|
A
Revolution in the Making?
Commentary
by the U.S. Alliance for Democratic Iran
June 23, 2009
Back in July 2005,
just a few days after “selection” of Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad as president by the mullahs’ Supreme
Leader Ali Khamenei, we commented that the
well-organized political coup “engineered by the
notorious Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC),
cements the dominance of the ultra-conservative
faction of the ruling regime over all key levers
of power in Iran."
We added that “The ruling regime has just gone
through its most drastic political shake-up
since its coming to power in 1979. With failure
of the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s
16-year attempt at cohabitation with his
powerful, yet rival partners, chief among them
former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, major
power realignment was completed when Ahmadinejad
became President. … Rafsanjani had become a
liability, rather than an asset, in the face of
mounting challenges by a restive society and
growing international pressure. The state as
whole could no longer absorb a schism at the
top.
We warned that “Ahmadinejad’s win also serves as
a wake-up call that we are indeed dealing with
an irreformable fundamentalist regime that has
all centers of theocratic power, the judiciary,
the Parliament and now the presidency” under
Khamenei’s control” and that “The ruling regime
is incapable of change... Only when Iran tyrants
are unseated by the Iranian people, this growing
regional and global menace will be neutralized.”
And we predicted that “the political coup
launched by the office of Khamenei and executed
by the IRGC to bring Ahmadinejad out of the
ballot box could very well turn out to be the
mullahs' unraveling under the mounting weight of
domestic and international pressure.”
On June 12, the factional coup culminated, as we
had expected, in total purge of the rival
factions when Ali Khamenei in collision with the
Council of Guardians and the feared
Revolutionary Guards declared Ahmadinejad the
winner. Unable to resolve the rift without
weakening his own leadership position, Khamenei
instead opted to end the bleeding by getting rid
of the rivals. Although in 2005 Khamenei dealt a
sever blow to Rafsanjani’s faction by placing
the until-then obscure Ahmadinejad at the
presidential helm, he failed to end it. In June
2009, Rafsanjani came back with a vengeance to
severely weaken Khamenei by defeating his
hand-picked president. With an eye on position
of Supreme Leadership, he put all his resources
behind Mirhossein Mousavi and brought him back
to the political arena after almost twenty years
of hiatus.
In summer of 2007, observing a trend in the rise
of public acts of dissent in all walks of life
particularly among women, students and workers,
we concluded that Iran rulers were sitting on
sea of popular discontent which could explode at
any moment. We commented that “Without gallows
and public hangings, without TV “confession”
travesty, without kidnapping and torture of
dissidents, the tyrant mullahs would not be able
to keep their house of cards. Without a reign of
terror, they would not be able to quell the
rising opposition to their nuclear program and
financing of terrorism in Iraq using the oil
revenue while more than half of Iran’s
population lives in poverty.”
Ayatollahs’ own analysts had a similar view. In
June 2007, just a few days after major uprisings
sparked by sudden announcement of rationing fuel
shook Iran, a major state-run daily, Etemad,
acknowledged that there are mounting economic,
health, transportation and bread and butter
issues that have turned the society into a
barrel of explosives where anything could ignite
it. “It does not matter what the event is; it
could be the loss of the national soccer team,
sudden loss of electricity, the cutting off of
the drinking water, or the sudden and unexpected
rationing of the fuel... They all can spark a
riot... Although most of these riots are put
down after the security and military agencies
intervene, every act of riot adds to the
collective memory of the people who will use it
as capital or a learned experience for the next
uprising.”
Reflecting the mullahs’ fear of the enemy
within, Newsweek reported in June of 2007 that
“In the name of national security and what they
call ‘public order,’ Iran's hard-liners are
frantically lashing out at anyone they imagine
might somehow pose a challenge to their
increasingly unpopular rule.” It added that the
mullahs are “especially fearful of feminists,
trade unionists and the like... The big fear is
a repetition of the people-power uprisings that
toppled antidemocratic regimes a few years ago
in the former Soviet republics of Georgia and
Ukraine...”
And in August of 2007, we commented that “As
mullahs are skillfully exploiting this
paralysis, a close look at Iran’s internal
dynamics, on full display in a series of
anti-government demonstrations since April,
provides all the tell-tell signs of a tyranny in
the existential fear of its own people.”
Now on eve of the 10th anniversary of the 1999
student uprising which shook the foundations of
the ruling mullahs to the ground, millions of
Iranian, not just women and students, are in the
midst of a brave uprising with chants of “death
to Khamenei”. After events of the past ten days,
there is no turning back for either side.
Khamenei gambled big and has hastened his
regime’s ultimate downfall.
Dictatorships’ demise often begins or speeds up
when they experience rifts at the top of their
pyramid of power. These regimes rule through
fear and terror and any rift at the top
emboldens the subjugated populace and public
acts of dissent become rampant. This in turn
deepens the split at the top when it is so deep
that it can no longer patched up even for the
sake of survival of the whole ruling system.
This is the case in Iran and it is even more
pronounced since its system of governance is a
theocratic tyranny and the religious aspect of
it causes a much more sever unraveling.
This uprising is still in its infancy and has a
way to go to topple the clerical rule. It has to
find a competent and unwavering leadership,
develop organization and find ways to overcome
the mullahs’ horrific multi-layered security
apparatus. The movement, however, has the core
component of a viable movement for change:
Iranian women and men who are willing to
sacrifice for the cause of freedom.
We salute them and bow our heads to their
awareness, courage, and steadfastness.
(USADI)
USADI
Commentary reflects the viewpoints of the US Alliance
for Democratic Iran in respect to issues and events
which directly or indirectly impact the US policy toward
Iran |