Iran:


Here's my take on what's going on in the Islamic Republic.


As I see it, what you and the world are witnessing is a game of multidimensional chess, with various forces pulling this way and that. Fundamentally, there are four forces operating within Iran:


1) The clerical supporters of the regime. Led by, of course, Ayatollah Khameni. These are fairly radical to very radical folks that truly believe in the religious destiny of the regime, and the odd (to western ears) tenants of Shia Islam. These folks are willing to countenance a totalitarian state if need be to preserve a regime they largely believe in. There is also some genuine popular support for the Islamic nature of the regime, albeit less than a few weeks ago....


2) The military/paramilitary supporters of the regime. Their most public face is President Ahmadinejad who won the Presidency (fair and square, by Iranian rules and standards, which include required approval from the regime to run for president!) four years ago, and has been declared the "winner" amidst such controversy recently.


#s 1 and 2 are in a pretty strong coalition. Should this coalition break down, a revolution is quite likely.


3) Clerical opponents of the regime. It is of course simplistic to simply label them opponents, but right now, at a time of maximum uncertainty, these people are calling the recent election fraudulent. Since Khameni has repeatedly said otherwise, and threw down the gauntlet in a defiant fist-banging, and somewhat threatening speech on Friday, it is fair to call these clerics opponents. The most visible person representing this faction, by far, is former president Rafsanjani. He is currently the Chairman of the Assembly of Experts, a fairly important behind-the scenes body which, among other things, elects the Supreme Leader. There are several Grand Ayatollahs that also fit within this description, many of whom have far superior religious credentials to Khameni.


The most interesting aspect of the the current Iranian crisis (and a crisis it is!) is that there is such a public split amongst clerical elements within the regime. Previous disagreements, with a few odd exceptions, have been papered over, and in the past, such as 1999, when there were visible splits within the regime, the Supreme Leader put his foot down, and everyone basically jumped back in line. This time, not so much.


Another key thing to keep in mind as the Iran situation unfolds. Rafsanjani was once a crucial supporter of Supreme Leader Khameni, and was the key person involved in elevating him to that status when former Ayatollah Khomeni died in 1989. He has been rumored, however, to have turned somewhat on his former protege, and acted within the Iranian government to maneuver against Kahmeni. Rafsanjani was once considered a moderate, and compared to Kahmeni and Ahmadinejad he really is. He does NOT believe in the overthrow of the regime or (god-forbid from his perspective) western democracy. He does, however, think the regime has led the country into a ditch . He apparently opposes the harsher clerical controls over people's daily lives, and has been a critic of the economic decisions made by recent governments, especially that of Ahmadinejad. His focus is on economics.


4) Pro Civil society (and in some cases far less anti-western than the regime, or even pro-Western democracy in rare cases). This group is represented by former President Khatami and to a lesser extent, of course, "defeated" presidential candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi and many of the masses in the streets. Mousavi was perhaps better described really as an internal critic of the regime than some anti-regime outsider. However, he has recently stated that he is willing to "be a martyr," which paints him more as a regime opponent.

In order to run for president, you must be approved by the Guardian Council, a body appointed by the Supreme Leader of and 6 jurisits. These are crucial pillars of the regime, and not about to let a real rabble rouser run for the somewhat important job of president. I say somewhat important, because ultimate power rests with the Supreme Leader.


My take is that a lot of the public is unsure about whether they truly support a full overthrow of the regime. Many would probably blanch at the violence and uncertainty this would entail. They are united, however, in their loathing of the manner in which Ahmadinejad and his ilk have run the Iranian economy into the ground. Remember when oil prices were sky high? You'd think Iran, with the 3rd largest amount of proven oil reserves (Saudi Arabia, Canada, Iran, Iraq) would have had a rip roaring economy. Not so much! Instead, Ahmadinejad's blatant misrule has left the Iranian economy in a sad state. Kahmeni has obviously lost some influence in the eyes of the Iranian people.


