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Iranians Oppose US "Pro-Democracy" Efforts Wednesday 24 January 2007 Dissidents claim America's policy is doing more harm than good, and Iranian people will pay the price. On July 15, 2006, a short, gray-bearded man with dark, piercing eyes stepped out of the SUV he was being chauffeured in, leaving a New York Times reporter on the seat behind him. The ride from the airport was over, and so was the interview. A crowd that had been milling around and waiting, across the street from the United Nations Headquarters in New York City, quickly gathered around him, chanting slogans to show their support. He wore a simple strip of white fabric across his chest which read in black marker "On Hunger Strike." Later that day, a Fox News correspondent would ask the man if he was foolish enough to think that a hunger strike could actually "do anything." His name was Akbar Ganji, and he was no stranger to hunger strikes. Ganji, a high-profile Iranian dissident, had gone on a ten-month hunger strike while in prison after he wrote a book accusing his government of killing scores of dissidents. As an award-winning journalist, Ganji is regarded by many as a hero for his unwavering belief in nonviolence, despite having been tortured and imprisoned for nearly six years by the Iranian regime for his writings. The White House demanded that the Iranian government release Ganji in 2005, saying "The president ... calls on the government of Iran to release Mr. Ganji immediately and unconditionally, and to allow him access to medical assistance. Mr. Ganji, please know that as you stand for your own liberty, America stands with you." When Ganji was released in spring of 2006, he declined a White House invitation, preferring to meet with American intellectuals such as MIT professor Noam Chomsky. Ganji is not alone among Iranian dissidents in his refusal to speak with the US government, despite their repeated requests. In exclusive interviews, noted dissidents explained their concerns about US policy towards Iran and why they fear not only military action against their home country, but also the more moderate Bush administration policy of funding pro-democracy movements within Iran. In attendance at the Ganji rally (which called for the release of political prisoners in Iran) was Fatemeh Haghighatjou, another respected dissident who declined to speak with US government officials about Iran. "Two senators last year invited me to go to Congress, but I refused to go," she said in an interview. Haghighatjou was invited by Senator Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.) and then-Senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) to participate in a Capitol Hill forum on the state of human rights in Iran. Although she said she strongly believes in the importance of diplomacy and talks between the US and Iran, the American government should not be trying merely to talk with Iranian dissidents and refusing to talk with the Iranian government itself. "I think talking between two governments is useful ... diplomacy - we should reduce tension between US and Iran; this is important for both sides, and normalization is very important," she said. "But you know, these negotiations should be [done] formally, not informally." Haghighatjou was one of only 12 female members of the Iranian parliament when she was first elected in 2000 (the Iranian parliament, called the Majlis, is a 290-person body). After she was elected, Haghighatjou proved to be one of the parliament's most outspoken voices in favor of human rights and critical of the regime for its activities suppressing dissidents and torturing political prisoners. "All of my speeches were problematic for the government's side," she explained. This was because Haghighatjou's speeches were broadcast live on Iranian State Radio and picked up in foreign media outlets. After a string of speeches blasting the regime for its human rights record and for wrongly imprisoning journalists (like Ganji, who was first imprisoned around the same time) Iranian security forces arrived at her house one day and arrested her. She was sentenced to nearly a year in prison, although after keeping a low profile in Iran, she was able to slip out of the country with her husband and young daughter. Haghighatjou has still not served her time, and the Iranian government has three outstanding cases against her as well. She fears that if she returns to her home country, she will be arrested right at the airport itself. "This is unfortunately very common," the former MP said regarding the regime's habit of arresting and imprisoning dissidents immediately upon their return to Iran. After Haghighatjou declined to participate in the Iran panel organized by senators Santorum and Lieberman, because she said it would be "harmful for us - for reformists inside the country," former Iranian president Mohammed Khatami personally thanked her for her refusal. A translator explained, "last year when former president Khatami came to the United States, he thanked her for not going to the Senate to testify: he said 'we were under a lot of [political] attack in Iran, and I thank you for not going.' If she had gone, they would have attacked [reformists] more as traitors and sellouts." Both Khatami and Haghighatjou are members of the Islamic Iran Participation Front, the largest reformist party in Iran. "If she accepted to go to the Senate and testify, in Iran they would have criticized her, [saying] 'oh, she is talking with Americans; look, our enemy; reformists are all traitors.'" In fact, after Lieberman and Santorum held their forum, the Iranian government did use the opportunity to crack down on pro-democracy activists, accusing them of working in concert with the American government. One notable former student leader, Ali Afshari, attended the forum at the senators' request, and used the opportunity to speak out against the Iranian government's human rights record. Afshari had been imprisoned and tortured by the Iranian government for more than a year, due to