By
Ismael Hossein-zadeh
One year after his feverishly
contested reelection as the president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad seems be to
standing on firmer political ground than any other time of his presidency.
Having withstood all the relentless destabilization plots, both from within and
without, his government is now more confident at home and more respected abroad.
On a broader scale, that is, beyond Ahmadinejad and his administration, one
could also argue that today the Islamic Republic of Iran is in many ways
stronger and more stable than ever before-notwithstanding the continued
demonization of Ahmadinejad and/or Iran by the wicked forces of global
domination and their angry and frustrated allies at home and abroad.
Even on economic ground, where
relentless pressures of sanctions, sabotage and psychological warfare continue
unabated, Iran has weathered those pressures much better than expected. In its
May 2010 report on Iran, the
IMF points out that while unemployment and inflation still remain high, they
have stabilized and, in fact, begun declining. The report notes that, for
example, "In the past two years . . . inflation stood at 25.4 and 10.3 [percent]
respectively: however in 2010 this rate will fall to 8.5 percent for the first
time." The report further predicts that Iran's foreign exchange reserves "will
increase $5 billion and reach 88.5 in 2010." This healthy accumulation of
foreign exchange reserves stands in sharp contrast with the depleted reserves
and huge debts of many countries around the world.
Iran has been quite successful
in extending transportation, communication and electrification networks to the
countryside; providing free education and healthcare services for the needy; and
reducing poverty and inequality. As I have pointed out in an earlier article,
"Iran has also made considerable progress in scientific research and
technological know-how. All the oppressive economic sanctions by US imperialism
and its allies have not deterred Iran from forging ahead with its economic
development and industrialization plans. Indeed, Iran has viewed imperialism's
economic sanctions and technological boycotts as a blessing in disguise: it has
taken advantage of these sanctions and boycotts to become self-reliant in many
technological areas.
"For example, Iran is now
self-sufficient in producing many of its industrial products such as home and
electric appliances (television sets, washers and dryers, refrigerators, washing
machines, and the like), textiles, leather products, pharmaceuticals, and
agricultural products and processed food and beverage products (including
refined sugar and vegetable oil). The country has also made considerable
progress in manufacturing steel, copper products, paper, rubber products,
telecommunications equipment, cement, and industrial machinery. Iran has the
largest operational stock of industrial robots in West Asia.
"Iran's progress in automobile
and other motor vehicle production has especially been impressive. Motor
vehicles, including farming equipment, now count among Iran's exports. . . .
Most remarkable of Iran's industrial progress, however, can be seen in the
manufacture of various types of its armaments needs. Iran's defense industry has
taken great strides in the past 25 years, and now manufactures many types of
arms and equipment. Since 1992, Iran's Defense Industries Organization (DIO) has
produced its own tanks, armored personnel carriers, guided missiles, radar
systems, military vessels, submarines, and a fighter plane. . . . As of 2006,
Iran had exported weapons to 57 countries, including NATO members" [1].
In the international arenas of
geopolitical and diplomatic challenges, too, Iran has recently scored a number
of important points, and won important new allies. While the recent
Iran-Brazil-Turkey agreement on nuclear fuel exchange has proven Iran's
willingness to reduce international tensions, it has also shown the U.S. and its
allies as being utterly unreasonable by callously dismissing this important
agreement. Likewise, the U.S. opposition to international calls to hold Israel
accountable for the atrocities committed against the Gaza aid flotilla has
further exposed the arrogant attitude and unilateral foreign policies of the
United States and its allies. As these events have, once again, exposed the U.S.
as an international bully, they have also given further legitimacy and
credibility to Iran's arguments against the bully. Iran is perhaps the only
country in the region that determines its own economic, political and military
policies independently of foreign powers' advisors, guidelines and
dictates-something that many people in other countries in the region (and
beyond) are envious of.
While the political standing of
President Ahmadinejad, as well as the economic and geopolitical status of Iran,
seem to have improved since his June 2009 reelection, the political fortunes of
his major adversaries such as Mousavi, Rafsanjani, Karroubi and Khatami have
significantly declined; and their "green movement" is in confusion and
disintegration. Indeed, Mr. Rafsanjani, the Godfather of the Greens, is so
discredited and politically weakened that he has been forced to swallow his
purported pride of power and independence of yesteryear and, instead, pay homage
to Ayatollah Khamenei as the undisputed leader. Mr. Mousavi, the main challenger
of President Ahmadinejad, is also notably marginalized and his influence of a
year ago evaporated. His banal and hollow political statements, occasionally
posted on his Website, Kalemeh, are often ridiculed not only by the
government/Ahmadinejad supporters but also by many of his former supporters, who
have gradually abandoned him.
