THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume VI, Issue # 52, March 12, 2004
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
IRAN: DELIVERING ARMAGEDDON
By Alan Caruba
While most of our attention is fixed on Iraq and the difficult process of instituting a constitutional democratic government there (and
in Afghanistan), the news out of Iran is largely erroneous and does not focus on the fact that, along with Saudi Arabia, it is the
leading supporter of Islamic terrorism in the world.
It is Iran that identifies the United States of America as “the Great Satan.”
It is Iran that has been systematically seeking to develop a nuclear arms program since the 1980s and lying about it. It is Iran that will
not only be able to destroy an American city with a nuclear device, but it is also Iran’s leaders who are the most likely to do so.
The mainstream American press has not been well served by reporters for major news services who, for example, continue to refer
to recent elections in Iran as having been between “reformers” and “conservatives,” as if to suggest that there is a real chance of
reform in Iran. There hasn’t been any such opportunity since Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini seized power on February 1, 1979, after
Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi had fled the country.
The Islamic Revolution that began then is now twenty-five years old and Iran has long since sunk into the Dark Ages of the same
Islamic Revolution that is being pursued by al-Qa'ida and that other Islamic terror organizations would impose on the entire world.
To look at Iran today, is to see what the future would be if this violent revolution should ever succeed.
“The reality is our situation is like a nightmare,” said one prominent Iranian intellectual. The demographics of Iran are interesting.
Two-thirds of Iranians are under 30. They are a generation of well-educated men and women. Fully 60 percent of university students
are women. They can see the outside world via satellite television and have access to the Internet. They want good jobs and
opportunities, but so long as the ayatollahs remain in control, they have few of either. A recent report on Iran by Borzou Daragahi
notes, “The economy remains in the control of conservative [reactionary] clerics and their allies who seized businesses at the
beginning of the revolution.”
Largely unknown or ignored by the mainstream press is the way the current Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and his
unelected Guardian Council retains total control over all aspects of life in Iran. The socalled parliament of Iran is composed of only
those people who have been approved for membership. The notion that President Mohammad Khatami favors reform is easily
dismissed by ignoring what he says for public consumption and reviewing his record of doing nothing to open Iranian society to
less oppression. There is, simply stated, no credible internal opposition to the dictators who run Iran.
Like all dictators, the Supreme Leader and his cohorts will not yield their power through elections. With the Supreme Leader and
his Guardian Council controlling all the instruments of power in Iran, the people there have no means to initiate any change. Earlier
efforts, mass marches in the streets, have given way to despair. Just as in Iraq, any change will likely require military intervention as
the final option, if an internal revolt cannot be successful. This is the sad, inevitable truth about the Middle East and it is one that
many Americans either don’t understand or might well oppose, given our current commitment along with its problems and costs.
Neocons argue that whatever we spend toward these goals saves the U.S.A. from far worse costs from attacks such as 9-11. I
agree. As it was, 9-11 continues to have a negative impact on our economy.
The fact remains that, without change, Iran poses as great, if not the greatest threat to the United States of America and the rest of
the world. This threat will not abate, so long as Iran continues under the present leadership.
The record is there for anyone to examine. First came the 1979 taking of U.S. diplomats as hostages for 444 days. This is
unprecedented in modern history. Other American hostages were those taken in Lebanon in the 1980s. Iran provides the funding for
Hizbullah, the terrorist organization that has staged so many terror bombings in Israel (along with Hamas, the Palestinian organization).
It was Iran that funded the truck bombing of 241 U.S. Marines in Beirut on October 23, 1983.
Intelligence sources, according to a recent issue of Insight on the News, told that magazine that Iran “supplied the explosives”
for the 1998 al-Qa'ida bombings of U.S. embassies in Africa.
It was Iran that funded the attack in 1996 on the Khobar Towers barracks for U.S. military personnel in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, that
killed nineteen soldiers and injured 400 others. Former FBI Director, Louis Freeh, testified the attack was “planned, funded, and
sponsored by the senior leadership of the government of Iran.”
It can and should be argued that we have been in a state of war with Iran since 1979. At the very least, it is obvious that Iran sees
itself as being in a state of war with America. Just as we went to war in Afghanistan and Iraq to eliminate the threat that fanatical
Jihadists represented there, the need for regime change in Iran is ten times more essential because this is a nation with the will to
destroy America.
No doubt, the findings of the International Atomic Energy Agency will, with US pressure, find their way to the United Nations
Security Council and, no doubt, it will linger there, just as the many resolutions regarding Iraq lingered until the U.S.A. took action.
No doubt, too, Europe and the IAEA bureaucracy will seek to delay that action.
As much as Americans find their role in transforming the Middle East distasteful and costly, in terms of the lives spent and the
billions required, it is the only realistic option. We have had one 9-11. That’s enough.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
The Middle East & the Problem of Iran
The Threat of Radical Islam
More on the Threat of Radical Islam
War & Peace in the Real World
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
U.S. National Security Strategy
Alan Caruba is a veteran business and science writer, a Public Relations Counselor, Communications Director of the American Policy Center,
and Founder of the National Anxiety Center, a clearinghouse for information about media-driven scare campaigns. Caruba writes a weekly
column, "Warning Signs," posted on the Internet website of the National Anxiety Center
(www.anxietycenter.com). A compilation of his past col- umns, entitled Warning Signs, is published by Merril Press. In addition
to Warning Signs, Caruba is the author of A Pocket Guide to Militant Islam and The United Nations vs. the United States,
both of which are available from the National Anxiety Center, 9 Brookside Road, Maplewood, New Jersey, 07040.
Copyright 2004 Alan Caruba
Published with Permission of Alan Caruba
ACaruba@AOL.Com
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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