[A-List] US Imperialism: Iran

["Anyutka" <annewilliamson@xxxxxxx>]

Sanders Research Associates
September 22, 2003


Meet the Next President of Iran



Dr. Taha Hashemi: Iranian Nationalist, or Neocon Stooge?

Whenever I hear the word "reform," I reach for my revolver - or would do if
I had one. For the past decade, I have listened to reformers in Eastern
Europe spout about civil society and free markets, and watched as the
countries they lead collapse into corruption and misery. Nearly everything
they say is false: they claim to stand for democracy and pluralism, but
invariably react with fury whenever they are questioned or opposed. They
claim to stand for the free market, but in fact all want their countries to
join the highly-regulated European Union, and simply to sell off what few
factories or other national assets they may to foreigners - who usually then
close them down so that they acquire the market for their own exports.

It was therefore with a considerable sense of unease that I travelled to the
Islamic Republic of Iran. Although it is ostensibly the greatest obstacle to
American-Israeli hegemony in the Middle East - its Islamic Revolution in
1979 was based on a heady mix of religion and nationalism, both directed
against "the great Satan", America - and although it now stands accused of
trying to build a nuclear bomb - a development which, if true, would
radically re-write the geopolitics of the Middle East - Iran is also a
country which has been governed by reformers since 1996. The West places an
enormous amount of hope in these "reformers", and even extremist
neo-conservative ideologues like Michael Ledeen, who hope for a "revolution"
which will decisively overthrow the mullahs, say that their first option is
to work for regime change within the existing political system in Iran. The
aim will obviously be to "turn" a person who is capable of taking power in
Iran, and doing what the United States wants.

What are the chances of this happening?  Throughout my week's stay in Iran,
I was repeatedly told that the country was really controlled by hard-liners
around the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Khameini.
(The Iranian constitution subordinates the classical institutions of state -
presidency, legislature and judiciary - to the Supreme Leader and the
Council of Guardians, which is effectively a sort of Senate composed of
clerics that can veto legislation on religious grounds.)  According to this
version of events, the reformers are struggling bravely within the system,
but their attempts at reform are being thwarted by a minority of
"hard-liners" at the summit of this clerical state.

Each camp - reformers and conservatives - is itself divided into different
categories. There are moderates and radicals on both sides. Representatives
of each side claim to have the support of the mass of Iranian people - 70%
or 80% is the figure each side usually quotes. But, for a foreign visitor,
it is almost impossible to meet any representative of the conservative
cause. Despite numerous attempts on my part, I managed to meet only two
people who are generally categorised as conservatives. The government does
all in its power to present the reform face of Iran to outsiders, to the
extent even of forbidding people from talking to the opposite camp. When I
expressed an interest in going to the holy city of Qum to see some
conservative clerics, the woman at the Culture Ministry who gave me my press
card suggested instead the names of Ayatollahs Montazeri and Taheri, both of
whom have called for the end to the Islamic regime.

The majority of the press is in the hands of the reformers. There are some
13 national dailies in Iran, of which only 5 support the conservatives. In
the country as a whole, there are some 100 dailies, the vast majority of
which also support the reformers. Moreover, as is invariably the case in
Eastern Europe too, the offices of the allegedly harassed reformist
newspapers are far better kitted out than those of the conservatives who
supposedly enjoy the support of the highest officials of the state.
Reformers are currently trying to wrest control of the state television from
the Supreme Leader; if they succeed, they will control nearly all written
and electronic media in Iran, as they invariably do in other countries where
they have taken power. (Serbia springs to mind, where there are not media
outlets for the opposition at all - for how can anyone possibly be opposed
to a "reformist" government?)  This proliferation of reformist newspapers,
which persists despite the reformists' claims that they are persecuted by
the conservative-controlled judiciary, is probably explained by the fact
that the seven-man media committee which grants licences to newspapers has
six reformist members and only one conservative.

This predominance of reformists in the media is the inevitable reflection of
their predominance in government. All the most important institutions of
state are in the hands of the reformers. These include the executive
(presidency and government), the legislature, and the secret police
(Intelligence Ministry) as well as the Ministry of the Interior. The
conservatives are represented by the Supreme Leader and the Council of
Guardians. In other words, there is a sort of "cohabitation", as there was
in France from 1997 - 2002 when the president was supposedly conservative
and the government socialist. But, like reformers everywhere, the ones in
Iran will not be satisfied until they control all the institutions of state
without exception. No doubt such a situation would be warmly welcomed by the
West, as it has been throughout Eastern Europe.

A taste of the extent of the power of the reformers comes in the literature
distributed to foreign journalists when they receive their accreditation
from the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance. In the Weekly Press
Digest dated 30th August - 5th September 2003, foreign journalists are left
in no doubt what they are supposed to think:

A new round of confrontation between the ruling conservatives - a minority
of non-elected clerics who rule Iran - and the official reformists who
control both the executive and the legislative powers but have no say in
decision-making, has set the tone for the run up to the Majlis (parliament)
elections, due in less then six months (italics added).

In Iran as in Serbia, therefore, the government continues to think of itself
as the opposition, and to behave as if it were. This line is
enthusiastically peddled by foreign journalists, who like nothing better
than to present a complex situation as a struggle between the forces of
progress and the forces of reaction.

