Iran's leader Ahmadinejad
Photo: Reuters
Winning war on evil
Question of sovereignty irrelevant when it comes to dictatorships like Iran
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad released the 15 British captives. He said the decision to release them was a gift to the British people. That's what this megalomaniac madman said, while taking the opportunity to present a citation to the Iranian officers who captured the Brits.
We still don't know whether the Iranians received something in exchange, secretly, but what we saw openly is certainly significant. British Prime Minister Tony Blair simply threatened Ahmadinejad and his evil state that Britain would adopt harsher measures if the captives are not released within 48 hours.
And there you have it, despite the Iranian arrogance and all the big talk, the Iranian president caved in. Apparently he had no interest in getting entangled in a British military offensive or economic sanctions.
On the other hand, Tony Blair did not suck up as if he was a French leader, but rather, conducted himself like a sovereign democratic state should be conducting itself when its soldiers are harmed: resolutely, and without trembling with fear in the face of the madness and oddness displayed by the man from Teheran.
In this hostage crisis, it turned out that Blair is a serious leader. To Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's credit, it turned out that he may be crazy, but he isn't an idiot.
Are the Iranians right and the British soldiers indeed violated Iranian sovereignty? This question may be of interest on the factual plain. It is a rather appropriate question when it comes to neighborly conflicts in Western Europe, or civilian disputes between two municipalities regarding building rights.
Yet this question is based on the assumption that sovereignty and territorial waters are a matter that determines who is right and who isn't right. Those are also the international rules of the games.
Sovereignty isn't everything
Yet here is a different proposal for a new world order, in the spirit of George W. Bush, Tony Blair, and our own opposition leader, Benjamin Netanyahu: The democratic country is the right one, and the undemocratic country is the guilty party.When a country displays a sweeping absence of human rights, threatens world peace, and grants no rights to women – we should not get too excited when it screams out about the sanctity of its sovereignty. If anyone entered its holy territorial waters, at most it can get rid of the trespassers and file a complaint with the United Nations.
Therefore, a progressive and modern person should always back the democratic side in confrontations between a democracy and a dictatorship - because the backward and crazy countries view only one thing as holy when it comes to their relationship with the world: Their sovereignty, their dignity, and their territory.
Indeed, as we know very well, democratic countries also have dignity, sovereignty, and territory, but they also take into consideration the opinion of the majority, human life, and other interests that balance the basic need for sovereignty.
The question of the real facts regarding events at the maritime border between Iraq and Iran is a completely secondary question. In the last confrontation between Iran and Britain, Blair is right and Ahmadinejad is dangerous. Why? That's just the way it is - because the democratic world must win every battle and every war against the forces of evil. This is, very briefly, the whole story.
