Background: Totalitarians always have a yin to play against an unruly yang. The Roman emperors had a Praetorian Guard to protect them from the Army, just in case. When the Red Army got to powerful and influential, Stalin sicced the KGB on their leadership; when the KGB in turn got big enough to threaten him, he turned the Army and the Party on them, killing its leadership. Likewise, Hitler had the SS – which pledged loyalty to him at the Party directly – to serve as an insurance policy against the Wehrmacht, whose Prussian Junker leadership was loyal to the German state, drawing Hitler’s distrust; the SS “Blackshirts” themselves were a response to what Hitler saw as the excessive power in the hands of the SA (“Brownshirts”), whom he formed the SS to counter and, eventually, dismantle. Saddam Hussein had multiple levels of backups; against the Army, he had the Republican Guards – again, smaller but better trained and better-equipped – and beyond that, a smaller, even more elite group of guards in case the Republican Guard got uppity.
Iran has had the same arrangement for most of the past thirty years. The Iranian Army – once by far the largest in the Middle East, and by far the best-equipped in the Moslem world – was cut town to size after the Revolution, and especially after the Iran-Iraq War, as the mullahs established an “elite”, or at least intensely-loyal, “Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps” (IRGC). The IRGC were the foot soldiers and muscle of the Revolution, and developed over time into an entire parallel military, serving the mullahs directly in parallel to the regular (and now cash-starved) regular Iranian military, which is a faint shadow of its shah-era self.
According to Time, that development has continued; the IRGC has taken over Iranian policy:
On Monday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton finally got around to acknowledging what a lot of people have known since Iran’s contested election last June — there’s been a military takeover in that country, with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) grabbing every important lever of power. As Clinton put it during a televised town-hall meeting, “The Supreme Leader, the President [and] the parliament is being supplanted, and Iran is moving toward a military dictatorship.”
No doubt one reason it took Clinton so long to admit that the mullahs have been forced to cede power to the IRGC, Iran’s élite military force, is that Washington hates to be the bearer of bad news, especially news that moves us closer to war.
Especially when the Administration’s campaign-era pledge was that to deal with the mullahs, all you needed was love.
Since its birth in 1979, the IRGC has been the hardest of the hard core of Ayatullah Khomeini’s Islamic revolution. It thrives in confrontation with the U.S. and Israel, and does even better when Iran is at war. The IRGC looks at the 1982-2000 war in Lebanon as its most glorious moment, when its proxy Hizballah forced the West and Israel out of Lebanon. It left Hizballah with the enviable reputation of being the only force in the Middle East to have beaten both the West and Israel. Not to mention that Hizballah is now the de facto government in Lebanon. No wonder the IRGC would like an encore in the West Bank and Gaza, where it has been arming militants for more than a decade.
There’s method to what we in the West could consider the Madness:
It may make us feel better to label the IRGC as a terrorist organization, but it’s more instructive to look at things from the IRGC’s perspective. It truly believes that its brand of asymmetrical warfare can defeat a modern, well-equipped force in a limited war. It did so in Lebanon, and given the right circumstances, it would do so in other parts of the Middle East. But the real point is that in a limited war with the U.S. and Israel, the IRGC could predominate, or at least wear us down to the point that we would decide it’s better to settle.
And as western thinkers have known for centuries – nothing takes the pressure off a dictator like a perennial state of war:
With inflation and unemployment running at 30% in Iran, continuing demonstrations in the country and shaky oil markets, the Obama Administration should be considering the distinct possibility that the IRGC may welcome an open conflict with the U.S. (and Israel), its coup d’état solidified.
All by way of saying; it’s possible we’re not re-living the Carter years in nearly every coneptual particular. I’m just not seeing it.
While there is little question of Iran being a totalitarian state, news flash Mitch, that happened in 1953.
What IS different, is that they are unfriendly AND are NOT prone to invading neighbors. Further, one comment, one MASSIVE reality you conveniently left out, is that totalitarians universally seek to survive until and unless there simply is zero hope. Stalin didn’t start a nuclear war, neither did Mao, nor Kruschev, nor Breshnev, nor Andropov, nor Peng, nor did Jong Il, nor has Il Sung.
The thing is, you all want to invent boogey-men to justify your phumpering feigned patriotism and desire for big military budgets, but frequently, those boogey-men don’t exist in reality any where near as dangerously as they do in your fantasies. You rail against a ‘state’ which overreaches here (even if such overreaching is really only something you just don’t like much – like say helping the poor, or having to pay taxes), against totalitarianism elsewhere, but gladly embrace both when YOUR party is power. We do agree in one area though, though of course that makes both of us disagree with the majority of the right-wing nuts, the years 2001-2009 bore more resemblence to 1920-1929, than the current time/place bear a resemblence to 1977-1981. There are a host of comparatives which could be made, but let’s just start with this – Carter faced the calamity of Iran and the invasion of Afghanistan and unless you see the BUSH negligence in Afghanistan as akin to what the Soviets did, there really are virtually no similarities on foriegn policy.
