Small Changes and Revolution

This David Brooks article reminds me of one of Michael Totten’s posts at the beginning of the demonstrations and protests.

In both, the authors highlight the importance of small changes in attitude, such as people not fearing the IRGC or basiji or the wearing of green by the riot police “monitoring” the demonstrations.

Both authors conclude that when those small changes in attitude occur, you know something big is happening.

Brooks:

Small gestures unify a crowd and symbolize a different future, like the moment when Mir Hussein Moussavi held hands with his wife in public.

Ryszard Kapuscinski:

We don’t know whether the policeman and the man on the edge of the crowd already realize what has happened. The man has stopped being afraid – and this is precisely the beginning of the revolution. Here it starts. Until now, whenever these two men approached each other, a third figure instantly intervened between them. That third figure was fear. Fear was the policeman’s ally and the man in the crowd’s foe. Fear interposed its rules and decided everything.

Now the two men find themselves alone, facing each other, and fear has disappeared into thin air. Until now their relationship was charged with emotion, a mixture of aggression, scorn, rage, terror. But now that fear has retreated, this perverse, hateful union has suddenly broken up; something has been extinguished.

The most important changes are not those that we can see, like the dissipation of fear, but they are crucial to the survival of such movements.  I hope that what we witnessing is the dying gasps of that fear.

Who are the Basiji?

The Basiji’s have received a lot of media attention as of late.  Yet, the majority of the analysis that I’ve seen has not truly described the organization.  Fortunately, Jon Lee Anderson at the New Yorker wrote a small but accurate analysis a few days ago about the origins and purpose of the basij.

Key section:

Instead, bearded plainclothes militiamen have been attacking and harassing the demonstrators in Tehran this past week. These are Basijis, members of a civilian paramilitary organization founded by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1979. It was conceived of as a civilian auxiliary force subordinate to the Revolutionary Guards, and so it has functioned over the past three decades. During the eight-year Iran-Iraq war, fervent Basijis volunteered to serve on the front lines. For a time, very young Basijis were encouraged to offer themselves for martyrdom by clearing minefields with their bodies in what became known as “human waves”—literally walking to their deaths en masse so that more experienced soldiers could advance against the enemy…

In peacetime, the corps lets the Islamic regime employ violence as a form of social control while retaining some plausible deniability; scruffy bearded men in civilian clothes are not, after all, uniformed soldiers. The Basij is now said to have some 400,000 active members nationwide, with perhaps a million more reservists; in some ways, their relationship to Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who is also their commander in chief, recalls the one between Nicolae Ceausescu and the loyalist miners trucked in from the Romanian countryside to strong-arm pro-democracy protestors. From 1997 to 2005, during the reformist presidency of Mohammad Khatami, the Basij showed its usefulness again, by attacking students at demonstrations. Some students were killed. The protests died out.

…During the past four years, with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as president and the reform movement dormant, the Basij has not been needed as shock troops. Instead they have made their presence felt by periodically throwing up traffic barricades on the streets of Tehran and stopping cars to smell the breath of drivers for evidence of illegal alcohol consumption, or to question couples about their marital status. These Basijis are usually scruffy working-class men, and thus bring an element of notional “class struggle” to the otherwise pragmatically lived lives of the citizens of the Islamic republic. Not surprisingly, among more educated and affluent Iranians, they are almost unanimously despised.

Now, the basij are once again being used as shock troops, praying on straggling protesters, invading University dorms, intimidating families of protesters, and controlling the streets of Iran to try and limit the size of the demonstrations.

Khamenei Doubles Down…and the Crackdown Starts

In his speech the other day, Supreme Leader Khamenei reemphasized that Ahmadinejad won the election.  Period.

