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In Iran, a generational
crossroads
By Ehsan Ahrari
As
the world's attention is focused on Iraq, a very
important struggle between two generations is in
progress in Iran.
One generation was young
during the waning days of "America's Shah". It
participated in his ignominious ouster, and ushered in
the Islamic revolution of 1979 led by the late Ayatollah
Ruhollah Khomeini with an unprecedented fervor. The
second generation of that struggle comprises the youth
of today, most of whom were not even born during the
reign of the Shah, Mohammad Reza. Thus, it did not grow
up hating his regime and the United States, whom the
earlier generation branded as the puppeteer of Reza and
as the "Great Satan". Today's youths hate with growing
intensity the conservative hardline mullahs (clerics),
who reject all attempts to loosen their grip on power
and who are continuously frustrating the preference of a
majority of Iranians being expressed since the general
elections of 1997. This struggle might shake up, if not
unravel, the very edifice of the Islamic Republic of
Iran.
Young Iranians envisioned the election of
President Mohammad Khatami in 1997 as a sign of hope.
They viewed him as an enlightened mullah who would use
his elected position to get their country ready to face
the awesome and intricate challenges of the 21st
century. From the perspective of youth, a good starting
point for that great leap was the effectiveness of
Khatami in persuading the hardliners to reform the
political system.
But that did not happen.
Khatami has proven himself to be a reluctant reformer.
He does not seem willing to rock the apple cart of the
Islamic Republic, and often appears weak in the ongoing
tug-and-pull with the conservatives. The youth are
clearly frustrated with him and are even calling for his
resignation as a voluble symbol of their disappointment.
The least understood fact about Khatami is that,
as much as he favors liberalization and modernization,
he is still committed to the Islamic revolution. More to
the point, he does not seem to be interested in playing
the role of "Iran's Gorbachev". That tongue-in-cheek
characterization is quite popular outside Iran, as is
Khatami - at least since 1997. To fully explain the
implications of comparing Khatami with Mikhail
Gorbachev, it should be recalled that the latter was
always more popular outside the former Soviet Union,
even when he was riding the tsunami of change. But that
tsunami swept away everything, including the communist
superpower - an outcome that Gorbachev did not intend.
Thus, Khatami never really welcomed that sobriquet; he
wanted no part of bringing about an end to the Islamic
revolution, especially in an era when the immediate
neighborhood of Iran seems to be edging closer to
heightened uncertainties, indeed, turbulence and chaos.
Consider three examples:
First, Saudi Arabia has
become an uncertain place at a time when King Fahd Bin
Abdul Aziz is paralyzed and his half brother, Crown
Prince Abdullah, is serving as a perpetual heir
apparent, it seems. The Wahhabi hardliners are very much
part of the Saudi government, and no one really knows
how much sympathy toward Osama bin Laden and his ominous
perspectives related to transnational terrorism has
permeated government circles. When it comes to the
commitment of maintaining theological puritanism, there
is virtually no difference between the Wahhabi
perspectives inside Saudi Arabia and those held by
Islamist organizations such as the Islamic Jihad of
Egypt. Those perspectives have long legitimized the use
of violence to eliminate all aspects of "apostasy" from
the world of Islam, with apostasy defined to include the
practices of any who do not follow the Wahhabi creed,
including Muslims. That is precisely what bin Laden has
preached, and why he has claimed that the Saudi
government must be overthrown for deviating from the
traditions of Aslaf (pious ancestors).
The
question still remains, however, whether the Saudi
regime will attempt to appease the Wahhabi elements
within its own borders, or decide to adopt a
middle-of-the-road course. No one can answer that
question until Prince Abdullah becomes King Abdullah.
The Shi'ite religious hierarchy of Iran is very
cognizant of these subtleties, and is hoping that their
country's friendship with Saudi Arabia has acquired an
enduring status that would not be reversed to the bad
old days of hostility, when King Fahd is no longer
around.
Second, Iraq is undergoing the most
stringent UN inspections in history, and its leading
antagonist - the United States - is sending daily
signals that the invasion of that country is impending.
Third, the real military rulers of Turkey got a
wake up call when the Justice and Development Party
Party - a moderately Islamic party - won 34 percent of
the popular votes. No one seems to know how long the
secular posture of the Turkish government will remain
intact, whether it will undergo any changes, or how
those changes might affect the political stability of a
state which is also an important member of NATO.
