[antiwar-van] Reality of Iran: Trapped Between Theocracy and Imperialism

[Harsha]

Trapped Between Theocracy and Imperialism: The Reality of Iran
By Poya Saffari


Iran is urgently facing both domestic tyranny and foreign imperialism.
Instead of emphasizing opposition to one, in isolation, a balanced
understanding should evaluate both. Iran’s current geopolitical reality is
shaped by both a despotic theocracy and threats of US-led imperialist
intervention.

In the midst of this reality, current anti-war and anti-imperialist
movements in the “West” disproportionately emphasize imperialist threats,
some sympathizing with the Iranian regime as a stronghold against
imperialism and others opposing the regime, but avoiding active criticism
for fear of playing into right-wing agendas and discourses. Conversely,
many in the Iranian Diaspora have focused opposition solely on the Iranian
regime. While both these standpoints are understandable given the contexts
out of which they arise (a brutalized Iranian Diaspora and a passionate
anti-imperialist movement), neither is viable in the face of past and
present realities.

In the context of looming military intervention against Iran, advocated in
the United States by both Democrats and Republicans, we must root our
analysis in a nuanced understanding, cognizant of colonial and imperialist
histories as well as the unacceptable tyranny of the Islamic Republic of
Iran. A conscientious perspective must seek to explore, criticize and
resist both. The following text seeks to contribute to the development of
this perspective through exploration and analysis of contemporary Iranian
history and current events.

To understand the contemporary reality of Iran (1), it is useful to start
with the important events of the early 1950s. In 1951, building on decades
of popular struggle, Iran's Prime Minister Muhammad Mossadeq nationalized
Iran's oil production, which had to that point been under the exploitative
control of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (known today as British
Petroleum). Just two years after this bold challenge to imperialist
control the CIA - encouraged and aided by British intelligence - funded,
engineered, and executed a military coup that toppled Mossadeq’s
government and restored the pro-western and dictatorial rule of Muhammad
Reza Shah. This imperialist attack on Iranian democracy thrust Iran onto a
collision course with a brutal Islamic theocracy.

The roots of the anti-imperialist and democratization efforts headed by
Mossadeq in the early 1950’s go back to the gradual penetration of Iran by
the West during the nineteenth century and the popular struggle that
occurred in response, most significantly during the Tobacco Revolt
(1891-92) and the Constitutional Movement (1905-11). Western penetration
started with military defeats throughout Central Asia and the Caucasus at
the hands of the Russian and British armies. These defeats resulted in
creation of several treaties that established borders that have endured
more-or-less intact into the contemporary age. Representatives from Russia
and Britain became influential players in Iranian politics and even though
Iran was still ruled by the Qajar monarchy, the quasi-colonial impact of
Western influence was established. In 1890, Nasir al-Din Shah, the
tyrannical head of the Qajar monarchy, granted the British a monopoly on
the sale of Iranian tobacco. In response, a popular revolt - boycotting
the use of tobacco forced Nasir al-Din Shah to rescind the concession. The
Tobacco Revolt of 1891-92 amounted to a dress rehearsal for the
Constitutional Movement of 1905-11 that followed.

In April 1896 at the Adb al-Azim Mosque, just outside Tehran, Nasir
al-Dine Shah was shot and killed. His death along with an economic crisis
and threats of foreign control went on to trigger a massive uprising,
known as the Constitutional Movement (1905-11), which became the political
vehicle for opposition to foreign domination and the arbitrary powers of
the Shah (2). Between June 1905 and June 1908 several waves of resistance
- combining mass meetings (under the structure of popular anjumans, or
community councils), revolts, protests and strikes - brought the Qajar
dynasty to its knees. What had in earnest been fermenting for several
decades, culminated in 1906 with the creation of a Constituent National
Assembly (Majles-i Meli) and a constitution. Although, the constitution
was a progressive accomplishment for its time, the fragile alliance
between secular reformers and religious authorities (ulama) produced a
noteworthy compromise, especially given Iran’s present political reality.
Beyond opening the door toward democracy, the constitution also created an
“ecclesiastical committee” of five ulama with veto power over all Majles
legislation they deemed contrary to Islamic law. Thus, in 1906, this
religiously sanctioned committee, established the precedent upon which
today’s Guardian Council, along with other authoritarian state organs,
prevent genuine democracy.

Soon after the creation of the Majles and constitution, opposition from
certain members of the ulama, began to mount, particularly from Shaykh
Fazallah Nouri. He described the concept of equality as an “alien heresy,”
and labeled the constitutionalists as “atheist.” As a leading religious
figure, his hostility toward the constitution markedly weakened the
movement, creating an opening for Mohammad Ali Shah, with the help of a
brigade under a Russian colonel, to jail and kill constitutionalists,
silence the press, establish martial law and bomb the Majles. However, the
Constitutional Movement was able to regroup and converge on Tehran,
finally forcing Mohammad Ali Shah to surrender on July 16, 1909.

