that would invite the wrath of not just the United States, but a whole bunch of other nations that don't want to risk a nuclear war.

But why Iran, specifically? Why aren't you worried about every other fucking nuclear-armed nation? Aren't they capable of changing their minds? Shouldn't we advocate the use of force against France, the UK, Israel, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, and Russia, promising to, once we have destroyed all other nuclear arsenals that could be used against us, disarm all our nuclear weapons too. But that's idiotic, is it not?

To add on to what Shroom is saying, you know why North Korea built a nuke, and why Iran is quite possibly doing the same? Because they want security. North Korea wants an assurance that, should South Korea move away from the American sphere, that China won't just withdraw support and let the two reintegrate. They want a reassurance that nobody can push them around, and so now they've got nukes, and people are a little more on edge, but they're not going to invade North Korea unless they can neutralize its nuclear capabilities.

[hongi]

Rather than acquiring nuclear weapons because they want to go on a crazy war that will get their peoples killed, maybe the Iranians want a nuclear weapon because they DON'T want the USA to go on a crazy war in Iran that will get their peoples killed?

Iran probably also wants to take the reigns as the strongest regional power. Nukes will give Iran a strong defensive deterrant, as well as secure it's position as the country to talk to in the Middle East.

The fact that Iran wants to get a nuclear deterrant is probably why many people don't want Iran to get them: not because they're afraid that Iran will use them and go out in a blaze of lunatic glory, but because it'll make dealing with Iran infinitely more troublesome. They want a weak Iran.

[Shroom Man 777]

If we don't want nations to have nukes, just like how if we don't want mohammad jihads to blow themselves up and do other terrorizings, maybe we should examine the factors on why these nations want nukes?

No shit proliferation is bad. The mere notion of wanting, or aspiring, for nuclear arms has caused much grief amongst the nations of the world. Even when they didn't have nukes yet. Maybe proliferation can be stopped, or dampened, or whatevered, through means that attack (figuratively, without JDAMRAAMLRSLBM92F-117/11s) the factors causing the desire of some to proliferate.

[hongi]

If we don't want nations to have nukes, just like how if we don't want mohammad jihads to blow themselves up and do other terrorizings, maybe we should examine the factors on why these nations want nukes?

No shit proliferation is bad. The mere notion of wanting, or aspiring, for nuclear arms has caused much grief amongst the nations of the world. Even when they didn't have nukes yet. Maybe proliferation can be stopped, or dampened, or whatevered, through means that attack (figuratively, without JDAMRAAMLRSLBM92F-117/11s) the factors causing the desire of some to proliferate.

Power. That's basically why North Korea got it.

I think you're going about this the wrong way though. Instead of trying to address their motives, we should be trying to destroy the capability of countries to attain their weapons. Because if a country wants to be big and powerful, there's really nothing you can say to convince them otherwise. Especially Iran, since among its reasons for wanting to become big and powerful, there are quite good ones.

[Simon_Jester]

It's very clear that Iran wants a nuclear deterrent to make itself safe from invasion, and that that's their main reason for wanting it, and that that's a logical reason for wanting it.

What makes me worry is that Iran will put pressure on other neighboring countries by making them fear nuclear attack more than they do now, or that the Iranian government will do something foolish and provoke a war recklessly by doing things that border on acts of war (like blowing up foreign diplomats in remote countries), or that the Iranian government will become unstable and break up into its crazy and non-crazy components, and that not all the nukes will belong to the non-crazy people.

Every time any country has a nuclear arsenal people worry about all this, in direct proportion to that nation's past history of picking fights with foreigners and political craziness. I do not exclude the US from that list of "any country," either: of course people worry about the US and its nuclear arsenal, I don't blame them or disagree with them, and I'd worry about it myself if I thought there was any chance it might end up pointed at me. Nuclear weapons are to international relations what firearms are to interpersonal relations, something that must be handled with care, taken seriously, not waved around without provocation, and whose presence in the hands of an unstable agent should make anyone worried, even if the odds of accidental firing are low. It's just the basic, minimum level of awareness and thought about risk that you need to have in mind, dealing with such a big "handle with care" item.

And while I understand that this is not and should not be a bar to diplomacy, I object strongly to people who pooh-pooh all this as racism and start misapplying Edward Said at Broomstick because she does not want people to get blown up, and worries about anything that makes people getting blown up by a nuke more likely.

