When I read the first few sentences of David Kay's National Interest essay on Iran and nuclear inspections, I said, "uh-oh": 

There is a global consensus that any agreement with Iran on ensuring its nuclear program is for civilian purposes only will have to involve inspections to verify its disarmament. But as a former weapons inspector, I have very bad news for you: a weapons-inspection regime in Iran will not work. Inspections themselves are most effective when both the state being inspected and the inspecting countries are fully on board—and even then there are limits. An inspection regime can never ensure full disarmament.

David Kay knows a lot about inspections, so this looked to be depressing reading. 

As I read the rest of the essay, however, it dawned on me that while Kay's point was correct, it was also banal.  Of course inspections will not be foolproof.*  The thing is, I don't think anyone really believes that to be true.  Indeed, Kay provides no evidence or quotations for the "global consensus"  that inspections will be perfect. 

You would also think, from that first paragraph, that Kay believes that inspections have no utility.  But then we get to this section:

[T]he purpose of IAEA oversight remains one of the most misunderstood elements of discussions about establishing an effective international inspection and verification regime. Inspection and verification are often thought of as ways to prevent a state from developing nuclear weapons. This is certainly not the case, and what’s more, it would be well beyond the capabilities of any conceivable inspection regime tasked with this verification mandate. If a country decides to break its international obligations and proceed with a nuclear-weapons program, the only options are military action by other countries or the acceptance of an atomically armed state. Inspectors simply do not have the military force that would be required to dissuade Iran or any other nation determined to breach its obligations and acquire nuclear weapons....

Instead, the goal is to create the equivalent of a strong plate-glass window that Iran would have to shatter if it were to embark upon a militarily significant nuclear program—and that inspectors could be reasonably expected to detect that shattering.

Um... that's exactly what I think are the purpose of IAEA inspection.  The first metaphor that came to my mind was "tripwire," but you get the idea. 

Kay's essay is extremely odd.  Any realistic appraisal of IAEA safeguard inspections would posit that they are an imperfect but useful method of divining Iran's intentions with regard to their nuclear program.  I'm pretty sure that is Kay's assessment as well.  The entire tenor of his essay, however, seems designed to deflate some mythical belief in the power of inspections that no one possesses. 

*Readers are encouraged to suggest other hyperbolic feats of strength that IAEA safeguard inspections cannot accomplish. 

On the 30th 31st anniversary of the Iranian Revolution, lots of people are clearly out in the streets of Tehran and other major Iranian cities.  Andrew Sullivan has/will have posts galore on the Green protests -- and I have every confidence that the Leveretts will have a post up soon minimizing the significance of said protests (UPDATE:  they do not disappoint). 

As I've posted on Iran, I've been intrigued by all of the commenters arguing back and forth on the precise power of the Green movement.  Some have argued that the current regime is doomed; some have argued that it's much ado about nothing. 

So, here's my question to those readers -- what observable evidence would convince you that your analysis is wrong?  If supporters of the Green Revolution movement only saw evidence of anti-government protestors in the hundreds, would that convince you that the regime will be standing for quite some time?  For those who believe the regime is here to stay, would millions in the streets chanting "Death to the Dictator" make you think twice about your assumptions? 

Think hard about this question and post your answer in the comments. 

UPDATE:  Just to provide an example, this excerpt from a NIAC post bolsters the Leverett position on Iranian state strength:

It’s still very early to be drawing conclusions from today’s events, as people are still out in the streets.  But one thing I’m struck by is just how much the government has been in control today.  Sure, they chartered busses and lured tens of thousands to the official government rally with free food, but they have also managed to keep the opposition activities largely on their terms today.

The government’s strategy is to depict the protesters as a small group of rioting thugs, burning trash cans and disrupting order for their own radical, “foreign-backed” agenda.  Toward that end, they have been very effective at keeping the demonstrations today dispersed and nervous — less of the “million man march” and more like Seattle WTO protesters.  Above all else, the ruling elites know the danger of big crowds: strength in numbers takes over and individuals no longer feel like they will be held accountable for their actions, thus their demands get more radical and their tactics more extreme; this forces a harsher backlash from security forces, possibly including using lethal force.  And then that’s the ball-game.  That’s exactly what happened in 1979, and Khamenei learned that lesson well enough that he’ll do his utmost not to repeat it.

