Wampum

First, Eric's Guide to Garbage: If the writer uses the embassy takeover to frame any piece on Iran, its domestic propaganda, or the product of a neo-plagerist with a stopped clock. If the writer uses "reform" vs "something other than reform" to frame any piece on Iranian politics, its domestic propaganda, or an MEK media placement. Think of the MEK as 1,000 way-way-way-bitter-ender-Saddamists, who in 2024 are plotting to liberate Iraq, using new, improved theology and the occasional cross-border remote village smash-and-grab, with real mock-executions, from a base camp in central Fantasy-stan. Only they're Iranian, and God's Gift to the Present Drooling NeoCon America. I might as well be writing this in Farsi.

Anyway, Primary season in Persia.

Mohammad Khatami is winding up his second, four-year presidential term. Color him "reformist" and term-limited out, for the next four years anyway.

Now, on to the next would be kings. This election is being defined by generational conflict within the dominant forces within Iran, and the pending military conflict with the United States. That is it. The generation that came to power with Imam Khomeni, that exercise power through the major clerical politicial institutions -- the Association of Combatant Clerics (which didn't join the Reform boycott of the elections to the 7th Majlis last spring), the Association of Theological Teachers and the Islamic Coalition Society, versus a generation that would like to come to power, and didn't do too badly in the elections for the 7th Majlis earlier this year, courtesy of the Guardian Council and the re-invigorated Revolutionary Guards. The United States vs Iran. More on that later.

The candidates:

• Aliakbar Velayati, former Foreign Minister. Color him "Traditional".
  
• Ali Larijani, former managing director, Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB). Color him "Traditional".
  
• Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, mayor of Tehran. Color him "NeoCon".
  
• Ahmad Tavakoli, influential member of parliament. Color him "NeoCon".
  

Both generational factions are supported by Ayat Allah Ali Khamenei. I don't know if Ayat Allah Ahmad Jannati and the GC are as theoretically even handed as the Supreme Jurist, and if the subtext isn't how the next Supreme Jurist is chosen, and one will have to be chosen under war-time conditions as soon as the decapitation phase of the Anglo [1] - American attack begins.

Then there are the loose canons. Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, term-limited (two consequtive terms) former president. Color him ... "calico", he chairs the Expediency Council, the final (non-religious) political arbitration body. The Any-Body-But-Rafsanjani candidate, Gholem-Ali Hadad-Adel, Speaker of the 7th Majlis. Color him "neocon" and a relative of Ayatollah Khamenei.

Somewhere behind all the party positioning, will the trads side with the refs against the neos, the usual stuff of any competitive primary season, there is a real question of calculation. The next President has to be concealed from the American attack, as does the ministerial government and the provincial governments (except Khouzestan), just as the Supreme Jurist has to be exposed to it. The election isn't simply over infantile "hardline" assaults on the status of women or any "values" issue as fundamentally stupid in Iran as elsewhere, it is over who will be running the multi-year war of defense, in an Iran that won't need wilayat-i faqih, at least for the duration, until the occupation of Khouzestan is ended, or the war is generalized to more of the former Central Treaty Organization (nee Baghdad Pact), the Gulf Cooperation Council, and former Soviet states.

It won't be simple. Whoever wins has to run a war of attrition and get at least a cease-fire on terms no worse than those in Security Council Resolution 598. If Mir-Hossein Mousavi were in the running, my money would be on him. He didn't stand for the 1997 election, so his supporters set on Ali Khamenei, who won by a large majority.

While this piece has been in-prep, the UK/DE/FR/IN talks have progressed, and Sunday Iran sent the IAEA a text announcing the suspension of uranium enrichment. Nothing can remove the American pretext for war, not even the Fords, the Carters and the surviving Reagans, traveling jointly to Tehran to apologize to Ayat Allah Ali Khamenei (Supreme Jurist) and Ayat Allah Ahmad Jannati (Guardian Council) at the tomb of the Imam Khomeni, and then to President Muhammad Khatami and the entire 7th Majlis assembled in parliament for the American support for the Pahlavis and the dirty war that kept the Anglo-American regime in place, and the American support for Saddam and the decade of war his regime imposed on Iran under Reagan and Bush (1), and accepting the regrets and apologies of Iraninans for the deaths of American soldiers attempting to rescue the Embassy staff and the American casulties of three decades of intermittant conflict by proxy. It does however under cut the pretext for joining the American war on Iran for European states predisposed to do so, so it is an important diplo-military win for Ali Khamenei and all who sailed with him.

At the end of the Tarrantine War (1607-1615) between the Mic'macs, who won, and the Abenakis, who lost, peace was made when the parties met and performed condolence. There is no "right" or "wrong", only condolences for the crimes of war. The tune isn't snappy and the ceremonial dance takes a long, long time, but the parties don't simply "make peace", they weep for each other's losses, they share suffering, the only bond that matters. It is still part of Wabanaki musical repitoire.

[1] All bad things in Iranian popular consciousness end with "because of the British". It doesn't matter if the Iranian is a royalist or a communist or any point in between.