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In 2007, U.S. intelligence said Iran had stopped its nuclear weapons program. Analyst policy bias and disinformation from Iranian double agents may explain the mistake.

By Edward Jay Epstein

Source: The Wall Street Journal

July 29, 2010

In a stunning departure from a decade of assessments, the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran declared: “We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program,” including “nuclear weapon design and weaponization work” and covert uranium enrichment. Even more astonishingly, it attributed this change to “increasing international scrutiny and pressure resulting from exposure of Iran’s previously undeclared nuclear work.” In other words, the threat of sanctions had ended that country’s surreptitious effort to obtain nuclear weapons.

This assessment suggested that further action against Iran was unnecessary. Unfortunately, as the Obama administration has now acknowledged, the NIE’s conclusion was dead wrong, costing us precious time in dealing with a serious threat.

The question remains, what caused such a disastrous mistake?

David Gothard

In 2007, there was still much the same mountain of evidence that led U.S. intelligence to conclude in the 2006 NIE with equally “high confidence” that Iran was secretly engaged in a nuclear weapons program. This evidence included verified reports that Iran had experimented with Polonium 210, a key ingredient in the trigger of early-generation nuclear bombs. And documents recovered from a stolen Iranian laptop described its efforts to fit a warhead in the nose cone of its Shahab 3 missile that would detonate at an altitude of 600 meters, which is too high for anything but a nuclear warhead to be effective.

The CIA had learned that Iran had most likely acquired a digital copy of a Chinese nuclear warhead design from the A.Q. Khan network. It also had monitored Iran’s crash program at Natanz to build a nuclear enrichment plant that could house up to 50,000 centrifuges.

Taken individually, these secret activities might have a nonnuclear explanation. For example, Iran claimed the purpose of its Polonium 210 experiments was merely to find a power source for an Iranian spacecraft (though Iran had no known space program at the time). Taken together, however, these efforts added up an inescapable conclusion: Iran was going nuclear.

What helped change this conclusion, in addition to the reorganization of U.S. intelligence following the report of the 9/11 Commission, was the receipt of new secret intelligence from Iran. This intelligence included convincing evidence that the facilities of the weapons-design program (code named “Project 111″) revealed on the stolen laptop had been closed down in 2003. Satellite photographs showed that buildings involved in the program had been bulldozed, communications intercepts indicated that scientists were no longer at the location, and a high-level defector from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Ali-Reza Asgari, reported that Project 111 had stopped functioning.

Since the Iranians knew that we knew about Project 111 in 2004—the CIA had released technical drawings from it to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)—it was not surprising that the Revolutionary Guard, which runs Iran’s nuclear activities, shut it down. The issue was how to interpret the closure. Had the weapons-design work been quietly moved to avoid further scrutiny? Had it been closed because the warhead design had been solved with the acquisition of the digital blueprints of the Chinese nuclear weapon? Or had Iran abandoned its quest for a nuclear weapon?

Deciphering a government’s intentions is no easy task. It is especially difficult in a closed and terrorized society in which the U.S. has no diplomatic relations and little direct access. So it came down to espionage to illuminate the intentions behind the shut-down of Project 111.

Over the years, the CIA had recruited a network of Iranian agents who had, or claimed to have, access to the thinking of Iran’s governing elite. These agents were in a position to cast light on Iranian nuclear intentions, and presumably they provided reports that supported the thesis that Tehran decided to end its nuclear weapons program. In any event, the authors of the 2007 NIE cited secret evidence to support the conclusion in its publicly released summary document that “Tehran’s decision to halt its nuclear weapons program suggests it is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been [previously] judging.”

As we now know, the Revolutionary Guard was secretly completing the construction of new facilities in 2007. For example, at Fordo, 20 miles north of the holy city of Qom, it was reinforcing tunnels leading inside a mountain cavern designed to house a new uranium enrichment plant. This underground facility was only disclosed by Iran to the IAEA in late 2009. Clearly, Tehran was not abandoning its nuclear-weapons program.

What may have misled the CIA was a flaw in its espionage system. James Risen, the New York Times’s national security reporter, explains in his book “State of War” that since the CIA had no embassy base in Iran, it communicated with its agents through state-of-the-art satellite transmissions, which it assumed were invisible to the Iranian security services.

Then, in 2004, a CIA communications officer accidently included data in a satellite transmission to an agent that could be used to identify “virtually every spy the CIA had in Iran.” This disastrous error was compounded, according to Mr. Risen, because the recipient of the transmission turned out to be a double-agent controlled by the Iranian security service.

So the Iranians knew the identity of all the agents that the CIA had arduously maneuvered into positions of access, and the technical methods by which the CIA communicated with them. The agents (or their replacements) in Iran would have little choice but to allow the Iranian Security service to control the information they provided the CIA. If so, the CIA may have been vulnerable to receiving misleading secret intelligence that Tehran had abandoned it nuclear ambitions in 2004

One Iranian agent who supplied information to the CIA is Shahram Amiri, who defected to the U.S. last year and re-defected back to Iran this month. He reportedly provided details about the termination of Project 111 that presumably dovetailed with other information we got from the CIA’s compromised network. Iran now claims Mr. Amiri was a double agent all along.

Whether Iran controlled his secret reports to the CIA will be hotly debated for years to come. But willful blindness on our part should not be ignored. There were high-level people in the newly reorganized U.S. intelligence community who wanted to believe Iran was ending its quest for the bomb, and messages to the CIA from agents inside the country that diplomatic pressure was accomplishing this task fell on receptive ears.

Whether the erroneous conclusions in the 2007 NIE proceeded from Iranian deception or American self-deception, they undercut the case for taking more drastic action against Tehran. To the degree that other countries believed Iran had ended its nuclear program, they had little incentive to join us in imposing further sanctions.

To be sure, Iran could not conceal forever the evidence of its massive increase in uranium enrichment capabilities at Natanz, its missile testing, and its preparation of other underground facilities. In the interim, however, Iran managed to upgrade a large portion of its centrifuges and stockpile enough low-enriched uranium gas to manufacture, if it chose to further process it, the fuel for a nuclear bomb.

The moral of this sad spy story is that espionage is by its very nature a two-way game. Spies that are viewed as “assets” in a closed country can turn out to be very risky liabilities.

Mr. Epstein, an investigative reporter, is currently completing a book on the 9/11 Commission.

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It’s an idea that’s been repeated so often on the Internet that it has become to look like a fact: namely that social media like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter helped inspire and fuel protests in places like Iran, Burma, China and elsewhere. But is it really? In spite of all the flash, are social media really a good way to organize?

By Philip Alexiou in Washington DC

Source: Voice of America (VOA)

29 July 2010

“The Internet is a wildly powerful and disruptive tool. It can be used for good, it can be used for ill.” – Alec Ross, senior advisor to Sec. of State Hillary Clinton

Last year, the US State Department made an unusual request to a social network. It asked Twitter to delay maintenance that might have interrupted messages from Iranians protesting the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Twitter obliged by delaying its operation keeping the network open and Iranians free to tweet.

Anger over the Iranian presidential elections spilled into the streets, along with violence as protesters fought with Iranian security forces. So, was this a Twitter moment?  Did Twitter ignite the protests in Iran and abroad?

Not so fast, says Ethan Zuckerman, founder of the “citizen’s media” website Global Voices Online.

“A year after the fact people have tried very, very carefully to get a count of how many people were actually twittering from within Iran,” he says.  “And those estimates, the estimates I find most reliable range from several dozen to a couple hundred.”

According to Alec Ross, the senior advisor on Innovation to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, there is very little information to support the claim that Facebook or Twitter or text messaging caused the rioting or can inspire an uprising.

“What I have yet to see is a piece of data, a single piece of data, a single study that says, you know, access to information in environments of historic inter-cultural, inter-ethnic conflict has the following outcome when overlayed with a social media strategy,” he cautions.

“The Internet is a wildly powerful and disruptive tool.  It can be used for good, it can be used for ill.  It disrupts markets, it disrupts communication, it changes the way people connect and collaborate with one another, but it’s just a tool, and it’s a tool used by people for a variety of different ends.”

