Comment Central - Times Online - WBLG

The mind of Iran's most powerful leader

This new FORA video takes us inside the world of Ayatollah Khamenei.

What does he really think about Ahmadinejad, America and Israel? What are his plans for Iran? And how should the West deal with him?

If you can't see this video, click here

A book to read and film to see: Persepolis

You are probably on to this already, but I've only just noticed. Marjane Satrapi's brilliant graphic account of her childhood and adolescence has been turned into a film.

What do I mean by graphic? I mean she not just written her autobiography, but also drawn. Persepolis reads and looks like a comic.

But it is, in fact, one of the best books I have read about Iran and growing up after the revolution.

Satrapi is very sensitive about Iran and her books (there are two volumes) are all the more devastating for that.

Dial 113 and turn in your brother

This TV broadcast from the Iranian Intelligence Ministry is simultaneously absolutely hilarious and blood-chilling. 

Hat Tip: Tom

Say what? Ahmadinejad's new post

Ahmadinejad displays a unique blogging style - a blend of political theory and utter incoherence...

One's perspective regarding government and governance determines the way one ‎should cooperate with the people.   If one recognizes government as a privilege and prey ‎of the governors, then the period of governance can be counted as an opportunity to fulfill ‎the expectations of certain individuals and groups or the ostentation and hedonism of the ‎governors.‎

Eh?

Ahmadinejad the blogger returns...

He's back!

The only blogger about whom one can say with "high confidence" that he is not about to blow up the world has returned to the keyboard.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad explains, entirely convincingly, that the fact that he hasn't posted since March does not mean that he hasn't kept his promise to spend 15 minutes a week on his blog:

As a matter of fact, I have spent more than the allocated time on the blog. The ‎magnitude of the reception and acclamation from the viewers was beyond ‎expectations.

So I had to decide how to spend the limited time that I have allocated ‎for the blog; should I write new notes or respect those viewers who kindly and ‎generously have shared their thoughts and opinions with me and sent messages and read ‎their numerous received messages. ‎

‎Slightly missing the point, I feel, of the new medium that he has embraced, the President decide it was more important to reply personally to those commenting on the site than it was to post on the blog.

So he declares proudly:

I personally have read those messages that are considered to be short.

He continues:

I am apologetic to those who have been waiting for my new posts.

Your apology, dear President, is accepted.

(Hat tip: Alex Ray)

The truth? Pressure has worked in Iran

Does the report that Iran halted its nuclear weapons programme in 2003 really

transform the political and diplomatic debate about what to do about Iran

as Coffee House suggests?

Yes, of course, but instead of producing the outcome that the Spectator blog suggests:

At first blush, it appears to thwart any chance America and the EU-3 had of getting the UN Security Council to vote for tougher sanctions on Iran.

the response should be the opposite.

If Iran has indeed halted the programme, it did so under huge US pressure and in the same year as the attack on Saddam. The lesson is that this pressure works.

Huge numbers of articles have been written since 2003 about how the US was powerless and how the Iraq war had strengthened the war. The new assessments suggests that these articles were wrong.

The debate should be transformed - with those urging a tough line feeling greatly strengthened.

What about Iran?

Seymour Hersh has had another go in The New Yorker at suggesting that an attack on Iran is in the offing.

His account is hedged around and, in any case, his judgment is not, ahem, uncontroversial. But the issue is certainly worth more debate than it is getting, isn't it?

Iran wasn't mentioned at all in the Prime Minister's speech. And yet within a year it could be the only issue in town. If we have an election, we surely aren't going to have one without mentioning one of the biggest issues of our time, are we?

Words fail me

This would be hilarious if it wasn't so tragic...

Coming soon: Oliver Stone's "Ahmadinejad - The Movie"

Here's a contender for Top 10 Stupid Film Ideas of our Time - a docudrama on President Ahmadinejad. That'll pack 'em over the Summer to be sure.

It is being reported in Iran that Oliver 'JFK' Stone has written to the President seeking permission to make a film of his life. Apparently it's been turned down:

Mehdi Kalhor, the Iranian President’s media advisor, stated that Stone is “part of the Great Satan.”

