Michael Ledeen—everyone’s favorite tool of the global Zionist conspiracy—takes issue with a seemingly “coordinated” meme being floated by the legacy media in the wake of the Iranian “capture” of British sailors:
Time Magazine talks about the Revolutionary Guards in the same misleading way as the BBC. After pointing out that the British hostages were taken by the Revolutionary Guards Naval Forces, Time “explainsâ€Â:
The IRGC is a powerful, separate branch of the Iranian armed forces. Soaked with nationalist ideology, it has grown into a state within a state in Iran, with its own naval, air and ground forces, parallel to official government institutions. The IRGC is directly controlled by Supreme Leader Ayatullah Ali Khamenei, the ultimate font of religious and political power in Iran. The IRGC also has its own intelligence arm and commands irregular forces such as the basij  a voluntary paramilitary group affiliated with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad  and the Quds force, which has been accused by the U.S. of supplying material to Iraqi insurgents bent on killing American soldiers. The IRGC is also known for its clandestine activities including logistical support for militant organizations like Lebanon’s Hizballah, which it helped to set up in the 1980s, and several Shi’a militia groups in Iraq. The IRGC’s activities are often a thorn in the side of Iran’s Foreign Ministry, which is forced to repair the ruptures in Tehran’s diplomatic relations with countries the Guard has inflamed with its self-directed adventures. Nevertheless, it has been one of Iran’s main instruments in projecting power and influence over the last few decades.
Because the IRGC’s actions are always interwoven with the religious-nationalist ideology of Iran’s hardliners, extricating the British may be complicated.
Time would have us believe that the IRGC are something other than the regimeâ€â€look at all the heartburn they create for those poor diplomats at the Foreign Ministry. And unlike the rest of the government, the Revolutionary Guards are tied in to the wackos, the “religious-nationalist…hardliners.â€Â
One should ask Time’s journalists just what exactly they believe this regime is, if not a bunch of religious fanatics. Religious fanaticism is what the Islamic Republic of Iran is all about, and has been since its creation by that great Islamic Fascist, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. The IRGC was created in order to protect the regime from anyone who might prefer freedom to Islamic Fascism, and to extend the domain of the Islamic Republic outside Iran’s borders.
The IRGC IS the regime, not some aberration.
Poor Michael. So lacking in the requisite nuance to live in the exciting new world of reality-based realities and hard-bitten political truthiness—a world where Iran acts NOT out of some fidelity to the theocracy that rules the country (after all, we have seen theocracy up close, what with the Reverend George Bush trying to rape science with repeated legislative thrusts of his patriarchal Bible), but rather as a country that simply pretends to religious zealotry in order to fool the bedwetters and chickenhawks in the West into misinterpreting their motivations, which at base are completely pragmatic: they simply want to protect themselves from the threat of a Zionist state whose very presence is anathema—not because Jews are “evil” per se, but because Israel has long-oppressed Muslims, and has managed to thrive in the Muslim middle east by dint of being crafty, thrifty, sneaky, and, most of all, by enlisting the US as its chief ally.
By gulling the bloodthirsty conservatives like poor misguided Mr Ledeen, Iran is able to discredit them—mention Michael Ledeen to any progressive scholar of Iran, for instance, and s/he will simply dismiss the argument out of hand on the basis that Ledeen is the author—and so avoid US military adventurism of the kind visited upon Iraq. Because progressives—who, let’s face it, operate from a far more realistic and nuanced worldview—would never even consider a military or hardline stance against Iran (except, of course, during election season, and even then it is only with a knowing wink to the netroots); which consequently leaves Iran in a position to deal realistically with realistic people, people with caring, understanding, diplomatic hearts, people who recognize that Iran simply wants the right to protect itself against the Zionist entity and any future Republican President so bent on Rapture that he may indeed invade Iran, or—God Protect us from the Neocons—nuke them preemptively.
If Ledeen wasn’t so enamored of the mythical idea of America as a shining beacon on a hill, he’d recognize that such poetic bunk is hardly the stuff upon which to base foreign policy. Instead, “thinking” people know that foreign policy needs to be based on stark reality—and in that material world, there is nothing universal, only competing interests. Therefore, well-bred men in expensive suits need to hash things out at big conference tables. It’s only civilized.
And who says US interests or Israeli interests should take precedence in a world driven by contingency? Just because those two countries claim to support “freedom” doesn’t mean that they practice what they preach. And besides, “freedom” itself is a western linguistic construct, a localized preference disguised as some metaphysically-backed “universal.”
