Ayatollah Khamenei Warps Reality--Again

One of the features of the First Cold War which the Geek has missed is the high quality, inventive invective that formerly poured from Moscow and, to an even more delightful extent, Beijing. The Geek still gets a frisson of delight when he remembers that at one time he and others like him were characterised as "running dog lackeys of the Wall Street imperialist claque."

Those were the days, my friends (to borrow a song lyric) when US presidents were routinely abused as "fascists," or "Hitlerites." The Good Old Days when the Soviet capo could promise "to bury" the US and all of us. It's enough to make you sigh with nostalgia for the way-back-when, the time when we Americans were "the oppressors of the legitimate aspirations of the toiling masses."

Praise be to the All-Highest (under whatever name you prefer.) The mullahocracy in Tehran has volunteered to take up the rhetorical slack.

Not that the Iranian theocrats have ever been bashful when it comes to insults and threats. Recently the commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards naval component promised to make the Persian Gulf a "hell" should the US navy get uppity. The warning was expanded to include the states of the Gulf littoral.

The Geek supposes that the USN is quaking in its seaboots.

The emir of the IRGC navy was backed by his commander,who shortly before he was transferred to the post of security and military advisor to the president,promised to "punch" the US should it be so bold as to list the IRGC as a terrorist organ. Oh, boy, that was scary, right?

Perhaps the same man in his new role as presidential advisor wrote the speech given by Iran's Cleric-in-Chief, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. As the crowd in the mosque cheered him on with rhapsodic cries of, "Death to America," (a favorite Iranian oldie-but-goodie), the Ayatollah compared George W. Bush unfavorably with Adolph Hitler.

Wait one, Ayatollah!

The Geek was thunderstruck when George H.W. Bush compared Saddam Hussein with Hitler sixteen years ago. The Geek said then and he writes now, the comparison was unfair to both Saddam and Hitler if for no other reason than Saddam didn't even make the top ten in genocide practitioners.

The Supreme Mullah is even more wrong. But the line was a crowd pleaser. So was its follow-on. The Man of Allah predicted that W. Bush would stand trial as a war criminal just like Hitler and Saddam.

Flag on the play, Ayatollah.

Hitler, in case your theological education overlooked recent history, committed suicide in his bunker while Red Army shells exploded outside. In case you were too busy praying or cranking out fatwas to notice what was happening next door, Saddam Hussein was tried, convicted, and executed by a pure Iraqi team. It wasn't an international tribunal as in Nuremberg after World War II or a constituted international court such as heard the cases of more recent perpetrators of war crimes or crimes against humanity.

That didn't matter to the mass in the mosque. It was time for more delirious cheers of "Death to America." Seems the worshipers didn't know anymore about the recent past than the preacher--or didn't care about such trivialities as reality or truth.

On a roll now, Khamenei accused the US of manipulating Saddam Hussein so he kicked off the Gulf War. (The one between Iraq and Iran, not the US led operation to kick the Iraqis out of Kuwait.) This piece of oratorical flourish committed an assault on historical reality akin to charging that Franklin Roosevelt manipulated Hitler to attack the Soviet Union in June 1941.

(Whoops! Maybe the Geek shouldn't have written that. There might be some academics of the Blame-America-First school of history who feel that must have been the case.)

Similar violations of historical fact dotted the balance of the "sermon." The US made sure that Hamas won the elections in the Palestinian Authority. The US egged Israel into last year's disastrous invasion of Lebanon. And so on. And so on.

The crowd ate it all up.

Can't say it surprises me. How about you?

We all understand political rhetoric for hometeam consumption. It's what we're going through right now. W. Bush slings his I-Was-Right-and-We're Winning! brand. The Surrender Now! crowd in Congress heaves its. Both distort truth, ignore history, chuck rationality into the pottie and pander to emotions.

Politics as usual, right?

Sure. The Geek has no problem with the concept although he is amused by the Tehran version and irritated by the Made in America sort.

There is, however, something in play here far more important than rhetorical distortions for domestic consumption.

Iran has a credibility problem. A major one. It is very hard to believe Teheran's protestations that all the Islamic Republic wants is it's own Atoms For Peace and Prosperity program.

It's also very hard to believe the mullahocracy's protestations as delivered by the Foreign Minister the other day that if the US would just leave the region, Iran along with its good friends and peace-loving allies Syria and Saudi Arabia would provide fraternal assistance to the Iraqis. Even harder to accept is the oft repeated denials of providing material, munitions, training, and other assistance to some insurgent groups in Iraq.

While the Ayatollah's spewing of high-quality invective was enjoyable for his audience (and the Geek), while it was intended for domestic consumption only, it was dangerous. Dangerous to Iran. Dangerous to all the rest of us.

It was dangerous to Iran because it served to widen the credibility gap yawning between mullah driven blathering and the suspicions of Iran's intents growing in the US and much of Europe.

It is dangerous for the rest of us because while rhetoric may not be reality, rhetoric has the potential to drive perceptions both within and outside Iran. Perceptions rapidly and readily become the bases of action.

So reads the book of history.

A final piece of advice to the ayatollah's speech writers. Take a look at some of the old communist declarations. They were both more amusing and far less likely to be taken seriously. Also, retire the "Death to America" slogan--it's been overdone.