west,
Dan, we are going in.....no question.
Iran is such a threat to the West, what choice is there?
...
Going to be one ugly situation, the greater question is Russia and how they will align!
There's no question at all about how Russia will align. Think about what the US (and the rest of the West) did when the Russians invaded Afghanistan. We supplied the Afghanis with money, weapons, ammunition, whatever we could to oppose the Russians. We did it openly and with great pride. In fact, we ended up supplying and training many of the same people we are now fighting there.
The Russians have the exact same motive as the Americans. They want to help the Afghanis (and the Iraqis, and if it comes to that, the Iranians) to oppose the Americans. But the Russians will not do so openly because they are not yet ready for a direct confrontation with the US. In fact, I would bet money they and their proxies (Syria, Egypt, libia, whomever) already are.
Also, having learned from the West's mistakes, they will not do so so generously that they end up with a nuclear armed fundamentalist Moslem state, and their future enemy, right next door. Their interest is not so much in the Afghanis/Iraqis/Iranians beating the US as in keeping the US occupied, squandering their "blood and treasure" on these quixotic foreign adventures while they quietly solidify their grip on the supply of energy (e.g. natural gas) and other raw materials to Western Europe. Then, facing an impoverished, demoralised US they will be ready for more direct confrontation.
Would we do otherwise in their place?
habit |
