Come on, if you argue with the Persian empire, I can argue with the Roman Empire, Alexander's successor states (Greek), the Byzantine (effectively Greek again) Empire and - this blows a 2,300 y.o. empire to pieces - the Ottoman Empire, which controlled the region for centuries well into the 20th century (Turks).

You overstate the influence of Persians/Iran in the Arab world badly.
They're a different crowd and the actions of some people in Tehran in '79 had as much to do with later AQ-style terrorism as did the attack on the Embassy in Saigon.


Moreover, you're moving goalposts. You CANNOT have meant 1979 with your 30 years statement without having written nonsense.

(...)That lack of decisiveness arguably led to halfhearted measures -- easier to attain or perform -- in response to 30 years of provocations from the ME;(...)
You were clearly writing about 30 years with only halfhearted measures. This could impossibly include the last nine years. It would at most have been 22 years (79-01) of half-hearted measures, not 30.

Furthermore, the bombardment of Libya in 1986 with 60 dead cannot seriously be considered half-hearted. A full war would have been disproportionate and unnecessary.


I still don't buy this revisionist view that the U.S. was overly passive and Arabs/ME/Muslims/whatever were the provoking party.
At most, the history of the post-WW2 relationship between the U.S. and the Arab world could be called troublesome and full of minor offenses/skirmishing from both sides (with the biggest offenses being the invasion of Iraq, decades of support for Israel and 9/11 - in this order).