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Speaker 1: Hi, this is newt Twenty twenty is going to be

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Speaker 1: one of the most extraordinary election years of our lifetime.

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Speaker 1: I want to invite you to join my Inner Circle

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Speaker 1: fast pass to my live events. Join my Inner Circle

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Speaker 1: free book at checkout. Sign up today at Newts Inner

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Speaker 1: Circle dot com Code free Book. This offer ends January thirty. First,

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Speaker 1: they were in some instances, lined up against walls and

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Speaker 1: believe they were about to be shot. They had every

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Speaker 1: expectation that they were never going to get out of

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Speaker 1: this alive. The last majority of the Ranias of the

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Speaker 1: eighty two million people in a rat or against the

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Speaker 1: regime because they got forty years of policy failures to

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Speaker 1: point to the Curtis fought us tooth and nail. A

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Speaker 1: threatened men father's brother's husband that if you let your

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Speaker 1: women come out without his job, we're going to destroy

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Speaker 1: your business, destroy set fire to your house. Past Patuay

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Speaker 1: gainst you, and so on. On this episode of News World.

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Speaker 1: When you look at the current crisis involving around and

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Speaker 1: the tensions between the United States and around, it's useful

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Speaker 1: to remember that this began forty years ago, that in fact,

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Speaker 1: when the Shaw left power and was replaced ultimately Solohomini,

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Speaker 1: who had a very anti American regime. A key place

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Speaker 1: to start with all this is the Iranian hostage crisis,

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Speaker 1: which began on November fourth, nineteen seventy nine, when fifty

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Speaker 1: two American diplomats and citizens were taken hostage when the

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Speaker 1: students seized the US embassy in Tehran. They were supporting

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Speaker 1: the Iranian Revolution. To understand our current relationship with Iran,

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Speaker 1: it's important to look back at our forty year history

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Speaker 1: that began with the Iranian Revolution in nineteen seventy nine

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Speaker 1: and to see how it shapes US Iranian policy today.

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Speaker 1: And we'll look at how the lives of Iranian women

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Speaker 1: have changed under Sharia law since the revolution, and how

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Speaker 1: they have formed their own secret society of support, I'm

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Speaker 1: pleased to introduce my guests. Mark Bowden, journalist, screenwriter, teacher,

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Speaker 1: national correspondent for the Atlantic, the author of fourteen books.

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Speaker 1: He is the author of Guests of the Ayatola. Alex Fattanka,

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Speaker 1: the senior fellow at the Middle East Institute who specializes

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Speaker 1: in Middle East regional security affairs, with a focus in

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Speaker 1: Iran and mandez An Urban author of The Ladies Secret Society,

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Speaker 1: History of the Courageous Women Who Are in Mark Bowden

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Speaker 1: is the author of Guests to the Iotola. Given everything

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Speaker 1: has been happening recently. When you wrote Guest to Ayatola,

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Speaker 1: the Iran hostage crisis, the first battle in America's war

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Speaker 1: with Miloda in Islam, I was a freshman member of Congress.

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Speaker 1: Was my first year in Washington when the hostage crisis

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Speaker 1: broke out. What led you to write the book? It

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Speaker 1: was actually my first year as a reporter at the

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Speaker 1: Philadelphia Inquirer. In fact, I started to work there on

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Speaker 1: the day that the embassy was taken, and so as

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Speaker 1: a young porter on the staff, it wasn't my job

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Speaker 1: to cover the big story in the world. But I

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Speaker 1: watched it with great interest, and as you know, it

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Speaker 1: lasted for more than a year, and so really throughout

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Speaker 1: my career as a journalist that episode, which I saw

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Speaker 1: gaining significance as time went on, because, as you said,

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Speaker 1: this notion of the Islamist world being at war with

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Speaker 1: the Western world, the United States included, has become a

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Speaker 1: major defining feature of modern life. So I think through

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Speaker 1: the years, my feeling about this episode was that I

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Speaker 1: wanted to better understand it. And the fact is that

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Speaker 1: when I undertook it some years later, no one had

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Speaker 1: done it. I mean, there were many books about Iran

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Speaker 1: hostage crisis, all of them through a fairly narrow lens,

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Speaker 1: either through the lens of someone in the Carter administration

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Speaker 1: or a hostage or what. And I thought that it

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Speaker 1: would be worthwhile to step back and take a look

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Speaker 1: at the whole episode and try to write something definitive

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Speaker 1: about it. Did you actually go to Tehran? I did.

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Speaker 1: I took three trips to Iran, And so even though

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Speaker 1: the book was wonderfully received and well reviewed, is that

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Speaker 1: no one seemed to notice that I had actually gone

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Speaker 1: to Iran and track down the people who took the hostages.

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Speaker 1: That was the first time that that had happened, and

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Speaker 1: I thought it was a fairly remarkable reporting challenge, but

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Speaker 1: apparently everyone else didn't notice. Well. Of course, the same

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Speaker 1: thing was true with blacklog Down, that it was really

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Speaker 1: told from both sides. And it's one of the things

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Speaker 1: I'm most admirable by you. You're a genuinely serious reporter.

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Speaker 1: You know, there's two sides to every story, and often

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Speaker 1: more than two sides, And I think the fun and

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Speaker 1: what's interesting about it is to try to understand from

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Speaker 1: varying perspectives, what actually happened. What was your experience of Tehran?

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Speaker 1: Like it was a big, sprawling, polluted city, just choked

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Speaker 1: with traffic. I've never experienced such fear just trying to

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Speaker 1: cross the street in my life. In fact, people in

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Speaker 1: Tehran would take you by the hand because they would

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Speaker 1: see that you weren't going to be able to safely

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Speaker 1: navigate by yourself. They don't have the sort of Germanic

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Speaker 1: American discipline of street lights and stop signs, and people

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Speaker 1: just sort of drive like crazy. I found the food

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Speaker 1: was wonderful, the atmosphere was oppressive because it's an authoritarian regime,

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Speaker 1: and I knew that I was being monitored, and I

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Speaker 1: knew that every step I took was being observed. But

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Speaker 1: at the same time, I found Iranians themselves to be

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Speaker 1: remarkably welcoming and actually, in many instances, genuinely excited to

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Speaker 1: meet with an American. Were you surprised by the people

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Speaker 1: who you were interviewing for the book itself and their

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Speaker 1: attitude and their approach some of them and some I wasn't.

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Speaker 1: Several of the key hostage takers had risen to positions

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Speaker 1: of power in the regime, and they of course hadn't really,

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Speaker 1: at least to me. They weren't acknowledging that they'd changed

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Speaker 1: their thinking throughout the years over what they had done

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Speaker 1: back in nineteen seventy nine. So I found that piece

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Speaker 1: of it not terribly surprising, given who they were. But

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Speaker 1: I was surprised by the number of former hostage takers

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Speaker 1: who fully believed that it was a mistake, that it

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Speaker 1: was something they were not proud of, and that they

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Speaker 1: felt like they had been used by the Mullahs in

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Speaker 1: ways that they never anticipated and ultimately came to regret.

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Speaker 1: Take us back to seventy nine, the Aetola comes back home.

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Speaker 1: And as you know, they just recently released declassified a

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Speaker 1: whole range of documents in which the Ayatola was promising

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Speaker 1: Jimmy Carter he was moderate, and both the CIA and

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Speaker 1: the State Department were just like one hundred percent wrong

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Speaker 1: in their analysis. It's amazing to read these documents and

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Speaker 1: realize that these guys, they didn't have a clue who

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Speaker 1: he was and what was about to happen. Then why

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Speaker 1: don't you begin with the Ayatola and walk us forward? Well,

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Speaker 1: I think the revolution in Iran took everyone by surprise,

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Speaker 1: certainly the SHAW and the United States. And I think

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Speaker 1: to some extent Kamine himself, who I don't think set

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Speaker 1: out to become the supreme leader of Iran. He was

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Speaker 1: a religious figure and I think he was ambivalent about

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Speaker 1: taking a leadership role. I think what many people forget

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Speaker 1: looking back at the revolution is that it was a

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Speaker 1: combination of forces in Iran who collaborated to overthrow the Shaw,

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Speaker 1: and that included not just religious extremists, but socialists, people

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Speaker 1: who wanted to create a parliamentary style democracy, communists. But

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Speaker 1: they were united in their hatred of the Shaw and

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Speaker 1: their desire to overthrow his government. So once the Shaw fled,

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Speaker 1: for actually more than a year, there was a struggle

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Speaker 1: going on inside of Iran between these various factions to

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Speaker 1: see what kind of government would take the Shaw's place.

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Speaker 1: And so that was the situation when the embassy was

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Speaker 1: taken in November of seventy nine. Well, many turns out

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Speaker 1: to be really effective at organizing power. I think in

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Speaker 1: a matter of a very few days, he shoots the

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Speaker 1: first of the Shaw's generals, begins to communicate that this

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Speaker 1: is going to be in his terms. But why do

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Speaker 1: you think they were able Because they were clearly I

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Speaker 1: think a minority at that point. They were an alliance

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Speaker 1: with the Communist and then they wipe out the Communist.

