Brian H. Appleton

I certainly don't defend the IRI and never have

despite what some readers who want to be angry and vent may think. At the same time if things had been so great under the Shah there would not have been a revolution and it wasn't the first one either, in 1906 they also tried to curb the powers of the Shah of that day. The problem is one form of dictatorship got swapped for another and the elite this time clerics continued to rob the wealth of the nation while the common man stayed poor as usual. 

I am not in the business of just bashing America nor am I in the business of white washing everything that our government and military industrial complex does and all the neo cons who wrap themselves in the flag... When Free On reminded me of the Korean women that the Japanese military forced into prostitution to "service" them during World War II, I was reminded about the some 200,000 illegitimate babies that the US military left behind in Japan who were rejected by Japanese society and also it happened again in Viet Nam.

Now that I have finally found some common ground with Free On, I am not going to launch into another diatribe again about the institutionalizing of prostitution in the Phillipines to serve the US Navy or Bangkok, etc. but I just want to point out that we are not saints and in general Americans do not regard the suffering of other nationalities as real. For example, why does the media only consistantly report data on American casualties in our wars but trying to find out how many Iraqis or Afghans or Viet Namese have died  takes research.

I am not in favor of the supremacy of any nation or even culture over any other. That is why "globalization" is so insidious. It reduces indigenous culture into a global consumer.

 I just think we have finally reached a point in human history when we need to change the paradigm. A country cannot act only in its self interests in its relationships with other countries and neighbors anymore without it coming back to bite us. It must act in a way that is mutually beneficial and in the best interests of the majority whether they are socialist or capitalist or in between.

I don't believe in theocracy especially a blood thirsty, vicious, corrupt, mysogenistic thugocracy like the IRI and I really can't think of any other nation at this time that is a theocracy, since the fall of Tibet.

However, I can understand how a mass of illiterate people barely freed from serfdom and afraid of the future could be taken in by religion. There are many things that offend the sensibilities of any traditional society and indeed institutions in the West are in need of repair, reform and remedy themselves; we are not beyond reproach...we can ridicule the IRI for smashing bottles of alcohol for example and yes it is a way of attacking the Christian Armenians who ran the liquor stores and yet how much does alcoholism cost our society? We can criticize the internet censorship of the IRI which I agree is reprehensible and yet our internet is clogged with unavoidable pornography, child pornography and the objectification of women and studies show that our children are the main viewers. The point is that places like Iran become a convenient scapegoat for ignoring our own societal ills and projecting them onto the "enemy."

It just really bothers me when people assume some sort of moral superiority and define Iran, if they even think about it at all by all the propoganda and stereotyping which has been made against it to the point where some in the diaspora change their names. The demonization is a definate attempt to  shape the minds of the American public into acceptance of a war on Iran and the goal is to return Iran to a vassal client state like it was before. Look I can't write about it here as definitively or as well as others like Barsimian, Chomsky and Michael Parenti have done and I know that the right dismisses them as leftists but the fact that there are film makers like Michael Moore and movies with the box office impact of Avatar show that I am not a lone voice calling in the wilderness...

I will never forget when Mrs Bahadorzadeh, director of the Kharizak Foundation gave a talk at Stanford University last year and told us about her organization, which rather than isolating the elderly, integrated them into a cohesive community with people of all ages and abilities. She spoke about the organizations' success rate at rehabilitating drug addicts, destitute, indigent elderly, orphans and handicapped into productive members of society, a community in which they were able to attain university degrees and take classes in job skills and crafts and set up businesses and earn income and contribute to the very relatives who had once spurned them. She closed her speech by saying that she felt Iran had things to teach the rest of the world and not just the other way around...

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

Revolutionaries

of the 1979 time were some of the most deluded people in our history. No understanding of history or politics. Driven by hate and leftist or islamist propaganda they wrecked and destroyed. They put hate ahead of anything else. The fruit of a poison tree: planted by an evil Mullah; watered by ignorance and tended by the like of Khalkhali is today's IRI.

I don't see how anyone still defends this.

Holding back

I am trying to hold back getting into endless arguments. But I have to say I agree with Free 100%. Brian you seem to have a problem with the US and ignore the other issues in the world. 

I am an Iranian nationalsit. I don't hate other nations and do not want them damned. I do want to put my energies into improving Iran which is unfortunately difficult thanks to the IRI. 

I most emphatically do not put religion ahead of nation. Iran first: my religious beliefs are personal while Iran is a communal responsibility for all of us. I would not turn back an Iranian because of their religion. I would not favor another person because of their religion. 