I mean, NSA surveillance? The PATRIOT Act? The coordinated decades-long attack on Hillary by the VRWC? Are those examples of promoting “freedom”?
No, Ledeen shouldn’t be looking to Iran for civil rights violations—not when our own leadership is so busy turning our nation into a totalitarian state.
Amen.
The verisimilitude-to-humor ratio on that bit of satire was a little high, for my taste. Would it kill you to, like, wink, or kick me under the table? Now where are my tranquilizers….
I am THE ENIGMA and I DEMAND A CAPE AND UTILITY BELT!
And speaking of neocons, who let the little kids play around with the weather control machines? It’s colder now than in mid-january, here, for god’s sake. The plan for this year was no winter, don’t you remember that George and Karl?
I can’t help but wonder what the reaction to such over-the-top parody would be if you posted it, under a psuedonym, on, say, DailyKos.
TW: Vigorous head-nodding and such27, I’d bet.
HATER!
Now you just sound like my whacked-out brother-in-law. And I get enough of that shit already. So, like, KNOCK IT OFF, okay?
Great post Jeff.
That being said, if we REALLY wanted to get the bottom of this thing with Iran, we could send Joe Wilson.
Jeff said, sarcastically:
But just the other day you had no problem whatsoever with Reagan dealing that way with exactly the same enemy. An enemy who, according to you, was at war with the US at the time. In reference to that you said:
Maybe I’m reading the humor wrong, but shit Jeff–where’s the consistency?
This is the greatest sentence ever written on the internet.
I thought you guys didn’t want to bomb Iran?
Now you do want to bomb Iran?
Brain hurt, can’t you just stick to blaming Jimmy Carter for all the world’s ills?
Michael Ledeen has such great anagrams, btw.
I deem acne hell!
Are you out of your mind, son? A crazy dumb move like that could bring down an entire intelligence apparatus built up and in place for years and possibly endanger the life of a future movie star. Just the thought of exposing her makes my nostrils flare out big enough to snort whole gumballs.
No, wait…that was Henry Waxman. Sorry.
“Us guys” only want to bomb Iran if they want us to.
I thought you guys didn’t want to bomb Iran?
Now you do want to bomb Iran?
Because once you state something, it can never, ever change regardless of any event or circumstance.
Rigid consistency here, people, RIGID!
(sorry for the hypermasculine, patriarchal word, there.)
And alphie takes a “hi leap” off the deep end…
”…the hobgoblin of little minds.”
Like alphie’s BB-sized brain.
Hey, it’s not like I want to bomb ALL of Iran – just a few government buildings, the odd mullah’s house, and their entire “Navy”.
It’d take 2-3 days, tops. Depending on the breaks.
SB: force77
From Okinawa!
That jacket with that vest with that shirt with that tie is sort of a tip-off.
Are you suggesting that we should bomb the Carter Center?
NO BLOOD FOR PEANUTS!
I was in the middle of projecting crop circles onto the banana plantations on the south facing slopes of the Ural mountains… I am so about the future… then I saw Reagan and the Iran-Contra deal trotted out as the lefty trump card. Disturbed my whole reverie.
OK. So we did business with the SOB’s with our fingers crossed. Made the Persians deal directly with the Hebrews whom we had told to overcharge them… as if in the Middle East that might NOT be done as a matter of course.
I am soooooo ashamed.
You win. Iran is good. It is the rogue neocon wing of the Iranian government that is behind all this, plus we brought it on ourselves via past misdeeds.
The old “they didn’t do it, but if they had it’d be because you made them”.
A little OT:
Evan Sayet on How Liberals Think.
Long but worth it.
Wait…
NO BLOOD FOR
PEANUTSOILNo… That’s not it.
Aha!
NO BLOOD FOR PEANUT OIL!!
I was in favor of bombing Iran long before it became cool.
thanks dicentra –
Evan Sayet = navy tease.
How appropo is that?
Is Ledeen suggesting that the press barons of the liberal illuminati got together over the weekend to decide how to mislead the gullible proles?
I don’t believe your name came up, alpo.
As you say, dicentra, off topic, but though Sayet’s heart is in the right place he’s a bit off.