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Speaker 1: They pretended to be part of a broad reform group

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Speaker 1: and then within a very short time they're eliminating the

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Speaker 1: various allies. Why do you think they were so good

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Speaker 1: at that? They were ruthless number one, and they were

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Speaker 1: the best organized part of the revolution. Under the Shah's regime,

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Speaker 1: it was very difficult to organize opposition. He was very

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Speaker 1: willing to lock up and punish and execute those who

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Speaker 1: spoke out against him. So the one area of Iranian

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Speaker 1: society where there was a degree of safety in coming

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Speaker 1: together talking. Organizing was inside the Muslim world. That was

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Speaker 1: one of the reasons why I think the Ayatollah, whose

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Speaker 1: speeches were being distributed one tape at a time for

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Speaker 1: years inside Iran, emerged as the most effective of the

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Speaker 1: opponents of the Shah's regime. He had an organization, and

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Speaker 1: as you know, do you want to accomplish anything in

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Speaker 1: politics or in the world, you need a good organization.

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Speaker 1: Why did they end up deciding to seize the embassy,

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Speaker 1: which was clearly a violent of international law and likely

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Speaker 1: to estrange them decisively from the US. Did they just

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Speaker 1: stumble into this or was this a deliberate strategy. Oh,

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Speaker 1: I think they stumbled into it. I think the Islamist students.

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Speaker 1: These were young people who had been students, and I

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Speaker 1: know once the revolution happened, a lot of them really

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Speaker 1: stopped going to classes and had become full time revolutionaries.

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Speaker 1: Most of them are the ones that took over the embassy,

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Speaker 1: were religious extremists from various campuses in Iran, and they

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Speaker 1: anticipated holding a sit in. A number of them had

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Speaker 1: been educated in the United States and had seen sit

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Speaker 1: ins at American universities during the nineteen sixties and seventies,

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Speaker 1: and so their idea was they would take the embassy

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Speaker 1: and hold a protest and then leave. But what happened

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Speaker 1: was unforeseen by everyone. The takeover of the American embassy

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Speaker 1: tapped this enormous outrage within Iranian society about the way

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Speaker 1: the United States had interfered with their history and with

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Speaker 1: their government, and so literally millions of people took to

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Speaker 1: the streets. And at that point the Ayatola Coomani and

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Speaker 1: probably more importantly, the Mullahs around him, realized that this

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Speaker 1: was an enormous wave and they had better get on

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Speaker 1: it if they planned to make use of it. So

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Speaker 1: they endorsed the takeover of the embassy. The students, who

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Speaker 1: thought they would be leaving in a couple of days,

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Speaker 1: ended up sort of chained to their own crisis. The

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Speaker 1: anger against the Americans go all the way back to

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Speaker 1: replacing Mosadek Or was it because we had been sustaining

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Speaker 1: the Shaw. The Shaw's rule had become increasingly authoritarian over

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Speaker 1: the years, and I think that a lot of people

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Speaker 1: blamed the perpetuation of an unpopular regime on the United States.

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Speaker 1: When you have this anger welling up and back on

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Speaker 1: the very first day. Had there been demonstrations outside the

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Speaker 1: embassy before the takeover. Yes, In fact, the embassy had

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Speaker 1: been overrun earlier that year of nineteen seventy nine. And

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Speaker 1: what people forget is that the initial interim government during

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Speaker 1: this period was a secular government. Albalhasan Bani Sader was

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Speaker 1: the president, and the authorities quickly chased the protesters off

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Speaker 1: of the American Embassy grounds when it first happened. So

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Speaker 1: I think this sort of loved the United States and

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Speaker 1: certainly the people at the embassy into believing that if

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Speaker 1: there was a serious confrontation that the local authorities would

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Speaker 1: once again step in. By the time that the takeover

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Speaker 1: of cars has the secular government disappeared. No. In fact,

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Speaker 1: the takeover of the embassy instigated the wave. As I

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Speaker 1: described it, that the Mullahs eventually rode to power when

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Speaker 1: something that exciting is happening and is focusing all of

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Speaker 1: the popular feeling on one particular event. This gave the

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Speaker 1: religious extremists, the Islamists within the revolutionary factions, a tremendous

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Speaker 1: amount of leverage, and they played it for all it

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Speaker 1: was worth, and they used it to turn on the

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Speaker 1: members of the secular government. When I interviewed Bonnie Sodder,

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Speaker 1: for instance, he's living in exile in Paris. The secularists

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Speaker 1: in Iran were either ultimately arrested and executed or forced

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Speaker 1: to flee. So the day of the actual takeover, the

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Speaker 1: Americans who were there must have been in a state

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Speaker 1: of shock. Well they were, and I think they had

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Speaker 1: every expectation that this would be brief. They were taken hostage,

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Speaker 1: and I think they felt that the Irani authorities would

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Speaker 1: step in, or that the students, who at least initially

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Speaker 1: announced their intention was to stay for a few days

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Speaker 1: were being held were sort of holding their breath and

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Speaker 1: expecting this would all end quickly. The Mulla didn't formally

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Speaker 1: seize power in Iran until summer of nineteen eighty. All

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Speaker 1: of the African Americans and many of the women were

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Speaker 1: released early on as well. And was that because of

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Speaker 1: a sense of humanitarianism or good public relations or what

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Speaker 1: was going on? It was both, and there was also

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Speaker 1: I think we overestimate how much Iranians understand about America.

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Speaker 1: The Iranian students felt that they would earn the solidarity

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Speaker 1: of African Americans in our country by releasing black hostages,

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Speaker 1: because their understanding of the United States was that there

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Speaker 1: were factions in this country who were actively conspiring to

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Speaker 1: overthrow the government and would ally themselves with the movement

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Speaker 1: in Iran. One of the things that struck me as

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Speaker 1: a freshman member of Congress was the depth of Iranian

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Speaker 1: hostility towards Carter. They reserved a particular level of anger

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Speaker 1: and contempt for President Carter. And I remember being on

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Speaker 1: the platform for Reagan's inauguration and literally when Reagan got

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Speaker 1: up to speak, the word began to pass from one

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Speaker 1: member to another that the hostages had just left Iranian airspace.

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Speaker 1: It was almost like they were determined not to release

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Speaker 1: them as long as Jimmy Carter was president. Nude I

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Speaker 1: would say, it wasn't almost like that. That's what it was.

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Speaker 1: Carter had visited Iran, either that or the Shaw had

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Speaker 1: visited him. At the United States. It was a state

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Speaker 1: dinner at which Jimmy Carter got up and as the

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Speaker 1: President of the United States would do with a visiting

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Speaker 1: head of state, is pledge friendship and cooperation and whatnot,

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Speaker 1: and to Iranians, who, as I said, have very little

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Speaker 1: understanding of the history of the United States, don't follow

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Speaker 1: politics in America. Carter became the symbol of America's commitment

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Speaker 1: to the Shaw and he embodied for them everything that

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Speaker 1: their revolution was against. They'd launched this effort to rescue

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Speaker 1: the hostages, which was just an utterly, amazingly incompetent and

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Speaker 1: tragic being broke down at a desert one and one

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Speaker 1: of the aircraft was destroyed and they had to abort

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Speaker 1: the mission. And I suspected that both came across as

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Speaker 1: a sign of weakness and reminded the Iranian dictatorship how

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Speaker 1: much they disliked Carter, and I think, probably more importantly,

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Speaker 1: knew it was a sign these are religious extremists. They

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Speaker 1: saw the United States as having almost absolute power and

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Speaker 1: the ability to do anything it wanted to accept that

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Speaker 1: Allah intervened with sandstorms in the desert to knock down

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Speaker 1: American helicopters and to defeat this American plot. So I

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Speaker 1: don't really think the Iranians saw this as an example

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Speaker 1: of American ineptitude. They saw it as an example of

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Speaker 1: the fact that God was on their side. Do you

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Speaker 1: sense that the regime still has to be understood from

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Speaker 1: a religious perspective without question. I mean they enforce a

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Speaker 1: sort of a patna of piety in that country where everyone,

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Speaker 1: at least in public has to be overtly religious and devout.

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Speaker 1: Women have to cover their heads, and men and women

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Speaker 1: they're not allowed to hold hands or your kiss in public.

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Speaker 1: I mean there's a sort of a public show of

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Speaker 1: devotion and piety to religion that frankly, many Iranians hate.

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Speaker 1: And if you visit Iranians in their homes, you know,

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Speaker 1: once behind the walls of their houses, it's a very

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Speaker 1: Western world. I mean, people have all kinds of opinions,

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Speaker 1: they're not especially religious. They offer you a drink even

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Speaker 1: though drinking is forbidden. So in a way, what the

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Speaker 1: Islamic state does is it creates, as I call it,

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Speaker 1: a patna of piety over the country in its appearance,

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Speaker 1: but the reality is something completely different. If I remember quickly,

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Speaker 1: you end the book with people getting on an airplane

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Speaker 1: and literally changing into Western clothes once the plane has

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Speaker 1: left Iranian airspace, Yes, exactly, and you're seeing it in

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Speaker 1: nationwide protests in that country, which boil up from time

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Speaker 1: to time it's happening right now. There's a tremendous undercurrent

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Speaker 1: of dissatisfaction and fatigue in Iran toward this religious regime.

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Speaker 1: I think that the United States, when it acts wisely

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Speaker 1: in relationship to Iran, realizes that there is this dual reality.

