They should be toppled:
We should respond in scale to violations of international law, whether at our expense or not, and opportunistically move to make an example of such regimes when they so mismanage their affairs as to lose control of their own countries. When these awful governments can be eliminated easily, do it. Instead, we have helped destabilize and bring down the Shah of Iran, President Mubarak of Egypt, and President Musharraf of Pakistan, who were allies, however far removed they may have been from replicating the state of Connecticut or the kingdom of Denmark in their own affairs. And we have given the ayatollahs a pass for a brutally stolen election in Iran and waffled inelegantly for years over Syria. This, of course, summarizes the contrasting errors of the George W. Bush and Obama administrations: Bush stumbled into nation-building and Obama has tried and failed to make deals with Iran and the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood.
In terms of foreign policy, the Bush administration’s biggest failing was that there seemed to be no strategy once Saddam was removed, when he should have taken the opportunity to pressure the mullahs in Iran. And the Obama administration’s naive approach to Tehran has been worse than feckless.
Pressure the mullahs?
We should have done much more than that. While we had troops on the ground on both sides of Iran, we should have moved into Iran and gone right into Tehran. The only way to pressure the mullahs and their fanatical followers is to send them to meet Allah.
That’s just silly. Taking Iraq was the pressure on Iran, which was surrounded by American forces and allies at that point. Alas, W. could do nothing about the Democrat suicide bombers in America, who could not be stopped or reasoned with, and had no tactic they would not use in their burning need to destroy W. Remember Louisiana Cannibals in the Super Dome? I do. Heck, I even remember that it was the Democrats who claimed Iraq had Weapons of Mass Destruction (which is why we couldn’t invade. They just wanted to protect our soldiers ;).).
In addition, the CIA was in open revolt with the Bush White House, producing a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) that all but denied the existence of Iran’s nuclear program.
There was no way to get a declaration of war out of the Congress at that time. Ineffective airstrikes would have been the best he could do, and even that may have led to his impeachment.
Yes. In a sane world, the Democrats would have been working with the Republicans to deal with that and the political assassination of Senator Ted Stevens. In both cases, the permanent government attacked the Elected government, cost free. Madness…….
As another aspect of the CIA’s intransigence: If you poke through the details of the long-form reporting post-war on Iraq’s chemicals, the CIA basically recategorized a variety of precursor chemicals as well. A 100-year supply of insecticide concentrate was (retroactively) not WMD.
So: Bogus nuclear program. Bio program intrinsically unprovable (without a wall of insiders, notes, and documentation). And a binary chemical program of over-the-counter chemicals.
There was no way anything was going to be sufficient.
So let me get this straight. You want to cut the budget, taxes and the deficient while imposing a Pax Americana on the world. Talk about incompatible philosophies…
Do you really have any idea how many ground troops would be needed to go into a country like Iran and clean it up? Sure you could bomb them into submission quickly as with Iraq, but it takes boots on the ground to occupy a nation. Most of the security problems in both Iraq and Afghanistan were the result of not having enough boots on the ground.
I must have missed the part where anyone proposed occupying Iran.
Any day now, Congress will vote to replace “E Pluribus Unum” with “If we do something and it doesn’t work, we will do more of it.”
Patrick, it’s more like…
People that think evil exists are evil. (Logic and reason being the first evil.)
Rand,
If you don’t occupy them how do you expect to get political change? That was the mistake we made in WWI, not occupying Germany long enough to change their politics. We corrected it in WWII with both Germany and Japan. We also made that mistake in Iraq in 1991 and had to return to finish the job in 2003 but as you noted, there was no plan for the occupation the U.S. forgetting the lessons we had learned from WWII with the result being we will probably have to return again in the future.
All a quick strike/bombing will do is allow the hardliners to find more followers and go more extreme. It doesn’t solve anything long term. It takes boots on the ground and an occupation plan to do the job properly so you don’t have to do it again later.
If you don’t occupy them how do you expect to get political change?
We didn’t occupy Libya.
Nor Egypt…we merely chose to not support our guy.
“You want to cut the budget, taxes and the deficient …..”
Which would result in a huge increase in tax revenues.
So let me get this straight.
That would be a refreshing change. 😉
Talk about incompatible…
You suggest nothing is a better approach? You do what you can with the resources you have. It doesn’t have to be bombs and brigades.
Iran
As if that were the only way? The people of Iran would do the job themselves if we just gave them a little of the right support.
We don’t have to play a global game of risk to win. Losing is an option.
Ken,
There is no free lunch. Either you pay for a military large enough to implement your foreign policy or accept the limitations of the military you have. A few bombs on Iran won’t change things. In the 1990’s we sunk most of their navy and it didn’t change things politically. Why would another strike now on what ever target you select be any different in terms of long term results?
” Either you pay for a military large enough to implement your foreign policy or accept the limitations of the military you have. A few bombs on Iran won’t change things. ……Why would another strike now on what ever target you select be any different in terms of long term results?”
Why do you read Ken’s post *before* you reply to it? Read it now..for the first time…..
er.. I meant to say:
Why DON’T you try reading Ken’s post *before* you reply to it? Read it now..for the first time…..
Gregg, you’re talking about Matula here. It’s amazing he avoided mentioning the Koch Brothers or the Skull and Cross Bones society when responding to Ken’s question:
As if that were the only way? The people of Iran would do the job themselves if we just gave them a little of the right support.
Matula lives inside the world of his own mind, and be happy you don’t have to live there with him. Asking him to read someone’s comments and respond to them even somewhat directly is a bridge too far.
The regime we need to topple is US.
Not to engage to win is just stupid. They aren’t going to take us on directly. Instead they use our system against us. Why do we continue to let them? Why does the FBI having Islamists telling them how to fight Islam? This is insane.
Government is downstream of culture. These regimes are a result of the culture of their people. Only they can change it.
As a libertarian, I find the continuing urge of many to turn national defense into national offense to be a disturbing one.