Iran Rocked

Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi

I am following events in Iran. Things seem to be developing quickly. I hear that police are in some cases joining the protesters, that IRGC stations are being found abandoned, and that the security forces deployed are Arabs, not locals. These are strong indications that the regime’s grip is failing. Usually the tipping point in a revolution is when the security forces melt away or join the crowds—when the regime cannot command its enforcers.

There is also a credible shadow government in the wings, under the Crown Prince; and the crowds know it. Israeli agents are surely on the ground, helping things along. The good old International Jewish Conspiracy, you might say.

What will the world look like if the Iranian regime collapses?

It will do damage to Russia, surely. Russia is close enough to the brink itself, with its hands full in Ukraine, and it has been relying on Iran for drones, perhaps other aid. This could tip that balance. Not only that—revolutions are contagious. An Iranian collapse may give courage to Russians sick of the war and the sanctions and the repression to try the same. 

It would be another huge accomplishment for Trump, to start the new year. Pretty lucky, with the midterms coming up. And it would be a cautionary tale to other American opponents not to poke the hegemon too far. The American sanctions and the American bombings surely contributed to this event, and certainly look like they did, which may be more important.

The contemporary Axis of Evil has been Russia, China, and Iran. Now that one is knocked out, the other two look weaker and more vulnerable. If one tiger was paper, are the others as well?

And who knows where else the contagion of revolution might spread? China? Venezuela? Cuba? Belarus? Georgia? All have looked restive recently. Each domino endangers the others.

Presumably this is very good news for Isael and Middle East peace. The Iranians have been funding conflicts in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Palestine, and Yemen. Now that funding will be gone. The Irish Troubles ended when funding stopped flowing from Libya. So something similar might happen here.

This may also tend to discredit the ideology of political Islam. Iran was the leading example of this in practice, and it will have ignominiously failed. That fit of xenophobic reaction may have had its day. Time to wake up and join the world.

There have been rumours of secret mass conversions to Christianity within Iran, inspired by the oppression of the Islamist government, yet hidden for fear of punishments. It may be, with the lid off, that there will be a rush of public conversions to Christianity and Zoroastrianism soon.

Which will encourage Christian revival elsewhere.

Before the Islamist Revolution, Iran was an important regional power, with a GDP on a par with Spain. Newly allied with the West, it might again develop rapidly and be again a bulwark of American foreign policy in the region. And a powerful ally of Israel as well. 

I suspect post-revolution, Iranians will be as pro-Western as the various populations of the old East Bloc turned out to be after the Berlin Wall fell.

I have several Iranian friends who have been wanting this badly. I hope it happens this time for them.