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How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

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Re: How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

#71

Post by tus88 »

idoubtit wrote: post #51
tus88 wrote: post #21

... in the middle of the cold war .

And as soon as the cold war ended, in 1989, the USA invaded Panama to put their own man as president. In the process, the USA killed more than 3000 civilians. The man who ordered the invasion was George H W Bush, a former director of the CIA. And if you're looking for more recent cases, the USA supported the military coup in Egypt in 2013. The government even refused to call it a coup because of legal implications. T…

Panama was ruled by a dictator who was in fact leaning towards the Soviet block. He also ignored election results against him. And in the world of realpolitik the US was not going to ignore the strategic value of the Panama Canal. The Soviet Union was very aggressive at winning over other nations with military aid, similar to China today with financial aid. And Panama was a lot cleaner than the mess in the Middle East today.

Re: How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

#72

Post by EliRivers »

Dinux wrote: post #15

And even nowadays that resentment against Great Britain from Iran is very much still alive, while we hear mostly about the US getting involved in these regions

For those interested, Jack Straw (former UK Foreign Secretary) wrote a book, "The English Job", about the history of the UK and Iran (but of course touching on a lot more) is very readable. Having been published in 2019, it's also pretty up-to-date.

There is apparently a joke amongst diplomats that 'Iran is the only country in the world which still regards the United Kingdom as a superpower'. There is a phrase in Iran, which translates as something like "It's always an English job", applied to something that has been botched and mishandled. I'd definitely say that for the layman, if you want to understand the relationship twixt the West and Iran (which is so much more than just the US and Iran) this book has a place on your reading list.

Re: How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

#73

Post by emilsedgh »

nexuist wrote: post #64
dr_dshiv wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. It's really sad. Iran had/has so much potential.

In that regard, the current offensive action may as well be viewed as a breath of fresh air. If blood must be shed to end tyranny, perhaps it is a worthwhile gamble. The Iranian people gain nothing from allowing the current regime to grow. A US-Iran war would almost certainly result in a democratic Iran, with a connected and educated populace capable of maintaining it. I think one of the main flaws in Iraq and Afghan…

You think waging war is the way to bring democracy to Iran?

Iran is a country next to Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq. It's an enemy to _both_ Saudi Arabia and Israel.

And you think destabilizing it will be followed by a democratic government and not a rush of ISIS-Taliban-Al-whatever?

Iran is made of dozens of different ethnicities. What if it became a Libyia and different regions started a civil war?

This is sickening. You _saw_ what the U.S. did to Iraq and Afghanistan and you're "still" thinking the way to bring democracy to the country next to them is bombs? Don't you think you should be more responsible than that? What if you are wrong? What if another Iraq came out of this?

By withdrawing from Iran's nuclear deal, U.S. practically destroyed any chance of a peaceful path for Iran to democracy.

JCPOA was the last chance for reformers in Iran to have a say. After the U.S. withdrawal, they have 0 credibility left with the people. Now hardliners have all the power and noone talks about reform anymore. Diplomacy is dead.

Iran's populace is much better equipped for democracy. They have already started begging for it.

U.S. is basically suffocating Iran with it's sanctions and people are hungry. These are not people who want democracy or freedom of press or separation of powers. They are people who are burning banks and want blood. No democracy is coming out of this.

This [0] is an organization of Iranians in diaspora, trying to form a council to help Iran have a proper transition in case the Islamic Republic fails and even their current CEO believes at the moment, the chance of a peaceful transition are not high and Iran becoming Syria is far more likely.

In that regard, the current offensive action may as well be viewed as a breath of fresh air.

I know that you are not responsible for these actions and you are probably a normal software engineer or something and probably a nice person. But U.S. is a democracy and people who do have the power, get their power from your thoughts and your vote.

So I do hold you responsible for the actions of your government. Therefore, if you find another war "fresh", please, fuck off. Your ignorance is harmful.

My apologies for personal attack.

[0] http://www.transitioncouncilofiran.org/index.html

Re: How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

#74

Post by pjc50 »

nexuist wrote: post #64
dr_dshiv wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. It's really sad. Iran had/has so much potential.

