Guardian: US interventions have boosted Iran, says report

[BurtWorm]

No shit?


http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,1856362,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=1


Staff and agencies
Wednesday August 23, 2006
Guardian Unlimited




The US-led "war on terror" has bolstered Iran's power and influence in the Middle East, especially over its neighbour and former enemy Iraq, a thinktank said today.

A report published by Chatham House said the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan had removed Iran's main rival regimes in the region.

Israel's conflict with the Palestinians and its invasion of Lebanon had also put Iran "in a position of considerable strength" in the Middle East, said the thinktank.

Unless stability could be restored to the region, Iran's power will continue to grow, according to the report published by Chatham House

The study said Iran had been swift to fill the political vacuum created by the removal of the Taliban in Afghanistan and Saddam Hussein in Iraq. The Islamic republic now has a level of influence in the region that could not be ignored.

In particular, Iran has now superseded the US as the most influential power in Iraq, regarding its former adversary as its "own backyard". It is also a "prominent presence" in its other war-torn neighbour, Afghanistan, according to Chatham House's analysts.

The report said: "There is little doubt that Iran has been the chief beneficiary of the war on terror in the Middle East..."

[BurtWorm]

1. Iran is "simply too important...to be treated lightly."

From the Guardian article:

The report added the country was "simply too important - for political, economic, cultural, religions and military reasons - to be treated lightly".

One of the report's authors, Dr Ali Ansari, reader in modern history at the University of St Andrews, told Radio 4: "The United States needs to take a step back and reassess its entire policy towards Iran and work out, first of all, what does it want and how is it going to achieve it, because at the moment everything is rather like putting a sticking plaster on a fairly raw wound, and it is not really actually doing much at all."

[BurtWorm]

2. kick

[BurtWorm]

3. kick

[underpants]

4. Okay anyone who saw this coming please stand up

[Subdivisions]

6. What is that?

[BurtWorm]

7. Damn focus groups!

:patriot:

[Subdivisions]

5. Ok, I'll bite...

Looks to me like it is US who are the terrorists and that groups and nations like Hezbollah and Iran are the more reasonable parties.

After all, who the hell are we (*) to dictate to and impose our (*) will on these cultures.

I think if we left them the hell alone and simply traded with them none of the World War III-invoking shit would be happening.

[BurtWorm]

8. We are at least the imperialists, trying to force our will on our conquest

Imperialists have never been very welcome in the lands they've conquered. I don't know how any American can think it would be different for us. (Excepting, of course, those brainless pinheads who think our will is God's will.)