Could anybody with an IQ in the proverbial triple digits be surprised how the Iran nuclear weapons talks are playing out? There’s nothing perplexing about it at all, as the mullahs delay any way they can while going about the business of building their atomic arsenal. The only slightly interesting drama is the Russians. My guess is they can’t really decide what to do. On the one hand, a nuclear armed Iranian regime is a great thorn in the side of the hated USA; on the other they know as well as anybody that the mullahs are crazy. Who wants a religious lunatic with an A-bomb on your border?
Interesting conundrum. I suspect the Russians are crazy enough themselves (a majority evidently still love Comrade Stalin) to come down in favor of the mullahs, but we shall see. Or not. Events could take over. It doesn’t seem that anybody has a real plan – anybody that’s talking about it anyway.
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7 Comments
1. CR:“I suspect the Russians are crazy enough themselves (a majority evidently still love Comrade Stalin) to come down in favor of the mullahs, but we shall see.”
The Russians are on the same side they are always on; their own. They’ll dance with whoever best helps them achieve their own advantageous goals. If that means hob-nobbing with Ah-mad-nut-job and the mad mullahs then so be it (until it bites them in the backside a-la Molotov-Ribbentrop).
Nov 3, 2009 - 12:40 pm 2. chrisa798:I completely agree with CR, with one possible exception: Stalin knew exactly what he was doing in ‘39–the policy backfired in the sense that the USSR had to go largely solo against the Germans for a long time. I suspect CR probably realizes this.
The key issue re Russia will be where things are when they decide it’s in their interests to reverse tack on Iran.
Nov 3, 2009 - 1:39 pm 3. CR:“Stalin knew exactly what he was doing in ‘39–the policy backfired in the sense that the USSR had to go largely solo against the Germans for a long time.”
Not true at all! If you look at transcripts of Stalin’s speeches from that timeframe it is apparent that he intended to keep marching westward. His hope was that the British and French would keep the Germans bogged down on the Western Front to enable a speedy campaign across Poland to “liberate” Germany and effect a Glorious Communist Revolution there. The “Sitzkreig” of French and German inactivity during 1940 was not anticipated.
When Operation Barbarossa began in the summer of ‘41 the Germans were tanned, rested and well equipped thanks to a year long lull in fighting after overrunning France and the BeNeLux in no time flat. Stalin was caught with his pants down. And don’t tell me that General Paulus’ knocking on the doors of Leningrad and Moscow in 1943 was somehow a brilliant strategic move on Papa Joe’s part.
The Russians have historically been self-serving in their calculations. At times, this self-serving arrogance has been brutally offset by sheer folly.
Nov 3, 2009 - 1:55 pm 4. cfbleachers:“Who wants a religious lunatic with an A-bomb on your border?”
Roger, You mean Juche?
Nov 3, 2009 - 3:19 pm 5. cfbleachers:…Cause it’s funny…he doesn’t look Juche!
Nov 3, 2009 - 3:27 pm 6. Wayne:The Mullahs know that the Russians, who have recently affirmed their ‘right’ to preemptive use of tactical nuclear weapons, are fully willing and able to turn Iran into glass (there’s a lot of sand over there), while the U.S. and other western nations would dither over the ‘proportional response’ and how our retaliation would avoid unnecessary civilian casualties.
You might let your dog poop on the lawn of the leftist eco-freak next door, but you would be very careful to keep the dog off the lawn of your mafia boss neighbor.
Nov 3, 2009 - 6:24 pm 7. Barrie:CR is right. Roger could put two and two together and conclude that Russians are as in love with authoritarian ’solutions’ as Americans are with laissez faire individualism. Two very different histories, religions, and instincts don’t make a good fit as friends ‘resetting’ anything..
Nov 7, 2009 - 12:40 amSomeone needs to tell those enormous geniuses Lady Macbeth and Ohhh! Baaahhh! Maaaa!