So today’s events (like previous ones) have seen security forces disrupt crowds before they can coalesce into a large group, arresting numerous individuals as a way of controlling the crowds before they get out of the police’s hands....

Interestingly, many accounts we've been hearing involve protestors being hesitant to wear green, flash a V for victory sign, or even chant openly out of fear of backlash from security personnel.  In some cases, particularly at Azadi square where Ahmadinejad addressed the official government rally, security forces scanned the crowd for any signs of "green" activity, and quickly pulled people out of the group as soon as they were given cause. 

I, for one, am glad that the foreign press is brave enough to cover what America's mainstream media is not -- the U.S. government's complicity in causing the Haitian earthquake. Never mind that the foreign media echo chamber aparentluy started with a false rumor -- with luck, our MSM will now start asking the tough questions.

This is a plan so brilliant that only the Evil League of Evil, in conjunction with the reverse vampires and the Obama administration, could have devised it.

Why, you might ask? What is America's motivations to trigger Haiti's earthquake and then intervene with massive aid in the hemisphere's poorest country? Well, there are different theories bandied about.

Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez suggests that this was a practice "drill," designed to test the earthquake weapon before targeting Iran (though see the update below). Very clever!! It is unclear whether Chavez believes that this is a test of the "demonstration effect" variety or not. It is also unclear just how such an earthquake would actually destroy Iran's nuclear program -- the 2003 Bam earthquake certainly didn't.

This Canadian-based Centre for Research on Globalization's Ken Hildebrandt offers the following ingenious explanation:

You've likely guessed my suspicions about recent events. I'm not saying this is what occurred, though it's sure a possibility to be considered in my view.

This could hardly have happened at a more convenient time. The president's ratings are plummeting, and his bill to subsidize the insurance industry has essentially divided the nation in two.

What better way to lead the people into believing we're one big happy family than to reunite former Presidents Clinton and George W. Bush along with Obama in a joint humanitarian effort?

This is so convenient... and brilliant!! It makes perfect sense that the Obama administation would try to kill upwards of 200,000 Haitians in order to bring the country together as one! Because, clearly, in recent years, natural disasters have bolstered the standing of U.S. presidents!! Certainly, a calamity in Haiti would work even better! If only Rush Limbaugh had played ball....

What I love about conspiracies like these is the careful balancing of smart and stupid that the key actors have to possess in order for the plan to work as described.

Question to readers: how far and how wide will this meme travel?

UPDATE:  I just received the following from a atrategic communications advisor to the Venezuelan Embassy in the United states: 

In response to your recent post on Foreign Policy’s website, I just wanted to clarify that President Hugo Chavez never associated himself with the theory that a U.S. weapon had caused the earthquake in Haiti.  

The claim was made by a blogger on the website of a state-run yet independent television station. At some point thereafter, someone jumped to the conclusion that President Chavez had agreed or repeated the claim, which is absolutely not true. President Chavez did argue against an increased U.S. military presence in Haiti, but at no point did he question what had caused the earthquake or aligned himself with any conspiracy theories to that effect.

 

Andrew Sullivan has been blogging about Iran juuuust a wee bit the past 48 hours.  Now he asks a question:

The Green Movement has strongly resisted all sanctions against Iran, and even more passionately opposes any military strikes. If Israel strikes, it will effectively kill the Iranian opposition movement, and set off a global wave of Jihadism which will kill many American soldiers and civilians. So how to respond to the Revolutionary Guards' continuing and mounting brutality?

He also links to some useful Spencer Ackerman posts, which contains the following two points of interest:

1. Some leaders of the Green Movement are begining to think some targeted "smart" sanctions might be useful;
2. The Obama administration has been pulsing the system to figure out what the possible sanctions options are. 

What to do?  I think two big questions need  to be asked.  First, how are the sanctions supposed to work?  Is the idea to squeeze the elite coalition ruling Iran just hard enough to get the current leadership to cut a deal?  Or is the idea to cause enough discontent with the regime such that it collapses, and then a deal can be struck with the next regime?

The process by which sanctions are supposed to work matters.  If the hope is to still do business with the current regime, then targeted or "smart" sanctions make more sense.  They're less likely to impact the broader Iranian population -- though, like precision-guided munitions, there will always be collateral damage. 