In other words, Ross says, social media may have some power, but like everything else, it has limitations.

With regard to the news out of Iran, Sanaz, an Iranian student studying in the US, says the social network websites at least helped get the news out about events after the election.

“It’s absolutely crucial for people to be able to use these websites,” says Sanaz, “because otherwise a lot of the news may not have gotten out, if the foreign journalists or Iranian journalists are banned or forbidden from doing their work.”

Largely because these social media tools are so new, those who study its effects have more questions than answers about its influence on conflict and change.

“What we’re really interested in is when someone comes up with a novel way of thinking and framing something,” says Ethan Zuckerman, “not just how that quote spreads through time, but how that idea spreads through time.”

Complicating matters, while analysts try to understand the uses and limits of social media, the technology keeps reinventing itself.  That’s especially true in developing countries, which in some cases have leap-frogged over cumbersome personal computers, instead using their phones as computers.

That’s according to Colin Rule, who is eBay and PayPal’s first director of Online Dispute Resolution.

“And these phones are getting smarter all the time,” notes Rule. “So, they can do text messaging, they can do voice communication obviously, but they can also start to access parts of the web and as they get more and more powerful they’ll be able to access more and more of the web.”

This may nowhere be more true than in many African nations, where use of mobile phones and other portable devices is exploding.  Marc Lynch is an associate professor of international affairs at George Washington University.

“I think one of the things which we all grapple with as social scientists trying to deal with this is that it’s implausible that this fundamental transformation in the way people process and receive information and the way information flows, is its implausible that this doesn’t matter.”

So what’s the real world impact of social media?  Can BlackBerrys and smart phones inspire demonstrations?  Does Twitter, Facebook or YouTube make it easier or more difficult to organize large, diverse groups of people?

Answering that question, says Marc Lynch, remains “maddeningly difficult” and will for some time.

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The monument was still under construction in this photo of a pro-government rally at Revolution Square in December 2009.

Source: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL)

July 29, 2010

The Iranian hard-line website “Seratnews” says that Tehran’s Revolution Square is nowadays covered with hundreds of Stars of David and that the central square has been “conquered by the Zionist regime.”

The website claims that the “stars” are part of a newly built monument at the square.

“Seratnews” has posted visual aids and photographs of the monument on which it has superimposed a blue outline of one of the “stars” to back its claim.

The website says that the “flashing” of the Star of David on the monument became clear to people as the monument was being completed.

“There is a flower with five petals in the middle of the [monument]. But the flower is surrounded by triangles that are laid next to each other and they’ve created hundreds of Stars of David that have covered the [monument] at Revolution Square!”

The website says it is unclear whether the transgression should be attributed to “ignorance” or “carelessness” on the part of the artist who designed the monument and of officials in charge — or whether it was done “intentionally.”

“Seratnews” adds that as a result a “sinister symbol” is standing in the “strategic heart” of the Iranian capital.

That would be a real embarrassment for a regime that doesn’t recognize Israel and whose leaders — particularly its president — use every opportunity to launch verbal attacks against the Jewish state.

Yet it’s clear that the hard-liners angered by the monument are taking their own artistic license.

We asked a woman in Tehran who had driven around the square recently about the monument. She said she had noticed simply “another ugly work” and hadn’t paid attention to the details. It would be “funny” to have a Star of David in the middle of Tehran, she added.

The “Seratnews” report bears striking resemblance to a report posted on July 25 on a hard-line blog called “Antimosalasizm” that also quoted Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as saying: ” Wherever in the world the Zionists want to build a building, they try to somehow make sure the sinister symbol of the Star of David is on it. Their political work is also similar.”

“The Guardian” reported in 2008 that Tehran was “furious” after an advertisement for a peace plan featured the Iranian flag and the Star of David.

– Golnaz Esfandiari

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By Fernando Espuelas, Host of Cafe Espuelas on Univision Radio

Source: The Huffington Post

July 28, 2010

Since Harry Truman led the world in recognizing the State of Israel, the United States has been its staunchest ally. Through decades of wars and near-death experiences, America has stood by Israel with military, diplomatic and financial support.

Over the last year, however, tensions have emerged between Washington and Jerusalem. Frustrated by the lack of any meaningful progress in bringing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to a close, the United States has pressured Israel to stop any further development on Palestinian lands, a source of tremendous friction for Arabs on the streets and their governments trying to maintain fragile stability.

The message from the American Government has been clear: restart face-to-face negotiations with the Palestinians.

This pressure has come as a shock to the Israeli political establishment. During the George W. Bush years, American policy had tilted away from the honest-broker posture of past Republican and Democratic administrations to a noticeable pro-Israel bias.

The prospects for a lasting peace moved farther and farther into the future as Palestinians felt abandoned by the historic American referee that had guaranteed them over decades of negotiations a fair deal, while the Israeli government felt no urgency to end the conflict.

With a new administration in the White House, American policy in the region over the last year has focused on simultaneously pressuring for a final peace accord, while grappling with the other strategic flashpoint in the region: Iran.

The United States has sought to stop Iran’s illegal nuclear ambitions initially with the open hand of diplomacy, which led to more tactical delays from Tehran and further violations of existing U.N. resolutions, and now with a new round of United Nations, European Union and U.S. sanctions.

But the prospect of a nuclear Iran, an Iran determined to be the regional superpower that threatens Israel while dominating its Arab neighbors, has once again brought the U.S. and Israel into strategic confluence.

Recently President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met at the White House for private talks and a public show of solidarity. The usual vows of an unbreakable alliance where uttered for the global media.

More interesting, and unknowable outside of the top reaches of the American and Israeli governments, is what was discussed behind closed doors.

Israel has stated in the past that it will not wait indefinitely to respond – read unilateral military strike – to what it sees as Iran’s hostile intent in developing illegal nuclear weapons capability.

Israelis rightly see a nuclear Iran as an existential threat – a threat repeated over and over again by the Islamic Republic’s president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, an avowed Holocaust-denier.

The U.S. has also said that it will not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons. The stage is therefore set for a confrontation with Iran.

Mounting evidence of Iranian illegal weapons nuclear development is now the overarching strategic consideration facing the United States in the region. At stake is Israel’s security, of course, but also the security of Iran’s other traditional regional rivals – the largely Arab Sunni states on its periphery.

Moreover, Iran’s provocative testing of long-range ballistic missiles is now putting NATO countries within reach of a potentially nuclear armed Iran.

Some have argued that the Cold War-era Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) doctrine would contain Iran. That is a big assumption – specially in light of the Iranian regime’s ideology.

Like fundamentalists in all religions, who are driven by a fanaticism that will supposedly get them closer to their god, the martyr tradition of the Shia is a powerful ideology that distorts traditional notions of realpolitik.

In contrast, the Soviets’ drive for world domination was largely the mission of atheists, rationalist men who calculated risks and rewards in the context of winning battles in this world – not in heaven. Mutual Assured Destruction is the ultimate rationalist argument against nuclear war. And it has worked.

The founder of the Islamic Republic famously differentiated his messianic mission from the actual nation of Iran. Ayatollah Khomeini said, “We do not worship Iran, we worship Allah. For patriotism is another name for paganism. I say let this land [Iran] burn. I say let this land go up in smoke, provided Islam emerges triumphant in the rest of the world.”

In another glimpse at his world view, Khomeini said, “This regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time.”

These are not the thoughts of a rationalist who will be deterred by concepts of mutually assured destruction or even the asymmetric risk of conflagration at the hands of the world’s superpower.

Besides funding and arming terrorist organizations Hezbollah and Hamas on Israel’s borders, Iran showed its true intent in the slaughter of Argentine Jews in a terrorist attack against a community center in Buenos Aires in 1994. Two years earlier, the Israeli Embassy in Argentina was destroyed by a car bomb. Argentine investigators have tracked the source of the attacks all the way to Tehran.

And clearly Khomeini’s ideology drives the current crop of the Islamic Republic’s leaders. They have not only threatened us and our allies with words – in fact, they have projected military power into Iraq, attacking U.S. soldiers through proxies, provided the matériel for the missiles raining on Israeli villages, and have sought advanced military technologies from Russia and North Korea.

