So now the Ahmadinejad people and the Khamenei people are fighting it out in the streets of Tehran, as Reza tells us. Those who have followed this blog for some time will recognize it as the latest phase in what I call “The War of the Persian Succession,” a nasty fight over who will be the next Supreme Leader of Iran, after the passing of Khamenei.
Remember, too, that Mousavi — the leader of a Green Movement that is very much a player in this struggle — designed a strategy that would lead to the implosion of the regime, not its overthrow in a dramatic confrontation. He believes that the internal conflicts are so severe, that if only pressure can be maintained, the system will come down. He hoped that pressure would come from the West, but it didn’t (even though the sanctions have made life more difficult). So the process is slower than it might have been, but still moving along the lines he designed.
I think it is unlikely that one “faction” will definitively prevail over the other. The leader and the president are siamese twins, fused at a vital part of their anatomies, and separation might well be fatal to both. Each has weapons aimed at the other’s heart, and the weapons consist of information of massive fraud and theft.
The Greens issued a lengthy report on these practices, and on the skullduggery the contending forces are practicing on each other. It’s quite spectacular (h/t Michael Rubin and Ali Alfoneh):
- “Following clerical criticism of Ahmadinejad’s behavior and the policies of his government, Ahmadinejad supporters have pressured the theologians through the Counter Espionage Directorate of the Revolutionary Guards… By installing listening devices in their classes and their offices, they have tried to force them to cooperate with the government and approve of his [Ahmadinejad's] initiatives… In reaction, some theologians threatened to react and put the government in its place, which led the Revolutionary Guards to station special forces units in Qum to suppress any unpredictable movement… This has further angered the theologians.”
- “Following the Office of the Supreme Leader’s decision to transfer the main part of the oil revenue to a special account supervised by a three man group headed by Mojtaba Khamenei… Ahmadinejad used the first cabinet session following this decision to attack Mr. Khamenei and his entourage. He called this decision insulting and restriction of the cabinet’s access to the oil revenue. He [Ahmadinejad] called the Supreme Leader ‘ignorant’ and a ‘tool.’”
- “Ahmadinejad has recently sent [Intelligence Minister] Heydar Moslehi the names of 45 senior Intelligence Ministry officials and has demanded their dismissal… Ahmadinejad had also said that according to the investigations of the Revolutionary Guards Counter Espionage Directorate, these individuals had not shown the necessary loyalty towards the cabinet and must be replaced with a number of individuals soon to be identified by the cabinet… Heydar Moslahi had in his report to Ayatollah Khamenei called ‘acceptance of this demand’ a ‘serious blow to the body of the Intelligence Ministry.’”
- “In Moslehi’s report, there is also account of surfacing of a number of microphones in the wake of infiltration of the ministry by members of the Revolutionary Guards Counter Espionage units… According to the report, with Ahmadinejad’s knowledge, the Office of the Supreme Leader too was tapped.”
- “In February, a group of internal security forces close to Ahmadinejad visited Dubai as a trade mission….They also met with two American political/military authorities in the United Arab Emirates. In the report, the Intelligence Ministry has strongly warned the Leader of the consequences of such deeds.”
- “The Ministry of Industries has in a confidential report to the parliament – officially also submitted to the Intelligence Ministry – reported that it is not capable of explaining the oil and industrial agreements between Iran and China and Iran and Malaysia and is not aware of their content. The Ministry of Industries has also reported that it has not played any role in those activities. Following the disclosure of the report in the parliament, Ahmadinejad sarcastically tells the Industry Minister: ‘This is why we have decided to dissolve the Ministry of Industries.’”
- “The Oil Ministry has in a report to the parliamentary Energy Committee stressed that it is completely ignorant of the level of fuel exports through the tenth countrywide pipeline and is not willing to accept any responsibility in this regard since this pipeline is not at all under the ministry’s control and its revenues are not sent to the government….The report also discloses that the Kish subsea pipeline – built by the Revolutionary Guards and Chinese companies – exports great amounts of fuel which has resulted in $3 billion discrepancy in the oil revenue, which the Oil Ministry no longer desires to be accountable for. According to the Intelligence Ministry, the 600 kilometers long Ahwaz-Dehgolan pipeline, has resulted in $580 million embezzlement by the Revolutionary Guards. The amount has been tracked to two personal accounts in Malaysia. There is also report of $2 billion embezzlement in the Neka-Jask pipeline. The amount has been traced to personal bank accounts – in China – of several senior Revolutionary Guards commanders.”
