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Consequences
of a forced regime change in
Iran
By
Abbas Bakhtiar
ccun.org,
September 25, 2007
“Give
me the money that has been spent in war and I will clothe every man, woman,
and child in an attire of which kings and queens will be proud.
I will build a
sc
hoolhouse in
every valley over the whole earth. I
will crown every hillside with a place of worship consecrated to peace.”
(Charles Sumner)
In
each war there are always winners and losers. The winners are those who make
money and gather more power to themselves while all the others are the
losers. It doesn’t matter if one has been on this side or that side;
chances are that in the end the majority end up losing far more than they
thought they will gain. Ask any parent that has lost a child in a war if he
or she can in any way be compensated for that loss and you’ll have the
answer.
One
can expect the push for war from those who will gain from it, but not from
those who lose.
B
ut the sad
fact is that those who gain from war use all the communication means at
their disposal to persuade the losers to support and even participate in the
war. The American people were thus persuaded to participate in the war
against
Iraq
. Those who
were against it were labelled as unpatriotic fools who were working against
their country’s interests.
B
ut it
wasn’t only the foreigners that wanted a war in
Iraq
. Some Iraqi
exiles played an important role in this as well. They gave the Neocons the
excuse to claim that they were not invading
Iraq
only to
secure
America
, but also
to “FREE” the Iraqi people. People such as Ahmed Chalabi and Iyad Allawi,
supported and funded by CIA and others, gave credence to the allegations
against
Iraq
. Did these
people do it on purpose or were they fooled? Did they sit and consider the
consequences for the rest of the Iraqis, or were they thinking only of what
was in it for them?
As
the Neocons and their allies continue to push for a devastating war against
Iran
, they are
joined by some Iranian exiles who profess that they cannot wait a minute
longer for the war to start. They are claiming, as their Iraqi counterparts
did, that they are supporting the Neocons because they want to free the long
suppressed Iranian People. Here I am not going to question their motives,
but their wisdom. Have these people considered the consequences of such an
action? Do they know what it means to create chaos in
Iran
and what
the consequences will be for Iranians and
Iran
? In case
they don’t know, I would like to provide them with some information.
We
all have heard of the Neocons’ plan for a new Middle East but had never
seen a map of it until it was published in the Armed Forces Journal in June
2006, which as can be expected was greeted by protests from Turkey and other
countries. The map resurfaced again in
September
15, 2006
when it was
presented at the NATO’s
Defence
College
in
Rome
[[i]].
This
map showed how fu
tu
re
Iraq
,
Iran
,
Turkey
and
Afghanistan
would look
like. With regards to
Iran
, one can
see that in the south west, the oilfields are taken out and merged with oil
rich regions of
Iraq
to make a
country called “
Arab
Shia
State
”. In the
north, parts of
Iran
is merged
with the Iraqi and Turkish Kurdish area to create the “Free Kurdistan”.
The Iranian Azerbaijan is merged with
Azerbaijan
. In the
west the Sistan and
B
aluchistan
is merged
with the Pakistani
B
aluchistan
to create the “Free
B
aluchistan”.
On the other hand
Kuwait
is kept in
place, while
Saudi Arabia
is divided
into its oil and non oil regions. This was not a political map, but an
“oil” map. Those places that had oil or gas were put into mini-states,
vulnerable and needing protection; the protection that
US
and its
allies could then provide.
Now,
if you look at the events as they are unfolding, at least as far as
Iran
is
concerned, you’ll see how this fictional map is slowly being
tu
rned into
reality. To start with
Israel
has
admitted that it is shipping weapons and helping Iranian Kurdish rebels to
fight the central government. On August 27, Avigdor Lieberman said
Israel
is
extending aid to those opposition organizations which are proving effective.
He was the first member of the Israeli government to expose the clandestine
war against
Iran
[[ii]].
The
Kurdish group is not the only one enjoying Israeli or Western help. We have
the Azeri group in the north and Ahwazi group in the south. We also have the
B
aluchi group
in the south east enjoying funding and support from the
UK
, US,
Israel
, etc.
As
you are reading this article, the roots of major internal conflicts are
being sown. No one can guess how many people are going to die because of
this, but one thing is certain; none of those that are going to suffer are
in LA or
New York
or
London
. They are
all in
Iran
.
Even
if we dismiss these as only conspiracy theories, we cannot dismiss the fact
that an invasion or occupation of a country as populous and as vast as
Iran
is going to
be extremely difficult and bloody.
One
must not forget that if only 10% of over one million
B
asiij and
the revolutionary guards decide to mount a guerrilla war against an
occupying army or a puppet regime, it will take many many years to bring
stability to the country. We will see many Abu Gharibs and many more
atrocities committed in the name of Democracy and Freedom.
Who
would like to see foreign boots kicking down doors in the middle of the
night? Who would like to see women and children crying in terror as their
houses are searched and their men-folk blindfolded, manhandled and taken to
prisons? Who would like to see pic
tu
re of rapes
of his or her fellow citizens by foreign troops? Please stand-up and be
counted. Don’t hide behind slogans.
B
efore
shouting slogans and jumping on the Neocon’s bandwagon, one should
consider all the consequences. Some claim that those who are against war
with
Iran
are in the
pay of the Iranian government or are its apologists. They are mistaken. No
one but a fool will support a “preventive” or an expansionist war. After
seeing
Iraq
and
Afghanistan
, only a
fool will support more of the same.
B
ut again
some may see this as an oppor
tu
nity to make
a quick buck. To these I have to say that no amount of money in the world is
going to w
ash
the blood
of the innocent people from your hands.
Please
remember that as the German proverb says: A great war leaves the country
with three armies - an army of cripples, an army of mourners, and an army of
thieves.
Dr.
Abbas
B
akhtiar
lives in
Norway
. He is a management consultant
and a contributing writer for many online journals. He can be contacted by
e-mail at:Bakhtiarspace-articles@yahoo.no
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