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4 Responses to “Photocommentary: “The Coming Face of Iran””

1. fabius.maximus.cunctator Says:
   June 16th, 2009 at 8:56 pm

   Zen,

   I do not know who or what exactly was behind the WJ coup. The Poles themselves seem to be divided on the question, even today. In any case however, the Soviet Union was an important figure on the chessboard so I do not think the comparison is a good one as I do not see how any other country cd play the same role with regard to Iran.

2. zen Says:
   June 17th, 2009 at 4:40 am

   hi FMC,
   .
   Historians are divided as well on Jaruzelski. The analogy is simpler than the consideration of a Soviet invasion, that the regime in Iran may try to declare martial law because its legitimacy is in tatters the way the Polish Communist Party lost face 78-79 and had to put a military mask on itself to suppress Solidarity

3. fabius.maximus.cunctator Says:
   June 17th, 2009 at 2:15 pm

   Hi Zen,

   Didn t want to be pedantic but the Russian angle but it looms larger in my mind then in yours because the mearest Russian tank was only a cpl of hours drive distant from my parent`s place when I was a boy.

   Talking of martial law in re Iran I doubt it. A fundamentalist revival wd be a better way to crush dissent if it comes to that. I do not quite buy the line that the majority of Iranians are completely against the mullahs. How strong their real support is, is impossible to determine it seems. Just relying on what I have read over the years and what a cpl of immigrants from Poland told me I am quite sure however that the communists in Poland had rather less support at any time since 45 because they were always the Quisling party no matter what.

4. fabius.maximus.cunctator Says:
   June 17th, 2009 at 6:41 pm

   Zen,

   To continue the legitimacy topic a bit: in my in I find the newest stuff from STRATFOR with a highly interesting article by Friedmann about how and where Achmadinedjad is popular (the poor, the rural masses, the veterans etc.). Now I am not a Friedmann fan, in fact I am often critical, but here I think he has hit the nail on the head for once. A few nuggets (you are free to edit if that overloads the section oc):

   1. Americans and Europeans have been misreading Iran for 30 years. Even after the shah fell, the myth has survived that a mass movement of people exists demanding liberalization — a movement that if encouraged by the West eventually would form a majority and rule the country. We call this outlook "iPod liberalism," the idea that anyone who listens to rock ‘n’ roll on an iPod, writes blogs and knows what it means to Twitter must be an enthusiastic supporter of Western liberalism. Even more significantly, this outlook fails to recognize that iPod owners represent a small minority in Iran — a country that is poor, pious and content on the whole with the revolution forged 30 years ago.
   2. There are undoubtedly people who want to liberalize the Iranian regime. They are to be found among the professional classes in Tehran, as well as among students. Many speak English, making them accessible to the touring journalists, diplomats and intelligence people who pass through. They are the ones who can speak to Westerners, and they are the ones willing to speak to Westerners.
   3. Some still charge that Ahmadinejad cheated. That is certainly a possibility, but it is difficult to see how he could have stolen the election by such a large margin. Doing so would have required the involvement of an incredible number of people, and would have risked creating numbers that quite plainly did not jibe with sentiment in each precinct. (…) Mousavi still insists he was robbed, and we must remain open to the possibility that he was, although it is hard to see the mechanics of this.

   It also misses a crucial point: Ahmadinejad enjoys widespread popularity. He doesn’t speak to the issues that matter to the urban professionals, namely, the economy and liberalization. But Ahmadinejad speaks to three fundamental issues that accord with the rest of the country. (…) piety (…)corruption (…)patriotism.

   Perhaps the greatest factor in Ahmadinejad’s favor is that Mousavi spoke for the better districts of Tehran — something akin to running a U.S. presidential election as a spokesman for Georgetown and the Lower East Side. (…) Fraud or not, Ahmadinejad won and he won significantly. That he won is not the mystery; the mystery is why others thought he wouldn’t win. (…)
   End of quote.
   Friedmann also cites Hitler`s example, as any American wd. Well, my two cents on that – the Nazis cheated, enormously in fact, yet the were popular at the beginning of their regime. Friedman`s piece  is free to post with attribution btw.

   Well, what do you think ?