At least I have lived in the ME and have a clue...
Good. Then you know that staying in SA for a bit and living in Iran are two completely different things. Having spent several thousand hours in
both locales, and away from americanised installations to boot, I can say without concern of contradiction that all comparisons are virtually irrelevant. Esfahan and KKMC ("Emerald City") are not interchangeable...
Troops coming home
Personally I think it is a mistake but I do not see any alternative. I believe in the you break it you buy policy We went in not just to topple Hussein but as an occupation force that was trying to rebuild the country. That was a failed venture from the get go. Iraq is probably going to break up into three parts controlled by the three factions. Iran is chomping at the bit to stick their hands in the pot. I would not be surprised if the sectarian violence explodes after we leave and tens of thousands if not more die in the ensuing violence. What a cluster phuck. We screw up and others get to pay the consequences.
Having skin in the game (I recently started working for a major transportation contractor), I do not welcome this news, though again, I'm sure that's for personal reasons. In a larger, more macro sense, I'm not sure how I feel about it. While I do believe that america has no place in the ME (and frankly vice versa WRT politics), with the notable exception of Israel, of course.
Concerning Iran, like everyone else here, I have no idea if they will ever actually attack anybody on a large scale. This country does a great job going around having no idea about what life in Iran is actually like (If we did, we might very well sell out the Saudis and effect a change in "alliance" as the Iranian outlook, is in general, a great deal
less ideologically extreme).
I can say that I doubt it will happen. As we saw a few summers back, Iran has its own difficulties keeping its population subjugated. It's in fact likely that things there are a great deal less stable then we imagine. My time there certainly indicated that people are a lot less enthralled with their leadership then we imagine. It's tough to imagine that orders to initiate a conflict that could severely damage the standard of living they do have would be blindly followed. We are, after all, well within living memory of an event that gives Iranians every reason to view both the us and their own leadership with profound distrust. The '80s weren't
that long ago...