|
Although, only representing one side, Iran Perspectives on the Iran Iraq War is an intelligent and persuasive collection of articles that provides insights and facts about a forgotten historical tragedy of an eight year war. As his second book on this topic, Farhang Rajaee has done a sound scholarly work in editing this volume. This readable and engaging book has multiple objectives to update debate on unresolved issues of the Iran Iraq war, to show the biased roles of international forces favoring Iraq, and to provide particulars about the controversial issue of the relationship between the war and Iranian revolution among others. To solidify this claim, the book refers to various dimensions and historical, economic, political, ethnic and religious backgrounds of the conflict between Iran and Iraq. The book's focus is on Iraqi aggression, yet it is a valid source of information, facts, and reliable analyses useful for scholars as well as any individual interested in regional conflicts, international politics, and war. It also presents an analytical perspective on the causes and consequences of the war. The book is organized into three parts and fifteen chapters, including the editor's introductory chapter and the contributions of fifteen knowledgeable scholars. The first part of the book, Policy Dynamics, consists of six chapters that covers the roles of the regional and global forces in the conflict. The second part, Conceptual Dimensions, in five chapters, covers the various issues of the conflict between Iran and Iraq. The third section, Postwar Development, addresses the issues of post war period. Understanding the historical and global connections of regional and national events and the relationship between the policies and actions of major powers and their interests in the world is obviously different than what is known as the conspiracy theory. The book clearly makes distinction between these two, while indicating its awareness of the prevalence of a conspiratorial mind among the Middle Eastern people in general and Iranian policy makers in particular. For instance, the egoistic and paranoiac personality of Saddam Hussein is seen as a factor affecting all the war events. This volume succeeds in documenting it as a fact that Iraq started the war. It falls short, however, in proving their claim that the US followed a conscious policy to...destroy the revolution, encouraging Iraq to impose a war on the newly formed revolutionary government p. 49. This position contradicts that European states were selling arms to both sides in a hidden competition p. 47. Or, it is possible that Iraq could not have waged the war, or continued it, without military support from the Soviet Union p. 36. And the war began when the revolution in Iran was in a moderate phase, and evidence demonstrates that the Iraqis had been planning this aggression for months p. 95. As it is correctly stated elsewhere, in the international arena, states have neither permanent friends nor permanent enemies, only permanent interests p. 70. It was the interests of these nations used as justification for the alternate supports for both sides in the conflict, or the shift from one policy to another, or the use of an entirely different policy during the second Iraqi aggression against Kuwait. As part of this policy ...in 1986, as the Iran Iraq war began to turn decisively in Iran's favor, the pace of U.S. intelligence information escalated as part of bid to at least restore Iraq's edge. The United States was not alone. In advance of the Faw counteroffensive, France, Egypt and Jordan provided help in reorganizing and retaining the weary Iraqi military, Reagan administration officials pointed out. Robin Wright, LA Times, Feb. 16, 1998 Saddam was looking for an excuse to attack Iran to lessen the effect of Iranian revolution on Iraq and to declare the 1975 treaty of Algeria invalid. Based on his assessment of the Iranian military force as be
ISBN: 0813011779
Author: Farhang Rajaee (Editor), Farhang Rahaee (Editor)
Category: Foreign Relations
|