In that regard, the current offensive action may as well be viewed as a breath of fresh air. If blood must be shed to end tyranny, perhaps it is a worthwhile gamble. The Iranian people gain nothing from allowing the current regime to grow. A US-Iran war would almost certainly result in a democratic Iran, with a connected and educated populace capable of maintaining it. I think one of the main flaws in Iraq and Afghan…

> What I do know is that the Iraq war absolutely ended the suffering of people under Saddam Hussein's dictatorship, and the Afghanistan war somewhat ended the suffering of people under Taliban rule (the Taliban unfortunately still exists but is definitely not as strong as it used to be). What I don't know, and I don't think anyone can really know, is if the loss of those governments and introduction of our armed forces led to a general improvement on quality of life of Iraqi and Afghani citizens.

The war isn't even over yet. Normal countries don't have missiles falling out of the sky onto the highway murdering a visiting foreign general, or routine car bombings with hundreds of casualties. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_car_bombings

The most systematic attempt at assessing the impact of the war was the famous Lancet study, which estimated the "excess death" from all causes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lancet_surveys_of_Iraq_War_cas...

> published on 11 October 2006, estimated 654,965 excess deaths related to the war, or 2.5% of the population, through the end of June 2006

So, if we round that to the five years since 9/11, or about 1800 days, that's 360 casualties a day, or one 9/11 roughly every week.

You can't argue quality of life improvements for the dead.

Iraq is a slightly larger country. Quite likely you'd see a million dead in the first decade of the occupation, on which the US would spend enough for another moon programme or universal healthcare for all its citizens.

Re: How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

#75

Post by alamaslah »

thdrdt wrote: post #7

Most western people are very negative about countries like Iran, China and Russia because they are the 'bad guys'. Well this article again shows that there are few countries that will not gain power over dead people. It's sad but true. Now imagine you were living in Iran and came to know about the work of the CIA. Whould you think the USA is the greatest country in the world and democracy is the way to go? I think it…

No, western people do not care about Iran and China, providing they are not actively making their lives worse. And vice versa.

I think the attitude you are expecting people to have is insulting both ways. You are denying the Iranians and Chinese have any agency...Do you really think they or their Goverments spend all their time just reacting?

Ps. If you say to someone in the west "What do you think of those re-education camps?" they will reply "Sounds like a university". Sadly, they are not completely wrong.

Re: How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

#76

Post by mad_tortoise »

nexuist wrote: post #64
dr_dshiv wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. It's really sad. Iran had/has so much potential.

In that regard, the current offensive action may as well be viewed as a breath of fresh air. If blood must be shed to end tyranny, perhaps it is a worthwhile gamble. The Iranian people gain nothing from allowing the current regime to grow. A US-Iran war would almost certainly result in a democratic Iran, with a connected and educated populace capable of maintaining it. I think one of the main flaws in Iraq and Afghan…

How many innocent people must die for the USA to end 'tyranny' in the Middle East? In Iraq alone it's over a million, then we can look at Yemen, Syria, Libya, Palestine, Lebanon before we even begin with Iran. And what then? Iran isn't like any of those countries the US has already pillaged, it has a 500k member armed forces, all highly trained. State of the art military systems, they have direct backing from Russia and China, they are perfectly placed to attack the Israel, Saudi, Qatar and the UAE where the US is vulnerable, the US has enraged the member's of the Iranian special forces by taking out their leader, so now you have a lot of very angry spec ops guys who will avenge this action.

So how many Iranians must die for your version of 'tyranny' to be met? What figure would you be satisfied with, and what kind of tyranny are you ok with? Because it seems you've got major double standards when it comes to Saudi, Israel, UAE and Qatar, let alone all the extra-judicial and illegal acts carried out by the USA themselves in the name of rooting out 'tyranny'.

Re: How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

#77

Post by surewhynat »

Const-me wrote: post #67
29athrowaway wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Russia is invading neighbours, actively escalating military tensions and sabre rattling. In the specific case of Crimea, it's much more complicated than that. It is an invasion, but there's much more about it than just "Russia invading neighbors", you're oversimplifying things. Russia invaded the Crimean Oblast within Ukraine, rather than all of Ukraine. In the Soviet Union, Crimea was an Oblast of the Russian SFSR…

> Russia is occupying the Crimean Oblast within Ukraine Russia also occupying parts of Donetsk and Luhansk. > many Russians were not satisfied with the resulting situation, including Russians living in Crimea Pre-war sociology shows 38% of Crimean residents wanted to join Russia, that number declining over time: https://www.km.ru/world/2012/09/14/polozhenie-russkoyazychno... (Russian). 38% is indeed many people, but…

This thread is not about Ukraine, but, if we must ...