The entirety of the country’s oil and gas business is now in the hands of Khamenei’s son. There is no oversight from the “government,” and when the deputies in the Majlis tried a bit of earmarking, they found the cupboard was bare:
IranChannel reported on March 18 that the mullahs in parliament found $11 billion missing from the state-controlled petrodollar fund in Iran’s foreign exchange account. On April 29, Asriran.com reported that a member of parliament declared that not even a dollar was left in that account. Reviewing the current budget, the head of the parliamentary agricultural committee proposed $2 billion from the foreign reserve account to fund water projects, to whom the head of the joint (talfigh) committee replied that nothing, not even a dollar, remained.
No surprise, then, that there is still no approved national budget for the year that began in March. There are varying reports of whether food subsidies will be extended, cancelled, reduced or increased. The numbers we have on the economy are impressively negative. The government’s bank debt has risen 35% in the last 9 months; unemployment is up, labor protests are increasing…
Indeed, aside from stealing, the only thing this regime is still able to do is torture and kill. There are many reports of the Iranian involvement in the Syrian slaughter, most recently a story — which I have confirmed — that Khamenei has ordered the Iraqi-based “Sadr Army” (you remember Muqtadah al Sadr, surely) to send thousands of killers into Syria to save the Assad regime. Previous stories identified Hezbollah killers as snipers in Syrian cities, and Revolutionary Guards officers acting as commanders in the field and advisers in Damascus.
Thanks Michael for shining the light on the duplicity inside the Beltway. What you shine the light on will be used to communicate skepticism when those inside the Beltway want folk outside of the Beltway to do.
I dunno. How are we possibly going to take on a nation whose leaders have mastered the dark art of sorcery?
http://www.allgov.com/Unusual_News/ViewNews/Iranian_Dictators_Arrest_Ahmadinejad_Allies_for_Using_Sorcery_110508
This explains a lot really. I cannot think of any logical reason who Obama is not going after Iran and Syria but if he has an evil spell on him that explains everything.
Sorcery, like everything else, carries a death penalty in Iran.
These are largely due to its large petroleum reserves and low population. Libya has the 10th-largest proven oil reserves of any country in the world and the 17th-highest petroleum production.
hello. nobody cares. dead Iranians are little different from dead Chicagoans. when GE builds a nuclear reactor, they want a slice of the revenues. until they have a CEO running the energy council in Iran, there will be continued fighting. corporations know how to do things right, and bring good things to stockholder life.
They’ve re-created a George Orwell theme park and can’t get up.
It is patently clear that Obama and surrogates ‘heart’ with Assad and the Iranian Hitler.There is NO other plausible explanation for allowing them to continue their domestic and worldwide barbarity.
In fact, to assume that their overthrows would usher in worse ! Islamic regimes is to believe in the tooth fairy.
So, the urgent question is – why are their regimes still standing?Mubarak had to GO NOW, Libya’s loon received R2P treatment.What’s going on here?Inquiring minds want to know….NOW!
The Gulf Arabs told Obama that Assad stays. Gulf oil money builds presidential libraries just ask Clinton.
Michael! “The leader and the president are siamese twins, fused at a vital part of their anatomies … .” Great line; just what “part” are you referring to? Too bad the situation is so forlorn for those who have to live this nightmare. One can only pray for a quick end to their pain and suffering. BTW, I think I know where the $11B in petrodollars might be: someone has been buying up a lot of depressed homes in our state of California.
that would be all the chicoms
and they pay in cash
Dax: you’re not kidding. Actually, we have seen them sitting in cars watching traffic — local and commercial — between the border with Mexico for hours in a day in the southern-most remote parts of the state.
Iran is imploding. Their population will add another 11.3 million people by 2050 and reach 85.3 million. But the median age will rise rapidly from 27.1 to 47.2 (2.5 years older than the oldest country on the planet — Japan in 2010). The percentage of the population aged 65 and older will skyrocket — from 5.2% to 23.5%. This is all because of their birthrate collapsing over the last 40 years — from 6.9 to 1.6.
The mullahs know that Iran is in the midst of a Slow-Motion Train Wreck. They are collapsing under their own weight. And there is nothing that the mad mullahs can do to stop it. There is no way for Iran to solve their demographic problems. It is impossible.
