Those are the words of Fareed Zakaria who is a very insightful reporter on CNN. He sums up the hope and mistakes the administrations have made since former President Dwight Eisenhower’s CIA meddled in Iranian politics. Each administration since has felt the policy needed to be fine tuned while leading to today’s disastrous situation.

                Most Americans do not know that Iranians are not Arabs which were the racial basis for the CIA’s policy. This was the time of the so called Brush Fire Wars around the World. The CIA’s meddling caused many of them so they thought they could control the Arabian Peninsula by having a strange white military power that could put down and rebellions or wars in the oil-rich Middle East.

                Not everyone in Iran’s new democracy was interested in attaching themselves to either side of the Cold War so we got rid of the elected leadership and installed the hereditary ruler – The Shah of Iran. We trained his army in how to put down any dissent and moved the religious leader, who wanted to do away with the secular culture, to France.

                One President after another kept up the façade that all was well in Iran until former President Carter’s morals pulled his support from the Shah. The religious minority was about to gain the support of the young and overthrow the government. The upper military and government people either fled or were killed. The new Anti-American allowed the Ayatollah Khomeini to return and become the religious and political leader of Iran. He incited an Anti-American fervor and policy which led to the taking of the American Embassy and Carter’s loss to former President Reagan. Carter had stopped supplying weapons to Iran so Reagan’s people worked out the guns for hostage deal. The deal depended on Iran holding the hostages so Carter could not claim the victory and win a second term.

                This feeling of anti-Americanism and religious Shiah Muslim fervor created a regional problem for the United States and the Arab countries it was now friendly with. Whether we encouraged former President Saddam Hussein to invade Iran or it was totally his idea, we supplied some supplies and lots of satellite images of the Iranian positions and movements. It was Reagan’s way of revenge for the Embassy. Saddam lost but Iran lost hundreds of thousands of cannon fodder militia and trained soldiers. This created the need to use Arab insurrectionists to upset the political leaders of the Arabian Peninsula countries and of course, Israel.

                When Iran was just getting into Refining Uranium, the major countries developed a treaty restricting how far Iran could go with the enrichment. It was working although their support of those working to create dissension in other countries continued. Former President Donald Trump pulled out of the agreement, enrichment shot past the agreed percentage. Trump’s verbal treatment of Iran’s leadership increased, Iran’s leadership worked to hurt Americas by reduced affection of its people to Americans. That is why they hate Trump and want to hurt him physically or his chances of re-election.

                Iran is a great example of how the United States has not planned for the long term future. Ever since our leaders decided we should interfere with the little countries around the world we have put in dictators, tyrants, and killers. – All just to get our way for a few years.