They are at this moment arming themselves for war.

Ignoring this objective reality is as foolish as it is dangerous.

So what to do? From many corners of the Washington establishment we hear that military strikes will not be effective against Iran. The skill with which the Iranians have spread their nuclear program, the hardening of sites and the redundancy supposedly built into the system makes an attack a huge gamble.

As historian Barbara Tuchman observed, “War is the unfolding of miscalculations.” Can we be sure that a preemptive attack will deliver a sufficient blow to stop for decades, if not forever, Iran’s nuclear weapons program? No.

But we can be sure that once Iran acquires nuclear strike capability it will permanently be a significant threat to the U.S., our allies in the Middle East, Europe and beyond.

Winston Churchill’s warnings about the rising menace beyond the Rhine seem as relevant today as they did in the 1930’s: “One ought never to turn one’s back on a threatened danger and try to run away from it. If you do that, you will double the danger.”

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To friend or not to friend? That is the right-wingers' question.

By Golnaz Esfandiari

Source: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL)

July 28, 2010
“The website of the followers of Khamenei has been created. Please enter with your hijab and after completing your ablution.”

With that Facebook post, 29-year-old Iranian Ahmad heralded the arrival of a new social networking site, called Velayatmadaran, launched by the Iranian establishment.

The name is a reference to “followers of the velayat,” or Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and it’s part of an attempt by Iranian officials to get in on the social-networking craze. Like other sites that have proved to be crucial tools for communication, discussion, and the exchange of news and information among members of the opposition — including Facebook — Velayatmadaran allows users to network and post pictures, videos, and articles.

Predictably, given his support for Iran’s political opposition, Ahmad’s status update, the messages that go out to Facebook “friends,” became an immediate hit. There was an explosion of sarcastic comments from his friends. One wrote that he would join the website on condition that his friends promise not to tag him in pictures of President Mahmud Ahmadinejad and hard-line cleric Ahmad Khatami. Another mocked that “the networking site is a dream come true.”

Iranian officials have smeared such social networkers as lackeys of Iran’s enemies and victims of a “soft war” being waged against Tehran.

For his part, Ahmad thinks Velayatmadaran holds little attraction for young Iranians: “[The hard-liners] are losing their supporters from top to bottom. It’s clear just from the name of the site that it is designed for their own supporters.”

If You Can’t Beat ‘Em…

According to the “About Us” section, the site was launched to create an online platform for the religious hard-liners of Iran’s Hezbollah to exchange ideas and fight “evil.” Issues like “the rule of the supreme jurist” and “women and family” are up for discussion.

So far, the site has attracted some 3,000 members and includes posts of pictures of “Imam Khamenei,” a reference that seeks to elevate the current supreme leader beyond his clerical status; articles about the teachings of ultra hard-line Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi; and cartoons skewering the opposition Green Movement.

In the aftermath of Iran’s disputed election in 2009, social-networking sites were filled with images and comments related to the protests over the reelection of President Mahmud Ahmadinejad. Despite official attempts to limit the free flow of information, word of the use of force by government forces spread quickly.

Velayatmadaran’s creators write that “the enemy” has recently used social-networking websites for its own benefit and for “spreading lies.” They say that while that same enemy has used the virtual world “skillfully” and social-networking sites as a “weapon,” Hezbollah has relied on its “faith and correct belief.” It’s time to fight fire with fire, they argue.

Ali Honari, a 32-year-old sociology student who has been living and studying in Holland for nearly a year, sees little to attract Iranian young people.

He says the new website appears to be an attempt by Iranian authorities to funnel their supporters away from mainstream social networking or from engaging in open debate.

“A friend of mine who taught some courses at the Qom seminary said that even there, students are becoming increasingly modern,” Honari says. “They have access to the Internet, they watch the latest movies. [The establishment] needs to make sure they remain loyal.”

Toronto-based Iranian blogger Arash Kamangir says he doubts Velayatmadaran would attract many members.

“It’s not difficult to launch a new social site,” Kamangir says. “What is difficult is to attract members. [Iranian leaders] cannot do it, because they don’t want to open these sites to those who are opposed to them and their supporters don’t seem to be many.”

He adds that Velayatmadaran looks suspiciously like a sort of “training camp” for hard-liners to gain familiarity with social-networking sites.

“They see it as a military camp where they can receive training,” Kamangir says. “They say that the next steps will be to go out and take some [action].”

‘Cyber War’

New York-based journalist Roozbeh Mirebrahimi, who was jailed in Iran in 2004 over his online writings, says the creation of Velayatmadaran and other similar moves — such as the launching of hard-line blogs — is the result of Tehran viewing the Internet as a threat.

“The Islamic republic and the security military organs that are behind such projects make a big mistake by thinking that online tools — blogs and now social networking websites — themselves have the power to influence,” Mirebrahimi says. “It’s a wrong belief, these are only tools — the ideas that are being discussed within these tools are [what is] important.”

The Iranian establishment has for years fought a cyber battle on several fronts. It has reportedly blocked and hacked websites, tracked activists online, and threatened Iranians who have turned to blogs and other online platforms to express themselves. It has prosecuted and jailed some people based on their online content.

But the Iranian establishment has faced fierce and determined opposition by activists and intellectuals, who have used proxy sites and antifiltering tools to bypass government censorship.

One web developer in Tehran, who spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear for his safety, says activists seem to be winning the cyber battle. “The government blocks [and] young citizens find a way to unblock the filtered website,” he says. “They manage to spread the news the government wants to censor.”

One Friday Prayers leader, Ayatollah Alam Ahdi, effectively acknowledged as much last week. He said during a public appearance in Mashhad that “the enemy” has occupied the virtual world, adding that the “cyber war” should be taken seriously.

“If, for example, we have inside and outside the country 10 million bloggers, 9.5 million of them are against Islam,” he said.

He advocated using “any tool,” even if contravened Shari’a, or Islamic law.

“In a war, anti-Shari’a [moves] are permissible; the same applies to a cyber war,” Alam Ahdi said. “The conditions are such that you should fight the enemy in any way you can. You don’t need to be considerate of anyone. If you don’t hit them, the enemy will hit you.”

Honari, the doctoral candidate studying abroad, says he thinks the Iranian establishment is fighting a losing battle.

“All the sites that are popular are sites where users can discuss and express their critical views [freely],” he says. “That’s against the views and principles of an authoritarian regime. The Iranian government cannot use the Internet properly.”

As far as Velayatmadaran goes, he says a critical dialogue is impossible.

“What would they do with someone like me with opposed views if I became a member?” Honari asks. “They would have to delete me over and over.”

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Imam Khomeini Relief Committee

By Ali Alfoneh, Ahmad Majidyar

Source: American Enterprise Institute (AEI)

July 2010

This is the first in a series of Middle Eastern Outlooks documenting Iran’s growing influence in Afghanistan.

As the United States targets the Taliban in Afghanistan, Iran is using soft-power tactics to combat U.S. influence and win over the minds of the people. This Outlook examines the activities of the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee, a charitable organization that aims to promote Iran’s ideological and political goals in Afghanistan. Since the early 1990s, the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee’s Afghanistan arm has been expanding its budget and reaching more and more Afghans, which poses a growing threat to U.S. interests. To succeed in Afghanistan, the United States must focus not only on the hard power of the military, but also on a comprehensive soft-power strategy.

Key points in this Outlook:

• The Imam Khomeini Relief Committee is part of Iran’s larger goal of using soft power to gain influence in Afghanistan and throughout the region. An ostensible charity, it actively promotes Iran’s ideological and political goals in Afghanistan. In particular, it promotes Shiism and incites anti-American sentiment.
• The charity and its assets are under the control of Iran’s supreme leader. It receives government funding, donations from private individuals both inside and outside Iran, and religious taxes, and it engages in fundraising activities outside Iran.
• To combat this threat, the United States must add soft-power strategies to its military tactics in the Afghanistan war.

