Iran: Reason and Recklessness

At last, a voice of sanity on the subject of Iran, "Stalin, Mao And... Ahmadinejad?" (Newsweek)

If ever there was a must-read article about the current White House saber-rattling against Iran, it is this one-pager in the current issue of Newsweek.

Written by someone who understands and rejects fear-based policies on terrorism, Fareed Zakaria brings reason to the emotion-charged subject of our danger from oil-rich Iran.

Zakaria, born in India to a Muslim family, has been Newsweek's International editor since 2000 and has a rich grounding in foreign affairs including a PhD in Political Science from Harvard. Soon after the 9/11 attacks he wrote a seminal cover-story essay for Newsweek entitled "The Politics of Rage: Why Do They Hate Us?"

In it, he argued that Islamic terrorism has its roots in the stagnation and dysfunctions of the Arab world with decades of failure under tyrannical regimes who claimed to be Western-style modernizers.

Of course, these regimes only produced violent opposition to those Western values. Since the Mosque is the one place where people can gather in an Arab country, that is where the opposition to these tyrannies grew.

Zakaria, as a political "realist" advocates that the United States should help Arab countries to modernize their economies and societies as the path to liberty rather than forcing elections and democracy.

And, while as a Muslim he has a depth of understanding of the religion and culture, Zakaria's is a political moderate who believes the world needs an open and confident United States.

In this week's article, Zakaria exposes the war-mongering wizard behind the curtain. He points out that Iran has an economy the size of Finland's, while the U.S. has a GDP that is 68 times larger, and defense expenditures that are 110 times greater. What's more, Israel and every Arab country (except Syria and Iraq) are quietly or actively already allied against Iran.

But, the most chilling observation Zakaria makes: "We're on a path to irreversible confrontation with a country we know almost nothing about.... Iran is a black hole to us--- just as Iraq had become in 2003."

Remember the "Alice in Wonderland" prediction last year by Princeton scholar, Bernard Lewis.... a close adviser to The Decider and Darth Cheney.... that on August 22, 2006, Iran's President Ahmadinejad was going to end the world.

Well, we're still here. But so are the administration's Middle East ambitions. Secretary of State Rice today breathlessly announced, "U.S. Imposes New Sanctions Against Iran." (WaPo)

Unilateral sanctions.... designating Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps as a proliferator of weapons of mass destruction and of the elite Quds Force as a supporter of terrorism.

It's all too terrifyingly familiar....