Iran: the Tipping Point

The images of a young woman shot just like that by one of the Iranian regime thugs are going around the world (you can find them here at Breakfornews.com, I won't show them yet another time. The dead have their dignity as well, after all.) What the regime is after and all about has become abundantly clear - no "Islamic republic", no "peace", no "prosperity" for its people, but unfettered, raw power. And as it always goes, it has its thugs and brutes at its command, the kind of people that alwayys rise with the ruthless, be it the Basiji in Iran or the Nazi in Germany back in the Third Reich.

But unlike in Germany in those fateful days of the Nazi reign, we get the pictures from Iran and the people's uprising, and they get them as well. There is no going back now. This is no limited, circumscribed Tiananmen anymore, this is a crackdown on a signficant portion of an entire people. Khamenei, by using brute force, may get his way one more time. But his days and the days of the theocratic regime are counted. And, frankly: I do not believe he may get his way. The Iranian people have awakened. The tipping point has been reached. There are too many of them, and they have been suppressed far too long. This is not about elections and stolen votes anymore. This is about freedom, about rights, about democracy. This is about young people getting killed for no reason but the one that they want to live good and free lives.

The moment some of the thugs started killing, the tipping point was reached. There is no going back to the status quo ante any longer. Regardess whether the uprising is successful or the regime's crackdown is, what little trust had been there is gone for good. Eventually, Iran will be free, out of its own ability.

Iran: Levels of Conflict Resolution

There's one thing about the current conflict I cannot get out of my mind: that conflict tends to be resolved on the lowest level accepted by the involved parties. In short, there are six general possible levels of conflict solution:

• Consensus: both parties agree on the topic
• Compromise: both parties move away from their initial goals and agree on a third position
• Delegation: a third party rules on the conflict, i.e. a judge or international body or whatever
• Fight with submission: the two parties fight until one gives in, usually with a bloody head or worse
• Fight with destruction: this is no game anymore. Fight until, well - destruction. It's a win/loose situation now. There can be only one
• Escape: the lowest possible level of conflict resolution - one side gives in and lops off. Sometimes the only viable option.

That's about it in conflict theory. Well, my concern is that the Iranian regime is not really interested in a compromise, let alone a consensual solution to the popular uprising. Right now, they are using force, that's the fighting-levels for you. The regime still hopes for submission, but I'm afraid it would accept the "destruction"-option as well. That's why popular support outside of Iran is so important - it shows the regime that the Iranian people is not alone, that they have international support. And that's also why it's very rational by the Obama administration not to take sides too openly - because that would only show the regime that they're with their backs to the wall, and make the "fight with destruction"-option so much more probable... The revolt in Iran is walking a thin line, and I seriously hope they can continue to walk it, all of them.


(For a thorough analysis of the background and all the other stuff concerning the Iranian revolution, please have a look here at CNN, here at Theran bureau, here at TED, and here, again at Theran bureau, and a very touching testimonial. Apart from that, the Dish is great at offering further information.)

The Leaders of Iran's "Election Coup"

If it's true, the most informative stuff I've read so far on what's going on in Iran and why.
Quoting:

This is a pivotal moment in Iran’s history. If the reformists and the Iranian people cannot reverse the outcome of Iran’s rigged elections, Iran will enter a dark period of dictatorship, with no light at the end of the tunnel. The country will be controlled completely by the military/security forces, with an unelected Supreme Leader as its titular head, and no elections (or extremely meaningless ones). This would be a terrible development for the rest of the world as well.

Where will it end? Where CAN it end?

A number of options are on the table in Iran and have been considered, for example by Micheal Ledeen. Everything could transpire from the Iranian second revolution, as I am tempted to call it, from a bloody abatement to a change of the guard to an actual revolution that puts away with the whole theocratic dictatorship you have in Iran. In theory, all of these developments are possible; some would say, the survival of the regime by pure force and even more brutality would be the most probable one.
I do not think so. We have been witnesses to something like a spontaneous uprising in the last three days; all the contempt that built up during the last thirty years and gained more and more momentum in the last few years only needed a good reason to erupt. And the Iranis got the best of reasons: quelled hope and destroyed illusions.
Now they beat the people, they throw them into their dungeons, and they even kill them (for a sad account of what's happening, pay a visit to Andrew Sullivan who covers the events with the help of a lot of Iranis out there). That quality of the conflict originates with the regime, and it will not be forgotten. After all, this is not Tiananmen - not a few thousand Chinese in a country that holds a billion of them; and not just students, as it seems, but a broad cross-section of the Iranian people. They may get killed, they may be suppressed once more. It is possible. But they will not forget who did it, and they will not forget what they dreamed and aspired to during these days. You cannot hold a whole population hostage, at least not in a country like Iran that has fully adopted all the means of modern technology (Iran is the third-largest nation of bloggers, for example; only Twitter is making possible that what is currently happening). And Iran is too important: there's too much oil (not like in Burma or North Korea, for example).

So where will it stop? Can it stop any longer before they have travelled the whole way? Will the regime survive in a new disguise? I think that Ahmadinejad and his likes blew it when they took resort to brutal force and only urged on and itnsified the protests threw it; and then they tried more of the same, more force, and still try it, but it will not help them any more than the first time. They should have let Moussavi win; he would not have changed the system much. Change would have been inevitable anyway; but it would have occured at a much lower pace. Now things have been sped up to the limit, and I do not believe Iranians will settle after all their blood has been spilled for the old status quo, only with someone else at the helm, although he is a "reform candidate". Even it this revolution should get shattered, the Iranian people will have won. The regime has shown its most ugly face. Freedom will come, eventually.
I only hope that not too many of those fighting for it right now will have to give their lives. If I did not believe in humanity but in any deity, believe me, I'd pray.

Not My EU

So much for the Czech EU presidency:

The Presidency of the Council of the EU closely followed the course of the Presidential elections held on 12 June 2009 and notices Mr. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-elected for the second term as the President of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

There was no need to cave in that early, especially now [1] [2]. At least Germany seems to be acting differently for the time being and not following the EU lead. Let's hope the best that Steinmeier can do something right for once.

Not even counting

From Radio Free Europe:

[...] they didn’t even count people’s votes. They announced the results without opening the ballot boxes. It was sent as a circular to the state television, which announced it. Is it so difficult for the world to understand this?

That would at least explain the swiftness with which the election's "results" were announced - within hours of the closing of the polling places. Either all of this was an ad-hoc reaction by the Ahmadinejad people to an unfavourable development of election results, or a long-since prepared coup d'état - without anyone paying any attention to the actual votes whatsoever, except the people themselves. And now the world, watching...

On Iran

No one outside Iran is currently sure what's going on inside - some media plainly speak of an Ahmadinejad-win, others are more skeptical. If you were to ask the people in Tehran, a different picture forms - everyone's convinced the election was rigged.

Another one of those pivotal moments in history, as if we hadn't had enough of those already these days. But the acceleration of everything seems to continue, and politics are no exception there. Another people fighting for its freedom, as it seems, having been cheated upon once too often.

The incidents in Iran are almost non-existent in the German internet-based media, safe for a few platitudes copied from news agencies, but excellent coverage on the events can be found on the Huffington Post, as well as at Andrew Sullivan's, although he's a little slower and mire sparse today than yesterday. A lot of additional links can be found there as well.

Whatever is going on in Iran right now, we should know about it - if another Tiananmen were to take place, which God forbade, at least the world should know... Peace to the Iranian people, and perhaps even freedom, at last.

[Picture from Tehranlive.org]