Operation Enduring Freedom–the war in Afghanistan–is now the longest war in American history. U.S. casualties are increasing, and public support for the war is in decline. But the United States is not alone in the sandbox. The State Department and Pentagon expend much effort getting NATO members to commit troops and adopt rules of engagement that can contribute to the U.S. mission. Beyond the international coalition, Pakistan, China, and Iran are all actively involved in Afghanistan.

These countries sometimes act at cross purposes to U.S. goals. U.S. officials, for example, frequently express concern over Iranian arms shipments to the Taliban. “Iran is covertly supplying arms to Afghan insurgents while publicly posing as supportive of the Afghan government,” said Dennis Blair, director of national intelligence, to the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.[1]

While U.S. military and intelligence focus on Iranian hard power, they seldom discuss Iranian soft-power efforts in Afghanistan, which are largely coordinated by the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee. The Imam Khomeini Relief Committee is the most prominent among several Iranian state-sponsored organizations operating in Afghanistan. Its ostensible goal is to provide humanitarian aid to poor communities. How-ever, with about thirty-five thousand Afghans on its payroll[2] and tens of thousands of indirect beneficiaries, Iran’s largest charity aims to advance Tehran’s ideological and political ends in Afghanistan, promote Shiism, and incite anti-American sentiment.

Background

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and his followers secretly formed his covert charity in 1963 both to support the families of shah-era political prisoners and to finance subversion against the shah. On March 5, 1979, as Khomeini consolidated the Islamic Revolution, he formally established the organization as the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee.[3]

Today, the committee’s governing statute places the charity and its assets under the supreme leader’s control and defines its mission as “providing livelihood and cultural support to the needy and underprivileged people living inside and outside the country in order to secure self-reliance, to strengthen and increase piety, and to preserve human dignity.”[4] An additional article charges the organization to “support as much as possible the needy outside the country based upon the Islamic Republic of Iran’s government policies.”[5] The committee has no shortage of resources: it receives government funding, donations from private individuals both inside and outside Iran, religious taxes, and revenues from its own income-generating programs.[6] It also engages in fundraising activities outside Iran.[7]

Structurally, the committee consists of three subordinate offices: a Central Council staffed by the supreme leader’s appointees and led at present by Habibollah Asgar-Owladi, the Office of the Superintendent chaired by Hossein Anvari, and an Audit Unit headed by Abolfazl Haji-Heidari. The Imam Khomeini Relief Committee’s superintendent, who serves a five-year term, can establish or close down branches outside Iran, contingent on the Central Council’s approval.[8] The committee’s structure mirrors Iran’s administrative divisions with offices in each province, county, township, and rural district.[9]

Inside Iran, the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee has been quite effective at its ideological mandate. Last year, for example, many rural poor refrained from joining the antigovernment protests because they feared losing the social security benefits the committee provides. The committee helps the disadvantaged with food, shelter, education, and health care. “According to the information we have, none of these families [helped by the charity] got involved in the destructive scenes, which is natural because they have touched the warmth of people’s donations,” Anvari told the Financial Times.[10]

Mohammad Mohammadi-Fard, coordination and international affairs deputy; Hadi Dehbashi, Foreign Offices executive affairs director; and Hamed Azimi, head of the Office for Expansion of Relations with Iranians Abroad, direct the committee’s activities outside Iran.[11] The Imam Khomeini Relief Committee also operates in Azerbaijan, Comoros, Iraq, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories, Syria, and Tajikistan.[12]

After the ouster of the Taliban, the Iranian government immediately set the stage for a soft-power offensive in Afghanistan.

Activities in Afghanistan

In Afghanistan, the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee, led by Massoud Ashkan,[13] focuses its assistance on orphans, the physically disabled, and the elderly.[14] In addition, it offers computer classes and distributes food aid, blankets and fuel, interest-free loans, and marriage assistance to destitute young people.[15] The organization also provides medical services through a Kabul hospital, which has a daily capacity of two hundred patients and sends some patients to Iran for further treatment. The committee also provides free services to the general public to commemorate special days such as the anniversary of the Islamic Revolution, the anniversary of the death of Khomeini, and Ramadan.[16] At present, nearly thirty-two thousand Afghans from over seven thousand families are enrolled in the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee’s aid and educational programs (see table 1).

The committee’s goal, however, is not simple charity. As in Lebanon and the Palestinian territories, in Afghanistan it often agitates against common enemies like the United States and Israel. On the anniversary of Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, for example, the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee sponsored a competition at the Iranian Embassy in Kabul among more than one thousand aid recipients in Afghanistan to test knowledge of Khomeini’s Last Will and Testament.[17]

Each year, the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee also organizes Qods [Jerusalem] Day rallies to express solidarity with the Palestinians and opposition to Israel, usually through temporary organizations like the Qods Day Celebration Committee, the Cultural Shura of Qods, or the Cultural Council of Supporters of Sacred Qods.[18] At a 2008 rally in solidarity with Palestinian children described as a “spontaneous sentimental act,” Afghan children said they received money from the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee to pledge to Palestinian children. “We have come here on the orders of the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee to help Palestinian children,” twelve-year-old Mariam told Pajhwok Afghan News. Laila, thirteen, said the committee also organized a march in front of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan office.[19] The political potential of the Qods Day rallies has not gone unnoticed by the Afghan press. Kabulpress, an independent Afghan news website, accused the Iranian government of exploiting Qods Day to advance its “satanic policies” in Afghanistan.[20]

The Imam Khomeini Relief Committee’s work in Afghanistan began in the early 1990s, when it opened two offices in Kabul and an office in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif. Between 1994 and 1995, the committee established branches both in the city of Bamyan and in the Yakawlang district of Bamyan Province, which is predominantly inhabited by Shia Hazaras. After the Taliban took Kabul in 1996, the committee relocated its Kabul offices to Pul-e Khomri, the capital of the northern Baghlan Province, and to the Panjab district in Bamyan Province.[21] In 1998, as the Taliban advanced north, the committee shut down its offices inside Afghanistan but continued to provide assistance to northern Afghan provinces through offices in neighboring Tajikistan.[22]

After the ouster of the Taliban, the Iranian government immediately set the stage for a soft-power offensive in Afghanistan. It dispatched Hassan Kazemi Qomi, Qods Force commander and liaison to Hezbollah in Lebanon, to be Iran’s consul-general in Herat and coordinate Iranian assistance to Afghanistan.[23] The Imam Khomeini Relief Committee reopened its offices in Kabul and, in 2003, also opened branches in the western provinces of Herat and Nimruz,[24] giving it extensive coverage in areas populated by Persian speakers and Afghan Shia. In November 2003, the Iranian media spoke of Iranian support for forty-four major infrastructural projects in Herat Province alone.[25]

The Imam Khomeini Relief Committee’s activities in Afghanistan have grown steadily in recent years, with increasing numbers of beneficiaries (see figure 1). The organization has expanded its area of operation to eastern and southern Afghanistan to target disenfranchised Pashtun communities. Here the motivation may be political: in September 2007, the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee distributed fifty tons of food aid both to those neglected by the Afghan government and to victims of coalition air strikes in the southern Kandahar Province.[26]  Last year, the committee distributed food aid both in Kandahar and in Jalalabad, the capital of the eastern Nangarhar Province.[27]

By 2008, the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee had forty-five offices in Afghanistan. Headquartered in Kabuland, it has three main branches in Herat, Mazar-e-Sharif, and Zaranj, the capital of Nimruz. It also runs two “cultural branches,” three clinics, and thirty-six workshops.[28]

This year, the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee’s overall annual budget increased by 6 percent.[29] The committee’s budget pales in comparison to international aid to Afghanistan, but it effectively bolsters Iranian influence. While the Iranian government has given more than a quarter billion dollars in grants, and perhaps double that in loans, to influence Afghan politicians at the national and provincial levels, the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee garners influence among village leaders and poorer segments of society who otherwise would not enjoy trickle-down wealth.[30] Importantly, while the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee is expanding activities in Afghanistan, it provides no assistance to the 2 million Afghan refugees living under harsh conditions inside Iran.[31] Simply put, that is not where the Iranian government seeks to influence Afghans.

