A book review: Iran, A People Interrupted

Hamid Dabashi, an Iranian-American professor of Iranian Studies, has written an interesting 200-year history of Iran, its culture, and its politics, both geo-political and internal. I find his writing in this book to be arrogant, opinionated, full of big words, extremely interesting, and very important. Sometimes I wondered if I would even finish it when I got lost in some of his concepts. But I read several pages most nights and made it through and I'm glad I did.

I will return it to the Duluth Public Library 2009-08-11. If you are interested in borrowing it, its call number is 955.05 D11i.

For starters about arrogance, he writes in his introduction:

"I promise you by the end of this book, you will know more about Iran than the U.S. Department of State, the CIA, the Pentagon, the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at the Johns Hopkins University, the Hoover Institution, the Heritage Foundation, and five other neocon think tanks–not to mention the Ministry of Islamic Guidance and Islamic Culture in the Islamic Republic of Iran–all put together. I know things they do not know, or do not care to know, or would rather forget, or never learned, or would not tell you." (p. 11)

But considering the arrogance of the people in these institutions who pretend to understand a complex history and a complex people, I feel he is justified. Do I know more than they do after reading his book? In some respects, yes. I do know that war, torture, and execution are not going to do the Iranian people and a lot of other peoples any good. But many of the so-called experts think that these undemocratic and irreligious actions will bring greater glory for their causes.

As an example of the complexity that these experts do not understand, Dabashi writes:

"Iranian political history is a Trojan horse. Inside its belly is a hidden force never noted either for what it is or for its catalytic effect on that political history. The hidden force is the power of the imagination, the force of defiant intellect. Any attempt to reduce the cosmopolitan pluralism of Iranian political culture to an Islamist, nationalist, or socialist absolutism is at once analytically ludicrous and politically catastrophic. More than anything else, such lame and lazy reductionism distorts the inner grace and overriding power of a thriving culture that outsmarts its tyrant rulers and career opportunistic observers alike." (p. 125)

Geopolitics often damages the ships of the high and the mighty. With their grand designs treating others as mere pawns, they do not recognize that the pawns are icebergs. So it was with the U.S., first overthrowing an elected prime minister of Iran, then treating the Shah as a great ally, then using the Afghani resistance to fight the Soviets and to contain Iran, and finally then having the Afghani resistance turn against the U.S. and having the Iranian mullahcracy turn inward.

As part of this grand design of geopolitics, the high and the mighty indulge in demonizing those who oppose them, for example, George W. Bush and others calling any resistance to their grand design "the enemy". Is it any wonder that many of the rulers of Iran are paranoid about the U.S.? Especially when Bush included Iran in the "Axis of Evil". His and his advisors' ignorance of internal Iranian politics undercut reformers who had been making gains. Now these reformers were considered traitors.

BTW, Dabashi wrote this book in 2007, two years before the recent election in Iran. An election followed by the resistance of a culture that was often outsmarting its tyrant rulers.

Dabashi predicted the current turmoil as one of two possibilities of failure with the election of Ahmadinejad. "At worst, he will abuse the hopes and aspirations invested in him and resume an Islamic reign of terror over those young yuppie voters with their stylish hairdos, chic scarves, and sexy sunglasses–in which case he will turn them and their innocent semiotics of resistance into the real inheritors of the moral authority of Shi'ism. ... [Shi'ism] is alway on the side of the tyrannized and discredits those who are in power..." (pp. 233-234)

I have many more notes, but I'll finish with Dabashi's last sentence:

"...the only way that Americans can help promote democracy in Iran and anywhere else in the world is by first and foremost restoring and safeguarding it in their own country." (p. 263)

Revolution or restoration?

The actions of the Iranian opposition have been called a "Green Revolution", but is it really a revolution? Is it more a call to restore the ideals of the 1979 revolution that have been corrupted by the power grab of certain parts of the Iranian elite?

For one view, see "After the Crackdown: Iran's Opposition Down but Hardly Out", Scott Macleod, Time Magazine, 2009-06-30

Is Iraq interfering in Iran's internal affairs?

Authoritarian regimes tend to blame the problems of their own creation on outsiders meddling in internal affairs. Even would-be authoritarians like Sen. Joe McCarthy see meddlers in every cubicle. So it is no surprise that many in the Iranian government are spending so much energy blaming everybody but themselves for the dissatisfaction in Iran.

What surprised me was that one "outside" "meddler" is either unnoticed or seen as a mediator in the conflict in Iran. Who is this "outside meddler"? The Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani of Najaf, Iraq.