Brian, please do not assume we are all anti-American. We are not. I live in the US and see its good and its bad. US is neither all good nor all bad. It is in between. But it sure beats the Taliban!

I haven't flagged you?

 What are you talking about man? What I have said in the past is that bullying and badgering like yours by internet trolls intimidates many people into not wanting to participate in dialog or debate because it is abusive and unpleasant and that this is a defacto loss of free speech.

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

Appleton,

Is that all you can do to my comments, FLAG me, when you have absolutely no arguments? You know, flagging is a form of censorship. Now, if I was using profanity and being over the top abusive, you may have a point, but my post below has neither in it, yet you flag me.

Wasn't it you who wrote somewhere that the right wing conservatives on this site have taken away your freedom of speech? Isn't that what you try to do to me all the time, trying to take away my freedom of speech?

Mr. pot, meet Mrs. kettle. IRI apologist have absolutely no shame, and are some of the most hypocritical people on the face of the Earth. Why is that so, I wonder?

Why is that so...?

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Brian

The threat is not from Afghans to US. It is from Taliban to both Afghans and the US. 

Nothing is black and white

shoot at the messanger as much as you like but it doesn't change the fact that both sides are culpable for the current impasse and situation in Iran. Neither side is all right or all wrong.

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

when I left Iran 4

when I left Iran 4 months after the revolution in 1979 was our neighborhood Mullah who whispered in my ear that he hoped I did not think all moslems were like the radicals who had taken over

Is this why you sound just like the radicial's who took over Iran now?

strange irony you live..

Yes actually

it was a name given to me by my best friend's father on the occasion of my conversion at the Tehran Rotary Club in 1976. But I admit that I am not very devout...at the time I was going to marry into a moslem family...

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

There is a distinction whose subtlety perhaps escapes you

Being against our US government policies is not the same thing as being anti American. The problem with much of the world today and always is that governments rarely represent the will of the governed. The IRI does not represent the Iranian people and yet the media and yourself have no problem saying Iran this and Iran that...America this and America that...I only voted for Obama to end the wars and instead he expanded them...he does not represent me nor do my two pro Israeli California senators... nor does Hillary Clinton who offered to "obliterate Iran" when she was running for president.

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

Brian, Henry Kissinger once said

Anyone stupid enough to sign up for the military deserves to be exploited for Military Industrial Complex profit. He's a regular commentator on the ultra patriotic lol Fox News. 

The entire Iran-Israel-USA nonsense is pre-Iraq invasion de ja vu. They are exploiting ex pats too who hate the regime. The funny part is the most of the ex pats are falling for the war rhetoric without even knowing it. Ahmad Chalabi admitted that this was a helpful sentiment in going to war when he and the Iraqi National Congress were courting the Pentagon regularly. He told Charlie Rose this. The history is so fresh, you'd think people would be wiser..... how sad.

You are right about the pacifist Israelis. They exist, but they are ignored and attacked on a regular basis. Self-loathing Jew is the main criticism used to target these people. I even heard American media attacking Jews with this on the radio in Los Angeles when Operation Cast Lead took place. 

Brian Appleton: Just

Brian Appleton: Just wondering about your muslim name, Rasoul. Did you convert to Islam?

Oh yeah, the WMD scare revisited

you nailed it! That is why I am a columnist for CASMII and proud of it.  And that is why Israeli govt and US administrations are such buddies, same tactics...it's like projection....they see themselves in their "enemies" when really they just want their land and resources. The media paints Israel as a one faceted right wing war mongoring entity and yet there are many pacifists in Israel. The PeaceNow organization was actually formed by former Israeli officers after the "6 day war." So many Israelis were born in Iran. This whole struggle for hegemony over the region between Israel and Iran  has emerged in the aftermath of Iraq no longer acting as a buffer once Bush removed his former buddy Saddam from power and bombed hell out of Iraq....US military industrial complex plays with other nations like a checker game...thank you Henry Kissinger...

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

Agreed

well said Molla as usual. I wanted to mention that one of the last people who came by to say good bye to me when I left Iran 4 months after the revolution in 1979 was our neighborhood Mullah who whispered in my ear that he hoped I did not think all moslems were like the radicals who had taken over or words to that effect and I told him that I knew that...I wept in the taxi all the way from Mehdune Ferdowsi to Mehrabad...and my heart never left...I feel your pain diaspora

love and peace brother 

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

Iran hasn't invaded anyone....

