N Korea helping Iran with nuclear testing

[Tears]

I'm curious what you think makes them so unstable.
Surely there must be more to 'unstable' than just wanting to see Israel wiped out.

Perhaps Iraq's heavy use of chemical weapons against them during the Iran-Iraq war has had some effect. Gee... wonder who supplied Iraq with those chemicals. Maybe someone should ask the Americans... oh wait... that's right... Rumsfeld has the receipts. No big surprise there.

Funny you wouldn't expect an 'unstable' country to one of the largest oil producing countries in the world with a relatively high GDP. I think that they produce roughly 10% of OPEC's oil is more telling than anything.

Of course the western countries are itching for a war. They've got egg on their face from their other embarrassments in Iran over the years and they want the oil and the footprint in the middle east.

Again no big surprise.

 

[nomole]

I love how eager you seem to be to carry the current havoc into another sovereign nation.. You come off as a bit of a trigger happy despot to me.

(and Dresden didn't have much in the way of military if you check your history.. It was more like firebombing innocent civilians..) So if you're suggesting we steamroll in and bomb the hell out of them without considering the reprocussions, I'd say you're a few excedrin tablets short of a full medicine cabinet.

 

[Rookie]

Actually I agree that internally they ARE pretty stable. A few political dissidents whining about "democracy" and "human rights" don't really count as instability.

 

[NM]

Why do people insist on referring to Iraq (pre invasion) and Iran as "sovereign nations"?

Is it just to imply their governments are just as legitimate as one that is democratically elected?


Obviously it's only my opinion, but since the term "sovereign nation" is defined as "self governing" it's really a very misleading name for a nation where most of the people have very limited right to self-government.

And in any case, even by the strict definition, the term is hardly relevant: Is the implication that it would be ok to invade a non-sovereign nation? Not really. So why phrase it so?

 

[fullofwonder37]

You're right.
I'd be more worried about countries that run off to start wars for oil when and where they see fit - all while peddling sham stories about weapons of mass destruction. Or for that matter countries trumpet human rights yadda yadda yadda but then set up institutions like School of the America's or install puppet regimes like the Ba'ath party.

Oh wait... those are supposedly 'stable' countries.

 

[fruitinspector007]

err... because they fit the definition that people by and large use when referring to 'sovereign' countries. You can play the semantics game all you want... but at the end of the day 'sovereign' still applies.



see above.



Perhaps this phenomena is only outdone by the imposition of democracry.
Also it's ironic that you complain about 'self governing' being so leading yet it's the western powers that be that have continually installed puppet governments only to have those collapse and result in hardline governments.

 

[NarutoWatcher]

Oh well, i never fancied NK or Iran for my hols anyway.

 

[itsangelinax3]

I said it once, I'll say it again(towards some of these posts)


Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

Pure money

 

[ababy]

I'll take that to mean "yes". In the context that it is used when referring to Iraq, the term "sovereign nation" rather than "nation" is an utterly irrelevant distinction. The term is clearly only used by critics of the US to imply that the Iraqi government had some sort of legitimacy.








So you're saying we should ignore Iran's quest to become a nuclear power?

 

[Sheena]

The way I see it is that if Iran did obtain nuclear weapons, the only purpose they would serve is as a deterrent. Who would be stupid enough to nuke another country, risk nuclear war and total annihilation, especially since Iran’s enemies, the US and Israel both have nuclear capabilities.

The way I see it is that the US does not want to risk Iran, and oil rich country, having such a powerful deterrent against their potential future invasion.

Furthermore, Israel has illegal nuclear weapons, why is it ok for them and not for anyone else. Double standards come to mind. I bet if Israel was disarmed Iran would be less likely to want to develop nuclear weapons. Oh but wait, how do we even know Iran wants to develop nuclear weapons, cause the US told us so, right. Smells fishy to me.

 

[likearollingstone]

Yeah, because the one post I make that isn't vehemently anti-war makes me trigger happy.

 

[truthsleuth]

It is very hard to step outside your own culture and try to understand a culture that is so drastically different. In our culture, where 'tolerance' is a virtue, the idea of 'dying for one's beliefs' is considered passe'. In Iran, it is a way of life. Iranian president Mahmoud Amahdinijad (forgive the spelling errors, pls) holds to an apocalyptic belief that the 13th imam will reappear, heralding the end of the world and the start of Shi'a Islamic domination on earth, after a time of great cataclysm. He believes (his words, not mine) that he can hasten the Islamic 'end times' by instigating such a cataclysm through a war that he is eager to bring on.

Yes, there really are people crazy enough to risk total annihilation in order to wipe out their adversaries, and we are sticking our collective heads in the sand if we build our foreign policy ignoring this fact. "MAD" is dead, because madmen live.

BTW, the US did NOT supply chemical arms or chemical arms precursors to Iraq prior to or during its war with Iran - that would be the French. In fact, the top two weapons suppliers to Iraq were France and Russia, not the US.

 

[MynameisDarrenGove]

But it wasn't only the Americans in on the rigmarole, now was it? France who has been against the war from the word go lost billions of dollars in lucrative contracts when the US rolled into Iraq. There are many others as well who had hands in the pie... so let's portion out a share of blame in a relatively honest fashion - not just some anti US diatribe as we so often see.

 

[Mask]

Well said

 

[islandhobbler]

err... of course.
But then again I thought that was painfully obvious.
Well at least to anyone who follows the story with anything more than a knee jerk reaction and a quick post.

Americans seem to be the ones leading the media blitz on the whole mess... but you can sure other western countries are up to their elbows in the mess as well. Britain, France... I'm sure if you really want to be pedantic you could type out a whole list.

 

[AshleyO]

?!
Well said?
It's blindingly obvious.

 

[unamuno]

I hope the United States NEVER gets in a position that we would ever call Israel our closest ally. That would be like having a pet rattle snake. We know that Israel will never attack Iran, they'll more than likely get us to do their dirty work like we always do.

Who are we to tell the world who can and who can't have nuclear weapons? Iran hates a country and they're called terrorists, we hate (and invade) a country and we're liberators? What a joke.

 

[gazzacroy]

Bingo.

 

[KarisS]

Thus blouts the voice of reason

 

[mrhappysuperbowlchamps]

North Korea and Iran are not global threats, and if that putz Bush (along with his poodle Bliar) rolls into Iran, then 9/11 will have succeeded beyond the terrorists wildest dreams.