But you're misrepresenting the argument- the argument is that the chance that the Iranian government would wish to commit mass suicide is so improbable, based on every other nation that has nuclear weapons of some kind, that it is practically nonexistent. You're basically presuming that Iran is creating its nuclear weapons in a vacuum while you're arguing that its much poorer and less developed neighbors are going to build up their own nuclear arsenals because of Iran. They have 60 years of experience behind them, which universally says that nukes are there to exist, not to be used. Departing from that would invite the wrath of not just the United States, but a whole bunch of other nations that don't want to risk a nuclear war.

The past 60 years of experience also teach those of us who pay attention that there have been many close calls and false alarms. The false alarms caused nuclear forces to be put on a hair-trigger and ready to fight the unthinkable nuclear war at any moment. Some of these close calls were averted purely by luck, or by the actions of a handful of individuals. During the entire Cold War there were people who were endlessly afraid that a nuclear war would break out between the US and USSR, even people who feared this while maintaining that both nations desired peace and would not want to strike first.

This is not new. Kahn was warning us about a nuclear Camlann fifty years ago- in which both parties eye the other nervously, then one draws a sword for an unrelated reason, which is misinterpreted and causes a battle that kills practically everyone. He was far from the first to do so, and far from the most anti-nuclear person to do so.

Do you really think such fears are irrational? They were the motive behind that were done during the Cold War- efforts to minimize the risk of accidental war, refusal to design weapon systems which would be so automatically hair-trigger they could start the accidental war too easily, cases of both sides trying to keep weapons that could be launched into their territory on short notice comfortably out of range of their territory, and so on.

Why would such fears become any more irrational applied to Iran than they are applied to the US, or Russia, or any other country?

But why Iran, specifically? Why aren't you worried about every other fucking nuclear-armed nation?

Who says I'm not? Thing is, it's brutally, obviously impractical to compel existing nuclear states to disarm. Even a quick glimpse at reality makes it easy to understand why they would refuse to disarm entirely. The whole point of having a nuclear arsenal is to make yourself immune to that kind of compulsion- no one can hold you at pistol-point all that well when you've got a bomb on a dead-man switch in your hand. Every country that ever developed nuclear weapons did it partly so it could be sure it would never have to fear being ordered around by another country- even the US did, because the US started its nuclear program in fear of a Nazi nuclear program.

Since we have to live in the world that exists, not the world where all ideas are taken to their parodic conclusion, trying to take away the nuclear arsenal of states that already have one is a stupid plan compared to trying to live with them. This does not mean we should be happy to see more nations join the nuclear club.

Aren't they capable of changing their minds? Shouldn't we advocate the use of force against France, the UK, Israel, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, and Russia, promising to, once we have destroyed all other nuclear arsenals that could be used against us, disarm all our nuclear weapons too. But that's idiotic, is it not?

It also flowed out of your brain, not mine. This is not a reductio ad absurdum of my position; this is just more random absurdum coming from you, in hopes that if you fling enough strawmen one of them will stick.

To add on to what Shroom is saying, you know why North Korea built a nuke, and why Iran is quite possibly doing the same? Because they want security. North Korea wants an assurance that, should South Korea move away from the American sphere, that China won't just withdraw support and let the two reintegrate. They want a reassurance that nobody can push them around, and so now they've got nukes, and people are a little more on edge, but they're not going to invade North Korea unless they can neutralize its nuclear capabilities.

No one was going to invade North Korea before, either- and by the same token that everyone should know that no one is willing to launch nuclear first strikes and they don't exist to be used, everyone (including the North Koreans) should know that as long as South Korea would have to fight millions of indoctrinated riflemen to take over North Korea, it will never be all that inclined to try.

Except the North Koreans don't know that, or don't think they can rely on it. Despite being from the same racial and original cultural stock as the South Koreans, the North Korean government thinks very differently from the South Korean government, and is working as hard as it can to make sure that the North Korean people think differently too. Hopefully it's failed, but it sure tries hard enough.

[Bakustra]

So if it's possible to live with other nuclear-armed nations, at least one of them far more belligerent than Iran, then why can't Iran be lived with? Why is that risk too great?

PS: Exoticizing the Iranian people as culturally more likely to martyr themselves, as Broomstick did, is the very definition of Orientalism. It's not a misapplication of Edward Said at all.

[Simon_Jester]

Who says a nuclear Iran couldn't be lived with? When did Broomstick or I say "Persia delenda est!"

But there are a lot of things you can live with that you wish you didn't have to worry about. What bothers me isn't the idea "we should not preemptively attack Iran and cause mass suffering to stop them from getting a nuclear arsenal." I can deal with that idea. What bothers me is the blind arrogance of "no one uses nukes, therefore anyone who claims to fear nuclear attack or worries about bad things resulting from Iran getting a nuclear arsenal is a racist trying to manufacture a narrative to justify war against Iran!"

