Who is New Iranian President Hassan Rowhani?

The news is full of stories proclaiming that new Iranian President Hassan Rowhani is a real moderate and that with him replacing Mahmoud Ahmadinejad there is opportunity for renewed relations and a solution to the Iranian nuclear program difficulties. Oh if only that were so. Even a cursory review of the pre-election schemes and actions taken to prepare the ballot which was finally placed before the people will disavow any rational person from such thoughts. Initially there were literally hundreds of candidates who wished their names to be on the ballot so, as in any nation, there was a primary of sorts. These names are listed and sent to the Assembly of Experts which is made up of leading Imams and Ayatollahs where the list is selectively narrowed to a list of names these Clerics approve. There are those who believe that in all honesty the Assembly of Experts never even bothers to view the list and simply puts together a list of the names of whoever they think should hold the office of President. The possibility of a true liberal who believes in separation between the religious hierarchy and those who run the political functions of the State have absolutely no chance making past this review. The list formulated in the Assembly of Experts is passed along to the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei who then prepares the final list of five to eight candidates who make up the actual ballot. So, in the end only those whom the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei feels would best support his views and desires before the people and the world are allowed to even be on the ballot thus removing any possibility of a true moderate becoming President of Iran.

 

But what is known about now Iranian President Hassan Rowhani. We know he is sixty-four years old and his first statement announced a “new opportunity” for the West to treat the Islamic Republic with respect and to recognize its rights. Treat the Islamic Republic with respect and to recognize its rights was also a favorite grouping of words used by the preceding Iranian President and he used them to mean for the world to prostrate themselves before their betters and permit Iran to do whatever they pleased and be happy about it. I suspect it still means the same thing. We know that Rowhani was the country’s former nuclear negotiator under the former President Mohammad Khatami and also served as top security official under former moderate President, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. There were no cracks in the Iranian insistence to the right to develop nuclear projects as they desired during his time in either position. To his credit, Rowhani recently accused his predecessor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of needlessly incurring crippling economic sanctions though such was very likely simple campaign rhetoric. In his first speech as Iran’s new President, Hassan Rowhani showed his true colors when he launched into a diatribe almost immediately against Israel, blaming the Jewish state for Iran’s economic problems. He defiantly pointed out, “The Iranian nation has done nothing to deserve these sanctions. Our activities are in line with international norms. If the sanctions help anyone, it is Israel. They are directed only at us. The Western nations do not have sanctions against anyone else.” He concluded his tirade claiming it was all part of the Israeli plan to “ruin” Iran.

 

Across the world it appears that all the players are lining up salivating at the chance to prostrate themselves before the new great hope in Iran. The United States said it was prepared to engage Iran directly. The White House said such engagement would seek a, according to reports, “diplomatic solution that will fully address the international community’s concerns about Iran’s nuclear program.” Along similar lines, EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said she was committed to working with Rowhani towards finding a “swift diplomatic solution” over concerns about the Iranian controversial nuclear program. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon stated he hoped Iran will now play a “constructive role” in regional and international affairs. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said France is eager and “ready to work” with Rowhani, on issues including the country’s nuclear program and its involvement in the Syrian conflict. German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle welcomed the election of Rowhani as a vote which may provide for “a constructive foreign policy.” He added, “We hope that the country’s new administration collaborates in this sense in order to reach solutions on international and regional questions.” The British statement urged Rowhani to set “a different course” for the future of the Iranian Islamic Republic. Italian Foreign Minister Emma Bonino said Italy hoped that Iran and Italy would find a “relationship of renewed comprehension and constructive dialogue.” And lastly, the Syrian National Coalition representing the rebels in the Syrian Civil War hoped that Rowhani will review Iranian support for Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad. This is almost reminiscent of the press and world’s stated praises for newly elected United States President Barack Obama upon his first winning the election in November of 2008. Let’s hope that everybody takes the eventual letdown when this person fails to live up to the hype better than they did when President Obama proved to be merely a fallible human-being. On a more sane reaction, Israel issued a blunt reaction to Iran’s new president Saturday saying, “Iran’s nuclear program has so far been determined by Khamenei, and not by Iran’s president. After the election, Iran will continue to be judged by its acts, in the nuclear field as well as that of terrorism.” During a meeting with Canadian Foreign Minister John Baird, Netanyahu was quoted yesterday saying, “Iran should not be allowed to gain time by holding drawn out talks” with the nations of the international community thus gaining precious time to complete their nuclear intentions. “Today, it is indispensable to keep the pressure. We should not surrender to illusions.” Israel was simply pointing out through the cacophonic din that, in reality, nothing has changed once again. There really is no great new hope on the Iranian horizons or especially in the office of the President.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

