Pick the Continue Reading link for George Friedman’s
above titled essay, from Strategic Forecasting Inc. (via
www.stratfor.com), permission granted to reproduce here.
In 1979, when we were still young and starry-eyed, a revolution took place in Iran. When I asked experts what would happen, they divided into two camps.
The first group of Iran experts argued that the Shah of Iran would certainly survive, that the unrest was simply a cyclical event readily manageable by his security, and that the Iranian people were united behind the Iranian monarch’s modernization program. These experts developed this view by talking to the same Iranian officials and businessmen they had been talking to for years — Iranians who had grown wealthy and powerful under the shah and who spoke English, since Iran experts frequently didn’t speak Farsi all that well.
The second group of Iran experts regarded the shah as a repressive brute, and saw the revolution as aimed at liberalizing the country. Their sources were the professionals and academics who supported the uprising — Iranians who knew what former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini believed, but didn’t think he had much popular support. They thought the revolution would result in an increase in human rights and liberty. The experts in this group spoke even less Farsi than the those in the first group.
Misreading Sentiment in Iran
Limited to information on Iran from English-speaking opponents of the regime, both groups of Iran experts got a very misleading vision of where the revolution was heading — because the Iranian revolution was not brought about by the people who spoke English. It was made by merchants in city bazaars, by rural peasants, by the clergy — people Americans didn’t speak to because they couldn’t. This demographic was unsure of the virtues of modernization and not at all clear on the virtues of liberalism. From the time they were born, its members knew the virtue of Islam, and that the Iranian state must be an Islamic state.
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.
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. And these people give Westerners a wildly distorted view of Iran. They can create the impression that a fantastic liberalization is at hand — but not when you realize that iPod-owning Anglophones are not exactly the majority in Iran.
Last Friday, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-elected with about two-thirds of the vote. Supporters of his opponent, both inside and outside Iran, were stunned. A poll revealed that former Iranian Prime Minister Mir Hossein Mousavi was beating Ahmadinejad. It is, of course, interesting to meditate on how you could conduct a poll in a country where phones are not universal, and making a call once you have found a phone can be a trial. A poll therefore would probably reach people who had phones and lived in Tehran and other urban areas. Among those, Mousavi probably did win. But outside Tehran, and beyond persons easy to poll, the numbers turned out quite different.
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. Widespread fraud would mean that Ahmadinejad manufactured numbers in Tehran without any regard for the vote. But he has many powerful enemies who would quickly have spotted this and would have called him on it. 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.
Ahmadinejad’s Popularity
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.
First, Ahmadinejad speaks of piety. Among vast swathes of Iranian society, the willingness to speak unaffectedly about religion is crucial. Though it may be difficult for Americans and Europeans to believe, there are people in the world to whom economic progress is not of the essence; people who want to maintain their communities as they are and live the way their grandparents lived. These are people who see modernization — whether from the shah or Mousavi — as unattractive. They forgive Ahmadinejad his economic failures.
Second, Ahmadinejad speaks of corruption. There is a sense in the countryside that the ayatollahs — who enjoy enormous wealth and power, and often have lifestyles that reflect this — have corrupted the Islamic Revolution. Ahmadinejad is disliked by many of the religious elite precisely because he has systematically raised the corruption issue, which resonates in the countryside.
Third, Ahmadinejad is a spokesman for Iranian national security, a tremendously popular stance. It must always be remembered that Iran fought a war with Iraq in the 1980s that lasted eight years, cost untold lives and suffering, and effectively ended in its defeat. Iranians, particularly the poor, experienced this war on an intimate level. They fought in the war, and lost husbands and sons in it. As in other countries, memories of a lost war don’t necessarily delegitimize the regime. Rather, they can generate hopes for a resurgent Iran, thus validating the sacrifices made in that war — something Ahmadinejad taps into. By arguing that Iran should not back down but become a major power, he speaks to the veterans and their families, who want something positive to emerge from all their sacrifices in the war.
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. Such a base will get you hammered, and Mousavi got hammered. 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.
For a time on Friday, it seemed that Mousavi might be able to call for an uprising in Tehran. But the moment passed when Ahmadinejad’s security forces on motorcycles intervened. And that leaves the West with its worst-case scenario: a democratically elected anti-liberal.
Western democracies assume that publics will elect liberals who will protect their rights. In reality, it’s a more complicated world. Hitler is the classic example of someone who came to power constitutionally, and then preceded to gut the constitution. Similarly, Ahmadinejad’s victory is a triumph of both democracy and repression.
The Road Ahead: More of the Same
The question now is what will happen next. Internally, we can expect Ahmadinejad to consolidate his position under the cover of anti-corruption. He wants to clean up the ayatollahs, many of whom are his enemies. He will need the support of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. This election has made Ahmadinejad a powerful president, perhaps the most powerful in Iran since the revolution. Ahmadinejad does not want to challe
nge Khamenei, and we suspect that Khamenei will not want to challenge Ahmadinejad. A forced marriage is emerging, one which may place many other religious leaders in a difficult position.
Certainly, hopes that a new political leadership would cut back on Iran’s nuclear program have been dashed. The champion of that program has won, in part because he championed the program. We still see Iran as far from developing a deliverable nuclear weapon, but certainly the Obama administration’s hopes that Ahmadinejad would either be replaced — or at least weakened and forced to be more conciliatory — have been crushed. Interestingly, Ahmadinejad sent congratulations to U.S. President Barack Obama on his inauguration. We would expect Obama to reciprocate under his opening policy, which U.S. Vice President Joe Biden appears to have affirmed, assuming he was speaking for Obama. Once the vote fraud issue settles, we will have a better idea of whether Obama’s policies will continue. (We expect they will.)
What we have now are two presidents in a politically secure position, something that normally forms a basis for negotiations. The problem is that it is not clear what the Iranians are prepared to negotiate on, nor is it clear what the Americans are prepared to give the Iranians to induce them to negotiate. Iran wants greater influence in Iraq and its role as a regional leader acknowledged, something the United States doesn’t want to give them. The United States wants an end to the Iranian nuclear program, which Iran doesn’t want to give.
On the surface, this would seem to open the door for an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Former U.S. President George W. Bush did not — and Obama does not — have any appetite for such an attack. Both presidents blocked the Israelis from attacking, assuming the Israelis ever actually wanted to attack.
For the moment, the election appears to have frozen the status quo in place. Neither the United States nor Iran seem prepared to move significantly, and there are no third parties that want to get involved in the issue beyond the occasional European diplomatic mission or Russian threat to sell something to Iran. In the end, this shows what we have long known: This game is locked in place, and goes on.
That essay is by George Friedman © Strategic Forecasting, 2009
(at www.stratfor.com), permission granted to reproduce here.
One of the great book on Iran says: In Iran one thing which is certain is that nothing is certain. It can well apply to that piece of George Friedman prose:
“For a time on Friday, it seemed that Mousavi might be able to call for an uprising in Tehran. But the moment passed ”
The moment has not passed with 1 mln people or so on Sunday spontaneously marching in Tehran.
The moment has not passed with one to one and half million people descending on Azadi (Freedom) Square on Monday, even as Mousavi said that the protest is canceled.
The moment has not passed with Mousavi declaring nation-wide strike on Tuesday.
The moment has not passed yet, even with terribly slow internet and cell phones cut off.
It may pass tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow or it may not pass at all.
But George Friedman is wrong – it has not passed yet.
If you believe those reports, Ella. Time will tell.
Nope, I disagree. Friedman is focusing on the rural, no-growth, no change sector of the Iranian population. That’s not the locus of the majority of Iranians, who are young (under 30) and urban.
Friedman ignores this sector as a key political force, and so does Ahmandinejad. The urban population is almost 70% of its total.
