The War on Iran

Very nice, you have a professional and personal relationship to the former White House adviser. And clearly the White House is all knowing, especially when it pertains to foreign relations and the Middle East. Apparently rather than relying on the persuasiveness and logical force of your arguments, you would rather the audience defer to the superior omnipotence that is you. Because you have a professional and personal relationship to the White House. I should concede now, because clearly the White House can do no wrong pertaining to the Middle East right? (Sarcasm is my bread and butter, and for that matter my fried egg, pop tarts, and lucky charms) Now onto your independent points. A) It's a bad idea. -- To call this an independent point is laughable. So i'll laugh. Ha! A.1) We don't have a standing military to make a successful offensive on the ground That's what many detractors said when we were about to enter Iraq. How long did it take us to prevail in defeating Iraq? Iran borders the Persian Gulf and it borders our Pakistani ally. The statement "historically no army has had success invading the region since Alexander the Great" is a blatant and egregious lie. The Muslims invaded Iran around the 600s. The Turks conquered Iran in the 11th century. The Mongols invaded Iran around the 1300s. Iran lost real sovereignty to European powers (like everyone else) in the colonial era. Thus if Pro is relying on historical precedent, he has clearly dug himself quite a deep pit, despite his white house connections. B) Diplomatic consequences. You're right, foreign policy should never be considered in a vacuum. By all means, what do the lives of Americans here at home matter when it would annoy Russia and China? Granted that was rather flippant, but the point is, the ultimately diplomatic consequences come second to the interests of American citizens and American lives. To that end, the first rebuttal takes into account "with Iraq's influence in the region gone, it basically created a situation in which Iran may be able to form a Shiite hegemony." Your absolutely right. Through invading Iraq we have thrown power into the hands of Iran. What I do not agree with is your contention that "these Islamic fundamentalists, however, are not interested in attacking the United States." That they're "attempting to find a pragmatic solution to their domestic problems" is not an excuse for attacking American soldiers in Iraq and their grab for power in Iraq is a direct danger to the United States. A Caliphate under Iran that controls the resources of both Iran and Iraq, a Caliphate that believes America to be a demonic hegemony of corruption, a Caliphate which does not believe in the Holocaust, and a Caliphate with nuclear weapons and a vast army of fanatical followers is a danger to the United States. So yes, the diplomatic consequences of leaving Iran alone, as according to your own arguments, is the centralization of power in the Middle East into the hands of Iran. As to the other arguments pertaining to Turkey, Russia, and China, you have not stated one consequence to the United States that would result from an invasion of Iran. Your argument very explicitly and undeniably does not include even one hypothetical consequence of invading Iran. The international outcry in invading Iraq, a sovereign nation, without cause, was non existent. If there were serious potential consequences, Con would have listed them. So either the Con is an incompetent debater, or more plausibly, it could not actually think of any likely consequences of a US invasion of Iran from a diplomatic perspective. Either way, Con loses on this point. Now back to my Independent Points 1. Iran is not leaning towards a more open relationship with the West. Ahmadinejad is not supportive of Democracy. That they were once in support of the United States is nice and heartening, but irrelevant. That Bush should have taken advantage of 9/11 to build strong US - Iran bonds is also irrelevant. The fact of the matter is, Iran as it is now is hostile to the United States. We would only have to target "more than a thousand locations" only if we were launching surgical strikes against various locations in Iran. If we launch a broad scale invasion to destabilize the ruling government, then they would be unable to muster the resources to develop their nuclear weapons technology. What does it matter they want nuclear weapons out of fear of Israel? Everyone wants nuclear weapons, its the In thing. And Korea is an excellent example. Because they already have Nuclear weapons, it is TOO LATE to enter Korea. We still have a chance of entering Iran, NOW, Before they get nuclear weapons. We DO only dick around with non-nuclear powers, and the last thing we want is for Iran to have the power to ignore the United States and our interests with impunity. As to the argument that a preventive war is a war crime, well, I hope you come up with something better than that. Bush hasn't yet been tried by the World Court for the preventive war we waged in Iraq. And from the looks of it, the international community doesn't give more than 5 cents either, or at the very least they would have sanctioned the United States for committing a war crime. 2. Greater Global Civil Rights Here Con offers no argument. The essence of Con's arguments is as follows: We commit civil rights violations in America. And that pretty much sums it up. Iran Tortures it's Homosexuals. Ending the torture of homosexuals is good. What does it matter who ends it? Does it matter that the French Monarchy contributed to the American Revolution? Does France being a monarchy make the world a worse place because they helped give birth to a Democracy? How about when the USSR put an end to the genocide of Jews as they rolled across German occupied territories? Are you saying the world was worse off because the USSR participated in the liberation of Jews from concentration camps? The USSR being a brutal communist tyrannical regime DOES NOT MAKE SAVING JEWS A BAD THING. By your argument, the USSR should not have entered Germany, because God Forbid, they might save some lives. The horror, the HYPOCRISY, my God, however will they live with themselves. If a horrible nation does something good, the world will be thrown into chaos, whatever shall we do, it's the End of the World. 3. For our duty to the people of Iran Yes, let's apologize. Is an apology mutually exclusive with actually military support? If I'm reading you correctly, apparently we can't both apologize and help out, by saving Iran from the tyranny of their oppressive government. Now that might be your point of view. Perhaps you can't both apologize and offer restitutions. I on the other hand adhere to the concept that America can actually do both things. So let's let the voters decide how taxing of our resources an apology would be, and let the voters decide whether or not an apology will so consume American resources that it would render us unable to do anything else in regards to Iran. And for these reasons I am proud to support.