President Reagan and the ‘Iran Deception’

The Iran deception includes all the elements of a classic con in which the con artist plays upon the fear, ignorance and greed of the conned.

The alarming suggestion that Iran might become part of the U.S.S.R. was the tap that jerked the knee. From that reflexive response the people responsible for the arms transactions chose not to seek advice about the effectiveness or advisability of such dealings. Instead they were seduced by the notion that it is possible to control events, to win.

We are learning painfully that military power is largely unusable. (Can we really count Grenada?) Providing arms to other nations makes a mockery of assertions that we favor peaceful solutions. To avoid the embarrassment of being conned, let’s support a foreign policy that is based on sound information, that can resist knee-jerk manipulation and is committed to the long haul of negotiation and peaceful resolution of conflicting beliefs and goals.

JANET V. KELBLEY

Rancho Palos Verdes