Immaturity, as the alienists tell us, expresses itself in various psychological strategies to cope with a reality that challenges self-image -- e.g. a recalcitrant Islamic Republic of Iran threatening the ingrained belief of American leaders that they can coerce weaker states to bend to their will and thereby fulfill the United States' self-defined needs. Such an ego defense mechanism becomes pathological when its persistent use leads to recurrent maladaptive behavior that impairs the ability to act rationally and to pursue realistic goals -- Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, Mali. These ego defense mechanisms and strategies try to protect the exalted self from the acute anxiety of adjusting basic images of self identity and relation to others. They construct a refuge for a threatened ego.
What are those strategies? Denial that anything fundamental has changed -- in oneself and out there. Denial entails unconscious attempts to find resolution of emotional conflict and reduction of anxiety by refusing to perceive or consciously acknowledge the more unpleasant aspects of external reality. So, excuses and rationalizations are avidly seized upon to explain failure to achieve objectives. Reiteration of established behavior such as intimidation, coercion, winning hearts and minds -- e.g. repeated futile efforts at "nation-building" in uncongenial settings. Parsimonious changes at the pragmatic margins of one's outlook and worldview -- changing the packaging but not the content of proposals offering terms for unconditional surrender to Iran. Cultivated ignorance -- taking liberties to pronounce on matters of which one knows next to nothing. There is a double advantage here: the facts of actual reality do not act speed bumps on the way to a pre-determined conclusion; shifting realities on the ground make no difference when the baseline is ignorance. Ignorance creates space for dogma. As examples, choose any of the above.
When these mechanisms fail, there arises the danger of delusional projection, i.e. grossly frank delusions about external reality. Eventually, there is the even greater risk of regression, i.e. reversion of the ego to an earlier stage of development rather than handling unacceptable impulses in a more adult way, e.g. Robert Kagan, William Kristol, John Bolton, Mitt Romney, a large slice of Congress, and sundry syndicated columnists -- not to mention some high placed officials in the Obama administration like Leon Panetta.
The realities of the Iran situation are these, in a nutshell.
If the United States is not ready for all-out war and its aftermath, then it should make the necessary intellectual, emotional, political and diplomatic adjustments.
Juan Cole: Why Washington's Iran Policy Could Lead to Global Disaster
And at the end of the day, only Israeli opinion on this issue matters.
A nuclear-armed Iran is not an existential threat to the US, but may be to Israel.
Comments that an Israel-Iran war will summon WWIII are alarmist.
Neither Russia nor China are willing to defend the regime in Iran militarily.
Nor is this likely to be a nuclear conflict.
The bottom line is that this is Israels conflict and they won't be asking permission if they feel they need proceed with it.
FYI...Iran helped the US in its fight against AQ.Bush ignored overtures From Iran for talks.No wonder Iran wants the weapons.We threatened them.
http://www.divestfromwar.org/
I find your analysis instructive. The Wikileaks references to the "Persian Mind" would have done better to have used your commentary.
But, I'm not sure I agree that it's possible for one nation-state to treat another nation-state as if a one-on-one human interaction. The likelihood of an awakening in Iranian leadership seems very small to me. Even if individuals in Iran's leadership could recover from their ego wounds, if they didn't do it all at the same time they're likely to be met with great hostility by those still acting on fear.
What I am trying to say is, while North Korea presents a bit of opportunity in this area, we have no way to force Iran into therapy. Fortunately, I don't think that is the object of sanctions. The object of sanctions is to try to persuade the enlightened Iranian people that their country is not playing well with others. The object is to incite a Revolution. It seems nearly the entire world is in agreement: Iran has got to change course, and it has to do it now.
Since they never are presented or conceived by those who consume the presentations for what they are, they become exercises that are more or less displays of behavior conducted by ourselves for ourselves. The nations over which we would exert control are only important as impediments to or exemplars of that control.
