The Redhunter

This tells me that what's going on is not just street mobs vs the government. This is crucial because street action can create a lot of chaos but in the end cannot take over anything, because it by definition has no leadership. One reason the revolution in 1979 succeeded is because the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and his cohort was waiting in the wings, ready to take power. From Taheri's information it is possible that there are credible leaders who could take power if enough of the military loses confidence in Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei

Second is John O'Sullivan, former publisher of National Review, who wrote this not too editor in chief Rich Lowry:

Dear Rich,

Thanks for your note. I am happy to give you my judgment on the Iranian revolt. In brief, it's one of the most important movements of our time. It radically undermines both the realist argument that Muslims are uninterested in democracy and the Jihadist claim to represent the mass of Muslims. And if it continues--whether it is crushed or triumphs in the immediate future--it will add immeasurably to the forces of evolutionary change in the Muslim world since it strikes me as being more like the Glorious, American and "velvet" revolutions (i.e., it is a revolution against a radical revolution) than like the French, Bolshevik, and 1979 revolutions.

Well, that's a bigger mouthful than you expected. But this is an issue on which I would prefer you to take the advice and opinions of my Iranian colleagues on Radio Farda and the English language website of RFERL. So I am attaching two documents below that I think you will find helpful.

The first is a private e-mail form my senior colleague, Abbas Djavadi, a former head of Farda and now the Associate Director for the service as a whole. I had asked him to predict what might now happen. Here is his reply (which I quote with permission) from a hurried discussion yesterday:

Defiance? Definitely, but I don't know for how long. Nobody says it loudly but everybody understands this is about the Supreme Leader and not only Ahmadinejad. Yesterday after Khamenei's speech I thought they would back off. Today in the morning I thought it may be primarily students. This afternoon surprised me. Not only students, not only Tehran. Maybe Mousavi has been pushed up as opposition leader against will. He had the motivation for it for the last 20 years when he kept away from government. He seems to be emboldened now, seeing the masses and the ripening of something in the society, in "masses" and in most big cities.

I wish I could know if it would continue and how. I think nobody knows. I am seeing here two big issues, based on what I am hearing and reading the live inputs and feedback from the "foot soldiers":

1) Mousavi has to further establish himself as a popular leader. Today he again said he has prayed to God that he is ready for martyrdom, sign of strengthened resolve. He needs support from more, hundreds of thousands and millions of middle and upper classes (villagers never attended the Islamic revolution 1979, workers joined just in the last few months of the revolution, middle class did it with a bit upper classes). Bazaris, for example, teachers, doctors, vendors, municipality workers, mid-level state employees, lawyers... And the most important: he needs to get more support from moderate or other clergymen opposed to Khamenei and Ahmadinejad -- people who have been critical, but have rarely spoken out. If we have that trend growing in the next few weeks and months, we will have a new ball game in Iran. If not, the resistance will gradually fade out while reprisals intensify.

2) Security and organization as well as communication of the opposition leaders (Mousavi and Karroubi). Today and last weeks were typical. Will they join the demonstrations? Are the meetings cancelled? There were hundreds of conflicting news, information and disinformation until it really happened. And it happened, mainly thanks to the websites, Facebook and Twitter. 20 years ago it would be unimaginable. But the communication is distorted and disorganized. Security for the leading figures is also extremely important. What if Mousavi just disappeared? (detained, under strict house arrest) etc.? Khomeini in 1978 had the security provided to him in Paris and his big group of executives in Europe instructing his army of mullahs inside Iran what to do and how to lead the movement. In the case of Mousavi, once he is out of the country, he would be disregarded and would play no role after a year or so at all. [Yet] staying safe in Iran while the movement is intensifying is a contradiction per se. And we don't have any relieving indications that they are well organized. That's also bad. Things may change and would change if both the defiance continues and if the leadership grows together with the defiance.

That is the judgment of a shrewd and experienced observer of Iranian politics.

What this tells me is that the situation is very fluid and could go either way, but again there are opposition leaders. They're hardly perfect, of course, as neither Mousavi nor Karroubi are to be mistaken for Thomas Jefferson on any day.

But the protests don't have to completely overthrow the existing government and institute a Western style democracy complete with Bill of Rights in order to succeed. All they have to do is topple the existing system and start a process of slow reform. Once the hard-line theocrats have been chased from power, the work of real reform can begin.