I think it's very low probability that Iran will improve --

by omahadomer, Sunday, March 01, 2026, 10:04 (151 days ago) @ Flann

Unlike 1979 when Khomeini was in exile, there's no clear opposition leader. When the Shah fled, there were guerrilla forces that overwhelmed the loyalists. And Iranians thought (correctly) that the Shah was closely aligned with Western powers, especially after the 1953 coup that was led by the CIA and the British MI6.

Iran has never been a democracy. The idea that a government that wants to be a good neighbor as defined by the West is going to emerge is probably far-fetched.

The only way to really get a governmental change is to have ground forces like we had for 8 years in Iraq and 17 years in Afghanistan. As soon as we left Afghanistan, the Taliban came out of the hills and now girls can't go to school.

I think there are two motivations for this (and I don't attribute all of this to Trump's thinking, because I don't think he's capable of thinking this far ahead). The first is to drive up oil prices for his oil tycoon buddies and maybe lure them into investing in Venezuela's infrastructure. I'm not sure he really wants oil and gas prices to go up but his billionaire buddies do. The second is to distract from the Epstein files, particular as reports about him trying to get oral sex from a 13-year-old drip out.

--
"Somewhere in Middle America"