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Speaker 1: When you interviewed people, to what extent did you find

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Speaker 1: that there were still hard liners who twenty years later

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Speaker 1: or thirty years later were still hard liners? There were

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Speaker 1: many of them. The ones that I met tended to

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Speaker 1: be officials. They are the people who had risen through

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Speaker 1: the hierarchy were profiting, frankly, from being in power. The

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Speaker 1: vast majority of Iranians don't share those shillings, I would say,

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Speaker 1: with the exception of those who are genuinely, devoutly religious

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Speaker 1: and who still believe that the Ayatollah is Allah's representative

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Speaker 1: on earth. And these are true believers. And that's not

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Speaker 1: a majority, but a sizable and important faction. Coming up,

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00:20:26,080 --> 00:20:29,960
Speaker 1: how the hostage crisis was finally resolved after four hundred

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Speaker 1: and forty four days. When it comes to your estate planning,

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00:22:20,119 --> 00:22:29,840
Speaker 1: Year's resolution when you look back on this From the

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Speaker 1: American side, was there anyway Carter could have accommodated the

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Speaker 1: people who had held the hostages short of giving them

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Speaker 1: the shawl? No. I think he tried, and I documented

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Speaker 1: as much of it as I could, in every way

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Speaker 1: he could think to reach some sort of solution. I

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Speaker 1: think Carter placed, to his credit, in my opinion, the

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Speaker 1: highest priority on getting of those Americans home alive, and

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Speaker 1: he took a terrible political beating because that was his

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Speaker 1: primary goal. And I think another president might have placed

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Speaker 1: to hire priority on American prestige in the world and

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Speaker 1: maybe struck back at Iran, and on all likelihood it

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Speaker 1: would have meant that the hostages would have been executed

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Speaker 1: or killed and they never would have gotten home. So

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Speaker 1: in that sense, they tolerated the desert won because it

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Speaker 1: failed and gave them the sense that God was on

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Speaker 1: their side. But had we actually been more aggressive, it

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Speaker 1: might have led to the hostages all being killed. This

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Speaker 1: is in fact, you know what they threatened, and I

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Speaker 1: have no doubt that they would have carried it out.

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Speaker 1: It certainly was the expectation of the hostages themselves. You

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Speaker 1: know that they were going to eventually be put on

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Speaker 1: trial and either imprisoned or executed. And I think Jimmy

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Speaker 1: Carter made it, as I said, his priority to get

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Speaker 1: them home safely. It was one of the reasons why

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Speaker 1: he was so reluctant to launch that rescue mission, which

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Speaker 1: took place I think in Frill or May of the

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Speaker 1: following year, some seven six or seven months after the

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Speaker 1: hostages were taken. It was because it was as a

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Speaker 1: last resort. I mean, Carter was literally at wits end.

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Speaker 1: He had no options other than to try and sin

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Speaker 1: in delta force and bring them home by force from

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Speaker 1: the same point of the hostages. It must have been terrifying.

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Speaker 1: It was, and I think that's something that we lose

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Speaker 1: sight of in retrospect because they didn't all come home safely,

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Speaker 1: and so we don't tend to see how dire their

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Speaker 1: predicament was. I mean, they were in some instances lined

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Speaker 1: up against walls and believed they were about to be

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Speaker 1: shot put through mock executions. They had every expectation that

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Speaker 1: they were never going to get out of this alive.

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Speaker 1: So the level of anxiety and stress that they were

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Speaker 1: under for more than a year is difficult to overstate.

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Speaker 1: And I think one of the things that I tried

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Speaker 1: to do in the book was to capture the great

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Speaker 1: variety of ways that the Americans coped with captivity. On

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Speaker 1: the one extreme, you had Michael Matrinko, who was literally

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Speaker 1: held in solitary confinement from the first day, and who

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Speaker 1: fought his captors aggressively every single day of captivity, so

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Speaker 1: much though, that he got in a fight on the

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Speaker 1: bus on the way to the airport on the day

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Speaker 1: they were released and was thrown off the bus, and

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Speaker 1: his fellow hostages feared that Michael would be left behind.

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Speaker 1: That You had other examples of an American serviceman who

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Speaker 1: collaborated immediately with the Iranian students and began walking around

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Speaker 1: pointing out which of the officials in the foreign mission

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Speaker 1: were Cia who was one of the top officials, in

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Speaker 1: other words, saying these are the important people, and collaborated

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Speaker 1: very closely with them throughout. And you had gradations of

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Speaker 1: response that varied from one hostage to the next. We'll

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Speaker 1: have to go back to Michael for a second, because

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Speaker 1: you left him off the bus, and how did he

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Speaker 1: get to the airplane. Well, the agreement that the Iranians

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Speaker 1: had made with the United States that they would send

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Speaker 1: all the hostages home, and so somebody intervened at a

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Speaker 1: higher level and said, I don't care what he did

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Speaker 1: on the bus, He's got to be on that plane.

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Speaker 1: And so he did arrive elatedly and was put on

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Speaker 1: the plane. That's a pretty amazing story. Well, I want

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Speaker 1: to thank you. I think you're a remarkable writer. Everything

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00:26:21,440 --> 00:26:24,920
Speaker 1: I've read by you has been astonishingly well done. Well,

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00:26:24,920 --> 00:26:29,520
Speaker 1: I appreciate it. I'm grateful. Next, we'll look at the

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Speaker 1: forty year history between the United States and Iran. All Right,

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Speaker 1: this is newt Twenty twenty is going to be one

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Speaker 1: of the most extraordinary election years of our lifetime. I

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00:26:45,560 --> 00:26:48,200
Speaker 1: want to invite you to join my Inner Circle as

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00:26:48,240 --> 00:26:50,440
Speaker 1: we discuss each twist and turn in the race and

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Speaker 1: my members only Inner Circle Club. You will receive special

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Speaker 1: flash briefings, online events, and members only audio reports from

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Speaker 1: me and my team. Here's a special offer to my

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Speaker 1: podcast listeners. If you joined the Inner Circle today at

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Speaker 1: newtcenter circle dot com and sign up for a one

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Speaker 1: or two year membership, I'll send you a free personally

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Speaker 1: book at checkout. Sign up today at Newts Inner Circle

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Speaker 1: dot com Code free Book. This offer ends January thirty first.

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00:27:43,320 --> 00:27:46,440
Speaker 1: Alex Fatanka is the Senior Fellow at the Middle East Institute.

426
00:27:47,280 --> 00:27:50,600
Speaker 1: Because of your remarkable background, the degree to which you

427
00:27:50,640 --> 00:27:53,480
Speaker 1: really know this topic, has any of the last two

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00:27:53,480 --> 00:27:57,119
Speaker 1: weeks surprised you, Well, I'm not surprised by the protest

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00:27:57,320 --> 00:27:59,560
Speaker 1: because that has been going on on and off for

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00:27:59,560 --> 00:28:04,400
Speaker 1: so many years now, in a bit surprised by the

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00:28:04,520 --> 00:28:07,800
Speaker 1: US decision to take out US and Solemney. I'm still

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00:28:08,560 --> 00:28:10,840
Speaker 1: trying to figure out in a long term if this

433
00:28:10,960 --> 00:28:14,240
Speaker 1: is going to work out or not. It definitely had

434
00:28:14,760 --> 00:28:19,000
Speaker 1: put the fear of God into folks in Tehran that

435
00:28:19,240 --> 00:28:22,320
Speaker 1: Washington for so long has wanted to, you know, grab

436
00:28:22,400 --> 00:28:26,840
Speaker 1: their attentions and perhaps brought them to rethink some of

437
00:28:26,880 --> 00:28:29,960
Speaker 1: their policies. But look, I think overall the regiming is

438
00:28:29,960 --> 00:28:34,560
Speaker 1: in a terrible place. It's almost overwhelmingly their own doing.

439
00:28:35,280 --> 00:28:38,520
Speaker 1: And my fear is the supreme rally comedy at the top,

440
00:28:38,920 --> 00:28:42,480
Speaker 1: being the political character that he is, he might not

441
00:28:42,640 --> 00:28:46,400
Speaker 1: want to learn from his past mistakes occurrent mistakes that

442
00:28:46,480 --> 00:28:49,640
Speaker 1: he wants to stay the course. And my other fear

443
00:28:49,920 --> 00:28:53,360
Speaker 1: new is that this isn't just about US Iran. This

444
00:28:53,480 --> 00:28:56,480
Speaker 1: is about the likes of Russia and China. I would

445
00:28:56,480 --> 00:28:58,880
Speaker 1: love to know what they're telling the Iranians in terms

446
00:28:58,880 --> 00:29:02,600
Speaker 1: of stay the course on let the Americans prevail. The

447
00:29:02,720 --> 00:29:05,760
Speaker 1: last thing Moscow in Beijing, Wanta sees the USMBA se

448
00:29:05,760 --> 00:29:09,160
Speaker 1: reopening to rads. So there are so many factors going

449
00:29:09,240 --> 00:29:11,600
Speaker 1: on here. But do your point about am I surprise

450
00:29:12,680 --> 00:29:17,480
Speaker 1: not about the protest. This is a fundamentally unpopular regime

451
00:29:17,520 --> 00:29:21,200
Speaker 1: and has frankly been popular since the earliest days of

452
00:29:21,320 --> 00:29:24,000
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy nine. I mean I had told Hooman it

453
00:29:24,080 --> 00:29:26,520
Speaker 1: took only a few weeks before he really started showing

454
00:29:26,560 --> 00:29:29,480
Speaker 1: his real colors. So it's been a regime that's been

455
00:29:29,520 --> 00:29:34,800
Speaker 1: in place for forty years, overwhelmingly because it uses force

456
00:29:34,920 --> 00:29:37,800
Speaker 1: to stay in power. But you see with a younger generation,

457
00:29:38,040 --> 00:29:40,240
Speaker 1: they're not putting up with it anymore. They're out in

458
00:29:40,280 --> 00:29:44,160
Speaker 1: the street and literally risking their lives demanding change. Do

459
00:29:44,240 --> 00:29:47,200
Speaker 1: you get into these questions about who do you negotiate with?

460
00:29:47,640 --> 00:29:51,680
Speaker 1: Everybody who has power in this dictatorship has blood on

461
00:29:51,720 --> 00:29:55,120
Speaker 1: their hands. They were all prepared to kill as many

462
00:29:55,160 --> 00:29:58,320
Speaker 1: people as they had to. They're all prepared to torture

463
00:29:58,360 --> 00:30:00,800
Speaker 1: as many people as they had to. They're all prepared

464
00:30:01,080 --> 00:30:05,080
Speaker 1: to hang people from cranes in public in order to

465
00:30:05,200 --> 00:30:10,040
Speaker 1: terrify the population. I mean, that's who we're negotiating with. Dude,

466
00:30:10,080 --> 00:30:13,280
Speaker 1: I totally agree. This is a regime that staying power

467
00:30:13,440 --> 00:30:16,680
Speaker 1: not because it has won the hearts of its people.

468
00:30:17,400 --> 00:30:20,200
Speaker 1: This is a regime of staging power because if you're

469
00:30:20,200 --> 00:30:25,160
Speaker 1: standing its way, it will put you away in prison

470
00:30:25,520 --> 00:30:28,240
Speaker 1: or worst case scenarios, and they've done it plenty of times,

471
00:30:28,480 --> 00:30:32,280
Speaker 1: don't kill you. Absolutely, you do have a regime, certainly

472
00:30:32,280 --> 00:30:35,640
Speaker 1: at the top level. I don't think anybody disputes that

473
00:30:35,800 --> 00:30:37,560
Speaker 1: you can't stay in power as long as they have

474
00:30:38,120 --> 00:30:41,120
Speaker 1: doing the things they have done without most senior members

475
00:30:41,120 --> 00:30:44,120
Speaker 1: having blood on their hands. I thought that the shooting

476
00:30:44,160 --> 00:30:49,200
Speaker 1: down of the Ukrainian airline struck a very intense nerve

477
00:30:50,320 --> 00:30:53,200
Speaker 1: among the demonstrators. You suddenly had a real shift of

478
00:30:53,240 --> 00:30:57,120
Speaker 1: intensity and a real shift of clarity, and it was

479
00:30:57,160 --> 00:31:00,840
Speaker 1: almost like it was a final straw. Know, being a

480
00:31:00,840 --> 00:31:04,400
Speaker 1: Persian speaker, I pay a lot of attention to the chants.

481
00:31:04,520 --> 00:31:08,000
Speaker 1: You can pick up the latest scenes from Tehran literally

482
00:31:08,000 --> 00:31:11,040
Speaker 1: within minutes sitting here in Washington, as I do. And

483
00:31:11,120 --> 00:31:13,840
Speaker 1: the chance I was hearing this time around, and that

484
00:31:14,000 --> 00:31:16,160
Speaker 1: was true also back in November when we had the

485
00:31:17,080 --> 00:31:23,560
Speaker 1: previous rounds of protest, the chants were about one individual cominade,

486
00:31:23,640 --> 00:31:27,480
Speaker 1: this unelected supremeter who pretends to be God's man on

487
00:31:27,520 --> 00:31:30,840
Speaker 1: the planet. And the younger generation were in the streets,

488
00:31:31,240 --> 00:31:35,160
Speaker 1: did no longer talk about reform and small changes here

489
00:31:35,160 --> 00:31:38,120
Speaker 1: would make them happy. They're saying, this whole thing is rotten.

490
00:31:38,560 --> 00:31:42,080
Speaker 1: The entire system is beyond reform. It has to go.

491
00:31:42,720 --> 00:31:45,120
Speaker 1: And what happened with the shooting down of an airliner

492
00:31:45,800 --> 00:31:50,719
Speaker 1: here is the revolutionary guards, the foot soldiers of Ifela Comenade,

493
00:31:50,760 --> 00:31:52,920
Speaker 1: who have kept them in power for the last thirty

494
00:31:53,000 --> 00:31:57,760
Speaker 1: years and killed and imprisoned when necessary, have spent billions

495
00:31:57,800 --> 00:32:03,479
Speaker 1: of dollars in pursue of ideological projects inside Iran in

496
00:32:03,520 --> 00:32:06,959
Speaker 1: the region that we've seen in places like Iraq and Syria,

497
00:32:07,280 --> 00:32:10,640
Speaker 1: spending billions of dollars in arms. The missiles that they

498
00:32:10,760 --> 00:32:14,360
Speaker 1: used to bring down this Ukrainian airline there were Russians delivered,

499
00:32:14,760 --> 00:32:17,560
Speaker 1: and surprise, surprise, the Russians have good relations with the

500
00:32:17,640 --> 00:32:21,640
Speaker 1: Revolutionary Guards. But to your young Iranians in the streets,

501
00:32:21,680 --> 00:32:24,800
Speaker 1: they were saying, hang on a minute, Revolutionary Guards, what

502
00:32:25,000 --> 00:32:28,240
Speaker 1: is your job? Are you here to defend this nation

503
00:32:28,600 --> 00:32:32,719
Speaker 1: us Iranian citizens? Are you basically in the business of

504
00:32:32,760 --> 00:32:35,480
Speaker 1: getting rid of us? Because that's exactly what they did.

505
00:32:35,520 --> 00:32:38,360
Speaker 1: They get rid of the one hundred and seventy six

506
00:32:38,400 --> 00:32:40,720
Speaker 1: people on that plane. One hundred and sixty seven of

507
00:32:40,720 --> 00:32:45,480
Speaker 1: them were Iranian citizens, mostly carrying Iranian passports. Many of

508
00:32:45,520 --> 00:32:49,800
Speaker 1: them had Canadian citizenship but are Iranian origin. And the

509
00:32:49,840 --> 00:32:54,080
Speaker 1: irony mute is this. Many of those young ones we're

510
00:32:54,120 --> 00:32:57,920
Speaker 1: living in places like Sweden, UK and Canada were studying

511
00:32:57,920 --> 00:33:02,240
Speaker 1: in those places, going home to see families, to leave Iran,

512
00:33:02,360 --> 00:33:04,840
Speaker 1: to go back to live their normal lives in the West.

513
00:33:05,280 --> 00:33:08,880
Speaker 1: And guess what happens. The Revolutionary Guard's long arms somehow

514
00:33:08,960 --> 00:33:12,360
Speaker 1: brings them down and take their lives. And that's where

515
00:33:12,400 --> 00:33:16,200
Speaker 1: the anger was all about, that the incompetence of the

516
00:33:16,240 --> 00:33:20,240
Speaker 1: revolutionary guards. And one of the chants was the following news.

517
00:33:21,000 --> 00:33:24,600
Speaker 1: You take our young and brightest and you leave us

518
00:33:24,640 --> 00:33:29,240
Speaker 1: with these dinosauric clerics who have really nothing to contribute

519
00:33:29,640 --> 00:33:32,800
Speaker 1: to Iran's development, to the future of Iran. They don't

520
00:33:32,840 --> 00:33:35,720
Speaker 1: really do any good for Iranian national interest in any

521
00:33:35,800 --> 00:33:38,440
Speaker 1: way or shape or form. And that's what the anger

522
00:33:38,560 --> 00:33:42,720
Speaker 1: is all about. That who are you representing this Iranian regime?

523
00:33:42,720 --> 00:33:46,800
Speaker 1: Are you representing us ordinary Iranians? Are you representing just

524
00:33:47,000 --> 00:33:49,920
Speaker 1: yourself the few who have managed to stay in power.

525
00:33:50,600 --> 00:33:54,240
Speaker 1: That is a surprise. But I tell you what, if

526
00:33:54,280 --> 00:33:57,160
Speaker 1: the regime doesn't want to learn from its mistakes, this

527
00:33:57,240 --> 00:33:59,600
Speaker 1: is the avalanche. This is not going to be something

528
00:33:59,680 --> 00:34:04,120
Speaker 1: you can wish away. This will continue. It's comedies called

529
00:34:04,320 --> 00:34:06,600
Speaker 1: does he want to let this avalanche come and take

530
00:34:06,680 --> 00:34:11,520
Speaker 1: him down or is he gonna make changes? I'm very skeptical.

531
00:34:11,680 --> 00:34:16,000
Speaker 1: I think Common is a very stubborn individual. He rather died,

532
00:34:16,160 --> 00:34:19,000
Speaker 1: didn't admit to having made mistakes, to having taken the

533
00:34:19,040 --> 00:34:23,520
Speaker 1: country in the whole wrong direction. Certainly, Iran today nude

534
00:34:23,600 --> 00:34:25,960
Speaker 1: is in a very different place than the promises of

535
00:34:26,080 --> 00:34:30,400
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy nine when these iatolas took down the Shaw.

