I appeal to you, generals of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards,
the Pásdárán: Do what I did! Defend the people, not the
tyrant. I am a two-star general who was once at the top of
communist Romania's version of the Pásdárán, the
Securitate, and I learned the hard way that no tyrant
can keep a country's people enchained for ever.
I have been in your shoes. In December 1988, the Romanians took
to the streets to overthrow their two-bit Dracula dictator,
Ceausescu, just re-enthroned at the end of a rigged election,
just as the people of Iran are trying now to get rid of their
Hitler-style dictator, just re-enthroned at the end of another
rigged election. Like Ahmadinejad, Ceausescu also ordered his
security forces to open fire against the population.
I sided with the people. Helped by the publisher of this very
magazine, who had just published my book Red Horizons: The
True Story of Nicolae and Elena Ceausescu's Crimes, Lifestyle and
Corruption, I used the microphones of Radio Free Europe to
expose the true face of Romania's tyrant. My fellow generals in
the Securitate got the message, and ignored his order to
stifle the people's rebellion in a bath of blood. On Christmas
Day 1989, Ceausescu was executed for genocide by his own people.
Now the former Kingdom of Romania, transformed by the communists
into an epitome of tyranny, is a prosperous member of the
European Union.
Iran is home to one of the world's oldest civilizations, going
back to 7,000 BC. Its literature, philosophy, medicine,
astronomy, mathematics and art have been major contributors to
the whole Muslim civilization. Now Ahmadinejad, who dreams of
being a new Hitler, wants to unleash a new Holocaust that will
turn the whole civilized world against Iran, just as it was
turned against Nazi Germany.
My fellow Pásdárán generals: Ahmadinejad is history.
He'll share Ceausescu's fate. If not today, tomorrow, or the day
after tomorrow. In the geopolitical Age of Twitter -- when seven
in ten Iranians own a cellular -- there is no longer any place to
hide. If you order your subordinates to fire on the people, your
crime will be well documented with thousands of pictures at a new
Nuremberg Trial.
If you break with the past and join the future, the liberated
energy of Iran's people, enchained for much too long, will
transform your country into an explosive democracy. Your children
will be proud of your courage. Just as my daughter is now proud
that her father eventually sided with freedom, not with tyranny.
topics:
Iran, Romania
