The Latest from Iran (30 November): Nuclear Distraction, Trashing the Greens?

1915 GMT: Quiet Engagement. News is just emerging of five British nationals who have been held by Iran since their yacht Sail Bahrain strayed into Iranian waters on Wednesday.

The significance behind the headline is that the story was kept quiet for five days. That indicates that Britain does not want the matter to escalate into confrontation and that Iran, for now, does not want to use the detention for political advantage.

NEW Iran: How Washington Views the Green Opposition — The Next Chapter
NEW Video: The Bahari Interview on CNN (Part 2)
Today’s Iran Non-Story: Some Guy Who Looked Like Ahmadinejad Protested in 1984
Video: The Mothers of Martyrs Protest (28 November)
Iran: The Routes of 16 Azar
The Latest from Iran (29 November): Iran’s Nuclear Bluff

1830 GMT: Just for the Nuclear Record. Iranian Foreign Manouchehr Mottaki used a press conference with the Russian Energy Minister (who confirmed Moscow's intention to complete the Bushehr nuclear plant by March 2010) to denounce the IAEA resolution:

We could not find any logical reason for the Board of Governors' decision. We cannot accept discrimination in international relations. Either there are rights or such rights do not exist. The age of discriminatory policies is over. This is the law of the jungle.

Nothing surprising here and no further indication as to Iran's next step.

1625 GMT: Mehdi Karoubi, in an interview on his website Tagheerwebsite (official website of Etemad-Melli party), responded to accusations from Kayhan newspaper:

I really did not want to point out the arrogance of these guys but when I saw that they repeatedly are talking about “conspiracy”, denying their role in the events after the election, and are influencing the Judiciary system, I decided to respond....My message to the management of Kayhan newspaper is that the our interpretation of Islam is different than yours.

1610 GMT: President Postponed. It appears that President Ahmadinejad's national broadcast (see 0715 GMT) has been postponed to Tuesday night.

1555 GMT: A Detainee Speaks. Amidst a slower afternoon, interesting revelations from Behzad Nabavi, the high-profile reform activist who has recently been given a six-year prison sentence. Nabavi is free on a 10-day release pending appeal: "They asked me the night before my release to sign a paper and agree not to engage in political activities or conduct interviews until the appeals court hearing; they told me not to meet or contact political parties and organizations, but I refused. When they couldn't close the deal with me they gave me [only] a 10-day break from prison [instead]."

Nabavi claimed that the former Tehran Prosecutor General, Saeed Mortazavi, was present for at least one of his interrogations. He also claims that his arrest warrant had been issued on 9 June, three days before the Presidential elections (and six days before the supposed basis for his "crime", presence at the mass demonstration on 15 June).

1255 GMT: Larijani Baffles (Part 2). I have a hunch --- and nothing more -- that Ali Larijani, with his statement on the nuclear programme this morning, is setting himself up as an alternative to President Ahmadinejad, both for elements in the Iranian establishment and for the "West".

But who is the target of this Larijani statement, keeping in mind the shaky translation of the Iranian Labour News Agency: "Commenting on the post-election events, the speaker remarked that the unjustified persistence of certain people on their own views would only benefit others"?

1220 GMT: Report that journalist Hengameh Shahidi has been sentenced to six years, three months, and one day in prison.

1204 GMT: Larijani Baffles. Press TV has summarised this morning's comments by Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani:

I believe there is still room for diplomacy and it is useful for them [the "5+1 powers] to adopt a diplomatic option. That way Iran would be able to make progress within the framework of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) while they would also be certain that Iran activities are peaceful. But of course, if they choose to take a different path Iran would also adopt a different stance.

Here's what puzzles me: given Larijani's hostility to the diplomatic process pursued by the Ahmadinejad Government in recent months, criticising apparent Iranian concessions, why is he now embracing "room for diplomacy"? Why not celebrate the apparent demise of the Ahmadinejad strategy?

Suggestions welcomed.

1200 GMT: This is Interesting. Just over a week before the protests of 16 Azar, students from Amir Kabir University have met Mehdi Karroubi in his home.

1100 GMT: Ahmadinejad and Latin America. An EA reader points us to an intriguing discussion between Mohsen Milani, Aram Hessami and Babak Dad, "What is Ahmadinejad searching for in the USA's backyard?" The reader notes Dad's provocative speculation that one purpose of the President's recent tour of Latin America was to prepare a "safe haven" if one should be noted for him and his allies.

