The Devil is in the Details

It is not easy to try to understand why people take actions that harm or offend you.   It’s not pleasant either.  You have to overcome fear, surprise, anger, laziness, and who knows what else to find out that the person might have an understandable or even legitimate reason for doing what they are doing.  You may even find out that they have a legitimate grievance that could be addressed.  Heck, you might even be able to deter such behavior in the future.  On the other hand, all that is a lot of effort and it’s just so much easier to refer to them as evil and as puppets of the devil.  Then, all you have to do is strike back.  You just need strategy rather than thoughtfulness.  If Iran is evil, then it makes it easier to attack.  When you think of the different interests and movements within the country, then things get murkier.  When you consider the impact on the current crisis of American actions, it gets murkier still.  When you see how the Iranian Government is trying to use this crisis to shore up support within Iran, well then it’s almost impossible to support a simplistic solution based on raw force.  This is the way it should be.  People don’t just attack us because we are good and they are bad.  They have reasons.  If we don’t acknowledge these reasons and do something about them, we can’t stop future attacks.  But if you’d rather just stand there and shout obscenities at the devil, go for it.