his prominence in the Iranian student movement. Like Ganji, whom Afshari has said he regards as a hero, he was also invited to the White House. Also like Ganji, however, he declined that invitation, refusing to meet with the Bush administration because he believes that the eventual regime change that will happen in Iran must be organic and not influenced by outside governments. In interviews, prominent dissidents said they felt the Iranian regime was using the accusation that pro-democracy student groups might be working with America in efforts to discredit them. One Iranian activist lamented in an interview, "Our government says that if anyone wants human rights and democracy, 'this group is an agent of the CIA.'" Ganji has cited much the same concern. "We do not want the regime of the Islamic Republic of Iran. However, this is our problem. Any intervention by any foreign power would bring charges of conspiracy against us," he has told reporters. Akbar Atri, another Iranian dissident interviewed, was a former leader in Takhim Vahdat (known in English as the Office for Consolidation and Unity), the same student group whose founders were responsible for the 1979 US embassy hostage crisis in Iran. As the group evolved through the years, however, it grew further apart from the Islamic regime with which it had been so closely allied initially. The Islamic regime has now, ironically, begun to accuse it of acting as an agent of the United States. Atri, who left his home country while under investigation by the Iranian government in 2004, was sentenced to half a decade in prison for his pro-human rights activities while in Iran. Atri suggested that outstanding arrest warrants were used as a means of deterrence to stop former dissidents from returning to their home country. "If we stay in Iran, we are activists and can make problems. After we leave Iran, they accuse us [so] we can't go back," he explained. Like Haghighatjou, he would likely be arrested upon arriving at the airport in Iran, should he return. "It is common in Iran to have an open charge against political activists in order to intimidate us," Atri told the New York Sun in early 2005, shortly after his arrival in the United States. "They can bring these charges to the court anytime they want." Atri, like Afshari, was invited by senators Lieberman and Santorum to speak on Capitol Hill about human rights in Iran. The event was cosponsored by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a right-wing think-tank based in Washington, DC. Atri came under fire from some Iranian dissidents in his home country after speaking with the group, which advocates military action against Iran. Nevertheless, Atri said he is committed to diplomacy and nonviolent means of regime change, and expressed great admiration towards the American civil rights movement. Atri also said he was impressed with the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, through which regime change occurred after massive peaceful protests during late 2004 and early 2005. Atri explained, "This regime is very worried of anything like the Orange Revolution in Iran. "They're very sensitive. Everybody who is talking about an Orange Revolution or nonviolent action, they say 'okay, this is a CIA program.'" The fact that Atri (himself a prominent student leader who had been severely beaten by the Iranian secret police), was criticized by some Iranians back home for meeting with senators who support forceful regime change, demonstrates the seriousness that Iranian students have about keeping their democratization movement organic and free of governmental ties. The Bush administration and the Republican-controlled Congress allocated millions of dollars to fund pro-democracy groups within Iran. While the dissidents interviewed for this piece were strident in their belief that no serious groups would consider taking money from the US government (and that it would be extremely dangerous for them to do so even if they wanted to), they wondered where that money would end up. Still, Iranian dissidents said, there were some things that the United States could do to help. For example, Atri said that he welcomed US efforts to support free media in Iran, such as Voice of America satellite television broadcasts, to which Congress has committed several tens of millions of dollars over recent years. Haghighatjou agreed, adding that these broadcasts would be viewed with more legitimacy if they were not entirely funded by the US government. She suggested that wealthy Iranians in exile could assist with efforts to bolster free media in Iran instead. Most Iranian expatriates in the United States live in Westwood, a district of Los Angeles. There are so many Persian-Americans living there that some refer to the area as 'Tehrangeles' (a combination of the name of Iran's capital, Tehran, and Los Angeles). As Akbar Ganji spoke to supporters in New York on that summer day in 2006, it began to rain. Undaunted, he continued his speech into a megaphone, and aides took turns holding an umbrella above his head while everyone else got soaked. A few Iranians were staging a counter-protest across the street on the sidewalk adjacent to the UN compound. Their sign reads "We support the national security of the USA and the leadership of President Bush." The words "President Bush" were written in red and preceded by a heart. They were monarchists who wished to return to the days of the US-supported shah's regime. After they originally tried to join the much larger assembly of Iranian dissidents meeting with Ganji, Ganji's supporters rejected them, echoing their leader's unyielding belief in peaceful regime change. The moment was in many ways representative of the same debate taking place within the US government. On the one hand are those, like Lieberman and Santorum, who have signaled that they advocate a US strike on Iran. Others, who are more aligned with Iranian dissidents, want to reduce tension between the two countries. It seems, for the moment at least, that voices who want to ease tensions with Iran are