Two years before this reassertion of popular will, an important event had
set the stage for the end of the Constitutional Movement. The
Anglo-Russian Entente of 1907 divided Iran into three spheres of
influence: the north and central parts under the Russians, the south under
the British, and in-between a “neutral zone.” This colonial agreement set
the stage for imminent foreign intervention. After the Shah’s surrender of
1909, Russia - fearing that the Constitutional Movement, with strong
foundations in northern Iran would hurt its interests - occupied Enzeli
and Rasht in the north and threatened to march on Tehran. By December
1911, due to this imperialist intervention, the Majles was forced to
dissolve. The decades that followed saw mass protests in the face of the
Anglo-Russian occupation, a period of political disintegration and the
rise of another local tyrant: Reza Shah. Nonetheless, this short-lived
revolution inspired generations to follow, ultimately leading to the
strong anti-imperialist movement of the early 1950’s.



* * *


Iran has always been an amalgamation of ideologies, histories, languages
and ethnicities, layered with religious, class, urban-rural and gender
complexities and divisions. These various communities and identities are
tied together by the presumptuous and ultimately false notion of “Iranian
nationhood.” Iran, like so many other nations, should be understood as a
complex mix of incongruities and differences. Beyond the dominant Persian
and Twelver Shi’i Islamic identities, there at least another eighteen
languages, religions and ethnicities present in Iran, including but not
restricted to Azeris, Kurds, Baluchis, Turkmens, Armenians, Assyrians,
Georgians, Bakhtiaris, Khamsehs, Lurs, Qashqais, Arabs, Jews,
Zoroastrians, Bahai’s, Sunni Muslims and Afghan refugees. Iran’s
population, numbering roughly 70 million (not including the 1.9 million
Afghan refugees), while in no way monolithic, does share one commonality:
the tyranny of the Islamic Regime.


* * *


The Iran of today has deep roots in the events of 1953, when the CIA
reinstalled Reza Shah to act as the United States’ main proxy in the Gulf
region. As the Shah re-established his repressive rule, Iran also became
the US’ main provider of cheap and accessible oil and an important
consumer of Western military hardware (including nuclear technology).

The 1953 coup lowered an “iron curtain” on Iranian politics, making the
work of progressive and revolutionary movements treacherous. Still, six
decades after the Constitutional Revolution another epic movement against
a native-born tyrant shook Iran. Building on decades of resistance, wide
sectors of Iranian society participated in the monumental Iranian
Revolution (1979). On January 16, 1979 a defeated Muhammad Reza Shah left
the country; however, what had begun as a radical broad-based initiative,
supported and developed by millions was quickly highjacked by the Islamic
leadership trusted to lead it.

In order to mount a united campaign against the monarchy, many nationalist
(most importantly the Liberation Movement led by Mehdi Bazargan and the
prominent progressive cleric Ayatollah Taleqani), socialist (namely the
urban guerilla movement of the Cherik-ha-ye- Fada'i-e Khalq and the
longstanding, Russian backed, Tudeh Party), and non-clerical Islamic
socialists (the Mojahedin-e khalq) rallied behind the populist leadership
of Ayatollah Khomeini, not knowing what horrors were to come. Although,
the religious authority of clerical leadership was deeply anchored into
Iranian culture, and Shi’i sentiments where readily activated toward
political ends (in both positive and negative ways), the 1979 revolution
was in no way exclusively Islamic; rather it was forcefully “Islamicized.”

Through a series of opportunistic and repressive maneuvers following the
Shah’s departure - including the systematic annihilation of all opposition
- Ayatollah Khomeini shrewdly transformed a popular revolution into the
tyrannical Islamic Republic of Iran. The clerical regime was able to
achieve its aims by utilizing and manipulating two important events: The
American Embassy Hostage Crisis (1979-80) and the brutal Iran-Iraq war
(1980-88).

The hostage crisis broke when a group of students took American diplomats
and embassy staff as hostages. Khomeini seized the situation as a
smokescreen for the regime’s brutal repression of Kurdish autonomy, the
ratification of a draconian Islamic constitution and the suppression of
progressive meetings and gatherings (carried out by the emerging Hezbollah
or “party of god”). The Hezbollah, established by Khomeini to impress upon
the population his political ideology, was a ruthless agent of repression.
(3)