Conclusion

Both President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have endorsed smart or soft power. In her confirmation hearings to take the helm of the State Department, Clinton said, “We must use what has been called ‘smart power,’ the full range of tools at our disposal.”[32] The 2010 National Security Strategy refers repeatedly to the concept of soft power, if not the phrase itself. “Our moral leadership is grounded principally in the power of our example–not through an effort to impose our system on other peoples,” it declared. Later, it explained, “Successful engagement will depend upon the effective use and integration of different elements of American power. Our diplomacy and development capabilities must help prevent conflict.”[33] Certainly, as Joseph S. Nye Jr. outlined in his seminal book, Bound to Lead: The Changing Nature of American Power, soft power is an important component of U.S. strategy when coupled with hard power. Recognition of soft power’s role in U.S. strategy is also evidenced by the emphasis on civilian aid and development in the State Department’s Afghanistan and Pakistan Regional Stabilization Strategy.[34]

The flaw in the U.S. embrace of soft power, however, is the assumption that in Afghanistan, the United States and its NATO allies are alone in the sandbox. The fact remains that countries like Iran–competitors if not adversaries–also embrace a multifaceted strategy that combines hard and soft power. The U.S. military is well prepared to counter hard-power threats, but nowhere in the White House’s Afghanistan strategy does the administration spell out how to counter the Iranian soft-power challenge.

Ostensibly, the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee is an ordinary charity rendering humanitarian assistance to the poor communities in Afghanistan. In reality, ¬how-ever, it is exploiting a variety of soft-power tools to further the Iranian government’s political and ideological agenda and undermine U.S. interests in Afghanistan. Indeed, the organization’s activities are integral to Iran’s larger plan to use soft power to gain influence not just in Afghanistan, but also throughout the region. As the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee expands its influence in the insurgency-ridden Pashtun-dominated areas of Afghanistan and exploits local grievances to provoke anti-American sentiment, the consequence of U.S. officials’ failure to address adversarial soft power grows.

Ahmad Majidyar (ahmad.majidyar@aei.org) is a research assistant at AEI. Ali Alfoneh (ali.alfoneh@aei.org) is a resident fellow at AEI.

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Notes

1. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Annual Threat Assessment of the Intelligence Community for the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, 111th Cong., 1st sess., February 12, 2009, available at www.fas.org/irp/congress/2009_hr/threat-qfr.pdf (accessed July 22, 2010).

2. “Komiteh-ye Emdad-e Emam Khomeini dar Afghanestan 50 Kelas-e Fanni Va Herfeh-i Dayer Kard” [Imam Khomeini Relief Committee Establishes 50 Professional and Technical Courses in Afghanistan], Imam Khomeini Relief Committee, available in Persian at www.emdad.ir/news.asp?nu=1533 (accessed July 7, 2010).

3. “Tarikhcheh” [History], Imam Khomeini Relief Committee, available in Persian at www.emdad.ir/moarefi/index.asp (accessed July 2, 2010).

4. “Asasnameh-ye Komiteh-ye Emdad-e Emam Khomeini Rah” [Statute of the Blessed Imam Khomeini Relief Committee], Imam Khomeini Relief Committee, available in Persian at www.emdad.ir/moarefi/files/p2.pdf (accessed July 2, 2010).

5. Ibid.

6. Ibid.

7. “Jahiziyeh-ye Komiteh-ye Emdad Baraye Dokhtaran-e Dam-e Bakht-e Keshvarha-ye Khareji” [The Relief Committee's Dowry for Girls outside Iran], BBC Persian (London), June 20, 2009, available in Persian at www.bbc.co.uk/persian/iran/2009/07/090719_ka_relief_foundation_anvari.shtml (accessed July 8, 2010).

8. “Asasnameh-ye Komiteh-ye Emdad-e Emam Khomeini Rah” [Statute of the Blessed Imam Khomeini Relief Committee]; “Showra-ye Markazi” [Central Committee], Imam Khomeini Relief Committee, available in Persian at www.emdad.ir/moarefi/shora_markazi.asp (accessed July 3, 2010).

9. Gozaresh-e Amari-ye 1387 [1387 Statistical Report] (Tehran: Imam Khomeini Relief Committee, 2008-2009), available in Persian at www.emdad.ir/gozareshat/files/s/1387/fasle19.pdf (accessed July 3, 2010).

10. Quoted in Najmeh Bozorgmehr, “Iran Charity Keeps Poor out of Politics,” Financial Times (London), June 30, 2010.

11. “Howzeh-ye Sarparasti” [Head Men Directorate], Imam Khomeini Relief Committee, available in Persian at www.emdad.ir/moarefi/moaven_kol.asp (accessed July 2, 2010).

12. Gozaresh-e Amari-ye 1387, 427-71.

13. “Tawajoh-e Komiteh-ye Emdad-e Emam Khomeini Dar Afghanistan Ba Amozesh Wa Eshteghal-e Madad Joyan Ast” [Imam Khomeini Relief Committee Focuses on Education and Employment for the Needy], Bazar-e Kar (Tehran), December 22, 2009, available in Persian at www.bazarekar.ir/frmArticle_fa-IR. aspx?ID=285246&CategoryID=19 (accessed July 14, 2010).

14. Gozaresh-e Amari-ye 1387, 455.

15. “Iran IKRC Sending Aid to Afghanistan,” PressTV, September 15, 2007, available at www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=23216 (accessed July 8, 2010); “Komiteh-ye Emdad Beyn-e Haft Hezar Khanevadeh-ye Afghan Soukht Tozi’e Mikonad” [The Relief Committee Distributes Fuel among Seven Thousand Afghan Families], Persica, n.d., available in Persian at http://persicaforum.com/showthread.php?t= 2857 (accessed July 8, 2010); “13000 Khanevadeh That-e Poushesh-e Komiteh-ye Emdad” [13,000 Families Covered by the Relief Committee], AVA (Kabul), December 24, 2008, available in Persian at www.avapress.com/vdca.onek49nao5k14.html?PHPSESSID=dd81fdc6b3cb88fd8708ce42d85ed12b (accessed July 8, 2010); and “Hozour-e Komiteh-ye Emdad Dar Digar-e Keshvarha Dar Rastaye Khedmat Be Niazmandan Ast” [The Relief Committee's Presence in Other Countries Serves the Purpose of Serving the Needy], Fars News Agency (Tehran), December 3, 2006, available in Persian at www.farsnews.ir/newstext. php?nn=8509120318 (accessed July 8, 2010).

16. “Barnameh-ye Ayamollah-e Dahe-ye Fajr-e Komiteh-ye Emdad-e Emam Khomeini Dar Afghanestan E’lam Shod” [Programs of the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee in Afghanistan for the Godly Days of the Dawn Are Announced], Islamic Republic News Agency (Tehran), January 31, 2010, available in Persian at www.irna.ir/View/FullStory/?NewsId= 931177 (accessed July 8, 2010). The focus on common Muslim and Iranian state holidays rather than explicitly Shiite commemorations is deliberate to avoid sectarian tension that could hamper outreach to the majority Sunnis.

17. Ali Dianati, “Dekhalatha-ye Rezhim-e Iran Dar Afghanestan” [Interventions of the Iranian Regime in Afghanistan], Afghanmaugh (Kabul), n.d., available in Dari at www.afghanmaug.net/content/ view/558/32 (accessed July 8, 2010).

18. “Ba Hozour Dar Hamayesh-e Bozorg-e Mardomi-ye Aghsa Zemzemeh-ye Qur’an” [Presence at the Large Popular Conference of Whispering the Quran], Rah-e Nejat (Kabul), September 4, 2009, available in Dari at www.rahenejatdaily.com/1265/88062612.html (accessed July 12, 2010).

19. “Children Express Solidarity with Palestinians,” Pajhwok Afghan News (Kabul), September 25, 2008, available at http://pajhwok.com/viewstory.asp?lng=eng&id=62720 (accessed July 8, 2010).