being largely drowned out. On January 10, President Bush announced he was sending another carrier strike group to the region - a move seen by many observers as aimed at intimidating Iran's government. "If we continue [going the direction we're going] maybe the US will use military action," one Iranian dissident feared. "But Iranians pay this price, not the government. The Iranian people pay the price." --------- Arlen Parsa is a documentary film student at Columbia College Chicago. In between classes, Parsa writes about American politics and current events at TheDailyBackground.com. The Logic of US Deployments Points to Iran Wednesday 24 January 2007 The logic of the new force deployments President George W. Bush has approved for the Middle East appeared geared towards launching an air strike against Iran or deterring Iranian retaliation rather than preparing for a major change in U.S. strategy to win the war in Iraq. As we have noted in previous coverage, the much hyped "surge" strategy the president has approved to strengthen U.S. forces in Iraq, especially in Baghdad, will be almost negligible in its boost to U.S. troop numbers in and around the Iraq capital in the short term. By the end of February, only 7,000 additional troops are currently scheduled to be sent out. The impact those numbers by themselves can have on a city of 7 million people will be negligible. The U.S. Army's own latest manual on counter-insurgency warfare calls for a ratio of 20 troops to secure 1,000 of the general population who need to be protected, as Trudy Rubin pointed out in the Philadelphia Inquirer Friday. That would require 140,000 U.S, troops to secure Baghdad alone. By contrast, the build up of U.S. air and sea assets in the Persian Gulf area is far more massive than the "surge' in ground troops. A second aircraft carrier battle group is being sent to join the USS Eisenhower carrier battle group already in the region, in effect doubling its air striking power. In terms of the new tactics that Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, President Bush's choice to replace Gen. George Casey as ground forces commander in Iraq, is expected to implement, this makes no sense. Petraeus is a renowned student and exponent of the traditional principles of counter-insurgency war. He has advocated greater U.S. force levels to be deployed on the ground at grassroots level, especially in Baghdad, and that they be spread out around the city's many neighborhoods rather than bunched up in a defensive posture in the heavily defended Green Zone in order ensure increase protection and security for the general population. Adding more aircraft capable of striking at ground targets, but only at the expense of devastating more civilian areas, increasing civilian casualties and thereby generating far more active support for the Sunni insurgents, makes no sense in terms of this policy. Besides, the greatest strain on U.S. forces in Iraq is on the manpower of the Army and Marines ground combat forces, not on carrier-based pilots. The insurgents have no air force of their own and what ground-fired, hand-held anti-aircraft missiles they have appear to have had negligible impact on the unquestioned U.S. air superiority in the theater. Similarly, as we have also note din previous columns, the appointment of Adm. William Fallon as the new Central Command, or CENTCOM, commander-in-chief, makes no sense if his primary mission is expected to back Gen. Petraeus in fighting a classic counter-insurgency campaign more effectively in Iraq. Adm. Fallon is widely respected in the Navy and by Bush administration officials. But his primary expertise is in running the PACCOM, or Pacific Command, which he has done with great distinction, and in being one of the U.S. Navy's most experienced directors of deploying carrier-based air assets against land targets. This expertise too would be superfluous against the Sunni insurgency. However, it would be of the greatest importance in the event of any U.S. air strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities, or if the Bush administration was anticipating some kind of widespread Iranian attempt at retaliation. The same logic applies to the president's approval of sending new Patriot PAC-3 anti-ballistic missile batteries to the Middle East. The Patriot is the finest anti-ballistic missile system in the world. But it appears entirely superfluous to the many needs of the hard-pressed U.S. combat forces in Iraq. However, if Iran were to attempt to launch any of its Shihad -3 intermediate range missiles at U.S. forces or allies in the region such as Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States or Israel, then the Patriot deployments would be of the greatest importance. Even the extremely small augmentation of U.S. ground forces in Baghdad takes on a different significance when interpreted from the perspective of possible Iranian retaliation against future U.S. or Israeli air strikes. It is not remotely enough to make a significant difference in providing security to the general population of the Iraqi capital. But the additional forces could be of crucial importance in deterring or putting down a new rising by the Iranian-backed Mahdi Army militia of Moqtada al-Sadr. Washington has been pressuring Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to commit Iraqi army forces to suppress the Mahdi Army. But the Shiite Maliki has been very reluctant to commit his army, which is Shiite dominated, against a force that has heavily infiltrated it. None of these assessments mean that a U.S.-Iran military clash in the region
is automatically inevitable or imminent. Prudent military commanders always
try and anticipate dangerous contingencies that may never come to pass. Or the
new military assets may be intended for other regions. However, the fact remains,
their relevance to current and projected U.S. military operations in Iraq appears
very unclear. And their relevance to having to constrain or defeat a hostile
Iran appears obvious.
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