UPI:

The Trump administration hadn't launched a pre-emptive strike on Iran in time for the State of the Union address, but the White House would be well-advised to consider this: Iranians are Persians, too.

The legacy and culture of Persia is manifested in a proud and defiant people no matter how much the ruling clericocracy has attempted to repress and exorcise that history.

The last time I was in Iran was in early 1979 just as Reza Pahlavi was fleeing. I spent a number of months in the Persian Gulf in 1981 commanding a U.S. destroyer, playing cat and mouse with an Iranian military that had been armed with U.S. weapons, including F-4 Phantom jets. But before that, two anecdotal experiences were very meaningful.

On exchange with the Royal Navy from late 1969 to 1971, for the last five months, I was assigned to the Britannia Naval College in Dartmouth in the south of England, the Royal Navy's equivalent of the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis.

It was a beautiful summer's day. I had been playing tennis on the lovely grass courts that then existed next to the main building. With a Pimm's Cup in hand, I meandered to the college entrance as, in the distance, an XKE Jaguar was driving at high speed up the drive.

The car did not slow when it hit the many brick speed bumps on the half-mile journey. It came to a screeching halt a few yards in front of us. The officer of the day was next to me. Curious, he approached the convertible. The driver was Persian and was joining the college as a cadet.

He rolled down the window, and throwing the keys to the officer of the day, pleasantly said, "Please park it." It turned out that the soon-to-be-cadet would be in my division. And he was a quick learner.

Before I left the college to return to America, the cadet thanked me for being his division officer and presented me with a jewel encrusted dagger that probably cost many times my yearly pay. Unfortunately, I could not keep it.

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