This can't be true can it?

Tom Gross comments:

Stone may go ahead in any case. But he has already made a film called Natural Born Killers, so he will have to think of another title

Iran makes the case for Rushdie support

Disturbing news this morning from Iran:

Iran said today that a fatwa ordering the death of British writer Salman Rushdie issued by its revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini still stands after his knighthood by the Queen.
"The stance of the Islamic Republic of Iran with regard to this issue has not changed from what was put forward by the Imam Khomeini," foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini said.

The Indian-born Sir Salman, 59, was forced to go into hiding for a decade after Khomeini issued the 1989 death sentence over his book The Satanic Verses, saying it insulted Islam.

Khomeini's successor as supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said in January 2005 he still believed the British novelist was an apostate whose killing would be authorised by Islam.

It is extraordinary that some people are arguing whether Shalimar the Clown is a good novel or whatever, instead of seeing what is at stake.

The need for a show of support grows stronger.

Iran and its crimes against Iranians

From this morning's LA Times:

On May 8, the walls of Tehran's Evin prison closed around my wife, Haleh Esfandiari, a 67-year-old scholar, grandmother and dual citizen of Iran and the United States.

Haleh, director of the Middle East Program of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, went to Iran in late December to visit her 93-year-old mother, a trip she has made almost twice each year for a decade or more. On Dec. 30, on her way to the airport to fly back to Washington, she was stopped by three masked, knife-wielding men who took all her belongings, including her Iranian and U.S. passports. In retrospect, it was clearly an inside job; Iran's Ministry of Intelligence fielding "highwaymen" against Iran's own citizens.

These are the opening words of an oped by Shaul Bakhash, a teacher at George Mason University in Virginia. You'll want to read it all.

Indecent picture of Iranian President

This is a great little story:

President Ahmadinejad of Iran yesterday found himself accused of breaking Islamic law with an “indecent” public act, after he could not resist embracing and kissing the hand of his former primary school teacher, an elderly woman, at an impromptu reunion.

Say, I've got an idea. Why don't we let these people have nuclear weapons. What could possibly go wrong?

Des Browne fiasco - The real Iran problem

Des Browne gave us something of an answer to what I regard as the most important question on the Iranian hostages - where did it all go right?

The media handling was catastrophic, but not so the handling of the negotiations itself.

He believes that the early release of the military personnel without any obvious concessions on our part was partly the result of united European pressure. This sounds credible.

Wouldn't it be good if we had serious, united European pressure on Iran not to arm itself with nuclear weapons.

The Iran hostage crisis - where did it all go right?

I am with Andrew Roberts on the rules governing the behaviour of the captured servicemen in Iran. We certainly need to revisit the advice that forces are given on their behaviour if captured.

But aside from that, the near universal view that Iran has won a great victory, humiliating Britain at will, seems somewhat wide of the mark. They got no apology or concession, yet they returned the hostages anyway.

Mickey Kaus asks:

Am I missing something? Why exactly was the resolution of the latest Iran hostage crisis a "success" for Iran and a "humiliation" for Britain?

and adds:

Didn't they blink? If that's humiliation, it's not far from what a U.S.-U.K. victory in the crisis would look like.

So while I am all for learning Roberts' type lessons about what we did wrong, we also need to establish what we did right.

It would be extremely useful to know what encouraged Iran to release the forces when we had not given in to any of their demands. If it worked once, it might work again.

Why the Iranians wanted Faye Turney to "confess"

The purpose of getting Faye Turney to appear on television "confessing" to trespass was not just to put pressure on the British Government via the airwaves. It was to get her to believe the version of the story the Iranian's are retailing.

In his book, Influence, Professor Robert Cialdini explains how the Chinese applied basic ideas from social psychology in their treatment of American prisoners of war. They would get them to write down and then repeat confessions and admissions that communism was superior to capitalism.

They understood that getting the prisoners to say these things was a big step to getting them to believe them.

For the same reason companies ask you to send back "tie breaker" forms for competitions, beginning with words such as "I like this detergent because...". Once you have written these reasons down and sent them off, you are far more likely to believe that you like the products.

