[knowThySelfx]

I do not know how others feel. But I feel resentment towards embargoes (and calling their poodle countries to follow suite) placed on other countries just because they don't tow your line. Going to Iran's backyard and threatening them and then cry when they retaliate (a pretext to start war)...its so...pathetic. In fact most of the 20th century wars were started using this kind of baiting.

[kweks]

Most of the comments below you are correct in the scope of the last 10 years, but in the context of the last 50 are absurd.

For those curious about how and where the whole "Iran thing" started: A freely elected Iranian president decided to nationalise oil fields. This irked British Petroleum (Anglo-Iranian Oil Company at the time..) and the USA, so they initiated a coup to overthow the government [1], complete with CIA-paid Iranian mobsters to push the Shah regime.

Years after this imposed rule, the western-propped government was overthrown with an.. anti-western government.

If you look at Iran with the context of 15 - 20 years history, it's impossible to understand the government's rabid anti-west stance. If you zoom out a little bit more - you understand completely.

Finally - the Iranian people suffer incredibly under this regime. The Persian culture has over 5000 years of rich (non-islamic, incidentally..) history. I'd sincerely advise traveling to Iran if you'd like to understand geo-politics a little better.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9ta... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Revolution

[saiya-jin]

Travelling in Iran is amazing experience - completely unspoiled from tourism, amazing history left and right, very warm and welcoming people, almost everybody speaks OK english (and most signs are dual farsi/english). For an experienced travelers / backpackers, this is one of the best places to experience these days.

Btw one addition - we all know that US embassy was stormed and employees held hostage in 1979. It gave US political ammunition for decades to come. Do you know why it was stormed? Because it was proper CIA headquarters in all this meddling and impoverishment of iranian people for decades. They shielded themselves with diplomatic immunity. Not something you see mentioned in the (rather bad for all that empty patriotism) movies. But wouldn't you be pissed off if they did this to your own country? To have the potential for greatness due to rich oil reserves, but having little from it because some foreign power installs corrupt ruler to have safe access to oil. Sounds like an african story.

Those employees taken? Most were involved or directly in CIA payroll. No respect there, nor much sympathy. Spies are generally either executed or traded for.

[MaxBarraclough]

> I'd sincerely advise traveling to Iran if you'd like to understand geo-politics a little better.

Unless you're gay, in which case they reserve the right to execute you. Seems worth mentioning.

[knowThySelfx]

Yeah I was aware of this. Didn't state it here since I thought most of the people here are intelligent enough to understand what really happened. I saw a few here trying to play the "timeline" game (like you stated about the time frame). To what end?

EDIT - Does not mean you are playing this timeline game. I meant a few others.

[cm2187]

And not mentioning islamism once in your post....

[Phlarp]

>We are talking about a country funding lots of militant groups that kill lots of people.

No, that's Saudi Arabia, our partners in peace.

[knowThySelfx]

>> We are talking about a country funding lots of militant groups that kill lots of people

I wish it was so one sided like we wish to paint it here. But starting a thread about this will only contribute to a never ending discussion thread. There is no moral high ground here. What we can do is to step away from this madness and try to make a general sense of it. All this warmongering is unneeded.

[stunt]

> Let's be specific what we are talking about here. We are talking about a country funding lots of militant groups that kill lots of people

You know U.S. actually did fund militant groups directly a few times because we thought we can make it a better place. In fact that’s how big, powerful complicated militant groups started to rise in the Middle East and they are out of control now.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Cyclone Not to mention, that is kind of still on going with all the support to Saudi Arabia.

When it comes to Iran, 1953, U.S. and UK did overthrow the democratically elected Prime Minister of Iran only because his interests wasn’t aligned with ours! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d'état

Before that, During the WWII, British and Russians invaded Iran and did overthrow Iranian king because he was neutral and we needed their oil fields. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Soviet_invasion_of_Ira...

And then revolution happened in Iran and this time people did overthrow the last King who was introducing many social, economic, and political reforms in Iran but we hated him because he was moving too fast for our interests. (Skipping some conspiracy theories about how CIA did trigger the revolution by turning people against the king) https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=imil1iIpIYA

And then Iraq/Saddam Hossein(Yes! Same guy that U.S. killed after the U.S. invasion of Iraq) was supported directly, intelligence and military, by the U.S. to invade Iran as a counterbalance to post-revolutionary Iran. Which took them 8 years and it was one of the deadliest conventional war ever fought in modern history, and both countries never recovered from it. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran–Iraq_War

And that’s my friend every single man/government they had in power since 1940. So no wonder why it’s so fucked up in Middle East now. Every single time we thought we can make it a better place, But there are consequences to foreign interventions that we can’t control. One of the the richest regions in the world in terms of natural resources and history consequently is in complete misery as a result.

[molteanu]

> funding lots of militant groups that kill lots of people

You're talking about US, right?

[jussij]

The problem is the report that Iran is a country funding lots of militant groups comes out of the USA and it's recent actions means it has lost all credibility.

Just in recent times we have seen the USA spy on it's own nationals (NSA) and invade a country based on a lies (WMD in Iraq).

The USA also has a long history of propping up murderous dictators (MBS just the most recent) and it now has a president who loves being photographed with tyrants like Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin.

So while the claims being made might even be true, because these are USA claims the statements needs to be taken with a grain of salt.