If the goal is regime change, well, then broad-based sanctions might make more sense.  If these reports are any indication, then  it appears that the Khamenei regime is alienating an ever-larger swath of the population.  Obviously, the regime could try to use the prospect and implementation of broad-based sanctions as a way to rally around the flag.  If the regime's popular support is badly eroding, however, and that erosion is partly explained by economic hardship, then you want sanctions to target a somewhat larger segment of the populace. 

Of course, as I've said before, this is all sophistry unless you get Iran's major trading partners on board.  And my hunch is they won't go for the "heavy" sanctions option.  This is a shame, because at this point, I think it's the option that's somewhat more likely to work.   

Let's not kid ourselves, however:  we're talking about policy options that will change the probabilities by a few percentage points either way.  There is no magic bullet -- or bomb, for that matter -- on this policy quiestion. 

Am I missing anything? 

The New York Times' Robert Worth and Nazila Fathli take a bold step for inference in their story on Iran's demonstrations: 

Unlike the other protesters reported killed on Sunday, Ali Moussavi appears to have been assassinated in a political gesture aimed at his uncle, according to Mohsen Makhmalbaf, an opposition figure based in Paris with close ties to the Moussavi family.

Mr. Moussavi was first run over by a sport utility vehicle outside his home, Mr. Makhmalbaf wrote on his Web site. Five men then emerged from the car, and one of them shot him. Government officials took the body late Sunday and warned the family not to hold a funeral, Mr. Makhmalbaf wrote.

Whoa there, big fella.  Talk about jumping to conclusions!  Sure, this looks suspicious, but I can think of several other plausible reasons for why this could have happened:

1. He was behind on his payments to bookies.... that'll teach him to bet on the New York Giants.   
2. He was in the market for an SUV that could run over people and the haggling over price got out of hand.
3. The Basij are playing one of those college assaassination games across all of Tehran, and they forgot to use their dart guns rather than real guns.
4. It was a hit and run accident, and the men in the car decided to put him out of his misery after seeing how badly wounded he was. 
5. Moussavi was really an agent for the Mossad.  The men in the SUV were really agents of the Mossad.  In  fact, 95% of the protestors in the streets of Tehran are actually agents of the Mossad, MI6, or the CIA. 

See, these are all plausible alternative storylines, and should be investigated thoroughly before calling this a "political assassination."   

Nader Mousavizadeh, a special assistant to U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan from 1997 to 2003, writes in The New Republic that the United States should prioritize democratization over de-nuclearization in Iran:

The fracturing of the Islamic Republic’s traditional elite, and the persistence and power of Iran’s democratic awakening six months later, make clear that a regime change is under way in Iran--one that is indigenous, sustainable, democratic in spirit, and peaceful in its means. It is the most promising development in the broader Middle East in the past quarter-century. Rather than being viewed as a sideshow, the uprising should be at the core of every policy decision regarding Iran. Western leaders should ask themselves just one question whenever faced with a new set of measures toward Iran: Will they help or hurt the Green Movement?

For all the concern about a fitful and still highly vulnerable nuclear program, a far greater prize is now in sight: a freer society and an accountable government under the rule of law. An opportunity now exists to encourage the evolution of a democratic Iran--through careful, calibrated, and principled policies that refuse to be baited by the crude and bellicose behavior of a usurper president. 

Now, I'm sure Flynt Leverett and other purebred realists would vehemently disagree with this assessment.  And I'm sure that William Kristol and other neoconservatives would vehemently agree with this sentiment. 

For the rest of you, does this preference ordering make sense?  To me, it seems that you need to take the following variables into account:

1. What is the likelihood of a second Iranian Revolution?  Mousavizadeh seems to think it's a virtual certainty.  I'm probably more optimistic than most Iran-watchers, and I'd give it a 50/50 shot at best.
2. If a revolution took place, what is the likelihood that the new Iranian government would be more amenable on the nuclear issue?  Again, Mousavizadeh seems to think this is a virtual certainty.  Me, I'm not so sure.   
3. If a revolution took place, what would be the additional positive policy externalities?  An implicit point in Mousavizadeh's essay is that on a whole array of other issues, a democratic Iran would be much more constructive.  This is indeed possible -- I suspect support for, say, Hezbollah might dry up.  That said, it is equally possible that a democratic Iran would freak out the non-Democratic Sunni states in the region just as much as a revolutionary theocracy has done in the past.

