I genuinely wish that Western writers would not expound on the demonstrations going on in Iran as Terry Glavin does in MacLean’s:
The Iranian uprising that began last Thursday in Mashhad, Iran’s second largest city, was initially reported as an isolated protest over food prices and unemployment. By Sunday, the entire country was heaving in convulsions. Tens of thousands of people had poured into the streets of at least two dozen Iranian cities and towns, upturning police vehicles and setting government offices ablaze. The Khomeinist regime has been shaken to its foundations. Hundreds of people have been arrested. At least 12 people are dead.
By Monday morning, state broadcasters were reporting that security forces had prevented armed protesters from seizing military bases and police stations. President Hassan Rouhani was threatening a crackdown, but the rebellion continues. Nothing quite like it has happened since the Khomeinists seized power from the decrepit Mohammad Reza Shah, the last ruler of the Pahlavi dynasty, in 1979.
Unlike the massive protests that erupted after Mahmoud Ahmedinejad came out on top in the sham presidential elections of 2009, the unrest this time around is not largely confined to Tehran, Iran’s capital. It’s coming from everywhere. And unlike the 1999 uprising, the tumult of the past four days is not a student revolt. It’s an eruption that has arisen from the Khomeinist heartlands. Even in Qom, the Shia holy city, throngs of protesters last Friday were shouting ‘Khamenei, leave the country.†Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is Iran’s doddering Supreme Leader. In Iran’s criminal code, disparaging Khamenei in that way is a crime punishable by death.
I believe he’s mistaken in thinking that these demonstrations are an incipient revolution. He’s forgetting that the mullahs are successful revolutionaries. They won’t hesitate to use force in putting down demonstrators including mass executions and they have the loyal followers, the Revolutionary Guard and paid mercenaries, the basiji, to do it with. They have no Plan B.
The Khomeinists organized and planned their revolution for decades and they were bloody-minded enough to carry it out. The Shah wasn’t willing to kill enough of his own people to stay in power.
The demonstrations are indications of dissatisfaction not incipient revolution. Overthrowing the mullahs will require a lot more than dissatisfaction.
