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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Dupe entry: Spengler: Yes, the Iranians are crazy |
| 2019-06-21 |
| ...During the past week I've spoken to a number of skilled and experienced observers of the region, and every one them is hard put to make sense of Iranian motives. In the absence of a rational explanation, let me offer this one: The mullahs are nuts. I don't mean that they are nuts in the way that a power-mad tinpot dictator is nuts, but rather that they are world-historically, existentially, and metaphysically nuts. Their character and circumstances, that is to say, impel them toward actions that would be irrational for another character under other circumstances. Iran is dying, as I argued in my 2011 book How Civilizations Die. In a February 2017 analysis for Asia Times, I summarized the reasons for Iran's likely demise: Iran may well become the first country in the world that will get old before it gets rich. Its fertility rate (the number of live births over the lifetime of an average woman) fell from 7 in 1979 to perhaps 1.7 today. That produced an enormous generation of people now in their 20s to 40s who have very few children. As this generation ages, the proportion of Iranians over the age of 60 will soar from about 7% today to around 40% by mid-century. Other countries face an aging crisis, but with ten times the per capita income: Iran’s nominal GDP per capita is only US$5,300, compared with US$56,000 for the United States, for example.No poor country can care for an elderly population comprising two-fifths of the total. Iran will undergo an economic disaster unprecedented in history. That is baked in the cake, and nothing its government can do will make much different at this late stage. Iranians know their world is coming to an end and behave as if there is no tomorrow (which, in their case, there isn’t)...The number of marriages has fallen by 20% since 2012. In Iran, the customary marriage age range is 20-34 for men and 15-29 for women ... 46% of men and 48% of women in those age ranges remain unmarried,"according to the national statistics agency. ...Alongside the decline in marriage, a quarter of Iran’s married couples report that they cannot conceive children. A possible factor aggravating the infertility could be epidemic rates of untreated venereal disease, according to Iranian researchers, pointing to a deeper shift in social customs. Iran’s government believes that the Shia practice of "temporary marriage" is the culprit. ...The mullahs are nuts, but they aren't stupid. They know that if Iran is bottled up for the next twenty years, it will undergo an internal collapse. The alternative is to take desperate risks. The Obama administration (and, sadly, the George. W. Bush administraiton under the council of Condoleezza Rice) let Iran get away with murder--literally. The experience of the Iranian leaders teaches them that the West will back down before their threats. This time they will learn differently. |
| Posted by:g(r)omgoru |
| #2 Crazy belligerence is not a losing strategy if the adversary is a pathological masochist. |
| Posted by: Elmerert Hupens2660 2019-06-21 22:46 |
| #1 A lot of the economy is now controlled either directly or indirectly by either military or religious 'corporations'. The corruption is breathtaking and there are also problems with water shortages and pollution. The currency is debased also. If the military and religious corporations were rational, they would overthrow the govt themselves and reform the economy so their businesses would be worth more. But that's easy to say and hard to do. |
| Posted by: lord garth 2019-06-21 11:16 |