 None of this is to say that a carrt-and-stick appoach on the nuclear issue is going to work either.  If you're comfotable with risk, an approach that marginally boosts the likelihood of a Green Revolution taking place might be the best play. 

I bring up these questions, however, because it's possible that a carrot-and-stick approach that prioritizes the nuclear issue over the regime change issue is the best of a really lousy set of policy options. 

Developing....

My latest bloggingheads diavlog is with the New America Foundation's Flynt Leverett, who co-authored an op-ed last week that didn't sit too well with me.  We discuss the Leveretts' proposal for a grand bargain with Iran and all of its implications. 

I come away from the diavlog even more skeptical of the Leverett proposal -- the more I listened, the more I thought that:

1. Today's Iran would not go for it;
2. The collateral damage inflicted on our allies would be nontrivial;
3. There is no domestic political support for such an initiative; and,
4. From a realpolitik perspective, it's not demonstrably better than the alternatives.  

Opinions will vary, however -- give it a listen and let me know what you think in the comments. 

You know how so many in the blogosphere bitch and moan about the ability of neoconservatives to get their policy proposals published even after screwing up on Iraq? 

I'm kind of curious how these people feel about Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett's op-ed in the New York Times today about Iran.  I mean, this is a scant few months after they served as apologists for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad after the controversial June election.  I guess the Leveretts know Gwen Pollard well. 

Others can debate whether the Leveretts deserve the prime real estate on the NYT op-ed page.  I'd like to focus on the fact that the op-ed itself makes no f***ing sense whatsoever. 

Let's take a look at it, shall we?

[T]he meeting on Thursday in Geneva of the United Nations Security Council’s five permanent members and Germany with Iran (the “five plus one” talks) will not be an occasion for strategic discussion but for delivering an ultimatum: Iran will have to agree to pre-emptive limitations on its nuclear program or face what Secretary of State Hillary Clinton calls “crippling” sanctions.

However, based on conversations we’ve had in recent days with senior Iranian officials — including President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad — we believe it is highly unlikely Iran will accept this ultimatum.

Oh, wow... senior Iranian officials told the Leveretts that they would not concede?  Well, I'd definitely take that at face value.  I'm sure these were the same people who told the Leveretts that Ahmadinejad was the legitimate victor back in June.  Clearly, these are reliable sources with zero incentive to dissemble to regime-friendly pundits in the United States.  And it's not like they have anything to hide.  Oh, wait....

 American officials tend to play down Iranian concerns about American intentions, citing public messages from President Obama to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, as proof of the administration’s diplomatic seriousness. But Tehran saw these messages as attempts to circumvent Iran’s president — another iteration, in a pattern dating from Ronald Reagan’s Iran-Contra scandal, of American administrations trying to create channels to Iranian “moderates” rather than dealing with the Islamic Republic as a system.

Wow again.  See, I would view these exchanges with Khamenei as attempts to talk to the person with actual control over Iran's nuclear program, as opposed to the guy who rants on and on about how the Holocaust was just a big myth. 

Indeed, the Obama administration is "dealing with the Islamic Republic as a system" -- and they are trying to talk to the people with genuine foreign policy power.  The Leveretts, on the other hand, seem to be convinced that the only way to talk with Iran is through Ahmadinejad. 

Unfortunately, the Obama administration was enticed by the prospect of regime-toppling instability in the aftermath of Iran’s presidential election this summer. But compared to past upheavals in the Islamic Republic’s 30-year history — the forced exile of a president, the assassination of another, the eight-year war with Iraq and the precipitous replacement of Ayatollah Khomeini’s first designated successor, Ayatollah Hussein Ali Montazeri, with Ayatollah Khamenei — the controversy over this year’s election was hardly a cataclysmic event.

Seriously, how did this paragraph get past the op-ed editors?  First of all, beyond a rhetorical flourish or two and asking Twitter to hold off on their scheduled maintenance, what exactly did the Obama administration do to foment regime-toppling instability?  Second, if the largest street demonstrations since the 1979 revolution don't qualify as a big event, what would convince the Leveretts of the import of the June election?  More YouTube videos?  Hand puppets? 