I do understand he’s somewhat constrained to using accepted terminology to make his point, but there is a vital distinction to be made between liberals and progressives when you talk about the various political philosophies that make up the left. The two are often conflated and that’s a mistake. The real confrontation in the great debates of our time, and this goes to the heart of the problem, is between conservative and progressive, not between conservative and liberal.
Ok, who wins, THE ENIGMA or Aquaman?
So let me see if I get this straight. Its rogue elements of the Iranian Navy that captured these guys so we can’t hold Iran’s government responsible… but when three people for one weekend act out dark, twisted sexual fantasies with prisoners in Abu Ghraib, the orders must have come from the top.
Did I get that straight?
Of course because members of the US military are too stupid to do anything on their own, which kind of explains Kerry’s Presidential campaign both the 2004 & 2008.
BECAUSE OF THE HOMOPHOBIA!!
TW: Busy diving out the window65…
I’m with Ardsgaine.
Doesn’t anyone grow weary of these A-Rab’s shenanigans? Next week the headlines will be “Iran agrees to nuclear inspectionsâ€Â.
Fuck the UN.
Bomb the shit out of them.
Either ten really, really (wink!) big bombs or hundreds of thousands of ‘little’ bombs.
I’m flex.
Are you saying the mullahs have better control over Iran’s military than Bush has over ours, Chris?
It’s ironic that Bush now faces the same dilemma that Jimmy Carter did.
What will he do?
From that Great Thinker from the Left(tm) Rosie O’Donnell.
Of course she comes across as a total nuclear physicist compaired to some… (~cough~alpo~cough~)
Well, little “a†if he was a Democrat, he’d first have to wait for a poll to be conducted, or maybe two, then consult w/ the French & finally demand a non-binding bill be passed in the Congress spending 120 million to protect the Blue Mountain Egress bird & its native habitat. 30 years later he’d release in a ghost-written book that in fact it was all the Joos fault. Silly.
Actually it’s Blair that faces the same dilemma as JC. And that’s a fair question. What will he do? Blair’s had a little longer to neglect his miltary than Carter did so he probably has fewer options. But their’s no way he could be a bigger pussy.
What dilemma?
Interesting.
Even though the British are in Iraq at our request, if they run into a spot of bother with the Iranians, they’re on their own?
Will that line of spin fly with the True Believers?
Oh, nuts—is there a killer rabbit wandering around on that ranch in Texas?
Maybe we could like hold a rally and protest the totally illegal and immoral British occupation of Iranian… umm… ocean space. Me, I already have a 10 foot Blair is Hitler paper-maché diorama that’s been collecting dust and could be put to good use. I should know my uncle Henry was in a boat once.
I will ignore amoeba rectum.
Query for our lefty friends and willfully ignorant members of the fourth estate (I’m looking at you Keith Olbermann):
What is the one reason to enrich uranium to the level the Iranians are now enriching it?
Hint: A historical parallel can be found in Hitler’s construction of “racing” aircraft in the 1930’s. Perfectly peaceful, dontcha know…
Anyone know Jimmy Carter’s address?
I hear Tony Blair wants to send him a thank you card.
Well, we have got our answer during today’s White House press briefing:
Q About the British sailors. These are 15 sailors with, perhaps, the U.S.’s closest allies have been taken by the Iranians. And the President hasn’t made a statement about it, and even from the podium you all—both you and Tony have said, we echo what the Brits have said. Is there a deliberate effort to keep a backseat on this, for the White House to not mess up some sort of diplomatic efforts?
MS. PERINO: Well, you can be assured that we are in close contact with our British allies. We strongly support the message that Tony Blair sent yesterday, the strong message of the hostage taking being wrong and unjustified. But as far as further comment, I don’t have anything for you.
Q Is the President not outraged by this?
MS. PERINO: We share the same concern and the outrage that Prime Minister Blair has.
Q Will we be hearing from the President on it?
MS. PERINO: I’ll keep you updated.
Yehaw!
No Jimmy Carter he!
So are the US Marines, but I don’t see them hijacking Canadian Coast Guard cutters without orders…
It is Blair’s problem, and not Bush’s. However, it really is not the same dilemma.
If it can be proven that the British Navy ship was in international waters, that makes it an act of war. Unlike civilian ships, boarding a warship that is not in obvious distress in international waters is considered an act of war. Do it in the middle of the Atlantic, and it’s open and shut. It gets fuzzy in coastal waters though, since it depends on the distance the country doing the boarding sets as national waters. There are international agreements, but some countries don’t recognize them. So…it’s fuzzy. Taking the Brits sailors is an international incident but not an act of war.