And here is nuclear armed Israel claiming to feel threatened by Iran. 

What a joke. Brian, you raise very good points. Most of the debate is controlled and sanitized. It's actually wrong to call it a debate.

I LOVE your blog. The content is fantastic. So glad you're here. Good to meet you. Thanks for the link.

And may I remind you about Nagasaki and Hiroshima

for which there was absolutely no justification. It was conducted as an experiment.The USA is the only nation to actually drop atomic bombs on civilian populations and the Japanese are one of the few nations that are totally against nuclear.

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

Brian,

I remember a fellow bi-racial American student who I used to know. His father was an Afghan and his mother Afro American. He used to tell me about his times visiting Afghanistan in the 70's. He had many fond memories visiting different provinces and hitch hiking there. Afghans are warm and friendly people. What has happened to them for the last 30 years is a shame. Occupying Afghanistan is a dead end policy and will get us or Afghanis no where. It will make the war industries and their lackies in the US congress richer while leading the country to bankruptcy.

A nomad with a flag-Jappy finger

I don't expect you stop your anti-American propaganda any time soon.

Do I have to remind you of the cowardly attack by the royal army of your  birth place which  pushed Americans out of their isolationist den in WWII?

How dare you criticize Americans for getting even with the Japs? 

I don't know how many fingers you have, but I hope you will be able to keep adding to 60 million bomb crater holes whatever is needed to remove  *your* friendly mullahs from my homeland, which happens to be my genuine birth place.

If my body dies, let my body die, but do not let my country die.

By the way "I Have a Crush on Alex Trebek" and others

If you want more of my blog I would direct you to my website at www.zirzameen.com 

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

Actually I was born in Japan

what other country has 3,000 military bases around the world? What other country has started as many wars in the past 100 years? What other military has left 60 million bomb crater holes in another country?(Viet Nam.) 

Am I not supposed to criticize my own country when it does wrong. As I said before the concept of nation state is becoming blurred, irrelevent and obsolete especially where there are multinational corporations with bigger revenues than the GNPs of many nations. Nationalism is a root cause of war. When I see a sticker that says God Bless America that means by implication God Damn Everyone else. I  personally am more interested in the well being of humanity as a whole not one nation over another.

OnlyIran quite rightly mentions the legend collosal blunders of the US policy in the Middle East. Right now I am reading John Limbert's account of the Iran Contra Affair in his book "How To Negotiate With Iran; Wrestling Ghosts of The Past" and I finally understand where Michael Ledeen came from before the AEI. Unbelievable stupidity, the Iran Contra Affair, basically attempting to trade 1000's of missiles to the IRI so Ghorbanifar and Adnan Koshogi could get richer in exchange for the release of 5 US hostages in Lebanon  that the IRI were supposed to have control over.

Anyway, I am aware of Massoud and also commander Abdul Haq. In fact I wrote to Haq's son and nephew in Union City a letter of condolence in 2001 to which they replied with thanks. I sent them photos of children I had taken pictures of in Afghanistan in 1976 and told them how much I loved their country and culture and how sorry I was about the war and his father's death. His mother had been assassinated in Pakistan.

I appreciate your perspective Fred even if you bear so much invective and anymosity towards my ideas and waste a lot of time trying to ridicule me, at least you are a thinking man with opinions. 

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

Appletonian lies... What else is new?

"The CIA then created El Qeda and the Taliban and trained them in Madrassas in Pakistan."

Pray tell, Appleton, did the CIA create Ahmad Shah Massoud? Did they? Was he Taliban? Was he? Boy, you don't miss an opportunity to bash America, supposedly your home country. And it's okay to bash one's government, but at least bash it with the truth, not with lies!

As OnlyIran rightly points out, some of the Mujahedeen ended up in the Taliban, with Pakis/Saudi funding, and successive American administrations turning a blind eye to this growing cancer.

Ahmad Shah Massoud was a very brave noble leader, he fought the Soviets valiantly. He was NOT Taliban! And he was not Al Qaeda! And he was NOT CIA! Get your facts straight -- it's never as simple as CIA this or CIA that. Self-hating folks like you want to blame everything wrong in the world on the CIA and America, and I suspect it's probably because the Agency didn't accept you or promote you, or more like rejected you, and your professional bitterness/resentment has evolved into a full-blown vendetta against both the agency and the country of your birth.

Quite sad, actually. Quite pathetic as well.

Thanks

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

Brian you are a wonderful blogger

I appreciate your blogs so much. You share good stories. I've enjoyed them since you joined IC. Thanks.

