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Gnomemoot 0: Iran - what is the problem? | 194 comments (194 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)
Players: Iran (4.00 / 4)
I don't even know where to start with Iran. We have the following

  • An ostensibly crazy prime minister who has gone out of his way to appear militant and anti-semitic.
  • A reform movement in retreat since the last elections, partly due to the advantage given to the conservatives by the spectacle of the invasion of Iraq.
  • A religious head of state who in theory holds supreme power and is the one who has the authority to declare war and so on.

The wikipedia article on this is here.
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 05:24:26 AM EST
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
As Soj says in the wrong place below:

What's almost never mentioned is that the religious head you mentioned in Iran has issued a fatwa which forbids Iran not only building a nuclear weapon but also using one or possessing one.
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 06:40:03 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
I'm aware of that and was coming to it. So we have what is on one hand accused of being a fundamentalist state acting under the terms of a fanantical and dangerous religion and a religious injunction issued by the highest authority forbidding the behaviour it's being accused of.

What are the odds that this is a pretend fatwa to confuse the enemy? Anyone know if that's permissible in the version of Islam in question?

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 06:42:27 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
Which is to say, are there grounds for discounting the edict?
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 06:44:01 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (4.00 / 2)
A fatwa not a law, it is a legal opinion. Wikipedia adds:

Because Islam has no centralized priestly hierarchy, there is no uniform method to determine who can issue a valid fatwa and who cannot, and upon whom such fatwas are binding. Some Islamic scholars complain that too many people feel qualified to issue fatwas.

<snip>

In nations where Islamic law is the basis of civil law, fatwas by the national religious leadership are debated prior to being issued. Thus, they are rarely contradictory. If two fatwas were contradictory, the ruling bodies (combined civil and religious law) attempt to define a compromise interpretation that will eliminate the resulting ambiguity.

Multiple contradictory fatwas are possible. All Ahmedinijad would have to do to get around an anti-nuke fatwa is to find a compliant cleric/scholar and then build a consensus around his "bespoke" fatwa.

The fact is that what we're experiencing right now is a top-down disaster. -Paul Krugman

by dvx (dvx.clt ät gmail dotcom) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 10:58:26 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
Which is great, except in the case of Iran the clerical authority is centralised and this is true in some other countries.
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 11:12:43 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
I'm not sure this is entirely true. There is a central authority, true, but it's not like the Catholic church, it's more like the Anglican synod. In "religious" terms there isn't a full "chain of command."

Discipline has been exercised by force/blackmail/discreditation, but mostly using "political" enforcers (e.g. Police, TV, Secret Services.)

Thus, the Iranian Preznit is likely to be able to go against the heads of religion if he can hold on to popular religious support.

by Metatone (metatone [a|t] gmail (dot) com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 11:39:50 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 1)
It did until 1922. The Shiites still have one to some extent. The Imam Ali Khamani is the Shiite "pope" although Sistani might have a presige close to that.
by messy on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 02:47:38 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (4.00 / 4)
"the religious head you mentioned in Iran"

Should we allow them to develop missiles with religious heads only?

"Dieu se rit des hommes qui se plaignent des conséquences alors qu'ils en chérissent les causes" Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet

by Melanchthon on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 09:23:22 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 1)
Useful wikipedia article on Iran and WMD.
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 06:47:49 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
Melo says:

iran wants to sell oil in euros, which will upset the dollar-hegemony, whose inflation also weighs on us in europe.
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 06:51:54 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
Interesting. This is what I have heard not so long ago as an alternative explanation for the American attacks on Iran.

See the last 3 comments here.

A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government -- Edward Abbey

by serik berik (serik[dot]berik on Gmail) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 07:41:14 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 1)
Yes. I've heard it too. I know that Jérôme and several other people expert in this area consider it far-fetched.
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 07:44:24 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 1)
See this comment (copied below, but there is a long thread over there with good input from HiD)


The Iranian exchange will NOT work because nobody will trade on it:

  • traders need a common currency to work together. Once they've set on one, it's really hard to make them change - hence the fact that a number of commodities are still traded in pound sterling despite the fact that the UK hasn't been the main market for quite a bit of time. The existence of a standard is more important that which one it is. Cf the dominance of Windows as an operating system: it's used because it's used. To switch, you need everybody to switch at the same time. Only a monopolist (or a monopsonist) can force that, and Iran is far from being one;

  • in addition, the oil market is not just about oil, today it is about all the financial instruments derived from oil - term sales, derivatives, structured products, etc... The same constraints as above apply to these markets, which are even more diverse and globalised than the oil markets. Also traders have all their references, price histories, and standard trading instruments based on the dollar. To change all this, again, would require massive effort and coordination (remember how much effort it took to switch to the euro in 1999);

  • the other thing you need to have a market is a stable and trustworthy regulatory and legal system. People will not go trade in Iran because the risks or abitrary interventions and meddling are too high. The euro can be an alternative to the dollar as a reserve currency because European rule of law and regulation is seen as acceptable, and the currency is backed by a real economy, but Iran stands no chance to impose any switch of any kind for trade, financial instruments or anything else.

Please forget these ideas, they are totally cut from the reality of financial markets.


In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Sat Feb 18th, 2006 at 05:59:53 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
Is it possible that the Prime Minister is acting mad on purpose as a tactical move? It seems that being crazy has worked as a strategy for North Korea. Maybe they hope it will confound US strategists?
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 06:58:03 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
Not PM, President.

