Posted on 04/19/2003 12:08:44 PM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
A few days ago, I walked into a local small business owned by a naturalized American citizen who was from Iran. During our conversation, the owner asked me what I thought about the U.S. and Coalition forces invading Iraq.
I said that in my opinion Jimmy Carter and his State Department were totally responsible for this war, Iraq's slaughtering of its own citizens, and the tragic war with Iran.
The shop owner grabbed me and gave me a "bear-hug." He said that in his 20 years living in America, I was the only American who understood what Iranians have known about Jimmy Carter from the beginning.
He agreed with me that Jimmy Carter started the dominoes falling that eventually created the chaos that led to the present and recent wars in the Gulf.
Thousands of Iraqi citizens now fleeing the Gulf II War zone will join thousands of Iranians who fled during the "Reign of Terror" which the Ayatollah Khomeini unleashed after then-President Jimmy Carter decided to make a regime change by pulling U.S. support from the Shah of Iran. The Shah and his administration were suppressing Islamic fundamentalists who wanted to return Iran to the 7th century under Islamic law.
President Carter's advisors were out of touch with reality. Like Don Quixote, they raced in, without regard to reality, to vanquish the Shah and his attempt to modernize Iran.
The consulting company I worked for at that time sent their Iranian office manager and engineering staff to a technical symposium in Pasadena, CA. The staff from our Tehran office was not so concerned about the technical presentation as they were about the pending disaster that President Carter was about to create, since his State Department was removing all support for the Shah. After all, it was argued, the kindly religious leaders of Iran would install a peaceful socialist government and save the country from the upheaval of Westernization.
Our office manager, a Jordanian Christian, recommended that we cease soliciting contracts from the Shah's government because its days were numbered. He recommended finishing the existing construction jobs and moving the office to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. He was worried we might not be paid for the existing work, and certain we would not be paid for any work done for a replacement government.
We had moved his family to Riyadh and also recommended that all other employees move there for their safety.
When the Shah fell, the Ayatollah Khomeini promised a welfare state that would outshine anything the Shah had done for Iran. Of course, his real objective was to use Iran as a launching pad for radical Islamic rule of the Middle East.
The Ayatollah unleashed a blood bath against his enemies. Americans in the Embassy were taken hostage for 444 days, and the economy of Iran plummeted into chaos.
As the Ayatollah encouraged radical Islamic uprisings in surrounding countries, we decided to contain Iran by using the dictator of Iraq, Saddam Hussein. We supplied him with a massive arms buildup, which apparently included chemical, and perhaps even biological, weapons.
The 15,000,000 Iraqis were outnumbered by the 43,000,000 Iranians; but with the weapons we supplied him, Saddam Hussein fought the Iranians to a stalemate. Millions were killed and wounded.
In the first Gulf War hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Kuwaitis were sacrificed by Saddam Hussein. The United Nations Coalition failed to consummate their victory over Saddam Hussein.
General Douglas MacArthur said it best: "There is no substitute for victory."
We naively thought that the Iraqis would rise up and depose their evil dictator. The majority of Iraq's provinces, with our encouragement, did revolt. However, the United Nations and the United States left these people without the needed military support, and Saddam Hussein annihilated them by the tens of thousands. Thousands of them were killed by poison gas.
Perhaps the most ironic twist in this whole affair is that Jimmy Carter was recently awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
This is my rifle..this is my gun..
Well, anyway, Jimmy Caahhtur wouldn't know which end to hold.
This article once again points out the neverending saga of what happens when tyranny is not faced "immediately".
It also points out the inherent dangers of a representative republic which makes it possible to elect a total nincompoop to an office of such immense power as the president.
I'll admit that Jimmy Carter had me fooled for a long time. No, I didn't vote for him - I believe I pulled the lever for Ed Clark - but I used to go along with people who gave him high marks for being a "humanitarian."
Older and wiser (and better read), I now cut Jimmah no slack. His actions make him either a clueless dumb-ass, a mouthpiece for the VLWC, or simply a very committed socialist with good camouflage; over time, the evidence points to the latter (making him something of a proto-Clinton). A lot of people I talk politics with initially don't understand why I get vehement about the damage President Goober did, but they soon find out.
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