Apparently he has more respect among Shi'a muslims than either Rafsanjani or Khameni. Iranian politicians have gone to Najaf to consult with him. Interestingly, he refused to see Ahmadejani. See "Iran's Rafsanjani and Iraq's Al-Sistani", Patterico's Pontifications, 2009-06-22.

I was led to this site from a transcript of "Fareed Zakaria GPS" program on CNN, 2006-09-28.

He had an interview with Robert Baer, a former CIA agent, who thinks there has been a military coup by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard with the connivance of Ahmadinejad, a former officer of the Guard. However, Zakaria followed the interview with his own musings on the influence of Al-Sistani in Iran.

I then looked up Al-Sistani and found Patterico's Pontifications. He in turn referenced "Regime Change Iran: Movement Seeks to Eliminate 'Supreme Leader' Position", Threats Watch, Steve Schippert, 2009-06-21. Schippert quotes Al-Sistani,

"I am a servant of all Iraqis, there is no difference between a Sunni, a Shiite or a Kurd or a Christian," and that Islam can exist within a democracy without theological conflict. You will never hear such words slip past the lips of Iran's Ayatollah Khamenei. Ever.

Sorry, the quotes are exact from the site.

I recommend reading the full text to get a better idea of all the complexities of this situation. As Patterico implies, we may be seeing a "slow-motion regime change".

Did the Iranian government win the battle only to lose the war?

We lived in Stockholm, Sweden from 1970 to 1974. In our last year I remember seeing a demonstration of a couple hundred or more Iranians demonstrating against the Shah. The Shah did not abdicate until 1979. Iranians in Iran demonstrated this month in the thousands against the Iranian government. The government turned out in force and stopped the massive demonstrations. Did the government succeed or fail? Indications are that they may have failed; will it be weeks or years before the current government falls?

The streets of Tehran are calm and commutes take 15 minutes where they used to take 45. But business is way down, some shopkeepers report by more than half. People are afraid to go out. But they remember what they saw and will not forget.

“'People are depressed, and they feel they have been lied to, robbed of their right and now are being insulted,' said Nassim, a 56-year-old hairdresser. 'It is not just a lie; it’s a huge one. And it doesn’t end; they keep on insulting people’s intelligence with more lies on TV.'”
- "In Tehran, a Mood of Melancholy Descends", Nazila Fathi, New York Times,

"Instead, hard-liners around President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad opted for schism, a historic error. The Iran of yesterday is gone, the Iran of tomorrow not yet born."
- "Iran's Second Sex", Roger Cohen, New York Times, 2009-06-27.

If you haven't done so already, read Roger Cohen's reports from Tehran for the last several days.

The quiet before the storm?

The mass protests in Iran have petered out in Iran because of overwhelming action by the security forces. Even protests made without crowds seem to have been feeble.

Yesterday was supposed to be a day of releasing green balloons. I wondered where the protesters would get enough balloons to fill the sky. Even if there had been enough green balloons in the stores, wouldn't the authorities rush to buy all the balloons?

Supposedly because protesters ran out of green balloons, they used trash bags instead. I knew they would never have enough helium; who stores a helium tank in their apartment? A quick Google search led me to the clue - hair dryers, and I didn't even have to read any full article.

Maybe the time it would take to fill a trash bag with sufficient hot air explains why the only pictures I saw of green balloons were of single groups of four or five bags tied together. Not a very massive demonstration. I was surprised that a trigger-happy Basij didn't shoot them down.

However, a couple of Iranians have been quoted as there is plenty of heat beneath the ashes. We haven't heard for several days about Rafsanjani's work behind the scenes with the Council of Experts, the group that can hire and fire the Supreme Leader. We have read that the mayor of Tehran thinks that people should be able to protest peacefully. We know that several clerics, including some very senior clerics, have spoken out against the clampdown. We know that many members of Parliament did not attend the congratulatory party for Ahmadinejad. What many of us didn't know is how much the security forces control so many aspects of Iranian society. But even in the security forces, not all agree with the necessity of the crackdown.

If there is indeed heat beneath the ashes, what, if any, fuel will start a new conflagration. The 1979 revolution took a year; the 2009 revolution could also.

Guns and poses

U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio of Florida has been quoted as saying that the Iranian people should have more guns. I forgot where I saw that framing, but what he actually wrote on Twitter was "I have a feeling the situation in Iran would be a little different if they had a 2nd amendment like ours." The National Journal has a more detailed explanation from a Rubio spokesman.