In Carter’s case, a US Embassy was invaded. An embassy is considered national soil. What Iran did in the 70’s was invade American soil, an act of war. Not fuzzy at all.
Deceptive Iran
the harvest of fanatics
nuclear mushroom
alphie, your stupidity has gone so far as to be truly painful.
Consider the Falklands War. Did the US declare war on Argentina? No. Did the US send forces to fight the Argentinians? No.
But the US, through its actions, ensured that the UK could fight the war, and do so successfully. And not one of them involved actions that required a statement at a WH press conference.
So, your fartings mean nothing, as usual.
You pretty much don’t see a Marine doing ANYTHING without orders.
Having said that–it would be pretty cool to pick on the Canadians.
“a” took the same internbational law class as actus did…
I have been following the British hostage situation as best I can for the past few days, and although I don’t like the menacing talk of precipitous action against Iran, I am still perplexed: why would they do such a stupid thing? I don’t care if the detentions are the action of the regime itself, or some renegades trying to gain strategic advantage, it’s counter intuitive. Surely, Iran can’t be that oblivious to the the negative psychic energy directed toward it.
One would think the best thing to do, if Iran believes the British have strayed into their territory, is simply escort them out of their territory, like any good bouncer. I was astounded when I learned of this. What possible gain or advantage could they be seeking?
I am truly at sea here; but in international waters, of course.
You actaully wrote that. Oof.
These are the same people that support murderous terrorists all over the world. They want us dead or converted. They want the Jews gone. THEIR LEGISLATURE COMPLETES IT’S SESSIONS WITH ROUSING CHANTS OF “DEATH TO AMERICA”
And you ask why they risk negative waves by snatching some British sailors?
I said I don’t find the observation that Iran was at war with us troubled by our dealings with them. Meaning, our dealings with them didn’t change the FACT of their having essentially declared war on us.
Your confusion, Themistocles, is that you mistake an fairly straightforward description of what happened for a judgment on the appropriateness of foreign policy “realism”—which, were you to search the site, you’d find I am rather hostile toward, in most scenarios.
Yes, I recognize that at times realism is more in our interests. But no, I don’t think Reagan is a god, nor was he immune from miscalculations. Witness the pullout after Beirut. After Carter’s enormous fuck up, that was a bad move—but alas, Reagan’s idealism was focused on winning the Cold War.
wishbone:
[…]our lefty friends and willfully ignorant members of the fourth estate[…]
The fourth estate is the fifth column, wishbone. Watching agitpropagandists like Jon Stewart and Keith Olbermann is an incitement to anger I can only take in very brief snatches. The degenerate shitforbrains that comprise their audience don’t know their history, believe only in attacking the Bush Administration, and never had an original thought of their own. They have to be told what to think and when to speak. The anti-war Left are seditious garbage —but a sweeeet demo, man. Gotta ride it, baby —even if it doesn’t make any sense, either morally or intellectually.
Is the official neocon position really going to be that British troops just happen to be in Iraq?
That America had nothing to do with them being there?
I think even Greg Louganis would admire the degree of difficulty for that weasel.
Really Major John, I am serious here. Are the Iranians spoiling for a fight? Or are they just so full of the Allah juice that they can’t consider their actions? Either way, it makes them look like fools.
Posturing for domestic consumption would be my guess. I mentioned this in another thread. I think Iran is gambling that both the British an US governments are antsy about the defeatists that have gained a voice in both countries recently. This is really a low risk move on Iran’s part. If the British push, the Iranians release the sailors sooner rather than later as all a misunderstanding. No matter what, they get propaganda credits at home and abroad
Yes, and yes.
And, no, they don’t look like fools. They’re getting away with it, thanks to tools like alphie and the UN in general.
Well, they’re starting to look like fools to me. Dangerous fools. You know, many of us on the left don’t care much for the trigger finger of the far right, but we do appreciate a damn good aim.
Cynn, imagine if they get nukes…
While it’s true that boarding ships in unclear international waters is not an act of war, seizing soldiers of a foreign country and holding them can certainly be. Wars have started for far less in the past, but I believe Iran can rely on the British being more Galloway than Churchill on this.
I have been following the British hostage situation as best I can for the past few days, and although I don’t like the menacing talk of precipitous action against Iran, I am still perplexed: why would they do such a stupid thing? I don’t care if the detentions are the action of the regime itself, or some renegades trying to gain strategic advantage, it’s counter intuitive. Surely, Iran can’t be that oblivious to the the negative psychic energy directed toward it.
