Wednesday, March 21, 2007

Anyone seen my magic eight ball.?

Like everyone else, I am keenly aware of the history of Iran, Persia, the various kings and religious leaders through the course of their history. It is impressive, but in my opinion, history is interesting, actually a hobby of mine, but that was then, the question remains, what is the now.

We can take all of the points being made into consideration, one fact remains, are we the keeper of the Middle East? Is it our responsibility to insure every country is democratic in nature, a mirror of our own standard of government?

This is where I begin to raise questions that I have yet to find answers for. I do not subscribe to the dogma that democracy is the only method in which to govern across the globe, specifically within the various religious factions of the volatile Middle East. The concept of the legislative, judicial and executive form of government is not going to work unless a religious branch is tightly interwoven into the overall democratic fabric.

My thoughts on the escalating tensions with Iran are just that, thoughts. They will not accomplish a thing, however, I feel going to war with Iran would serve no purpose. What would be next? Syria, Lebanon, ad nauseam. Of course, as we attacked Iran, Syria would begin banging their war drums, sending their invisible insurgent army against us. This would lead to Israel attacking Lebanon, why not, we are going for broke, so they will figure they can as well.

The current state of the Middle East is and always has been best described as a few million or so humans standing on a single strand of black widow silk. If one human moves a fraction of an inch the strand is broken, the spider consuming everyone in its path. We do not need to add a few pounds to this strand, not even an once.

Has anyone even contemplated the fact that the state of Israel has weapons of mass destruction and will use them in a preemptive manner to safeguard their existence, not giving it even a second thought? Yet, we wish to be the guardians of the Middle East and look at the track record we have.

Time alone will tell what is going happen, if not now, but in the future, the present leader of the country or the future leaders. We can only hope that history will show we made the right decisions, or better yet, we can always ask the magic eight ball.

3 comments:

Michael said...

Has anyone even contemplated the fact that the state of Israel has weapons of mass destruction and will use them in a preemptive manner to safeguard their existence, not giving it even a second thought?

Why do you say that?
At Israel's darkest moment, in the first 48 hours of the 1973 War, when it looked like Egypt and Syria would overrun the country, Israel showed restraint, and did not use nuclear weapons.

Why is today any different? Israel's been taking scores of rockets out of Gaza, every day, since the laughable "cease fire" last November, and has yet to reply. Israel was attacked with Scud missiles in 1991, and did not reply. The restraint is there.

The Old Ranter said...

Hi Michael,
I say that, not as an insult to the state of Israel, on the contrary, I am using that to show that the Middle East is defined by a fine line and Israel is the deciding factor in that line, that through their restraint, it stays at a form of peace.

I was also giving a view into just what could happen, should we change all of the rules keeping that part of the world out of WMD mode.

We could change the status quo and it could break loose.

Thanks for the input.

Michael said...

I was also giving a view into just what could happen, should we change all of the rules keeping that part of the world out of WMD mode.

Very interesting points you've made, and exactly the reason why the Iranian nuclear program is such a bogeyman. Does anyone really believe that the Iranian gov't would show the same restraint as Israel?