As well, the economy of 1975-1979 was generally stronger than now, not terrific, but reasonable. We had high inflation, and higher than later years unemployment, but the average wage was higher, there was more liesure time, and most importantly, we had a vastly higher manufacturing and IT base, things which are now understood to be the key to sustainable strength. Those were shredded in the 1980’s (in the case of manufacturing) and Reagan did nothing, and again in the 2000’s (in the case of offshoring IT jobs), and Bush.Did.Nothing.
The economic crisis we faced under Carter (and Ford – but you all like to forget that) was one brought about by an oil embargo and the END of a war, not because of the cost of a stupid occupation. Contrastingly, Obama faces an economic condition brought about by our own malfeasence. WE repealed laws separating banks from investment houses, WE repealed laws and oversight on the quality of mortgages (and underlying investments), WE offshored 8 million jobs, WE ran up massive debt to fight this voluntary and unnecessary occupation of Iraq. WE encouraged automakers to build big, gas-guzzling vehicles, and encouraged citizens to buy them by passing 100% tax write-offs on vehicles with GVW above 6k pounds – and when gas spiked, in a very predictable way due to the growth of China and India, our automakers were effectively doomed. They doomed themselves, but we surely helped. WE saw people cashing out 401k’s and IRA’s via loans, we saw energy and healthcare inflation spiral out of control, and did nothing. Much like we didn’t bother to worry about the excesses of the capitalists in the 20’s, the Bush White House did nothing on purpose – and Obama and the nation inherited a huge mess. It wasn’t solely Bush, certainly not, but he took no action when it was clear action was needed. Do nothing is a kind term – morally bankrupt is more apt. So while Obama’s economic crisis wasn’t made by Obama, much as Carter’s wasn’t made by Carter, the quality and genesis of each is utterly different, and this is by far a much more difficult and deep hole to climb out of, if we can at all.
news flash Mitch, that happened in 1953.
Bill Haley formed the Comets.
Oh, yeah, the CIA installed the Shah.
Now – do you know the difference between the Shah and the IRGC? Do favor us with an answer, or I’ll do it for you.
What IS different, is that they are unfriendly AND are NOT prone to invading neighbors.
Non-sequitur.
That was one of the points of the article – assuming you read it. They don’t “invade” neighbors, but they do love to destabilize them, fund proxies, and send their goons to help bomb their neighbors.
Further, one comment, one MASSIVE reality you conveniently left out, is that totalitarians universally seek to survive until and unless there simply is zero hope. Stalin didn’t start a nuclear war, neither did Mao, nor Kruschev, nor Breshnev, nor Andropov, nor Peng, nor did Jong Il, nor has Il Sung.
Pen, you need to drop the whole “inconveniently left out” bit. No book, muchless blog post, is big enough to cover every question that relates to a nation and its government. It’s like a project; you have the concept of “scope” to deal with.
The thing is, you all want to invent boogey-men to justify your phumpering feigned patriotism and desire for big military budgets,
No, Pen, conservatives – myself especially – believe in being realistic about threats, and defending against them. Liberals believe in being unrealistically phlegmatic and assuming that all you need is love.
And please, Pen – it’s “phumpHering”. Which a second “H”. Phumpering makes no sense whatsoever. Please see to this.
And now you depart into fantasy:
As well, the economy of 1975-1979 was generally stronger than now<, not terrific, but reasonable. We had high inflation, and higher than later years unemployment,
We had horrendous inflation! And while unemployment peaked at 10% in 1982 (as part of Volcker’s strategy to sweat out inflation), the unemployment had been over 7-8 for the better part of the decade, to the point where people thought 5 was a fantasy. Five years ago we were under 5.
but the average wage was higher
That whole “income is dropping” meme depends on an arguably dishonest and contex-deprived reading on the numbers.
there was more liesure time,
Partly because people were unemployed. I’m here to tell you, that’s not leisure.
and most importantly, we had a vastly higher manufacturing and IT base,
“Higher IT base?” Huh? WHat on EARTH are you talking about?
A higher percentage of the (much smaller) world IT market, perhaps. But as a percentage of the economy, IT – even with the outsourced programming and engineering jobs – is many times what it was, as a percent of the GDP.
Sorry, Pen. Carter’s regime was at least recoverable. Obama is setting us up for much, much worse.
Peevish Boy claimed MMGW is better understood than gravity.
Now she wants to claim Carter I were the good old days and Carter II is even better?