Has there been a military takeover in Iran?

Ex-CIA middle east field agent Bob Baer and Newsweek editor, Fareed Zakaria, (who is something of an expert on the subject of Iran) seem to believe it's likely.

Both agree that the Iran Revolutionary Guard Corps seem to be in charge of everything that's happening in Iran at the moment. The tell was the speed at which the Basij (a volunteer military/police auxiliary force) was employed to quell dissidents. The Basij is directly controlled by the IRGC and in past years the IRGC has been spending a great deal of money and energy arming this particular group.

Baer also pointed out last week that it is entirely possible that Ahmadinejad actually won the election and that Ahmadinejad is actually leading a hard-line take over, ousting the mullahs.

Before we settle on the narrative that there has been a hard-line takeover in Iran, an illegitimate coup d'état, we need to seriously consider the possibility that there has been a popular hard-line takeover, an electoral mandate for Ahmadinejad and his policies. One of the only reliable, Western polls conducted in the run-up to the vote gave the election to Ahmadinejad — by higher percentages than the 63% he actually received. The poll even predicted that Mousavi would lose in his hometown of Tabriz, a result that many skeptics have viewed as clear evidence of fraud. The poll was taken all across Iran, not just the well-heeled parts of Tehran. Still, the poll should be read with a caveat as well, since some 50% of the respondents were either undecided or wouldn't answer.

In that same article Baer, who knows Iran well, points out that there is something missing from the so-called popular uprising in Tehran.

Most of the demonstrations and rioting I've seen in the news are taking place in north Tehran, around Tehran University and in public places like Azadi Square. These are, for the most part, areas where the educated and well-off live — Iran's liberal middle class. These are also the same neighborhoods that little doubt voted for Mir-Hossein Mousavi, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's rival, who now claims that the election was stolen. But I have yet to see any pictures from south Tehran, where the poor live. Or from other Iranian slums.

Even the great Twitter revolution is centered on a specific group of Iranians with both access to and comfort with the internet.

For too many years now, the Western media have looked at Iran through the narrow prism of Iran's liberal middle class — an intelligentsia that is addicted to the Internet and American music and is more ready to talk to the Western press, including people with money to buy tickets to Paris or Los Angeles.

Add to all this that the west has next to no reliable window into Iran. Diplomatic missions are sparse and the Basij has been rounding up western reporters and Iranian workers at the British embassy.

The government's arrest of nine Iranian employees of the British Embassy was a significant escalation in its conflict with Britain, which Tehran has sought to cast as an instigator of the unrest since the disputed June 12 election. Tehran also continued to charge journalists with working as agents of discord, publishing one editor's "confession" while continuing to detain others without charge, or barring them from working.

The whole idea, if Ahmadinejad has suborned the IRGC in a take over, would be to continue to accuse Britain and the U.S. with interference, and continue to arrest western journalists and embassy staff in the hopes of provoking a response. It would suggest that Ahmadinejad did win and now commands enough popular support to suppress the power of the clerics and take control of the country. He can point at any rhetoric or threats from either the U.S. or Britain (or both) and declare an even greater emergency on the basis that his accusations are correct.

That will likely translate into even greater suppression of anything which looks like opposition or an uprising. The government will transform into a military dictatorship (as opposed to a religious one) led by former IRGC member Mahmoud Ahmadinejad with the support of the IRGC.

The thing is, we're not likely to know what is really happening for some time to come but the chances of the uprising in Iran resulting in something good are very slim indeed.

Nothing hides incompetency like a war

There are a few people who use it with skill while others fumble about trying to locate the formula used by so-called Great Leaders in history.

George W. Bush, essentially a useful idiot for a much larger force, continually tried to shift the focus of Americans from his repeated acts of incompetency by deflecting their gaze in the general direction of war. He declared himself a "war president", even after he told Americans the best thing they could do was to "go shopping".

Surprisingly, the current US antagonist isn't in much better shape. In fact he could be worse. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, president of Iran, has made an incredible mess of the place and despite public sabre-rattling, may be more unpopular with his electorate than Bush is with his.

Thomas P.M. Barnett illuminates the conditions which make war for two people in particular very appealing.

One is US presidential hopeful John McCain who, without an elevated level of fear among Americans, doesn't stand a snowball's chance in hell of actually winning.

The other is Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who, without a war with the US or Israel, is almost certainly going to find himself on the unemployment roles and trying to survive in an economy which he is personally responsible for wrecking.

Looming behind the most crucial dynamics is the possible presidency of Barack Obama, suggesting that war may become inevitable due to the fear of peace. [...]

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presidency has been a disaster for the Iranian people. Despite all the oil wealth, inflation is raging and the economy goes nowhere. Add in a stunning birth dearth, the world's worst brain drain, plus Iranian prostitutes headlining European brothels, and this is clearly a society in a death spiral. With restless students chanting in public for Ahmadinejad's death, little wonder the man pines for a splendid little war.