One would think the best thing to do, if Iran believes the British have strayed into their territory, is simply escort them out of their territory, like any good bouncer. I was astounded when I learned of this. What possible gain or advantage could they be seeking?
I am truly at sea here; but in international waters, of course.
Posted by cynn
They don’t care.
They know the British government will do nothing, or they believe so. They now have 15 hostages. They believe that by threatening to harm the hostages they can keep the british at bay. It worked with Jimmy Carter. To believe that they would adhere to international law is naive in the extreme.
This is a no lose for the Iranians.
They care zero about global public opinion….
Where is the negative for them?
Any forceful response by the UK or US would be brushed off as “bullying” by 2/3 of the world and 95% of the Code Pink wing of the Democratic Party (the other 5% are too busy yelling at otherwise sympathetic House members for not filibustering).
The Iranians obviously march to their own tune
They don’t even pay their reactor construction bills on time
Carter was a joke as a president and his legacy that of a dithering fool. That being understood, the Iranians played a very sophisticated game during the embassy hostage crisis and adroitly kept just the other side of an open act of war. At no point did forces officially attached to the Iranian government enter the embassy grounds. Iranian regular forces surrounded the embassy ‘to contain the occupiers’, but it was the Revolutionary Guard that was inside – an independent militia that the government could deny it controlled. The Iranian government actually posed as a mediator between the US and the Guard. So on the surface, the game was played as NOT the act of war that it was, but as a criminal takeover of an embassy in Iran that they were handling as a police matter. Another president would not have played that game but the Iranians read Carter perfectly as weak and non-confrontational. The Iranians read Reagan as anything but and ‘solved’ the crisis as Reagan took office.
Aren’t you forgetting that Jimmy Carter did launch a rescue mission to get our hostages back, Rusty?
With riot gear. Honest to God.
Have I told you recently, alpo, that you are a an idiot?
Best laugh I’ve had in a while.
Ha Ha, good one! You said “Carter launched a rescue mission”
OK… I’m calling bullshit on that turd.
Jeff… Alpo has GOT to be your sockpuppet. NOBODY could be that gleefully moronic and make me spray Mt Dew all over my monitor in one go.
Yes, alphie, but like most Democratic military operations, it was a poorly planned, poorly led fiasco.
I’m so there markgr8 !!!
Balloon fence = can be elf loon.
Mile high dirt berm = lib dim germ hither.
What are you saying, FJ?
I’ve never quite understood that part of the fairy tale.
Jimmy Carter is personally responsible for this latest rise of radical Islam because?
Even though he sent the US Army Special Forces into Iran to get the hostages back…here’s where I lose the thread to this myth.
How does it go again?
Yeah, “a” – Warren Christopher was asking Hackworth to shoot people holding hostages in the leg or the shoulder when Hackworth said “anyone holding a hostage, we will shoot right between the eyes”…
Warren Christopher.
(shudder)
No I got that Jeff. Just found it a little strange you’d suspend judgement in the Reagan example and go full sneer in the post above for what is essentially the same approach.
“Jimmy Carter is personally responsible for this latest rise of radical Islam because?”
Because he personally allowed the Ayatollah to bend the United States of America over and fuck us in the ass.
“Even though he sent the US Army Special Forces into Iran to get the hostages back”
With orders not to use deadly force. With fucking riot gear.
“…here’s where I lose the thread to this myth.”
alpo, when did you ever not lose the thread?
“How does it go again?
Posted by alphie | permalink
on 03/26 at 07:45 PM”
It goes:
Have I told you recently, alpo, that you are a an idiot? A fucking loon?
TW: alpo knew35 jack shit about anything.
A. Unlike many on the left in their worship of St. Jimmy or Bubba, we can and do recognize that Ronnie was not perfect.
B. However, and this is an important “however”–Ronnie did reflag those Kuwaiti tankers and blew the crap out of Iranian ships, boats, and oil platforms in the aftermath.
C. None of this can take away St. Jimmy’s place in the pantheon of truly crappy chief executives, which after all, was Jeff’s point.
Ronnie also pulled our troops outta Lebanon after their barracks were atacked back in 1983.
Another part of the fairy tale that’s…an inconvienient truth.
But I think we’ve been down this path before.
What is Bush gonna do?
