Watching President Trump manhandle the Iranian president on twitter was worth it. Having publicly declared that he should never again threaten the United States was tempered with a credible disinformation campaign aiming at threatening the regime. The Australians are reporting that they will assist in identifying targets within Iran was released yesterday; the fiction of hitting Iran is working to American advantage.
Team Trump will not directly confront Iran, they will instead, provide untold resources to bring about regime collapse in the form of open containment. For Iranian handlers like Reuel Marc Gerecht and Ray Takeyh, its a credible policy.
Iran today resembles characteristics of domestic China. Near permanent tension exists between Beijing and its peripheries. Today its bond maturities and zombie companies, for Iran its a convulsive struggle between mullah’s in Tehran who wish to maintain power and the ruled seeking freedom.
Iran never really had a problem with modernity. The very first Pahlavi monarch named Reza Shah resolved tensions between these competing camps, having abdicated in ’41, constitutional rule gained a near permanent advantage for the Iranian people. It was Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh who tried to derail Iran’s democratic evolution. We should never forget that what happened in ’53 was an Iranian initiative.
1953 saw Mossadegh squander everything leading to a coup in ’53. Having lost the support of the public in his management of Parliament nationalizing Anglo-Persian Oil Company, the Iranian regime turned inward with Mohammed Reza leading to the return of the Ayatollah’s in ’79.
By ’99 the hope of witnessing the Ayatollah’s reform themselves was gone, fraudulent elections and decrepit economics has discredited the regime.
Enter Rouhani, who believed that the JCOPA nuclear deal would generate enough revenue to placate public discontent has failed. The Iranian’s know rank corruption when they see it. A failed banking system untethered to the rule of law has locked a morally bankrupt regime into turbulence that frightens foreign direct investment. Its the Soviet Union all over again.
Absolutely no one should fear regime change in Iran.
William Holland
William Holland 