In addition, Ahmadinejad is blamed by people in this group for foreign policy misadventures. Not that these people like Israel, by a damn long shot. Many are, however, neutral to slightly favorable about the US. But what they DO think is that Ahmadinejad has brought a world of negative attention onto Iran with his various diatribes, and that this has done no good and some harm to these people's day-to-day lives.

Predicting what will happen next is a fool's errand. But make no mistake; the regime is clearly threatened, and could fall, with Kahmeni likely winding up in exile in Iraq. More likely, unfortunately, is a Tianenmen like crackdown, where Kahmeni calls out the army for real, kills a few hundred or more, and makes crystal clear that its all over, time to pack up and go home. I fear this outcome greatly.

Now that some of the dust has settled, I have finally gotten around to posting about what the revised National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) regarding Iran's nuclear program means.

You will recall that a few weeks back our intelligence community posted its overall analysis of Iran's nuclear intentions/capabilities. I ASSUME for purposes of this post that the revised NIE represents a good faith attempt by the Intel agencies to give their best intel on Iran, as opposed to a hit job to prevent a rush to war. I realize that's a simplistic assumption, guaranteed to be neither right/wrong nor useful, but I have to start somewhere.

The press reported widely at the time that our intel community concluded that they were wrong and that Iran is NOT pursuing nuclear weapons. Don't you believe it!!! If you read the report carefully, http://www.dni.gov/press_releases/20071203_release.pdf,, the NIE really said no such thing. Bear with me.

1) By far the most difficult part of an atomic/nuclear bomb is the weapons grade material, plutonium or highly enriched uranium (HEU). This is not exactly secret. In other words, if you gave Osama some of this stuff there's every chance he could get a working nuclear device given some time and money, whereas if you gave him everything else except for the HEU/Plutonium, he'd still have to acquire it from a state, and would likely have some real difficulties. So, crudely, Bomb = A (HEU/Plutonium) + B (everything else-- weaponization, fitting on missle, delivery, etc).

2) Everyone, including the NIE, agrees that Iran is still actively working on processes which could result in HEU. Even Mohamed ElBaradei of the IAEA (No Bush stooge!) agrees with this, and has publicly said since the NIE revisions that he wouldn't go that far as the US intelligence community has. (We've now become less anti-Iran on nukes than ElBaradei, which does NOT give me the warm and fuzzies). So, Iran is still working on weapons grade materials, and doing so in a way that makes little sense in the context of a civilian program. To list one simple example, they are enriching uranium without having anything civilian to DO with said uranium.

3) Iran has largely ceased efforts for now on the B portion of my above, highly simplified (yet useful) equation. This is the one and only valuable part of the NIE's analysis. I don't think it means anywhere NEAR as much as the lazy mainstream press thinks it means, for reasons I discuss below.

4) Should Iran acquire/produce HEU, there's little doubt they can, in a discreet number of years, perhaps even mere months, overcome the hurdles in the B portion of my equation.

5) (repeating)-- HEU is the most important/difficult part of this whole enterprise; therefore

6) Whether Iran has ceased efforts on the B portion of my equation may well effect the precise TIMING of when they get the bomb, but not whether. Should Iran enrich enough uranium (and the amount of uranium sufficient for 10 bombs could be hidden in an 18 wheeler with plenty of room for fruits and vegetables), it can, with at the absolute most a few years delay, acquire a bomb.

7) So the revised NIE, accepted as true, tells us AT MOST that Iran has voluntarily delayed by a short time the amount of time it will need to have the bomb. This hardly qualifies as what the press reported, namely that Iran truly stopped its efforts towards having a nuclear weapon.

8) Notwithstanding anything I have said, everyone agrees that Iran WAS working towards a nuclear weapon (both the A and B parts of the equation above) until 2003. And of course lying through its teeth about it.

Iran is still a grave threat to Israel's national security, and a real threat to regional stability in the middle east.