I don’t think blaming the British for this latest Iranian hostage crisis is gonna fly with anyone but the most addled true believers.
Do I smell a hostage swap coming?
Cynn,
Although I have intended to sit this thread out, your comment “You know, many of us on the left don’t care much for the trigger finger of the far right, but we do appreciate a damn good aim.” did crack me up and leave a smile on my face.
BRD
Nothing inconvenient about that truth. Reagan bears approximately as much responsibility for our current situation as does Carter for that very reason. And Bubba bears a similar amount for Somalia.
I, for one, have never understood why our response to the murder of 241 Marines in Beirut was to invade Grenada, and I was set to deploy in support of the response that wasn’t.
I have been waiting for the press to point out that holding uniformed military and threatening to try them as spies violates the Geneva Conventions. For some reason, this is not a widespread object of discussion. Does anyone find this strange?
Me neither.
Did you not notice that our gracious host wrote, just upthread, “But no, I don’t think Reagan is a god, nor was he immune from miscalculations. Witness the pullout after Beirut. After Carter’s enormous fuck up, that was a bad moveâ€â€but alas, Reagan’s idealism was focused on winning the Cold War,” you syph-infected cumbubble? Or is that another…inconvenient truth?
Dumbass.
*but when three people for one weekend act out dark, twisted sexual fantasies with prisoners in Abu Ghraib, the orders must have come from the top.*
Yes.
Or the shorter version “America bad, Iran good”
*Aren’t you forgetting that Jimmy Carter did launch a rescue mission to get our hostages back, Rusty*
alphie, do you know anything about that rescue mission ? I’m assuming you don’t because if you did, you’d realize Jimmy Carter (your hero) sent good men to their deaths, without sufficient logistics support equipment and a winnable strategy.
It wasn’t a launch- it was a suicide mission so the sitting president (a coward) could appear to be “doing something”.
God damn it! Don’t they know fucking anything in the MSM anymore???
It’s not ”you all”. It’s “y’all”! And if you’re addressing more than one person, it’s ”all y’all”!
Jesus H. Christ. Do I have to do fucking everything around here?! Buncha losers….
Actually, on a serious note, this is just flaming idiocy:
Who’s the fucking idiot who asked this question? Are they trying to create a larger international incident? Right now, it is in everyone’s best interest to let Blair and company take the lead on this. That includes all public statements concerning the event and the current whereabouts of the British marines. To practically demand an expression of “outrage” from the President is dunderheaded lunacy. It’s not his job. Yet.
When Tony asks for support from Bush, Bush will give it to him. In the meantime, let Tony figure out what he wants/needs to do. I’m sure, if this goes in a particular direction, the MSM leaches are going to get plenty of fodder for their headlines.
And I’m sure they’ll figure out a way to work the word “neo-con” into them.
…sent good men to their deaths, without sufficient logistics support equipment and a winnable strategy.
Setting up such an easy reply makes me suspect a trap, Matt.
I’ve always seen Reagan’s move in Lebanon to be something of an angry response to the tough situation Israel’s war policy put us in. They call it the “death blossom” now but the horror of the deaths in those refugee camps turned the American people away and then Beruit…
alf…. read up on the Reagan doctrine. It worked.
He set in place a policy that got the Soviets out of Central America and isolated Cuba.
He turned Angola, Ethiopa away in Africa. He played Iran and Iraq off each other and sent the Soviets home from Afghanistan.
Sure Putin is still hanging tough, but Russia is not the foe it was and Eastern Europe is free.
It was an overall success. Deal with it.
I didn’t suspend judgment in the Reagan example. I said it before, and I mentioned it again here tonight, that I think Reagan made a huge mistake.
The only mitigating factor is, Reagan was looking at Hezbollah as a fringe group in a backward part of the world, and he believed himself fighting toward what Fukiyama so famously called the end of history.
A lot of folks underestimated the Islamist threat. Why we would continue to do so, however, is another story entirely.
For Reagan’s part, I really think he believed he had bigger fish to fry, and that being caught up in a low level war with a terrorist organization would be a distraction.
alphie, that was actually kind of a classy bit of snark. Nice.
In terms of the Cold War, yes. But in terms of the Islamists, it further solidified the idea that you can attack Americans without paying a price, ie; the Paper Tiger meme. And we are dealing with it. In Afghanistan, ironically, among many other places.
