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The mullahs feel the economic heat — 28 Comments

1. Though we cannot see into Iran these last few days it does seem the nation has entered a civil war that will not end until one side or the other is victorious. I’m not a bettor but I would not bet on the regime. They have too many hostile neighbors, to say nothing of the hostility of the US, Israel and others further abroad.

2. Four rockets were fired from Syrian territory into Northern Israel night before last, all intercepted, prevented from striking. Shortly thereafter Israeli Defense Forces struck a couple of dozen Iranian and Syrian regime targets in Syria, smashing stuff up, killing perhaps 20 some odd people, mostly Quds Force types we’re told. Why was Iran inducing its proxies to do stupid shit? Because Israeli had been recently killing Iranian proxies doing stupid shit, probably.

3. and so will A Schiff(ty) person soon.

   As reported on Wednesday the head of Burisma Holdings was indicted this week in Ukraine! He has gone missing

   Democrat Adam Schiff is linked to both US corporations named in the $7.4 BILLION corruption case.

   Schiff is connected to both BlackRock and Franklin Templeton Investments, two companies that were named in the $7.4B Burisma/US-Ukraine corruption claim that was announced

4. Heshmat Alavi reports as of 1 hour ago:

   Uprising in 148 cities
   Death toll: at least 251
   Wounded: at least 3,700
   Arrests: at least 7,000
   Internet shutdown: 125 hours & counting

5. Let us hope that not only the terrorist regime in Iran goes down, but also the communist regime in China.

6. But, but, but, have you heard what Trump said about Carly Fiorina during the campaign?

   Harming the interests of the Iranian regime and perhaps hastening its end just isn’t worth it if we have to put up with mean tweets and painful noticing of reality from the Bad Orange Man.

7. Kate… there is NO CHANCE the chinese regime will go.. none, zippo, nada

   When Tianeman square happened, maybe you forget they used 30 caliber machine guns… on a population of college students, and so on… right now, they are rounding up the protestors, and they will be sent to camps..

   for some other history

   ao Zedong moves to Wuhan , Lin Biao to Suzhou and the general staff to a nuclear bombproof bunker in the western hills outside Beijing. The country’s warplanes are scattered around northern China, runways at the main airports blocked and workers given weapons to shoot Soviet airmen when they land.

   It is October 1969: China is preparing for a nuclear attack by the Soviet Union. Lin, second to Mao, orders 940,000 soldiers, 4,000 planes and 600 vessels to scatter from their bases and the transfer of major archives from Beijing to the southwest.

   Then US president Richard Nixon intervenes. Secretary of state Henry Kissinger tells the Soviet ambassador in Washington that as soon as the Soviets set off their first missile against China, the US will launch nuclear missiles at 130 Soviet cities.

   This is the dramatic account in an official magazine of the closest China has come to a nuclear war. The latest issue of Historical Reference, published by the People’s Daily, mouthpiece of the Communist Party, describes in detail the five occasions in the post-1949 period when China was threatened by nuclear attack.

   It is a rare account by an official publication of the most dangerous moments of the People’s Republic. They are a far cry from the nuclear security summit in mid-April in Washington, where President Hu Jintao was received as an honoured guest and key interlocutor.

   even Russia is still Russia..
   a KGB man runs the state now, and has stayed in office how long?
   poisoned people in the UK?
   killed over 400 press people (which i think the press people here dont believe.. or they dont think that such would apply to them after the change)

   The Chinese could kill 100 million of their own, and not blink an eye
   there is no way it can change…

   they even tried the Hong Kong way to copy us baltics which negated Kruschev, who said “we have lost the baltics”… no, the chinese would not lose a tiny island.

8. Bolivians escaped feeling the heat
   ‘Don’t Let Food into the Cities’: Evo Morales Caught on Tape Planning Starvation in Bolivia

9. I used to read a blogger who called herself “IranGirl.” She was a big fan of the Iraq War. She was quite moved when Saddam Hussein fell. Then she wrote, “Us next, please.”

   I haven’t been able to find her on the internet in probably ten years. I hope she’s safe. I fear she’s not.

10. Refusing to lend the Iranians who were trying to rebel so much as public moral support is one of the many evil things the Sith did.

    Another was announcing when we would leave Iraq, and then doing it.

    He was and remains a disgrace to the country. Our worst disgrace by far.

