so for months, the right wing press has been reporting that iran has been arming sunni insurgent groups, not just the shia militias. the charges are always based on some anonymous military source--often contradicted by other more prominent public military sources. despite this shaky foundation, the idea that iran is arming the sunnis now seems to be taken for granted over in right blogistan. in my arguments over there, i've found it to be virtually impossible to get anyone to acknowledge the weakness of the case. a badly sourced article from the NY Sun will always be trusted over what the general pace says.
so anyway, now it turns out that the u.s. is arming those very same sunni groups. on top of that, the anti-al qaeda sunni coalition that the u.s. is arming seems to be coming apart.
so, to summarize: iran is evil because we have unsubstantiated allegations that they are arming sunni insurgents. meanwhile, the u.s. is actually arming those same sunni groups because they've banded together to fight al qaeda in a coalition that is in the process of unraveling.
some would call this a sign of desperation (why would the u.s. military arm insurgents who have a 4 year history of attacking u.s. forces so they could fight al qaeda if the u.s. thought it could handle al qaeda itself?) i call it thinking outside the box.