Rather than letting Iran grow old, and slowly fade away (like Japan)… and eventually be conquered by hostile invading tribes (Pakistan? Afghanistan? India? China? …) the mad mullahs are going to make one last desperate attempt at regional dominance. Iran is dying. If they don’t take some wild risks, they will grow old, become irrelevant, and eventually be conquered. This is Iran’s last chance to make some noise. Central Asia is a tinderbox (akin to the Balkans in 1914) waiting to explode…explode it will, it’s just a matter of time…
Wrong.
http://www.indexmundi.com/iran/birth_rate.html
You are mistaken.
http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/unpp/p2k0data.asp
Michael,
Schneller! Pass auf.
Semper Fi!
The only way this will end well is if the mullahs and ‘diner-jacket’ fight each other to exhaustion then, at the right moment, the Green’s rise up and crush them both. If they wait to long one side or the other will wipe out its opposition then consolidate power.
However even if the Greens some how manage to throw the Islam-o-fascists from power the victory will be a temporary and unsettled thing. Look at Turkey. The cultural pressure of Islam always pushes in the direction of corrupt, inept dictatorships.
Yes Michael,the two sides must to leave.And good luck for the Persian people.
Now,can Ahmanijedad conduct a coup d etat?
As I see,this confrontation seems difficult to analize today.
Ojala me equivoque Mighel.
Michael, this is one of the most revealing articles I’ve read on the subject of the internecine warfare within the rotting corpse.
Good work, and best wishes.
Larry Odhner
Rigth Michael,they must to go.
Can Ahmadinejad plus R Guards conduct a Coup d etat?
Michael,
Can the people of Iran liberate themselves without outside help, i.e., the US, Europe or Israel? And, what percent of the population of Iran supports the status quo vs a western style democracy? Thank you in advance for your response.
Steve
We need to re-think our entire approach to and policy towards the Middle East and Central Asia. George Bush may have been right in some theoretical sense that all humans on the planet long for freedom, but the guys in the Middle East and Central Asia don’t seem to know what to do with it.
It looks like Afghanistan is just a corrupt swamp which will revert to an Islamic despotism as soon as we leave, and I’m not too sure that Iraq will long survive our eventual departure as a viable democracy. It appears that things are getting dicey for non-Muslims in Egypt, and the news is reporting that Quadaffi’s forces are moving on Ben Ghazi.
When the Brits left Iraq after WWII, they installed a king, probably under the conviction that only a despot of some nature could rule over the quarreling factions. Maybe they were right.
Why exactly are you posting an article by neocon, zionist and warmonger Ledeen, the man behind the Niger uranium fraud? and one of the men responsible for the invasiom of iraq(1.2 million dead)? Havent you learned to be wary of neocons in humanitarian dress?
Michael,
Do you think the Iranian people can free themselves from the theocracy without western assistance?
This is hilarious. I showed it to a friend, and he told me of Theda Skocpol’s four criteria for a pre-revolutionary situation:
The regime is on the verge of collapse…
I’m not sure what the article is trying to portray!
["So now the Ahmadinejad people and the Khamenei people are fighting it out in the streets of Tehran, as Reza tells us. Those who have followed this blog for some time will recognize it as the latest phase in what I call “The War of the Persian Succession,” a nasty fight over who will be the next Supreme Leader of Iran, after the passing of Khamenei."]
According to the ‘constitution’ of powers and authorities the article is only a smoke cloud. The ASSEMBLY OF EXPERTS, COUNCIL OF GUARDIANS and EXPEDIENCY COUNCIL essentially has ultimate power and authoritiy. The Assembly of Experts elect the Supreme Leader from within their own ranks.
The Supreme Leader, if you check, also is commander-in-chief of the armed forces and controls the Islamic Republic’s intelligence and security operations and he alone can declare war or peace.
So, blowing all the smoke away and redirecting back to relevency, the future of Irans political environment will be in the hands of the Assembly of Experts who are not ignorant of any of the government and Supreme Leaders activities. The Assembly of Experts has never been known to challenge any of the Supreme Leader’s decisions. While technically elected by the ‘people’ to their terms of office they enjoy the ever prevelent election corruption. Everything else in the government is pretty much bobbingheads and any dissenters have few ears in their corner that are meaningful.
