...An initial sense of the Iranian leadership’s current worldview may be best perceived simply by looking at a map of the Middle East as seen through their eyes. As a Pasdaran (Revolutionary Guard) officer once expressed to me while discussing Iran’s security situation depicted on a map on his office wall, most Iranian leaders now share, with increasing anxiety, the common view that the U.S. is following a policy of gradually encircling Iran with hostile American forces based in neighboring countries. They note that 30 years ago the U.S had only a couple of military bases in the region—ironically, located in Iran itself. Now, U.S. bases are in all the Persian Gulf states except Iran, and in one form or another, U.S. forces are in all of Iran’s neighboring states—Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Iraq, Pakistan, and Turkey—except for Turkmenistan. Moreover, the U.S. has special ties with Pakistan (a supposed ally against Al-Qaeda), Turkey (a NATO ally that has a special defense treaty with Israel), and Azerbaijan (where hundreds of American military advisors with equipment are pouring into a country whose oil industry is already closely tied to U.S. interests). Along with this gradual buildup of forces, U.S. leaders from both political parties have kept up a steady stream of threatening rhetoric, publicly calling for regime change in Iran. This is a cause for special alarm, given U.S. military actions in Afghanistan and Iraq since 2001....
Originally Posted by JJackson
Bookmarks