536
00:34:30,800 --> 00:34:33,759
Speaker 1: The promise at the time was democracy. Everybody's going to

537
00:34:33,800 --> 00:34:37,560
Speaker 1: have a better life, everybody's going to have political freedom

538
00:34:37,600 --> 00:34:40,279
Speaker 1: to say their peace. None of that has happened in

539
00:34:40,320 --> 00:34:44,880
Speaker 1: the last forty years. People tend to forget. Pamini arrived

540
00:34:46,080 --> 00:34:51,520
Speaker 1: in an alliance with the Iranian Communist Party on the

541
00:34:51,560 --> 00:34:55,240
Speaker 1: grounds that there will be a broad based democratic, modernizing system,

542
00:34:55,640 --> 00:34:57,560
Speaker 1: and I think it took him about four days to

543
00:34:57,640 --> 00:35:02,040
Speaker 1: consolidate enough power that he began. People in fact, to

544
00:35:02,200 --> 00:35:07,839
Speaker 1: read the now declassified documents from the Carter administration where

545
00:35:07,840 --> 00:35:11,680
Speaker 1: the CIA and the State Department were so totally wrong

546
00:35:11,719 --> 00:35:16,239
Speaker 1: about Homani, who was reassuring them that he was going

547
00:35:16,280 --> 00:35:18,400
Speaker 1: to be reasonable to work with, that he was not

548
00:35:18,520 --> 00:35:22,360
Speaker 1: anti American. I think outside of his immediate core group,

549
00:35:22,440 --> 00:35:26,000
Speaker 1: almost everybody was shocked in the opening sixty or ninety

550
00:35:26,080 --> 00:35:30,000
Speaker 1: days of that regime. Absolutely I knew you pointed out

551
00:35:30,040 --> 00:35:33,480
Speaker 1: the documents. The US was not aware of what Hoomani

552
00:35:33,560 --> 00:35:37,000
Speaker 1: stood for. Certainly, at the time, very few people had

553
00:35:37,000 --> 00:35:41,960
Speaker 1: a good idea of the idea of Shia militant Islamic worldview.

554
00:35:42,000 --> 00:35:44,120
Speaker 1: We found out later on, but as you pointed out,

555
00:35:44,200 --> 00:35:46,319
Speaker 1: literally within a few weeks and within months, you had

556
00:35:46,320 --> 00:35:49,920
Speaker 1: the US embers you taken by the Homans in November

557
00:35:49,920 --> 00:35:53,439
Speaker 1: of nineteen seventy nine. I think the point also needs

558
00:35:53,480 --> 00:35:56,239
Speaker 1: to be put out there, which I think might have

559
00:35:56,360 --> 00:35:59,160
Speaker 1: some relevance here in terms of US policy going forward.

560
00:35:59,280 --> 00:36:02,920
Speaker 1: At the time, the US wanted to hope for the

561
00:36:03,040 --> 00:36:08,840
Speaker 1: best when the shaf ultimately fell. Why because the Soviet

562
00:36:08,960 --> 00:36:11,759
Speaker 1: Union was a bigger threat, and the US reading was,

563
00:36:11,800 --> 00:36:14,840
Speaker 1: if we can kind of deal with this new Ayatollah Hoomani,

564
00:36:14,920 --> 00:36:18,719
Speaker 1: then it's better than losing Iran to those Communists were

565
00:36:18,880 --> 00:36:22,319
Speaker 1: just right behind Romania at the time. It didn't pan

566
00:36:22,440 --> 00:36:24,239
Speaker 1: out that way. It didn't work out that way, and

567
00:36:24,440 --> 00:36:26,720
Speaker 1: Romani was the smart one, I guess, of them all,

568
00:36:27,040 --> 00:36:29,480
Speaker 1: because he was ruthless and he got rid of anybody

569
00:36:29,480 --> 00:36:33,520
Speaker 1: who was in his way. Now, coming to twenty twenty,

570
00:36:33,880 --> 00:36:38,360
Speaker 1: my fear is is the US going to be forced

571
00:36:38,400 --> 00:36:42,760
Speaker 1: to have to shape its Iran policy based on Russian

572
00:36:42,800 --> 00:36:46,920
Speaker 1: and Chinese designs on Iran? Because I really can't believe

573
00:36:47,000 --> 00:36:49,920
Speaker 1: that the Russians of the Chinese have any interest in

574
00:36:50,000 --> 00:36:53,439
Speaker 1: seeing the US return to Iran or have regime change

575
00:36:53,480 --> 00:36:56,359
Speaker 1: in Iran, which essentially would mean Iran will come back

576
00:36:56,400 --> 00:36:59,440
Speaker 1: and be a pro American proest and country. That is

577
00:36:59,480 --> 00:37:02,400
Speaker 1: basic has always been based on the opinion of the

578
00:37:02,400 --> 00:37:06,000
Speaker 1: majority of Iranians. That is going to I think shape

579
00:37:06,200 --> 00:37:10,759
Speaker 1: the Russian and Chinese calculation. It might complicate life for

580
00:37:10,840 --> 00:37:14,600
Speaker 1: some folks in the Trump administration who in a heart

581
00:37:14,680 --> 00:37:17,840
Speaker 1: of heart want to see regime change, because that's basically

582
00:37:18,040 --> 00:37:21,960
Speaker 1: the public sentiment in Iran. But we are entering a

583
00:37:22,000 --> 00:37:25,160
Speaker 1: new Cold War era and every real state out there

584
00:37:25,160 --> 00:37:26,920
Speaker 1: in the world is going to be fought over, and

585
00:37:26,960 --> 00:37:30,560
Speaker 1: I have doubts whether we can expect Russia and China

586
00:37:30,680 --> 00:37:33,120
Speaker 1: not to put up a bigger fight than some people

587
00:37:33,200 --> 00:37:36,279
Speaker 1: might anticipate in terms of keeping this Iranian regime in

588
00:37:36,360 --> 00:37:40,399
Speaker 1: power because it serves their geopolitical interests. Well. Of course,

589
00:37:40,560 --> 00:37:43,560
Speaker 1: it was ironic the Russians and the Chinese are actually

590
00:37:43,560 --> 00:37:49,160
Speaker 1: holding a naval exercise with the Iranians and the Persian Gulf.

591
00:37:50,239 --> 00:37:53,560
Speaker 1: There was a real possibility that if you had gotten

592
00:37:53,600 --> 00:37:57,879
Speaker 1: into a US navy engagement that in fact, you could

593
00:37:57,920 --> 00:38:00,960
Speaker 1: have had collateral damage to Chinese and rush and ships.

594
00:38:01,320 --> 00:38:05,080
Speaker 1: Remember that if the Russians and the Chinese. We're not

595
00:38:05,239 --> 00:38:09,239
Speaker 1: propping up the dictatorship in Venezuela, it would have collapsed.

596
00:38:09,840 --> 00:38:12,719
Speaker 1: I think you're seeing a similar pattern in Korea. You're

597
00:38:12,719 --> 00:38:16,200
Speaker 1: seeing a similar pattern in Iran. I think you're exactly

598
00:38:16,280 --> 00:38:18,960
Speaker 1: right to focus on it because we don't currently have

599
00:38:19,000 --> 00:38:22,440
Speaker 1: a doctrine which allows us to think through how do

600
00:38:22,480 --> 00:38:26,680
Speaker 1: you dismantle a dictatorship if it's being propped up by

601
00:38:26,719 --> 00:38:29,040
Speaker 1: the Russians and the Chinese. And that's what we're going

602
00:38:29,080 --> 00:38:31,920
Speaker 1: to end up with. And this is a dictatorship which

603
00:38:31,920 --> 00:38:36,480
Speaker 1: currently has twenty thousand in the Revolutionary Guard one hundred

604
00:38:36,520 --> 00:38:39,560
Speaker 1: thousand and the regular military ground forces, twenty thousand in

605
00:38:39,560 --> 00:38:43,680
Speaker 1: the Navy, six hundred thousand paramilitary who can be used

606
00:38:43,719 --> 00:38:47,560
Speaker 1: to impose the will so overthrowing a dictatorship that can

607
00:38:47,640 --> 00:38:50,760
Speaker 1: call on seven hundred thousand plus that doesn't count the police,

608
00:38:51,160 --> 00:38:54,400
Speaker 1: so they probably have over a million people prepared to

609
00:38:54,520 --> 00:38:58,520
Speaker 1: use force in order to sustain the dictatorship. That's a

610
00:38:58,560 --> 00:39:03,680
Speaker 1: pretty big challenge for an unarmed populace, you know, by

611
00:39:03,800 --> 00:39:07,279
Speaker 1: most estimates, and we have really no hard data to

612
00:39:07,320 --> 00:39:10,120
Speaker 1: go by, because as you would expect, the radio regime

613
00:39:10,160 --> 00:39:13,719
Speaker 1: does not allow for public surveys to be carried out

614
00:39:13,760 --> 00:39:18,080
Speaker 1: in Iran, but by most educated estimates, something like ten

615
00:39:18,160 --> 00:39:21,799
Speaker 1: to fifteen percent of the Iranian population of eighty two

616
00:39:21,840 --> 00:39:26,960
Speaker 1: million are either supportive of the ideology of their regime or,

617
00:39:27,320 --> 00:39:30,440
Speaker 1: in the case of the majority, are basically receiving their

618
00:39:30,480 --> 00:39:32,960
Speaker 1: paycheck at the end of the month from this regime

619
00:39:33,000 --> 00:39:35,840
Speaker 1: and therefore they're kind of staying neutral in this. But

620
00:39:35,960 --> 00:39:38,560
Speaker 1: vast majority of the Iranians and the eighty two million

621
00:39:38,640 --> 00:39:41,520
Speaker 1: people in Iran are against the regime because they got

622
00:39:41,640 --> 00:39:47,080
Speaker 1: forty years policy failures to look at point two. I

623
00:39:47,120 --> 00:39:50,239
Speaker 1: wrote about this this week. I said, it seems very

624
00:39:50,280 --> 00:39:53,120
Speaker 1: clear to me that the Iranian people are saying to

625
00:39:53,160 --> 00:39:57,040
Speaker 1: their ruling elite, don't forget us. When you're busy out

626
00:39:57,080 --> 00:39:59,840
Speaker 1: there trying to help the likes of Bashasa or some

627
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:03,160
Speaker 1: somebody else in the region, what about us. You know,

628
00:40:03,600 --> 00:40:08,319
Speaker 1: by Hassandro Honey's Iranian president's own account, they have lost

629
00:40:08,360 --> 00:40:12,279
Speaker 1: two hundred billion dollars in terms of the sanctions that

630
00:40:12,320 --> 00:40:14,319
Speaker 1: the US have imposed on them, so they can't sell

631
00:40:14,400 --> 00:40:16,600
Speaker 1: their oils. They're losing out something like one hundred and

632
00:40:16,600 --> 00:40:20,399
Speaker 1: ten million dollars per day. We can just say, well,

633
00:40:20,400 --> 00:40:22,960
Speaker 1: that's just numbers, and that would have been something we

634
00:40:23,000 --> 00:40:27,000
Speaker 1: could ignore if everybody in Iran with having a happy life.