The caption of revolution is nothing new in Iran and the constitution gives great insulation and protections from anykind of revolutionary overthrow attempts by the people…or within the government. The 86 “virtuous and learned” clerics of sharia, or Islamic law making up the Assembly of Experts will maintain the political and religious virtues even in times of changing of the guard.
Hmm, but I do not understand your objections to the article.
It may be that Assembly of Experts elects successor of Khamenei but do you really think that the members of Assembly do not have differences of opinion? And don’t you think that, may be, the Assembly will be made irrelevant after the death of Khamenei? And may be there will be changes to the constitutions made at the business end of revolutionary guards’ weapons?
Who knows…..
Yes there are different factions on the Assembly of Experts, etc. That should be understood under the context of Rafsanjani v. Ahmadinejad presidential bids and various other events. The Khamanei v. Khomeni are two powerful families of clerics that have long maneuvered to control the Assembly. Think of it as the body of Cardinals in the Catholic church that elected Borgia and basically had proxy wars outside the church with allegiances to various principalities and dukedoms.
Dinner Jacket is simply one of those dukes who were raised to power by the pope and eventually decided to subjugate the Papal throne to his own demands and screw the cardinals. (No offense to Catholics for using that as an example).
The problem here is that the Assembly has been slowly losing it’s power over much of anything, mostly money because Ahmadinejad and the Revolutionary Guard have been slowly taking over all of the industries in the country. The question is whether they can buy the loyalty of anyone who is not ideologically attached to the Assembly or if their access to the weapons and military make them the power house. Who inside the military is willing to break the military in half by confronting either?
What, if anything, would be the deal breaker?
So what you are saying is that a ‘convenient accident’ resulting in the deaths of 44 (or 86) ‘experts’ would be sufficient to entirely change the direction of the government. I wouldn’t bet against the ‘muddy-nut-job’ having orgasms at the prospect of actually making that happen…
Yes, but will they fall before or after they sail nukes into our ports?
There was never a doubt from day one in 1979 that their regime was doomed, it was always a question of how much damage they will do before going under.
And if Obama is re-elected (we can’t rule it out, the Republican vote may be divided by some fruitcake) then what?
OK, let’s say something POSITIVE. The great thing about having Muslims for enemies (oh sorry, just the RADICAL Muslims), is that in the course of any given day they spend:
1% of their time eating, sleeping, and not brushing their teeth,
3% of their time learning to fire weapons at something other than the air,
6% of their time practicing the secret handshake and getting confused about the new secret code words,
22% of their time running in circles carrying a wounded comrade and shouting loudly, until the guy dies or the news cameras leave – then they just drop him and go back to firing weapons in the air.
14% of their time beating their wife, daughter, or any other woman who “looks” guilty of something,
18% of their time making propaganda videos that look like a weaponized version of Special Olympics, and
36% of their time arguing about who is going to sit where.
Keep it up boys. You should try tapping your head with one hand, and rubbing your belly with the other before you try to take over the world. NEXT…
This is getting scary. Un parfum de fin du monde.
["There was never a doubt from day one in 1979 that their regime was doomed, it was always a question of how much damage they will do before going under."]
The statement is void of centuries of history, early 20th century and the divisions of Wahhabi Islam and Sunni/Shia Islam! The borders granting soverignty to the Muslim nations is irrelevent as is any of their constitutions and ‘governments’ today. The super powers, however divided, of Wahhabi and Suni/Shia represent the entireity of the region and any populist gains made by minority groups of opposition will eventually be eradicated. Therefore, the suggestion that one or the other is destined to fail and fall is a complete misconception.
Islam is the worlds second largest religion (20%) and growing rapidly towards the worlds largest religion, Chistianity at approximately 33% in 2005.
What is seen as a constitution and westernized democracy government in Iran is nothing more than a fascade. The ‘only’ thing that will fail and fall the superpowers of the Islam region and its current expansion of world influences is, when they run out of oil and the revenues created by it. They will then revert back to nations of pure theocracy embattled in ideological supremacy….Arab/Islamic history repeating itself!
Michael, please please please do not use phrases like “We stand by as Syria and Iran — totalitarian and barbaric regimes that kill their own as well as our own ..”. Say, “We stand by as Syria and Ayatollahs — totalitarian and barbaric regimes that kill their own as well as our own …”. Yes, we Iranians are sensitive to these differences in syntax. The word Iran is holy to us, and we do not want it used incorrectly. Once everyone respects that, then the Ayatollah regime will be just that, an Ayatollah regime, and not part of the Iranian culture. It should not be represented in the world bodies as Iran. The people of Iran certainly do not accept it as part of their culture as you know. We can do make this separation here in text, even though the people of Iran cannot physically remove them yet.
