Murderous baby-killing Holocaust-denying nutjob Iranian President Ahmedinejad is in the Big Apple today, to give what will doubtless prove to be an inept, rambling, psychotic, Holocaust-denying speech to the UN General Assembly. (To avoid being Chavezed again, our own President Obama will be hiding in the men's room till Ahmedinejad is safely away.)
Yesterday's chat by Muammar Gaddafi doubtless gave us a preview of the sort of thing we might expect.
Members of the Iranian opposition have offered the idea that New York turn green for the duration of the General Assembly. (Green is the color of the Iranian democracy movement.)
If you live in the Apple, plug in green light bulbs! Hang green Xmas lights in your windows! Wave green flags! Wear green! Hang out your green welcome mat!
Green isn't just for St. Paddy's day anymore!
Interestingly enough, the Empire State Building will be green tonight. Not because of Ahmedinejad, but because it's the 70th anniversary of the Wizard of Oz movie.
The Iranian revolution has entered a grim and secret phase. Grim, because the news is of mass arrests, protests being smashed, demonstrators beaten. Secret, because the situation may be resolved--- or not--- by maneuvers within the Iranian power structure that are opaque to those of us in the West.
Still, the cries of "Allah o akbar" are louder than ever at night. Three weeks ago, Iranians still had residual faith in their regime. Now there is little to none. The regime can stay in power only through the continuous use of force.
The strategy now would be to co-opt the regime's security force.
Here's the video of "Stand By Me" recorded by Jon Bon Jovi and Iranian superstar Andy Madadian. The recording isn't for sale, it's a free gift to the Iranian people.
All the thinking I've been doing about Iran in the last week has brought to mind something that I always thought was kind of obvious, which is that Iran talks big and swaggers rather a lot for a country that has a built-in on-off switch. By which I mean Kharg Island.
Kharg Island lies about 25 nautical miles off the coast of Iran, and is the facility from which it ships the vast majority of its oil to the outside world--- 950 million tons per year from the southern facility alone, according to one article.
Seize Kharg Island, and you can basically turn off the tap on the Iranian economy. The government can't pay the basij, so the basij go home. They can't pay for their expensive nuclear facilities. They can't pay for their military.
That's what happened to the Shah in 1979. The revolution dragged on for a year or so, but when the oil workers walked out, the King of Kings became plain old Mr. Pahlavi.
Kharg Island is a hostage facility. It's a shotgun permanently pointed at the head of the person who built it.
Not that I'm advocating any of this, mind you. I merely make the observation that if the Iranian government really piss off any country that could mount a large enough carrier task force--- uh, I guess that would be the USA--- that force needn't bomb Tehran, or nuclear facilities, or anything beyond the minimum amount of suppression necessary to secure the island. (And the island is a large naval base, so it wouldn't be a complete pushover.)
The disadvantage, from the point of view of the world economy, is that the world would have to do without a billion tons of oil per year for however long the crisis lasted. (I wonder if that's why all those bomb-bomb-bomb-iran guys never mention this option--- they're also committed to a petroleum-fuelled economy.) Still, Kharg Island was pretty much shut down during the Iran-Iraq war, thanks to Iraqi air raids, so the world has done without Iranian oil before.
I wonder how many other nations have on-off switches? Certainly Egypt is one--- they became a hostage the second they completed the Aswan High Dam. One sufficiently large bomb behind the dam, and a tsunami carries 99% of the population out to sea. It would be the greatest atrocity in history, but few Egyptians would survive to complain.
Mr. Putin has successfully demonstrated that he can hold Ukraine and much of Europe hostage, simply by turning off the taps that control oil and natural gas.
The US doesn't have any single switches that I can think of--- unless of course someone succeeds in switching off World of Warcraft, the dangers of which this video points out.
Whatever happens from this point on, nothing will ever be the same in Tehran.
Whatever happens, if the protest gains momentum or loses steam, if it ends up prevailing or if the regime succeeds in terrorizing it, he who should now only be called president-non-elect Ahmadinejad will only be an ersatz, illegitimate, weakened president.
Whatever happens, whatever the result of this crisis provoked two weeks ago by the enormity of a fraud that serious-minded people can no longer doubt, no Iranian leader can appear on the global scene, or in any negotiation with Obama, Sarkozy, or Merkel, without being haloed, not by the nimbus of light dreamed of by Ahmadinejad in his 2005 speech to the United Nations, but by the cloud of sulphur that crowns cheaters and butchers . . .
