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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sun Tzu who wrote (273021)	1/20/2010 11:50:25 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

First off, did you find the following too difficult to answer when determining why it's in our interest to support a democratic Israel: Is it in our interests to permit religious militants to gain control over large swaths of the Muslim world? Is it in our interest to provide Israelis sufficient confidence we'll defend their existence so that they aren't motivated to turn most of the populated parts of the Arab world into smoking ash and rubble? I'd really like to know how it's in our interest to let Israel be backed into a wall (or ocean) and lash out? We're already holding them back from attacking Iranian nuclear facilities. Now.. to your other questions. Did democracy prevent US from overthrowing Mossadegh? Did democracy prevent US from overthrowing Salvador Allende? Were US troops involved in either incident? Did we actually invade either Iran or Chile and physically overthrow either government? I would suggest that in either, or both case, all we did was encourage and finance INTERNAL opposition to each respective government. NOW.. Certainly our encouragement, in collusion with and at the behest of Churchill and the British government (British oil facilities had been nationalized) the overthrow of Mossadegh was not our finest hour. And both of our governments flashed cash and gifts around to persuade the Shah to dismiss Mossadegh. en.wikipedia.org But I can tell you that the Soviets were doing the very same thing as they tried to influence events in Iran during that time. It was called the cold war for a reason. They heavily supported the Tudeh party, which was largely responsible for the nationalization of British assests. en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org Now. following the overthrow of Mossadegh, Iranian security succeeded in utterly destroying the Tudeh underground network, which apparently had been permitted to develop under Mossadegh. Thus, from the "cold war" mentality, it was a "victory".. But it certainly wasn't one that we can be proud of. Now.. with regard to Chile.. Again.. no US troops were involved and the overthrow was completely carried out by Chilean forces. Did we consent to it? Certainly so... Allende won that election with 36% of the vote (again.. the major reason I do not like Parliamentarian (unicameral) structured governments. And based upon this slim margin, he began nationalizing numerous foreign assets (yes.. including US corporate assets). Apparently what he did was very similar to what Hugo Chavez has done in Venezuela and it created the same kind of economic crisis and inflation. en.wikipedia.org Also, it would appear that the Chilean Supreme Court had some major issues with Allende's refusal to enforce it's judicial rulings. Additionally, the Chilean congress (Chamber of Deputies) denounced his refusal to uphold the constitution, as well as forming armed groups of leftists gangs that undermined public order. en.wikipedia.org So guess what?.. Allende was no friend of ours and it was pretty clear that the path he intended to take was in the direction of Castro's Cuba. The Chilean military was ALREADY PRIMED to overthrow him. All they were looking for was the "blessing" of the US (or at least our forgiveness)... Allende did a VERY FIND JOB of alienating people in his own country. He obviously didn't have the backing of the military, and his generals were very uncomfortable with Allende's closeness to Castro. And from the US perspective, already deeply involved in Vietnam and Europe, we didn't care. I recall reading once that this was exactly Kissinger's attitude. Chile was a side-show for him and he didn't care about it so long as it didn't distract from his efforts at a diplomatic solution to Vietnam and waging the cold war with the Soviets. Israel is a personification of religious bigotry. In many ways, yes. But it's very secular in many other ways. It's a Jewish country, with 20% of the population being Arab. But there are completely Arab countries with few, or no, Jewish citizens. And while I'm not Jewish, but they do a better job of safeguarding Christian (and Muslim) holy places than would be the case under Palestinian Arab rule. You claim that our interests lie with the Arabs.. So tell me where the Arabs are any better? United "Arab" Republic? The Copts of Egypt, who predate the Arabs by hundreds of years, are oppressed minorities in the very land of their ancestors. Death penalties for selling land to Jews (or any other non-Muslim). Everyone that isn't a Muslim is a "Dhimmi", or just an infidel. Lots of equality there for non-Muslims. The population of Bethlehem, which used to be 80% Christian is now 80% Muslim. Sounds a lot like ethnic cleansing to me. Yet you want us to sacrifice Israel to cozy up with even WORSE religious bigots/fanatics? People who are already pledging to wage a global Jihad against the infidel west? Israel ain't perfect. And they have their zealots as well. But they are more secular that you would assert: en.wikipedia.org Hawk