1020 GMT: Montazeri Criticises "lllegal" Violence. Lots of chatter this morning about a video of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri denouncing post-election violence by Basiji militia, betraying its mission “unite and mobilise everyone on the path to God not to the path of evil”.

There's more. Montazeri also implicitly attacks the Supreme Leader for his thanks to the Basiji for "defeating the enemy in the events after election”: “Isn’t it a misery that one [i.e., the Basiji] goes to hell (in afterlife) for the wellbeing of others in this world?!” (Summary of remarks on Facebook page supporting Mir Hossein Mousavi)

0940 GMT: You Might Want to Be More Subtle. The head of Iran's nuclear organisation, Ali Akhbar Salehi, kind of gives the political game away today:

We had no plan to build many nuclear sites like Natanz [enrichment facility but it seems that the West do not want to comprehend Iran's message of peace. The West adopted an attitude toward Iran which made the Iranian government to pass the ratification on construction of ten sites.

Hmm....So you haven't make any previous moves to build beyond the enrichment plants at Natanz and Fordoo but now you've going to throw all your resources at a crash construction programme because of Friday's IAEA resolution?

Wouldn't back Salehi as a poker player: this is either clumsy deception --- Iran has already started on other sites --- or clumsy bluff.

0930 GMT: We've posted the second part of Iranian-Canadian journalist Maziar Bahari's interview with CNN. We've also been moved by his comments on the Green movement(s) to consider again how Washington may be viewing (and belittling) the opposition.

0810 GMT: Blackout. Fears are growing that, in addition to "containing" the protest of 16 Azar (7 December) through a 48-hour holiday just before it, the Government may try to pull the curtains down on it through a cutoff of Internet and mobile phone service.

0730 GMT: Sigh. The coverage of Iran this morning on the BBC's flagship radio programme? Declare "time is running out" for Tehran, then turn over seven minutes of airtime just after 7 a.m. to the Israeli Ambassador to the UK, Ron Prosor for comments such as: "Iranians are not just carpet makers but carpet weavers; they will divide one red line into 100 pink lines and then cross the red line"; "Israel's nuclear capability is irrelevant in the current situation"; "all options are on the table".

0720 GMT: Russia Mending Political/Nuclear Fences? Russian energy minister Sergei Shmatko, in Iran for talks with his Iranian counterpart and other officials, has pledged that Iran's first nuclear power station will soon be completely. Shmatko said earlier this month that the Bushehr plant would be delayed beyond its announced opening date of the end of 2009.

The political significance of Shmatko's statement overshadows the technical dimension: days after supporting the International Atomic Energy Agency resolution, Moscow is tacking back politically towards Iran. That means some continuing level of co-operation (though the Russians can always dangle and pull back support) and no sanctions.

0715 GMT: President Ahmadinejad will speak on national television this evening.

0645 GMT: Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani is now holding a press conference on Iranian television.

0630 GMT: Reality Check. Here are two reasons, courtesy of Gary Sick, why the Iran Government's nuclear announcement is "all mouth and no trousers".

The declaration of 10 enrichment plants is for 500,000 centrifuges. In the last nine years, Iran has constructed and installed fewer than 9000 centrifuges, of which only about half are operating. At that rate, the plans announced yesterday will be completed in the year 2509.

According to documents, construction began on the second enrichment site at Fordoo in 2003. There are still no centrifuges installed, and the site is due for completion in 2011.

At that rate, 10 enrichment plants would take 80 years to construct, if they were built one after another. If they were all pursued at the same time, it would put great strain on Iranian resources and manpower, to say the least. What's more, the proposed plants would be the same size as Iran's primary enrichment facility at Natanz, much larger than Fordoo.

0610 GMT: One week before the demonstrations of 16 Azar (7 December), but all the headlines are far away from the internal conflict in Iran. The Ahmadinejad Government's declaration of "10 new enrichment plants" has successfully walked the international media down a nuclear garden path, even though the proposal at this point is a fantasy. In addition to our coverage in yesterday's updates, we'll have further analysis laying out both the technical and political realities later this morning.

However, while Tehran's move is political symbolism, it reinforces the mood in the US that engagement is now a long-shot. A clear sign of that is in Trita Parsi's piece for The Huffington Post, "Washington Can Give An Israeli Attack On Iran The Red Light". That headline in itself is a hyperbolic diversion --- for reasons beyond the Obama Administration, Israel will not be launching military operations --- but it shows that Parsi, the President of the National Iranian American Council and a fervent supporter of a political settlement with Iran, has now all but given up on the process.