The fact that this rural sector, that 30% of the population doesn’t speak English doesn’t mean that they are a majority force in political and economic goals, in Iran. Iran cannot remain a no-growth economy, as its oil runs out. It has set itself up with an economy that is almost entirely state-run and based around oil. Private enterprise is minimal and local.
This economic and political marginalization of the majority of the population, the youth in the urban centres, has led to a call for reform. Mousavi didn’t speak for ‘the better districts’. He spoke for the urban youth who are un or underemployed, without power and treated as peasants in a modern state.
The call for reform in Iran has been suppressed by diversionary strategies. These include the diversion of Evil, exemplified by Israel and America, as somehow responsible for the internal situation. Another diversionary strategy is mental blackmail by installing a rigid theocracy with threats of crisis and damnation if you don’t obey the authorities.
So, what you have in Iran is a conflict between an old tribal, no-growth societal system, now confined to the rural areas – and the older generation…and a young, urban generation who are marginalized, unemployed, and without economic and political power.
It cannot last. The ‘energy’, both physical (police) and mental (religious) required to suppress an emerging middle class requirement is too great to sustain.
So, I very much disagree with the esteemed Friedman. Oh, and Iran wants more input into Iraq? What right does it have for that agenda?
As for fraud, I continue to consider it a reality. Ahmadinejad was not democratically elected. There is no way that the ballots could be counted so rapidly, no way that exit polling could be all that wrong, no way that the youth could be that angry over a valid election.
I agree with you in theory, ET.
I agree with Friedman in practice.
Kindly explain, vitruvius, the reality of your Iranian world where theory and practice have become so drastically separated.
I think that such a state, where Ideal Form (theory) and Material Actuality (practice) are separate is a state on the verge of collapse.
My perspective is that the economic and political situation in Iran – strictly internally – has reached its threshold of tolerance from the people. It is a two-class structure with an elite theological governance tied to an authoritarian governance – that sets itself up as complete ruler over the mass of the people.
There is no middle class allowed, economically or politically. But the urban youth ARE the emerging middle class, and my point is that they ARE the reality, or ‘practice’…and Iran can’t continue to constrain and repress them. It’s like trying to make a river flow the opposite way; eventually, you have give up and let Nature Rule. A middle class is Nature’s Rule.
The proposition that one can declare a winner in a truly free democratic election within two hours of the polls closing doesn’t pass the smell test by any stretch of the imagination.
In the US a presidential election return night drags on for hours with the punditocracy drooling over the entrails of each poll returned in close districts. Usually in the neighbourhood of 5 or 6 hours. With a population of 70 odd million in Iran, how are they going to count the votes from rural areas with the lack of a fully modern computerized voting system? I’m sure there would be some lengthy hand counting of millions of ballots.
It is pure fantasy to suggest the ‘winner’ within two hours of the polls closing.
I think Khamenei is smart enough to recognize this fact and has ordered an electoral investigation. A simple whitewash won’t probably do it this time round.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6502374.ece
“Iran’s Supreme Leader has ordered an investigation into the disputed re-election of President Ahmadinejad, reversing his earlier decree that the result was fair.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s intervention came as Iran braced itself for a third day of street protests by reformists, who claim that official voting figures giving Mr Ahmadinejad 63 per cent in last Friday’s election were rigged, and a “charade”.
Ayatollah Khamenei, who has the final say on all strategic matters, had described the result as fair and urged the country to unite behind Mr Ahmadinejad.
Today it emerged, however, that he had met the defeated opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi last night and ordered the powerful Guardians Council to examine his allegations of vote-rigging.”
I would submit that this little episode is far from over.
Cheers
Hans-Christian Georg Rupprecht, Commander in Chief
1st Saint Nicolaas Army
Army Group “True North”
The theory and practice are at this time temporally separated by a fractal transition barrier, ET. From the perspective of a political scientist, they may not seem that far apart, yet when the realpolitic energy barriers are considered by a political engineer, they don’t seem as close as theory seems to claim.
vitruvius – heh, nice one.
