Click here for a thought provoking, and conventional wisdom challenging, post from STATFOR. It is a bit out of the box but may also be quite inciteful. U.S. and Iranian Realities is republished here with the permission of Stratfor.
The world continues to change: e.g., the lessening dependence on Mideast oil for affordable energy. The article suggests that serious consideration be given to a change in direction in foreign policy and alliances. It also shows the major risks such a change entails. Perhaps most interestingly in overlaps the chess moves implicit in foreign policy with the national sentiments of the body politic. In this case both the Iranian and the US public have long memories: Iran has not forgiven the US for the 1952 coup and more than the US has forgotten the Hostage Crisis. These popular sentiments may, in many ways, limit the ability of either side to exercise new and perhaps beneficial policies.
It is too early to sort this one out but it bears monitoring.