WebsterMark wrote on 12/08/13 at 16:49:45: Its not about terrorism. Its about centralizing power & harvesting resources,
This is so ridiculous ..... If we wanted it, we'd take it in five minutes.
Actually, you're quite right.
I remember reading essays on "
The fall of the Dollar?" where analysts hypothesized the fall of the US$ if OPEC and China would start asking for Euros, not US$, for their international exports.
Saddam Hussein was so fed up of some nations "teasing" support, then pulling away when that support was needed with most urgency, that it turned elsewhere.
Odd how the UK and the US cried outrage when Iraq "took back" Kuwait, instead of justifying it with events from their own past national history.
Not many of you know
Iraq was selling oil for EUROS when the fabricated mess of "WMD" was fed to the "Free World Media".
Actually, the risk was not that of WMDs, because what WMDs there were, were of US manufacture, and had been delivered "ready to roll", preventing Iraq from being able to producing them themselves.
The real problem was that Iraq was selling OIL asking payment in a currency which was antagonist to the US$, and in that day, more competitive than the US$.
If you don't believe me, go back and check the exchange rates Euro/US$ from 2000 (when it was an abstract "reference point") to 2003.
Similarly,
Lybia was selling OIL and Natural Gas to Europe for Euros.It was even easier to start a civil war in Lybia, because within the Country political power had always been split between Tripoli (Tripolitania) and Benghazi (Cirenaica).
Back in older days these were two separate entities, united only by Colonialism.
Now the issue seems to be... Iran... again... (as Forrest Gump would say)
It is a natural thing that two neighboring Shiite Countries, both "Islamic Republics", should shake hands.
Iran is an Islamic Republic since the day the Ayatollah Khomeini returned from exile.
Afghanistan, on the other hand, was made an Islamic Republic under ther Taliban Regime, and it stayed an Islamic Republic when the US put Hamid Karzai as the new President.
So I don't see what's "abnormal"... when two "cousins" sitting side by side shake hands.
The best way to make a dog snarl and become hostile at you is to chain it to the wall, and beat it with a stick.
The best way to make a dog be indifferent towards you is to leave it alone.
The best way to make a dog wag its tail at you is to be friendly, and feed it a little from time to time, but not too much, and not too often, lest it expects to be fed "
gratis" (for free, and regularly, just because... that's what it's learned)
Just my 2 cents'...