Reset: Iran, Turkey, and America's Future by Stephen KinzerMy rating: 0 of 5 stars
At first, I felt this book was too wide in scope and shoe-horning together the diverse history of United States relations with Turkey and Iran. However, the author brings together the post-Ottoman nations and contrasts well with other regional players: Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Palestine. The book really traces from post-WW I to today this history of American and Western involvement in the region and the author's suggestions for where it should go from here.
Beginning with Persia, now Iran, American seemed to find a natural ally and partner so closely aligned that American Howard Baskerville (1885–1909) has a bust at the museum of the Constitution House of Tabriz. This American teacher in the Presbyterian mission school in Tabriz, Iran, died fighting for Iranian democracy and was lauded as a hero by Iran. William Morgan Shuster (1877-1960), American lawyer, civil servant, and publisher, became the treasurer-general of Persia by appointment of the Iranian parliament, or Majles, from May to December 1911. The, post-WWII, these rosy relations soured when, in 1951, Mohammad Mosaddegh was elected as the prime minister. He became enormously popular in Iran, after he nationalized Iran's petroleum industry and oil reserves. He was deposed in the 1953 Iranian coup d'état, an Anglo-American covert operation that marked the first time the US had overthrown a foreign government during the Cold War. We've drifter apart ever since, though we could have drawn closer and had a democratic ally rather than inspire an anti-American backlash that became a fertile ground for theocratic authoritarian rule.
In Turkey, Following WW I, the Turkish War of Independence (1919–22), initiated by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and his colleagues in Anatolia, resulted in the establishment of the modern Republic of Turkey in 1923, with Atatürk as its first president. Atatürk was dissolute as he was visionary, using required military service to enforce literacy and exposure to Western elements. This forceful hand pushed aside the mullahs and created a viable secular democracy of muslims that fought valiantly with America in Korea afterTurkey's entrance into World War II on the side of the Allies in February 1945 made it a charter member of the United Nations. U.S.-Turkey relationship has been rocky with Cyprus and the Cold War offering challenges. The friendliness of Turkey towards the United States has declined markedly over the past decade, primarily a result of the United States' action in the Iraq War in 2003. Still, as a Middle East democracy and strategic NATO member, it would seem natural for the two nations to find common ground.
The nations, the author observes, we do work most closely with: Saudi Arabia and Israel are problematic when looked at objectively. The Saudis are are an authoritarian monarchy with a poor human rights record, and Israel is a flashpoint itself while kicking off sparks with its occupation of Palestinian lands while it tries to schizophrenically strive for a Jewish democracy and a subjugated Arab population.
The other calls for the two state solution and fair land swaps for Palestine, suggests a concerted Western effort to get off Saudi oil, and rapprochement with out natural friends in Turkey and Iran.
While wide in scope, there is a concise clarity to the historical context here.
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