The offstage battle can be brought out from behind the scenery and shoved down stage center by actions taken by the US and other Western countries. Indeed, it is arguable that the correct actions will bring about a denouement to the current interlocking Iranian crises which is favorable to the interests of the outsiders to say nothing of the Iranian public generally.
While it is legitimate to assert that there is no such critter as a "moderate" inhabiting any of the several religious and secular centers of power in Iran, this should not be taken as meaning that the regime and its instruments are monolithic. Quite the contrary, there are deep fissures within the remnants of the Revolutionary Generation.
One faction which is currently growing in its oppositional solidarity to Supreme Leader, the Grand Ayatollah Khamenei, is comprised of the Revolutionary Old Guard. Its membership includes "defeated" presidential candidate Mousavi. It also numbers within its list such old stalwarts of the deceased Ayatollah Khomenei as the senior clerics Hashemi Rafsanjani and Ali Montazeri. Along with these ayatollahs as many as fifteen of the twenty mariji (those worthy of emulation) from whose ranks the next Supreme Leader must be chosen are arrayed against Khamenei and his plans for a family dynasty.
It isn't just the religious Old Guard which is joining the lists against the theocratic and dynastic ambitions of today's Supreme Leader. Important secular figures such as Ali Larjani, the current speaker of the Iranian parliament and former chief nuclear negotiator; the mayor of Tehran, Mohammad Qalibaf; and Mohsen Rezai, another of the defeated presidential candidates. Even the supposedly one-for-all-and-all-for-one Revolutionary Guard is not solidly behind Grand Ayatollah Khamenei. Ali Jafari, the overall commander of the Revolutionary Guard Corps who was personally chosen by Khamenei, is slipping over to the opposition. So also is the RG's commander of the Tehran district, Ali Fazli.
The reason these rather different components of the Old Guard are jelling in opposition to Khameni is Khamenei's son. Mojtaba Khamenei is the Grand Ayatollah's number two son and has been reportedly being groomed to take over the family business when the old man steps down. Not much is known publicly about Mojtaba beyond the fact that he has the rank of ayatollah in the Shia hierarchy.
While Mojtaba holds the minimum rank required to become Supreme Leader, there is buzz to the effect that he is a theological lightweight even compared with his father. When dear old dad was chosen to follow Khomenei as Supreme Leader, many in the Koranic know, including Grand Ayatollah Rafsanjani, had discounted the possibility since the old man was not too bright in the theology department.
But, whatever Khamenei pere might have lacked in Islamic jurisprudence, he more than made up for in backroom politics. Since the Khamenei family once demonstrated that the ability in the field of practical politics defeats theological competence, few of the Old Guard are now willing to bet that Mojtaba will be knocked out of the box simply because he can't pass hermeneutics 101.
The vibrations on the table top speak of Mojtaba having been the Conductor-in-Chief of the Great Ahmedinejad Election Victory. It is even more clear that Mojtaba has been in charge of the repressions carried out against the post 12 June protesters. Mojtaba is the undisputed man in charge of the basiji. He is, in essence, the Himmler of the regime.
As Mojtaba has emerged from the depths of the shadows in recent days, a number of very nasty rumors have surfaced as well. Most of these focus on Mojtaba's ability to collect money and place it in safe harbors outside of Iran. It has been alleged, for example, that much of the more than two and half gigabucks frozen by the UK on 18 June in keeping with EU and UN resolutions was Mojtaba's personal fortune.
Whether true or not, rumors of large scale peculation are a strong indicator that Mojtaba and Khamenei's plans for a family dynasty are perceived as threats to the Revolution. As such the ambitions and the personalities must and will be opposed both directly and indirectly by the true believers of the Old Guard.
The opposition may be overtly directed against Ahmedinejad. The Old Guard and its sympathisers among younger Iranians can complicate Ahmedinejad's efforts to govern. Any number of monkey wrenches can be tossed in the mechanisms of governance. On the clerical level the same may be done--on steroids. Considering that the Old Guard opponents of the re-elected president and Mojtaba control both the Guardian Council and the Assembly of Experts, their capacity to hamstring Ahmedinejad is pronounced.
The challenge for the Obama administration as well as the rest of the West is that of putting additional stress on the fragile Iranian economy and the less-than-resilient political system without overdoing it such that the highly nationalistic Old Guard are compelled to drop their opposition to Khamenei's plans. At the same time the imposition of additional stresses particularly on critical civilian sectors of the economy will bolster the opposition's efforts to discredit both Ahemdinejad and the Khamenei family.
It is not beyond the realm of plausibility that the combination of civilian sector economic pressure such as the banning of refined petroleum product sales to Iran and a limit to the amount of food sold to the country and the opposition of the Old Guard will result in the early selection of a new Supreme Leader--and the holding of ahead-of-schedule presidential elections.
If the Obama administration takes proper advantage of the continued opportunity which is presented by the Conservative vs Khamenei struggle (which the Geek doubts) the endgame will be very much in the best interests of all. Iran will not stop being an ambitious power, propelled by nationalism and a firm belief in the divine right of Iran to be a global actor and regional hegemon, but it may be a little less irrational and threatening in its pursuit of ambition.
And, the world may yet dodge the bullet of a war nobody wants.
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