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Random Thoughts
Iran�s Tragic
Century
by
Gaurang Bhatt, MD
 Iran shares the shame of
India in the betrayal of a nation by its rulers and population. India�s
Hindu kings were so occupied with their extravagant lifestyles and
internecine quarrels with neighboring kingdoms, that they were
completely unprepared for the raids of Arab conquerors and Afghan
plunderers of Sind and northern India respectively. The raiders from
Ghazni had been converted to Islam earlier within less than half a
century of the birth of Islam. Islam legally and morally sanctioned
discrimination against non-believers including their slaughter,
expropriation of property and sexual abuse of women. In an era when
there were no guns, cannons and transport was by foot, horse or camel,
Mohammed Ghazni conducted thirteen annual looting raids a thousand miles
south into India, dependent on food and victuals that he could
confiscate along the way. Even after his first surprise raid, no advance
preparations or reconnaissance measures were taken to thwart him despite
a Indian superiority in numbers.
Iran, a Zoroastrian nation with superior culture under the Sassanid
dynasty was in constant conflict with the eastern Roman or Byzantine
empire based in Constantinople. In the seventh century it had been so
weakened that Arabs under the new banner of Islam routed the Persians at
Qadisiyah. The Arabs had a culture of poetry but not much more. The much
admired Islamic art, architecture, science were all Iranian gifts to
Islam. Jizya tax on non-Muslims, the prohibition on their holding any
slaves who converted to Islam, the inadmissibility of any legal
testimony by any non-Muslim against a Muslim and petty harassment of the
majority of Persians, who were Zoroastrians, accomplished near total
conversion to Islam, but it took over 400 years. Persecuted Zoroastrians
were initially internally displaced and quite a few took ships and
landed in Gujarat, India as refugees. They currently constitute a
shrinking minority called Parsis.
The system of administration in the Arab empire was mainly Persian.
Avicenna, a physician known to the West and Al-Khwarizme from whom we
get the English word algorithm as well as the father of algebra were all
Persians. The viziers and high officials of the Arab Islamic Caliphate
were often Persian. Over time, by the fifteenth century fragmented
Islamic kingdoms of Persia were unified by a new Persian dynasty called
the Safavids. A resurgence of Iran began and the nation was converted to
the Shia sect of Islam to distinguish the Persians from the Sunni Arabs.
The Arab Caliphs became titular heads and the real power shifted to the
Turkic Sultans who destroyed the Byzantine empire just as the Arabs had
destroyed the Persian Sassanid empire eight hundred years earlier.
In India, the Islamic conquerors were replaced by the Europeans in the
eighteenth century. The despicably shameful behavior of Indians
persisted. The kings once again sold out the nation, but this time the
common folk enlisted as mercenaries in the service of the British,
French and Portuguese and made war on their own people at the behest of
foreigners and for their benefit. Britain triumphed and India became its
colony and cash cow. Another European empire of the Czars of Russia was
spreading from Europe to Central Asia and Afghanistan became a buffer
and Iran became an area of interest between the two great behemoth
empires. In the late nineteenth century Iran was ruled by the Qajar
dynasty. Its Shah, a useless wastrel, sold a monopoly for tobacco
products all over Iran to a British adventurer for a paltry sum of
money, to maintain his profligate lifestyle. The railroad concession
sale was on the agenda as well. It is reminiscent of the Mughal emperor
in Delhi who sold the tax collecting concession to the East India
company for the same nefarious purposes. These were later rescinded by
popular protest.
In the first decade of the twentieth century oil was discovered in Iran
and the British government which now controlled India, formed an oil
company to exploit Iran�s oil. It treated the Iranian workers worse than
slaves and cooked the books to cheat the Iranian government of its
share. Oil became a necessity as Churchill converted the British navy to
run on oil instead of coal. Iran was divided into a northern part under
Russian influence and a British southern half as WW1 broke out. Some
time later the Qajar dynasty was removed from power by a Persian Cossack
in the military, named Reza, who took over first as a prime minister and
later became Shah. Prior to WW2, he was sympathetic to Germany and was
deposed by the British and replaced by his son. After WW2, the Iranian
clergy and population became agitated and altered the monarchy from
absolute to constitutional and under the new prime minister Mossadeq
threatened the nationalization of the oil company. The British resisted
and engineered a boycott of Iranian oil, but to no avail. They asked
President Eisenhower to help but he refused. They then used the bogie of
labeling Mossadeq as a stooge for the communists and took the plan to
overthrow him to the Dulles brothers who were the secretary of state and
CIA chief. They convinced Eisenhower to sanction a coup carried out by
Kermit Roosevelt of the CIA.