Instead of pushing the falsehood that sanctions will give America leverage in Iranian decision-making — a strategy that will end either in frustration or war — the administration should seek a strategic realignment with Iran as thoroughgoing as that effected by Nixon with China. This would require Washington to take steps, up front, to assure Tehran that rapprochement would serve Iran’s strategic needs.

On that basis, America and Iran would forge a comprehensive framework for security as well as economic cooperation — something that Washington has never allowed the five-plus-one group to propose. Within that framework, the international community would work with Iran to develop its civil nuclear program, including fuel cycle activities on Iranian soil, in a transparent manner rather than demanding that Tehran prove a negative — that it’s not developing weapons. A cooperative approach would not demonize Iran for political relationships with Hamas and Hezbollah, but would elicit Tehran’s commitment to work toward peaceful resolutions of regional conflicts.

This seems as propitious a moment as any to cave to popular demand that I articulate some thoughts on the sanctions question with regard to Iran.  I would expect some somewhat more utility in the sanctions process than the Leveretts.  If the U.S. can foster cooperation among the P5 + 1, and the Iranians see the extent of this cooperation, then I think they'd be willing to deal.  That's not an easy proposition to pull off, and would require both diplomatic skill and will.  That does not mean it should't be tried, however.  Even the effort to build momentum in the Security Council might prompt serious bargaining from the Iranians. 

I would also like to know how the Iranian opposition feels about sanctions.  If they reject them as a policy tool, well, that's a good argument against their imposition.  On the other hand, if this is a replay of South Africa, then that's something else to consider. 

One final point -- the analogy with Nixon's opening to China makes zero sense in the current context.  Nixon was trying to outflank the Soviet Union during the Cold War by cozying up to their most powerful bordering state.  What the Leveretts seem to be proposing is a multilateral move to bring Iran in from the cold -- which benefits Russia and China far more than it benefits the United States.  In other words, I'm not sure how a Nixon strategy works in the P5 + 1 framework. 

I suppose that the Obama administration could attempt secret shuttle diplomacy with Iran to outflank Moscow and Beijing.  Such a gambit would infuriate our European allies and push Israel into panicking, however -- and I'm not sure that's worth whatever strategic gains would be had by a rapprochement with the regime in Tehran. 

So, to review, I give the Leverett op-ed an "I" -- for being inchoate, inconsistent, and idiotic. 

Laura Secor writes in the New Yorker about the bass-ackward effects of the Iranian government's decision to televise the show trials.  I think she misses a key point, however: 

Since the disputed Presidential elections of June 12th, about a hundred reformist politicians, journalists, student activists, and other dissidents have been accused of colluding with Western powers to overthrow the Islamic Republic. This month, a number of the accused have made videotaped confessions. But the spectacle has found a subversive afterlife on the Internet. One image that has gone viral is a split frame showing two photographs of former Vice-President Mohammad Ali Abtahi. Before his arrest, on June 16th, he is a rotund, smiling cleric; in court on August 1st, he is drawn and sweat-soaked, his face a mask of apprehension. The juxtaposition belies the courtroom video, making the point that the only genuine thing about Abtahi’s confession is that it was coerced through torture.

Show trials have been staged before, most notably in Moscow in the nineteen-thirties. Typically, such rituals purge élites and scare the populace. They are the prelude to submission. Iran’s show trials, so far, have failed to accrue this fearsome power. In part, this is because the accused are connected to a mass movement: Iranians whose democratic aspirations have evolved organically within the culture of the Islamic Republic. It is one thing to persuade citizens that a narrow band of apparatchiks are enemies of the state. It is quite another to claim that a political agenda with broad support—for popular sovereignty, human rights, due process, freedom of speech—has been covertly planted by foreigners.

I don't doubt that the broad-based nature of support for change is one reason the show trials have rung hollow.  Still, isn't this a case where the medium is the message? 

Stalin's show trials were not broadcast on television -- they were reported in state-run newspapers or aired, edited, over state-run radio.  This gives the state much greater editorial powers than a live television transmission.  Furthermore, as Secor's first paragraph suggests, it's the non-verbal cues that come from television that completely undermine the intended effect of the spectacle. 

It is possible that, in the future, more sophisticated CGI effects will allow governments the capacity to digitally edit these images, a la The Running Man, to maximize the desired effect (i.e., making Abtahi look as healthy as he did pre-incarceration).  For now, however, such efforts would only look like bad plastic surgery.  No, I don't think televised show trials really work at all. 

