Then They Came for Me_ A Family's Story of Love, Captivity, and Survival - Maziar Bahari [141]
Iranians are becoming more suppressed and poorer at the same time. Facing an ideological and industrial military monster, many young Iranians have come to believe that violence is the only language the regime can understand.
But using violence to defy the regime will not result in progress. This military Islamic regime is prepared to defend itself by force, and even if a group can manage to topple it through violent means, that future government will just be another tyranny in the history of tyrannies in Iran. I often remind young Iranians of the betrayed ideals of the 1979 Islamic Revolution and tell them that nothing good can be achieved through violence. Nothing.
Alongside the horrifying specter of mayhem inside the country, there is also the danger of a military confrontation between Iran and the United States or Iran and Israel, prompted by Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Khamenei has repeatedly declared that Iran doesn’t want to build a nuclear bomb, and he has even asserted that doing so would be against Islamic principles. But he lies. Khamenei may not want to develop a nuclear weapon, but he does want to be one turn of a screw away from a bomb. He needs nuclear capability to threaten the West and the countries in the region and prevent them from helping the opposition inside the country. To Khamenei, giving up the nuclear program equals surrendering to the will of foreigners, and to a tyrant nothing is more important than his power.
Khamenei knows that he can always rely on the mistakes of his enemies, especially the United States, to expand his power. The American misadventures in Afghanistan and Iraq led to the toppling of two of Iran’s biggest regional enemies, the Taliban and Saddam Hussein. Their demise has helped make Iran a regional superpower. Through proxies in Iraq, Lebanon, and the Palestinian territories, Iran can always challenge the United States and Israel outside of its borders. As Rosewater said, Hamas, in Gaza, and Hezbollah, in Lebanon, are in a sense two branches of the Revolutionary Guards.
Yet Khamenei’s plans, devised in the isolation of his house under the protection of thousands of guardsmen, can backfire, with disastrous consequences for both Iran and his regime. Israel will never tolerate a nuclear Iran. Ahmadinejad denies the Jewish Holocaust and promises to wipe the Jewish state off the map. Furthermore, Israel feels an existential threat from any country in the region, friend or foe, that has a stronger military capability than it does. Israel objected to Iran’s nuclear program even when the shah—a friend to Israel—was in power in the 1970s. The Israelis, hitherto, have been patient and have backed negotiations and sanctions to stop Iran’s nuclear program, but they may soon change their tactics.
Of course, Israel will not take action without the blessing of its major ally, the United States, which has so much to lose if Iran becomes a nuclear state. There are thousands of American troops stationed in the region, and many American allies feel threatened by Iran’s rogue behavior. Countries such as Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Bahrain buy arms and other products and services from the United States and, in turn, provide it with crude oil and/or military bases. The unpopular authoritarian regimes in these countries are rattled by Ahmadinejad’s and Khamenei’s extremist rhetoric, and the prospect of a nuclear Iran instills fear in them. As secret U.S. diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks revealed, many American allies in the Middle East have repeatedly asked the United States to attack Iran in order to stop its nuclear program. The American government has so far adopted a diplomatic approach to handling Iran. But the situation is untenable. These countries are important allies in America’s war against terrorism, and protecting them from Iran is integral to the United States as a military and