“ Here was a source of great fear to us.So formidable does the Sassanid king seem to our eastern legions, that some are liable to go over to him, and others are unwilling to fight at all.” ”

This was written by the Roman historian and public servant, Cassius Dio [1] During the battles between the Sassanid Empire [2] and the Roman Empire [3] (27 BC - 476 CE), which caused such pessimism in Rome that the historian wrote like that.

The Persia (Iran) geographical map during Sassanid Empire (224 - 651 CE) was as follow:

This map shows that the Persian Empire used to cover many current Middle Eastern and Central Asian countries including the whole Iran itself, Iraq, Kuwait, Turkmenistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Uzbekistan, Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Palestine, Israel (Occupied Palestine), UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Yemen, Oman, then most of Afghanistan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Lebanon, Kyrgyzstan, Egypt and finally a part of India, Kazakhstan, Russia, Libya and Saudi Arabia.

. Well, this was a huge empire which had the most land ever in world’s history. Many people think that Iran’s geographical area was the largest during Achaemenid Empire [4] (559 - 330 BC) but it doesn’t seem to be true. Achaemenids had a part of Greece but not the countries located at south of the Persian Gulf [5]. If you compare the above maps with this below map you’ll see what I mean. . [6] .

I want to mention that all enormous empires have existed one day and have expired few days after, this is an important lesson from world’s history. Babylonian Empire, Egyptian Empire, Persian Empires, Roman Empire, Chinese Empire, Arab Empire, Portuguese and Spanish Empires, British Empire, French Empire, German Colonial Empire, etc. These were all before the 20th century. Even the 20th century’s empires such as Nazi and Soviet Union are gone now. And today it seems the only empire - if you could call it so - is the United States of America.

I’m not going to write further today, but just to say that as a historical rule; USA’s time will come sooner or later, but if the next American presidents follow Bush’s “Avarice Policies” and behaviours with gunboats, phantoms and tanks in the name of democracy, that will make United States’ time approach faster.

http://sanaei.com/blog/2007/04/29/all-empires-have-an-expiry-date-whether-its-the-persian-empire-with-its-48-nations-or-its-the-united-states-with-its-50-states-and-few-puppet-countries/ [7]