And would those leaders be able to embrace the US attacks, which would no doubt cause several hundred thousand civilian deaths, and retain any credibility with their people?
Iran is not a beaten Iraq with no defense, and no allies. It's a much harder target than Iraq ever was. THe Soviet Union was not overthrown by external military action,the berlin wall was not bombed by a series of tomahawk missiles.It was an internal process which took time and the situation is very very different from a foreign force attacking a country. On 8/6/05, Robert Munn <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Did you read the rest of the post? In Iran you could remove their leadership > because there are civil institutions set up already and there are plenty of > people who could step in to fill the void immediately. If the Iranian > leadership were toppled, from within or from without, they could have > elections quite quickly and elect new leadership from among the thousands of > people who were banned from running for office in the last two elections. The > Iranian people would replace the leadership, not us. > > The lesson of Iraq is not that you have to replace the leadership, the lesson > is that there has to be people there in the country that can replace the > leadership, and there have to be civil institutions set up for those people > to build a new government around. Iraq was basically a criminal gang state. > Once we knocked out the leadership, there were no civil institutions set up > to build a new government around, and no identified community leaders to step > in and build a new government. > > Critics of the war say the Administration planned for the war but failed to > plan for the aftermath of the war. I think that is an oversimplification of > the problem. The Administration didn't understand what it would take to put > in place the civil institutions necessary for the Iraqi people to run their > own affairs at a federal level. At the local level, tribe and clan chiefs run > things, and in that respect Iraqi society is quite sound. But at the federal > level, it took a year to build enough structure for the Iraqis to run the > government through an interim body, and it will have taken another year and a > half for them to elect represetatives and draw up a constitution. > > By contrast, we could not successfully occupy Iran, but if the leadership > were overthrown, new leaders could and would step in almost immediately, just > as they did in former Soviet bloc countries and in Russia itself after the > Soviet Union fell. Such a change in Iran would almost have to happen from > inside, as it did in those states. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Get the mailserver that powers this list at http://www.houseoffusion.com/banners/view.cfm?bannerid=17 Message: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=i:5:168296 Archives: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/threads.cfm/5 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=s:5 Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5 Donations & Support: http://www.houseoffusion.com/tiny.cfm/54
