The Persian Puzzle
author Kenneth Pollack both informed and defined the national debate about Iraq. Now, in The Persian Puzzle, published to coincide with the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Iran hostage crisis, he examines the behind-the-scenes story of the tumultuous relationship between Iran and the United States, and weighs options for the future.Here Pollack, a former CIA analyst and National Security Council official, brings his keen analysis and insider perspective to the long and ongoing clash between the United States and Iran, beginning with the fall of the shah and the seizure of the American embassy in Tehran in 1979. Pollack examines all the major events in U.S.-Iran relations--including the hostage crisis, the U.S. tilt toward Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war, the Iran-Contra scandal, American-Iranian military tensions in 1987 and 1988, the covert Iranian war against U.S. interests in the Persian Gulf that culminated in the 1996 Khobar Towers terrorist attack in Saudi Arabia, and recent U.S.-Iran skirmishes over Afghanistan and Iraq. He explains the strategies and motives from American and Iranian perspectives and tells how each crisis colored the thinking of both countries' leadership as they shaped and reshaped their policies over time.
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What Hacker News says
- > a friendly Iranian government
That will take hundreds of years to accomplish. No Iranian has forgotten Operation Ajax in 1953[0] - overthrowing the lawfully elected government of Iran and replacing it with a dictator[1].
> In the current state of the world, USA interests and global economic interests are becoming increasingly decoupled
This is entirely due to Trump constantly "ripping up" previous agreements and treaties. It has become obvious to all observers that the US can no longer be trusted to act in the interests of any other nation. For their own survival, they have to become independent of US economic and political interests.
Notes:
0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9ta...
1 - The book The Persian Puzzle explains much of the history behind why the US/Iran relationships have always been and will always be terrible. https://www.amazon.com/Persian-Puzzle-Conflict-Between-Ameri...
- 25% of the world's crude oil was shipped out of the Gulf at that time. The Iran-Iraq war had caused the prices of crude to skyrocket as many insurance companies refused to cover any shipping in the region. So the US felt compelled to protect the exports of crude oil from "friendly" nations. While continuing to blockade Iranian imports/exports.
For more details on the political situation at that time, I recommend reading The Persian Puzzle by Pollack.
https://www.amazon.com/Persian-Puzzle-Conflict-Between-Ameri...
Additionally, to help explain how messed up the shoot-down was, Sources of Power by Klein.
https://www.amazon.com/Sources-Power-20th-Anniversary-Decisi...
- I appreciate your evidence-based response. I was providing shorthand, but you should familiarize yourself, for instance, on Mosaddegh's use of emergency powers after his reinstatement. If you would prefer to review this history in a less heuristically-based fashion, I can recommend The Persian Puzzle, which explores the full complexity of local politics in great detail, including Soviet participation in Iran as well. Among the other things that it includes is a great breakdown of how Khomeini manipulated the levers of influence to gather power in 1979, and how he was particularly anti-American in outlook even among those populations that were predisposed to look unfavorably on the U.S.
Also, implicit in your criticism, such as it is, is the notion that the chanting is representational of the Iranian population. It is not; most of the country has lived for long enough under the 'revolutionary' rule of the IRGC that they are actually more disposed towards the West than you might think.
Regardless, you asked why the U.S. was tilted towards Saudi in its conflict with Iran, and I was trying to provide a summary: that is an outgrowth of regional balance-of-power politics as much as anything else.
- I'm reminded of a remark in the book Persian Puzzle:
> We English have had hundreds of years of experience on how to treat the Natives. Socialism is all right back home, but out here, you have to be the master.
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