Political History of Iran & Present Nuclear Crisis

For large parts of the short history of human civilization, Iran has been at the centre stage of international power struggles. Not withstanding its current status, Iran (or rather Persia as it has been called for most part of history) has many times been one of the major nation-states involved in the struggle for world supremacy. Persia's rise to power started with Cyrus the Great (a popular name even to this day among the Parsees of India), who through process of conquest and assimilation found the Achaemenid Empire. He and his successors spread the power of Persia through the middle east, north africa and southern Europe. At its height, the empire stretched from the northern border of India and Afghanistan right upto Libya to the south east and included parts of Greece and Bulgaria to the north. Though Persian expeditions for conquests of Greece failed multiple times, in even in their heyday the Greeks were no match for the Persian Military and Political power. In fact Greeks was never a great military power until the coming of Alexander the Great (who technically was not a Greek but a Macedonian). After the conquests by Alexander , the Persian empire was destroyed and they come under the hegemony of Hellenes. Many centuries later, the Persians would again rise to power during the period of Sassanian Dynasty. Once again they would compete with newer counterpart of Greeks, the Eastern Roman Empire, centered at Constantinople, (modern day Istambul, Turkey) for the control of middle east and north Africa. This dynasty would ended with last of its kings being vanquished during the Islamic conquest of Persia, during the early days of Arab expansion. Though local dynasties again gained power and started a processes of de-arabisation during the 15th century, Persia never again rose to similar international prominence.
Coming back to the present, the seeds of nuclear crisis in Iran can be traced back to the first discovery of Oil in Iran by the British in 1908. The discovery held would hold both fortune and misfortune in store for Iran. Earlier also, Iran had been the centre of Great game being played between Great Britain and Russia for the control of entire Central Asia. But after the discovery of Oil and consequent economic implications, the stakes would get doubled. Through a process of alternation between royal coups and re-establishment of democracy, western powers (especially Great Britain and USA) would again get opprotunities for intervention in Iran for the control of trade (essentially oil-wealth). However , things did come to a head when the democratically elected Prime-minister of Iran, Mohammad Mossadegh, was removed by the CIA, for trying to nationalize the oil facilities in Iran. After this deposition of the Prime Minister, a deal was struck with the returned Shah, for allowing GB and USA to control most of the stake in Iran's Oil Industry. This state of affiars continued till the Islamic Revolution in Iran in 1979, which established a Theocratic Republic which functions with a unique mix of representative elected by clerics and those elected directly by people ( Although Islamic clerics don't directly govern in Iran, they still they excercise enormous control over the elected parliament and executive which essentially makes it into a theocracy). Whatever the merits (or demerits) of this form of government, one thing is clear, the United States and its historic involvement in Iran is has a great deal of responsibility for the Islamic Revolution and the present enmity between the Iranian government and the worlds most powerful nation. It is not realistic to expect that we can keep on getting away by in fooling a whole nation of people for the sake of our petty advantages. Counter-reactions (many voilent) are to be expected, sooner or later. And that is what we almost always get. A truth which can be emperically verified by analysing even the history of past century.
A few days back I was listening to President Bush giving a Press conference about the American "war on terror" in Iraq. Not much intelligent talk is usually expected of these press conference, which are generally an excercise in Gobbelian Propaganda. But I was struck by the Presedent talking about the need of spreading democracy world over and how it leads to states which are friendly with the United States. An example of Japan after the world war II was given. I found both the reasoning and the example very incongrous, but it made me wonder what president Bush might have said about the nature of interventions of United States in Iran in past couple of decades. I hope that some day, through a relook at history, political strategists over the world would understand the shortcomings of the following the policy of short-term national interests and try to find a more enlightened path for managing international affiars.

First Post

Thought of wasting some of my new found time in writing a blog. So what can I possibly write about?? As the great British philospher would say, nothing is more worthy of consideration than the the problem of "Life, Universe and Everthing"....
Since I started writing this blog on suggestion of the Colonel, I would dedicate the blog to him. I am sure that he won't be able to appreciate the usefullness of the output I plan to produce. But then, unlike me, he usually doesn't classify typing practice as a useful activity ...