20. “Rezhim-e Iran Ba Qods Noshkhar Mikonad” [The Iranian Regime Devours the Qods], Kabulpress (Kabul), September 10, 2009, available in Dari at http://kabulpress.org/ mmy/spip.php?article4033 (accessed July 12, 2010).

21. Gozaresh-e Amari-ye 1387, 454.

22. “Tawajoh-e Komiteh-ye Emdad-e Emam Khomeini Dar Afghanistan Ba Amozesh Wa Eshteghal-e Madad Joyan Ast” [Imam Khomeini Relief Committee Focuses on Education and Employment for the Needy].

23. “Entekhab-e Safir-e Jadid-e Iran Dar Eragh Va Janjal-e Resaneh-ha-ye Arabi” [Appointment of New Iranian Ambassador to Iraq and Mayhem of the Arab Media], Diplomasi-ye Irani (Tehran), January 24, 2010, available in Persian at www.irdiplomacy.ir/index.php?Lang=fa&Page=24&TypeId=1&ArticleId=6790&Action=ArticleBodyView (accessed July 13, 2010); and Michael Rubin, “Understanding Iranian Strategy in Afghanistan,” in Afghanistan: State and Society, Great Power Politics, and the Way Ahead, ed. Cheryl Benard et al. (Santa Monica: RAND, 2008).

24. Gozaresh-e Amari-ye 1387, 454.

25. “Karzai Lauds Iran’s Role in Afghanistan,” Islamic Republic News Agency (Tehran), December 7, 2003.

26. “Iran IKRC Sending Aid to Afghanistan.”

27. “Ziafat-e Eftari-ye Komiteh-ye Emdad-e Emam Khomeini Dar Afghanestan” [Breaking the Fast Festivity of the Imam Khomeini Relief Committee in Afghanistan], Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting Dari Radio (Tehran), August 29, 2009, available in Persian at http://dari.irib.ir/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=15170 (accessed July 12, 2010).

28. Gozaresh-e Amari-ye 1387, 454.

29. Bozorgmehr, “Iran Charity Keeps Poor out of Politics.”

30. U.S. Department of Defense, “DoD Press Briefing with Maj. Gen. Cone and Gen. Wardak from the Pentagon, Arlington, Va,” news release, October 18, 2007.

31. “That-e Poushesh Gharardadan-e Niazmandan-e Afghani Vazifeh-ye Komiteh-ye Emdad Nist” [Covering the Needy Afghans Is Not the Duty of the Relief Committee], Aftab News (Tehran), May 11, 2010, available in Persian at www.aftab.ir/news/2010/may/11/c4c1273566076_social_relief_help.php (accessed July 7, 2010).

32. Hillary Rodham Clinton, “Statement before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee” (speech, Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Washington, DC, January 13, 2009).

33. National Security Strategy (Washington, DC: White House, May 10, 2010), 10-11.

34. U.S. Department of State, Afghanistan and Pakistan Regional Stabilization Strategy (Washington, DC: Office of the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, February 2010).

More »

By Michael Ledeen

Source: Pajamas Media Faster, Please! Blog

July 27, 2010

The increasingly incoherent leaders of Iran have long claimed that their domestic opponents are taking orders from a secret foreign group. Sometimes I think they make such statements because they really believe them, other times I think they have to say such things because if they admitted the truth – that the vast majority of Iranians hate the regime – they would have to pack up and go to North Korea.

But President Ahmadinejad’s latest sortie seems to me to establish a new standard for dementia, as he has now attacked Paul, the celebrated prophetic German octopus, as an agent of Western propaganda and psychological warfare.

You may have missed the events that propelled Paul to international celebrity. Briefly, he correctly called the outcome of several soccer games in the recent World Cup, including the final. Shortly after of the tournament, Paul was asked to choose the winner between Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and opposition Green Movement leader Mir Hossein Mousavi.  Paul unhesitatingly chose Mousavi (for those curious about the details, Paul was placed halfway between two mussels, one with Khamenei’s picture on it, the other with Mousavi’s.  Whichever Paul ate first was deemed the winner).

I hope that Paul has good security. Iranians have killed their enemies in Germany before.  The soccer-loving Oracle of Oberhausen deserves a long and satisfying life.

More »

Source: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL)

July 27, 2010

The last shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (left), with his wife, Farah Pahlavi, in a royal ceremony (undated).

July 27 is the 30th anniversary of the death of Iran’s last imperial ruler, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

Shah Reza Pahlavi left Iran in December 1978 after 37 years in power. After living in Morocco, the United States, Mexico, and Panama, he went to Egypt where he died in a Cairo hospital on July 27, 1981. His body was laid to rest in the Al-Refai Mosque in Cairo.

His wife, Farah Pahlavi, spoke to RFE/RL’s Radio Farda about the incidents of those times.

RFE/RL: I would like to ask you whether it’s true that the shah was unaware of the illness he suffered from and that he was kept in the dark regarding his illness?

Farah Pahlavi: His illness, as I have mentioned in my book, was immune-system cancer. It is true that he was not told the word “cancer” on some occasions, but he was fully aware of his illness. His Majesty had discussed it with his doctor, asking whether he had about two years’ time in order that his son could reach a certain age [before his death] and in order that he would be able to complete the work he had started. This clearly shows that he was aware of his illness.

I remember discussing it myself with his doctors, asking them not to keep him in the dark, as he was the ruler of a country and he had some decisions to make.

RFE/RL: When exactly did His Majesty find out about the cancer?

Pahlavi: He found out when the French doctor was summoned. I myself was unaware of it until I found out in 1977. When the doctors arrived — the specialist for blood cancer and one of the most renowned French [professors], Jan Barnard — His Majesty knew exactly what he suffered from when they checked his blood hemoglobin level. I believe that was the time when he found out.

RFE/RL: Let’s now discuss another period of your life next to the ruler of Iran: your exit from Iran. Numerous countries whose leaders called themselves allies of the Iranian ruler created barriers to the entry and residence of you and His Majesty. What was the shah’s reaction to this behavior, did it have a political aspect, and did those leaders have any interest in the formation of the Islamic republic?

Pahlavi: I try to forget about the bitter past as I [also] recommend for my fellow countrymen. I do not live in the past, I live in the present, always hoping for a brighter future. This is my message to all my countrymen.

Farah Pahlavi in January 2009

But these incidents are a part of history. I shall never forget the tears in the eyes of the shah the day we left Iran. In that deserted runway and in the aircraft, my only thought was whether it was the last time or would [we ever] return. We first went to Egypt, where the then-president, [Anwar] Sadat, accepted us. The downfall in Iran had not started yet. We then went to Morocco, where the late King Malik Hassan accepted us.

Things changed then, after the downfall on February 11, 1979. I shall never forget how I was following the news on the radio in Morocco. We no longer knew where we could be accepted after that. I should mention that His Majesty had kept himself [despite] all the lies and conspiracies and his only worry was the Iranians and their nation.

I think, as a politician, he had realized that the leaders were after their own political interests and they would very much like to establish relations with the [upcoming] regime in the country. But their inhuman behavior was terrifying, along with all the lies that the media would publish. I used to wonder for years, all those who wrote on the [subject] of human rights back then, how did they remain silent after all the inhuman incidents in Iran during the later years? [It was no] coincidence [that] the downfall of the shah [led to an Iran in which] the Iranians no longer had any human rights.

I believed all those incidents were a mixture of the trouble that resided within them, [the feeling of] insufficiency of all those who were against the imperial rule of Iran. There was a controversy on political ideology and the Cold War was going on. There was communism and then there was Russia, along with severe outside pressure that contributed to the matter. All this is being written in books now.

Many believed that a revolution was not the answer to these inconveniences. I consider many of the officials of the Islamic republic as the ungrateful children of the 30-year-old politics of the countries that now receive death slogans, as it is obvious that foreign policies of that time contributed a great deal to the downfall of imperial rule.

RFE/RL: Thirty years ago, when you and the shah went to Panama, many Islamic republic officials, including then-Foreign Minister Sadeq Ghotbzadeh, announced that the shah should be handed over to the Islamic republic. Was this true? And if it was, how were you informed and able to leave Panama?