Beyond Iran, have show trials ever worked in the television era?  This is a real question, readers.  About the only modern example I can think of where a televised trial of a political leader has broken the back of a movement was Turkey's capture and trial of Kurdish Worker's Party (PKK) leader Abdullah (“Apo”) Öcalan.  Öcalan's complete about-face and rejection of violence during his trial had an effect on the PKK. 

I'm not sure the parallel holds up, since most Turks held genuine antipathy for Öcalan and the Kurds.  So, the question remains open -- can show trials ever cement an authoritarian government's legitimacy? 

In a legen -- wait for it -- dary blog post, Belle Waring mentioned the pony problem in public policy.  Namely, "an infallible way to improve any public policy wishes. You just wish for the thing, plus, wish that everyone would have their own pony!"

I bring this up because of David Sanger's New York Times story about the prospects of imposing a gasoline embargo on Iran:  

The Obama administration is talking with allies and Congress about the possibility of imposing an extreme economic sanction against Iran if it fails to respond to President Obama's offer to negotiate on its nuclear program: cutting off the country’s imports of gasoline and other refined oil products....

But enforcing what would amount to a gasoline embargo has long been considered risky and extremely difficult; it would require the participation of Russia and China, among others that profit from trade with Iran. Iran has threatened to respond by cutting off oil exports and closing shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, at a moment that the world economy is highly vulnerable.

The rest of the story is kind of irrelevant -- because without China and Russia, this is just a theoretical exercise.  In fact, here's a good time-saver:  if you read any story about a gasoline embargo o Iran, just scan quickly and get to the part where the reporter explains how and why Russia and China would go along.  If it's not mentioned, the story is inconsequential. 

If you want China and Russia to agree to sanctions, should you wish for the free pony as well?  Here the growth of dissent in Iran complicates an already complicated picture.  I'm betting that Moscow and Beijing have observed the "Death to Russia!" and "Death to China!" chants among the protestors.  This is likely going to make them even more reluctant to do anything that undermines the current regime (even if this hurts their long-term interests).  Which a gasoline embargo would most certainly do. 

Do I think a gasoline embargo is a good idea?  Absolutely.  Do I think it will happen?  No, I don't. 

UPDATE:  Spencer Ackerman reacts the same way I do.  The Weekly Standard's Michael Goldfarb is more optimistic. 

I know so little about rap music* that I can't directly comment on Marc Lynch's marathon post on Jay-Z and American hegemony.  [You could comment on Beyoncé, though, right?--ed.  Let's just say that I am in complete agreement with Marc that this is one of the most awesome display of soft power on the Internet] 

In reading the blog reaction to the posting, however, I was struck by Ezra Klein's shrewd point about how truly powerful actors rely on proxies to fight their more vicious battles for them. 

Which made me think about what's going on in Iran again.  Najmeh Bozorgmehr's Financial Times story today suggests that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei can't seem to find the necessary proxy to push back against his opposition: 

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, warned the country’s opposition leaders on Monday that they faced “collapse” if they continued to incite protests over the disputed presidential election.

The warning came amid an unprecedented war of words between the regime’s senior leaders and looked like a retort to Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, the influential former president who has backed the opposition. Mr Rafsanjani said on Friday the country was in “crisis” and the regime had to regain people’s trust....

“The [political] elite should be careful,” warned Ayatollah Khamenei. “They [the opposition leaders] are in an exam session; a big exam. Failing in this exam does not mean getting one [academic] year behind. It will lead to [their] collapse.

“Anyone under any title and position who pushes the society toward insecurity would be a hated figure in the eyes of the majority of Iranian nation,” he said, in a clear reference to the top opposition figures including Mr Rafsanjani.

Meanwhile Mr Ahmadi-Nejad, who has been largely silent on the unprecedented dispute over his re-election, is preparing to swear in his new cabinet (emphasis added).

Pretty ominous words from Khamenei, to be sure -- but it's interesting that he's the guy who has to make these threats.  In doing so, Khamenei has brought himself down to the level of Rafsanjani and Khatami.  Like Jay-Z, I'm not sure he can maintain his hegemonic leadership status without throwing away almost all of the structural power that comes with being acknowledged as the Supreme Leader.  Now he just looks like the rapper with the biggest posse.   