I beseech you, think it possible you might be mistaken.

Which is itself a problem with crying "Orientalism" whenever anyone dares to suggest differences among the nations. The division of people into groups that think and react differently to stresses is a constant of human nature; it's not just "East vs West," it's "West vs West" and "East vs East" and "my backyard against my neighbor's backyard." Assuming that everything will always be as it has been, and that everyone will do what specific people did in the past, is foolish.

This may well be a problem with Said himself- while it's true that there are those who try to paint the Muslim world (in particular) as inherently so violent that there can be no dealing with them, this does not mean there are no violent men in the Dar-al-Islam. Life isn't that neat, and finding the idea that reassures you things are all right doesn't mean you get to stop thinking.

[MarshalPurnell]

Talking to Iran is all well and good. That's what diplomats are for, and the ones in Foggy Bottom are paid well enough that they should be employed at every opportunity. Even if only to say "nice doggie."

However the interests of the United States and of the present Iranian regime are pretty much diametrically opposed. The situation in Northern Ireland is not comparable because, in the end, the British government retained a considerable preponderance of strength over the domestic opposition. If Sinn Fein wanted to accomplish anything at all, it had to compromise. The present Iranian government is founded on a legitimizing narrative of hostility to the West and the United States in particular. The hardliners in control rely far more on that narrative to justify their right to rule, especially since they have tossed away the beginnings of democratic legitimacy that had been cultivated by President Khatami. Improved relations with the United States offer the hardliners nothing at all; bouts of hostility with the West buttress their popularity, let them attack the opposition as unpatriotic, focus the Iran people on an external threat, and the sanctions do not really impact the upper echelons of Iranian society. At the same time Iranian foreign policy and strategic posture has shown that they have significant ambitions in the Middle East, far beyond just "don't be attacked by America," and indeed their actions have not been those of a defensive power afraid of a stronger power. They have been those of a rising regional power straining against the bounds of an existing status quo.

That does not mean military confrontation is an answer to every provocation. But it has to be made clear to the Iranians that provocations will carry a cost to them before they will re-evaluate their strategic goals and posture. A course of diplomacy designed to tighten the screws on the Iranian economy by getting the European Union to sanction them and seriously restrain Iranian access to foreign credit would certainly work. It would have the advantage of making it more difficult for Iran to import sophisticated foreign technology and would make the internal situation in Iran even less stable, boosting the prospects of their opposition. Even better if the advanced Asian economies can be brought into a sanctions regime, which would leave Iran dependent on Russia and China, neither of which really have any interest in seeing the Middle East explode into flames. At the same time leveraging existing allies to strengthen regional opposition to Iran would alter the regional balance of power against Iran; instead of facing a divided and weak block of Sunni states, Iran could instead find itself confronted with a strong anti-Persian alliance. That would drastically raise the threshold of success required for expansionist or provocative regional policies to pay off and insure that any escalation imposes greater costs on Iran.

That is containment until the present Iranian regime collapses from its own internal failings, in essence. The Iranian economy outside of oil sales is stagnant, and the oil is closer to running out than in any other Middle Eastern state. It has a huge youth population which is increasingly estranged from the Islamist ideology and disgusted by the open corruption of the religious and political elite. The possibility of reconciling Islamist rule with democratic legitimacy was broken in the last election, and everyone in Iran is now clear that the hardliners will use violence to maintain their favored people and policies against the will of the majority. Successful regional expansion could provide the Iranian regime with a way out, and being battered down militarily could turn it into another North Korea, but failure will inevitably lead to the collapse of the regime within the foreseeable future.

At the same time the economic importance of the Middle East makes any risky ventures, whether to punish or to appease Iran, certifiably insane. The present world economic structure is based around the availability of oil exports from the Arab states. Bringing those into question would set off a catastrophe that would make the Great Depression look like a minor bump. That is certainly an understanding the United States can use to get support for a policy of isolation and containment out of Europe and Japan, both of whom are reliant on Middle Eastern oil supplies safeguarded by the United States and utterly incapable of taking over a security role in its absence. The Arab states need no real encouragement to form up against Iran, and pledges of military support will go long with them. For all the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have weakened the US, they also demonstrated the vast military power that the United States can bring to bear. And the alternative to active US backing including stopping Iran from gaining nuclear weapons is a nuclear-armed House of Saud, in collaboration with Pakistan, which is at least as bad as Iran getting the bomb and not likely to just stop there either.