United States Picks Between Wrong Sides in Syria

President Obama’s Administration reached a decision to, in theory, begin to send small arms directly. This is being sold as the United States will begin to send arms to the rebels in Syria. This implies that the United States was not arming the rebels before this decision. If only they were that discerning in their decision making. What this is actually announcing is that with Turkey now falling into chaos with riots in every major city across the nation, the United States has lost their go between which had allowed them to funnel arms to the Syrian rebels, mostly originating out of Libya, through Turkey while being able to pretend in the domestic news to appear to not being at all involved in the Syrian Civil War. The question the American public needs to decide is has their country chosen the right side to support. The obvious answer is they have not but the reality is that there was no correct side to choose. All that is being chosen in Syria is which terror groups will lead the Islamic world for the immediate future in any future engagements with the rest of the world. Perhaps some inspection and tracing the history behind this decision will make things more understandable.

 

Perhaps the first item would be to attempt to discern who gets the credit or blame for deciding to support the rebels in Syria. The first item we need to state is that, like or hate the choice, President Obama really did not have much of a choice in which side to support. He chose whether or not to support a side in the Syrian Civil War, but the side was chosen all the way back in 1953 and possibly even earlier. It was that year the United States backed Mohammad-Reza Shah Pahlavi in the 28 Mordad coup, date of the coup in the Persian calendar, with Operation Boot under the title of the TPAJAX Project during the end of the Truman Presidency, replacing the democratically elected government in Iran which was proposing to ally with the Soviet Union. Needless to point out that this alignment and access to the oil fields were the driving motivations for the United States and no altruistic reasons were present. This was purely a case of we will put our man in for the oil and to spite our adversary, the Soviet Union. Perhaps it was attempting to make amends for the previous devious actions that inspired President Carter to back the revolt which brought the Ayatollah Ali Khomeini to power establishing an Islamic religious regime which remains in power today under the second Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The miscalculation by President Carter was quickly made evident as the new leadership in Iran chose to ally with the Soviet Union soon after coming to power. Perhaps there was just a bit of schadenfreude felt by the Iranians and Soviets from these turns of events. This resulted in the current alignment with Russia aligned with the Shiites and Iran and the United States aligned with the Sunnis and Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Hopefully that is sufficient historical reference.

 

The current excuse for a Civil War in Syria has in all actuality become a power struggle for preeminence of the Muslim world between its two main groups, the Sunnis and the Shiites. The Alawite Ruler of Syria, President Bashir al-Assad, is backed predominantly by Iran which has provided him with troops from the IRGC (Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps) and Hezbollah terrorist troops from Lebanon, another satellite of the Iranians. These are the Shiite Islamic forces in Syria. The rebels originally consisted of one side representing secular interest and the other representing Islamist interests. The secular rebel forces have basically been all but removed from the conflict and have virtually no hope of prevailing in the conflict. That leaves the Islamist forces which consist of two camps, those with the Jabhat al-Nusra Front which has declared their alliance with Ayman al-Zawahiri and al-Qaeda and those supported by the Muslim Brotherhood. The challenge in this is to find which side consists of the good sides, or at least the less bad side. President Bashir al-Assad has utilized intimidation, torture, rape, and other equally abhorrent instruments of oppression to retain his hold on power and his two supporting groups are equally renowned for cruelty and ends justify the means reasoning. This does not necessarily make the rebels any more benign. There is not much that needs to be said about al-Qaeda beyond World Trade Center terror strike and the horrors of a fateful day in September 2001 and their compatriots in the conflict, the Muslim Brotherhood, are not the choir boys who have, according to Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, “…an umbrella term for a variety of movements, in the case of Egypt, a very heterogeneous group, largely secular, which has eschewed violence and has decried Al Qaeda as a perversion of Islam.” In truth they are exactly the opposite but somehow possibly still preferable to al-Qaeda as long as one ignores such aligned subgroups such as Hamas. So, this pretty much defines the adversaries from which President Obama has now presumably chosen one side to support. Perhaps he simply chose the side which was not supported by the Russians, but one might hope that such a decision was made with deeper concerns that just that.

