[mullingitover]

None of these things preclude a great relationship with the US, however.

One could 's/Islamic Republic/KSA' here and it'd be pretty much the same stories. None of these bad behaviors would stop you from being tight allies with the US as long as your oppressive theocratic dictatorship was in the US sphere of influence.

Heck, Iran is objectively far more democratic than KSA, not that it gets them any credit.

> e.g., they just confiscated a Korean ship on free waters

The rest of the story: Because South Korea is effectively stealing $7B worth of oil from Iran. They're following the sanctions that the US unilaterally imposed after breaking its deal with Iran over nuclear enrichment, which Iran had been following.

[yyyk]

>One could 's/Islamic Republic/KSA' here and it'd be pretty much the same stories.

KSA is smart enough not to openly shout 'Death to America'. Nor does it have a nuclear program or keeps hostages or refuses to join anti-terrorist transparency treaties.

>The rest of the story: Because South Korea is effectively stealing $7B worth of oil from Iran.

OK, lets have any country which has a financial dispute with some other country takes hostages. That would be a nice world, right? That's the world we'll be at if Iran keeps being rewarded for its behaviour.

[yongjik]

> OK, lets have any country which has a financial dispute with some other country takes hostages. That would be a nice world, right? That's the world we'll be at if Iran keeps being rewarded for its behaviour.

Well, I'd have to point out, when the US told South Korea (and the rest of the world) to cut trades with Iran (or else), it was engaging in this very kind of behavior.

As a South Korean, I'd appreciate if the US and Iran could talk to each other like adults and leave my country out of this, but that's not the kind of world we're living in. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[yyyk]

>the US... was engaging in this very kind of behavior.

The US is taking South Korean hostages?

[yongjik]

Who needs hostages, when you can crush a whole country's economy with your thumbs? America can cause $$$ to instantly evaporate off Korea just by looking at it the wrong way. You think Korea is keeping Iran's 7 billion dollars just because we like to be a jerk?

I don't want to complain too much, because the arrangement is usually mutually beneficial (after all, if you have to keep thousands of foreign soldiers on your own soil, better to be a part of team America than team Iran or team China) - I just think it would be better if we talk about practicality instead of moral outrages.

[yyyk]

I don't think practicality and moral outrages are in contradiction. There's a practical reason to get outraged here - because it would be bad for SK if everyone starts taking hostages and because SK has a duty to its citizens.

[frequentnapper]

>but that's not the kind of world we're living in.

Exactly, because without US Navy, China would be taking Korean ships and you wouldn't be able to do anything about it.

[nashashmi]

KSA is smart enough to make everyone hate Iran. The stuff you mention is just Iran hating back.

[input_sh]

> Nor does it have a nuclear program

If only there was some international agency that could have people on the ground that could walk into any place in Iran under any suspicion that they might be enriching uranium beyond the levels needed for nuclear power plants, overriding basically any local laws that might prevent them access. We could call it International Atomic Energy Agency or something.

Now seriously, this was in the deal that the US pulled out of, as well as an agreement that Iran will not enrich uranium beyond like 4% (enough for nuclear power plants, not bombs), reducing their stockpiles of uranium by 97% and much, much more. Now just days ago Iran let IAEA know that they're going to enrich it up to 20%.

[yyyk]

Yea. It would be tough for Iran to develop weapons under those conditions, if they existed in reality. What would a smart leadership do to make it easier?

If only there was a deal that wrote down that the international agency needed to ask permission from Iran in advance for inspections of 'military sites'. Also explicitly allow Iran to keep researching enrichment so breakout time would be small. And make that any extra restrictions are temporary. After all, there was that deal with North Korea, and we see how it worked so well - for North Korea.

[input_sh]

It's uranium, you can't simply hide it in the matter of days. Not to mention 24/7 video surveillance, satellite images, and that IAEA released quarterly reports and every one of them until over a year after US withdrew from the agreement said the same: Iran complied. Hell, even a year after Iran let IAEA know that they're gonna exceed their limits. Here's the entire timeline for those interested: https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Timeline-of-Nuclear-D...

Nothing like the situation was with North Korea, where North Korea was uncooperative with the IAEA, mostly disagreeing on which parts of the plants IAEA can access. Not to mention IAEA had 20 years in between to improve their methods.

US absolutely shot themselves in the foot by withdrawing from the deal no matter how you look at it.

[yyyk]

>It's uranium, you can't simply hide it in the matter of days.

The problem here is that Iran was allowed to not tell all on previous existing program. Lets pretend they cheat and IAEA finds out traces of Uranium. What happens when they argue that the Uranium signature is pre-2015 and not from a new installation? There's not enough time passed to prove either way.

> US absolutely shot themselves in the foot by withdrawing from the deal no matter how you look at it.

