Blog Iran passes on this impassioned plea from Ramin Parham:
"In my article, I related the story of Tannaz, an Iranian student, and asked the question the West is facing: Between Jannati, Secretary of the Guardian Council of the Iranian theocracy, and Tannaz, which one will you choose? A few years ago in Serbia, between Milosevic on one hand and the Serbian students and Zoran Djindjic on the other, a united West chose the students and their leaders. Today, the entire Balkan region has been stabilized and democratic nations are being built. Tomorrow, in Iran, which way will the West go? Will we all harvest the seeds of democracy or the grapes of wrath and resentment of a disillusioned youth? That is the question.
For Reggie, Charlie, and Tannaz to celebrate Democracy Day in a freedom parade in Tehran, we do not need bullets. Rather, to witness the Iranian D-Day we need the West's immense information-projection power....
...We need the West's vastly influential think tanks to advocate a policy of freedom for the people, not détente with a regime whose Majlis (Parliament) inaugurates with chants of "Death to America" and whose Friday "prayers" serve as recruiting speeches for suicide bombers.
We need congressional hearings and testimonies given by young Iranians describing the hopelessness of existence under theocracy; the complete lack of normalcy and dignity; the day-by-day attrition of life. We need a tiny fraction of the West's financial support channeled to the families of Iranian political prisoners and jailed journalists with international monitoring. We need your soft power, and all of it. We need it in a barrage of heavy-media artillery, think-tank platforms, and the solidarity of Western NGOs. We need U.S. and EU campus events with young Iranians "yearning for freedom" standing hand in hand with Western students. We need Western artists lending their music and their voices to the Joyless Generation."
If you're interested, the entire article is available at NRO of all places.
Hungarian Ambassador Simonyi discussed the power of Rock & Roll in an excellent Guest Blog series here at Winds of Change.NET. Does the mullahs' atomic program give this kind of 'soft power' strategy enough time to work? I'm not sure it does - but I know that we should start anyway, and make a serious attempt.
The Europeans are too corrupt to follow, of course, too busy cutting deals with Iran's theocratic jailers and torturers. "Blood for Oil," indeed. That still leaves the USA, however - and this is an option America has not pursued seriously enough.
Stronger, please.
> If you're interested, the entire article is available at NRO of all places
What do you mean "of all places"? Michael Ledeen is a long-time NRO contributor.
I hate to be the pessimist here, but soft power isn't going to get the Mullahs to resign and hand power over to the students. They will not go quietly, and will have to be put down with force. Eastern Europe fell relatively bloodlessly because the leaders were not willing to use force to keep power. The Mullahs are not cut from the same cloth.
In general, NRO has focused on 2 important points in the Iran debate: [1] Iran has already chosen to be at war with the USA in Iraq and elsewhere - the only question is will the USA respond; and [2] Iran's atomic bomb program continues apace, and represents an unnaceptable threat. Hence Ledeen's famous phrase: "faster, please."
And you know, there's an awful lot of validity in those observations.
Now, I'm a long-time NRO reader. I know that NRO has worked to provide a platform for Iranians like Mr. Parham. By advocating an approach of 'soft power' and explicitly ruling out bullets, Ramin Parham expresses something many Iranians say, but which is to some degree at odds with NRO's "soft power, then bullets if necessary" approach.
So, people who aren't frequent NRO readers may be surprised.
I'll also add this: America's ultimate decision needs to listen to the Iranians, but the trump concern is the safety and security of America. If Iranians really want to avoid a showdown with the USA, their only hope is really to remove the regime before events force that showdown.
Right now, I can't say that I'm optimisitic. Partly BECAUSE we've pissed away the last 2 years by failing to pour serious resources and American commitment into Mr. Parham's suggested strategy.
haha you guys are so stupid .winds are changing but which direction.thanks to you guys iran's enemy taliban and sadam is gone and o shit you do not have any more fucking troop to fight with. such a shame beacuse now iran have all southern iraq and when you will leave we can stuff up kuwait as well .ha .then how about 80$ barrel for oil.ha winds are changing and you better hold on to your cloths .
I don't know what babak's problem is, but I'm generally amenable to this approach.
One issue it does not seem to solve, though, is the nuclear question. It seems to me that Iran's yearning for nuclear weapons is broadly shared across segments of society. It's about national pride and "But Israel has them!"
So the equation must be framed as a choice: we will help you throw off your oppressors and rejoin the world community if and only if you renounce your nuclear ambitions.
Ramin Parham: "A few years ago in Serbia, between Milosevic on one hand and the Serbian students and Zoran Djindjic on the other, a united West chose the students and their leaders."
Don't forget that the far-from-united "West" only intervened after shilly-shallying for years while the former citizens of Yugoslavia killed each other by the thousands, and that NATO first intervened militarily, both by bombing and by putting troops on the ground. One result was eventually to weaken Milosevic and his goons enough for the students and Djindjic finally to topple him. Somehow I doubt Iranian students really want to replicate very much of Serbia's experience during the 1990s.
BTW, Milosevic launched his Greater Serbia campaign in 1989, the 600th anniversary of Serbia's defeat by the Ottomans in the battle of Kosovo Polje ('Blackbird Field') in 1389. The current Iranian mullahcracy has been in power twice as long as Milosevic, has far more resources at its disposal than Milosevic ever had, and appears to have far weaker internal opposition.