Our control is the paramount consideration-- not its objects or our stated goals. We like to see things jump when we say 'jump'. What the jumping is all about, or whether it's worth jumping over, is not nearly so important. We just like to see things going the way we want, just because we say so.
Otherwise, we're liable to feel insecure. And nobody likes us when we're insecure.
Never mind that it is our billionaires who gave away this nation's security to commie China.
Tell us how to make war against our own traitors and treasonous billionaires.
I am a socialist leaning liberal and vote Democratic sometimes Peace & Freedom if the Dem is too conservative.
We have had nothing but conservative propaganda posing as information/news since the 1970s.
I do not watch television and for the last 10 years it is pointless to listen to NPR since the K0chMachine is their lartest donor and controls much of the content.
I don't want to hear the CATO, AEI, Heritage and other conservative propagandists pushine their fibbers. . . . on economich, politics, banking and business regulations and the environment.
The opposition which much of the world has towards Iranian nuclear weapons is NOT "ego driven". Since this is the underlying foundation of the entire article, the articles entire core premise is profoundly miscalculated.
Humans can be intuitive. We can often see where a situation is headed~~well before it gets there.
When the Spanish Civil War broke out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_civil_war ordinary people from all over the world traveled to Spain to fight the fascists. Many on the left believed that Hitlerism could have been stopped then and there. Meanwhile . . The U.S. State Department issued warnings to U.S. Citizens not to join this war or they would be subjected to loss of U.S. Citizenship. (This, while Ford Motors and Texaco Oil were busy shipping jeeps, trucks and petrol to the Fascist regime.) That controversy is a close-cousin to this one. Do nothing and see what happens.
" . .the United States - rightly - will be held accountable by Teheran"
Why "rightly"? Does Israel not have its own autonomous government? The above statement reveals the equitably-disjointed approach of the author. Everything else stated seems to flow forth from that. The fact is that even friends of Tehran, including China and Russia have voted to impose sanctions. The article does not begin to explain this and what it does explain, it explainst through "Alice's looking~glass".
Why is it that the adversaries of Israel always seem to be the ones speaking for everyone else? Do you have any explanation for that? This is not a minor or obscure incongruence. It is extremely conspicuous.
Israel may be the only nation in the world that actually needs a nuclear arsenal. They would probably need such a deterrent even if every other nation disarmed their nukes. Does this answer your question?
"therefore illegally developed . ." Please explain how a non-signatory to the NPT is automatically violating international law? Please explain in detail. Bumper-stickers are not adequate.
Israel most likely has technology that no one has even heard of. That is a very good reason for their secrecy. Why should the rest of the world be allowed to arm themselves off Israeli's technology?
~ There is no excuse YOU can offer that explains that level of hypocrisy
i guess if the answer is yes then you have a better intuition than the people that re selling us wars for profit
9/11-- Yes. I was saying for months prior to 9/11 that the Arab militancy would likely try a repeat of the 1984 attack on the World Trade Center.
"complete depletion of the us treasury " Yes, although my position on this point was not confined to wars. I was always very opposed to any U.S. budget deficit because I knew that it would eventually pass the point of safe return, which it did (in my view) under Pres. Bush-W.
" . . was arab spring somewhere on your radar " Yes. I actually predicted the date and was off by one day (predicted publically about 45 days before Jan. 8, 2011). I told a bunch of people, including my lawyer and my banker. My lawyer can't remember but my banker did as I asked an wrote the date down. I told him that 'an event would occur in Africa that would profoundly change the dynamics of North Africa and the entire Mid East'. Close enough for ya?
We (in the USA) are being sold wars for profit. That much you have correct. That does not make all these wars inherently wrong. It only makes them wrongly handled but more importantly, we in the USA have lost our ability to lead by example. This makes almost everything we do somewhat defective. This includes our legal system, our political process and everything else down the line.
(More)
1. Iran's support for Palestine
2. Iran's oil
3. Justification for the MIC to suck up resources
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/reactors.html