Iran's top mullah may be on our side

Los Angeles Times ^ | January 8, 2006

[F14 Pilot]

THE UNITED STATES has a surprising ally in its impatience with the new Iranian president. Since his inauguration, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's pugnacious demeanor has not only roiled the international community but also a significant portion of Iran's ruling elite. A coalition of traditional conservatives, pragmatists and reformists is emerging within the government to oppose Ahmadinejad's brand of governance. With Iran saying it will resume nuclear fuel research, the U.S. should do all in its power to boost the bargaining power of these more moderate Iranian leaders.

The rise of the anti-Ahmadinejad faction defies the expectations of Iran analysts, who believed that the post-Khatami era would produce a monolithic conservative bloc in control of most major levers of power.

Instead, the coalition is strengthening and attracting many of the regime's powerful personalities, perhaps even the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Evidence of the latter is Khamenei's recent decree giving the Expediency Council, a non-elected body headed by former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, oversight of the presidency.

Ahmadinejad's primary supporters have always been the rank and file of the country's paramilitary forces. Renowned for their fearlessness and passionate commitment to the populist ideals of the Islamic revolution, they had not dominated government before or since Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's death in 1989.

The political struggle of Iran's security establishment has come full circle with Ahmadinejad's rise, which makes dealing with Tehran more difficult. The paramilitaries are the ultimate guarantors of the regime's survival.

Their leaders wield enormous influence in the Islamic Republic's coercive security establishment, particularly those associated with the Revolutionary Guards. The militants also dominate the volunteer, or Basiji, militia force, believed to have more than 1 million members.

[snowsislander]

Instead, the U.S. needs to offer Iran an acceptable face-saving mechanism to allow it to master, under appropriate international supervision, the nuclear fuel cycle. A seed planted now could even grow into the long-awaited detente between the two countries and help the U.S. extricate itself from Iraq.

Dangerous (if typical) nonsense from Berkeley: By Dariush Zahedi and Ali Ezzatyar, Dariush Zahedi teaches international political economy and political science at UC Berkeley.

[SampleMan]

Indeed, we may have to deal with them all alone, but let me rephrase my point for you.

If Iran goes nuts in the short term, it is more likely to force the Europeans to get involved. If we massage the problem through the short term, then it becomes more and more a U.S. problem. That is hardly a benefit to us.

I'd be all for dealing with the problem now, but that doesn't appear politically possible. So should we delay (which adds to their capabilities) or should we allow the political dynamic to change? I'm advocating the latter.

There is sometimes benefit to providing more rope, when someone is in the process of hanging themselves.

[Semper Paratus]

Heard this crap during the days of the Evil Empire about encouraging moderates in the Soviet Politburo.

[lentulusgracchus]

OK, I give up.......who is the quote from?

[lentulusgracchus]

[Quoting L.A. Times article] The fact that a British firm was allowed to sell the compound without scrutiny will raise questions for the British government over its controls on sensitive materials.

And here the Scotland Yard got all excited over a few hundred pounds of ricin stored in a London mosque.......

[Thumper1960]

Sad to say, the world will not wake up to the menace of Islamic extremism without an Islamic state doing what it must do: detonate a nuclear weapon somewhere, somehow, on its enemy's soil.

Islamic states must murder and maim their imagined foes since that is the nature of Islam. It can do no other.

Millions must die horribly for the leaders of the slumbering West to awake and take notice. The West can do no other, since that, too, is its nature.

[JasonC]

There are real theological opponents of extremism in Iran, but they aren't in the government, they are under house arrest. This stuff is mere wishful thinking.

[freema]

The article : )

[carl in alaska]

Indeed, this is just more naive wishful thinking by Ivy League liberals at the State Department. Last week Condi Rice said that it's time for the world to make some decisions about Iran and time for the US to make some decisions too. I saw on another thread that Israeli intelligence believes Iran is only 12-24 months from being able to produce a working nuclear bomb. It looks like this is going to end in an attack by the US, Britain and possibly a few other allies that will completely destroy or disable the Iranian nuclear facilities.

While I'm sure Bush would rather wait until after the 2006 election, we may not have that much time to wait because Iran is moving rapidly to upgrade its air defenses to make the task more difficult. The libs in the State Dept. really don't understand the threat from nuclear weapons in the wrong hands, but fortunately Bush & Cheney appear to fully understand the severity of this threat.

[carl in alaska]

"Instead, the U.S. needs to offer Iran an acceptable face-saving mechanism to allow it to master, under appropriate international supervision, the nuclear fuel cycle. A seed planted now could even grow into the long-awaited detente between the two countries and help the U.S. extricate itself from Iraq."

For whatever reasons, the authors appear to be willing to take the potentially catastrophic risk that Iran would instead end up as a very hostile regime armed with nuclear weapons. Once Iran "masters the nuclear fuel cycle", Iran could immediately kick out the nuclear inspectors and end the "appropriate international surpervison." The authors are advocating a dangerous riverboat gamble that could end in catastrophe for the western world.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Not believable!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

meanwhile:

Syria Leader Apparently Seeks Arab Backing ~ Assad feeling the Heat....

[defenderSD]

Cheer up. Bush, Cheney, Rice, Blair, Berlusconi, and whoever will be the new Israeli PM (Netanyahu?) all understand the severity of the Iranian nuclear threat. They will move to destroy or disable the Iranian nuclear facilities before Iran can produce a nuclear weapon. But of course if a liberal DemocRAT such as HRC is elected POTUS in 2008, then all bets are off for the future and your scenario of catatrophe could actually happen.

[freema]

Exactly.

[WoofDog123]

you get a big bonus star for "eerily prophetic comment!!!"

though not clear which side you expected to provide the passenger?

[WoofDog123]

"but all we've gotten is snide comments from the prissies that they can't tell who the real bully is.
"

it really does seem that corporate policy is dictating foreign policy in a lot of this. A lot of the european attachment to iran is that their companies do business with them (aside from the fact they are a petro-nation as well as a theocracy), and they will sell as much rope to iran as they want to avoid hanging themselves.