Dan DeWalt, a frequent contributor to these pages and one of the founders of this newspaper, writes that if he didn't love his country, he "wouldn't spend so much time trying to get it to live up to its purported principles."
SOUTH NEWFANE-Mark Berman's litany of evil acts of Iran against America left out significant pieces of history which would disrupt his conclusions. To hear him tell it, Iran just arbitrarily decided that they hate us and want to destroy us.
Let's take a closer look at what American troops were doing in all of those foreign countries when they were attacked by Iranian weaponry or allies.
We should start not at the beginning of the Iranian revolution, but in 1952 when Iranians joyously welcomed their first democratically elected leader, Mohammad Mosaddegh.
Determined to earn the country's trust and increase the well-being of his people, Mosaddegh started the process of nationalizing the oil industry in Iran, to the detriment of England, which had been exploiting Iran's oil for its own wealth and benefit.
This was unacceptable to the English and the Americans, so they overthrew Mosaddegh in a violent coup that installed Mohammad Reza Pahlavi as Shah. His 27-year rein was marked by brutal suppression enforced by the SAVAK, secret police who imprisoned, tortured, and murdered any opposition - all with the full support of the American government. (After all, as we love to point out, Iranian women were free to wear mini-skirts under the Shah.)
America supported the Shah until the bitter end, when he was deposed by a furious populace led by fanatic clerics who had been able to build a power base in exile because of the Shah's brutality and repression.
In 1980 Iraq and Iran went to war. While favoring Iraq, America also provided aid and materiel to the Iranians, cynically hoping that the two warring countries would further destroy each other, keeping them both weak.
When the Iranians looked to be gaining the upper hand, America quickly flooded Iraq with more material support and ensured that Iran would not gain a victory.
So the Iranians had a variety of reasons to hate America for what it had done to them and their fledgling democracy and for putting our finger on the scale to support Iraq, the country that started the hostilities.
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Berman talks about attacks on Americans in Lebanon, but why were they serving there?
As Israel cemented its land theft, driving Palestinians out of their homes and villages in order to replace them with Israeli homes and villages, many Palestinians ended up in Lebanon. The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was centered there and it was from there that they would attack Israel in an attempt to regain their stolen territory.
In 1980, Israel moved to clear out the border area with Lebanon, to cleanse the area of hostile Palestinians, but ended sending their army all the way to Beirut. While under Israeli control, militia groups allied with it conducted two massacres of Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps, prompting worldwide outcry, though not so much from the U.S. government.
Hezbollah came to be as a response to the Israeli invasion. Their resistance was tough and exacted a high price from the Israelis.
America sent Marines into Beirut to help "keep the peace" and take some of the heat off of our "ally," Israel. Those Marines were attacked by the Lebanese Hezbollah fighters because the Marines were supporting the aggression of the Israeli army on a foreign county's soil.
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What were Americans doing in Iraq that put them in harm's way to Iranian hostilities?
They were there to nation-build after destroying Iraq in a war built on the lies of George W. Bush and Colin Powell. If Russia was bent on controlling Mexico, would America sit by quietly, or would we take action to prevent Russia from succeeding?
And why were American troops in Syria, another neighbor of Iran? Because of ISIS, which grew out of the chaos and power vacuum caused by our invasion of Iraq. Once again, fallout from American aggression put our troops in harm's way.
Just like the governments of many of our historical allies, in Central America, in the Middle East, in Asia, Iran is a brutal dictatorship that represses its people. But, as our alliances with those other dictatorships shows, it is not their brutality that we abhor, it is their refusal to be controlled by us and our allies to our satisfaction that puts them into our enemy category.
Throughout his political career, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made crystal clear his desire to destroy Iran. Israel has the only arsenal of nuclear weapons in the Middle East. But we demand that Iran forsake any efforts to arm itself to defend foreign attacks.
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Israelis and Americans have enjoyed the freedom to elect our leaders. We are responsible for the governments that are now engaged in this vicious war.
The Iranians haven't had a chance to decide who their leaders are ever since the English/American coup that decapitated their democracy. But we expect the Iranian people to be the ones to suffer death and destruction by bombs and missiles, so that we can sit in safety as we allow our government to spew death and destruction throughout the world, unchecked and unhindered.
Iran is a threat to us only to the extent that it is reacting to the last 70 years of steadfast American hostility.
This Voices Response was submitted to The Commons.
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