Iran: What Do 1.4 Million Tweets Look Like?

An interesting "interim" post from Ali Fisher at Wandren PD, who is pursing an ongoing protest to map the use of Twitter in the post-election crisis. He has added to his October post, "The Iranian Election: Following a Conversation", by taking on the daunting task of mapping data from those using the #IranElection tag:

The level of traffic limited the extent to which a user could keep up with the flow of information from #IranElection. at its peak the #tag was running at over 22,500 tweets an hour and nearly 100,000 tweets in a day. There is little anyone can get from reading 375 tweets a minute, forcing users to rely on filters such as the more specific tags, or choosing only to follow certain users; narrowing the field of view but having a chance to understand what is being produced.

His work is at an early stage, but here's a number to make the head spin: in the 10 weeks after the election, there were 1,466,708 tweets using #IranElection.

Equally important (from my point of view), there are still quite a few using that tag, even as we add #16Azar.

Afghanistan: The Danger of Washington's "Experts" on Intervention

On the eve of President Obama's announcement on the next steps for the US in Afghanistan --- expect a public escalation of 30,000 more troops and a lot of rhetoric about non-military programmes and the necessity for the Afghan Government to be free from corruption and to take responsibility for security --- The Security Crank offers a loud, troubling polemic against so-called "expertise" in Washington.

It’s settled: the discussion about Afghanistan is no longer about Afghanistan. It is, instead, now a contest of who can write the most ridiculous article demonstrating their ignorance of the country. This isn’t a small deal: most of the people we’ll highlight below hold positions of great influence, including on General McChrystal’s review team this past summer. But they are all, pro- and anti-war, morons.

Afghanistan-Pakistan Video & Text: US Envoy Holbrooke Briefing (23 November)

It’s important to note that these opinion-mongers are not operating in a vacuum—they have willing accomplices in the media, most of which is utterly subservient to the U.S. military. In a lot of cases, this change is recent: Dexter Filkins, for example, used to write hard-hitting, critical pieces about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now, he writes this:

The Pashtuns, who form the core of the Taliban, make up a largely tribal society, with families connected to one another by kinship and led by groups of elders. Over the years, the Pashtun tribes have been substantially weakened, with elders singled out by three groups: Taliban fighters, the rebels who fought the former Soviet Union and the soldiers of the former Soviet Union itself. The decimation of the tribes has left Afghan society largely atomized.

Afghan and American officials hope that the plan to make peace with groups of Taliban fighters will complement an American-led effort to set up anti-Taliban militias in many parts of the country: the Pashtun tribes will help fight the Taliban, and they will make deals with the Taliban. And, by so doing, Afghan tribal society can be reinvigorated.

The Afghan reconciliation plan is intended to duplicate the Awakening movement in Iraq, where Sunni tribal leaders, many of them insurgents, agreed to stop fighting and in many cases were paid to do so. The Awakening contributed to the remarkable decline in violence in Iraq.

I didn’t realize the Taliban were led by a group of tribal elders. Yuck. This reads almost like a press release from ISAF [International Security Assistance Force]: demonstrate one’s understanding of a SAMS course on Afghanistan, then talk about how it’s America’s job to reshape Afghan society into what we think our image of it should have been before the Soviets ruined everything. The arrogance the first pair of paragraphs requires—starting with the assertion that Pashtuns are tribal and form solidarity through kinship and ending with the assumption that we can repeat the Awakening movement in Afghanistan—is really just… wow.

These assertions have been discussed at length in a paper prepared by the Human Terrain System, which practically begs the Army to stop trying to repeat the Sunni Awakening in Afghanistan. “The desire for “tribal engagement” in Afghanistan, executed along the lines of the recent “Surge” strategy in Iraq,” it says, “is based on an erroneous understanding of the human terrain.” The reasoning is that tribes in both countries are structured fundamentally differently, and that Afghans, even Pashtuns do not primarily organize around tribal lines. (More on the tribal militia idea-that-just-won’t-die is here.)

The military has largely ignored this paper—why is that, do you think? Do they not like having their assumptions about a neat tribal solution to all of Afghanistan’s problems challenged? Like this former Taliban official says, no one in the West has done their homework. Well, no one in charge, I should say. To bring up our old theme: they just don’t care.