So getting Faye Turney to praise the Iranians for their kindness on television and getting her to say she was in the wrong is a big step to getting her to believe these things.

If I'm right, they are attempting to brainwash her. 

Everything you've always wanted to know about Iran

Want to understand what is going on in Iran?  Kenneth Pollack is an excellent guide. The former Clinton adviser is author of The Persian Puzzle, a first class history of the conflict between Iran and America.

If you were after something a great deal shorter than a book then try this three page long Pollack primer on the Iran.

Showdown in Crisisland

Here's how The Daily Show's reported the hostage crisis in Iran. Arn't British accents hilarious?

Robbie Millen

What does Iran hope to achieve?

What are the Iranians up to? Ian Bremner in the National Interest gives a very clear insight into what Tehran means to achieve with its kidnapping of the British sailors and marines.

Will it lead to military conflict? Bremner says this:

Britain and the United States will now step up their military presence along the edge of Iran’s territorial waters, with more frequent and larger-scale patrols. That will heighten the risk of military miscues but reduce the likelihood of any surprise Iranian naval presence.

and this:

I still see Israeli security concerns as the most significant driver of likely military action. A series of Israeli war drills last week, including simulated missile attacks on Israeli urban centres and on the main Tel Aviv power station, are particularly noteworthy.

Robbie Millen

The Iranian banknote goes nuclear

In four days time Iran will print a new banknote with a nuclear logo on one side and a picture of the Ayatollah Khomeini on the other. Great.

But the attitude problem of the in-your-face note (Tom Gross records that on top of the design issues, exactly six million are to be printed) is less interesting than the economic problem it is designed to remedy.

According to AsiaNews:

The Iranian banknote serves to hide increasing inflation. The underdeveloped Iranian banking system is feeling the effects of economic sanctions imposed by US financial authorities on all business dealing with the US and Iran - thus the Islamic Republic finds itself in a delicate phase of dollar/euro transition. 

But perhaps the most serious problems are found within the Iranian economic system: badly governed and for the most part controlled by the regime, in which corruption and speculation triumph, resulting in chronic inflation.

The conventional wisdom is that Iran's nuclear ambitions cannot be thwarted. This isn't true. Sanctions may not work, but they could. If they are going to, Europe has to join in. Why won't it?

It is an irony that the same people who argue that sanctions and containment worked in Iraq are against using them in Iran.

Jurassic Park - and the international Jewish conspiracy

Pirates of the Caribbean - and the international Jewish conspiracy

Here is the news from Iran

Tom and Jerry - the international Jewish conspiracy

Here’s another reason why I don’t want Iran to get a nuclear bomb.

Incidentally, Tom and Jerry wasn’t made by Walt Disney.

UPDATE: One or two Times colleagues who watched this thought the translation was a spoof. So I should stress that it is genuine.

UPDATE: From this, to cats that look like Hitler.

Iran - my response

Several readers have replied to my column on Iran this morning by suggesting that we don't need to worry and that Iran's nuclear programme is peaceful.

My response is this.

Iran - living through our mistakes all over again

A further thought, following my piece this morning on Iran.

The main argument against war in Iraq was that containment and sanctions were working. The best argument for the war (made, for instance, by Clinton adviser Kenneth Pollack in The Threatening Storm) was that sanctions were breaking down and could not be used to contain in Iraq in the medium term.

And it is worth remembering that the left (for instance John Pilger) strongly opposed the continuation of sanctions on Iraq. Only when war was suggested did the sanctions suddenly become popular.

We are now living through exactly this debate again, this time over Iran.

Strong financial sanctions are the only hope for a peaceful resolution to the Iranian missile crisis. Without them, the crisis can only end in one of two ways - Iranian missile capability, supporting their aggressive terrorist clients, or missile strikes to stop the nuclear clock.

Yet Europe (particularly Germany and Italy) cannot be persuaded to support a strong enough sanctions package. Sanctions, it seems, will only become a popular cause when it is too late to impose them.

It is immensely depressing to go through all this again.