This comment is all over the web and the comments on it are multiplying even faster. On one side are people who say our freedoms are being protected by guns in the hands of the people. Others point out gun in the hands of the people have begot even more violence, like ethnic cleansing. One commentator said that Saddam Hussein required every family to have a gun and many had AK-47s. Well, the AK-47s didn't protect the people against Saddam but they certainly were used against the invasion by Americans.

Guns in the hands of the people have not worked against the U.S. Government: Shay's Rebellion, the Whiskey Rebellion, and Waco. Let's not forget the Civil War and all the Indian tribes defending their homes and lands with rifles. The government will always have more and bigger guns.

Suppose the Iranian people had more guns. The government is now fighting the people mostly with batons, water cannons, and tear gas. If the people counteracted with guns, more than the Basaji will be shooting. If the people kept fighting with guns, don't you think the Iranian Army might be coming back with tanks? How many people keep a tank in their garage? Think Tiananmen Square.

Hope among the uncertainty in Iran

BBC posted a telephone interview with a resident near one of the mosques where people wanted to mourn the death of Neda Agha-Soltan and others killed by government forces. The resident doesn't know how things will turn out but he does say that the Allah o Akbars from the rooftops are getting louder each night. He thinks that is keeping up hope among Iranis.

It is this uncertainty on how things may turn out can be the hope of the people because they know how to conduct themselves. The Iranian government is unsure of how to conduct itself. Consider all the changing positions despite many affirmations that things were done properly.

I thought of this when I read the following passage from "Talent is Overrated" by Geoff Colvin:

"Average performers go into a situation with no clear idea of how they intend to act or how their actions would contribute to reaching their goal. So when things don't turn out perfectly, they attribute the problems to vague forces outside their control." Like foreign press, U.S., U.K., France, Germany, Israel, ...

Iran, Berlin Wall, and Snapping Fingers

An old bromide raised its head on the comments in today's Lede of the New York Times; see comment at 8:06 a.m. by nymarty. Ronald Reagan said "Tear down that wall, Mr. Gorbachev!" and the Berlin Wall came down! Except the wall came down ten months after Ronald Reagan left office. It's like the hippy snapping his fingers on the park bench to keep the tigers away. Since there are no tigers nearby he assumes snapping his fingers is working.

The Reaganites ignore that the Soviet Union was changing under Gorbachev's leadership and it was probably not because of Western Armaments. It was probably because of Western ideas that Gorbachev saw how bankrupt the Soviet system was. The East German government was already being marginalized within the Warsaw Pact. The xenophobia of the East German government only prolonged the agony.

nymarty wrote that Obama said too little too late. Obama can only say so much without increasing the xenophobia of the Iranian government. It has already lashed out at the English, French, and German governments for their statements. And words are just that, words! What can any U.S. President do about Iran? Stop oil shipments? What a ruckus the increase in gas prices will cause in the U.S. Invade Iran? Remember, the people with the guns are mostly supporters of the Iranian government. But even those in the Iranian army and police who don't support the current government are going to be very hostile against any foreign invader.

What is interesting about nymarty's comments is that he goes on to say that JFK spoke out against Castro's Cuba and that Churchill and Roosevelt spoke out against Hitler. Castro's Cuba is still there and it took nearly seven years of war to defeat Hitler.

What is most ironic about nymarty's comment is that he ends with "The Mullahs want the bomb and nothing our president can say will stop them from getting it." In other words, Obama is wrong for not saying enough, but no matter what he says it won't mean anything.

My view is that Obama is choosing his words carefully to support the people of Iran while not giving the Iranian government an excuse for claiming "foreign interference" in "Iran's internal affairs", a well-known cop-out for corrupt governments everywhere.

An interesting non-violent counter-attack in Iran

If you have seen many of the pictures coming out of Iran, you may have seen a middle-aged man on the back of a motor-bike pulling a gun out of his belt. According to the Christian Science Monitor, he is a provocateur trying to increase the level of violence. See "Who's behind Iran violence? Website posts video in name-and-shame campaign".

An Iranian website has posted a few pictures of these provocateurs and some have been identified. People are surprised to learn that they are their neighbors. Supposedly one of the identified provocateurs has left town.

Many critics complain we have become beholden to our gadgets and our technology. But these gadgets and technologies are really giving power to the people. Power is held by the few when information is held only by the few.

Al-Jazeera more liberal than many think

Because Al-Jazeera broadcasts videos and other press releases from the likes of Al Qaeda, many Americans think of Al-Jazeera as nothing more than a mouthpiece for terrorists.

However, if you actually visit Al-Jazeera's web site you will find a much broader reportage. For example, see "Iranian writer on poll result", an interview with Azar Nafisi, author of "Reading Lolita in Tehran". Afisi doesn't pull any punches on what she thinks of the regime in Iran and of reactions to it. For example, "The US government is sometimes silly in its response to Iran."