US had to look for improvements, even if Clinton had been elected, since the agreement was designed to be temporary. The tactics involved are a different matter. I guess Trump could have been more devious and unofficially sanction Iran while officially staying part of the deal. Would that have been better? Hmm.. difficult to say.

[CryptoPunk]

>>What happens when they argue that the Uranium signature is pre-2015 and not from a new installation?

Is this even possible? Doesn't the half-life of the enriched uranium reveal when it was enriched?

>>The tactics involved are a different matter. I guess Trump could have been more devious and unofficially sanction Iran while officially staying part of the deal. Would that have been better? Hmm.. difficult to say.

The US could have stayed party to the nuclear deal and coordinated any new negotiations with its European allies, and that would have been substantially better than reneging on an important nuclear arms control deal.

[input_sh]

It was temporary in a sense that it applied for 10-15 years, so until 2025-2030. Whoever won in 2016 simply didn't need to worry about it in their first term. Iran did nothing to provoke it, IAEA repeatedly confirmed that, and Trump simply decided to undo it because it was Obama that reached the deal.

[AsyncAwait]

> KSA is smart enough not to openly shout 'Death to America'.

Try imposing harsh sanctions on them, murdering their generals etc., organizing illegal coups & we'll see then.

> Nor does it have a nuclear program

That's false[1].

There's little credible evidence Iran is trying to actually build a bomb.

1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_program_of_Saudi_Arabi...

> refuses to join anti-terrorist transparency treaties

It only funds terrorists in Syria, Yemen etc. and constructs radical schools all over, being dubbed fatwa valley but nothing to see here.

> That's the world we'll be at if Iran keeps being rewarded for its behaviour.

It seems to me like they tried to be constructive with the Iran Deal and got betrayed by the U.S. again. They have plenty of reason not to trust the U.S. Iran has not staged a coup in the U.S. as far as I know.

[yyyk]

>Try imposing harsh sanctions on them, murdering their generals etc., organizing illegal coups & we'll see then.

The first is after a nuclear program and Iran killing hundreds of American soldiers. The coup is unrelated (would you support bombing a different country over something that happened 60 years ago when both countries had very different governments?), and quite funny when one remembers the Islamists also supported the coup.

>It seems to me like they tried to be constructive with the Iran Deal

If you define being constructive as taking hostages over and over than yes they were.

>There's little credible evidence Iran is trying to actually build a bomb.

Apart from weapon drawings, direct recordings of one the key architects discussing weapons[1], mass uranium enrichment.... SA has nothing remotely comparable.

[1] https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-has-tape-of-slain-iran-...

[mullingitover]

> The first is after a nuclear program and Iran killing hundreds of American soldiers.

How far back should we go with the tit for tat calculations? I recall a war where US sold Iraq chemical weapons to kill Iranian soldiers[1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_chemical_attacks_against...

[yyyk]

Actually, Iran was happy to take American support during that war[1], and the Iraqi program was not supported by the US - the program was mainly supported by French and Germany, which Iran is weirdly not pissed at.

Almost like there's no tit-for-tat. Maybe the real reason for the enmity is the Iranian regime being theocratic revolutionaries and the US not allowing them to 'export their revolution' (that is, take over the ME) as much as they'd like.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Contra_affair

[stretchcat]

> and the Iraqi program was not supported by the US

Yes it was. The CIA knowingly helped Iraq kill Iranians with nerve gas:

> Declassified CIA documents show that the United States was providing reconnaissance intelligence to Iraq around 1987–88 which was then used to launch chemical weapon attacks on Iranian troops and that the CIA fully knew that chemical weapons would be deployed and sarin and cyclosarin attacks followed.[255]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran–Iraq_War

[mullingitover]

I agree realpolitik is certainly a thing, and as long as we can see that with clear eyes and not settle on one side or another being 'the good guys' or 'the bad guys' we're all much better off. The best outcome for everyone is for de-escalation and peacemaking efforts that reduce the suffering of the regular people in the region.

[adventured]

Correction, Germany did more than anyone to help Iraq with chemical weapons. 52% of their chemical weapons equipment derived from Germany for example. The Germans knew exactly what they were doing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_chemical_weapons_program

[mullingitover]

I'd call it a team effort. The US was certainly selling dual use equipment in the war, and not only did it not lift a finger to stop the use of chemical weapons, it blocked the UN Security Council from even passing a resolution saying that using them was a bad thing.

[pushswap]

Civilians, not only soldiers, were gassed by the German's munitions resulting in long term injuries and deaths. It's surprising this isn't more well known, and that Germany was not internationally censured, tried, & made to pay compensation to the victims of these disgusting actions following their conduct in the Holocaust.

Why's it so necessary for Germany to sell chemical weapons to be used in a warzone anyway? I wouldn't be surprised to see these were the same companies or individuals that acted 40 years earlier.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_chemical_attacks_again...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halabja_chemical_attack

[phobosanomaly]

> nuclear program

Objectively, why can't Iran have a nuclear program while Israel, India, and Pakistan can?

