Comments by "silat13" (@silat13) on "President Jimmy Carter on Iran's Release of the Hostages..." video.

  1. IRAN CONTRA First, let's recall the history from the mid-Twentieth Century. It shouldn't surprise anyone that this country suffered for decades due to our intervention when we deposed Mossadegh in 1953, is still viewed as sneaky and suspicious. Never did Iran attack our country, they only reacted to our support of the Shah by staging the 1979 hostage crisis because of our country's interventionist policies. Blowback is a bitch. Here's why they released the hostages the very same day Reagan was sworn in. Ronald Reagan was sworn into office on January 20, 1981, just as Iran released 52 Americans held hostage at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran for 444 days. The timing was deliberate. The young revolutionary regime did not want the hostages freed until after Jimmy Carter, who had supported the shah and allowed him into the United States, left office. At the same time, Tehran wanted to clear the slate in the face of a new Republican administration that had vowed to take a tougher stand on terrorism and hostage-taking. But Iran also had bigger problems. Four months earlier, on September 20, 1980, Iraq had invaded, and Iran was embroiled in a life-or-death struggle. For the first 18 months of the war, virtually all the fighting took place on Iranian territory. Let's give credit where credit's due; Iran needed our military help, so they gave up the hostages in exchange for something that would mire the Reagan Administration with the scandalous reputation it so richly deserved: Iran-Contra. The problem with all this today, however, is the American people have a very, very short memory and have largely forgotten the events that occurred three decades ago. The only thing they remember is that Iran is one of the "Great Satan" countries and we should NEVER do anything to facilitate peace and prosperity in that country. Republicans are very much in favor of either not teaching history at all or simply rewriting it to suit their objectives.
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