First, Happy Bastille Day. If your schooling didn’t include the details of the French Revolution of 1789, you can read about some of the more prominent ones here. Even if their reasons differ, mobs storming prisons have taken Bastille Day as their model ever since.
Second, Long Island is about to be broiled once again, which may force me into our basement for the duration. Yes, we have central air conditioning, but the system starts to struggle when the outdoor temperature exceeds 90 degrees Fahrenheit. Fortunately, there are two more computers down there… but there are also a large TV, a comfortable recliner, and several hundred movies on DVD. Which of those will command my attention is always a crapshoot.
Third – here we are again, Gentle Reader – a news item that slipped past me a few days back has been brought to my attention:
Alarming new satellite images show signs that the Iranian regime appears to be rebuilding its suspected nuclear facilities at Pickaxe Mountain and Parchin.
Footage of both areas – which sustained extensive damage during US and Israeli-led bombing campaigns that began in late February – reveal “major signs” of activity, according to CNN, which obtained images from private firms.
Such construction likely runs afoul of the Memorandum of Understanding that Iran and US negotiators reached last month during a cease-fire that President Trump called “over” this week following Iranian attacks on shipping vessels in the Strait of Hormuz.
Are there any Gentle Readers who didn’t expect that? Who sincerely expected the ayatollahs to abide by the MoU? That could only be due to a severe case of wishful thinking. Imagine me tut-tutting and waving an index finger.
Possibly no novel in history has excited as much admiration or discussion as J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy classic The Lord Of The Rings. If you're one of the three remaining English-speakers who has yet to read this extraordinary work of the imagination, it's essentially the tale of the final conflict between the Free Peoples of Middle Earth, belatedly come together in a defensive federation, and Sauron the Dark Lord, the superhuman embodiment of evil, who seeks to enslave the entire world, simply because that's what he does.
Enslaving others makes Sauron happy. Perhaps he could also get some use out of them – as soldiers against Gondor, for example – but even if he could not, enslavement is his supreme temporal aim.
For Islamists worldwide, the supreme temporal aim is the destruction of all competing creeds. The destruction of all Jews must come first, for it was Jews who first defied Muhammad. No agreement struck with another power will change that. Their creed – I refuse to call Islam a “religion” – demands the death of all Jews everywhere. The concentration of Jews in Israel and Israel’s geographic placement make it Islam’s foremost target.
But Islamists know that destroying Israel will require nuclear weapons. They also regard agreements struck with “unbelievers” as to be dismissed when doing so would bring “advantage to Islam.” Thus, their creed makes it next to obligatory for them to enter a “peace agreement” fully intending to violate it. The MoU, in which Iran’s rulers supposedly agree to abandon the quest for nuclear weapons, was signed under the falsest of pretenses, for they intended to violate it from the start.
I can easily imagine how President Trump, a consummate deal-maker, feels about this. To Trump, keeping one’s given word is a matter of honor and respect for the other party. While Iran’s violation of the MoU is consistent with the behavior of Islamist rulers, it must surely enrage him. We must hope that fury won’t lure him into a ground war, an outcome few Americans would approve.
Yet what the Post reports is just what Islamists do. They always make such a promise with their fingers crossed.
There is no Last Graf. Given prevailing attitudes and America’s experiences with 21st Century warfare, we must not expect an American expeditionary force to invade Iran and topple the Islamic regime. President Trump would resist the idea fiercely, and the preponderance of our citizenry would support him. If the Post’s report of Iranian duplicity is confirmed, the most likely consequence would be the resumption of bombardment of military and political targets within Iran.
It’s a bleak prospect, but the alternatives are unpalatable.
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