He also warned that any bloodshed would be the responsibility of the protesters.  In Iran, that is an implicit threat that there WILL be bloodshed if the protests do not stop.  Hopefully the affect of that speech is to push protesters who were just out against the vote rigging/against Ahmadinejad to being against the system.  Khamenei’s attachment to Ahmadinejad and the ultra-conservative movement might be what it takes to completely delegitimize the “Islamic Republic” in the eyes of most people – and might plant the seeds of a revolution (which I do not consider this to be yet – though a coup d’etat from within does seem appropriate).

The danger is that Khamenei’s speech will cause Mousavi to do what Khatami did in 2005 – back down and tell the demonstrators to return to their homes.  The question remains: is Mousavi willing to topple the regime?  The answer will become evident in the coming days.

While many claim the movement is much larger than Mousavi, the movement is depending on Mousavi’s leadership and bravery to motivate a wider audience and create larger marches.  Should he defect, I am almost positive that the protests, demonstrations and marches will end as well.

Today, violence is increasing according to reports.  The basiji are out in huge numbers prowling the streets, viot police are controlling most of the large intersections and surrounding universities to stop students from joining the protests.  The imminent crackdown that we’ve mentioned earlier (and that Guardian and Michael Totten caught on to) is happening now.

Say a prayer (if you believe in that) or do whatever you can.  The protesters will need everything we can offer them.

1979 Redux?

There is an interesting, ongoing conversation online between bloggers, academics and policy wonks over who will “win.”  There are two camps in this argument: 

The first believe that the experiences of the current regime (Ahmadineja, Khamenei, etc) during the 1979 Revolution prepare them for what is happening now.  These experiences, proponents argue, suggest that the regime will survive because they know EXACTLY how revolutions occur.  The signs of an upcoming crackdown to prevent such a revolution are increasing (see here, here and here) and the regime has all the guns.  These facts (experience, weaponry and willingness to use it) make the chance of an opposition victory small.

The second camp argues that, while the regime has experience with revolutions, so too do the demonstrators and opposition leaders (Mousavi, Karroubi, Rafsanjani, Larijani, etc).  In fact, these individuals were integral in bringing down the Shah in 1979, making them more able to successfully pull off another revolution against the current government (see here and here).  In addition, the method of pursuing the demonstrations, including silent marches, days of mourning, and shouts of “Allah o Akbar” from rooftops, makes it hard for the regime to mobilize its armed forces and security apparatus against the people.

I hope the protesters win out but I am afraid they won’t.  Sorry that’s not very useful, but it’s the truth. 

What tilts me towards thinking they have a chance (of at least getting rid of Ahmadinejad), is the fact that current Iranian culture glorifies victimization.  As a result, beating or killing people rarely succeeds in quieting the crowds (see my earlier post for a similar point or Juan Cole’s analysis here).  Rather, making the protesters the victim of government oppression simply reinforces their belief that they must stand up against the government. 

It’s a terrifying way to think about the situation, but I don’t think it’s wrong.  Reza Aslan points out  how martyrdom, and the mourning of those martyrs in a culture such as Iran’s, affects a revolution (and how it worked in 1979):

….you have these massive mourning rallies, where you mourn the deaths of those who were martyred in the cause of freedom. And these things tend to get a little bit out of control, they often result in even more violence by the security forces and even more deaths, which then requires another mourning rally which is even larger, which then requires more violence from the government, and this just becomes an ongoing snowball that can’t be stopped.

The Guardian reported that today’s marches were bigger than the last.

Strong, Level-Headed Analysis from Experts

For those following the Iran situation, read over this short piece.  It’s basically the argument, as made by several Iran experts, for why we shouldn’t be calling what is happening in Iran a revolution.

I agree with them for the most part- though I’m not sure the IRGC would sell out Ahmadinejad.  I guess we’ll see.

Irony is Wonderful (Iran)

Click here to see how large the protests today were.

Of course, I read some speculation on Twitter that one possible reason for the enormous number of people protesting is the unemployment rate (generally agreed to be somewhere between 17% to 22% by experts). 