The question is why? How do we
explain the disintegration of the "green movement" and the tragic decline of the
political fortunes of its leaders?
A widely-held explanation has
been "government crackdown." While government suppression is certainly a factor,
it is not the only or even the main factor. The more important reasons behind
the decline of the "green movement" and the ignominy of its leading architects
lie elsewhere. What are some of these reasons?
To begin with, they ran a
dishonest presidential campaign. Their candidate, Mr. Mousavi, ran for president
but refused to submit to the will of the majority when it became clear that he
had actually lost at the ballot box. This has led many observers to believe that
his presidential campaign was more akin to a coup attempt-or, more accurately,
coup light, versus traditional military coups-than a bona fide election
campaign. It was modeled after the color-coded revolutions in a number of former
Soviet republics such Georgia and Ukraine, a pattern that used election contexts
as opportunities for destabilization and regime change.
This explains why Mr. Mousavi
declared victory even before the polls were closed. It also explains why he
claimed that the election was stolen the moment he learned that he had indeed
lost at the polls.
Initially, many Iranians fell
for this ruse, believing that Mr. Mousavi must have had evidence of "stolen
election," otherwise he would not have made such an outlandish claim. And that's
why in the immediate days following the election they heeded his instructions
and took to the streets, outraged that their votes had been stolen. But as it
turned out that the news of "stolen election" was false, most of them, including
many of his levelheaded supporters, felt cheated and began to abandon him and
his "green movement."
Reflecting on these
developments, Professor Mohammad Marandi of Tehran University, points out that
when Mr. Mousavi "effectively accepted the support of the Western funded Farsi
media and the Western based opposition, through his silence, many more
[Iranians] became disillusioned and even disgusted. . . . There is no doubt that
today people are very angry with the foreign-backed Green movement and with the
role that Western governments, through financial support and other forms of
support have played in all this. . . . None of my colleagues, who had voted for
Moussavi, would vote for him again after what he did following the election.
That doesn't mean that they support President Ahmadinejad or that Moussavi has
no supporters at all, but only a small minority support him now" [2].
Perhaps Mr. Mousavi could have
saved himself a modicum of integrity had he sincerely apologized for his bogus
claim of stolen elections. Instead, he compounded that fault by cavalierly
ignoring all the available evidence to the contrary, and stubbornly insisting
that people's votes must have been stolen, without providing any convincing or
credible proof in support of his claim. Evidence refuting his claim of stolen
election, however, is overwhelming. It includes not only detailed and specific
official account of the voting results, but also a number of independent
accounts provided by several prestigious polling organizations, including a few
from the United States, that corroborate the authenticity of the official
account [3].
Not only did Mr. Mousavi thus
run a dishonest campaign, he also ran an unfair, unscrupulous and obfuscationist
one: blaming Iran's economic challenges and its chaotic diplomatic relations
with Western powers largely on President Ahmadinejad, thereby overlooking the
fact that the cruel economic, political and military pressures on Iran,
ruthlessly inflicted by US imperialism and its allies, started not with
Ahmadinejad's presidency but with the 1979 revolution, which overthrew America's
darling regime of the Shah. Characterizing Ahmadinejad's foreign policies as
"adventurous" and "confrontational," Mr. Mousavi and his campaign managers
faulted them for hostile military and economic pressures from abroad.
By the same token, they sought "understanding" and
"accommodation" with the United States and its allies, presumably including
Israel, in the hope of achieving political and economic stability.
Yet, as I
pointed out in an earlier article on these issues, "US imperialism showed its
most venomous hostility toward Iran during the presidency of Muhammad Khatami
(1997-2005), while he was vigorously pursuing a path of friendship with the
United States. While Khatami was promoting his 'dialogue of civilizations' and
taking conciliatory steps to befriend the US, including cooperation in the
overthrow of the Taliban regime in the neighboring Afghanistan, George W. Bush
labeled Iran as a member of the 'axis of evil.' This outrageous demonization was
then used as a propaganda tool to justify calls for 'regime change' in Iran"
[1].
In the face of
President Khatami's conciliatory gestures toward the United States, many
Iranians were so outraged by its unfair and provocative attitude toward Iran
that they began to question the wisdom of Khatami's policy of trying to appease
US imperialism. For the same reason, they also viewed Mr. Mousavi's blaming of
President Ahmadinejad for the cruel demonization of Iran as either naïve or
unfair and disingenuous. Not surprisingly, most Iranians, including many of Mr.
Mousavi's former supporters and sympathizers, have come to question the honesty
and integrity of his campaign.