Because I don't know Arabic, I can't say if this interview was also posted in Arabic. I can say if you click "Arabic" in the sidebar on the left, you will find many of the popular photos from Iran, including a demonstrator holding up a sign, "Where is my vote?"

I probably will not live to see it, but the 22nd century may see no dictatorships. Optimistic? Consider that in the 1950's Western Europe had Franco in power in Spain and Salazar in Portugal.

Many views on how to support the Iranian people

The comments on the Lede of the New York Times are all over the map: unquestioning support of the Iranian demonstrators, unquestioning support of the Iranian government, ignore the Iranians, stop the Iranian government, and more.

Those calling for no support believe that the Iranians are the enemy, government and people alike. This is the terrorist mindset: all of the X are the enemy, and so they all deserve to die.

The hard-nose cold warriors: they don't understand how foreign interference rallies people to support their government and backfires. Sen. John McCain faults President Obama for not doing enough. See "President Obama Reiterates Concerns about Iranian Election", New York Times, 2009-06-16. “He should speak out that this is a corrupt, flawed sham of an election,” Mr. McCain said in an interview on NBC’s “Today.” “The Iranian people have been deprived of their rights. We support them in their struggle against a repressive, oppressive regime.”

Boy, am I glad I voted for Obama! This is not the kind of talk we need coming from a President.

“We make sure that the world knows that America leads,” Mr. McCain said.

Wait a minute! If the Iranian election was corrupt and flawed, in what election was American chosen as a leader of the world?

There are the overly sympathetic meddlers: they call upon people to join a denial of service campaign against Iranian government sites. But denial of service on a few sites also reduces the available bandwidth in the local network and hinders outgoing messages. It is also stooping to the level of your opponent. In fact, one should avoid any Iranian site; the foreign traffic decreases the available bandwidth. Internet access in Iran has become very slow. Depend on non-Iranian sites to aggregate.

There is the reasoned approach: President Obama gave restrained support for people without undue criticism of the government. See the above article quoting John McCain. Also, note that Richard Lugar, Ind.-R, ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, agrees with Obama. “For the moment, our position is to allow the Iranians to work out their situation,” Mr. Lugar said in an interview Tuesday morning on CBS’ “Early Show.” “For us to become heavily involved in the election at this point is to give the clergy an opportunity to have an enemy and to use us, really, to retain their power.”

Whither Iran?

"Yet [Ayatollah Khameni] must have been troubled by a sense of déjà vu having lived to hear the calls of “God is Great” from Tehran rooftops denouncing his handpicked president. The same calls 30 years ago brought the shah’s regime to its knees."

- "A Middle Class Uprising", Abbas Amanat, New York Times, 2009-06-16, appended to an editorial "Where Will the Power Lie in Iran?"

Amanat also points out that 80% of Iran's population is urban or semi-urban. So much for the rural people were dominant in the election.

The size of the crowds in Tehran is unbelievable

See http://www.flickr.com/photos/mousavi1388/sets/72157619701000269/ for photos posted by Moussavi1388. 1388 is the current year in the Iranian calendar.

Also a counterattack on Iranian government websites is underway. Two can play the game of web-blocking. Simply by requesting a web site, thousands of people can block that web site. Try Ahmadinejad's web site. Since there are more Iranian citizens upset with the election results than there are government employees who can block opposition web sites, the only government defense is to shut the web entirely. And that would upset lots of business people who have not been demonstrating. I think the strong-armers in the Iranian government have put themselves in a no-win situation.

I think we're going to see the Web as the biggest promoter of democracy that we've ever seen.

Will Iranians bring democracy to the Middle East?

Many Americans think of Al-Jazeera as an anti-American, anti-Israeli broadcaster. However, you might want to take a look at one Al-Jazeera story on the crisis in Iran, "Iran protesters defy rally ban", Aljazeera.net, 2009-06-15. It is a rather even-handed reporting of the events and the conflicts in Iran.

When people in the other countries see footage and stories like this, will they starting asking why they shouldn't be doing likewise?

And it could spread out even wider. China Daily reportage seems on the surface to be pro-government, but those who read between the lines might see more. See "Iran's supreme leader warns against provocative behavior", China Daily, 2006-09-15

Is Tehran Bureau too popular or is it too accurate?

I tried to access Tehran Bureau's website and was diverted to its provider's error page:

Site Temporarily Unavailable



This website is currently experiencing technical difficulties. If you are the owner of this site, please contact us for more information. In most cases, this is only temporary.