Unemployment among Iranian youth and women is even higher than general unemployment (some sources claim that over 30% of Iranian youth and women are unemployed).  And Mousavi had a great deal of support among these two groups before he was elected (or so it was reported).

Suppose you were unemployed and blamed that fact on Ahmadinejad’s (mis)handling of the economy.  What would you do? (Hint: watch the video).

Figures.

Apparently, the regime (or Ahmadinejad’s people…is there much difference at this point?) have been editing pictures of rallies held in support of Ahmadinejad to make them look bigger.

We shouldn’t be surprised.  The regime has done this before to “augment” their power (think: rocket launches).

Color Me Impressed with Obama

As I was writing a third post on the topic of Iran – discussing how we shouldn’t blow Mousavi’s resistance or the demonstrations out of proportion – I saw this interview Barack Obama gave to CNBC.  Read it.

Needless to say, I think he does a great job of explaining the issues, explaining his policy and his actions thus far.  Furthermore, he brings up an important issue: Mousavi is a regime man.  Even had he won, we would still be dealing with a regime whose interests would have it continuing to support Hamas/Hezbollah while also pursuing nuclear capabilities.

He assumes that Mousavi, who campaigned on lessening tensions with the West with regards to nuclear capabilities and funding for terrorism, wouldn’t follow through.  Regardless of whether Mousavi could have delivered, the basic fact is that not much would have changed right away as the regime fought internally. Obama makes an important argument here that we should heed.

Lastly, regarding the crowds: let’s not get our hopes up.  We should remember that the most common slogan chanted at the onset of the protests was “raye man kojast?” (Where is my vote?).  While the focus and purpose of those protests might have shifted after the way the regime responded to the demonstrations, the truth is that the crowd is brought together against Ahmadinejad and his policies, and not so much for democracy.  While those participating in the marches demonstrate great bravery and determination, they are united in their desire for more liberty and voice, not necessarily the toppling of the Islamic Regime.  The “manifesto” being sent around supports this claim; the articles require the removal of Ahmadinejad and Khamenei but call for the appointment of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri to the post of interim Supreme Leader until constitutional reform occurs.

This in no way is meant to reduce the importance of what these Iranians are doing.  I just want to make sure that we’re not making assumptions about what the Iranian people want.  I don’t know, and from what I’ve read on blogs and tweets, they all want different things. Some want “freedom;” some want “democracy;” others just want Ahmadinejad gone.

In another parallel of the 1979 Revolution, we see that Iranians from different walks of life find themselves working together against a common enemy. Then, it was the Shah. Today, in what is not a revolution (yet), the common enemies are Ahmadinejad and (perhaps) Khamenei.  But, as the 1979 Revolution showed, the leadership that emerges after the removal of the government overthrow is almost as important as the leadership people rally against.

I should say, though, that after few more days of basiji attacks and killings, perhaps it will become a revolution that seeks more than the nullification of the elections and the replacement of Khamenei.  The next week will be extemely important in determining where the Iranians take their movement.

Mir offers new reasons to question Iran result

Many are turning from skeptics to sympathizers about Iran’s election results, particularly in light of the results of Ken Ballen and Patrick Doherty’s May poll, published in yesterday’s Washington Post under “The Iranian People Speak.”

Asieh Mir, a Persian scholar and Senior Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace, has written a response to this article, noting several reasons why the poll results should not be believed.  You can read her post here.

Mir makes important additions to the running list of reasons – some statistical, others circumstantial – to question the results.

How to Help Iranians

Jack has a few pointers here and here.

Also, you can help hack the filters Iran has put up using this tool.

Finally, you can wear Green (the color of Mousavi’s election) or you can change our FB picture to this.

Addition by Jack: The “Cyberwar guide to Iran elections” is essential for anyone wanting to help in the Twitter battle. Not only does it show you how to help. It shows you how to avoid unintended harm. (I’m linking to a mirrored version. The original on BoingBoing.net has gotten so much play that the ISP has suspended BB’s hosting account.)