If Iran gives Hezbolah weapons & We give them to Israel is there

any real difference? Which creates the most terror? Is it morally OK to delay exercising our influence over Israel, by with holding weapons, if they refuse to make peace? Is it un Christian to deliberately allow killings to continue if you can stop it? Have we become a hate group by default? Do the Hezbolah also have a right to exist?

is the good Capitalist thing to do...hey, it's only business!
We've armed our adversaries for decades. We've armed both sides of conflicts (Iran/Iraq), it's all about the 'Benjamins'..
It's the 'American Way'!!

Are they paying for them with the $3 billion they've already received from us?

I've long ago learned in dealing with others that if you talk it out, you're much less likely to act it out. Unfortunately, that flies in the face of neocon goals of domination at any price.

What's the role of private, religion-based militias? How do we feel about private militias whose stated goal is the elimination of a country or government? Would we support something like the Contras these days, if they called themselves Catholic nationalists and wanted to overthrow what they considered the illegitimate secular (or even socialist) government of Nicaragua?

Would we want some country to provide a few hundred million dollars in munitions to the Salvation Army?

Arm Lebanon, and I'd have fewer qualms. At least it's a government, and presumably can enter into international agreement and, in some sense, be held responsible.

I'll bet they'd know.

Or maybe someone connected to Iran/Contra?

And this might be of interest too:
http://www.ciponline.org/facts/fms.htm

we liked having the Contras supported.

At least there it was part of civil war. Wrong, but part of a civil war. Here ... not.

France supported us because they hated England at the time. What Countries supported Texas and the Confederacy as ligit governments?

can fight for independence from Lebanon.

I'm for it.

Nasrallah puts it differently: they're fighting for independence from Israel. Silly me, I'd have thought that pulling out and having Hezbollah get its bona fides as a political party, with seats in the legislature and with cabinet members, would qualify as independent.

Or perhaps he's confused Israel with Iran.

America sold weapons to Saddam and OBL when he fought the Russians in Afghanistan. Seems like our past is coming back to haunt us.

...is big business, especially the illegal trade.

Military arms kill people, both combatants and innocents. It seems many of the "pro-life" crowd has no qualms about condoning mass slaughter from all sides if it is cloaked by flag waving and chest thumping.

If we truly wanted to dent the escalating availability of weapons of mass destruction, we would end the foreign aid that immediately returns as new weapons orders for US death merchants. We would also strictly follow the Export Arms Control Act, which has become a joke.

But then, I guess the law and order crowd has proven that they get to pick the laws they obey, and order the rest of us around.

That is what now passes for democracy...

without the Israelis responding.

Israel, despite DOZENS of UN Security Council resolutions criticizing it, is untouchable in the eyes of the US government. Perhaps it's out of some guilt for having had American corporations help the Nazis out during WWII that the formation of an Israeli state was setup post-WWII and the continued protection thereof. Perhaps it's because of a very powerful Israeli lobby present in both the Democratic and Republican parties. The sooner the US stops its interventionist foreign policy, the better off the world will be. At least Britain isn't such the aggressor anymore, opting to just tag along for the ride in a show of support.

I tend to regard the IRA (and Sinn Fein) as the moral equivalent of Hezbollah. :shrug: