Iran on 22 Bahman: Ahmadinejad "Wins Ugly" (This Time)

I guess it was inevitable that --- to post a dramatic headline or to make artificial sense out of the complex and messy politics of events --- the open-and-shut, Victory-or-Defeat results would already be declared. Britain's Sky TV, known best for its across-the-wall sports coverage, puts the onus of loser on the opposition: "The danger for Iran's anti-Government Green movement is that after yet again failing to mobilise huge numbers on a key day, it will lose momentum....The Government looks to have maintained its firm grip on the country." The Times of London pronounces, "Iran crushes opposition protests with violence". Others leer --- The Herald Sun in Australia, "Iran regime strangles Green Movement on the streets" --- while some don't even see a contest (Time: "Where Was the Opposition?")

The Tehran Bureau ran up the white flag, "A big anticlimax," "defeat," "An overwhelming presence from the other side. People were terrified." Even Juan Cole, normally an expert offering nuanced, in-depth analysis, leaps to "Regime Victory on Revolution Anniversary; Opposition Fails to Mobilize".

OK, if we have to resort to a sporting metaphor to summarise the twists and turns of 22 Bahman, let's use one that offers some insight into what is to come as well as what has happened.

The Regime Won Ugly. And that's not the same as winning.

The Latest from Iran (11 February): Today is 22 Bahman

Let me explain: when a team "wins ugly", it doesn't triumph through overwhelming superiority, a strength that is likely to see it chalk up victory after victory. Instead, it scrapes through --- in a contest in which all sides makes mistakes and miscalculations --- because its faults aren't quite enough to take away its lead, because it hangs on with just enough of a territorial advantage, because it has a bit of luck to offset its weaknesses or enough tenacity to avoid exhaustion.


That's a good starting point for 22 Bahman. If the regime prevailed today, it did so in part because expectations of the opposition had been set so high. The dramatic scenes of protest of Ashura (27 December), fuelled in part by the recent death of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri, the relay of strong statements by Mir Hossein Mousavi, Mehdi Karroubi, and Mohammad Khatami, and the signs of regime fatigue offered the prospect of overcoming the blunt force and propaganda of the Government. And "overcome" was not the triumph of years or months from now but of this moment; 22 Bahman, 31 years after the Islamic Revolution's victory, might prove the triumphal day once more.

That didn't happen, and I guess in that sense, it has to be Government and Supreme Leader 1, Mousavi-Karroubi-Khatami and Greens O. But that winning score is a "negative" margin, rather than a tribute to the "positive" efforts of the regime. There was nothing hopeful in the rows of security forces who, having been prepared after the humiliations of Ashura, were not going to countenance another retreat. There was nothing of glory or Islamic value in the confrontations with Mehdi Karroubi (wounded, his son missing), Zahra Rahnavard (beaten), Mohammad Khatami and Mir Hossein Mousavi (forced into retreat), let alone the thousands of encounters in which chains, batons, and flying-squad detentions trumped hope and determination.

"Negative", not "positive". And no, the regime's rally in Azadi Square does nothing to alter that assessment. President Ahmadinejad's speech was not even subtle enough to offer a pretence of legitimacy through economic progress, social cohesion, or political manifesto for a post-election Iran in which the election is still a matter for dispute. This was a 75-minute diversion puffed up with a "surprise" (the 20% enrichment of uranium) which had been announced four days ago, the ritual denunciations of the "West" and Israel, and a fantastical vision --- awaiting the 12th Imam --- of Iran straddling the globe. Even the snapshots of the rally were beholden to these fancies, all deployed to avoid any reference to internal issues. There was the big rocket of Presidential strength:



And there was the eternal Western evil that would sweep over Iranians if they did not acknowledge Presidential leadership:



Of course, this was converted by State media into the markers, as the numbers in Azadi Square went from hundreds of thousands to a million to 2 million to 5 million, of all of Iran unified. And that unity was sustained by the reduction of any evidence to the contrary to a "couple of hundred" protesters in an outlying square in Tehran, soon to be dispersed by security forces.

But an unity sustained only by the "negative" is destined to melt away almost as quickly as the crowds dissipated from Azadi Square, duty done, needs met, or loyalties rewarded by the time slot allocated for the Ahmadinejad speech. Come tomorrow, or perhaps after the extended holiday that ends Sunday, the 31st anniversary of the Revolution will be just a date in the calendar as economic disputes resume, the qualms over the President resurface, and the detainees languish in Iran's prisons amidst the symbolic, limited but important manipulation of abuse cases such as the Kahrizak scandal.