Ahmadinejad's one popular success has been to champion Iran's brazen reach for nuclear capacity, an effort cleverly designed to emphasize the strategic dangers of attempted regime change by outsiders. [...] But Ahmadinejad's time grows short. A bevy of candidates seeks to oust him next year, and his opponents now head the parliament, the crucial Assembly of Experts and Tehran's city hall. With Obama currently leading decisively polls for the U.S. presidency, Iran's Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, faces the prospect of losing his most useful -- for internal politics, that is -- external enemy, reducing Ahmadinejad's utility as frontman.

You really do need to read the whole column. For even more though, Barnett provide even more clarification on his blog.

That too, is something you need to read.

Problem right now is how many sides would welcome war. "U.S. Plays Down Military Showdown" is a couple of quotes from Gates and an Undersecretary of State, meaning two counties heard from but hardly the "U.S." that matters right now on this subject (Bush-Cheney). Both, in my mind, have no problem with an Israeli strike on their watch that could easily suck us into combat. Time is short.

Of course, you'll want a bottle of something after all of that. 151 over-proof should work for a short time.

Blitzer's moment of national self-awareness

I had an afternoon of listening to various offerings on satellite radio today. In an act of self-immolation, I ended up listening to Wolf Blitzer's Situation Room and his take on the speech at the UN by Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

I have no use whatsoever for Ahmadinejad. Would that he could be completely ignored. However, what makes him dangerous is that he is being faced down by an utter moron. Bush vs. Ahmadinejad is a battle of two idiots, both without the mental awareness of anything beyond their own egos.

Ahmadinejad's speech was nothing out of the ordinary for him. It was the usual rhetorical garbage. What did catch my attention, however, was Blitzer and his immediate reaction to Ahmadinejad's words.

Ahmadinejad:

"Unfortunately human rights are being extensively violated by certain powers, especially by those who pretend to be their exclusive advocates.

"Setting up secret prisons, abducting persons, trials and secret punishments without any regard to due process, extensive tapping of telephone conversations intercepting private mail... have become commonplace and prevalent."

Blitzer:

"So the president of Iran speaking now for about 38 minutes, just under 40 minutes before the United Nations general assembly, lashing out at the United States, albeit with some diplomatic code words, but making it clear he considers the United States a bullying power on a path of arrogance with obedience to Satan."

Umm. The nasty little prick (Ahmadinejad) didn't mention the United States directly. The translation came out as "certain countries".

So, I wonder what code words Blitzer recognized from the above Ahmadinejad quote as being those which defined the United States?

"Zero Degree Turn" - an Iranian Shindler's List

Remember this cartoon?

It was the winner of the International Holocaust Cartoon Competition.
The contest was sponsored by the Iranian newspaper Hamshahri in response to the publication of the 12 cartoons mocking/denigrating Mohammed in a Danish newspaper in Sept 2005.

Statement of the artist, Abdellah Derkaoui :
"I want to express my total heartfelt sympathy with the millions of Jewish victims of the Holocaust who suffered the greatest crime against humanity under the Nazis. Nobody can deny that more than six million people were massacred during the second world war by the devil Hitler and his Nazi henchmen." Continued here.

At the time, many westerners were surprised that the winning entry was so sympathetic both to Jews and to the Holocaust. They are about to be surprised again.

"Zero Degree Turn" is the Iranian Shindler's List, a government-made miniseries airing on the Iranian state-run television. Based on a true story of diplomats in the Iranian Embassy in Paris in the 1940s who gave out about 500 Iranian passports to Jews to help them escape, it is a fictionalized account of an Iranian diplomat who decides to forge Iranian passports for French Jews.
SF Gate is enthusiastic about the series, despite repeating the now-debunked canard about Ahmadinejad and "wiping Israel off the map".

Reading about it, I was reminded that Iran was the only Middle East country on this list to hold spontaneous candlelight vigils for victims of the 9/11 World Trade Center attacks this year.
I wonder how many of them watch President Ahmadinejad on TV and think, "I sure hope the rest of the world isn't basing its opinion of the whole country on what this idiot says."
Just like us.

Cross-posted at Creekside

On trying to figure out Ahmadinejad

I share skdadl's relief at the release, by Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, of Britain's fifteen sailors and marines earlier today. The suddenness of the move was a surprise, although I had believed that, after a somewhat longer period of tension, the captive Brits would have eventually been released.

It is easier, now that the release has happened to take a look at what might have precipitated Ahmadinejad's unexpected action. What follows is nothing more than speculation. I honestly have no idea what is going on in the mind of the President of Iran. I don't think anybody can claim they have any real idea. That Ahmadinejad is a dangerously unstable individual should not be dismissed as the only reason for his sudden act of magnanimity. I do believe the man has synapses firing in the wrong order at odd times and his decision to release the captive Royal Navy personnel could as easily have been a sudden increase in serotonin as much as any diplomatic or strategic consideration.

Nevertheless, there are some ideas which could be taken into account as to why a sane person would have released those service personnel at this time and in such a surprise move.

Ahmandinejad has a few domestic problems. The former mayor of Tehran came to power after solidly winning an election in which his major campaign promise was to improve the standard of living for millions of Iranians living in poverty. It is a promise he has most decidedly failed to deliver upon.

