This is the critical moment US Presidents have been waiting for since the Shah was thrown down in 1979. Right now we will disregard the history of the Islamic Republic of Iran and how it came to be and instead focus on today, right now, and what Iran might become in the days and weeks ahead.
Today’s NYT has good and extensive coverage of the protests filling the streets of Tehran and other cities — in defiance of the the backward wannabe-Deng Xiao Ping reactionary cleric Khamenei. This old man and the old men around him are facing a similar situation China faced ALMOST EXACTLY 20 years ago. The people don’t want him anymore. Iranians, who throughout history have celebrated union with God through the poetry of Rumi the Sufi, are tired of being the downtrodden pariahs of the Muslim world.
In Shanghai a few weeks before the election, I hung out with “Ali Baba” the boss of the Shiraz restaurant and two other Persian friends. They tried to contain their excitement as they discussed what they believed to be a pivotal moment in their country’s history.
“This could be it,” said Said. “I don’t want to believe it, but we need that madman out of office. I really think it can happen …”
“Blood and terror if it does, my friend, you know how they do,” replied Amir. And we all returned to our teas and shisha and thought in silence. Hope swirled around the table like the sugar in my cup, like the apple tobaccky around our heads. silent hope.
All we have from Tiananmen are thousands of Chinese with green cards and the images of a lone man taking on a line of tanks. The world reported, discussed and lamented the eventual defeat of the brave students, but as the days wore on and became years .. business went on as usual.
Can we afford the same result with Iran? No, brothers and sisters, we cannot. China may be run by an oppressive collection of half-commies who want every computer in the nation to reflect their xenophobic terror and controlling nature, but they do business and for the most part, ADD to stability. (We can discuss the DPRK topic in another post)
Iran, on the other hand, is a key piece in the Middle Eastern puzzle that is causing TRUE Muslims, Westerners and everyone from Thai Buddhists to Black African Sudanese intense heartache. If Iran can shake off the cloak of fear its clerics have hidden under for the past 30 years, then what Muslim nation can justify a fundamentalist reactionary ideology as its source of legitimacy?
In Reza Aslan’s (An Iranian) book “No god but God”, the irrefutable fact that Islam is going through its (final?) Reformation is laid out in clear prose and logical historical sequence. Persia/Iran’s current turmoil may just be the Event that, like one log splitting from the jam, causes the entire river to flow in cleansing, refreshing abandon.
Now to the title of this post:
Obama and the White House has been very careful with what it says about the crisis in Iran right now. And this is the wisest and most prudent approach. Congress, pundits and Europe are filling the void for the Leader of the Free World with their adamant support for the protestors’ rights to speak out. What the real question here is not, what is Obama saying/not saying? but what is the White House up to behind the scenes in the backchannels of the world diplomatic halls?
Imagine watching your longtime enemy place a knife to his neck, do you step in an risk him pulling the knife away so that he might point it at you? or do you watch intently to see if the time has finally come for him to succumb to reality and take himself out?
This, in effect, is what Obama is doing, while at the same time reaching out through channels (that I unfortunately have no access to) to gauge: what next? what if tanks roll through Tehran? What if the opposition prevails? Who steps in? How? Do we step in at all?
Obama hopefully will remain true to at least a modicum of what he preached on the campaign trail and remember that people power got him into office here and people power in Iran is reaching out through Twitter and Demotix to let the world know that the demonization tactics of the Bush Administration were ignorant strikes at a nation of fervent freedom loving Muslims who have finally had enough.
As for me, I cannot rest on ideology and say that a nation’s troubles are its own and liberty is the fruit of those who take it for themselves. Iranians need our help and in the next few weeks I hope to see the White House aid the clerics in slicing their own throats.
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I think Obama and the american government are praying the events in Iran lead to a regime change or the birth of some form of democracy. I never dreamed I would see the people of Iran taking to the street in outrage over allegations of a fixed presidential election. The world is changing more than we know it. It looks as though the young iranians want to shun the old iran and begin on a new and uncharted path much like the young chinese 20 years ago. I have to wonder if the younger iranians have been seeing that positive changes taking place nearby in Iraq and Afghanastan and now they want change. Excellent post Sascha!