Of the three neighboring states, the future
twists and turns of events in Saudi Arabia and Iraq will
directly affect Iran. If Iraq is invaded and a different
government is installed, then the willingness of that
new government to allow the stationing of American
troops will make Iran more nervous than it already is
because of the continued US presence in Afghanistan. But
such a change is not that disconcerting when compared to
what might happen in Saudi Arabia. Any potential
enhancement of the power and influence of the Wahhabis
in that country has the potential of shaking the edifice
of Saudi-Iranian friendship that the present regimes in
both countries have been assiduously building for the
past several years.
On top of that, Iran itself
appears to be at a juncture of political change whose
scope defy all forecasts. The conservative forces are in
no mood to loosen their grip from power, and they hold
constitutionally guaranteed veto power to forestall any
institutional changes aimed at reducing their supremacy.
The outcome is inertia and a status quo that is
increasingly unacceptable to young Iranians. How much
longer the "conservative-in-chief" of Iran, the Supreme
Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, will take before he
recognizes that pressure for change has ominous
consequences if ignored for long and acts to accommodate
those demands to safeguard the Islamic Republic itself?
The show of force by 15,000 hardline militia men on
November 24 has indicated that, at least for now, he
does not seem to be too concerned.
The trouble
with the Iranian political system is that it is a
paradoxical amalgamation of democracy and theocracy.
Because it is a democracy, the younger generation want
it to behave like the archetypal Western liberal
democracy - guaranteeing freedoms of speech, religion
(or, at least, the freedom to interpret the practice of
Islam), and demonstration. When the Iranian academic
Hashem Aghajari was accused of apostasy for criticizing
the ruling mullahs, young Iranians expressed
astonishment and ridiculed at the very notion.
Yet, the paradoxical theocratic nature of the
Islamic Republic pulls it in the direction of tradition,
which is epitomized by the recalcitrance of the
conservative mullahs to make concessions to the
pragmatists. The same tradition emphasizes the primacy
of Vilayet-e-Faqih (rule of clergy), which is epitomized
by the fact that any criticism of clerics is equated
with apostasy, a ridiculous parallel, to say the least.
As diffident as Khatami has proven himself to be
in the pursuit of reform, Khamenei still does not pass
up any opportunity to express his irritation toward the
former, viewing any attempt to liberalize the political
system as an insidious "power grab".
In the
realm of external affairs, Iran is going through a very
delicate time. With national borders and loyalties in
the process of reformulating in its neighborhood -
Afghanistan, Central Asia and possibly Iraq - Iran will
feel increasingly isolated. In fact, it might be forced
to either revisit the proposition of developing nuclear
capabilities or restrict those capabilities to
transparently peaceful measures. Even then, there would
be no guarantee that it would not come under intense and
direct pressure from the US to abandon nuclear ambitions
altogether. The dual doctrines of "preemption" and
"proactive counterproliferation" of the US's National
Security Strategy, issued in September 2002, will be
glaring at Iran with heightened intensity. In all
likelihood, the Bush administration would even escalate
the volume of stridency by several decibels, demanding
that Iran cease and desist its nuclear program
altogether.
The hardline mullahs do not seem to
know it, but their regime is seriously threatened from
within, from young Iranians who did not inculcate the
revolutionary zeal, which by and large was the product
of the tyrannies of Reza's rule. Since they did not
experience it, they do not appreciate the significance
of changes under the Islamic Republic. To them, Islamic
rule has serious problems that should be corrected
immediately. They are also increasingly enticed by the
glitter of Western democracy, most significantly by its
promises of freedoms, instant gratification and even
hedonism - variables that are so appealing to youth all
over the world. The greatest challenge the conservatives
face is not to succumb to the temptation of antagonizing
the youth only because the current domestic balance of
power sways in their favor. They must remember the fate
of Mohammad Reza, who also believed that he was
invincible.
The most prudent course of action
for the conservative forces is to work with the moderate
Khatami - who believes in only adjusting the extant
distribution of power within the Islamic Republic and
moderately altering the status quo. If they survive the
growing challenge to their rule from within, they are
still likely to come out on top in their continued cold
war with the United States. As attracted as the young
Iranians are toward the Western way of life, they remain
intensely ambivalent of the intentions of the United
States in their neighborhood. Bush's imprudent lumping
of Iran as a part of the so-called axis of evil did not
win many friends in Iran. It is possible that Khatami
and his groups of moderates may be able to build on the
"us against them" type of feelings to lower the level of
conservatism on the one hand, while working to improve
the economic conditions within their country on the
other.
Ehsan Ahrari, PhD, is an
Alexandria, Virginia, US-based strategic analyst.
(©2002 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All rights
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