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Sun, Aug 30th 2009, 20:00

fizza sajjad, school, (5)

yes i completly agree with this because sanctions do not play a realistic role in this age of globalization. states get what they want one way or the other because the question is of survival. when survival is the need then states want power to maintain their status. international system provides very less for the protection of the staes unlikely it provoke the states to take what they want as said by David Singer decades ago.unless the core of the issue is addressed, the problem cannot be resolved. west needs to understand the geo-strategic location of Iraq, and then deal with the region as a whole not only one state.

Thu, Sep 10th 2009, 17:22

Member deleted

It is usually enriching and encouraging to see a few things. Nuclear weapons usually may not count as the currency for diplomacy. But how many states are there that disagree with such a view-point? War is, again, said to begin where diplomacy ends. If diplomacy was precisely invented in order to enable relations between adversaries, not friends (one would reserve one's comments over that since the adage that there are no permanent friends or enemies in world politics comes from the same era when diplomacy thus is said to have been invented) - even if so - one agrees here about what is stopping the "West" (amidst reservations about what forms this "west" and who in this "west" define it as such and what that definition is or should be) in trying diplomacy other than sanctions or other punitive measures?
Should sanctions, etc. count as diplomacy, nuclear weapons too would then - by the same logic and then why should or would anyone fault any state in increasing its repertoire of diplomatic arsenals? Yet once again, what is Iran to this "west" - if the "west" can define itself. What would be this "west" to Iran and similar states or regions, should Iran and others continue using such terms when referring to certain states. One wonders though if one is really talking about states or one is talking about individuals (that may belong to the fringe groups that much in academia likes entertaining) from particular states when one forms such impressions?
The question however needs to be clarified for the world at large by what one means by Iran and similar states and what one means by the "west" when one refers to some groups of states? Including other groups (real or imagined or still in their formative senses - as some groups. And what are those parameters that are used in such distinctions. They are useful and necessary to lend a certain clarity that academia and the media can often help obfuscate as it usually does.