Part One

Con: we suggest the Middle East rates more important things to discuss.

With present Middle East problems in mind, we should have our minds much more on little Israel.

1. Rather than Iran, Israel is definitely the odd one out owing to its illegal nuclear arsenal.

2. Not one Arab country is allowed to go nuclear. Does this mean that Israel holds a superior place in the minds of the Western world while the Arab countries including Persian Iran are regarded as enemies of the West?

3. A neutral overview of the Middle East at present leaves one with a cold shudder, first not only noting US airplane and missile carriers standing by in the Gulf, but also those 200 Israeli atomic rockets at the ready.

4. From our overall .position, still trying not to take sides, we see Palestinians outside Israel firing guns in the air after Hamas wins the democratic vote. But we already know that the Americans have rejected the vote because Hamas is backed by Iran and Syria.

5. Trying to remain neutral is even more difficult after the news that in extreme northern Iraq, now allowed to be called Kurdish country by the Americans, the Israelis are allowed a military outpost right close to the Iranian border.

Bushbred

Part Two
6. Once again our thoughts turn to the Israeli rockets, our anger towards America increasing, knowing that the rockets are illegal and only exist because the US secretly gave permission.

7. Why had the US been allowed to make such moves against the will of the United Nations? As Israel became militarily nuclear years before US became unipolar in 1998, it goes to prove that America has never cared more than a tinker’s cuss for the UN at any time. Some, say, in fact, that she still owes years and years of dues.

8. With our angers rising could we ask ourselves whether to be fair, Iran should be allowed to develop nuclear armoury to match Israel?

9. We decline to answer, turning our thoughts back years to the India-Pakistan insurrection when India devoloped nuclear armoury to punish Pakistan. Then the UN stood by to let Pakistan develop nuclear capability, no doubt following the old principle of the balance or power.

To be sure, it may have to come to that rather than letting the US attack Iran which would be a far far tougher proposition than attacking Iraq. There is also the possibility that Iran already has live nuclear facilities deep down in old salt-mines, out of the view of American drones. Furthermore, regarding Realpolik-style power-matching, it is interesting that if two potential combatants each are militarily nuclear, there is the colossal danger of either causing a Chernobyl-type reaction in the other, causing radiation over most of the Middle-East.

It is what classy Condy Rice should be aiming at with sensible persuasion rather than her threat to flood the more roguish world with American diplomats. Not that US diplomats would be received well around much of the world these days, especially in South America. Better to stay at home, Condy, and study a bit of real Realpolitik.

Pericles, "even I know that the Japanese government in the first part of the twentieth century was based on the Meiji constitution of 1889, and their parliament was voted for - admittedly only by men over 25 until MacArthur got his hands on it. But democratic, it certainly was."

During the 1920s, Japan progressed toward a democratic system of government. However, parliamentary government was not rooted deeply enough to withstand the economic and political pressures of the 1930s, during which military leaders became increasingly influential.

So the constitution did not provide for full democracy, separation of powers were not in place

After the war, Japan was placed under international control of the Allies through the Supreme Commander, Gen. Douglas MacArthur. U.S. objectives were to ensure that Japan would become a peaceful nation and to establish democratic self-government supported by the freely expressed will of the people. Political, economic, and social reforms were introduced, such as a freely elected Japanese Diet (legislature) and universal adult suffrage. The country's constitution took effect on May 3, 1947. The United States and 45 other Allied nations signed the Treaty of Peace with Japan in September 1951. The U.S. Senate ratified the treaty in March 1952, and under the terms of the treaty, Japan regained full sovereignty on April 28, 1952.

Seems they were forced to accept a democracy, even if it was following some semblance of democracy, it was a forced new form of democracy. As was Germany, which was forced to accept stringent requirements on its election law to prevent instability which had contributed to Hitler's rise.

scammed this info from: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/4142.htm#history

Pericles,
Appreciate your historical outline of the aftermath and outcome of the German and Japamese surrenders and the ensuing allied occupations which so thankfully led on to the democratisation of the two countries.

Talking as one going on 85, how pleased we are that our two former enemies have turned out the way they have. Even so, political philosophers do say that that the anti-Western nightmarish situation we are facing at present, is far more fannatically religous than WW2 or WW1, the latter in particular, proving the Germans under the Kaiser, unlike the Nazis in WW2, praised God and country throughout the conflict.

Though Hitler is said to have been a declared aethiest, he still had great support from many Lutheran Bishops, some of them in fact, not over-protesting about the German high command's agreement for the total elimination of German Jewry.

Regarding the Japanese, it is interesting that like the Chinese though they have followed Buddhism, they have never really had a state religion, any mysticism being more related to love of nation. It is interesting also that Zen Buddhism, which for a long time has had certain Christian spiritual connections has helped to soften the animosity built up between Westerners and Japs owing to the war.

Although the above appears rather long-winded, it is an endeavour to explain how the war we are experiencing now between Islam and the West, especially in the Middle East, though much less technologically volatile, is far more deadly.

Islamics believe they are so right, we see mothers prepared to offer their sons and daughters as human bombs.

There is so much the need to understand what is really going on about this war, especially in the Middle East, which though we know it is just a horrific replay of British colonialism, or at least with the same Anglipholic perpetrators. Certainly our religous leaders are not doing much about it, and of course, our social scientists who try to give clues, are called bleeding heart lefties by those who call themselves winners, but with nothing yet to show for it