Pahlavi: Yes, this is in fact true. Unfortunately, after the kidnapping incident at the American Embassy, we had to leave New York and the only country that accepted us was Panama, where we went to from Texas.

Mrs. Sadat had called me back then and had [invited] us to come to Cairo. That was when the U.S. government sent two officials to speak with His Majesty and ask him not to leave for Cairo. I was present in that meeting and I insisted that we leave, as many journalists and friends had called and told us that it was better to leave.

The plane that was to be sent by the Egyptians was canceled [at the] last minute and we were told by the Americans that they would provide us with one. That plane landed in the Azore Islands and we waited for several hours there in [a state of] utter surprise. I remember meeting the Portuguese foreign minister there after a long time. They said they asked the American authorities [about] the reason for our delay but were refused any information. Even their ambassador had asked the U.S. State Department in Washington the next day but was not given any answer.

I want to mention here that [U.S.] President [Jimmy] Carter had called Ashraf Qarbal, the then-Egyptian ambassador to Washington, telling him that he had called President Sadat trying to convince him not to let the Iranian shah enter Egypt, as it could [hinder] the Arab-Israeli peace talks, but he had not received an answer.

The American aircraft waited for hours in any case, which was quite concerning. His Majesty was also suffering from a fever then. Pierre Salinger, a journalist, writes in his book that Carter had contacted Mr. Ghotbzadeh and was offered the release of the hostages in exchange for returning the Iranian shah to Panama. Mr. Ghotbzadeh was unable to gather the Revolutionary Council due to the Iranian New Year holidays, hence he was unable to pass a decision. He had apparently mistaken the time difference with Panama, and had announced the return of the shah, which was later said to be canceled, and we ended up in Egypt.

RFE/RL: You mentioned Anwar Sadat, the Egyptian president who allowed you to enter Egypt. Was this due to friendship or was there any profit in it for him?

Pahlavi: It was completely out of his friendship and good human nature as he had no personal gain from it. Egyptians had not forgotten the help they received from Iran during their troubled times of war.

I remembered that when the shah was hospitalized, many foreign journalists came to gather negative reactions from the people of Cairo. But the opposite happened, the shop owners in the streets along with the general population were extremely glad to have the Iranian shah in their country. They considered us family who helped them in difficult times.

There were some chaotic reactions but fortunately, Anwar Sadat, his people, and his government accepted us in a friendly manner. It was [the first time] that we’d felt comfortable in months. It is for that that my children and I, along with several Iranians, are grateful to Anwar Sadat and the Egyptian government. Anwar Sadat gave a lesson to the world that even in politics there is room for kindness and human behavior.

RFE/RL: Besides the bitter memories of the 30 years that you referred to, might there be some pleasant ones that you’d care to mention for us?

Pahlavi: True, there were bitter moments but there were also sweet memories during those 30 years. One of the bitter memories was the death of Leila, my daughter, for which I thank the Iranian nation, who went to the Niavaran Palace holding candles to pay their respects. I think it was good that His Majesty was not alive to witness her death.

Especially, I believe that God [must have] liked him to have taken him away before he could see the Iranian nation in that condition, and especially Saddam [Hussein]’s attack on Iran. I am grateful to all those Iranian soldiers who fought this war bravely and did not allow our nation to fall into alien hands.

There were in fact some sweet memories, too, for instance the graduation of the kids from their universities, the wedding of Prince Reza with Yasamin, the birth of my grandchildren, and lastly the completion of school of my older grandson, who will attend university next year.

Also there is the great news from Iran that the people are holding on. Regardless of all the pressures upon them, people are fighting bravely against this suppression. The success of Iranians all across the world is also the happiest thought. What I always say is that goodwill wins over bad.

More »

By Michael Singh

Source: Foreign Affairs

July 26, 2010

On June 10, when the Iranian opposition movement cancelled its planned commemoration of the anniversary of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s disputed reelection, commentators assumed that the Green Movement was finally finished. For months, it had been criticized as lacking strong leadership and for being unable to seriously challenge Iran’s entrenched regime.

But the history of political turmoil in twentieth-century Iran suggests that the movement may yet survive. After all, movements propelled by similar social currents have succeeded in dramatically changing Iran in the past.

Three periods of domestic political turbulence shook Iran in the last century — the Constitutional Revolution of 1905–11, which for a time curbed royal power and led to the development of Iran’s constitution; the Muhammed Mossadeq era of 1951–3, which temporarily ousted Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi; and the 1979 Islamic Revolution, which replaced the monarchy with clerical rule.

Each of these episodes was brought about by the confluence of three factors: increasing popular anger at the regime’s corruption, a rupture between the ruling and clerical classes, and dissatisfaction with Iran’s foreign relations. In each instance, two disparate camps — one secular and liberal, the other comprised of politically active (often young and mid-ranking) clergy — momentarily came together in opposition. Indeed, although periods of upheaval tend to be remembered today as being driven by iconic leaders such as Mossadeq, in the 1950s, and Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, in 1979, it is important not to forget how broad and longstanding the popular movements behind them actually were.

The international community should not worry that the Green Movement is doomed, but it should harbor no illusions that its success would inevitably lead to peace and democracy in the long term.

In the early 1900s, for example, long-simmering outrage at the shah’s tyrannical behavior and humiliating trade concessions to Russia and Great Britain boiled over when the director of customs (a Belgian national) began to enforce tariffs to pay off Russian loans. Intellectuals were joined by clerics, for whom the concessions were not only an affront to Islam but also a threat to the economic interests of religious endowments. The two camps came together to demand the ouster of the shah’s prime minister and the establishment of a parliament. In the 1950s, nationalist revolutionaries campaigned to rid Iran of British control, citing the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company as a symbol of imperialist exploitation. Mossadeq spearheaded the movement but relied on Ayatollah Sayed Abol-Ghasem Kashani to rally an activist segment of the clergy. Kashani’s example may have been an inspiration to Khomeini, who, in the 1960s and 1970s, brought together an extensive coalition, including secularists, clerics, youth, and others. In demanding an end to the monarchy, Khomeini and his associates seized on widespread disgust at the shah’s coziness with Western powers and outrage over his oppressive and corrupt behavior. The coalition was galvanized by Mohammad Reza’s land reforms, which threatened the financial base of clerics and other wealthy elites.

All three opposition movements took years to consolidate before becoming powerful enough to force change on the regime. The Constitutional Revolution, which is thought of as emerging around 1905, as protests broke out over tariffs, was in fact a continuation of events that began in 1891, with the campaign to overturn an exclusive tobacco concession the shah had granted to the British.
Similarly, Mossadeq’s National Front achieved power in 1951, but this was after decades of discontent with a monarchy that had descended into disorder following World War II. The violence of this era was a longstanding family feud as well: before ousting Mohammad Reza in 1951, Mossadeq had been imprisoned by Mohammad Reza’s father — Reza Shah — for, among other things, casting a dissenting vote in the parliament in 1925 against his coronation. The Islamic Revolution of 1979, moreover, had roots going back to 1960–4, when riots against the shah swept the country and Ayatollah Khomeini and many other activists were exiled.

Each period of turmoil was distinctive but was propelled by similar undercurrents. It is a peculiar irony that in today’s campaign against Khomeini’s political heirs, the opposition movement is appealing to many of the same grievances Khomeini cited in his campaign against the shah. And indeed, the very same three factors that contributed to previous episodes of turbulence are converging again today. First, Ahmadinejad’s apparent theft of the 2009 presidential election, and the regime’s harsh repression of protests and other dissent preceding and following those elections, have fueled accusations of corruption and tyranny. This displeasure has been exacerbated by the popular perception that a privileged few — mainly elites in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps — have benefited from Iran’s resource wealth while average citizens have struggled. Second, the mounting international opprobrium directed at Tehran has created a sense that the regime’s mismanagement of foreign relations is an embarrassment and harmful to Iran’s interests. Finally, the clergy appear to be dissatisfied with the government (exemplified for now less by active opposition than by the dwindling clerical representation in government and the growing number of clergy who refrain from political activism on behalf of the regime), and some of the citizenry have even accused the regime of being “un-Islamic” for its policies of repression and torture.