Again enough Iranian traitors were bought to spread false rumors,
agitate the Shia clergy with the specter of communism and engineer
violence and protests. The cowardly Shah went along but fled to Rome in
morbid fear, to return as an absolute monarch, after the coup. Iranian
oil was divided between the British and Americans. The Shah signed a
humiliating agreement including one for Status of Forces with the US in
1964. Khomeini�s criticizing speech led to his exile.
�..All American military advisers, together with their families,
technical and administrative officials, and servants - in short, anyone
in any way connected to them - are to enjoy legal immunity with respect
to any crime they may commit in Iran! If some American's servant, some
American's cook, assassinates your marja'-i taqlid (main Ayatollah)in
the middle of the bazaar, or runs over him, the Iranian police do not
have the right to apprehend him! Iranian courts do not have the right to
judge him! The dossier must be sent to America so that our masters there
can decide what is to be done! �
The Shah�s secret police -SAVAK�were trained by the CIA to torture, kill
and intimidate any protesters or dissidents. The megalomaniac weakling
in his delusions of grandeur went on an arms buying spree, held a lavish
2500th year celebration of Persian monarchy, even though his dynasty was
less than fifty years old and despite that nearly half the Iranian
population survived on bread and onions. There was no planning of the
economy. Imports of luxury goods were expanded without adequate port
facilities or roads. Expensive goods and machinery rotted because of
bottlenecks in transport and lack of expertise and ships had to wait a
fortnight or more in ports for lack of unloading facilities. Cronies and
sycophants grew filthy rich while people starved. Many of the 750,000
Iranians now living in Los Angeles were rich Shah supporters who sought
asylum in the US when the Shah was overthrown in 1979.
Once again the Iranian population was made a fool of. The Shah was
admitted to the US for medical treatment. Iranians thought a repeat coup
was in the offing and occupied the US embassy in Tehran and held the
diplomats hostage. Khomeini ignored all diplomatic niceties and
encouraged the hostage taking. There were border disputes between Iran
and Iraq. Saddam had taken power in Iraq decades earlier with help from
the CIA and used the turmoil in Iran to militarily attack Iran�s
southern oil rich province with a large Arab population. He received US
encouragement and support including the chemicals to make banned
chemical weapons that he used against the Iranian defenders. Khomeini,
no saint himself, used the opportunity to eliminate his opponents, throw
out the civilian government and establish a theocracy with nearly
absolute power for himself, the infallible religious ruler and his
unelected assembly of experts. All this was passed in a national
referendum. This alone should give any thinking individual an idea of
the depth of religious feelings of the entire population. The communists
and socialists had been killed or exiled by the Shah�s secret service.
Few who remained and the parliament or democracy oriented were mopped up
by Khomeini.
Some years later, a new law vetted candidates for election to office by
the unelected religious body They were disbarred if disapproved. Once
again this should tell us something about hoping for democratic change
in Iran and the temper of the population which accepted all this without
a pipsqueak. The protests at the results of the present election are
mainly because of severe economic privation of the majority poor and the
rich �Westoxicated� of north Tehran wanting to dress liberally, dance
and frolic. Those supporting the so-called reformist Moussavi should
know that he is deeply religious and as prime minister during the
Iran-Iraq war of eight years, at best silently connived at his
government�s sending of unarmed children in their early teens to walk
through the mined battlefield with a wooden key designated as to the
gates of heaven, instead of using minesweepers. There is no side for
America to choose from or as Secretary Baker under Reagan once put it,
�we have no dog in this fight�
The real reason for the election unrest is that at the end of the war,
the unofficial second army of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps,
created by Khomeini who did not trust the remains of the Shah�s army,
has acquired tremendous power and its captive companies have a monopoly
on trade, oil and much manufacturing. They have become like the
Pakistani military and Pentagon, blood suckers of the economy and
nation. The second group of hogs feeding at the public trough are the
�Booniyaads� or religious foundations controlled by some of the top
Mullahs. Rasfanjani, the richest man in Iran, an Ayatollah, former
president and chief of the Assembly of Experts was a bitter opponent of
Moussavi when he was the prime minister, but has now joined his side
because he covets Khameni�s power and position. He is also supported by
the merchants (bazaaris) whose finances are taking a hit because of US
sanctions, inflation and unemployment.
The poor and religious are supporting the populist Ahmedinejad, but are
somewhat disillusioned by lack of jobs and inflation. The IRGC has a
finger in every pie and are using oil and trade revenues to establish
hegemony in Iraq, Lebanon and even Bahrain. Moussavi�s election would
reveal the details of which funds were used for what purposes. To
prevent the revelation, Ahmedinejad of the IRGC, would be the best
choice like the CFTC and SEC heads, Geithner, Summers etc., selected by
Obama in the US, in deference to those who funded Obama�s election.
Khameni lacks superior religious qualifications and was an afterthought
choice of Khomeini to succeed him. He has therefore chosen to align
himself with the controllers of the Booniyaads and the IRGC and against
Rasfanjani. That is what all this hoopla is about. The US stands to gain
or lose nothing by the outcome of the elections, as both sides are for
nuclear power, hegemony in the Gulf and respect from America. The shrill
voices of the neo-cons rooting for Ahmedinejad to start bombing Iran and
the Iranian expatriates and the US left rooting for Moussavi, smug in
their secular and intellectual credentials, probably have used their
California medical prescriptions for marijuana in excess of the
therapeutic dose and are hallucinating.
June 21,
2009
Image under license with
Gettyimages.com
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