Re the rescue attempt: The military tasked with carrying it out trained their hearts out, but it was just too complicated for their capabilities in that era. Didn’t help that all the services horned in on the mission, like it was the All Star game or something. Had the hostages been held in a remote area, like the Israelis in Uganda, it would’ve been a different story.
I agree that Reagan left the Islamists with too much power. He didn’t see the Taliban coming, and underestimated Hezbollah.
He did get the Russians to stop fighting us by proxy. He dealt with our own hemisphere is such a way that Chavez can be seen as a buffoon (a dangerous one, but without the Soviets setting up bases)
So over all Reagan did his part. GHWBush pulled back too soon and Clinton decided Bosnia was the lynchpin of the day and let attacks on American soil go without severe punishment.
GWB has managed to squander his advantage… spent the goodwill of the people post 9-11. He “misunderestimated” the far left’s willingness to sabotage America.
Anyway, given the choice of Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, BushI, Clinton, BushII to run today’s war… I’d pick Reagan every time.
In his time he put a lot of balls in the air; in Asia, Africa, Central America, the Middle East… and he had the balls to do it… and the charisma to bring most of America along with him.
even Iran Contra didn’t keep his popularity down for long.
All true. In a perfect world, the chief executive doesn’t make mistakes. It ain’t a perfect world. Reagan publicly said he’d made a mistake – if memory serves he said it was his worst mistake. Now I can live with a chief executive who bears the responsibility for his mistakes, admits them, and by doing so offers more freedom of action to the next guy in line.
To my knowledge, Carter has never publicly indicated that he felt he handled the hostage crisis wrong. Quite the opposite in fact – he has always maintained that getting the hostages back vindicated his handling of the matter. Clinton has said he should not have gone into Somalia. I agree with that if only and primarily because the US should never go into any conflict under UN command and ROE. Clinton has never admitted what hindsight makes glaringly obvious – cutting and running compounded the mistake.
Reagan was in it for the country, and his mistakes gave him the ‘I let the team down’ sort of guilt that a stand up kind of guy who takes responsibility feels. How history would judge him wasn’t his driver. Both Bushes are also stand up guys able to admit their mistakes.
History’s perception of their terms was and is the driver for Jimmy and Billy Jeff. Admitting to error means taking the responsibility for the ramifications. They’d rather attempt to revise the narrative and they get plenty of help doing so.
Therein lies the difference.
Now I can live with a chief executive who bears the responsibility for his mistakes, admits them, and by doing so offers more freedom of action to the next guy in line.
What’s up with all the easy home run balls you guys are servin’ up tonight?
Also true. And with that dies alpo’s “inconvenient truth” notion. Unfortunate, yes. Inconvenient, no, aside from the domestic elements that have inconveniently failed to take the lesson from it.
That was as close as I’m ever likely to get to putting some skin in the game. Despite the fact that I wasn’t especially thrilled to be going, even at the ripe old age of 19 having the responsive deployment called off left me with a “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me” feeling. The mullahs took something very different away, as did the rest of the region.
We, unlike you, are having an honest, introspective, analytical discussion. If you actually possessed a bat, we might be concerned about you knocking something over the wall, jihadi boy. As it is, not so much.
You may fuck off now.
Here is a great quote from some British Admiral on the current hostage taking”
Yesterday, the former First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir Alan West, said British rules of engagement were “very much de-escalatory, because we don’t want wars starting … Rather than roaring into action and sinking everything in sight we try to step back and that, of course, is why our chaps were, in effect, able to be captured and taken away.”
In effect. Nuance. They are not actual captives, but are in effect captives. OK.
Glad that got straightened out. Because the marines and sailors are able to be captured, well that makes it almost a choice, hell, it is a democratic election of a sort. “Lets bloody give up I say… Persians sell nice rugs I hear, perhaps we’ll get to sleep on one”
An “analytical discussion” that is pointedly avoiding the fact that Bush’s forays into Afghanistan and Iraq seem to have scared the residents of the Middle East not one wit, Pablo.
Given that your “strategy” has failed in the present, what makes you think it would have worked in the past for Carter or Reagan?
But what about the brutal, imperialist occupaaaaayyyyshun, alpo? What about Abu Ghraib!?!
Paper tiger or worlds greatest terrorist?
I report, you make demented hash of it.
Oh, and Saddam? Not the least bit intimidated. Just like Bashir Assad. Both sleep like babies tonight, with nary a care in the world.
Are you saying Syria isn’t causing trouble in the Middle East these days, Pablo?