The Gitmo System

[Uncle Mxy]

My 2 cent response...
A. You imply that we supported torture and prisons in Iran. Were you in on any behind the scenes negotiations? Maybe we said stop the shit. We did support the gov't.

The CIA overthrew Iran's elected Prime Minister who wanted to nationalize oil assets and do a "government for the people" to re-install the West-friendly Shah. It was the CIA taught the Iraqi secret police (SAVAK) many torture techniques and pointed them at people to torture. The rub is, we'd claim we were all in favor of democracy, but when it came to oil, we would install iron fisted dictators under our control just as surely as the Russians would rule their assets. The Shah could get away with all manner of abuse because he was the tool of the U.S. and the West. Toward the end, the U.S. attempted to -install- someone other than the Shah, but it was far too late.

B. I'm thinking that was about the time there was a regime change in Iran so a change in policy might coincide with a change in gov't.

To get the hostages out of Iran, the U.S. (under Carter, but with president-elect Reagan's support) signed a treaty that says:
http://www.parstimes.com/history/algiers_accords.pdf

"The United States pledges that it is and from now on will be the policy of the United States not to intervene, directly or indirectly, politically or militarily, in Iran's internal affairs."

then subsequently did all kinds of things to indirectly intervene in Iran's internal affairs and break the treaty. Again, "do what you say you will do".

C. I didn't interpret what Bush said the way you do. I think your statement is a stretch.

My understanding was that through covert channels, Bush Sr. encouraged their uprising, though he didn't say that publically for fear of pissing off the allies, but I certainly wasn't around for the specifics. We can limit the "do what you say you will do" argument to the no-fly zones. If you recall, the no-fly zones were established so that Saddam couldn't attack the Kurds and Shi'ites from the air. (They weren't for our protection -- we could destroy them at great distance.) Saddam was allowed to fly some helicopters for limited purposes, but promptly used the helicopters to shoot the shit out of the rebelling Iraqis. Our reaction to this? We just stuck our thumbs up our asses and played sit-and-spin. We didn't have to have American troops accompany the Kurds and Shi'ites in their uprising. We simply had to do what we said we'd do with the no-fly zones. Do what you say you will do.

D. Again, a stretch, imo. I'd like to see a link where 'we told everyone' "We will back down from Iraq quickly once an interem gov't was installed" I thought it was more about a stable working gov't. But I could be wrong.

It was the "Mission Accomplished" / USS Lincoln / "end of major combat operations" era. There were lots of happy horseshit things said around that timeframe. I might be stretching, but not by much. There's tons of links to wade through (and no good way to search by date range). The one that caught my eye was Dick Lugar's commentary on the messaging at the time:

http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/052403A.shtml

The Pentagon was talking about "quick exit strategies", Bush was saying that the army was not for "nation building", etc. The one I'm really trying to find is where anonymous White House folks spoke of aligning the Iraqi exit strategy to Bush's re-election. No one counted on hostilities escalating, despite the fact that our continued presence made us a magnet for terrorists and much resentment... hell, the Iraqis are asking us for an exit strategy.

And ofcourse the US makes mistakes. We trade with Egypt...are they perfect? No. Do they have prisons? Yes. Do they torture? Yes. We aren't perfect if a Dem or a Rep is in office. We must remember that Clinton bombed the Chinese embassy in whatchacallit a few years back. So mistakes happen.

Yeah, there's tactical mistakes but I'm talking strategic "do what you say you will do" antics, because that's where our "respect" in this area falls short IMO. At this moment, we claim our Iran/Iraq activities are not first and foremost about oil. Do you believe that's true? Does anyone?

[Uncle Mxy]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...061401054.html

[Tahoe]

I'm not avoiding the debate UMax, but I have 2 choices. Go find some links to back my points, or just say...You are right!