11. Obama propped up the mullahs. Obama was a terrible President.

12. “A regime willing to kill demonstrators is demonstrating both power and weakness. Ruthless measures can reach a point of diminishing returns if the number of protestors becomes huge, and a particular turning point tends to be if and when the security forces of police and military decide to turn on the regime and side with the demonstrators. Then all bets are off.” – Neo

    Big IFs.
    IF 1:
    AFAIK, there were no successful mass public protests* against Hitler and Lenin and Mao like those we see in Iran and Hong Kong (and other places not in current news). Maybe circumstances back then just didn’t support the kind of organizing and publicity we have now, which can magnify protestors’ actions to the level that might produce change in the regime.

    IF 2:
    The German military never turned against Hitler (Russian in-fighting was a different can of worms), especially not in the beginning, before it got too nazified to have a critical mass of rebellion; and later, the scattered individuals and small groups — the actual real #Resistance whose virtue our Leftists have tried to coopt — were unsuccessful in their coup attempts.
    That counter-factual history is what the Left tries to invoke with their Bushitler! and Trump is Hitler! alarms, but the reality in the US is so far different they mostly get traction only among those who are already true believers.

    *The one time I know of that Hitler backed down was when he orderd the euthanasia of retarded children and other defectives, and faced a fierce back-lash from German (Aryan) mothers. IRRC, he needed the support of the women on the home-front too badly to alienate them, and (at that time) had not completely solidified his nazification of the country to the point where he could ignore or bulldoze (punish) them.
    I don’t remember the exact details; they are in a book called “Mothers in the Fatherland.”

13. The mullahs in trouble?

    My gosh, how is that possible? What have Obama’s allies been spending their precious billions on?

    No wonder the Democrats insist that Trump is unfit—abandoning an ally is simply not acceptable!!

    Clearly, another solid reason to vote “D” in November 2020.

14. Related:
    https://nypost.com/2019/11/21/heres-whos-likely-to-lead-iran-if-the-ayatollah-is-deposed/amp/

15. OCTOBER 2, 2019 / 1:07 PM

    “LONDON/DUBAI (Reuters) – More than 20 ships carrying around one million tonnes of grain are stuck outside Iranian ports as U.S. sanctions create payment problems and hamper the country’s efforts to import vital commodities, sources directly involved in the trade said.”

    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-shipping-food-exclusive-idUSKBN1WH21A

16. No country other than the USA, and perhaps not the US either, can keep up a large middle class life style without global trade.

    The failure of the mullahs to diversify their economy away from oil export dependency is a huge “national security” issue for them. I was saddened, tho not much surprised, that Obama made no effort to support the prior Iranian protests. Instead, he sent them hundreds of millions of dollars.

    Which the economic geniuses in Iran chose to spend on spreading terror around, rather than building up their own infrastructure & non-oil production capacity.

    The Iranian civil war now seems likely to be coming. The mullahs cannot murder thousands, tho killing dozens still seems possible, and thus likely. Unfortunately, tho as usual, while millions of Iranians may agree that the mullahs should go, they are unlikely to agree on what will replace them.

    So a military coup / military refusing to kill protestors seems likely for Iran.

    In China, the military will kill as many as needed to keep the commie billionaires in power. Two big differences: (1)the commies are willing to kill far more Chinese than the mullahs are willing to kill Shiite Iranians, and (2) there is a lot more cash for the Chinese military leaders.

    When the Iranian revolution happens, Trump won’t get much credit, and will get blamed for “so much needless slaughter”. But few Americans, if any, will be coming back in body bags.

    Would a “good President” be willing to spend 1000 American lives to save 100 000 Iranian lives? Perhaps by invading to help the anti-mullah Iranians? I’m sure the Dem media would demonize any Rep Pres. who lost American lives, so it makes great political sense, tho perhaps less moral sense, for any Rep Pres. to just use the economic soft power like Trump is using.

17. Iran’s current population is estimated at over 82 million people.

    When Syria went to civil war at Assad’s choosing, Syrian population was estimated at 22.4 million. Half a million Syrians have died in that war. Current estimates seem to be in the range of 17+ million population, many of whom are internally displaced people. There are many millions of Syrians residing in camps in Jordan, Turkey, and Lebanon today.