The protests in Kiev and other cities were violent and out of control. Ukraine was 6 months away from an election which they could have normally voted out their president, but, the people overthrew the government instead. Since then, the country has been so much worse off economically and socially. People have barely any money to pay their gas bills or buy luxury food items such as almonds. The GDP is currently one of the lowest of any countries in the world.

Other regions in the country such as the Donbass also never wanted to overthrow their president, which is why they began their separatist movement which led to its current civil war.

Crimea got a lucky break that it had the history that it does, and that all the Russian speaking population was there, and that there was Russian military presence there to enforce peace.

Maybe pre-sociology shows 38% pre Ukrainian protests in 2012, but, a lot changed in 2 years during that complete anarchy in most Ukrainian cities such as Kiev, Odessa, and the atempted Anarchy in Donetsk. The people of Crimea very simply just want stability and peace, like most people do.

> 97 percent vote for integration of the region into the Russian Federation with an 89 percent voter turnout.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Crimean_status_referendum

Re: How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

#78

Post by viraptor »

nexuist wrote: post #64
dr_dshiv wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. It's really sad. Iran had/has so much potential.

In that regard, the current offensive action may as well be viewed as a breath of fresh air. If blood must be shed to end tyranny, perhaps it is a worthwhile gamble. The Iranian people gain nothing from allowing the current regime to grow. A US-Iran war would almost certainly result in a democratic Iran, with a connected and educated populace capable of maintaining it. I think one of the main flaws in Iraq and Afghan…

> A US-Iran war would almost certainly result in a democratic Iran

Where does that certainty come from? It's not like the US is known for finishing wars recently.

Re: How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

#79

Post by missosoup »

29athrowaway wrote: post #62
missosoup wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China is harassing all of its coastal neighbours and trying to politically infiltrate just about every major country on the face of the earth. Russia is invading neighbours, actively escalating military tensions and sabre rattling. They don't really fit the same profile as Iran currently does. Feel free to walk me through the 'good guy' point of view of the people who invaded my home country, shot down a passenger pl…

> Russia is invading neighbours, actively escalating military tensions and sabre rattling. In the specific case of Crimea, it's much more complicated than that. It is an invasion, but there's much more about it than just "Russia invading neighbors", you're oversimplifying things. Russia invaded the Crimean Oblast within Ukraine, rather than all of Ukraine. In the Soviet Union, Crimea was an Oblast of the Russian SFSR…

You're myopically selecting a single incident out of a multitude of hostilities and invasions such as https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Georgian_War which by the way included a prototype 'field test' of the disinformation strategy that was later wielded against US and EU with terrifying effectiveness.

I'm sure if one tries hard enough, they can find some kind of justifications for a lot of Russia's actions, but the bigger picture remains unchanged: Russia is a giant dick and most of its neighbours are afraid of it. Hence NATO.

Re: How the CIA Overthrew Iran's Democracy in Four Days in 1953 (2019)

#80

Post by mythrwy »

missosoup wrote: post #12
thdrdt wrote: post #7

Most western people are very negative about countries like Iran, China and Russia because they are the 'bad guys'. Well this article again shows that there are few countries that will not gain power over dead people. It's sad but true. Now imagine you were living in Iran and came to know about the work of the CIA. Whould you think the USA is the greatest country in the world and democracy is the way to go? I think it…

China is harassing all of its coastal neighbours and trying to politically infiltrate just about every major country on the face of the earth. Russia is invading neighbours, actively escalating military tensions and sabre rattling. They don't really fit the same profile as Iran currently does. Feel free to walk me through the 'good guy' point of view of the people who invaded my home country, shot down a passenger pl…

Your last sentence hits it right on the head. Also want-to-be superpowers are dicks which leads to issues, often for them.

It seems like there should be a better system globally but right now it's like a struggle of ant hills and maybe this is how the human race got to the level it is at. Through struggle and selection.

Iran has been treated badly by the west no doubt. But their hands are not clean either. Was not this commander killed in Iraq organizing pro Iranian militias? From the point of view of the US can they allow Iran to become the dominant power in this oil rich world crossroads region? They can't and they won't. It's really that simple. "Right" only marginally enters into this equation. I guess I'd feel much more badly had the commander been killed in Iran organizing soup kitchens for the poor. But he was poking a bees nest and the results were as expected.

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