there's this second competing narrative that it was our
desire to build a Pax Americana in the Middle East.
That our desire for a lucrative way of life dependent on a foreign sources of oil
what was that drove us to increase our
presence and then to militarize the Middle East.
And it is these grievances, it's our
presence ultimately, that motivated Bin Laden to
want to strike against us.
And, again, there is strong element of truth to that.
we do know that this was a grievance that motivated Bin Laden but
also helped to get Bin Laden's support because it was this anti-Americanism
and frustration with the American presence that even people who didn't like Bin
Laden or his tactics or believe in his religious or political ideas saw
him as a force against an American domination.
An American presence of which they were not comfortable.
none the less, I think the idea that the only reason we were in the Middle East
was to build this Pax Americana to protect our
sources of oil also doesn't tell the whole story.
the Middle East in the 1970s and 80s was the battleground in the cold war and
if our, our presence was increased to counteract the possibility of the, of a
Soviet increase there as well. So it was a proxy ground for the Cold War.
of course our defense of the state of Israel was complicated and also
played into our increasing intervention in the Middle East against and
to counter balance some of the other threats that Israel was facing.
after the Gulf War, of course, there had been evidence that Saddam Hussein was
building nuclear weapons and had stockpiles of chemical weapons in,
inside Iraq so our presence was there to prevent that from
occurring. And then, of course, there is the Iran.
And post the 1979 rev, revolution, its desire to be a regional power
and to impose its will and to spread its revolution to other states.
So the United States military was present in many instances because other countries,
allies of ours, wanted us there, invited us there to try to counteract this threat.
If we hadn't come would Iran
simply have been satisfied staying within it's borders, and not try to push it's
revolution elsewhere we'll never know but that
was certainly another reason that our interventions occurred.
so we have a, a complicated story of our Middle East policy.
It's difficult to explain through one particular paradigm.
That's why I wanted to expose you to more
than one.
But think of here we are towards the end, the, the last phases of the 20th century