This movement, too, is wide-ranging. It brings together not only reformists associated with Muhammad Khatami’s more liberal government of the late 1990s but also former conservative stalwarts, such as Mir Hussein Moussavi, the movement’s leader. It also appears to be at least tacitly aligned with other hardliners, such as former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, and with quiescent clergy, labor activists, students, and merchants who have grown unhappy with the regime’s economic policies. All seek to curtail corruption, restore a greater measure of civil rights to Iranians, and establish a less dangerous, more productive relationship with the outside world.

Moreover, the Green Movement is built on discontent that predates the June 2009 elections: it is the same dissatisfaction that led to Khatami’s landslide electoral victories in 1997 and 2001 and to the student protests between the late 1990s and today. Just as reform movements past were slow to build, today’s cannot be declared over because of the Green Movement’s apparent sluggishness. The mass protests following Ahmedinejad’s election have shown that regime has lost the affection of the majority of Iranians. So even as questions persist about the Green Movement’s viability, the regime’s viability is no clearer.

Yet if history gives cause for optimism regarding the opposition’s prospects for success, it also gives cause for caution. Their primary goals achieved, the coalitions leading the past century’s three reform movements quickly crumbled, riven by conflicting objectives and ideologies. After the Constitutionalists ousted the shah’s prime minister and convened a parliament, they quickly found themselves pitted against clergy advocating an Islamic state. By 1911, Russian troops had shelled and disbanded the parliament, leading clerics had been executed, and Iran was controlled by the Russians in the north and the British in the south. Two years after coming to power, the coalition led by the National Front was similarly fractured, and communist partisans were the strongest force in the streets. A U.S.- and British-organized coup soon ousted Mossadeq. And finally, in the months after the Islamic republic was established, Khomeini’s Iran plunged into bloody violence between competing factions. The regime likely only survived due to the unifying effect of the war with Iraq in 1980.

The international community should not worry that the Green Movement is doomed, but it should harbor no illusions that its success would inevitably lead to peace and democracy in the long term. Indeed, the United States and its allies should be considering not only how best to support the democratic aspirations of Iranians but also how to prepare for the real possibility of instability in Iran should the opposition prevail.

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By Michael Ledeen

Source: Pajamas Media’s Faster, Please! Blog

July 26, 2010

’ll bet you haven’t seen very much news about Iran during the past week or 10 days, have you? And yet there’s lots of news:

–first of all, there is still no end to the bazaar strike, even though the regime has taken very violent action against the strikers. A large part of the beautiful bazaar in Kerman has been torched ( for that matter, regime thugs have taken to setting ablaze large sections of forest land in the region.  Nor will the bazaar strikes end soon, since this week marks religious celebrations that traditionally close the bazaars all over the country;

– the major natural gas pipeline between Iran and Turkey was sabotaged. Enormous damage was done, and the authorities have no estimate as to how long it will be until repair work is finished. Meanwhile the two countries announced plans for a brand-new pipeline;

– Saturday – Sunday night there was a serious fire at the old petrochemical plant on Kharq island. That island is very important to Iran, because it is at once the central point from which Iranian crude oil is exported, and one end of the major pipeline that carries crude and refined products to the mainland. So anything that goes wrong there has immediate consequences both for the national economy and for daily life;

– you may recall that a bit over a week ago, amidst the continuing strikes at major bazaars around the country, there was a double suicide terrorist attack against the mosque in Zahedan, killing nearly 30 revolutionary guards. That unhappy city is still in a state of virtual military occupation, of the most brutal variety. Innocent civilians have been gunned down for the crime of walking at night, and plainclothes killers have gone door to door among the homes of bazaar shopkeepers, and killing anyone who answers the bell.  Here’s an exceptionally well written report:

The IRI kills the Rigi brothers, a few weeks apart, without proper trial, without even considering the possibility that giving Rigi a death penalty together with a pardon and a life term in prison, will have served the country far better than his death. The IRI is behaving like a savage barbarian; one matching the rogue elements of Jundollah; primitive, uncultured, mercurial!

So Jundollah sends suicide bombers and IRI sends thugs to the streets of Zahedan, the city of kind people, open minded people, mountain and desert people, city of smuggled goodies, city of white Sunni mosques, and dusty parks. The thugs, (the) report says, have been kniving people. These knife thrusters would be of the same ilk that was unleashed on Tehranis in Ashura: they are most likely Ahmadinejad’s products from the “rehabilitation program” that found “convicted criminals” a useful job in the society.

According to local observers, these knife-pushers are the worst of all: they seem to target Balouchis randomly, and beat them up for no reason–further fueling the ethnic resentments and convictions that the Balouch are discriminated against.

– It has been a very hot summer, and the electrical grid in and around Tehran has given up the ghost many times, especially in recent weeks. Not only have citizens suddenly found their lights and air conditioning out-sometimes for half the day or night–but the two big automobile factories have already reduced production by one full shift a day.  The president has publicly blamed the problem on foreigners, as is his wont, but his problems are local;

– as the regime increasingly wages war against itself, the comings and goings of seemingly powerful people have become almost impossible to sort out. There have been repeated purges in the ranks of the Revolutionary Guards, and the supreme commander, Gen. Jafari, has now publicly stated that many senior officers had actively sided with the opposition. Why then, the general was asked, had he not punished them properly (with torture and death)? His answer was telling: it’s better to convince them of the error of their ways.

This is a surprising answer, to be sure, but after all it is the same answer that the supreme leader has implicitly given to the much asked question: why have you not properly punished the leaders of the Green Movement, Mousavi and Karroubi? In both cases, the regime is afraid to move decisively against their opponents. Khamenei & Co. are real tough guys when it comes to torturing and killing students, political activists, homosexuals, Bahais, Christians and women. But even when it comes to their favorite targets — the women — they retreat in the face of strong protests, as in the recent case when they suspended the stoning of a poor woman unfairly accused of adultery.  Her plight has attracted international attention, and the regime backed off.

Yeah, surprising answers abound in Iran these days, even when nobody asked the question. For example, Ahmadinejad seems to have lost his official theologian.

Hojattoleslam Mohammad Nasser Saghay Biria, President Ahmadinejad’s Advisor on Religious Affairs, has resigned his post in what his close associates are describing as a protest against Ahmadinejad’s alleged un-Islamic views on requirements for women to wear veil and conform to strict Islamic dress code. Ahmadinejad has not yet accepted Saghay’s resignation.

Saghay Biria is a disciple of Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi.

That last line should get your attention, because the Ayatollah in question is generally considered to be the leading light in the cult of the 12^th Imam, the little boy who had been destined become the leader of Islam, but have to hide from his would-be killers some 900 years ago, and whose return would mark the End of Days.  Mesbah Yazdi is said to be Ahmadinejad’s guru, so why is his disciple walking out on the president? Your guess is as good as mine, but whatever it means, it is another signpost along the death spiral of the Islamic Republic.

Rulers of the Islamic Republic are looking more and more like the gang that couldn’t shoot straight, and Banafsheh uncovered a document that should cause them considerable embarrassment. It’s a flyer, recruiting virgin women for prostitution in a brothel located in the holiest site of one of the two holiest cities in Iran: the Imam Reza Shrine in Mashad.  You might wish to read the whole thing—it includes going rates—but here’s the essence of it:

In order to elevate the spiritual atmosphere, create proper psychological conditions and tranquility of mind, the Province of the Quds’eh-Razavi of Khorassan has created centers for temporary marriage (just next door to the shrine) for those brothers who are on pilgrimage to the shrine of  our eighth Imam, Imam Reza, and who are far away from their spouses.

To that end, we call on all our sisters who are virgins, who are between the ages of 12 and 35 to cooperate with us.

It’s a religious thing, you see.

To me, this is a perfect symbol of the Islamic Republic:  even the holiest places have been corrupted and turned into brothels and charnel houses. Degradation is the common denominator of Iranian life, and the women, starting at age 12, are its most common victims.

Faster, please