An attractive
feature of Mr. Mousavi's initial campaign was his apparent promotion of
democratic values and individual liberties. However, his purported advocacy of
democracy sounded hollow as he cavalierly defied the will of the people
by so brazenly disregarding the results of the majority vote in favor of
Ahmadinejad. Furthermore, it was obvious that, in light of his
Neoliberal economic agenda, Mr. Mousavi's vague and abstract utterances about
individual liberty and human rights did not include the right to basic
human needs such as food and shelter, or the right to affordable healthcare and
public education.
Mr. Mousavi's abstract, narrow
and, indeed, disingenuous promises of democratic rights resemble those of the
leaders of other color-coded revolutions-for example, of Mikheil Saakashvili in
Georgia and of Viktor Yushchenko in Ukraine. Had he succeeded in carrying out
his "green revolution," his promises of democracy would have proven as empty as
those of his counterparts in Georgia and Ukraine-who, by the way, have by now
been exposed by the Georgian and Ukrainian peoples for what they really stood
for, and thrown out of office.
An important factor that has
played a critical role in the decline of the "green movement" has been its class
character, its inability to relate or attract the masses of the lower-middle,
poor and working classes. It is no secret that the Greens hail largely, though
not exclusively, from the better-off and better-educated circles of the Iranian
society. Mr. Mousavi is obviously aware of this "problem" when he talks about
the need to expand the ranks of his supporters beyond the middle and
upper-middle classes. But class interests and alliances cannot readily be
re-configured through simple wishes or words. They are indeed beyond Mr. Mousavi
- the person. They shaped the character and the dynamics of his campaign and the
"green movement."
Having gone through thirty one
years of continuous revolutionary atmosphere, the Iranian people have become
very astute citizens in political affairs. They easily recognized the
market-friendly, Neoliberal nature of Mr. Mousavi's economic agenda when they
learned how (during his presidential campaign speeches) he condescendingly
characterized the government spending on basic social needs as "handouts," as
"squandering" resources on gedaparvari (nurturing or promoting
poverty/laziness).
This critique
of Mr. Mousavi and other architects of the "green revolution" should not be
viewed as a defense of President Ahmadinejad, or the Iranian government in
general. Nor should it be perceived as an aversion to opposing political views,
or to criticism as such. It is rather a critique of unscrupulous, opportunistic
and disingenuous politics, not of contrarian politics per se.
It is a truism
that healthy and principled criticism is key to improvement, progress and
perfection. It is also obvious that Mr. Ahmadinejad and the Islamic Republic of
Iran have a lot to be criticized for. Mr. Mousavi and other Green leaders could
have played an important role in furthering individual liberties and democratic
ideals in Iran were they not committed to the base objective of destabilizing
and overthrowing the people's duly-elected government. By disrespecting the
people's votes, by fabricating a huge lie that the election was stolen, by
resorting to violent means in pursuit of regime change, by remaining relatively
aloof from the Iranian grassroots, by seeking or accepting support from dubious
political forces abroad, and by blaming President Ahmadinejad for the
imperialist-Zionist pressures on Iran, the Greens have lost the credibility
needed to play a positive role as a constructive opposition force. More than
anything else, it is this unsavory political record that explains the failure of
the "green movement."
Ismael Hossein-zadeh,
author of
The Political Economy of U.S. Militarism (Palgrave-Macmillan 2007),
teaches economics at Drake University, Des Moines, Iowa.
Notes
[1] Ismael
Hossein-zadeh, "Reflectinn
on Iran's Presidential Election," Middle East Online, August 21,
2009.
[2]
Seyed Mohammad Marandi, "Green
Movement Defeated," insideIRAN.org, February 15, 2010.
[3] Fro a disaggregated,
province-by-province, city-by-city, and ballot box-by-ballot box account
provided by the Interior Ministry of Iran see: <http://thomaslotze.com/iran/Mebane_Lotze_Iran_2009_polling.csv>;
and for a number of expert analyses of the election result see, for example, (1)
"Analysis
of Multiple Polls Finds Little Evidence Iranian Public Sees Government as
Illegitimate," a comprehensive survey report issued by World Public
Opinion, an international collaborative polling project that is initiated and
managed by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of
Maryland; (2) "Post-Election
Poll in Iran Shows Little Change in Anti-Regime Minority," by Alvin
Richman; (3) "Did
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Steal the 2009 Iran Election?" By Eric Brill; (4) "Visualizations
and Analysis of the 2009 Iranian Election," By Thomas Lotze; (5) "A
Rejoinder to the Chatham House Report on Iran's 2009 Presidential Election
Offering a New Analysis on the Result," Reza Esfandiari, and Yousef
Bozorgmehr.
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