    Many of the Syrian dead have been killed by among others: Assad’s army, Russians and Iranians and Iranian agents: Hezbollah Lebanese, Iraqi and other mercenaries from various middle and further eastern nations, such as Afghanistan for instance.

    The Mullahs likely will not have — as Assad did — another Iran-like state standing outside willing to jump into Iran with men and treasure to expend to support a dead end. I think they are doomed, though they may not understand this yet.

18. “Groups including Amnesty International have documented at least 106 deaths during the protests, as regime security forces have used live ammunition to target demonstrators.”

    If Amnesty International has been able to document 106 I do wonder what the actual number of deaths is? It must be well over that. Also, how many are injured? how many are under arrest? I suspect we will never really know.

19. The Amnesty International report actually stated that all 106 of those protesters were, in fact, murdered by agents of the ‘Zionist Entity’.

    OK ( rayciss comment? ) it didn’t really say that. But you can bet dollars to doughnuts it’s authors WANTED to say that.

20. Barry’s NYP article included this phrase “security forces stood down after the people offered them flowers” which intrigued me (shadows of Kent State and all that).
    Internet search turned up a list of articles on the riots coming from the Middle East and other outlets outside the US news media.

    Long list of anecdotal reports from different areas.
    https://iranintl.com/en/iran/despite-crackdown-protests-continue-iran-audience-messages-iran-international

    One Shirazi citizen told Iran International: “Despite people’s chants asking for support from the police and giving them flowers last night in Moali Abad, the security forces attacked the crowd.”

    Video only, but it shows the protestors handing out flowers to forces who, it was said, did retire without incident.
    https://www.france24.com/en/20191119-three-iranian-security-forces-personnel-killed-by-rioters

    Regime-supporting media perspective, with a pretense of “balanced” coverage.
    Perhaps their analog to the NYT “Middle of the Road” claims.
    https://www.tasnimnews.com/en/news/2019/11/19/2143169/rioters-caught-shooting-at-people-in-iran-s-khuzestan-province-video

    Meanwhile, in another footage that has been circulated online, people are seen offering flowers to security forces while peacefully protesting recent fuel price hikes.
    …
    In a statement on Monday, the IRGC praised the vigilant and insightful people of Iran who have separated their ways from the rioters and anarchists that have taken advantage of the protests in recent days.
    …
    The Leader also called on the people to separate themselves from a group of thugs who are encouraged by the foreign-based anti-Iranian front to foment insecurity.

    A different take on the flower children’s motives, with pictures.
    https://en.farsnews.com/newstext.aspx?nn=13980829000246

    A number of provinces, including Isfahan, Khuzestan, Fars and Tehran, witnessed the highest volume of violence and destruction of public and private properties by the rioters who misused people’s peaceful rallies to protest at the hike in gasoline prices since Friday.

    But after several days, reports from the four provinces now indicate that except for a few cases of sporadic acts of sabotage, they spent last night in lull and full security.

    Police and security forces were in large numbers present in sensitive parts of the cities and towns to ensure the establishment of security and tranquility for citizens to continue their everyday life.

    In a relevant development in the town of Quds in Tehran on Tuesday night, people gathered to appreciate the security forces and Law Enforcement Police’s efforts to restore calm and gifted them flowers.
    …
    Riots by a small number who had taken advantage of legitimate public protests against the government’s gas price hike plan in Iran were directed at sowing chaos through targeted attacks on public and private properties, forcing law enforcement to step in to stop saboteurs.

    Early estimates of an intelligence body showed that a sum of nearly 87,000 protesters and rioters had taken part in protest rallies and gatherings since Friday night, mostly (over 93%) men. A large number of protesters had only been present in the gathering centers and avoided joining the rioters in sabotage attacks on public and private properties.

    “The identical methods of the main core of violent rioters discloses that they are fully trained individuals who have been prepared and looking forward for the situation to rise, unlike most people who have been taken off guard by the sudden hike in gas price,” the report said.

    The report showed that gatherings have been comprised of 50 to 1,500 people held in 100 regions of the country out of a number of 1,080 major towns and cities. The report says violent raids and damage inflicted on properties has been larger than what happened in February 2018 unrests.

    Most cases of damage to properties had happened in Khuzestan, Tehran, Fars and Kerman provinces. The report says most casualties have resulted from armed outlaws’ attacks on oil storage and military centers, adding that a number of police and popular forces have been martyred in these attacks.

