Peace through Justice:  A Strategy of Hudna to Eliminate the Iranian Nuclear Bomb

Dr. Robert D. Crane

Posted Aug 27, 2006      •Permalink      • Printer-Friendly Version
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Peace through Justice:  A Strategy of Hudna to Eliminate the Iranian Nuclear Bomb

by Dr. Robert D. Crane


  The so-called “International Community” is determined to eliminate all possibility that the Iranians will ever get the nuclear bomb, if necessary by bombing them into submission.  Those who want to persuade the Iranians not to develop weapons of mass destruction without bombing them seem to be almost by definition not part of the international community and perhaps not even part of “the civilized world.”

  Some hopeful strategists suggest that if America would simply drop the whole religiously-based concept of “axis of evil,” Iran would become good, or at least it could be dealt with as an equal, as we did the Soviet Union.  This, of course, would require correct translations of statements by President Ahmadinejad, who never issued a call to “wipe Israel off the map” and never denied the existence of the holocaust.  He did call for regime change in both Israel and the United States, just as we have demanded regime change in his country.  Quid pro quo.

  The question then for both countries is how regime change can come about.  For Iran, we have a suggestion that is so far out of the box that it causes shock and awe even to contemplate it.  Dr. Norman Kurland, the Founder a year ago of the American Revolutionary Party, writes:


“The best way to neutralize Ahmadinejad as well as the theocrats before they become nuclear armed is to push for getting ownership of Iranian oil spread universally among every man, woman and child in the country, as we proposed for Iraq in http://www.cesj.org/thirdway/paradigmpapers/iraq-nationbuilding.htm . That would put money power in the hands of the people rather than in Ahmadinejad or the theocrats.  If the opposition in Iran gets behind this economic democratization plan as a catalyst for change, it won’t be long before a Capital Homestead package of reform and the Just Third Way would unite the people against those who manipulate them for tyrannical objectives.  I can’t figure out why so many intelligent people lack the common sense to see the point.”

  This strategy for cutting off the legs of Ahmadinejad in Iran is a blow to the underbelly.  He is a populist who promises to enfranchise the dispossessed in the world.  Like Hitler he won his first national election by a landslide, contrary to all expectations.  The man in the street often has the last word, but also even more often lacks the necessary knowledge to see the long-run implications of his vote.

  The best audience for the Just Third Way in Iran is not the opposition, as Dr. Kurland suggests, but Ayatollah Khamenei himself.  The elites there are doing everything they can to undercut Ahmadinejad, including defunding his most popular programs for the poor.  If those who really run Iran get desperate enough they might just invite Dr. Kurland over there to launch a revolution beyond anything in their wildest dreams. 

  Unfortunately, U.S. foreign policy is concerned only with crude power equations, not with justice, which is the most reliable source of power.  We are concerned only about Iranian nuclear capabilities, without realizing that the only support for Iranian WMD comes from reaction to the demonization of Iran by the NeoCons.  The most prestigious ayatollahs in recent months have issued fatwas condemning the possession of all weapons of mass destruction as inherently immoral because they would kill the innocent and could not conceivably meet the strict requirements of the just war doctrine in Islamic jurisprudence.

  We often make the mistake of considering that our “enemy” is monolithic.  The “Sino-Soviet Bloc” was the most ridiculous of such judgements.  I wrote extensively on this during the Korean War in my capacity as probably the first professional expert on the subject and afterwards as a consultant for Bernie Shriever’s Air Force Systems Command and the RAND Corporation.  The Korean War was as much a war between the Soviets and the Red Chinese for power in the Far East as it was against America.

  In my opinion, ever since the election of President Khatemi and his dialogue of civilizations, Iran has been the most bi-polarized country in the world.  Ahmadinejad merely turned it into a tripolarized cauldron.  The U.S. government is insane to even think of promoting the Mujahidin al Khalq and such Communists as a means to overthrow the Iranian government.  It is absurdly ironic that half a century ago we overthrew Mossadegh precisely because he had Communist support. 

  There are good guys in Iran and pragmatic guys that may not be so good and then there are the bad guys and those who are even worse.  In Afghanistan we backed the worst of the worst, Hekmatyar, against the Soviets, who now is trying to unite all the forces against the Americans in support of his own blood-thirsty drive for power.  The great majority of the people in Afghanistan do not differentiate between Hekmatyar and Bush nor do the Iraqis between Bush and Saddam Hussein.

  We like to back the worst forces, because they are the ones who can be bribed.  Sometimes this works, but their brutal drive for power makes them inherently an ultimately destabilizing force.  And then we are stuck with opposition forces that oppose us as much as they do the tyrants whom we help to maintain in power.  Saddam Hussein was our fair-haired boy because he invaded Iran, but the oppressed Iraqis do not trust us any more then they did Saddam. 

  Unfortunately, justice died out as an American framework for policy long before we were born, which is why the NeoCon slogan “freedom and democracy” means so little to most of the people in the world. 

  If President Isma’il Haniya’s first foreign policy speech calling for a Hamas strategy of hudna, and even recognition of the State of Israel, is implemented, would Iran follow suit?  Certainly not if America goads Israel into doing its dirty work by bombing Iran.  But, if there were regime change in America, anything is possible.  Even Ahmadinejad said as much.

  If what Dr. Kurland calls “The Just Third Way” could have solved the problems of a confederalized Iraq, and perhaps still could, think of what it could do to stabilize Iran as a global leader of justice and therefore as a reliable friend of America.

                                               

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