Tyler Durden wrote:
But of course, we were still in the middle of McCarthy-ism, so way too ideologically blind to see the obvious. As a result we continued to mindlessly pursue ideology rather than practicality and so ended really making things worse in SE Asia, in a place where Marxism was really a useful but temporary veneer over local politics (again we were too blind to see that Marxism was a western transplant that wasn't going to do too well in Asia). And we're doing it again...(eg, we had some chances with Iran recently that we passed up...that was really stupid, and the Iranians seem to know it).The US missed a real trick when Khatami got into power in 1997; he had a huge swell of popular support behind him, and with significant US backing he could probably have outmaneuvered the conservatives and made some real changes. A truly democratic Persian state would be a huge boost to stability in the Middle East, not to mention the psyops benefits of having a poster-child for moderate, tolerant Islam. Instead, we had the 'axis of evil' hogwash, and lo: the conservatives marginalise Khatami, and we're back to abayas, beards and jihad.
Of course the more cynical might think that this lack of stability is entirely deliberate on the part of the US. Better to have pet tyrants who require American military aid to suppress dissent, and hence ensure ongoing access to oil fields, or else loonies who spit vitriol about The Great Satan and ensure their own irrelevance (in which case the oil stays underground, waiting for a more economically realistic owner). Stable regimes with the ability to sell oil on the world stage might start throwing their geopolitical weight around. Venezuela, anyone?
W