 

So, President Obama has chosen to back the al-Qaeda and Muslim Brotherhood in their attempt to be the preeminent guiding force in Islam while the Russians are supporting the Iranian sponsored terrorist out of Lebanon, oppressive dictator of Syria and the terror specialists out of Iran, the IRGC. The problem is deciding which side is populated with people who deserve the support of the nation which claims to be the bastion of freedom and human rights in the world. Truthfully, the reasoning behind President Obama backing the rebels is more realistically stated as backing Saudi Arabian and Egyptian interests and opposing Iranian interests, not to mention opposing Russian attempts to rise to power over the Middle East. As mentioned before, the sides were chosen far before the Civil War broke out in Syria and goes back to two fateful choices in Iran, the 1953 coup that brought the Shah to power to prevent Soviet Union preeminence in Iran and the 1979 coup that placed the Ayatollahs into power who then chose to join the Soviet Union block of nations despite the attempts by President Carter to make amends for the perfidy under the administration of President Truman. Now all that remain is to have one side prove out victorious and gain, for the moment, the leadership of the Muslim world. Will it be the Shiites with their Russian allies or the Sunni with their American allies? Why does it matter? That is the problematic part of the equation. Which side of this conflict would present the higher likelihood to bring peace to the Middle East? The Sunni Muslim Brotherhood has benefitted greatly from the Arab Winter which was initially represented as the rise of democracy in the Arab and Muslim world but really has simply changed the prearranged winners in every election from some nationalist dictator to some Islamist dictatorial party such as the Peace and Justice Party in Egypt which is nothing more than the Muslim Brotherhood political influence. The Sunni Muslim Brotherhood has risen to power across Northern Africa in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya all with backing and praise from the United States. Those changes in leadership were of no consequence to the power structures as the dictators were Sunnis as are the Islamists who have replaced them. Syria is the first place where the Sunni and Shiite both have a serious shot at controlling Syria. Syria is vitally important to Iran as it represents a critical nation in the Shiite Crescent which currently exists starting in Iran and the Persian Gulf and proceeding through Iraq, Syria and Lebanon to the Mediterranean Sea. Saudi Arabia has the most interest in neutering of Iran and breaking their control through the heart of the Middle East would be an impressive first step. If, on the other hand, the Shiites prevail and retain their control over Syria, the potential for the Shiites to continue their slow spread across the Middle East and, more importantly, the greater oil fields in the center of the Middle East, Iran will continue to spread its strangling tentacles across the Muslim world. Iran had made an attempt at expanding during the Arab Winter revolution in Bahrain in direct opposition to the Bahraini Monarchy, Saudi Arabia. The Shiites were repulsed by heavy Saudi Arabian troops which were sent across the causeway which connects Saudi Arabia with the island nation of Bahrain. This was the second part of the Sunni-Shiite contest for preeminence in the Middle East after the Shiite taking control over Iraq after the United States war to remove Saddam Hussein. Syria will be the deciding battle. Should the Shiites and Iran prove successful the spread of the Iranian influence is likely to continue while should the Sunnis and the Saudi Arabian-Egyptian alliance will present a more stable future.

 

So, what does this mean we should look for in the future that might signal a change in the status quo? Should the Sunni win out in Syria there will be relative quiet, is the Middle East ever really completely tranquil, and the first sign of trouble coming would be the overthrow of the Saudi Arabian monarchy by either the Wahhabi or the Muslim Brotherhood. This would soon result in the final contest to begin for who will lead the Muslim forces in any eventual contest. Should the Shiites prove victorious in Syria their next target appears to be Turkey followed by Jordan. After Turkey and Jordan, choosing their next target will be problematic as their preference would appear to be Saudi Arabia and their satellite nations they provide protection for such as Bahrain, Kuwait, the Emirates, Qatar and Omar or Egypt in order to begin a march across Northern Africa. Iran is being patient with their slow and inexorable march to gain the preeminent position at the head of the Muslim world. But the first stop of this creeping revolution is in Syria. The worst result that could result in Syria would be actual Russian or American troops intervening in the Syrian Civil War. Should either of these nations transit from arming their chosen side to actual boots on the ground or even fighters in the skies, the other will be obliged to also enter the war. Where that leads is unimaginable and something to be avoided at all costs. The critical point of no return will come when one side appears poised to prevail and defeat the other side and the United States or Russia will have to either accept defeat of their surrogate or intervene. Intervention should be avoided but I seriously doubt that either President Obama or President Putin is capable of accepting defeat. That means that the only end to Syria may be decided across the entire planet and that should scare any reasonable person greatly. This does not bode to end well or even to end any other way than a devastating conflagration.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Who Gets to Pick the Winner in Syria?

As the civil war continues to murder innocents with the latest estimate approaching one-hundred-thousand murdered civilians and over one and a half million refugees fled to neighboring Turkey and Jordan there is a group of nations attempting to influence who wins. The problem is that many of these outsiders are backing different forces which serve to extend the fighting possibly endlessly producing no winners, just increasing casualties in an endless procession. First we need to define the disparate groups and then find who is backing whom. The supposed home team definition would likely have to go the current President for life Bashir al-Assad and the Alawite tribe from which he comes. There are two sets that are considered rebel forces which sometimes cooperate and at other periods work either independently or actually impede each other. One rebel group consists mostly of members from the Muslim Brotherhood while the other consists of forces aligned with Jabhat al-Nusra which is the al-Qaeda terror group. Then there are two other groups which currently support Syrian President Bashir Assad but actually represent the Iranian interests and are likely to continue to engage in the war even after Assad collapses or is killed. These two groups are Hezballah, the terrorist group whose political wing currently leads the ruling coalition in Lebanon, and the IRGC, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps, a group of fighters which make up a second military force roughly equivalent in size, equipment, training and capabilities to the Iranian Armed Forces used mostly to assist in foreign interventions, terrorist training internationally and domestically as required, and any other clandestine operations which may be assigned by the leadership of Iran. So, generally speaking there exist five groups vying to take control over all of Syria.