Is the page too popular and has exceeded its bandwidth limit? Or is it too accurate and has been hacked again?

If the Iranian election was fair, why is the government afraid of criticism?

The Lede and other sources are reporting cell phone service being turned on and off, text messaging being blocked, access to certain Iranian web sites being blocked, and even sites outside Iran being sabotaged.

One of these latter sites is Tehran Bureau. It was hacked but supposedly is back up. If it is up, it must be extremely popular. I can't access it. On one try it stood at "15 of 18 pages loaded" for several minutes. I retried it and after a long wait told that "Safari could not access the server."

The Iranian authorities are even closing news bureaus that one would assume would be "more friendly". The correspondent for Al-Arabiya in Tehran was told to close the bureau and not report any news.

Many in the U.S. felt that George W. Bush stole both the 2000 and 2004 elections. However, there was no wide-scale censorship of the voices expressing this opinion.

The fallacy of "both sides" continues

This morning's Star Tribune has a front page article titled "Both sides claim victory in Iran". The article is not available on the Star Tribune web site because it is a Washington Post story. In the Post it was titled "Iran Election in Dispute as 2 Candidates Claim Victory", Thomas Erdbrink, Washington Post Foreign Service, Tehran, 2009-06-13.

The Post headline is more accurate as there are definitely more than two sides in the Iran election conflict. The Star Tribune headline ignores that there were four candidates on the ballot and that many more candidates were rejected by Iran's Council of Guardians.

Although the Interior Ministry is under the President, do we really know that the President was responsible for how the vote was counted or miscounted? What if a faction of the Council of Guardians, the Assembly of Experts, or the Supreme Leader wanted Ahmadinejad to win, not so much that they agreed with him, but wanted to control him? Discounting the candidates who got few votes or those who rejected, the possibility that unelected powers have an interest gives us at least three sides.

If this third side was responsible for giving the vote to Ahmadinejad, would he not be somehow beholden to them? If so, would they reign in some of the behavior that embarrasses Iran's interest and get him to work more in the direction they want?

If my conjecture is right, the power brokers should be careful playing with tame bears. Sometimes they attack their handlers.

Trying to keep up with Iranian events

I've found that even if you thought you had read an article, it may have changed since you last read it. I found this to be true with "Ahmadinejad Re-Elected: Protests Flare", New York Times, 2009-06-13 or is it 2009-06-14? The New York Times already has the URL datelined for the Sunday edition.

One of the new to me things I found in edition I read shortly after 1600 was that many moderate clerics supported Moussavi. Many of these apparently think Ahmadinejad is a disgrace to Iran.

Also as you read more, you get certain information refined. Andrew Sullivan gives a more refined chart of the "straight-line" "results" of the Iranian election. See "The Results as They Came In", The Daily Dish. The web page I mentioned in "A winning election formula - Iranian style" used only four data points. The one that Sullivan used has six data points. Still the correlation of the reported data to the formula is still way to close to one for a person to believe the results weren't manufactured. Think how vote totals swing during U.S. elections.

A winning election formula - Iranian style

Remember how we used to be glued to our radios or TVs when some major awe-inspiring event occurred. We just had to get the latest development as soon as it was broadcast. Now here I sit glued to my computer picking up minute-by-minute developments in Iran. One advantage the web has over other media is the greater variety of sources.

One of the very interesting item is that one person has determined the formula for the Iranian vote results

Mousavi = 0.5238xAhmadinejad - 742642

It's bad enough that the vote tallies matched this formula at least four different points, but Mousavi started out with a negative vote of nearly 3/4 million before Ahmadinejad had any votes!

For more details, see "Faulty Election Data", Tehran Bureau, by MUHAMMAD SAHIMI in Los Angeles | 13 June 2009

Iran: Another "When will they ever learn?" state?

The results are in. Ahmadinejad was declared the winner. Moussavi supporter claim fraud and have taken to the streets. For ongoing reports, see "Landside or Fraud? The Debate Online Over Iran's Election Results".

Who is not learning?

Is it the Iranian people who claim fraud? Are they not learning that the people who support their candidate is not supported by the majority? Are they not learning that there is no point in voting because the elections are rigged?

Is it the Iranian government that has not been adept at showing transparency? Is it not learning that people won't more than a show of democracy? Has it forgotten the current government exists because thirty years ago the people got fed up with the Shah and contributed greatly to his downfall? Is it ignoring that the too many people may consider the current government as no better or even worse than the Shah?

Stay tuned to your news sources. Things may change rapidly. Even as I wrote this, two new entries were added to the above blog.