Iran Analysis: Looking Back on the 1980s (Verde)

In recent weeks, one of the effects of the post-election crisis in Iran has been a look back at the early history of the Islamic Republic. In June, Mostafa Tajzadeh wrote an open letter asking for forgiveness for actions taken by reformists in the 1980s. This week, Mir Hossein Mousavi --- before his 1988 resignation letter as Prime Minister was published on the website of former President Abolhassan Bani Sadr --- issued an statement to disclose his version of events during the Iran-Iraq War.



Mr Verde explains the significance:

No one in the Iranian public knows anything about the decisions taken by politicians and military commanders during the Iran-Iraq War. There has never been any public scrutiny of the decisions taken. There is no independent information available about the actual events.

On the regime side, the narrative is this: “Backed by both the West and the East, Saddam Hussein attacked Iran in order to destroy the revolution, hence the war is called 'jang-e tahmili' (imposed war). The army of Islam fought heroically, hence the war being referred to as 'defa’-e moghddass' (Holy Defence). The whole world supported Saddam and eventually we were forced to accept the ceasefire, which Ayatollah Khomeini referred to as a chalice of poison.”

I am not saying this narrative is entirely false. Of course, Saddam started the war and the Iranian forces fought heroically against the odds on many occasions. My point is that the narrative is tainted by official propaganda. That is far from unexpected, but the problem is that there is no independently verifiable information, with the excuse that this is a "holy" matter, about the official thinking and decisions beyond the propaganda. Some people may be reluctant to question issues regarding the war, because it may appear that they are disrespecting the many servicemen, volunteers, and civilians who were killed during it.

However, this crisis and infighting within the Islamic Republic is producing an unexpected result. The recent revelations were spurred by the claims of Mohsen Rafighdoost, who was Minister of the Revolutionary Guard from 1982 to 1989. He makes it sound like the war was used as a tool for internal in-fighting of the regime: “Mr Hashemi [Rafsanjani, who had been put in charge of the war by Ayatollah Khomeini] told me: go and sit in your Ministry, I want to throw the ball into the court of the Government. He then gave an order that Mr Mousavi [then Prime Minister] became the head of the war effort, Mr Behzad Nabavi became the logistical deputy, and Mr [Mohhammad] Khatami became the propaganda deputy.”

Rafighdoost's implication is that Rafsanjani, knowing that the war effort was in bad shape, wanted to put Mousavi in charge so that once Iran had to accept the United Nations ceasefire resolution --- an acceptance which soon occurred --- Mousavi would be blamed for the failures. Rafighdoost also says that the government of Mousavi was hindering the war effort.

Mousavi responds that when he was put in charge, Iran was indeed in a very bad shape. He claims that in the first War Council meeting that he chaired, the regular Army and Revolutionary Guard commanders told him that Iran would certainly lose the Khuzestan Province to an Iraqi attack. He claims that the bulk of Iranian forces were massed around an unimportant height in Kordestan Province at the time, and even there they were in danger of being outflanked by the enemy.

As for management of the war, Mousavi claims that it had been handled badly since 1982.

At this stage it is impossible to know whose account to believe (maybe a combination of the two?).

A few years ago, after a public quarrel with Mohsen Rezaei, Revolutionary Guard commander in the 1980s, Rafsanjani published a secret message from Khomeini, in which the Ayatollah detailed his reasons for accepting the ceasefire. Unexpectedly Khomeini’s main reason for accepting the ceasefire was a letter from IRGC commander Rezaei. That letter said that Iran did not have any attacking capabilities for at least another five years. Even after that, it would only be possible to win the war if Tehran had hundreds of new planes and tanks and other modern weaponry such as laser-guided missiles and atomic bombs and if foreign powers were stopped from exerting influence in the region. Ayatollah Khomeini said that the Government was unable to support the war effort to this extent and everyone else except Rezaei was of the opinion that the war should be stopped.

I cannot help getting the feeling that officials are using nationally important information for their personal or factional gain, yet one effect of these disclosures is that they will further erode the Islamic Republic's historical foundations. In this crisis, the regime’s important days being tarnished: Qods [Jerusalem] Day in became “not Gaza, Not Lebanon” day, 13 Aban [in November] was a day when the regime's commemoration was so heavily guarded that it looked as if its marchers were prisoners, 16 Azar [National Students Day in December] became an occasion on which universities across the country voiced their protests, the funeral of a Grand Ayatollah Montazeri in the holy city of Qom turned into an anti-Khamenei demonstration, the religious celebration of Ashura [27 December] became a day on which the regime murdered its own citizens on the street, 22 Bahman [11 February] saw Iranian cities turned into military camps, and 14 Khordad [4 June] saw the humiliation by regime insiders of the grandson of Ayatollah Khomeini on the anniversary of his death.

Now the carefully guarded regime-backed version of the Iran-Iraq War is being disputed by regime insiders.

Next chapter to come soon?