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Capitol Ideas
Michael Ledeen on Iran and Democracy
An interview.
I hadn’t seen Michael Ledeen in years when I bumped into him at a party for George Gilder’s new book, The Israel Test. An admirer of Machiavelli, Ledeen has for years focused on Iran. His new book, Accomplice to Evil: Iran and the War Against the West, is just out from St. Martin’s Press. He held a chair at AEI for 20 years and today is a Freedom Scholar at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies in Washington, D.C.
Born in Los Angeles in 1941, Ledeen has a daughter in Afghanistan and a son in Marine Corps basic training. In October 2007 Ledeen said, “Those who believe that I am part of some ‘hawkish gang’ just haven’t noticed that I am opposed to invasion or bombing the nuclear facilities [in Iran]. My fear is that by failing to promote a nonviolent democratization of Iran we make large-scale vio-lence much more likely.”
For years he has believed that Iran “fulfills all the condition of a revolutionary situation,” and that the U.S. should promote it. The events in Iran this June confirmed this view. I congratulated him for being right. Nothing irritates the experts more than this, he said, and he had become un-popular as a result. He agreed to sit down for an interview.
TB: You are with the Foundation for
the Defense of Democracy. But is democracy always a good idea?
Aren’t “the people” en masse more likely to support fanaticism than
the educated? Democracy can give you what you don’t want, such as
the tyranny of Hamas. Meanwhile in Egypt we have a strongman bought
and paid for by the U.S. who has kept the lid on fanaticism.
ML: It’s true that the least of evils is a
legitimate policy. If you’re convinced that you face bad op-tions,
then by all means take the least bad. If the lid came off in Egypt
most people think that the Muslim Brotherhood would govern Egypt,
and that’s a terrible outcome, every bit as bad as Hamas.
TB: How would the Arab world look if
it became more democratic?
ML: It depends. I don’t do the Arab world that
much. I’m worrying more about Iran, which is anti-Arab. Iranians
hate Arabs. They’re a fairly well-educated population and they have
centuries of ex-perience with self-government. The fanatics who
have been governing the country for the last 30 years are not
uneducated. The Revolutionary Guards, which is now the most
powerful force in Iran, have their own university. The overwhelming
majority of the Iranian people want to be rid of this regime, which
they hate, and they have every good reason to do so. They want to
be a normal country enjoying good relations with the rest of the
world.
TB: Since I saw you last week, there
has been one more uprising in Iran.
ML: September 18th. I live-blogged it. I tried to
follow along the events of the day. Then I posted them.
TB: It was apparently much bigger than
anyone has conceded.
ML: It was bigger than most American media have
reported, and I think bigger even than the op-position leaders
expected. I don’t think anybody could have expected millions of
people in the streets of Tehran, a million and a quarter in the
streets of Isfahan. And the crowds were disci-plined.
TB: There was a parallel development
here a few days earlier. A crowd, much larger than media estimates,
turned out on the Mall to protest Obama’s policies. The press said
only “tens of thousands,” but there were estimates of a
million.
ML: It’s becoming a national sport for the dying
media not to report things that they don’t like. If they can get
away with it they don’t report it at all. In Iran these events were
even more powerful because the security people went out intending
to put it down. But there were so many people that they were unable
to.
TB: I can understand the media wanting
to ignore anti-Obama rallies, but why would they down-play revolt
in Iran?
ML: Because Obama wants to make a deal with the
regime. The Obama people are quite visibly annoyed that the Iranian
people have refused to go quietly. They get in the way of this
wonderful deal that they think we’re going to make.
TB: What are the prospects for these
negotiations?
ML: I’ll be very surprised if Obama gets an
agreement that’s enforceable. No one else has. Every American
president in the last 30 years has tried to make a deal with Iran.
Every one.
TB: Including Bush?
ML: Yes. Here’s another story they will not
report. In 2006 Bush approved direct negotiations be-tween the U.S.
and Iran. By the end of the summer the Americans believed they had
an agreement. Iran would announce the end of uranium enrichment and
Condi Rice would announce that we were ending sanctions. She and
undersecretary Nicholas Burns went to New York and they were all
sitting around waiting for the Iranians to come. And they never
came. The story was closely held. It’s featured in a series on the
BBC, and it’s all in my new book.
TB: In your September 22 blog you
called the leaders of the Islamic Republic “dead men walking.” How
long might that take?
ML: You never know with these things. Take the
Soviet Union. Even those of us who were con-vinced that it was
finished were surprised when it happened. And I’m sure it will be
the same with Iran. I can’t tell you whether it will happen quietly
and peacefully, or by some kind of huge conflagration. But it will
happen.