Pollyanna ET writes again. “Just a bit more industrialization and democracy shall smite tribalism once and for all”.
And they shall gaze upon the gods they have made and shall be dismayed.
Great societies rise and great societies fall. It is the ways of mankind. An idea is formed and from it an ideal springs. The ideal is codified and a society begins its upward trend. Slowly at first then gathering momentum it swings upward until unnoticed it slides past its prime and begins its inevitable descent. What was once an ideal becomes a right which becomes a demand. The good of the group is supplanted by the greed of the individual. The have of much begets the crave for more and downward spirals the society.
Oh how the mighty have fallen.
Persia, Greece, Roman, Mongolian, British, Russian, American it is the ways of mankind.
Thanks, ET. When I said that I agree with you in theory, I wasn’t kidding. I think that your description of the, how shall I say, generic model of the evolution of large-scale human social systems at the anthropological level is probably closer to what’s going on than many or perhaps all other contenders. Still, you can’t get from here to there in a straight line. Human nature at least, or perhaps nature in general, simply will not stand for simply. Thus, the question at this point isn’t “What should happen, in Theory”, the question is “What is Likely to happen, in Practice”, ergo, my referencing the Friedman essay.
I am totally surprised by the election results and can only conclude that they were rigged. I lived in Eastern Iran in the early 90s, saw first hand the corruption and inflation and things were only getting worse.
The current level of inflation in Iran precludes most from having any meat in their diets. Chicken, last I heard, was about 8 times as expensive as it was about 5 years before that.
I don’t agree that the young people put Imadinnerjacket back into power. Many are unemployed, even with degrees, and can’t ask their sweethearts to marry them until they can show that they have the means to support a wife and family.
That is not a rosy picture for the reelection of an incumbent.
The point remains, Niall, that you, like Ella, relate to the Iranian elite. However, in a democracy, the elite don’t necessarily get their way, sometimes the populace preferes what the elites consider to be despotism. In Iran, some non-trivial portion of the electorate considers the mullahs to be corrupt, and thus is siding with Ahmadinejad, even as the elite consider the state corrupt, and thus side with… oh, oh, the mullahs? Yuck! This you would have understood if you had actually bothered to understand Mr. Friedmans essay, which I so laboriously went to the trouble of providing to you the benefit thereof.
I argue it doesn’t matter if Mousavi or Ahmadinejad wins as the ayatollahs are in charge. While there is, no doubt, the need and demand for change, if the lynch pin of Islamofascism remains, not a lot will be done.
Just my thoughts.
Don’t be so glib, Osumashi Kinyobe. I think that what matters is that the ayatollahs and the state dance together well, and I don’t think that Mousavi understood that, else the ayatollahs probably would have backed him. It’s not who’s in control, it’s that neither the state nor the ayatollahs want civil war. So they work together to appeal to the de facto majority.
Vitruvius @ 7:51PM –
Vit – I was not referring to the Iranian elite, but to the general populace – the people who make up most of Iran and who are having a tough time feeding their families and generally providing for them.
As to who sides with the mullahs – not many, either in or out of the elite.
In any part of Iran you can see motor cycles that once had big Harley type engines but have been reconfigured to handle 150cc specials. Why? Mullah hunting was a popular sport. A driver and rider would ride into a town, find and kill a mullah and then head out into the desert – no police could track them. Hence – a law that required a limit on engine size.
And Vit – I did read the posting/essay you so kindly provided. Sitting politicians are not viewed any differently in Iran than are the mullahs – they are all past of the same ruling establishment.
In my time in Iran, I only encountered two anti-Western types; one was a shop keeper who told us to leave his shop, and the other was a corrupt local who only liked people who bribed him (we didn’t – we had no need to do so).