Rasool ibn alWindsor

Can't you guys leave Rasool alone? Why on earth some of you people keep bothering him? He has a job to do, and he's doing it to the best of his ability in order to make Her Majesty a bit jolly. If you disagree with him...oh well, that's your problem...then go somewhere else...maybe IC is not the place for you to be in. As far as I know Rasool is here to stay, and hopefully one day he'll have his boss's permission to reveal the alternative to America whenever she goes down.

Brian

Firts, the U.S. did not create the Taliban.  The U.S. helped the so-called "Mujaheddeen", some of whom, later became elements of the Taliban.  As you know, most of the U.S. backed Mujahedeen, such as Dostum and Ahmad Shah Masoud, actually hated and fought the Taliban.  

The Taliban were a creation of Pakistani ISI and Saudi Arabia.  The plan, logistics and training came from Pakistan and the funding came from the Saudis who were excited to create an extreme Wahabi state to counterbalance Iran. If anything, the U.S. turned a blind eye toward the Taliban.  But that's not the only mistake the U.S. has made in the region.  The U.S.'s failures and lack of foresight when it comes to Middle east issues are stuff of legends. 

Second, even if assuming everything that you say is true, still, the practical result of a NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan would be the return of Taliban to power, interference of neighbors or even worst, another bloody civil war.  Whatever the U.S. is there for, it is at least keeping the country together with some semblance of normalcy.   

hichi, tipota, nada, rien, niente, nothing

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

well as you sew so shall ye reap

When I was in Afghanistan 30 years ago, there was no Taliban or El Qeda.  The cousin of the King had deposed him and set up a socialist republic in which women were even cabinet ministers. The nomadic women in the countryside road horses and camels like men and wore no Burqas.I saw it with my own eyes.

 The US government did not and do not like socialism since it doesn't help the elite have access to all the resources at the expense of the people so they immediately started to destabilize the Afghan government who started calling to Russia for help. The Russians were reluctant to help for 6 years they avoided it then finally they started bombing which went on for ten years. The CIA then created El Qeda and the Taliban and trained them in Madrassas in Pakistan. The failed policy was that radical Islam would stop the spread of "Godless" communism. Really it was the way the Cold War between the USSR and the USA competing over global hegemony would fight eachother by proxy in third world countries at the expense of the local civilians. Who has paid for the 6 million refugees from that  ten years of bombing? Iran with 3 million Afghan refugees and Pakistan with 3 million have paid. Has the former USSR paid for them? No. Has the USA paid for them? No...

The US military is not in Afghanistan to stop the Taliban. The Taliban was on their pay roll up until only a few years ago. In fact we hear Obama showing a willingness to negotiate with them. The USA is there for the Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan gas pipeline they want to build right across the center of Afghanistan where they bombed. Mark my words.

All this is public information not secret. Does anyone really care? No, they would all benefit from the cheap gas. It's not even Afghanistan's gas, they just happen to be in the way. And the return to cash crop of heroine destined for American consumers is no accident either...

Brian H. Appleton

aka

Rasool Aryadust

What's the alternative?

I am not in favor of an ongoing war in Afghanistan.  But what's the alternative?  Let's say that the U.S. and NATO pull out tomorrow.  Who's going to take over?  We know that the current government will immediately collapse.  So, who's most likely to take over?  Taliban, of course.  Would they be a good alternative for the Afghan people?  They're going to implement their brutal brand of fundamentalist Islam and send the country back, again, to the 7th Century.  Another scenario is for Iran and Pakistan to come in and have chunks of Afghanistan under their control, with the Taliban controlling the rest.  So, while I'm do not support an endless war, I don't think that the alternatives are anything better.

Very touching story

How tragic the way the war industry functions.  Human life no matter how good, has only a miniscule part in the equations of benefit and cost anaysis. I have read and heard so many stories about the warm hospitable qualities of Afghanis anywhere in the world.  Yet each time I read such stories my heart sill feels tight for those beautiful people. 

I have this Afghani family who owns a little tobacco store nearby, whom I visit regularly for years now.  Every time I ask any of them how they are doing, they just reply "we're alive and always worried about our loved ones". That's our common ground I guess. i never had it as bad as they do, since some relatives or friends somewhere in Europe or Canada would at least relay to me the news about the other ones in Iran.

Afghanis here in the US, don't know half of the true stories since the media reports are fake and rare, never depicting the real lives of their loved ones left behind.