635
00:40:27,400 --> 00:40:30,000
Speaker 1: But the fact is they're not having a happy life,

636
00:40:30,000 --> 00:40:33,320
Speaker 1: they're not having the kind of life they want. And

637
00:40:33,520 --> 00:40:37,000
Speaker 1: you this is really important. One way of measuring if

638
00:40:37,000 --> 00:40:40,040
Speaker 1: the system delivers for its people or not is to

639
00:40:40,160 --> 00:40:44,480
Speaker 1: look at the immigration flows. You know, five million to

640
00:40:44,600 --> 00:40:47,920
Speaker 1: eight million Iranians now live outside of Iran and around

641
00:40:47,960 --> 00:40:51,440
Speaker 1: the world, from New Zealand to Buenos Iris. Ask to

642
00:40:51,520 --> 00:40:54,400
Speaker 1: self a simple question, if things are so good in Iran,

643
00:40:54,960 --> 00:40:57,960
Speaker 1: why did so many people suddenly would last forty years

644
00:40:58,040 --> 00:41:01,520
Speaker 1: decide to leave. Well, you don't have you answer, because

645
00:41:01,560 --> 00:41:05,520
Speaker 1: things are our working out and that includes many people

646
00:41:06,040 --> 00:41:09,440
Speaker 1: who have a job to crack down. But I suspect

647
00:41:09,480 --> 00:41:12,600
Speaker 1: at some point they're going to get tired of repressing,

648
00:41:12,719 --> 00:41:16,799
Speaker 1: of killing and putting people in prison, because oftentimes they're

649
00:41:16,880 --> 00:41:20,640
Speaker 1: killing and repressing their own folks in the neighborhood they

650
00:41:20,680 --> 00:41:25,040
Speaker 1: come from, if not family members. One of the biggest

651
00:41:25,200 --> 00:41:28,799
Speaker 1: so called opposition figures from two thousand and nine Green oppositions.

652
00:41:28,800 --> 00:41:31,200
Speaker 1: But when he's the second cousin of the supreme leader,

653
00:41:31,560 --> 00:41:34,920
Speaker 1: so sometimes even within families they have these disputes about

654
00:41:34,960 --> 00:41:37,600
Speaker 1: what are we doing? What's this regime about? Who are

655
00:41:37,600 --> 00:41:41,799
Speaker 1: we four? Is Hassan Ostralla of Lebanon more important than

656
00:41:41,840 --> 00:41:44,960
Speaker 1: your average Uranians year back home? These are some really

657
00:41:45,000 --> 00:41:49,000
Speaker 1: tough questions. But I'm afraid the eighty year old Supreme

658
00:41:49,200 --> 00:41:53,080
Speaker 1: Ter Carmona, he doesn't seem to care. He's really genuinely

659
00:41:53,120 --> 00:41:56,840
Speaker 1: seems to believe he knows best and the way forward

660
00:41:56,960 --> 00:42:00,480
Speaker 1: is to stay the course. And anybody who says anything

661
00:42:00,600 --> 00:42:03,000
Speaker 1: or criticize this, well, you can dismiss them. All of

662
00:42:03,560 --> 00:42:07,239
Speaker 1: CIA or Mossad agents that are all paid and all

663
00:42:07,280 --> 00:42:09,880
Speaker 1: the statistics point to the other reality that you know,

664
00:42:09,960 --> 00:42:13,120
Speaker 1: it's not a foreign plot. This is about Iranian people

665
00:42:13,120 --> 00:42:16,440
Speaker 1: in Iran have had enough. And you know, you can

666
00:42:16,520 --> 00:42:19,560
Speaker 1: blame it on Trump or Obama or the Israelians or

667
00:42:19,560 --> 00:42:23,839
Speaker 1: whoever you want, but these are all homegrown problems at

668
00:42:23,840 --> 00:42:26,319
Speaker 1: the hands of the Iranian regime, starting with I tell

669
00:42:26,360 --> 00:42:29,759
Speaker 1: of Romani nineteen seventy nine. It's a regime that it's

670
00:42:29,800 --> 00:42:33,160
Speaker 1: for a very tiny minority and forgotten about the majority

671
00:42:33,160 --> 00:42:37,840
Speaker 1: of Iranians. What should the American strategy be and what

672
00:42:37,920 --> 00:42:41,920
Speaker 1: should our goals be? That is the big question. Folks

673
00:42:42,200 --> 00:42:45,880
Speaker 1: around President Trump right now, from what I can tell,

674
00:42:46,160 --> 00:42:48,799
Speaker 1: most of them would want to see regime change, would

675
00:42:48,920 --> 00:42:52,040
Speaker 1: want to see kind of nineteen seventy nine in Iran

676
00:42:52,120 --> 00:42:55,560
Speaker 1: again you got a regime being entirely changed out. Something

677
00:42:55,600 --> 00:43:00,560
Speaker 1: else comes in, something secular or something rational, something at

678
00:43:00,600 --> 00:43:05,600
Speaker 1: peace with its neighbors, not help on exporting the Islamist ideology,

679
00:43:06,360 --> 00:43:09,920
Speaker 1: they might prevail. It really comes down to the situation

680
00:43:09,960 --> 00:43:12,040
Speaker 1: in the streets in t Ihran and the other Iranian

681
00:43:12,040 --> 00:43:15,480
Speaker 1: cities and towns. I can't sit here predict the revolution.

682
00:43:15,520 --> 00:43:18,239
Speaker 1: All I can tell you is people in Iran are

683
00:43:18,320 --> 00:43:21,759
Speaker 1: very angry. So if regime change becomes the policy of

684
00:43:21,920 --> 00:43:24,640
Speaker 1: the United States, which isn't really the case right now,

685
00:43:24,719 --> 00:43:27,759
Speaker 1: certainly not officially, then the US needs to look at

686
00:43:27,880 --> 00:43:31,200
Speaker 1: how do you help these people. I do think the

687
00:43:31,239 --> 00:43:35,160
Speaker 1: administration is not yet prepared to go to regime change

688
00:43:35,239 --> 00:43:38,880
Speaker 1: per se, but they certainly are looking for the equivalent

689
00:43:39,400 --> 00:43:44,319
Speaker 1: of a Polish strategy where the people are reinforced while

690
00:43:44,320 --> 00:43:48,440
Speaker 1: the people do what they need to have genuine freedom.

691
00:43:48,480 --> 00:43:50,600
Speaker 1: And I think that that's likely to continue, and they're

692
00:43:50,640 --> 00:43:53,400
Speaker 1: likely to actually ramp up the pressure even more. And

693
00:43:53,440 --> 00:43:55,879
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be at all surprised to see US begin

694
00:43:55,920 --> 00:43:59,000
Speaker 1: to apply pressure to China, because both with North Korea

695
00:43:59,000 --> 00:44:02,080
Speaker 1: and with Iran and Azuela, the Chinese are playing a

696
00:44:02,160 --> 00:44:05,359
Speaker 1: game that in the long run, we can't tolerate. So

697
00:44:05,480 --> 00:44:07,439
Speaker 1: I would not at all surprised to see that begid

698
00:44:07,480 --> 00:44:10,160
Speaker 1: to enter into the equation along the same line. But

699
00:44:10,400 --> 00:44:12,920
Speaker 1: I want to thank you personal though is very very helpful.

700
00:44:13,560 --> 00:44:17,440
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. A pleasure speaking to nude. Next

701
00:44:17,560 --> 00:44:20,279
Speaker 1: we'll talk about the courageous women of Iran and what

702
00:44:20,360 --> 00:44:31,600
Speaker 1: they have endured under sharia law. Hi, this is newt

703
00:44:31,920 --> 00:44:33,560
Speaker 1: twenty twenty is going to be one of the most

704
00:44:33,560 --> 00:44:36,640
Speaker 1: extraordinary election years of our lifetime. I want to invite

705
00:44:36,640 --> 00:44:39,560
Speaker 1: you to join my Inner Circle as we discuss each

706
00:44:39,600 --> 00:44:41,880
Speaker 1: twist and turn in the race and my members only

707
00:44:42,120 --> 00:44:47,080
Speaker 1: Inner Circle Club. You will receive special flash briefings, online events,

708
00:44:47,640 --> 00:44:50,920
Speaker 1: and members only audio reports from me and my team.