The outbreak of the Iran-Iraq war (1980-88) became Khomeini’s next
opportunity to cement his rule. The war was started by Iraq, although Iran
happily jumped into it. As a result one million people lost their lives
and another million were displaced. Beyond the opportunistic use of the
war to reinforce the cruel tyrannies of Ayatollah Khomeini and Saddam
Hussein, the war was perpetuated through the sale of arms by foreign
powers, particularly the United States (through Israel, in what become a
major scandal, know as the Iran-Contra Affair), the Soviet-Union and
France. Throughout the war the United States backed Iraq, even deploying
its navy into the Persian Gulf, though their overall strategy aimed to
contain both sides. Henry Kissinger’s statement "too bad they can't both
lose" is emblematic of this callous approach. Throughout the war Khomeini
brutally clamped down on internal unrest, using national security as a
pretext. Alongside social repression, an active propaganda campaign that
utilized the notion of martyrdom and attempted to evoke national pride was
at the forefront of the regime’s effort to control popular protest. The
same propaganda campaign, with imagery and language from Khomeini’s
period, is still present in Iran today.

The Iran-Iraq war and the American Embassy Hostage Crisis afforded the
Iranian regime the opportunity to wipe out its opposition and entrench its
own calculated authority. This power was most tyrannically expressed
through the establishment of velayat-e-faqih (rule of the jurisprudent, or
guardianship of the Clerical Jurist), a religious institution that grants
unequivocal and unquestionable authority to a Supreme Leader: at that time
Ayatollah Khomeini and today Ayatollah Khamenehi. The events surrounding
the forced transformation of the 1979 Iranian Revolution into an Islamic
Republic have left deep scars upon the people of Iran, particularly among
those who experienced the revolution.


* * *


After less than two decades of failed reconstruction and reform under
Presidents Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani (1989-97) and Mohammad Khatami
(1997-2005), Iranians went to polls, on June 25, 2005. This election made
the conservative populist, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, president. Although, Iran
has the semblance of democracy with an elected president and parliament,
ultimate power resides in the hands of the Supreme Leader and a few cleric
controlled state organs - the Judiciary, the Guardian Council and the
Expediency Council. Nonetheless, American foreign policy planners,
pursuing regime change, have exaggerated Ahmadinejad’s power, which is
limited (for example, he does not control the military or foreign policy).

>From his side, Ahmadinejad has opportunistically embraced the spotlight,
in order to divert attention away from social and economic distress and to
spur nationalism. To this end, he has pursued the ludicrous questioning of
the Holocaust and the chauvinistic defense of Iran’s nuclear program.
While elected into office by Iran’s poor and disenfranchised - left out of
Rafsanjani’s neo-liberal reconstruction project - Ahmadinejad has not been
able to deliver on his election promises. Iran’s harsh economic and social
realities have overtaken his empty populist rhetoric. Meanwhile,
Ahmadinejad has become a useful villain for American policy makers, trying
to convolute the realities of Iranian politics in an attempt to prepare
the stage for self-serving intervention.

The issue of Iran’s nuclear program has gained tremendous attention
recently. It has been exploited by both the Iranian and US governments
towards their own strategic ends. Iran has manipulated the issue into a
question of national pride and used it as a way to suppress political
opposition as treasonous. (4) The US, motivated by an agenda seeking
strategic control of the entire region including Iran, has pushed the
issue onto the international spotlight in order to manufacture an
opportunity for intervention. Moreover, the hypocrisy of US foreign policy
planners is glaring: it was the same United States, beginning in 1957,
that enthusiastically supported and provided nuclear technology for its
strategic ally, the dictator Muhammad Reza Shah. This technology and
infrastructure is being used today by the Islamic regime.

The criminal invasions and occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq to the east
and west of Iran, by the United States and its allies (including Canada),
have allowed the Islamic Regime to ratchet up misguided nationalism. (5)
In the wake of the Bush Doctrine, unveiled in a document entitled National
Security Strategy of the United States of America, and President Bush’s
“Axis of Evil” speech (on January 29, 2002), America’s aim for the
strategic control of the Middle East region, with Iran as a key component,
is more than ever clear. The pressure and warmongering so far directed at
Iran have only fed into the strategies of the Iranian conservative block.
This section of the Iranian regime has welcomed US aggression as a means
of propelling nationalism and camouflaging internal repression. (6)
Through indirect collusion, the United States and the Islamic Republic
have worked in tandem to silence resistance within Iran which, for all
intents and purposes, has created an atmosphere where Iranians fighting to
change or oust the regime are dismissed as supporters of the United
States. One example was the arrest of the widely respected Mansour
Ossanlou, the leader of the Vahed bus workers union who was accused of
“maintaining relations with and receiving financial support from a foreign
power.”

The challenge facing Iran’s peoples remains the same as a hundred years
ago: overthrow an oppressive domestic regime (with clerics replacing
monarchs) and defend against foreign intervention (with the United States
replacing Russian and Britain as the main imperialist force).


