[huldah1776]

First thing I thought after reading the source is if Reagan and Golda had that agreement. I will look for the book and if so, the only grudge against Reagan I have had is the seeming none response to Beirut. Problem is, Hezbollah is alive and well.

Since I have learned Iran was/is behind Hezbollah the social psychologists should have told Reagan to blow up the place in plain site to let everyone know what happens when our boots are attacked. Now we have doubts about Extortion 17 being a lucky shot and wonder if in fact the SEALs were sacrificed to diffuse a terrorist response.

[Defiant]

At the time of the Marine barracks attack,Syria was under the protection of the Soviet Union, and you could not attack Iran without danger of escalation involving the Soviet Union. Reagan's main focus at the time was defeating the Soviet Union, and he did it. Where he had room to maneuver against an enemy that did not have that protection (for example, Libya) he responded quite vigorously to provocations.

I have no doubt that were he President at the time of the 9-11 attack, things would have gone quite differently. Iran would have joined Iraq as terror states whose regimes had been changed, Syria, too, and we would not have buggered out.