We Keep Provoking Them To Need Them
In the later ’80s through to the early 2000s Iran was becoming a more moderate country. Then we brought war to the region and they pretty quickly went back to being more radical. Their interest in nuclear weapons tracks to some extent with this same sequence.
This is a simplified description of the chain of events but it’s also one true thread among many factors that have affected their radicalness and their efforts to have nuclear weapons.
Of course, to back up to their earlier radical phase, we have to look at ourselves there too. The familiar story is of our backing of the Shah, Shah Pahlavi, after WWII and our participation in overthrowing of the Iranian Prime Minister in the ’50s, because he wasn’t as cooperative with us and our interest in Iranian oil as the Shah was. The Shah remained oppressive and disliked which eventually led to a rebellion in the ’70s. That rebellion having been led by Ayatollah Khomeini and extremists, that became the new government. All our efforts to have a supportive leader in place blew up in our face.
But in the years that followed, starting about a decade after the rebellion, relatively moderate presidents and leaders were elected. The country was becoming more a part of the global economy. That mutual dependence, the world needing them and they needing the world because of the interdependent economic interests, was a moderating force. Culture began to soften too. Women could wear and do many things not permitted in more radical times.
Then George W. Bush and his administration decided to attack Iraq, despite there being no justification that had anything to do with the 9/11 attacks. They threatened Iran as well though they didn’t end up invading then.
The U.S. had just attacked and waged war on Iraq, Iran’s neighbor, and the U.S. was threatening the same on Iran. Iran could almost guarantee it would not be attacked in that way if it had nuclear weapons. If it had them then it’s ability to do horrible destruction in retaliation would make attacking them impossible. If you were them, wouldn’t you try to get nuclear weapons too?
How many other countries are going to react to Trump’s attacks on countries, and threats against others, by deciding they need nukes too?
At the same time that we threatened Iraq and Iran we also threatened North Korea. They already wanted to have nuclear weapons but their efforts greatly increased and now they have them.
The dynamics of war and threats and various ways of damaging neighbors that Iran has carried out, actually the dynamics of wars and strife across the whole Middle East, have thousands of factors and massive amounts of foolishness, hell, outright idiocy, on all sides. Our part is just one factor, but it’s a big one, and it’s repetitive and wrong headed and invariably both backfires and damages us.
If you are Poland and Hitler is invading, or Ukraine and Putin is invading, yes, you have to fight. There are few other times when war is the right step. When it doesn’t end up costing more in the long run than any gain. When the damage to ourselves, not to mention to whomever the current target is, not to mention to all the ordinary people just trying to live their lives, few other times that it doesn’t have long and horrible repercussions.
But this one is particularly ignorant. It is a lesson and a place we have inflicted harm on ourselves over and over again. While it’s possible Iran’s indirect warring on its neighbors and being a danger might have risen to the need for an attack to try to stop it, we weren’t at that point. Trump’s kicking of the entire hornet’s nest of the Middle East and of the mess and repercussions that wars create has set back chances for even a partial peace in the region by many years. There will be all sorts of unpredictable consequences and costs we and the world will have to live with for a long time to come.
“FREEDOM OF THE PRESS IS NOT JUST IMPORTANT TO DEMOCRACY, IT IS DEMOCRACY.” – Walter Cronkite. CLICK HERE to donate in support of our free and independent voice.