709
00:44:50,920 --> 00:44:53,960
Speaker 1: Here's a special offer to my podcast listeners. If you

710
00:44:54,080 --> 00:44:56,680
Speaker 1: joined the Inner Circle today at New Center Circle dot

711
00:44:56,680 --> 00:44:59,640
Speaker 1: com and sign up for a one or two year membership,

712
00:45:00,080 --> 00:45:03,080
Speaker 1: I'll send you a free personally autographed copy of my

713
00:45:03,120 --> 00:45:07,480
Speaker 1: book Jettisburg and a VIP fast pass to my live events.

714
00:45:08,320 --> 00:45:12,680
Speaker 1: Join my Inner Circle today at newts inner circle dot com.

715
00:45:12,960 --> 00:45:16,720
Speaker 1: Use the code free book at checkout. Sign up today

716
00:45:16,920 --> 00:45:20,640
Speaker 1: at newts inner circle dot com. Code free Book. This

717
00:45:20,880 --> 00:45:38,200
Speaker 1: software ends January thirty first. Manda zan Irvin is the

718
00:45:38,239 --> 00:45:42,239
Speaker 1: author of The Ladies Secret Society, History of the Courageous

719
00:45:42,280 --> 00:45:46,200
Speaker 1: Women of Iranu. Became very involved in very much an

720
00:45:46,239 --> 00:45:49,279
Speaker 1: activist as the founder and president of the Alliance of

721
00:45:49,320 --> 00:45:53,840
Speaker 1: Iranian Women. What led you personally to do this? It

722
00:45:54,120 --> 00:45:57,000
Speaker 1: is the history of Iranian woman. We have been fighting

723
00:45:57,040 --> 00:46:00,480
Speaker 1: for our rights for four hundred years against she had

724
00:46:00,560 --> 00:46:05,000
Speaker 1: clergy domination in our countries who were imported to Iran

725
00:46:05,760 --> 00:46:11,480
Speaker 1: from Anatolia in those times, the early seventeen hundred. These

726
00:46:11,520 --> 00:46:15,360
Speaker 1: were another branch of Ottoman Empire who attacked our country

727
00:46:15,360 --> 00:46:19,880
Speaker 1: and took over and they imported she had clergies to

728
00:46:19,920 --> 00:46:23,760
Speaker 1: our country. And ever since then we have been fighting

729
00:46:23,880 --> 00:46:27,960
Speaker 1: against the Sharia laws that these people have forced on us.

730
00:46:28,320 --> 00:46:32,640
Speaker 1: Share with us before they fall of the Shah, what

731
00:46:32,760 --> 00:46:35,920
Speaker 1: was happening with the status of women and what was

732
00:46:35,960 --> 00:46:40,719
Speaker 1: it like to be an Iranian woman prior to the

733
00:46:40,800 --> 00:46:45,960
Speaker 1: Ayatollah Hoomani coming back from Paris during seventies in Iran,

734
00:46:46,640 --> 00:46:51,040
Speaker 1: we had three women members of the Senator. One was

735
00:46:51,080 --> 00:46:59,560
Speaker 1: a woman lawyer who was the head of International Lawyer Association.

736
00:47:00,760 --> 00:47:05,800
Speaker 1: We had twenty eight members of parliament at that time

737
00:47:05,960 --> 00:47:10,520
Speaker 1: where women. Two members of the cabinet at that time

738
00:47:10,760 --> 00:47:16,399
Speaker 1: were women, one of whom was killed by Homany when

739
00:47:16,440 --> 00:47:20,839
Speaker 1: they took over the country. So we were completely a

740
00:47:20,840 --> 00:47:25,440
Speaker 1: part of society and we were equal. The women of

741
00:47:25,480 --> 00:47:29,920
Speaker 1: Iran had fought for it for two hundred years and

742
00:47:30,200 --> 00:47:34,400
Speaker 1: during the Panda dynasty took over, they were pro women,

743
00:47:34,520 --> 00:47:39,040
Speaker 1: they were patriotic, and we succeeded to get all our

744
00:47:39,160 --> 00:47:43,080
Speaker 1: rights back. The Shaw granted the right to vote and

745
00:47:43,239 --> 00:47:46,560
Speaker 1: to be elected, and you really were moving into a

746
00:47:46,719 --> 00:47:51,720
Speaker 1: significant level of equality in terms of opportunity in your rights.

747
00:47:52,360 --> 00:47:56,680
Speaker 1: Would that be a fair statement. Absolutely. The Clarity fought

748
00:47:56,800 --> 00:48:03,280
Speaker 1: us to the nail. They threatened the men's father's brother's

749
00:48:03,440 --> 00:48:06,840
Speaker 1: husband that if you let your women come out without

750
00:48:06,920 --> 00:48:10,680
Speaker 1: a job, we're going to destroy your business, destroy set

751
00:48:10,800 --> 00:48:14,680
Speaker 1: fire to your house, past pathway against you and so on.

752
00:48:15,239 --> 00:48:19,279
Speaker 1: The only thing that we could do was to go

753
00:48:19,480 --> 00:48:24,760
Speaker 1: and to ask the Shah to support us. And even

754
00:48:24,840 --> 00:48:29,040
Speaker 1: at that point, the Parliament, under the power of the

755
00:48:29,040 --> 00:48:33,359
Speaker 1: clergies would not help and would not allow the SHAW

756
00:48:33,560 --> 00:48:38,080
Speaker 1: to do anything in support of the women. So what happened.

757
00:48:38,400 --> 00:48:43,279
Speaker 1: The SHAW came up with a referendum, and within that

758
00:48:43,520 --> 00:48:48,760
Speaker 1: referendum there were three issues. One was equal rights for women,

759
00:48:49,320 --> 00:48:52,560
Speaker 1: the other one was the end of the issue of

760
00:48:52,719 --> 00:48:58,560
Speaker 1: clergies owning land and feudalism in Iran, and the next

761
00:48:58,560 --> 00:49:02,799
Speaker 1: one was education. Were all children of the country and

762
00:49:02,920 --> 00:49:08,880
Speaker 1: these three issues that were called White revolution. Iranian women

763
00:49:09,160 --> 00:49:17,160
Speaker 1: overwhelmingly voted for this referendum, and so under that vote

764
00:49:17,239 --> 00:49:21,879
Speaker 1: of the people of Iran, within this referendum, we succeeded

765
00:49:22,120 --> 00:49:25,719
Speaker 1: to get all our rights back. In nineteen seventy eight

766
00:49:25,760 --> 00:49:29,480
Speaker 1: could look forward to being integrated into the modern world,

767
00:49:30,040 --> 00:49:34,799
Speaker 1: been clothing, in occupation, in legal rights, most of the

768
00:49:34,840 --> 00:49:38,040
Speaker 1: time of great optimism that Iran was actually moving in

769
00:49:38,080 --> 00:49:42,320
Speaker 1: the right direction. Absolutely, we were moving to the right direction.

770
00:49:42,960 --> 00:49:48,920
Speaker 1: I was educated in United States under scholarships for women

771
00:49:49,200 --> 00:49:53,759
Speaker 1: to get foreign education. What really was going on at

772
00:49:53,800 --> 00:49:58,920
Speaker 1: that time Iran, who had been destroyed during the First

773
00:49:58,920 --> 00:50:02,360
Speaker 1: World War and six and World War we were just

774
00:50:02,719 --> 00:50:08,000
Speaker 1: making a comeback. And the United States has always been

775
00:50:08,320 --> 00:50:12,440
Speaker 1: a protector of Iran and Iranian people. I have the

776
00:50:12,480 --> 00:50:17,040
Speaker 1: whole history in my book that how United States at

777
00:50:17,200 --> 00:50:24,200
Speaker 1: every step of the way anti colonialism and supported Iran

778
00:50:24,600 --> 00:50:30,480
Speaker 1: against the Russians and British colonialism in Iran and Iranians

779
00:50:30,840 --> 00:50:35,239
Speaker 1: love America. It's only the curgy who hates America. The

780
00:50:35,360 --> 00:50:40,799
Speaker 1: people of Iran love America because our history shows that

781
00:50:40,800 --> 00:50:44,080
Speaker 1: it was the Americans who had opened schools in Iran

782
00:50:44,640 --> 00:50:50,560
Speaker 1: despite the pressures of Russians and British colonialists to educate

783
00:50:50,680 --> 00:50:54,880
Speaker 1: Iranian children, including my mom and my dad. It was

784
00:50:55,000 --> 00:51:00,400
Speaker 1: the Americans who prevented salmon in Iran after the Second

785
00:51:00,440 --> 00:51:06,719
Speaker 1: World War when the Allies had occupied Iran. So Iranian

786
00:51:06,880 --> 00:51:12,600
Speaker 1: teapots really love America. We have a long history of

787
00:51:13,040 --> 00:51:19,360
Speaker 1: America standing by the people of Iran. When Homony comes

788
00:51:19,400 --> 00:51:23,600
Speaker 1: back from Paris, everything starts to change almost overnight, doesn't

789
00:51:23,600 --> 00:51:27,760
Speaker 1: that well? Yes, of course, the legal age of marriage

790
00:51:28,000 --> 00:51:34,280
Speaker 1: before them was eighteen. When they took over, within three months,

791
00:51:34,840 --> 00:51:38,440
Speaker 1: the whole charial law was downloaded on the country and

792
00:51:38,600 --> 00:51:41,840
Speaker 1: on their charial law. An age of marriage for a

793
00:51:41,960 --> 00:51:47,720
Speaker 1: girl is nine and for a boy is sixteen. Also

