Revenge, it has been said, is a dish best served cold. The point is that getting back at someone is more enjoyable after a period of reflection and planning by the aggrieved party, a passage of time which also allows the offender to suspect no retribution is coming before getting the surprise of his/her/its life.
We awoke Saturday morning to word that Israel and the United States had exacted revenge on Iran by killing plenty of leaders, including Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to address ongoing wrongs which date more than four decades into the past. (Editor’s note: If you see the guy’s name spelled differently elsewhere, that’s due to a phenomenon called transliteration. When languages use different alphabets, spelling is a matter of choice as to how it sounds).
Regardless, this Ayatollah was yet another elderly guy with a scruffy beard, often seen in black garb with a towel wrapped around his head, a theocratic sort committed to keeping his country living in the dark ages and treating women like cattle. I can’t wait for the U.S. women’s hockey team to weigh in on all this.
The late Ayatollah and his ilk have been spreading terror for multiple decades and, truth be told, a lot of Iran’s neighbors are fed up with it all. Reports of cheering Muslim precincts in the aftermath of this action have been mixed with stories of protests regarding the killing and a red revenge flag being raised above at least one mosque.
With a few notable exceptions, led by Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman, response from our political left has been to side with Iran. It’s all too predictable. Remember, these people refused to stand during the State of the Union address just a few days back to demonstrate solidarity with American citizens vs. illegal immigrants.
The problem with Iran is one mainly with its ongoing leadership by Islamic madmen. Iranians in general had been moving hard to a western style of life prior to the 1979 revolution there, which removed Shah Pahlavi.
In the interest of candor, most agree Pahlavi had been installed in a 1953 coup aided and abetted by our CIA, British intelligence and some homegrown Iranians eager to see the country progress.
We’ve been riding the revenge train ever since. Iranian revolutionaries deposed the Shah, who ended up in the U.S. for medical treatment. In November 1979, protesters seized the American embassy in Tehran and took 52 hostages, demanding the Shah be extradited, and not for cancer treatments.
Those hostages were held for 444 days, through a bumbling attempt by President Jimmy Carter to rescue them. Iran gave them up only when Ronald Reagan arrived in the Oval Office and took out the big stick of sanctions to isolate Iran. Sort of sounds familiar.
We are at this point in part because in 2016 Barack Hussein Obama bribed Iran with about $2 billion in cold, hard cash to release four prisoners and because Joe Biden was a feeble caricature of a president. Understand, in the Middle East weakness is perceived as an invitation to take advantage.
For his part, President Trump has told Iran repeatedly that its bad behavior, up to and including development of nuclear weapons, would not be tolerated. Hard to believe Iran leadership missed that prior U.S.-Israel bombing run that leveled various nuclear facilities.
More recently, Trump had been very public about demanding cessation of nuclear activities, not to mention all the threatening bravado from Iran about punishing Israel and the United States.
It’s fair to ask what now? Reports of some deaths and injuries among U.S. troops have come out Sunday. Also, wild missile strikes against neighbors by the Iranians have been reported. Claims by those Iran spokesmen that their missiles had struck an American aircraft carrier have been found to be false.
Rest assured, there will be further wild retaliation by Iran. Sleeper cells of terrorists figure to be activated here and elsewhere. There will be random missile attacks and various other forms of attempts at exacting revenge on the United States and Israel.
Unfortunately, this is the cost of doing business with terrorists, or their sovereign backers.
You will hear some, particularly in our increasingly unhinged political left, decrying Trump’s actions. They will argue we should just have ignored it all rather that stir the hornet’s next.
To them I say, Iran is and has been a cancer on civilization for more than half of my life. Trump is giving that once-proud nation a hard dose of chemotherapy looking to cure the problem.
Such things are not easy, but they are necessary.
Sam Ross Jr's site 