    We have to beggar the poor in order to save them.
    Spinning like a top, but no flowers.
    https://apnews.com/283637ea6eb44474ba706ea4c908990d

    Iran’s relatively moderate President Hassan Rouhani, whose administration said it pushed for the gasoline price increase to pay for more aid to the poor, declared victory Wednesday in the unrest, blaming “the Zionists and Americans” for the violence.

    This is bad news for the arrestees – no hope of a fair trial, or any trial at all.
    No flowers for anyone.
    https://www.tasnimnews.com/en/news/2019/11/21/2143996/irgc-ringleaders-of-recent-riots-arrested

    The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) spokesperson said the ringleaders of the recent riots in Iran have been arrested in four provinces of the country.
    …
    The spokesman added that the individuals, who had links with foreign security services, have been arrested by the Iranian security and intelligence organizations.

    Sharif said the enemies employed thugs to create unrest after the failure of the sanctions against Iran.

    The US and its proxies have gained nothing 18 months after the imposition of fresh sanctions on the Iranian nation, the general said, adding that the Americans have formally announced support for the riots and recent acts of vandalism and insecurity in Iran.

    More on the scope of riots and the persons arrested.
    https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/11/19/iran-security-forces-violently-crack-down-protesters

    (Beirut) – Iranian security forces appear to be using excessive force against protests that emerged after an abrupt government increase in fuel prices across the country, Human Rights Watch said today. Authorities have ordered the near-total shutdown of the internet. Occasional video footage of protests posted on social media amid the internet shutdown appear to show security forces directly shooting at protestors in different cities.
    …
    While some news agencies and government offices appear to have regained access to internet, ordinary Iranians are still largely cut off from the global network, with network connectivity at a staggering 4 percent of the normal level as of November 19.

    “Authorities are brutally repressing Iranians who are frustrated with an autocratic, abusive government and its policies and who bear the brunt of negative economic consequences of renewed US sanctions,” said Michael Page, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “By severing Iranians from global internet connectivity, the authorities are hoping to hide their bloody crackdown on their own people from the rest of the world.”
    Videos and photos on social media reviewed by Human Rights Watch showed protests in the cities of Tehran, Isfahan, Shiraz, and numerous other cities in the provinces of Alborz, Isfahan, Tehran, Kurdistan, Kohgiluye va Boyerahmad, Ilam, Kerman, and Khuzestan, with banks, gas stations, and government buildings set on fire.
    …
    Mohammad Mahmoud Abadi, the interim Sirjan governor, confirmed the death of a protestor in the protests that erupted on the night of November 15 after the gas price increase and said the security forces are not allowed to directly shoot at demonstrators and can only shoot in the air to protect fuel tanks in the city.
    …
    Multiple videos posted on social media from the protests, however, show security forces apparently directly targeting protestors.
    …
    Several Iranians have also reported receiving text messages from what appears to be judiciary offices of Alborz province warning them about attending the protests and threating them with legal prosecution.

    On November 18, IRNA news agency reported that IRGC forces in Alborz province arrested 150 leaders of the unrest. “Some of the detainees have confessed that they had been recruited by people trained inside and outside the country and received money to damage public property,” IRNA added. On the same day, IRGC announced in a statement that, “If needed, its forces will respond to the continuing unrest in ‘a decisive and revolutionary manner.’”

    Authorities have also arrested several critics and activists over the past few days.

21. The France24 video linked above had pictures of a statement by Mike Pompeo saying the US stood with the protesters.
    Is that meddling in another country’s business?
    Is it a different kind of meddling from, say, sending planeloads of cash to the regime leaders?
    What kind of meddling is, and is not, acceptable to the Political Cognoscenti?

    For bonus points:
    When is a regime allowed to use force to put down insurrection?
    (Remember, John Adams defended a British soldier charged with shooting a protesting colonist.)

    Are protestors, especially including thuggish rioters, a legitimate insurrection or a lawless mob?
    (Where do Antifa and The Proud Boys fall on the spectrum of thugs?)
    How do you tell the difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter?
    Are there any general principles, or just the consideration of what side you are on?

    “A rebellion is always legal in the first person — our rebellion; it is only in the third person, their rebellion, that it is illegal.” Benjamin Franklin

    FWIW, I say stand by the protestors in Iran, as well as in Hong Kong.
    And IMO there are principles that distinguish terrorists from defensible insurrectionists, usually concernng their targets and level of brutality.

