[Patriam1066]

You seem to think that Khomeini wasn't an idealogue who hated Israel from the get go. This was going to happen regardless. Totalitarian governments seeking hegemony can't be reasoned with. Russia was opened to the international economy, so was China. Have we seen the inevitable opening of the political orders that everyone said would happen? Or do we see states with much better technology, access to western technology and markets, who are now better positioned to seek their own aims.

I'm not going to tell you that I think America is always right in foreign policy. America fucked Iran in 1953, everyone who grew up in Esfahan (and in the rest of the country) knows that. But Iran doesn't act this way because of America. They are ideological. Just like Russia, and just like China. You have a group of people in charge who want only more power for themselves, and they will hold their nations down regardless of what it means for their people.

Russia in Georgia and Ukraine, China in the South China Sea, and Iran in Syria, Yemen, etc.
This is about hegemony for their political elites, not their people. If these governments actually cared about their people, they would open the political order, or at the very list, provide basic human rights like a Singapore (a fairly authoritarian state but in such a way that people are treated mostly with dignity).

We could argue forever, but I've actually lived there. It isn't the same way you think it is. America has a plutocratic government. Iran is something different. They are conditioned to fight forever, regardless of what it costs their people. Do put it as simply as I can, they are run by people that are very similar to the people that run Russia. They will burn their countries to the ground if they can stand atop the ashes.

I just want what's best for my people, and nothing but political reform is a move in the right direction.