Of course, the supreme irony is that Khamenei might have triggered his invitable downfall by pulling out all the stops to bolster a proxy.   

Question to readers familiar with Iran, rap, and IR theory -- did the above make any sense whatsoever?  Because at this very late hour, the parallels seem surprisingly strong. 

*Seriously, I'm not acting faux out-of-touch here.  This is the last rap song I remember enjoying from beginning to end. 

The following is not rocket science, but rather International Relations 101. Still, I hadn't seen it anywhere else, so here goes:

The parallels between ongoing events in Honduras and Iran are surprisingly strong, and it's worth thinking about them for a spell.

In both countries, conservative elements of the established regime conducted what was, essentially, a coup d'etat. In both cases, the coup-plotters used both legal and extralegal means to cement their hold on power. These actions have triggered mass demonstrations in the streets of Tehran and Tegucigalpa. Both governments are rather paranoid about external influence on their regime. And, in some domestic politics version of the security dilemma (I hereby label this the "sovereignty dilemma"), that paranoia about external meddling is merely fuelling greater international attention to their domestic affairs of state.

Now, what are the differences? They boil down to a few important distinctions:

• Iran is much, much more powerful than Honduras.
• Honduras possesses much less strategic significance than Iran.

What does this mean? It means that realist and liberal logics will work together in Honduras and against each other in Iran. The Organization of American States could never reverse a regime change in, say, Brazil -- but multilateral coordination will have an effect on Honduras. Indeed, the fact that Honduras is relatively small is what makes it easy for the OAS to muster some consnsus on the issue. Furthermore, in contrast to larger countries, the effect of multilateral sanctions on Honduras would be pretty significant.

In Iran, on the other hand, conflicting strategic interests prevent any kind of great power concert that could push for domestic change. It's also far from clear whether anything short of a gasoline embargo would really have an appreciable impact on the regime in Tehran.

So, holding everything else constant, the odds are that the coup in Honduras are more likely to be reversed than the coup in Iran.

Bear in mind, however, that life never holds everything else constant.

Rob Farley wrote a excellent post last week explaining the crucial decision-making nodes during a social uprising against a repressive regime. 

Basically, people power revolutions only work in changing the regime if one of two things happen.  First, if the government decides not to pull the trigger on its citizens, then the state loses its trump card ad falls.  Second, if the coercive apparatus either resists or splinters in the wake of an order to pull the trigger, then things get much more messy, but the government usually falls. 

Looking at Iran right now, I don't think either condition is holding.  Sunday's events strongly suggest that the Khamenei regime is willing to kill to stay in power, though how much killing remains open to question (as horrific as the YouTube videos have been, there has not been any large-scale slaughter yet).  

As for the coercive apparatus, the signs are that they will hang together rather than hang separately.  The Revolutionary Guards just upped the ante: 

Threatening to crush dissent, the powerful Revolutionary Guards warned protesters Monday that they would face a “revolutionary confrontation” if they returned to the streets in their challenge to the presidential election results and their defiance of the country’s leadership....

A Revolutionary Guards statement Monday told protesters who took to the streets in a week of demonstrations to “be prepared for a resolution and revolutionary confrontation with the Guards, Basij and other security forces and disciplinary forces” if they continued their protests, news reports said.

I have seen no indication that other components of the coercive apparatus -- non-Revolutionary Guards military, police, Interior Ministry, etc. -- are either cracking or defecting from the regime.  And as Laura Secor points out, "Although the country’s constituency for democracy is vast and growing, the regime has a constituency, too, and it is passionately loyal and heavily armed."

There are only two cards left to play for the opposition.  If they double down on street protests, it forces the Basij and Revolutionary Guards to start killing in large numbers, and that could cause a splintering of the state. 

The other card is Rafsanjani's.  If he uses his institutional power to discredit Khamenei via the Assembly of Experts, then it raises further legitimacy questions.  Rafsanjani's been pretty quiet as of late, however, and I suspect his risk-aversion will keep him quiet regardless of the long-term consequences. 

Am I missing anything? 

My latest bloggingheads diavlog is with Bob Wright, the founder of bloggingheads and the author of The Evolution of God.  We talk about his book and Iran: