US policy continues to be a huge factor shaping Iran. That isn't "history."
Acting like that's "history" is kind of like acting like the issues that Black Americans have currently has nothing at all to do with the fact that their ancestors came to this country as slaves and we continue to have racist policies in place, many of which were intentionally and consciously racist at the time that they were created. And we keep failing to really overturn them.
(For example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24059608)
Which makes no sense, of course. You might just as well answer a "you break it, you buy it" sign in a shop with the claim that whatever breakage may or may not have happened, it's well in the past now, and there's no point trying on that basis to ascribe any kind of responsibility for the current situation to anyone except the shopkeeper, who clearly sees no problem with trying to sell broken merchandise.
That doesn't strike me as an argument that would, or should, get anyone very far.
The commenter also plastered the same embargo commentary elsewhere in this post -- demonstrating its lack of specificity -- and makes no attempt to link the presence of sanctions to causality for the revolution.
So yeah...it's a non-sequitur.
> It seems like a "butterfly effect" argument
The butterfly effect describes how a minor change in the current state of a system might lead to a huge change in a future state. But here we're talking about huge changes to begin with. Why do you expect that changes with such massive impact would have anything but visible and long lasting effects on every aspect of that system, including future choices?
> The Shah was ousted by Iranians and the new regime was put into place by Iranians. The revolution was expressly anti-American
This is how manipulation works. Someone appears to make a choice because they're manipulated into making it but they do it without understanding the full consequences and implications of their choice, that they were manipulated into making it, or by whom. And when you're dealing with such outside interference all bets are off. Even if the decision was taken by the individual citizens, they are in general ill-equipped to deal with such planned large scale manipulation. And it's exactly what the manipulators are counting on. Look at the Russian interference in US elections.
If a witness provides false testimony and evidence against you to a jury, who subsequently finds you guilty, who is to blame? The jury? The witness? You? And if your imprisonment has visible and long lasting effects on your life would you consider that point a pivotal one that forever influenced your future and future choices, or one that needlessly blurs the definition of "causality"?
The question of "what is a cause" loses all meaning when every past event is treated as the cause of every future event. That's what I mean by "blurring the definition of 'causality.'" Please don't intentionally misinterpret what I'm saying (see your last sentence).
People are responsible for the outcomes of their decisions, manipulated or not. Even today, the Iranian government manipulates the superstitions and fears of the Iranian people. Still, the actors who put that government in power were millions of Iranians -- not just Western government actors.
> here we're talking about huge changes to begin with.
In the article, some historians are mentioned as advancing the idea that Western powers are to blame for everything that happened in the timeline of Iran's government, and that's simply not true. There are clear differences between the removal of Mosaddegh and the removal of Mohammad Reza Shah. The removal of Mohammad Reza Shah was, as you say, huge. It's hard to justify the blaming of such a huge action on a few Westerners, but that's precisely the stance ascribed to historians in the article.
> If a witness provides false testimony and evidence against you to a jury, who subsequently finds you guilty, who is to blame? The jury? The witness? You?
I'm not sure I understand what your point is here. Whether you blame the Iranian people or a group of cleric manipulators, the fact remains that millions of Iranians removed the Shah in a drawn-out upheaval process that was remarkably different than what happened in 1953. That's one of the points of contention mentioned in the article.
> if your imprisonment has visible and long lasting effects on your life
This kind of emotionally charged approach to evaluating history is not useful because it clouds our ability to examine what actually happened. Essentially you are saying, "the long-term outcome of the Revolution should affect our analysis of the lead-up to the Revolution." However, in the 1970s the Iranian people did not know what the future held. They only knew what they had (the Shah) and what they wanted (not the Shah).
You're looking at this as if it was a literal tug-of-war game where "a few" can't beat the many due to the laws of physics. Yet the reality we live in thoroughly contradicts you at every step. If the "few" can apply pressure at precise points and in precise ways then a lot can be achieved.
Look no further than lobbying where "a few" people have far more power than a country's worth of citizens. For example they may de-prioritize education because a population with close to total zero understanding of the world is far easier to steer whichever way the "few" want.
> This kind of emotionally charged approach
You're free to make it as emotional as you want. I gave it as an objective example that destroyed the foundation of your line of argumentation. So call it what you may but you still haven't come up with anything that can stand up to even cursory scrutiny. Personal opinions and interpretations are not that.
The '53 coup was orchestrated by a small group. The '79 revolution was the result of a groundswell of opposition to the Shah.
> You're free to make it as emotional as you want. I gave it as an objective example that destroyed the foundation of your line of argumentation. So call it what you may but you still haven't come up with anything that can stand up to even cursory scrutiny. Personal opinions and interpretations are not that.
This is nonsense. You threw forward some hypothetical sob story that is neither accurate (talk to some Iranians) nor relevant (the post-hoc sadness or non-sadness of an event doesn't change its antecedents).
The 79 coup was part of a revolution led by a minority group of religious radicals, with support from some leftist groups (which they later regretted, obviously). They were certainly not chosen by "the Iranian people".
Whom did they lead? That's the question here. You're conveniently forgetting millions of protestors and several years of political conflict.
There is no parallel between the removal of Mosaddegh in 53 and the revolution in 79, because the former was orchestrated by Western powers while the latter was pressed by a groundswell of support within the nation, especially among students.
The fact that the leaders turned out to be bad has nothing to do with the way that they came to power in the first place.
But regarding your other claim: if some random group had seized power during the Green movement and its massive protests, that would have been the decision of the Iranian people?
Don't get me wrong, I supported the Green movement, but I would never claim - if some random coup had happened during that time - that it was a democratic process.
That won't happen until free and fair elections.
The historians referenced in the article did:
> Only later does Stewart confront the geopolitical implications and talk to Middle Eastern historians who blame his father for what later unfolded in Iran: no coup against prime minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1953, no tyrannical Shah, no Islamic revolution in 1979. Stewart hotly disagrees.
The removal of Mosaddegh was a four-day affair where a bunch of politicians were paid off. The removal of Mohammad Reza Shah was a two-year affair involving millions of Iranian protesters and thousands of casualties. This stark contrast is the basis for all of my comments in this thread.
Huh? It was a coup, not an election.
Not everyone supports the current US President.
To answer that I think you have to decide who gets to decide if a war "went well". Should some politician, historian, or descendant be allowed to weigh up the death and destruction and come to a simple answer? I think not. If a war destroyed your life then you have a right to be upset about that. The death, abuse, fear and rape of yourself or a loved one is all the qualification you need to have an opinion.
Too often the people who decide have little skin in the game. They are the survivors. They are politicians who spent the war sitting in an office. Or someone watching it on Fox News on the sofa. They can talk about the big abstract objectives whilst ignoring the individual suffering. Or they focus on suffering that signals virtue like the experience of veterans.
For most people war is something you get caught up in. Like being put in a tumble dryer full of knives. It is not really about looking to history. Millions will die hopeless, pointless deaths. That is the history that matters.
The Congo Crisis ended very poorly for Lumumba, very well for Mobutu, probably poorly for most Congolese, and probably well for Mobutu's patrons.
====
Goldstein's thesis is that Oceania has reached a static society, because no change can come from without, and no change shall come from within[1].
From http://www.gutenberg.org/files/48612/48612-h/48612-h.htm
> "... if the door is left open to voluntary conversion, so that anyone who wants to can come over to the winning side, the winning side will sooner or later convert almost everyone who is capable of making trouble. (In the language of Vilfredo Pareto, this would probably be termed "capture of the rising elite"; in the language of present-day Marxists, this would be described as "utilization of potential leadership cadres from historically superseded classes"; in the language of practical politics, it means "cut in the smart boys from the opposition, so that they can't set up a racket of their own.")"
followed by an asian postmortem. As the domino theory turns out not to have held water, the lessons Linebarger wished to offer have largely fallen on deaf ears:
> "Sir Henry Gurney, the High Commissioner of the Federation who was murdered in 1952, was a veteran of irregular warfare. He had faced the Zionist terrorists in Jerusalem and was a man without fear. His approach to the problem of confronting Communism was hopelessly sane. The Communists were offering young Chinese the intoxication of craziness, of a mad and heroic righteousness to justify the misspending of their lives. Sir Henry's answer was decency, goodness, security, prosperity, authority, liberty under law. He offered everything except glamor, terror, inspiration, and romance— Everything except the chance to join the British side.
> What kind of British side?
> A British side which, like the Communist side, would welcome the makers of the future, the builders of the next civilization, the arbiters of history.
> The Communists have presented a high bid against the U.S. and Britain as well as the other Western powers. We have not yet overbid them. The high bid is the opportunity to join, to belong, really to be equal, not just legally equal, and, above everything, to share, to struggle, and to work under conditions of heroism for a common goal."[2]
Note that the Inner Party has internalised these lessons well, operating as a colour-blind meritocracy despite Goldstein having been written several years (in a meta-fiction) earlier than Dr. Linebarger wrote (in non-fiction).
[1] Is Big Brother a surveillance philosopher-king? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24069572
[2] To what degree does Silicon Valley allow talent from all over the world to join, to belong, really to be equal, not just legally equal, and, above everything, to share, to struggle, and to work under conditions of heroism for a common goal?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Covert_United_States_...
Indonesia has turned out the best of the bunch?
I've got a hunch the up to 1 million dead might say differently.
The US (and UK) replaced Mosaddegh with the Shah. Then the Shah and SAVAK (with CIA help) launched a decades long attack on the secular, parliamentary oriented forces in the country. Initially the Shah supported the ayatollahs, and in turn was himself tacitly (sometimes openly) supported by them. Eventually they turned against the dictator under the spell of a foreign power.
Also, Iran had a large communist movement, and it is obvious in 1978 and early 1979 that the US, UK and France saw the communists as the enemy, Khomeini as someone to disempower but not destroy, and the Shah as who to support as long as they could. So that stance helped Khomeini on some level. France would not have allowed communists to sit in France and work successfully to undermine a friendly power (even Indochina, although that stance loosened in the 1950s).
This is a bizarre argument. Secularism and westernization in Iran during the 20th century were almost entirely a result of Reza Shah's reforms, as well as his closeness with the British monarchy -- itself a parliamentary system.
> Iran had a large communist movement
By the time of the revolution the Tudeh party and other communist groups were quite weak. They contributed to the upheaval without having any credible chance of installing their own leadership in the country.
> Initially the Shah supported the ayatollahs
This is a rosy but false claim. Khomeini and Khamenei spent a collective 18 years in exile under the Shah, and faced house arrest while in the country. The Shah arguably gave ground away from his own power base (aristocrats) during the White Revolution, but arguably this was intended to subdue anti-monarchical sentiment and solidify his power. That doesn't mean he "supported the ayatollahs."
So, I don't understand your objection.
It seems like a "butterfly effect" argument, where you are saying that anything done by one group of political actors is the cause of all subsequent events in that political sphere. I disagree with this; if we say that all subsequent events were caused by all preceding events, that may be true in some sense I suppose, but it needlessly blurs the definition of "causality" to the point where the word becomes altogether useless.
On the other hand, there's a little bit of a "dream deferred" tone to what you're saying -- as though delaying the downfall of the monarchy only led to a more reactionary, less goal-oriented revolution later down the road. Maybe so, as not all of the revolutionary groups belonged to the same political ideology as Khomeini...but the new government was definitely chosen by the Iranian people.