Commentary has been muffled on the important Iranian parliamentary (Majlis) election. Most reports have said that Ahmadinejad's group, the Principalists, won and "reformers" lost, but with warnings of splits in the Principalists over economic issues. This is essentially correct, although things are more complicated. First, the pro-reform Khatami group appears to have gained seats from about 30 to about 50 (out of 290), despite being limited by the Council of Guardians to only running 120 total (and the Rafsanjani group did not run at all), see http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/middle_east/7299733.stm. The Principalists are reported to have gotten 71% of the seats, http://www2.irna.ir/en/news/view/line-24/0803166580104449.htm,
however a substantial block of these are "reformist" or "pragmatic" conservatives who are critical of Ahmadinejad on economic policy.
Most of the little commentary in the West has been scary, that Ahmadinejad has been backed. But the real subtext is the domination by Supreme Jurisprudent Ali Khamene'i, who encouraged the pragmatic conservatives while blocking the Khatami group, with the somewhat moderate former nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani winning big in Qom, and poised to become Speaker of the Assembly. The key point is that Khamene'i has been very clear in supporting a civilian nuclear power program while opposing a military one, just what the US NIE reported this past fall. Thus, while many in the US do not like these guys, there is every reason to believe that they are not pursuing nuclear weapons, the underpinning of the Bush approach to Iran (and apparently that of McCain as well, who has just bizarrely announced that Iran has been training and supporting al Qaeda in Iraq, on which point Joe Lieberman had to correct him by whispering in his ear).
I will add an obvious comment. The hostility of the Bush administration, even after the reduced chance of invasion since the release of the NIE report, feeds into support for hardliners in Iran. Reformers there do not welcome Bush's rantings and ravings at all, not one bit. Pretty much everybody in Iran supports a peaceful nuclear program, and they do not like invastion threats one bit, even if those have been squelched, at least for now.
ReplyDeleteBarkley
Since nobody is commenting on this other than me, I shall not do a separate post on this. However, I note that today Juan Cole reprints an artile by William Polk noting danger signs that the Bush administration may be gearing up for war with Iran. Among the sign: firing of Admiral William Fallon as Centcom commander, who opposes such a war; Cheney quietly visiting Oman, the choke point at the Straits of Hormuz; Hersh reporting that the real reason for the Israeli strike on Syria was to make them activate their air defense system so that the Israelis will know how to deal with it if they want to cross Syria to strike Iran (Turkey will not let them do it, and they do not want to upset Jordan), and, finally, there has been a large and largely unreported buildup in the Persian Gulf of US naval forces.
ReplyDeleteBarkley
Don't interpret the absence of comments as a lack of interest.
ReplyDeleteAdded to the scary crap from Bush on Iran is that in an interview with Radio Farda yesterday, the US radio beamed into Iran in Parsi, to celebrate Nowruz, the Persian New Year, he lied that Iran has publicly declared a desire to obtain nuclear weapons to destroy enemies. Anyone who has followed my postings on Iran here will know that the Iranian leader, Vilayat-el-Faqi, Ali Khamene'i, has issued a fatwa against nuclear weapons, declaring them to be against Islam. Bush has lied. Is he indeed gearing up for war with them?
ReplyDeleteBarkley