794
00:51:48,360 --> 00:51:53,839
Speaker 1: one atrocity is that for the girls the law of

795
00:51:54,160 --> 00:52:00,440
Speaker 1: criminal responsibility on women is age of nine, so I

796
00:52:00,560 --> 00:52:04,240
Speaker 1: really was a reversion almost to the Middle Ages. Absolutely,

797
00:52:04,760 --> 00:52:08,520
Speaker 1: what are your sense of what's happening now? Right now Iran,

798
00:52:09,080 --> 00:52:13,279
Speaker 1: they're the youngest nation in the world as far at

799
00:52:13,320 --> 00:52:16,520
Speaker 1: the age of population is concerned, because when Komeni took over,

800
00:52:16,840 --> 00:52:20,839
Speaker 1: he kept telling people go make children. But these young

801
00:52:21,040 --> 00:52:25,640
Speaker 1: people who were born and released during this regime, they

802
00:52:25,640 --> 00:52:30,320
Speaker 1: don't want this system. Nineteen ninety eight was a huge

803
00:52:30,440 --> 00:52:35,640
Speaker 1: uprising in the University of Tehran. Eight thousand students were killed,

804
00:52:36,280 --> 00:52:40,640
Speaker 1: and the revolutionary gards went into the high rise buildings

805
00:52:40,719 --> 00:52:44,120
Speaker 1: that the students lived and they checked the doors in,

806
00:52:44,560 --> 00:52:47,719
Speaker 1: opened the windows and threw them out, no matter what

807
00:52:47,960 --> 00:52:53,839
Speaker 1: floor they were. And the crimes they have committed against humanity,

808
00:52:54,680 --> 00:53:00,920
Speaker 1: it's unbelievable. Ninety seven percent of the people of Iran

809
00:53:02,000 --> 00:53:06,120
Speaker 1: hate this regime and they don't want it. And the

810
00:53:06,160 --> 00:53:11,839
Speaker 1: only reason these people are in power is because foreign influence.

811
00:53:12,280 --> 00:53:14,959
Speaker 1: They don't care about the women and children and men

812
00:53:15,120 --> 00:53:20,400
Speaker 1: in Iran. France, Germany and Britain and some of the

813
00:53:20,760 --> 00:53:26,680
Speaker 1: Scandinavian countries. They want to cheap this regime because they

814
00:53:26,719 --> 00:53:32,320
Speaker 1: are using them for their own economic interests. I am

815
00:53:32,360 --> 00:53:39,600
Speaker 1: asking America to stand by humanity and end this criminal

816
00:53:40,280 --> 00:53:48,239
Speaker 1: system and tell the Western European countries you are free,

817
00:53:48,680 --> 00:53:55,600
Speaker 1: the democratic, progressive countries. How can you put business interests

818
00:53:56,200 --> 00:54:00,600
Speaker 1: ahead of the rights of Iranian women and child the

819
00:54:00,760 --> 00:54:04,719
Speaker 1: children of that country. When you watch all this and

820
00:54:04,800 --> 00:54:07,480
Speaker 1: I know it must be very frustrating at times, and

821
00:54:07,680 --> 00:54:11,279
Speaker 1: you see the United States ship a billion dollars in

822
00:54:11,360 --> 00:54:17,000
Speaker 1: cash to the dictatorship, mean, what's your reaction. My reaction

823
00:54:17,239 --> 00:54:22,480
Speaker 1: is okay, So the criminals are getting paid to continue

824
00:54:22,719 --> 00:54:27,279
Speaker 1: chilling Iranian women and children. You created the Alliance of

825
00:54:27,320 --> 00:54:30,279
Speaker 1: Iranian Women. Share with us what the goals of the

826
00:54:30,320 --> 00:54:34,000
Speaker 1: alliance are and how it operates. A group of US

827
00:54:34,040 --> 00:54:40,520
Speaker 1: Iranian American women decided to get together and establish an organization,

828
00:54:41,080 --> 00:54:46,279
Speaker 1: and it starts fighting and speaking for our sisters and

829
00:54:46,360 --> 00:54:52,759
Speaker 1: their children inside Iran who cannot speak up and if

830
00:54:52,800 --> 00:54:55,920
Speaker 1: they do, nobody hears them and nobody listens to them.

831
00:54:56,520 --> 00:54:59,720
Speaker 1: So that's how we got together and establish this Alliance

832
00:54:59,760 --> 00:55:04,160
Speaker 1: of Iranian Women and started all kinds of activism to

833
00:55:04,400 --> 00:55:08,200
Speaker 1: bring the voice of Iranian women to the West to America.

834
00:55:08,960 --> 00:55:13,320
Speaker 1: The last five years I have been working doing research

835
00:55:13,400 --> 00:55:17,880
Speaker 1: to write these books. The Lady's Secret Society and show

836
00:55:18,080 --> 00:55:22,239
Speaker 1: eight thousand years of the history of Iranian women and

837
00:55:22,440 --> 00:55:27,239
Speaker 1: how we have been warriors, how we have been rulers,

838
00:55:27,320 --> 00:55:32,440
Speaker 1: we have been ambassadors. I wrote this book to tell America, please,

839
00:55:32,600 --> 00:55:35,120
Speaker 1: this is not our culture. You want to know who

840
00:55:35,120 --> 00:55:39,080
Speaker 1: we are? Who art Iranians art here? It is? This

841
00:55:39,320 --> 00:55:43,680
Speaker 1: is us, and learn and respect the people of Iran

842
00:55:44,440 --> 00:55:48,160
Speaker 1: for who we are, not for what this regime is.

843
00:55:48,800 --> 00:55:52,239
Speaker 1: Your new book, which I recommend, The Lady's Secret Society,

844
00:55:52,680 --> 00:55:55,279
Speaker 1: gives you the courageous woman of Iran, your effort here

845
00:55:55,320 --> 00:55:59,759
Speaker 1: to create an intellectual framework to communicate the truth, to

846
00:56:00,040 --> 00:56:03,640
Speaker 1: remind us that there is a long history of a

847
00:56:03,760 --> 00:56:07,960
Speaker 1: dramatically better, more open, and freer society in Iran, and

848
00:56:08,040 --> 00:56:11,080
Speaker 1: that we don't have to assume that the dictatorship of

849
00:56:11,120 --> 00:56:15,440
Speaker 1: Homani and his successors is permanent or inevitable. We're going

850
00:56:15,480 --> 00:56:17,840
Speaker 1: to do all weekend to work with you and to

851
00:56:17,920 --> 00:56:21,359
Speaker 1: help free the people of Iran from this terrible dictatorship.

852
00:56:21,760 --> 00:56:24,960
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. You've always been a supporter of

853
00:56:25,040 --> 00:56:29,040
Speaker 1: Iranian people, and we really really appreciate what you have

854
00:56:29,200 --> 00:56:38,200
Speaker 1: done for us. The fact is that Iran matters because

855
00:56:38,239 --> 00:56:41,240
Speaker 1: it is a huge country. It has the second largest

856
00:56:41,280 --> 00:56:44,920
Speaker 1: supply of oil and natural gas of the world. That

857
00:56:45,120 --> 00:56:47,839
Speaker 1: is a country of the great history and tradition. It

858
00:56:47,920 --> 00:56:54,000
Speaker 1: is strategically located with Russia, Afghanistan, and Saudi Arabia and

859
00:56:54,040 --> 00:56:58,160
Speaker 1: Iraq as neighbors. And we have to look at what's

860
00:56:58,280 --> 00:57:01,800
Speaker 1: motivating the current government was motivating the people of Iran

861
00:57:01,880 --> 00:57:05,160
Speaker 1: as they respond to that government. What realistically can we

862
00:57:05,200 --> 00:57:08,680
Speaker 1: accomplish and what's at stake in trying to convince the

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Speaker 1: Iranian dictatorship at a minimum, to quit being an aggressive

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Speaker 1: supporter of state terrorism around the world and at a maximum,

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Speaker 1: to help the people of Iran actually regained control of

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Speaker 1: their country. Thank you to my guests Mark Bowden, Alex Batanka,

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Speaker 1: and Manda zan Irvine. You can read more about our

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Speaker 1: forty year history with the Iranian dictatorship and view excerpts

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Speaker 1: of my guests books on our show page at newtsworld

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Speaker 1: dot com. Newtsworld is produced by Westwood On. Our executive

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Speaker 1: producer is Debbie Myers and our producer is Garnsey Slump.

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Speaker 1: Our editor is Robert Borowski, and our researcher is Rachel Peterson.

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Speaker 1: Our guest booker is Tamara Coleman. The artwork for the

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Speaker 1: show was created by Steve Pendley. The music was composed

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Speaker 1: by Joey Saalban. Special thanks to the team at Gingwich

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Speaker 1: three sixty and Westwood One's John Wardock and Robert Mothers.

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Speaker 1: Please email me with your comments at Newt at newtsworld

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Speaker 1: dot com. If you've been enjoying Newtsworld, I hope you'll

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Speaker 1: go to Apple podcast and both rate us with five

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00:58:15,880 --> 00:58:19,200
Speaker 1: stars and give us a review so others can learn

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Speaker 1: what it's all about. On the next episode of Newtsworld,

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Speaker 1: I'm going to talk about the Republican Challenge in twenty twenty.

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Speaker 1: I think there's a great opportunity, but I think it

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Speaker 1: requires a very different approach than Republicans are used to.

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Speaker 1: I'm Newt Gingwich. This is Newtsworld, the Westwood One podcast Network.