Monday, February 02, 2004
Trouble in Khomeini-Country
One-Third of Iranian Parliament Quits in Protest: "More than one-third of Iran's Parliament resigned Sunday to protest a sweeping ban on candidates running in the parliamentary election later this month. The defiant move threatened to plunge Iran's political system into chaos. "
All joking aside, this looks like it's going to boil out of control very quickly if the clerics don't soften their stance. My heart is rooting for the moderates and is glad to see action being taken; but, I also feel a tinge of regret that this is occurring, because as I predicted the other day, a lot of people are going to die if civil war breaks out.
UPDATE: Major blogs, like Instapundit, Oxblog, and Intel Dump haven't hit on this yet. I encourage them to do so, this is a big deal. Iran has a massive population, and is right next to Iraq. A civil war in Iran would hamper if not kill our attempts to rebuild Iraq; chaos would unstoppably pour into Iraq from Iran. Also, Iran is on the verge of building, if not already possesses nuclear weapons. If it does have nuclear weapons or fissionable materials, a civil war would be even more catastrophic. The weapons could be used during the fighting, or more likely sold on the black market to someone looking for such weapons (like Osama and company).
The US should put some pressure on the clerics from the outside to soften up; we don't want this to get violent.
Another UPDATE: Pejmanesque has written about this story, and he says in his normal subdued, analytical tone "Most interesting. It will be fascinating to see what happens next." I almost wish I could take such a relaxed view on what could be a looming crisis, but there is something about civil war that I find detestable. It must be the democrat (lower-case d) in me who wishes and desires that political struggles be hashed out with debate and the ballot box instead of the death of fellow countrymen. Anyone who's read Lucan's Civil War would understand how horrible it can be, even if they haven't experienced it first hand.
Final UPDATE: InstaPundit has posted up a report by the Christian Science Monitor on this. I also have covered more of these breaking events in a post above.
All joking aside, this looks like it's going to boil out of control very quickly if the clerics don't soften their stance. My heart is rooting for the moderates and is glad to see action being taken; but, I also feel a tinge of regret that this is occurring, because as I predicted the other day, a lot of people are going to die if civil war breaks out.
UPDATE: Major blogs, like Instapundit, Oxblog, and Intel Dump haven't hit on this yet. I encourage them to do so, this is a big deal. Iran has a massive population, and is right next to Iraq. A civil war in Iran would hamper if not kill our attempts to rebuild Iraq; chaos would unstoppably pour into Iraq from Iran. Also, Iran is on the verge of building, if not already possesses nuclear weapons. If it does have nuclear weapons or fissionable materials, a civil war would be even more catastrophic. The weapons could be used during the fighting, or more likely sold on the black market to someone looking for such weapons (like Osama and company).
The US should put some pressure on the clerics from the outside to soften up; we don't want this to get violent.
Another UPDATE: Pejmanesque has written about this story, and he says in his normal subdued, analytical tone "Most interesting. It will be fascinating to see what happens next." I almost wish I could take such a relaxed view on what could be a looming crisis, but there is something about civil war that I find detestable. It must be the democrat (lower-case d) in me who wishes and desires that political struggles be hashed out with debate and the ballot box instead of the death of fellow countrymen. Anyone who's read Lucan's Civil War would understand how horrible it can be, even if they haven't experienced it first hand.
Final UPDATE: InstaPundit has posted up a report by the Christian Science Monitor on this. I also have covered more of these breaking events in a post above.
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