Brian Gaff wrote:

As for arms sales, well, of course the US never armed counties with dubious
regimes did it, oh now never...:-)

Brian


I think I'd put the U.S. history of arms sales up against the
USSR/Russian history any day. Yes the U.S. has sold conventional
weapons to many countries (though France probably sells more arms
globally when one compensates for their smaller population). What the
U.S. has *not* done is sell nuclear technology to complete wackjobs (and
Ahmadinejad/Iran is just the latest in a string of such sales).

At this point in time, Russia/Putin is reflexively anti-US. Even to the
point of doing stupid things almost solely because it annoys the U.S.,
in spite of the fact they they will almost certainly live to rue the day
that they did said stupid things (i.e. helping nearby Iran go nuclear -
perhaps one day Mother Russia will have to deal with nuclear Chechen
rebels armed by Iran - I certainly hope not).