Whatever happens, the block of ayatollahs who had always succeeded in maintaining a united front, whatever their differences and divergent interests, will have put their ferocious divisions on display: the ones behind Khamenei, approving of the decision to crush the movement with blood; the others, like the ex-President Rafsanjani, leader of the very powerful Assembly of Experts, warning that if the wave of protests were not taken seriously, veritable "volcanoes" of anger would erupt. Others still like the Grand Ayatollah Montazeri who, since his house arrest in Qom, has been calling for a recount and for national mourning for the victims of the repression; and without mentioning the leading religious experts of the "Office of Theological Seminaries" who no longer fear proposing the possibility--what passed for heresy not long ago--of Khamenei's resignation and of his replacement by a "Guidance Council."
Whatever happens, and beyond these internal conflicts, the people will be dissociated from an anemic and fatally wounded regime.
Whatever happens, young people, who were believed to be enthralled by the principles of political Islam and who a month ago, upon Ahmadinejad's return from Geneva, had supposedly planned a triumphal reception for the president-non-elect, will have said, loud and proud, with an audacity matched only by their political intelligence, that this president shamed them . . .
Whatever happens, the people know, from this point on, that they are the people and that there is not a regime on earth that can remain in power against the people. Whatever happens, a body politic has been formed in the heat of peaceful protests--and even if it gets winded and loses steam, even if the murderers think they can declare victory, there is a new actor onstage, without whom the rest of this country's story will not be written.
Whatever happens, the beautiful face of Neda Soltan, killed at point-blank range last Saturday by a Bassidj henchman, the images of kids beaten to death by the attack squadron and motorcycle infantry of the guardians of the revolution, the videos of the enormous protests, impressively calm and dignified, will have, via Twitter, circled both the cyberplanet and the planet.
Whatever happens, the emperor has no clothes.
Whatever happens, the regime of the ayatollahs is, in the greater or lesser long term, condemned to compromise or disappear.
We always forget that the other revolution--the first, which, 30 years ago, put this Iranian-style National Socialism into power--lasted almost a year: why would it be any different for this revolution, a democratic one concerned with what's right, which has also just taken the stage? The earth quakes in Tehran, and it is only, I'm willing to bet, the beginning.
Nothing like a French philosopher to sum things up in the grand manner.
Another long day trying to keep up with events in Iran.
For those who wish to help Iranians and dissidents in other nations evade surveillance, check out the Tor Project. Originally a project of the U.S. Navy and now spun off into a freeware company, Tor--- strangely sharing a name with the largest US science fiction publisher--- bounces messages around a distributed network to evade deep packet inspection and other tools of evil surveillance empires.
Be sure to read the fine print before you participate.
"A 19-year-old shot in the head and killed during the demonstrations... and Iranian officials asked his parents to "pay an equivalent of $3,000 as a 'bullet fee' -- a fee for the bullet used by security forces -- before taking the body back." One of the most tragic stories I've read in a long time, by the Wall Street Journal's exceptional Farnaz Fassihi."
Time to get rid of these bastards.
I close with a video showing the bastards running.
I haven't been posting for a couple days because, well, I have this life. I have friends, family, and a freakin' job. All of this keeps getting in the way of my Internet!
I realize this is overturning the natural order, but I'm all perverse that way.
I've been following the Iranian revolution via the live blogs set up by Andrew Sullivan of the Atlantic and Nico Pitney at the Huffington Post. I can't seem to find a lot of coverage of the Iran situation on television, what with Rachel Maddow's up-to-the-second coverage of Nude Bicycling Day, Bill O'Reilly bludgeoning "liberal media" (whoever they are) over the Letterman/Palin dustup, and Larry King burbling on about American Idol. So it's either the blogs or nowhere.
How to help now that Google Translate is available in Persian/Farsi. A great guide is here. And please do pass along anything notable you find.
Also: Reader Dan notes that you add a translation bookmark to your browser to translate sites without having to return to Google. (Bookmark the English tab, not the Persian tab, if you want to traslate Farsi sites into English.)
Now that Khameini's proclaimed himself unequivocally for Ahmadinejad, that leaves only the options of revolution or surrender. Some voices from the streets:
Mousavi supporters were out on the streets 'Basiji hunting.' Their resolve is no less than these thugs -- theyre after hunting them down. They use their phones, their childhood friends, their intimate knowledge of their districts and neighbours to plan their attacks -- they're organised and they're supported by their community so they have little fear. They create the havoc they're after, ambush the thugs, use their Cocktail Molotovs, disperse and re-assemble elsewhere and then start again - and the door of every house is open to them as safe harbour -- they're community-connected.
The Basiji's are not. These are not the students in the dorms, they're the street young -- they know the ways better than most thugs - and these young, a surprising number of them girls, are becoming more agile in their ways as each night passes on.