But it’s not just reporters losing their clinical distance who have been dumbing down the public understanding of Afghanistan. Below are some key concepts the willfully ignorant propagate in order to push whatever pet issue they have, which also happens to either obscure or twist a much broader, more fundamental issue—a children’s treasury of ridiculous assumptions and pet issues.

Pretending the War is Ethnic

Selig S. Harrison is by far the worst offender of the bunch. Without any evidence, and with a history that jumps from Alexander the Great (326 BC) to the British Army (1842) to the Soviets (1979), he says that all Pashtuns are xenophobic zombies who will unite against all outsiders and always win. Harrison supplements this argument by saying that this time, the Taliban’s xenophobia is being driven by a hatred of the Tajik minority lording itself over the Armed Forces, police, and government agencies. Needless to say, his argument is confusing and contradictory, starting with his apparent belief that Hamid Karzai, a Pashtun, is a Tajik puppet.

Gareth Porter makes a similar argument: Tajiks are disproportionally more prevalent in the Army, so therefore Pashtuns are culturally compelled to resist the government. Missing in both kinds of argument is a realization that their ideas of what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate ethnic ratios are 100% arbitrary, utterly dependent on which native informant happened to be whispering in their ear at that time. Neither demonstrates any understanding of ethnic relations (the original Taliban wasn’t xenophobic but kafiphobic—mistrustful of all non-Muslims), or why the Taliban actually gains social market share. But the neo-Taliban are a pan-Islamist resistance movement: they reject tribal and ethnic distinctions so long as everyone follows their version of Islam. There’s nothing ethnic about it.

Assuming arbitrary troop numbers will fix things

One of the key offenders here is Leslie Gelb, an otherwise respectable foreign policy scholar. The fact that anyone with his background—that is, with almost no academic or policy experience in Afghanistan of Central/South Asia—would say he’d prefer 15,000 trainers over the 34,000 foot soldiers President Obama is due to approve speaks volumes to the astounding ignorance of our pundit-class. Why would he know? Gelb has argued elsewhere that the troops in Afghanistan are being misused: how could adding more troops into that mix correct that?

SUUUUUUURGE!

You have to love the Kagans [Frederick and Kimberly]. They helped create the Surge in Iraq, which funneled troops into an area already in open revolt against AQIM [Al Qa'eda in Mesopotamia]. And of course, they blame themselves for it working, and not the thousands of Sunni Iraqis who decided to reject the insurgents operating in their neighborhoods half a year before the first surge troop arrived. It wasn’t those dirty browns we’re trying to rule, it was us and our surging, that saved the day!

Anyway, so they’ve been writing weekly op-eds in major newspapers about how badly we need more troops in Afghanistan ever since they realized their impassioned pleas in 2006 for America to ignore Afghanistan in favor of surging into Iraq was in fact a bad idea that needed to be reversed, even though they refuse to acknowledge they were one of the main drivers of said strategic inattention, but still this time their advice is super correct because they clearly got Iraq right because the country is peaceful and everyone really likes living there.

Their latest op-ed is a real gem, however: in a thousand-word explication on the necessity of using troops for political leverage, a lamentation of how the debate has ignored force levels (when in reality the debate has been dominated by a discussion of troop numbers), they can’t bring themselves to mention the Taliban once. I mean, even ignoring the ridiculous assertion that more troops will improve governance, development, education, law enforcement, health care, and whatever else… even ignoring all of that, they say troop numbers will fix Afghanistan but don’t mention why we need troops in the first place.

Somehow, these people are taken seriously. Do you get it?

Healthcare!

I don’t even know what to say: in a world of limited resources, the Obama administration is choosing to emphasize physical security over additional health care spending. This is a tragedy for the Afghans who won’t get health care, to be sure… but is it really undermining the government and the war?

Pee-yew. This is exhausting. I’m sure you get the idea. It is damned tough to find knowledgable people writing about the wars these days. For some reasons, the opinion pages seem dominated by ignorant celebrity-pundits, who of course tell us that we are good and never do wrong and always on the side of Right. Of course we want to believe them—who wouldn’t? But listening to these people both within and outside the government will, quite literally, result in the deaths of thousands of innocent people. They are making life and death arguments, and doing so without even basic diligence. I think we owe everyone—ourselves and the world—a tiny bit more effort than that.

Iran: How Washington Views the Green Opposition --- The Next Chapter

Carefully tracking US policy towards Iran, we've noticed since October that many inside and outside the Obama Administration have either stigmatised or dismissed opposition movements. This reduction has both stemmed from and reinforced the Administration's quest for "engagement" and a nuclear deal.