TB: Let’s assume these negotiations
fail. With Iran on the verge of legitimate rebellion, would that
not be the worst time for the U.S. to launch a military
attack?
ML: Without some dramatic new facts, there’s no
chance that the U.S will attack Iran. We have been busy releasing
Iranian prisoners in Iraq — Revolutionary Guards officers and the
like. Lots of them. So we’re not going to do anything.
TB: How about Israel?
ML: It’s a tough question to answer. You have to
know what Netanyahu thinks he knows. About Iranian nuclear
technology: Where does the program stand? Do they have a bomb? A
delivery system? How reliable is it? You would also have to know
all the key Israelis involved, and figure out how brave they
are.
TB: How brave?
ML: It seems to me if you were the prime minister
of Israel, and your head of military intelligence or Mossad came to
you and said, “Sir, the Iranians are a month away from having a
functioning nuclear device, and they already have intermediate
range missiles that can hit us anywhere they choose.” At that
moment it seems to me that any Israeli prime minister has to say to
his military, “Stop it. Whatever it takes.” But “stop it” could
take different forms. It does not automatically mean the standard
Hollywood bombing run. There are other ways.
About the Author
Tom Bethell is a senior editor of The American Spectator and author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science, The Noblest Triumph: Property and Prosperity Through the Ages, and most recently Questioning Einstein: Is Relativity Necessary? (2009).
Letter to the Editor View all comments (51) | Leave a comment
More Articles by Tom Bethell
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Kaveh | 11.10.09 @ 7:30AM
You do not need to be a genius to guess that the six do not want to impose a new set of sanctions on Iran. We can understand their motivations : the Europeans have important commercial interests in Iran, mostly oil related, that could suffer from newer sanctions ; and Washington needs a strategic alliance with the mullahs in order to dominate the Islamist agitation in the Muslim and oil rich provinces of it’s opponents ; Caucasia in Russia and Xinjiang in China.
http://www.iran-resist.org/rubrique32.html
Dai Alanye | 11.10.09 @ 11:54AM
"Washington needs a strategic alliance with the mullahs in order to dominate the Islamist agitation in the Muslim and oil rich provinces of it’s opponents…"
Ah, if only Washington were so wise, so Machiavellian. But foreign policy in Washington, especially under Obama, is ruled by emotion rather than reason.
Alan Brooks| 11.10.09 @ 2:01PM
"An admirer of Machiavelli"
He was centuries ahead of his time. Who would you choose?: Ruhollah Khomeini, or Machiavelli?
I choose the latter.
Alan Brooks| 11.13.09 @ 9:08PM
Machiavelli would move Israel out of the Mideast, before her enemies consolidate.
There's no light at the end of the tunnel; you can't trust Ahmadinejad across the street even if both his parents are with him.
Anthony| 11.10.09 @ 7:54AM
Know more about Michael Ledeen
http://www.salon.com/news/opin.....index.html
Jim O'Brien| 11.10.09 @ 8:32AM
Ledeen says: "Those who believe that I am part of some ‘hawkish gang' just haven't noticed that I am opposed to invasion or bombing the nuclear facilities [in Iran]. "
He is wrong. The only solution is to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities, neuter its military forces, bomb its wells and pipelines, and destroy all major electric generating plants. This will result in regime change.
Iran is supplying weapons and money used by terrorists threatening Israel and the world, and being used right now to kill our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Iran has repeatedly demonstrated that it understands nothing except force. If we don't neuter Iran (and we definitely won't while Obama is in office), then ultimately millions of people will pay with their lives when Iran uses nuclear weapons. A much wider war could then result.
Dai Alanye | 11.10.09 @ 12:02PM
Ledeen is wise. It's far better for us to play the part of France vs Britain in the 1770s that that of Germany vs Russia in the 1930s.
When we go to war against the Iranian regime it should be clearly in support of the Iranian people. Let the first step be to recognize a government in exile through which to funnel aid to the uprising.
Alan Brooks| 11.10.09 @ 2:20PM
If we don't neuter Iran (and we definitely won't "while Obama is in office), then ultimately millions of people will pay with their lives when Iran uses nuclear weapons. A much wider war could then result."
Some top Iranians want Armageddon as per their '12th Imam' beliefs.
Margie| 11.10.09 @ 7:05PM
If we did do that, and I've heard much discussion about it on radio programs (conservative, mostly). But if we did, do you believe that both Russia & China would turn on us, and if so, would we be able to handle it?
Alan Brooks| 11.13.09 @ 10:08PM
sounds like the book of Revelation.
