Originally Posted by tippit78

And also, Ahmadinejad isn't exactly autonomous. There's the council, there's the religious establishment, and the democratic forces that swept him into power.

While there are scary things about the government of Iran, and I wouldn't want to downplay them, they are also a country where decision making is diluted and not centered on one person. Even the religious establishment is made up of Islamic scholars, who have to argue to reach a consensus.*

What this means is that they're pretty unlikely to do something rash and stupid, because there are enough individuals and groups who can say no along the way. And to be honest, everything Iran has done and said makes me think they're telling the truth about not wanting nuclear weapons. Nuclear power, yeah, which I'm against because I think it's a terrible way to power the world, but not weapons. Frankly, I'm a lot more scared of Pakistan having nukes. Pakistan is about as stable as Saudia Arabia, which means not really.

As far as the Shah goes...well, he was a typical bloody tyrant. He may have tried to do some good things, but they were for his glory, not for his people (note that he considered them his people--emphasis on the possessive). And he did it really stupidly. There are stories about parts power plants arriving in ports, on order of the Shah, and then sitting and rusting because they didn't have the transportation infrastructure to actually get the parts to where they were supposed to go.

And actually a topic on Iran and it's history would be really fun: I always want to know more! When I can't wait to get home after my time here in the Czech Republic, which has been fun, but I was also halfway through a history of the Achaemenids when I left for a one month trip that turned into a year long stay.

*A common misconception of the west is to refer to Islamic clerics--they aren't priests in the way we think of them in Christianity. They are very respected and learned men, but they have no real role as intermediary between God and the people. Frex: A Catholic has to go to the priest to give confession, while in Islam, the relationship is purely between God and the individual, and the individual with his community, the community of the other faithful. The mosque isn't quite so much for the worshiping of God, but for the gathering of the community.