> Iran killing hundreds of American soldiers

They are a regional superpower and the United States invaded and destabilized their neighbor causing widespread chaos throughout the region. Civilian casualties from violence in Iraq following the destabilization of the '03 war have been estimated at around 200,000.

> would you support bombing a different country over something that happened 60 years ago

The US did shoot down an Irainian civilian airliner in 1988 and refuse to apologize about it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655

And then assassinated one of their generals earlier this year.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Qasem_Soleima...

> SA has nothing remotely comparable

They don't need them. They can do whatever they want in the region while the U.S. looks away and sells them the weapons to do it.

"The bomb dropped on a school bus in Yemen by a Saudi-led coalition warplane was sold to Riyadh by the US, according to reports based on analysis of the debris.

The 9 August attack killed 40 boys aged from six to 11 who were being taken on a school trip. Eleven adults also died. Local authorities said that 79 people were wounded, 56 of them children. CNN reported that the weapon used was a 227kg laser-guided bomb made by Lockheed Martin, one of many thousands sold to Saudi Arabia as part of billions of dollars of weapons exports.

Saudi Arabia is the biggest single customer for both the US and UK arms industries. The US also supports the coalition with refuelling and intelligence."

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/19/us-supplied-bo...

[yyyk]

>Objectively, why can't Iran have a nuclear program while Israel, India, and Pakistan can?

Because Iran signed the NPT unlike the others and should abide by its commitments? Because Iran is the country which threatens other countries publicly? Because the Pakistani bomb is enough of a problem and nobody really needs another such problem?

>They are a regional superpower and the United States invaded and destabilized their neighbor causing widespread chaos throughout the region. Civilian casualties from violence in Iraq following the destabilization of the '03 war have been estimated at around 200,000.

How many of those are the result of Iranian involvement? For that matter, how many civilian casualties are the result of Iranian 'stabilization' in Syria?

>The US did shoot down an Irainian civilian airliner in 1988 and refuse to apologize about it.

Read your own cite, there was an agreement and compensation.

>And then assassinated one of their generals earlier this year.

Who had been involved in attacking American soldiers.

>They [SA] don't need them. They can do whatever they want in the region while the U.S. looks away and sells them the weapons to do it.

SA couldn't even respond to the attack on their oil facilities. I was talking about the Iranian nuclear problem though.

[phobosanomaly]

> "Because Iran signed the NPT"

They signed in 1968. In your words, "something that happened 60 years ago when both countries had very different governments" But, perhaps after watching the US performance in Iraq, maybe Iran wanted a credible deterrent to prevent the same thing from happening to them.

If the issue with the nuclear program was really about proliferation, the US would have active sanctions against Pakistan. AQ Khan wasn't an Iranian!

> "How many of those are the result of Iranian involvement?"

They didn't invade the country, overthrow the government, and disband the army. If Iran invaded Mexico, overthrew the government, and disbanded the army plunging the country into chaos, do you think the US would stand by and do nothing? No way!

Do you feel that the ISI is any more odious of an institution that Iranian military intelligence in that respect? Why does the US treat them so differently?

> "agreement and compensation"

That's blood money, not an apology. The US screwed up big time in shooting down that plane, and the best they could muster was that it was a "...proper defensive action by the U.S.S. Vincennes." (rolls eyes) When Iran shot down the Ukrainian airliner, at least they had the decency to label it a "disastrous mistake."

> "Who had been involved in attacking American soldiers."

Why were the American soldiers there halfway across the planet in a country where they aren't welcome and don't speak the language? Maybe they wanted the Americans out so that the region could achieve some stability?

My point with the Saudi-Yemen thing is that KSA doesn't need nukes as an insurance policy because the US has their back. No nuclear-armed superpower has Iran's back, so they're probably looking for the security of a nuclear deterrent.

The US-Irainian conflict, like the US conflict with Cuba, is something that should have ended decades ago. It's a legacy of old political hostilities that happened when my parents were teenagers. It's 2021, we have better things to worry about. It's all so petty.

[kortilla]

> Try imposing harsh sanctions on them, murdering their generals etc., organizing illegal coups & we'll see then.

> They have plenty of reason not to trust the U.S.

Do you see how your goal posts have shifted from “Iran wants peace” to “Of course Iran doesn’t want peace, look at how bad the US is?”

[AsyncAwait]

The fact that they don't like or trust the US does not mean they also don't want peace. If your idea of peace however is the US antagonizing in the region, (Iran's backyard if you will) and Iran disarming and sitting on their ass watching the US surround them, without any regional allies, then no I don't think Iran is after that, I also don't think it has anything to do with wanting peace.