Please please please be more careful, I beg you.
Ali Mostafi, your country was renamed in the ’30s from Persia to Iran. It was in deference to Hitler and his ethos of Aryan supremacy, which your country adopted when the “strongman” appeared. Iran means Aryan. No?
Not so holy really.
Mr. Thomas describes a constitution that is not unlike the Directory before Napoleon. Need I say more, all these “contitutions collapse in a revolution the question is who or what picks up the pieces.
“There are many reports of the Iranian involvement in the Syrian slaughter, most recently a story — which I have confirmed — that Khamenei has ordered the Iraqi-based “Sadr Army” (you remember Muqtadah al Sadr, surely) to send thousands of killers into Syria to save the Assad regime. Previous stories identified Hezbollah killers as snipers in Syrian cities, and Revolutionary Guards officers acting as commanders in the field and advisers in Damascus.”
Something tells me that the Syrian people are not going to forgive or forget Iranian participation in their civil war. Memories are long in that part of the world and Syrians, like most people in the Middle East, are not prone to forgiveness. At this stage of the game, with so many Syrians gunned down in cold blood, I find it hard to see how the Syrian people are going to either welcome or work with the Iranians anymore. Iran is now totally committed to the Assad regime and the Syrian people will simply see the Iranians as mercenaries doing Assad’s killing for him. How long the Syrian Army puts up with this arrangement is anyone’s guess, but it won’t be long before the bulk of the Syrian people turn on Assad and his Iranian toadies. At the rate Syrian protesters are being slaughtered in the streets, that may not be too long from now.
Absolutely true. The killing of Syrian freedom fighters by the Islamic Regime occupying Iran (not by Iranian, there is a big difference)is exactly the same as the killing and torture of Iranian freedom fighters by the Palestinians and Lebanese (never their people of course but their regime’s mercenaries) back in the summer of 2009 and all the way back in the winter of 1979 when that terrorist organization PLO’s leader Yasser Arafat gave a big helping hand to Khomeini and promised him help in the way of paving the way for his power grab by killing Iranian citizens through the hands of his terrorist PLO jihadists in exchange for “money”. Back then Arafat’s job was to go whore around the world to raise money for his terrorist organization. Hey even Carter gave him money, even world bank gave him big money. But again that is how the corrupt world works.
Anyway the moral of the story is that always the putrefied regimes of barbarians regardless of where their base of power is located, be it in Syria, Iran, Libya, send their mercenaries to suffocate, stomp on, kill and stop the freedom march of their people wherever they may be.
Yes the freedom fighting people of Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Libya, etc never forget what the mercenaries of the other countries (who by the way are all Muslim terrorists) do and have done to them.
“So now the Ahmadinejad people and the Khamenei people are fighting it out in the streets of Tehran”
To paraphrase Golda Meir: I wish them both success.
Thank you for the update.
What most astonishes me is the silence of the GOP on any and every foreign politics subject. They should keep the present administration under a carpet-bombing of policy proposals on every subject, and act like a true shadow-government, to educate and convince the public opinion.
PS
I guess that Iran exports oil through a LIMITED number of pipelines and ports. That is very interesting. Kind of a rope around the neck of the regime, isn’t it ? What would happen if someone pulled it ? (Yes, I know the problem, but we DO have the strategic reserve.)
The West gets NONE of its oil from Iran. Now China…that’s another story. China (and probably Pakistan and Afghanistan) would be the worst hurt countries if the Iranian pipelines ‘failed’.
We (the west) had a golden opportunity to bring change to the good people of Iran…but then MICHAEL JACKSON DIED…and the world came to a screeching halt, because, as everybody knows, the death of a twisted little neurotic entertainer was FAR more important than the fate of people struugling for freedom and liberty.
Obama was glad for the distraction, too. It saved him from having to get Michelle to make a policy decision for him, which would have distrcted him from Jackson’s funeral…and a golf game or two…maybe even from shootin’ hoops wit his homies!
Iran can thank Jimmie Carter for his gift of Khomeini and the Revolutionary Guard. Now, they can thank Barrack Obama for them still being in power.
Hands off Ahadinejad. Iran is more of a democracy than the US