Ah, but the Iranians are “crazy.” I forgot.
Ever think that’s a bad fallback position? Calling your enemies “crazy” because they want things you don’t want them to have?
-Thomas P.M. Barnett
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Quote of the Day
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There's one flaw with the quote, which is what happens when your enemies *are* crazy. I think we can deal with Katami, Khameni, Rafsanjani, these all head factions which are evil but not necessarily crazy. Thuggee was crazy, Aum Shinrikyo is crazy, and the Hojjatieh is crazy. Ahmadinejad is coy about it but he's the Hojjatieh's man and their millenarian apocalyptism is a major problem.
In other contexts (the recent Assembly of Experts election) Barnett's recognized the threat of Hojjatieh craziness and every sane observer of Iran blew a huge sigh of relief when that crowd was crushed by the cynically corrupt Rafsanjani faction.
So a more accurate stance would be that a significant faction of Iran's politicians are crazy. That doesn't help the pucker factor much but it should change our strategy.
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