“I will participate in the demonstrations tomorrow. Maybe they will turn violent. Maybe I will be one of the people who is going to get killed. I’m listening to all my favorite music. I even want to dance to a few songs. I always wanted to have very narrow eyebrows. Yes, maybe I will go to the salon before I go tomorrow! There are a few great movie scenes that I also have to see. I should drop by the library, too. It’s worth to read the poems of Forough and Shamloo again. All family pictures have to be reviewed, too. I have to call my friends as well to say goodbye. All I have are two bookshelves which I told my family who should receive them. I’m two units away from getting my bachelors degree but who cares about that. My mind is very chaotic. I wrote these random sentences for the next generation so they know we were not just emotional and under peer pressure. So they know that we did everything we could to create a better future for them. So they know that our ancestors surrendered to Arabs and Mongols but did not surrender to despotism. This note is dedicated to tomorrow’s children…”
Ms. Hilsum explained that one part of [Khameini's] speech that has struck some Western listeners as curious, his harsh attack on the United Kingdom rather than the United States, is, in part, explained by how very influential the BBC’s Persian language television and radio broadcasts are in Iran. Three decades ago that same station was central to broadcasting the Ayatollah Khomeini’s massages into Iran from abroad. The BBC’s influence, combined with the British part in Iran’s history, Ms. Hilsum said, makes it “the only country in the world where people believe America is Britain’s poodle.”
More than all the revolutions that you have mentioned (Velvet, Green, Berlin Wall, Tiananmen, Romanian) Iran reminds me most of one that you have so far skipped: Serbia in 2000. There a brutal but often popular regime had manipulated a number of elections over the course of years. The leader made a living out of bombast and blaming western democracies for oppressing his people. Eventually, he misjudged an election and made a clumsy attempt to cover it up with fraud. Fatally, he made the "mistake" of allowing peaceful demonstrations to take hold. Milosevic lasted two weeks.
Leading the populace to believe that its opinion matters is extraordinarily dangerous for a regime that has no intention of listening.
Iran’s Seda o Sima (State TV) internet site was hacked today. The title was changed to state: “When will killing brothers end?” Below is states: “Mr. Ahmadinejad, how long do we have to stand these images? The kids of the people are getting killed day by day. How long do you plan on carrying out this carnage? For the sake of power, you have stepped on the dignity of the nation. What will be next after you have killed and scarred the kids of this land?”
What we see here is astounding courage in the face of oppression. I watch with admiration and awe.
Here we have a video of an Iranian paramilitary before and after he fired randomly into a crowd of protestors, killing at least one person. (Well, they did set fire to his building.)
We can see his face. There are people watching this video who probably know where he lives, and who his parents and family are and where they live. I don't think he's got much of a future.
There is a scene just like this in the novel I'm working on. My whole novel is playing itself out before my very eyes. All its specialness and wonderfulness, coolness and invention is curling up and dying in fire, as if one of the incendiaries from Fahrenheit 451 found it before I could even finish it. The Twitter Revolution in Moldova was bad enough, but at least it didn't get a lot of coverage over here, and most Americans never heard of Moldova.
Iran is different.
I feel like all those guys who were working on Cold War novels when the Wall fell.
The parade of demonstrators in Tehran today was nine kilometers long. It's a People Power revolution fired up by social media--- you don't get a crowd that big by sticking up posters on lamp posts.
Hackers are also proving useful, by attacking Iranian government web sites. (But be careful, script kiddies of the world--- you don't want to bring the whole system down.)
If you want to turn your computer into a proxy server to help Iranians avoid government roadblocks, "Austin Heap" provides instructions here. Be sure to read the disclaimers. I'd do this myself, but I have to admit that it's all beyond my competence.
As a final note, I'm startled by the wave of support for Ahmedinejad by American neocons like Marty Peretz ("Maybe the regime fiddled around a bit with the numbers at the polls and after the polling. Still, the outcome had a sense of authenticity.") and Martin Rubin. Maybe if there's regime change, and the Iranians liberate themselves, then the neocons won't get their holy war with Iran, and we won't get to liberate the Iranians by killing zillions of them. A great disappointment, to be sure.
UPDATE: The neocons aren't all speaking with one voice, it seems. Bill Kristol now demands that Obama immediately issue a statement of support to the protestors. Why? Because Hitler invaded Poland in 1939! (No, really! Read it yourself!) Ahmadinejad is Hitler! Obama is Chamberlain! So I guess Kristol's idea is for Obama to support the protestors, Ahmadinejad to denounce them as American puppets and kill them, and then we still get to invade Iran! Yay!
I'm an author, game designer, black belt, and scuba guy. This is a journal of my confrontations with existence, the life of the writer, and the occasional wicked adverb. There also seems to be a lot about food. Bon appetit.
