The American Spectator

Reader Mail

Leagues of Their Own

8.8.02 @ 12:01AM

(Page 2 of 3)

TIED TO BE FIT
Re: Dave Shiflett's Clothes Call:

Your Dave Shiflett accuses Nazis of wearing coats and ties. Hmm.

It seems to this reader too that any dunce can wear a coat and tie. But if a writer wants to accuse dunces and Nazis of wearing coats and ties, he should be more careful with his references.

I point to the following and Mr. Shiflett's closing; "When I hear anyone talk of culture, I reach for my revolver." This observation was made by none other than Hermann Goering, Hitler's Reichsmarshall, a known drug addict and also a cross-dressing homosexual. Mr. Shiflett should be more circumspect in his choice of references.
-- Paul Kellogg
New York

FOCUS ON IRAN
Re: Jed Babbin's Turning Iran Around:

I continue to believe the uprisings in Iran are the most important story in the world today, and only Mr. Ledeen (widely quoted in this article) is writing about it. Overthrowing the mullahs in Iran would have enormous impact on our war on terror: Where is the mainstream press? Simply disgraceful that they aren't covering this important story.
-- Judith Willms

Jed Babbin replies: I don't necessarily agree that the Iran demonstrations are the most important story, but it is definitely one of the most important. Michael Ledeen should get much credit for his attention to this issue. As to the rest of the media, their inattention to it is simply puzzling. I'm afraid that these days, where a camera does not go, no media will follow.

SHAH, PSHAW!
Re: Jed Babbin's Turning Iran Around:

I was living in Iran during the revolution which overthrew the shah, and I read Jed Babbin's article with interest. I found a lot in it with which I agreed. America, and the rest of the free world have discovered since 9/11 what I've been saying since 1979: fundamentalist Islam presents a far greater threat to Western civilization than Communism ever did.

American and other Western leaders made the mistake of looking on any regime which opposed the Soviet Union as necessarily being on the "good guys" side. This led to Western support for the mujaheddin who resisted the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and various rather suspect regimes in the Middle East such as those ruling in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states. It's ironic that weapons provided to Afghan rebels for their fight against the Soviets are even now being used against British and American troops.

On the other hand, I think it would be wrong to look too uncritically at the shah's regime. I believe that it was the considerable injustices perpetrated by the pre-revolutionary government that paved the way to the extremism which followed it. Was the shah's regime really all that much better than what has been imposed on the Iranian people since? Certainly, post-war Iran saw a very rapid increase in social inequality and secret police repression. When he came to power, the shah probably had some reformist tendencies -- he did make some attempts at land reform and gave women their first taste of emancipation -- but by the time he was overthrown, he was an isolated and universally despised autocrat.

The frequent Western attitude that my enemy's enemy is my friend led us into alliances with some very doubtful friends -- like the Somozas in Nicaragua and the Diems in Vietnam -- so it's not surprising that this policy was again followed in the Islamic world, and that contributed significantly to the growth of the extremism and virulent, irrational hatred which led to 9/11.

We keep looking for "moderate" Islam and are then surprised when it turns out that they really aren't moderate at all. I remember when Rafsanjani was the "liberal" speaker of the Majlis (parliament) -- now he's suddenly one of the leading conservatives. We hailed the election of Khatami -- yet another benighted cleric -- as the dawning of a new, more "moderate" Iran, and it wasn't. Please don't lets start supporting the shah's son, Reza, just because he's our enemy's enemy. There really isn't the least sign that he has any support at all within the country. We'd just be aligning ourselves once again with a discredited regime.

There are moderate voices in Iran, but it shouldn't be surprising to anyone that quite a lot of these are, perhaps, more to the left of center than we would like. That really isn't surprising. Under the shah, teaching about the French and Russian Revolutions was banned in state schools, and what has come since has scarcely allowed young Iranians the tools needed to make an informed decision about the merits of liberalism or socialism. They are against the conservative, reactionary conservatives who are ruining their country, trying to drag is back into the Middle Ages, so it's hardly surprising that they see themselves as progressives or even socialist.

I remember during the early days of the revolution having a long discussion with two gunmen from the fedayyin-e-khalq -- I had advertised my stereo for sale and they were trying to buy it cheap. We ended up discussing politics and philosophy for several hours. At one point, one of them said, "All we want is for everyone to be free to express their own opinions, for men and women to be treated equally and with respect, for people of all religions and none to be tolerant of each others' beliefs, etc., etc.... " I don't remember his exact words when he was describing his panacea, but I'll never forget his closing words: "Just like Cuba!" I tried to explain to him that Cuba wasn't quite as he imagined it to be and that he seemed to me to be describing France, England or the United States, but he and his friends were understandably ignorant of all this -- that's what happens when school curriculum is strictly controlled and international media restricted....

Letter to the Editor

topics:
Religion, Islam, Hollywood, Law, Iraq, Iran, Russia, NATO, Socialism, Communism