Interesting Links for 20-08-2023

[andrewducker]

1. 70 years ago, an Anglo-US coup condemned Iran to decades of oppression - but now the people are fighting back

(tags:Iran history USA UK revolution Islam religion )

2. Hundreds of churches will have to close, says Church of Scotland

(tags:Scotland religion )

Comments

[ckd]

My headcanon for the "no US support for deposing Mosaddegh" timeline is something like this:

• No Iranian Revolution, or at the very least a less anti-American-focused one
• No Iranian seizure of the US embassy in Tehran (even if there was an Islamic revolution, not having the Shah protected by the US makes this less likely)
• No Iran-Iraq War - or if there is one, no reflexive US support for Saddam Hussein as "the enemy of my enemy"

This gets us to the later 1980s, where the second-order divergences begin. (These could potentially be even larger if Carter is re-elected in 1980, but I think that was still unlikely.)

• Saddam Hussein doesn't expect US acquiescence to an invasion of Kuwait, so he doesn't
• No Operation Desert Shield / Desert Storm
• No US troops in Saudi Arabia for years
• Osama bin Laden loses a major recruiting tool for al-Qaeda

Again, maybe a US presidential election flips - 2000's was much closer than 1980's. :-D

If al-Qaeda is weakened enough and/or President Gore actually reads his daily briefings, perhaps there isn't a September 11th attack at all.

Even if the attack does happen, invading Iraq is no longer quite so easily justified without the previous history and the US and allies can concentrate on Afghanistan. This seems likely to still fail in the long run (Afghanistan has a long history in that department), but lacking the larger distraction of Iraq is unlikely to make it a worse failure....

[andrewducker]

That all seems at least semi-reasonable to me. Things are certainly unlikely to be worse!