[Analemma_]

“Death to X” is an overly-literal translation of a common Persian idiom of frustration, eagerly and maliciously repeated by motivated parties to make Iranians look as dangerous as possible. It’s essentially the Persian equivalent to “fuck X”, and so this is as though you had your arm bitten off by a shark and said, “Fuck sharks!”, and someone deliberately took that to mean you endorse bestiality.

[Siira]

This is a lie. The chant is literally "Death to X," there is no idiom whatsoever. The only human targets I have ever heard for this chant is the US and some of its allies (KSA, UK), the IR's leader, and some generic terms for the outgroup ("monafegh").

[EB-Barrington]

This should may help you, and other interested persons determine whether or not marg bar Amrika is to be taken literally, or is indeed an idiom (btw, it is):

In Persian, "Death to America" is "marg bar Amrika"

Common Persian phrases, and these are everyday phrases in Iran include:

1) Marg! Literally, Death!, closest we have in English: Shut up!

2) Khabare margesh! Literally, the news of his/her death! This is used with someone you don't like, as in, you're only interested in the news of that persons death (perhaps a politician is a typical example).

3) Boro bemir! Literally, Go die! Again, in English, the equivalent is along the lines of Shut Up!

4) Che margeshe? Literally, what's his death? Used mostly for objects, such as when your car won't start.

5) Marge man, literally, my death. Used when you are swearing you are telling the truth.

Iranians have so many idioms/expressions/figures-of-speech related to Death, this is just a small sample.

[miracle2k]

During the protests last year, Sohrab Ahmari, no friend of the IRI, chose to translate the phrase as "Down with the dictator". I wonder why.

[ShroudedNight]

Are there good secondary sources for this? This alleged perversion strikes me as a significant linchpin in the structural animosity between the two people. I really want it to be true, so am particularly hesitant to accept it without compelling evidence.

[EB-Barrington]

This may help:

In Persian, "Death to America" is "marg bar Amrika"

Common Persian phrases, and these are everyday phrases in Iran include:

1) Marg! Literally, Death!, closest we have in English: Shut up!

2) Khabare margesh! Literally, the news of his/her death! This is used with someone you don't like, as in, you're only interested in the news of that persons death (perhaps a politician is a typical example).

3) Boro bemir! Literally, Go die! Again, in English, the equivalent is along the lines of Shut Up!

4) Che margeshe? Literally, what's his death? Used mostly for objects, such as when your car won't start.

5) Marge man, literally, my death. Used when you are swearing you are telling the truth.

Iranians have so many expressions/figures-of-speech related to Death.

[elefanten]

Seems... well, pretty violent. And strangely dedicated to wishing death/finality upon everything.

That’s stark when most cultures draw on disgust (excrement etc) or some kind of power/possession dynamic (fucking, owning, etc).

[potatoz2]

Maybe https://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/24/world/middleeast/some-ira... (there's also a Wikipedia article). I think a good comparison may also be "damn Kubernetes", you're not literally damning some technology. It's less clear in the phrase "damn you to hell". I think it's kind of similar, it's overloaded.

[a1369209993]

> I think a good comparison may also be "damn Kubernetes", you're not literally damning some technology.

The only reason I don't mean that literally is because a: I'm fairly sure Hell doesn't exist, and b: if it did, I support and endorse most of the people there (eg blasphemers, scientists and other heretics, homosexuals and other deviants, and of course heathens, infidels, and apostates) and would not wish to inflict Kubernetes on them, even if the resulting increase in suffering would only be a rounding error.

I think you have a valid point in general, but in this case I would, in fact, prefer for Kubernetes to be gone from the world entirely, and I don't think this is by any means a unique position, either regarding Kubernetes, or in the general case of "damn X".

[nashashmi]

I thought it was the equivalent of “damn you” or “go to hell”. Or “leave us alone”.

[phobosanomaly]

Even if it does literally mean 'death to America,' as an American I always interpreted that as being directed at the American government. I never took it personally. Hell, I could probably wear them out complaining about the federal government.

[nashashmi]

It offends all those who are patriotic to America no matter who or how the government is. Remember this came out in the 70s when the sayings were Love it or Leave it.

Also when the concept is paired with imagery of a Nuclear Iran, you can’t help but feel attacked.

[phobosanomaly]

Nah. I love my country dearly, but I don't feel attacked at all.

My country has done a lot of stupid stuff in the Middle East. I get why they're upset. They should be. Fair enough.

It would be nice for us to move past the petty hatred over things that happened 50 years ago.

[Rapzid]

> None of these things preclude a great relationship with the US, however.

Doesn't it, though? We have great relationships with a relatively small number of countries. Then there are the mutually beneficial relationships.

Maybe our definition of "great relationship" differs. When I think "great relationship" I think five-eyes countries plus maybe Japan. Perhaps arguably a few others.