One of my Iranian friends and I used to discuss the situation – behind closed doors where no one could hear us. His conclusion was that all men/women only want something better for their children than they had experienced as children – and a better future.
I think his feeling is generally true in the entire country.
One other thing we noted – there are many women in Iran who remember what it was like pre 1979. Tehran was once a fashon capital. Now they are forced to wear chadors and if their head covering is too far back, they risk incurring the wrath of the religious police (who are now intergrated into the regular police).
We always felt the next revolution in Iran would be started by the women, one way or another.
Time will tell, Niall.
The problem is without a proper way of polling you’ll never really know.
Then it all comes down to symbols, demonstrations and raw power.
I dont doubt that Ahmandinijad has a power base. And he may have won, who knows now. You can’t appeal to an objective authority anymore, like conting ballots. The battle is at the elite level. The longer it goes it wont be a question of who gets to run the system, but what system?
For the moment the army, an army of conscripts, has been on the sidelines. We will see what they do, I am sure all sides don’t want to find out. At some point the Mullahs may realize their best option is Mousavi (sp) to preserve their own power…keep your enemies closer etc etc.
They were able to sideline rafsanjani, a prvious “reformer”.
In some ways my hope is that the hardliners overplay their hand and bring the house down on themselves. I just dont think they are that dumb.
Aye, Stephen.
I fully agree with your rejection of the linearity of a straight line. Societies are non-linear, they are complex adaptive systems, and most certainly, you don’t move from one structure to another one, in a gentle sleep-inducing linearity.
Here’s an interesting outline of how Ahmadinejad rigged the election.
How the Iranian Election was Won
It includes an outline of how the theocracy decided on Ahmad, how it has millions on their payrolls; how Ahmad himself had set up a network of dependencies in the rural areas by billions in handouts, how they prevented run-off elections, which they figured Ahmad would lose..and so on.
The corruption of the current regime has been exposed, and now, the people who want change are networked and interactive. There is no going back and change, soon, is inevitable.
I too think that change is, probably, soon, inevitable, but for some value of soon that does not include now. You can’t simply dismiss that portion of the electorate who think that the corruption is on the other side than you do.
Change may be inevitable, but how much? It may not be what we want…but it isnt about us.
But do not discount the ability of a regime with tentacles as extensive as you discussed to respond. Change is going to come, soon I hope but it may well take longer than we think. But like you, I see the regime as having an expiry date. It will collapse eventually. Contain and pressure and find a way to encourage the elements that work and play well with us, or at least do us no harm.
I do wish there were some expats on this board who could provide some insight from home.
You are correct, Stephen: It isn’t about us. Or rather, it isn’t up to us.
It’s early; we might eventually find out, or we might not. In the meantime, fwiw,
— The Guardian reports information that “disgruntled Interior Ministry officials” leaked results showing Mir Hossein Mousavi having won a clear majority, with Ahmadinejad placing third;
— Former president Mohammed Khatami said the election should be declared void because of fraud
— David Miliband, Britain’s foreign secretary, says he has “serious doubts” about the official results.
— AP asks “How do you count almost 40 million handwritten paper ballots in a matter of hours and declare a winner? That’s a key question in Iran’s disputed presidential election.”
Btw, there’s a good, extensive photo gallery of what’s been happening on the streets, and at the University, in Tehran, at:
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/06/irans_disputed_election.html
My heart goes out to the Iranian people.
Persian-Canadian blogger Winston is covering this at thespiritofman.blogspot.com
If the ayatollahs weren’t important, there would be no need for their input. They are hardly figureheads.
These reports of Hezbollah keep coming up….yesterday it was discounted as Ansar Hezbollah, a local band of nuts….but from Der Spiegel an allegation of 5,000 hezbollah from Lebanon in tehran for a showdown…..
