If pricked

Attacking Iran May Trigger Terrorism

Post: As tensions increase between the United States and Iran, U.S. intelligence and terrorism experts say they believe Iran would respond to U.S. military strikes on its nuclear sites by deploying its intelligence operatives and Hezbollah teams to carry out terrorist attacks worldwide.

Iran would mount attacks against U.S. targets inside Iraq, where Iranian intelligence agents are already plentiful, predicted these experts. There is also a growing consensus that Iran's agents would target civilians in the United States, Europe and elsewhere, they said. ...

Speaking in Vienna last month, Javad Vaeedi, a senior Iranian nuclear negotiator, warned the United States that "it may have the power to cause harm and pain, but it is also susceptible to harm and pain. So if the United States wants to pursue that path, let the ball roll," although he did not specify what type of harm he was talking about. ...

Former CIA terrorism analyst Paul R. Pillar said that any U.S. or Israeli airstrike on Iranian territory "would be regarded as an act of war" by Tehran, and that Iran would strike back with its terrorist groups.

Would be regarded as an act of war? How about would be an act of war--I think if any country launched an airstrike against the U.S., we'd call that an act of war, so why wouldn't it hold true when we attack someone else?

It's an odd article, it boils down to: If Iran is attacked, it will hit back. Shocking! You don't say!

Of course it'd use terrorism--that's the weapon it has available to it. If we were attacked, we'd use anything in our arsenal, including and up to nuclear weapons. And I can guarantee that some of the weapons we use would kill innocent civilians.

Right now, we have the moral high ground against Iran. They've engaged in terrorism in pursuit of national policies, which sometimes amount to just making their enemies bleed.

But if we attack Iran, we legitimize their certain terrorist counter-strike. Persians have been around for thousands of years; they're a proud people, and there are a lot of them all around the world. Just as if the U.S. was attacked patriotic Americans all over the world would, love or hate the current administration, rally around it, same with Iranians. I don't think this is a war we want anything to do with, especially since we're in the right at the moment.

Give Iran time, like we did with China and are being forced to with North Korea. Things change; even if they are able to develop nuclear weapons, it's no worse than North Korea having nukes. After all, Iran is a democracy, albeit one mixed with a theocracy (Israel actually fits that category in some ways too, and a fair number of right wing Christians in this country would like us to as well).

Let's not legitimize the terrorist factions by an act of war.

1979 Raised fists poster by anonymous artist, (inscribed in Arabic There is no God but God) from one of my favorite exhibits ever, NYU's Grey Art Gallery's 2002 Between Word and Image: Modern Iranian Visual Culture.

Photo of Young Woman at Anti-Shah Demonstration, Tehran, 1978 by Abbas, from above exhibit.

Poster of 1979 silkscreen Women of the Revolution by Morteza Momayez, from above exhibit, inscribed Women are the companions of the revolution.