22. Are there any general principles, or just the consideration of what side you are on?

    Are there any general principles? Yep.

    This right here: “That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…”

23. “The US and its proxies have gained nothing 18 months after the imposition of fresh sanctions on the Iranian nation,” according to tasnim.news (2nd link above).

    This must be what nothing looks like, then.
    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-shipping-food-exclusive-idUSKBN1WH21A

    Trading companies such as Bunge (BG.N) and China’s COFCO International have been hit by payment delays and additional costs of up to $15,000 a day as the renewed U.S. restrictions stifle the processing of transactions, trade sources said.

    Food, medicine and other humanitarian supplies are exempt from sanctions Washington re-imposed after U.S. President Donald Trump said he was walking away from a 2015 international deal over Iran’s nuclear program.

    But the U.S. measures targeting everything from oil sales to shipping and financial activities have deterred several foreign banks from doing any Iranian business, including humanitarian deals such as food shipments.

    The few remaining lenders still processing Iranian business face multiple hurdles to facilitate payments as financing channels freeze up.

    Six Western and Iranian sources said the situation was contributing to the cargoes being held up for more than a month outside Iran’s biggest ports for goods, Bandar Imam Khomeini and Bandar Abbas.

24. Barry Meislin on November 22, 2019 at 2:42 am said:
    Related:
    https://nypost.com/2019/11/21/heres-whos-likely-to-lead-iran-if-the-ayatollah-is-deposed/amp/
    * * *
    Lots of good observations among the impassioned assertions.

    Here’s who’s likely to lead Iran if the ayatollah is deposed
    By Sohrab Ahmari November 21, 2019 | 8:10pm

    The measure of a successful Iranian dynasty has always been simple: For 2½ millennia, Iranians have judged their kings good if the kings managed to keep good order. Siyasat, the Persian word for politics, originally meant simply this.
    …
    By that yardstick, the current clerical “dynasty” has failed miserably.
    Whatever the course of events, and as of now it looks as if the ­regime has indeed managed to ­extinguish the uprising, one thing is clear: Four decades since it was founded, the Islamic Republic has wrought little but crushing poverty, eye-watering graft and unrelenting foreign tension. The regime metes out Chinese-style oppression without even delivering Chinese-style growth and development.

    Regime ideologues can blame Western sanctions for their economic woes ’til they go blue, but the fact is, they have picked too many fights with too many neighbors — not to mention a certain superpower that can utterly cut off their state from global financial powers. They have built their Shiite crescent — stretching from the Arabian Peninsula to the Levant — on the backs of a hungry populace.

    What good is a Syrian conquest when the ordinary Iranian sugar factory hand can’t afford meat and a dozen eggs? Or what good is effective suzerainty over Iraq when the Iranian public school teacher hasn’t been paid her salary for nine months straight?

    Of course, the calculus of “what good is something” differs for the ruling elite and the populace, in more countries than Iran.

25. AesopFan on November 22, 2019 at 4:40 pm said:

    “FWIW, I say stand by the protestors in Iran, as well as in Hong Kong.

    “And IMO there are principles that distinguish terrorists from defensible insurrectionists, usually concernng their targets and level of brutality.”

    Agreed to both.

26. Roya Boroumand, twitter: A doctor in Tehran: “the emergency room’s doctor in Robat Karim says they are bringing in 100 people injured by gun shots every day. At least 30 or 40 have died. The number 138 killed is way below reality.”

    (via @Doranimated)

27. Iran internet service has within the last couple of hours (6:30 am eastern) risen from less than 25% connectivity to 69%. Information of the last five days’ events has begun flowing out.

28. I stand in awe of the many people throughout history who have been willing to die in their opposition to tyranny and injustice. They have courage, and honour, that most of us might shrink from emulating, and that their rulers cannot begin to approach.

    However, our own #Resistance, despite their claim (and possiblly sincere belief by the naive) that Republicans are Nazis and Trump is Hitler, are not in that valorous company, as they (especially Antifa) know full well that their lives are not in danger from government or police, and very little peril from their victims on the street.
    Even the thugs on the “Right” don’t do as much damage in their occasional melees as the Left does.

    “Right” in sarc-quotes because of this article:
    https://quillette.com/2017/05/03/time-retire-political-spectrum/

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