Caveat, fog of war, rumours etc…..but this one is to big to be ignored and should be able to be confirmed at some point. Yowsa thats not good and will not play well in a number of quarters if true.
http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,630463-2,00.html
Here’s a link to the reason the change is gonna happen…
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/HK21Ak01.html
Get real folks. Unless the regime is willing to employ draconian measures, like those imposed by the Chinese at Tiananmen Square, the game is up for the mullahs. When the people take to the streets in mass protest and are willing to risk beatings and summary executions, the ruling government has lost. Remember the pictures of Boris Yeltsin standing on the tanks and defying the Soviets? Thus far the Iranian military has not involved itself. Don’t be surprised if a military coup occurs in short order. The Revolutionary Guard isn’t geared for fighting against a military force. Should make for interesting news over the next few days.
Time will tell, Jack.
Two blogs I’m following closely are saying 2 million and that’s just in Tehran. There are other cities where the protest is also taking place. The videos on YouTube tell the story. The protest is massive and is entering it’s fourth day.
“Unless the regime is willing to employ draconian measures, like those imposed by the Chinese at Tiananmen Square, the game is up for the mullahs.”
This one is magnitudes larger than Tianamen Square. And it’s not just students. At one university where student dorms were surrounded by state police the faculty resigned en masse. Parents are out in the streets with their sons and daughters. No. This one is for real. I think the esteemed writer of that article needs to get on to twitter.
Watch this one.
http://azarmehr.blogspot.com/
And by the way, the election was called just minutes after the polls closed and hours before polls for Iranian nationals in the US had even closed. If Iranian votes weren’t counted, why bother with the ones in the US.
Listen to Hugh Hewitt. The guards are switching sides.
Listen to Hugh Hewitt. The guards are switching sides.
http://townhall.com/TalkRadio/Show.aspx?ContentGuid=d9c7b791-2e76-41d4-ae84-4e6fd12b4fb1&RadioShowId=5
Michael Leeden at PJ Media has a very interesting article about the uprising. Watch the women…
==============
Does Mousavi even want to change the system? I think he does, and in any event, I think that’s the wrong question. He is not a revolutionary leader, he is a leader who has been made into a revolutionary by a movement that grew up around him. The real revolutionary is his wife, Zahra Rahnavard. And the real question, the key question in all of this, is: why did Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei permit her to become such a charismatic figure? How could he have made such a colossal blunder? It should have been obvious that the very existence of such a woman threatened the dark heart of the Islamic Republic, based as it is on the disgusting misogyny of its founder, the Ayatollah Khomeini.
=============
Re: “The proposition that one can declare a winner in a truly free democratic election within two hours of the polls closing doesn’t pass the smell test by any stretch of the imagination.”
I’m not so sure about that. Canadian election coverage in some cases has projected a winner mere minutes after the polls close.
But this is a quibble. It certainly looks like the Iranian election was rigged. Some have suggested the previous one was too.
When the citizens, “disgruntled Interior Ministry officials”, the police and the army side with the protesters against the regime and its foreign, Arabic-speaking gangsters, the battle will be on. Let’s hope the mullahs’ day will be over. But recall that it appeared that China was going this way in 1989, and nothing in the way of political reform came of it. In that instance, a tank division from deep in the rural areas was brought in to crush the Tiananmen Square protest because the local ones wouldn’t do it.
Speaking of Michael Leeden, try reading this one.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/06/iran_election_the_beginning_of.html
The regime is dead folks. Neither the police nor the civil service are willing to do its bidding. The game is over.
I agree with much of the sentiment of this article, but not that the guy won, or that this was a real election.
The result was announced within 2 hours of the polls closing!
Vitruvious,
Is that like the Yogi Berra quip (I think was posted on another SDA thread)?:
In theory, theory and practice are the same. In Practice, they aren’t.
Another mass rally today is on the streets, despite Mousavi’s decision to cancel it in fear of the safety of his people. There are videos of it too, despite the regimes pathetic attempt to ban all media coverage of it.
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsMaps/idUSTRE55F54020090616