* * *


With half of the population under the age of 24, Iran’s youth are an
important factor for change. This demographic reality placed next to
rampant unemployment, rising inflation and increasing poverty has produced
bewilderment and opposition among many Iranians, youth in particular. In
an attempt to sidetrack this reality, the regime has continued its
militarization of poverty, through the absorption of youth and poor into
the various military branches (Pasdaran, Basijj and Hezbollah).
Nonetheless, people are still motivated by the dire realities of their
day-to-day lives, ranging from repressive social controls to economic
hardship.

The rise of mass communication, especially the Internet (with some
estimates reporting the existence of as many as 75,000 Persian blogs, and
Persian being one of the most popular languages for blogs in the world)
has become a key window toward change. This has occurred despite the
regime’s attempts to censor web access and restrict the speed of Internet
connections. At the same time the relentless work of labor, student and
women’s movements, who in the face systematic repression continue to forge
ahead, are another important factor for progressive change. Thus,
resentment toward the regime, especially by youth with access through the
Internet to alternative ideas and messages, along with the work of many
grassroots movements fighting to change Iran’s current reality, are
together fueling another broad-based struggle for revolution.

Hostilities and the looming prospect of an attack by the United States
have only served to stifle the voice of resistance movements and
strengthen the grip of the Islamic regime. US aggression has sparked fear
and nationalism amongst the population, which in turn has been insidiously
manipulated by the regime in order to further impose its rule. Not only is
any kind of forced intervention dangerous for those living in Iran (and
should be understood as part of a long history of imperialist aggression
built upon centuries of brutal colonialism), but it will also undermine
the persistent work of movements within Iran, by affording the regime more
opportunities to repress resistance in the name of national security.

As an “Iranian” forced to leave Iran by a brutal regime, who is very
conscious of past and present imperialist and colonial realities, I see no
choice but to expose and resist, with equal urgency, the Iranian regime
and US-led imperialism.

-- Poya Saffari is a farmer and activist based in Quebec. He is active
with migrant justice and indigenous solidarity struggles in Montreal with
groups like No One Is Illegal and Solidarity Across Borders. A previous
reflection by Poya is linked HERE. For feedback on this article, and for a
full bibliography, contact poya at resist.ca.

Footnotes:
1) “Iran” will be employed throughout this text in reference to both the
present nation-state labeled as such, as well as the entity formerly
called “Persia“(before 1935).
2) The period between June 1905 and August 1906 - beginning with a protest
in the form of a procession during the religious mourning of Muharram and
ending with the creation of a Constituent National Assembly, is know as
the Constitutional Revolution, although the struggle for a constitution
continued for years after. Consequently, the entire span between 1905 and
1911 is considered the period of the Constitutional Movement.
3) The passionate opinions of many left-wing Iranians regarding the
Lebanese Hezbollah are rooted in the brutality of the Iranian Hezbollah
following the Iranian Revolution of 1979. The Lebanese Hezbollah was
created from conditions spurred by devastating Israeli oppression, the
liberation efforts of Lebanon’s historically marginalized Shi’i population
and Iran’s desire to propagate its political ideology and influence. Even
though Iran did play a critical role during the formation of the Lebanese
Hezbollah, it is today an independent political entity, though it still
receives considerable financial and military support from Iran. Moreover,
its foundations and present political ideologies are arguably tied to
Khomeini (still revered in Iran, Lebanon and elsewhere, as a saint).
4) It should be obvious that nuclear weapons in the hands of anyone,
whether Iran or the United States, is unacceptable and disastrous.
Furthermore, it should be made obvious that Iran is pursuing nuclear
capacity as both a supplemental energy source and to pursue the
potentiality of a nuclear weapon for strategic power reasons. We should
remember that Iran has ample motivation, to seek a nuclear arsenal, since
it is surrounded by nuclear states; Russia, Pakistan, Israel and the
United States in the Persian Gulf.
5) The immense destruction and bloodshed perpetrated by at the United
States and its allies – through wars, sanctions and occupations in Iraq
and Afghanistan cannot be forgotten.
6) The clerical power structure within Iran is divided into two main
camps, with relatively differing perspectives on US hostility. The
pragmatists, led by Rafsanjani, prefer to maintain the regime through
relatively neutral and in-offensive positioning in the face of US
aggression. Rafsanjani, one of the wealthiest people in the world, holds a
great deal of power in Iranian politics, but cannot climb to the position
of supreme leader due to his lack of cleric credentials and thus is
pushing to do away with velayat-e-faqih in order to increase his potential
power. The strategy of the pragmatist branch is also fueled by a desire to
open the Iranian market to foreign investment (meaning they want to see an
end to the long standing American boycott on investment in Iran) and
increased neo-liberal economic strategies. Meanwhile the conservatives,
led by Mehsbah Yazdi and Khamenehi, hold a strategy that aims to maintain
power by aggressive posturing against the US that can be transformed into
public support.