When he took office, Mr Ahmadinejad promised to raise the standard of living for the huge number of Iranians living in poverty. Many of the 17 million people who voted for him did so in the expectation that he would create jobs, curb inflation and alleviate poverty.

Instead, inflation has risen, there has been no decline in unemployment and there have been huge price rises in the housing sector. The gap between rich and the poor has shown no sign of narrowing.

A great deal of the criticism he has faced in Iran was as a result of his near exhausting of the Iranian oil revenues reserve fund, without showing much in the way of results. He has been accused in the Iranian parliament of running a government which lacks direction. This is compounded by the fact that Ahmadinejad has been preoccupied with international pressure over Iran's nuclear program and an equal amount of domestic pressure over how badly he has handled international relations. The imposition of UN sanctions has only worsened his ability to deal with domestic problems and, in Iran, has highlighted his abysmal foreign policy. Add to all that the fact that his own intransigence in agreeing to a compromise list of conservative candidates for the municipal elections resulted in a split conservative vote and a massive loss for his party at the polls.

After the announcement of UN sanctions, Iran's Supreme Leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, wouldn't speak to Ahmadinejad for three months and, despite what the world heard from Ahmadinejad, he kept a low domestic profile until the end of February. The truth is, Ahmadinejad is very much on the ropes at home. Parliament has the authority to vote on his competence and the Supreme Court of Iran can put the President on trial for failure to carry out his constitutional duties. If either body produced a result against Ahmadinejad's favour, the Surpreme Leader, who actually has all the power in Iran, would be in a position to dismiss the President. Both constitutional bodies had made noises in the general direction of a vote of non-confidence or trial and apparently, the only thing stopping them was the amount of attention being paid to Iran by the rest of the world. The immoderate position of the Bush administration in dealing with Iran may have saved Ahmedinejad. An internal blood-letting of the government's executive would create and demonstrate a weakness. With the US threatening war, they couldn't risk any additional internal chaos.

What happened next is not speculation. Ahmadinejad is a typical hard-line conservative. When things are going badly, personally and politically, engage in theatre and create a diversion. The arrest of the British sailors and marine was just that - a means of diverting the attention of his political critics through a demonstration of sovereignty. Where he had been criticized for failing to show enough resolve and diplomatic acumen in dealing with the west over Iran's nuclear plan, defending his country's sea frontier, particularly over an unresolved border, would go some distance in rectifying his image.

He just had to make it last long enough to make it look like he was in charge. A sane individual would enter into such a plan with great trepidation. The risk was high, particularly since the Bush/Cheney led United States was looking for any reason to launch an attack. No one is accusing Ahmadinejad of sanity although one could say that his selection of the British Royal Navy as the target was fairly clever. The British were independent enough to tell Bush/Cheney to butt out and large enough to attract a good deal of attention. And, whether Ahmadinejad knew it or not, the British will usually play out diplomacy to exhaustion, notwithstanding the Blair pliant submission to Bush's will on the invasion of Iraq.

That would explain the capture of British troops, but why suddenly release them?

Well, there is the possibility that it was related to the newly imposed UN sanctions. The initial capture being theatre for everyone's benefit, both at home and around the globe, the sudden release of the captives had the same effect. Ahmadinejad had pretty much played out his hand. Three European Union countries, Germany, France and Italy, had been hesitant to go forward with sanctions. That was until Iran captured and then kept Royal Navy personnel. As the days of the detention went on, those three European countries were starting to harden up and there was some indication that those countries would impose further sanctions. German commercial firms, such as the Commerzbank, withdrew from arrangements with Iran.

Domestically, Ahmedinejad would have appeared somewhat magnanimous. Given the way the world views Iran, to do less than put the British troops on trial, would be looked-upon as extremely generous. While that does little to improve the general view that Ahmadinejad is incompetent, it may have had the effect of casting him in a slightly more favourable light, particularly at the Supreme Leader level. A release with a statement that says Britain will not violate Iranian waters again can now being interpreted as a diplomatic victory, (even though Britain never actually said that), and it would be a first for Ahmedinejad.

Ahmedinejad is probably being viewed as less aggressive and more accommodating on the international stage. Certainly one of the arguments Ahmadinejad can be expected to use is that, after a short period of consideration, the British troops, although legally detained, presented no real threat to Iran, therefore were released back to their home country. It could be held out that the United States detains people for years, without a trial, without specific charges and without much indication of release in the near future. Iran can then claim to have a better appreciation for the rule of law than the US.

Lastly, there is some Asian logic at work. By releasing the captives and not putting any serious demands on Britain, Ahmedinejad will now believe the British "owe him one". There was a test of British willingness to continue a dialog with Iran on a critical issue. By releasing the captives before Britain lost patience Ahmadinejad may well believe he has earned some diplomatic capital with Britain. Something he can call on in the future when faced with Bush administration sabre-rattling. Ahmedinejad's view would be something along the line of, "Hey! We resolved that problem without going to war. In fact, I resolved it before you even got really frustrated. Just think what we can do together against whatshisname. If we need help, we won't hesitate to call."

That, or maybe it was just that Ahmadinejad had a sudden and uncontrolled burst of exocytosis resulting in a moment of sanity.