The reality is indeed far more complex than this fairy-tale account allows.
>From what I could judge, the reformists are not popular. They have been in
power for seven years, and their economic record is uneven. They are seen as
self-serving opportunists who have a lot of power and money and who are
unconnected with the ordinary mass of people. The next elections may well,
therefore, favour the conservatives. To be sure, there is much grumbling
about corrupt mullahs who line their own pockets, and ride around in
expensive cars while preaching piety and abstinence to their faithful; but
it seems inevitable that, with Islam's emphasis on help for the underdog and
on charitable giving that the conservative camp, which is associated with
support for the clerical regime, will be supported more by the disadvantaged
than by the upwardly mobile town-dwellers.

Even more striking is the mild nature of the so-called conservatives. Dr
Taha Hashemi is a cleric who is also the managing director of the
conservative daily "Entechab" (Choice). It is also said that he might try
and get himself elected as the next president of Iran. (Elections are due to
be held in February.)  If he does, it will be with the well-worn tactic of
using conservative rhetoric to gain power, and then pursuing the policies of
the left, something which both Jacques Chirac and George Bush have practised
to perfection. His discourse is a clever mixture of anti-American rhetoric
with pro-American policies. When I met him, he started off by saying that
people across the Middle East had been rendered "speechless" by America's
actions, and repeatedly alleged that the United States was not interested in
democracy, but hegemony. But he then went on to condemn, in the strongest
terms, both the Taliban and Saddam Hussein, emphasising to me how strongly
Iran supported the US-puppet in Kabul, Hamid Karzai, and how Iran had no
interest in stimulating unrest in neighbouring Iraq. He said, as did the two
deputy foreign ministers I met, that removing Saddam Hussein from power was
in Iran's interest, and that Iran was working to see that the situation
there calmed down. But any tactician keen on confronting the United States,
and on preventing it from extending its hegemony, would not have supported
the invasion of Iraq, and would do everything to ensure that as much unrest
continued there for as long as possible. With conservatives like this, who
needs reformers?

Another conservative I met was Dr Hussein Shariatmadari, who edits the
conservative daily, Kayhan, and who calls himself a representative of the
Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khameini. He and his office exude old-world charm:
he asked not to be photographed without his jacket on, and his shabby office
was lined with books. He was obviously a sincerely religious and gentle man.
Because of his conservative reputation, I expected him to come up with some
good conspiracy theories about the reformist camp,  especially about them
being manipulated from abroad. But I was disappointed. He insisted to me
that there was no proof that even the Tehran University students were
American agents - even though George Bush had expressed explicit support
when they demonstrated in July, and even though certain circles had accused
them of being in the pay of foreigners. He also insisted that the reformists
were overwhelmingly pious Muslims and patriotic Iranians. In other words,
this alleged firebrand of reaction in Iran is in reality a kindly, rather
scholarly man sitting in a dingy office with antiquated air conditioning,
and speaking ill of no one.

Dr Shariatmadari predicted that conservatives would win the next elections
because people were disappointed with the reformers, and because the
Iranians were determined to defend Islam against its enemies. Whether the
Iranian people are as devout as all that is an open question; I was invited
to a family house in the countryside outside Iran on Friday evening, and was
served homemade brandy. Apparently everyone brews hooch if they can. But
without exception, everyone I spoke to - especially reformists, of whom I
met several - did emphasise that it was essential for reformists not to be
seen as being allies of the West.

Consequently, the sense of national pride might prove electorally more
important than an attachment to Islam, which is any case is never contested
(at least not openly) by any reformists, however radical. National pride is
obviously the key issue in the row over Iran's nuclear programme. The view
was expressed to me almost unanimously that Iran had its dignity as an
independent state and this it should not accept ultimatums. There is
widespread belief that the International Atomic Energy Authority has been
co-opted by the Americans into issuing an ultimatum on 12th September that
Iran must prove by 31st October that it is not trying to build a nuclear
bomb. (I received contradictory statements about whether or not Iran is
indeed trying to build the bomb:  the two ministers I met insisted that Iran
was not engaged in any military nuclear programmes, and various mullahs said
that the Supreme Leader and president had both denounced weapons of mass
destruction as incompatible with Islam. On the other hand, my interpreter
said that he had translated for the head of the Iranian nuclear programme
recently, and that - in his opinion - the man had clearly been lying when he
was quizzed at a press conference by foreign journalists about whether Iran
was trying to build the bomb.)

One outcome is therefore not difficult to predict. Many people in Iran,
including clergy and members of the political class, seem determined to
reconcile themselves with the USA. There does seem to be a move towards a
liberalisation of the Islamic regime, even though there may also be public
discontent with the self-serving antics of the reformer. Put all these
elements together, and a perfect next president of Iran would be someone
like Dr. Hashemi. His apparently conservative credentials might make him
popular with voters who are disillusioned with reform; his status as a
cleric should reassure the Islamists; and his determination to reconcile
Tehran and the United States would make him an ideal Western ally.

It is always possible, of course, that neo-conservative bullying could
produce a counter-reaction. George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld seem to be
unable to use a carrot when waving a stick is so much more satisfying. They
could, therefore, succeed in turning the pro-American Iranian public against
them if they tried hard enough. If instead they exercise an ounce of
restraint, there seems to me to be no reason why the Islamic Republic of
Iran should not, given a little time, drop into the lap of the New World
Order like a ripe pear.



John Laughland