IRANIANS WITH NO ENDGAME
That Iran’s illegal propaganda circus with captured British military personnel continues is an indication of the factional state of Iran’s leadership. Returning to the same provocative well once again is a sign that Ahmadinejad’s hardline Pasdaran faction behind the well-planned seizure have not garned the expected payoff that they most likely predicted would occur. So they are playing for time, hoping for a deus ex machina to whip the Iranian people into a nationalistic frenzy.
A second sign is the rather pathetic effort by the regime to employ a rent-a-riot “popular demonstration” against the British embassy. Aside from the laughably small number of “protestors”( probably Ansar Hezbollah or Basij goons), which indicates that the top clerics are keeping a very tight leash, as they could deploy thousands of paramilitary thugs in mufti, if they chose, there is a strong whiff of nostalgia here for the symbols of the 1979 Revolution. What appeal this political gesture will have to the vast number of Iranians too young to recall the seizure of the American embassy, I cannot say but to me it seems like something that would excite only the most partisan elements of Ahmadinejad’s base.
Ahmadinejad is painting Teheran into an increasingly isolated corner. Hopefully, the Bush administration will tailor their moves to maximize and profit from Iran’s diplomatic self-immolation rather than distract from it.
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The Lounsbury:
April 2nd, 2007 at 3:46 pm
It’s a bit rich for you to be calling the Iranian’s mild little show “illegal.”
Well, I suppose hypocrisy with respect to such issues is the meat of righteous nationalist indignation (although not your mates regardless).
mark:
April 2nd, 2007 at 5:11 pm
Hi Col ( Or should I say….”Theo”)
Well, as I am not British, the reaction could hardly be called “nationalist”. Gleeful, perhaps.
Re: hypocrisy. Throwing out of uniform irregulars in the clink raises a hue and cry in some quarters but not treating uniformed personnel in an occupational zone as ” spies” meets with a peculair silence from that particular chorus of law professors and IGO activists.
In any event, we both know that acceptance of IL is honored mostly in the breach when states believe their security is at stake. The Iranian move was simply a maladroit example of doing that.
As with hyprocisy, no state has a monopoly on incompetence either
A.E.:
April 3rd, 2007 at 1:06 am
This actually reminds me of Serbia’s chaining UN observers to high-value targets (which is put in its proper context as 4GW in The Sling and the Stone). However, I think you’re right that in the long run, this will not be good for Iran, however effective a short term propaganda coup they can pull.