A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

Why would a war with Iran be a terrible idea? Few veterans cherish a romantic remembrance of war. War is awful. When nations seek to settle their differences by force of arms a million tragedies ensue. Nothing, not the valor with which it is fought nor the nobility of the cause it serves, can glorify war. War is wretched beyond description, and only a fool or a fraud could sentimentalize its cruel reality. ~ John McCain, 1999 Why do I think that a war with Iran is a terrible idea? Other than the fact that Iran, aka the Islamic Republic of Iran, has not directly attacked the United States of America or its military forces in the Persian Gulf, a war with the second-largest country in the Middle East is a terrible idea because it will be extremely destructive, expensive (both in economic and human terms), and may have unwanted consequences for the U.S. and the world in general. Many Americans who say the opposite, i.e. that a war with Iran is not only a good idea but ...

In the early morning of November 4, 1979, a crowd of around 500 Iranian university students gathered around the U.S. Embassy in the capital city of Tehran. They were members of several radical Muslim student groups that supported Iran’s Islamic Revolution and its spiritual leader, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. The sight of such a large group outside the embassy compound was no novelty to the U.S. Marine guards or to the 60 or so Americans assigned to America’s diplomatic outpost in the heart of a nation now governed by radical Islamic theocrats such as Khomeini and other ayatollahs. Demonstrations in Tehran were an everyday occurrence, and this one seemed no different than the anti-shah and anti-American protests of the past few days. They were mistaken. The protestors were members of a group called Muslim Student Followers of the Imam’s Line, and they intended to break into the embassy compound and, according to one of the organizers,   "Our aim was to object agai...