 

Oddly enough getting the teams all figured out who are operating within Syria is difficult enough, but trying to untangle the external interests and influences is far more complicated especially when dissecting their various motives. Let us first address the most up front, above board and obvious of the external influences. The most obvious is Turkey who is steadily supplying arms to both rebel forces for the most selfish of reasons, assuring their continued preeminence as the only stable rout for oil and gas pipelines. There is a further reason driving Turkey in providing arms for the rebel groups which is that there is no love lost between Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Syria President Bashir Assad as both view themselves as a leader in some future Muslim Caliphate, Assad as leader of the Arab nations in an Iranian Caliphate and Erdogan as leader of a reborn Ottoman Caliphate. Add to this that as long as there exists some sustained level of violence which would discourage construction of new oil and gas routes through Syria then Turkey, with its already existent pipelines, would remain the uncontested and sole route of pipelines for oil and gas from the Arabian Peninsula and related reserves.

 

Another supplier of arms to one of the rebel forces is Saudi Arabia who is backing the Muslim Brotherhood aligned rebels. The Saudi interest is the opposite of Turkey as the Saudis would very much like to have an additional player supplying pipelines to the Mediterranean Sea and into Europe as competition would result in lower prices for them in transporting their oil and gas. Furthermore, the Saudis are rivals of the Iranians and thus would love to see Bashir Assad removed from ruling Syria thus breaking the Iranian crescent in which Syria is a vital link connecting Iran and Iraq through to Lebanon and the ports of the Mediterranean Sea. The Saudi Arabians are supported by the rest of the members of the GCC, Gulf Cooperation Council; whose members are of far less military capabilities thus the Saudis make all the decisions. The Saudis are also counting on support by the United States but they may run into some surprises in that relationship which we will cover later.

 

Then there are those exterior forces supporting the Syrian military and Syrian President Bashir Assad and at the same time defending the Iranian interests. These two groups are the IRGC and the Hezballah terror group. Should Bashir Assad fall either by fearing being taken by the rebel groups who would likely give him treatment similar to that used to dispatch Libyan Dictator Muammar Gaddafi, a rather unpleasant death, these two groups would simply continue the fight in support of their true masters, the Iranians. To either of these forces the continuance of Bashir Assad as the President of Syria is simply something that makes their presence in the fight more readily explainable. Remove Assad and their real motivations are revealed and Iran would be uncovered as the true force behind Assad remaining in power. Another nation supporting Bashir Assad, even if in a somewhat limited manner, is Russia and its President Vladimir Putin. Russia has thus far limited their support to continuing to fill all past weapons orders they have agreed to with Syria and are preventing any overt support for the rebels such as interventions or establishment of a no-fly zone by the United States or NATO. The most disturbing participation by the Russians is their intent to follow through with the sale and supply of their S-300 Anti-Aircraft Missile Systems which would make any Israeli strikes to prevent chemical weapons or other game-changing weapons from being transferred to the Hezballah forces in Lebanon for use against Israel in the future more hazardous. There is one potential future situation which would prove most intriguing, if President Assad should be killed or otherwise removed from the situation, would Russia continue their support giving the future weapons shipments to the IRGC and Hezballah or would their interest in the situation in Syria be terminated.

 

And then there is the most troubling foreign influence, and that is the United States and President Obama. The obvious interpretation of the United States interests is that they are aligned with Saudi Arabia and supporting the Muslim Brotherhood and against the entirety of other forces. This façade also has another participant, Turkey, who also appears to work with the Saudis while also passing weapons to their intended recipient without question. Some of these weapons are intended for Jabhat al-Nusra as they are supplied from the al-Qaeda forces and influences who were involved in Libya. There have been rumors that the truth behind the catastrophe in Benghazi may have been related to attempts to prevent powerful and game-changing weapons, possibly stinger missiles, from being sent from Libya to undesirable recipients. Even if such a proposition were true, that is one truth that will never see the light of day. As is said, some secrets are secrets for a very good reason and as such must remain nothing more than a rumor, a whisper in the tempest and nothing more.

 

Beyond the Cusp