Hm. Give his domestic performance, i.e. even enraging the conservative clergy establishment with his appointments of unqualified but faithful people for top jobs, I'd vote for at least partially mad. On the other hand, just in the internal battle in Iran, the President is certainly relying on populism - so it may be both, but the tactical purpose is not only foreign-policy-wise.

*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.

by DoDo on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 07:11:32 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
You're right: I was thinking of his function rather than his title.
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 07:12:55 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
So he's not a total puppet of the clergy, not is he necessarily speaking on their behalf.
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 07:14:03 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (4.00 / 4)
He is definitely not a puppet of the clergy. He is more of a fundie than most of the ruliong elite clergy. What everyone expected before the previous elections was that the so-called 'pragmatic conservatives' will win, a faction that sought to give some concessions to the masses while going on with strong theocracy. Their candidate was a heavyweight: the predecessor of Khatami the outgoing reformist President. From what I read, the support Ahmadinejad got from influential clerics was meant to weaken rivals in inter-conservative tussles, but he got 'too much support'. A further angle of Ahmadinejad's victory which I hinted at was that he is also a man-of-the-people populist, an Islamic fundie saviour of the proletariat, who blasted corruption and the rich lifestyle of the ruling elite.

*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.
by DoDo on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 07:24:30 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (4.00 / 4)
He's not a clergy mouthpiece. He's a populist and is no doubt attempting to build himself a popular base (by projects to help young couples afford housing and thus marry earlier, for example).

His anti-Israel and Holocaust provocations may be seen in this light, as an attempt to raise his popular profile, not only in Iran, but elsewhere in the region. (He's not an Arab, but this is a way for him to appeal to Arab opinion and bridge the Arab/Persian split). They (provocations) have something of the nature of before-battle taunts, as if he were trying to whip up enthusiasm behind his leadership by yelling to Israel and the US, "Bring it on!"

I don't think he's totally bonkers, and this rhetoric proceeds from a calculation (right or wrong) that Iran is in a strong position following the disastrous invasion of Iraq. That strength may be put down to:

  • Iran's oil;
  • capacity to disrupt shipping in the Persian Gulf;
  • (alleged) capacity to impact the dollar through a currency switch on the oil market;

and to the weakness of his designated opponents caused by:

  • resentment in the region of the Iraq invasion;
  • fairly global unease and disapproval of same;
  • fact that the invasion is a flying fuck-up;
  • consequent fact that Iran has considerably increased its influence in Iraq;
  • other consequent fact that the US can neither build a coalition nor convincingly draw up major battle plans alone;
  • leaving, as only military option, air strikes Ahmadinejad (and others in Iran) doubtless judge of little long-term importance.

I'm just trying to read in the tea-leaves here. If Ahmadinejad's thinking goes as I suggest, he may be wrong on a number of counts, just as he may well be right (sez me) on some of the big ones.
by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 08:27:24 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
with his appointments of unqualified but faithful people for top jobs, I'd vote for at least partially mad

nepotism, or empire building, are not de facto grounds for a diagnosis of madness... though perhaps they should be (ah, if only I got to write the DSM).  on this issue the US regime is in a very weak position for commenting on the blackness of the other guy's kettle -- given BushCo's consistent track record of stuffing high positions with incompetents, ideologues and sycophants.  if the Iranian premiere's nepotistic or grace&favour tendencies are evidence of madness and an incapacity to handle nuclear arms wisely, the same should be said of BushCo, no?

The difference between theory and practise in practise ...

by DeAnander (de_at_daclarke_dot_org) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 08:19:44 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
I have not meant nepotism. I meant chosing people on grounds of dogmatic purity, i.e. adherence to his version of Islamic fundamentalism.

*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.
by DoDo on Sat Feb 18th, 2006 at 04:35:17 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)

 his appointments of unqualified but faithful people for top jobs

We,ll, that didn't work too well. His first 3 (yes, three) nominees for the job of oil minister were blocked by the (conservaticve) Parliament on the gorunds of nepotism and incompetence.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Sat Feb 18th, 2006 at 06:04:12 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 1)
Remember Nixon's "madman theory"?

The difference between theory and practise in practise ...
by DeAnander (de_at_daclarke_dot_org) on Fri Feb 17th, 2006 at 08:15:29 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
No, I wasn't born yet.

A society committed to the notion that government is always bad will have bad government. And it doesn't have to be that way. — Paul Krugman
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sat Feb 18th, 2006 at 06:04:24 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Players: Iran (none / 0)
The "crazy" president is not in charge of Iran's foreign policy, military, intelligence agencies or judiciary. He's also not in charge of Iran's nuclear program, which predates his election back to the 1970's when the US and UK and France and Germany encouraged and supported Iran's acquisition of nuclear technology.

However, since he's a loudmouth, he naturally makes for a good bogey-monster. But Iran is not his little fiefdom, and he doesnt' rule as some sort of North-Korea like cult of personality. He was elected, has 4 years in office, and then will leave office (unless relelected for a final term.)

The prior president was Khatami, the "smiling reformist" who didn't say controversial things -- and the same people who are playing up Ahamadinejad as a "threat" that has to be taken oh-so seriously used to say that Khatami & his effort to reconcile with the US shouldn't be taken seriously since the position of President in Iran was only symbolic anyway....so which is it?

by CyrusI on Fri Mar 10th, 2006 at 05:28:47 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Gnomemoot 0: Iran - what is the problem? | 194 comments (194 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)
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