There are distinctions to be made in this "negative" victory. It is probably more substantial for the Supreme Leader. The window of political opportunity to curb his authority and, in extreme visions, to remove him from office has now closed; those pursuing compromise within the system like Hashemi Rafsanjani have had to do so by pledging fealty to Ayatollah Khamenei, and figures like Mousavi and Karroubi have now defined their resistance as one that accepts the Leader's rule, provided he deals with an unjust and abusive Government. Khamenei is a damaged figure, a damage that is seen not only in the failure to get resolution but in his own bouts of self-doubt, but he will survive.

Not so Ahmadinejad. He lives another day because Iran's security forces held the line, even advanced in the physical battle against the opposition. But there is no political authority accrued from his postures: even Seyed Mohammad Marandi, the staunch defender of the Iranian regime, was at great pains this morning, when he spoke on British radio to say that the Iranian people had come out for the Republic, not the President (no Marandi interview is now complete without ""I Didn't Vote For Ahmadinejad").

If the opposition had truly been "crushed" today, that might have been sufficient to ensure Ahmadinejad's longer-term survival, even in the absence of any positive measures. But the Green movement and figures like Mousavi and Karroubi were not crushed. They were bashed about, dispersed, and, most importantly, exposed as tactically naïve with today's loudly-declared plan to march from Sadeghiyeh Square to the Government's lair in Azadi. Their ranks have been thinned by the detentions, and their communications have to fight new ways to deal with regime restrictions.

But they are not crushed. They also live for other battles. A Mousavi or Karroubi declaration could come tomorrow or Saturday or later in the week. The Green websites, with new ones emerging as others are closed, will be trying to find the front foot in stories of defiance and justice. And the planning will be moving beyond the tactic of trying to "hijack" the regime's highlight days.

That does not mean easy answers for the opposition, let alone those establishment figures who would like to see the back of Ahmadinejad not today but a moment in the near-future. But --- and perhaps this was the hubris that fed into the build-up for 22 Bahman --- nothing was ever going to come easy in this post-election crisis.

"Winning ugly" doesn't mean winning. It means a scrappy, jaded, exhausting victory on this day and this day only. There will be another game soon, and the negative of force and the rhetoric of diversion may not be enough, especially if those who see behind the batons and the speech-screens refine their approaches.

Put this on your scorecards. Without "legitimacy", the President --- if not the regime --- has to "win ugly" every time. The opposition --- from within the system or without --- only have to win once.

Comments

[Anthony]

I think it is time everyone drops the wishful thinking and accepts the fact that the Iranian regime is going nowhere right now.

And in any event, who benefits from any fall in the regime -- Mister Mousavi, who was prime minister during the worst of the execuutions, terrorist supporting and excess of the early years of the Revolution.

I think the less the west does about Iran the better -- let them sort their own problems out but just remind them that any use of nuclear weapoins by Iran or a terrorist group supported by Iran will be followed by massively disproportionate retaliation.

[Ali N]

Scott,

Your analogy comparing 22 Bahman to a football match is not correct and does not fit the ongoing struggle of Green Movement. After reading your article and the responses from other readers it made me feel a little better after a day of desperation and dejection. However this morning the reality and impact of yesterday is set in. If we want to compare yesterday’s event to any match it will be closer to a poker or a chess match, at any given moment in these games you could be against an opponent which has far more assets than you and the playing field is not in equilibrium. If nothing else yesterday exposed the disjoint between the Green Movement and its leaders. They well knew the rules of engagement in this game; it was well advertised by the government and the security forces:

A.We are going to have big crowd to celebrate the anniversary of the revolution and they did.
B.The oppositions are a few trouble makers that will be dealt with harshly and they did.
C. We will deal with the seditious leaders harshly and they did.
D. If you are not with us stay home otherwise we will deal with you with so called Islamic justice (beating, torture, imprisonment and hanging). It worked and people stayed home.

So the rule of engagement in this match was clear from day one and the leaders decided to participate and made the biggest strategic blunder of their life. As one of your articles last week headlined “All In”, the green leaders miscalculated the strength of their hand and went all in against much stronger hand and lost all the political chips they had accumulated in the past eight months. Indeed the demonstrators were the only political assets these leaders ever had, they gambled and lost it. Without this asset they are exposed and can be dealt with once for all.

Nobody ever claimed this was a fair game. You can try to diminish the impact of this win for the regime by calling it ugly, never the less it was a win for them and we can be sure they will use it against us. The government can use this event as a mandate from people to clean the “enemy within” or blame all the ills of the society on their seditious act.

You are right that the game is not over, as they say in poker tournaments”all you need to win is a chip and a seat”. We still have one chip left (people’s defiance) and a seat (we are still Iranians), but the odds of winning changed drastically against us. Indeed this game has been ongoing for well over a century, but the momentum has shifted to the other side and this battle was lost, but the war is ongoing and will never end until we reach that allusive freedom that seemed so close in different occasions in the past century and never materialized.