The latest chapter in this belittling of the opposition comes from Mahiar Bahari, the Iranian-Canadian journalist who has been writing and speaking about his post-election detention. We noted last week his curious, rather muddled attitude in a Washington Post opinion piece towards protest and the Iranian people. Now this comes out of the second part of his CNN interview, filmed almost two weeks ago but aired yesterday:

Latest Iran Video: The Bahari Interview on CNN (Part 2)
Iran MediaWatch: Has “Green Reform” Disappeared in Washington?
Iran Video: Maziar Bahari Tells CBS of His Detention and Post-Election Conflict
Iran Video & Text: Maziar Bahari on His 118 Days in Detention

Unfortunately...we cannot really talk about an opposition movement in Iran because the Green Movement in Iran is just a collection of different groups coming together against the Government. Some of them are monarchists, some of them are Communists, some of them are terrorists.

The majority of course wanted a peaceful reform in the Government, but since the Government crackdown which started in June, people just started questioning themselves, "What should be the next step?" At the moment, the slogans are political and cultural, but soon these slogans will be economic. Factory workers [who] were not paid will...join the opposition movement. Farmers who cannot sell their crop will join the opposition movement and then we will see a serious change in Iran....

Soon there will be a more united opposition movement. The danger really is both the opposition and the Government is becoming more militarised. The terrorists both within the regime and the opposition are taking over. As we saw in Baluchistan, there was a suicide attack....I'm sure we'll see more of it....

I think Obama is on the right track right now. I think the world community has to stop a nuclear Iran by any means possible, but most importantly through smart sanctions. But the Obama Administration also has to respect the Iranian people, I think, through smart sanctions and through keeping the dialogue open with the Iranian Government but at the same time talking about human rights abuses in Iran, helping the human rights organisations in Iran, talking about freedom of expression, helping the alternative media.

So, to break this down 1) the US Government cannot really put any faith in the current Iranian opposition; 2) at some point in the (distant?) future Washington can look upon a "more united" movement; 3) in the meantime, the fear of disorder outweighs the hope for change; 4) which, put on top of a nuclear-first policy, means a priority on dialogue with the Ahmadinejad Government while maintaining some supportive general rhetoric about the "Iranian people".

Engagement with the internal situation in Iran, as opposed to engagement with the Iranian Government, will consist of some steps to target elements in the regime through sanctions and to assist dissenting groups with communications.

I suspect readers will raise eyebrows and possibly voices over some of Bahari's analysis. In particular, he not only portrays "terrorism" in the opposition movement but somehow connects post-election protest to the activities of the Baluch insurgent group Jundallah and suicide bombings. His contrasting hope seems to be that a mass repository of factory workers and farmers will save the movement from itself, offering the cohesion that is now lacking.

That's not the immediate point, however. Bahari is very well-connected and well-respected in Washington and that significance has been elevated by his recent detention. So I would think that his line of reasoning will resonate with, and possibly be shared by, key members of the Obama Administration.

The problem for the US Government is that, combined with the difficulties in the nuclear talks, that --- in contrast to Bahari's articulate description of his detention --- that doesn't lead to clarity but even more muddle.

Latest Iran Video: The Bahari Interview on CNN (Part 2)

On Sunday CNN aired the second part of Fareed Zakaria's interview with Iranian-Canadian journalist Maziar Bahari, who was freed after 118 days in detention on charges of "working with foreign governments" in the post-election conflict. (Part 1, as well as Bahari's article in Newsweek, was posted on Enduring America last week.)

Beyond Bahari's personal reflections, the most interesting parts of the interview are his framing of a Revolutionary Guard takeover of the Islamic Republic and his representation of the Iranian opposition. Bahari reduces the current Green movement to an uncoordinated, confused collections of groups which include "terrorists" and are becoming "militarised". We're so intrigued and concerned by this perception of the opposition, and whether it is shared by the Obama Administration, that we've posted a separate analysis.

Iran: How Washington Views the Green Opposition — The Next Chapter
Iran Video & Text: Maziar Bahari on His 118 Days in Detention
Iran Video: Maziar Bahari Tells CBS of His Detention and Post-Election Conflict

Video (1 of 2)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ow4iYiYNgDg[/youtube]

Video (2 of 2)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TllGmYIcPF0[/youtube]