FG

Guardian says: Khamenei is running scared

 //www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/05/iran-strait-of-hormuz-threat

EXCERPTS:

 Seen from Tehran, the most serious threat to the survival of the regime
led by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei comes from within, not
without – a consideration not sufficiently understood in the west. The
political establishment is riven by deep divisions, principally between
economic reformers loyal to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and clerical
arch-conservatives backed by the Revolutionary Guards and a wealthy,
corrupt merchant class that has grown fat on the 1979 revolution.

 Khamenei appears to be trying to hold the line between the two factions. What worries him more than the movements of the USS John C Stennis aircraft carrier group in the Gulf,
or even US and EU oil sanctions, is the thought that crucial
parliamentary elections due in March could produce a permanent rupture
within the Islamic Republic. Such a split could open the way to a second
Iranian revolution.

... "The regime is now in a quandary. While it has
traditionally boasted about high voter participation as the symbol of
its legitimacy, Tehran is increasingly concerned that an election
boycott or turmoil could adversely affect its standing. In the wake of
the Arab uprisings the clerical regime is seeking to project an image of
its power and popularity. If the election becomes a dismal affair,
however, it will have the reverse effect."--commentator Yasmin Alem

... Food prices are soaring, dollars are being hoarded, and Iran's currency,
the rial, has fallen in value by 40% in recent weeks. The prospect of
sharp falls in oil export earnings – the oil industry accounts for 60%
of Iran's economy – is a dire one. Khamenei and other leaders have
indicated that such an outcome would amount to a casus belli.

 And this is the point that should worry the west's sanctioneers, fixated
by Iran's nuclear programme to the exclusion of other considerations.
At the moment the regime's deep internal contradictions could be leading
towards a revolutionary climax, the US and its allies are giving
Khamenei a possible way out by allowing him to externalise the problem
and claim that the Iranian nation is under attack from hostile foreign
forces, rather than definitively changing from within.

(FG observes: I don't see any western attack on Iran except if Iran attempts to block the Gulf or if it attacls naval forces.  In that case, I'm not sure Iranians will rally around the regime, as I wrote in my last blog here)

... confident statements by the White House and state department that Iran
is buckling under sanctions pressure appear to blithely ignore the
possibility that the regime is being pushed into a corner from which it
will come out punching, not negotiating.

(FG: Japan went to war for exactly the same reason.  The difference is that Japan was far better equipedwith a formidable navy and a fine aircraft in the Mitsiubitschi Zero.   Japan's ground forces inferior and too reliant on WWI type strategy but in the Far East the latter was less important than the other two branches.  Japan still lost even though the US grand strategy called for throwing our best at Germany and a holding action in the Pacific.   Iran has a tiny navy and a very obsolete airforce.   I susect the reliabity of many conscripts may be questionable when not fighting an enemy like Saddam or the Nazis.  People have little reason to fight enthusiasticaslly or risk their lives for a regime that represses the majority and rules for a small clique).

FG, Thanks for amazing News indeed.

I think AN is really smart rather than seems stupid most of the time with his BIG Mouth.

FG: That is indeed Breaking

FG: That is indeed Breaking News. We just have to wait and see.

A state of war only serves as an excuse for domestic tyranny.--Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.

Big news from Jam-e Jam

President Ahmadinejad has been summoned to answer questions before Parliament next Tuesday. The process could lead to impeachment, if the President's answers are deemed unsatisfactory.

Critics of Ahmadinejad have attempted for months to bring in the
President for interrogation, amassing the required minimum of 73
signatures (25%+ of the 290-member Majlis). However, they were blocked
this summer by the Board of Parliament.

If this news is true, it would indicate that key players in
Parliament --- notably the Speaker, Ali Larijani --- and perhaps the
Supreme Leader have lifted their objections to questioning.--Enduring America

Picture the following sight

Khamenenei's pants pulled down and exposed for all Iranians to see.  Ditto for his son, Mojtaba as well as Janatti, Jafari and Taeb.  These are real Bad Guys.

It's too bad the Greens didn't take such precautions.  Of course they lacked the opportunities which Ahmadinejad enjoyed.  I get the impression that he started collecting this evidence long before the feud with clerical hardliners broke out and in anticipation of that.

Also, certain to IRCG generals would probably look pretty bad--another reason Ahmadinejad hasn't already been arrested, tortured to confess and placed in a televised show trial.