Tim| 11.10.09 @ 9:59AM
To my mind, the fundamental error we make is that idea that the Iranians have a price for which they will sell their national identity . Many of our own politicians are bought and sold daily, thus they cannot conceive of a regime that will not sell out- for money, awards, media approval.
The Iranians seek power , they crave the fear of other nations confronted by Iran wielding that power. To paraphrase Orwell, their vision is not one of happy and contented Iranians (or anyone else) going about their daily lives in peace and prosperity. The vision is a boot stamping on a face, forever.
This was dramatically enacted before our eyes this past spring as Iranians beat and shot their own people in the streets.
Pingback| 11.10.09 @ 10:51AM
The American Spectator : Michael Ledeen on Iran and Democracy | Iran Today links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.10.09 @ 10:51AM
The American Spectator : Michael Ledeen on Iran and Democracy | Iran Today links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
JimBob| 11.10.09 @ 12:10PM
Ledeen Doctrine ”Every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business”
Dump the Neocons
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10935
Ed Crane founder of the Cato Institute
Hardius| 11.10.09 @ 12:30PM
Considering how incompetent our elected officials are, I think we should let other nations choose their own destiny. No matter what the situation is on the ground our elected officials will only make it worse for us. They only know fraud, graft, bribes, and kickbacks. Their grasp of what is actually going on anywhere is nonexistent, look at how they screwed Honduras and then ask yourself if you really want them to get involved in the workings of a nuclear power. If Iranians want to be free they will find a way and they don't want our help because they are aware of the price we charge for getting involved. How about we mind our own business and let Iran do the same.
Jim O'Brien| 11.10.09 @ 1:40PM
When do you expect Iran to start minding its own business? They are threatening Israel and the whole region with nuclear weapons, and supplying conventional weapons which are being used right now to kill American soldiers. Should the U.S. government just continue to ignore Iran's active role in killing our troops?
JimBob| 11.10.09 @ 2:11PM
Ehud Barak, Israels most decorated soldier and current Defense Minister recently said Iran is no threat to Israel.
The one thing the very unpopular Iranian regime wants is to be able to blame all its problems on the Great Satan.
Pingback| 11.10.09 @ 2:52PM
Michael Ledeen on Iran and Democracy - Why We Protest - IRAN links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.10.09 @ 3:10PM
Welcome | Project on Middle East Democracy links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Ken (Old Texican)| 11.10.09 @ 3:58PM
Jim Bob ...Jump Back,
You are a liar. Worse, you are a stupid ignorant liar.
Meet me on any "green" and we can let God sort it out.
Coward...name a time and place.
JimBob| 11.10.09 @ 5:46PM
You're a few bricks short of a full load.
Alan Brooks| 11.13.09 @ 10:32PM
well, Daphne is a few fries short of a happy meal.
But with 4 mil of haldol for dinner, she is feeling no pain.
Ken (Old Texican)| 11.10.09 @ 4:01PM
Jim Bob
I shall have cameras with audio to film the event.
Coward.
Pingback| 11.10.09 @ 5:03PM
Twitter Trackbacks for The American Spectator : Michael Ledeen on Iran and Democracy links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Ran | 11.10.09 @ 9:52PM
Thank you, Mr. Bethell, for the interview.
The Administration perhaps fears a successful Iranian revolt for the message it will send to the Tea Party sympathizers. God only knows what will happen elsewhere - say, China... or Washington.
Pingback| 11.11.09 @ 9:47AM
Wine Tasting 56: 2002 Thorn Clarke Shotfire Shiraz from Aust | Wine Making Kits links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 11.11.09 @ 7:43PM
Twitter Trackbacks for The American Spectator : Michael Ledeen on Iran and Democracy links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
dofus kamas | 11.12.09 @ 5:05AM
http://www.igchest.com
Alan Brooks| 11.13.09 @ 10:11PM
Iranians are ... interesting people.
Here's an Iranian expatriate I knew:
http://rds.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0oG.....258210946/**http://www.scribd.com/doc/20239753/Alan-Brooks-on-FM-2030
Alan Brooks| 11.13.09 @ 10:24PM
... oops, a blind link. Must be the Gremlin in the Kremlin.
Heck with it.
Alan Brooks| 11.13.09 @ 10:26PM
will this do it?:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/2023.....on-FM-2030
Pingback| 11.19.09 @ 12:54PM
The American Spectator : Michael Ledeen on Iran and Democracy @ halloweengenderbende links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 12.18.09 @ 8:31AM
Big Government » Blog Archive » ‘Clueless’ Clark Alert: The Top Ten Undernews Stories links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
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