Barzin Pakandam's Open Salon Blog

Why the Boston Bombers are Terrorists, and Why it Matters

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 21:04:03 -0400

This week, in the wake of the capture of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, a debate has been brewing amongst the pundit class as to whether the media and the government rushed to judgment regarding the brothers’ alleged terrorist connections. Many liberal pundits believe that the labeling is racially or discriminatorily applied, and argue that Middle Easterners/Muslims (it should be clarified that the Tsarnaev brothers are not Middle Eastern) who behave violently are quickly labeled terrorists, while white Americans who go on shooting sprees are not similarly labeled.

The way I see it, this is an incorrect assessment.

First, when the President initially identified the Boston bombing a “terrorist act,” the perpetrators were not yet identified. Initially, some argued that the act could easily have been perpetrated by domestic terrorists. Thus, the act itself was worthy of the label “terrorist act,” so presumably, whoever was connected to it would have been deemed a terrorist.

More broadly however, the question becomes, what constitutes a “terrorist”? Or even, an “act of terror”? An expansive definition – one that attempts to be inclusive, while not so broad that it includes all violent acts – is something along the lines of:

Those violent acts which:

(1) are intended to create fear (terror);

(2) are perpetrated for a religious, political or, ideological goal;

(3) deliberately target or disregard the safety of non-combatants (civilians); and

(4) are affiliated with a larger organizational framework.

The first three characteristics need little explanation. The fourth requires a bit more inquiry, because ostensibly, many deranged actors – Jared Loughner, for example – affiliate themselves with a larger organization or network.

At the least, such a network will promote political, religious, or ideological causes through acts of violence. Further, it should be a tangible network of people with similar aims and intentions. Most crazed gunmen would not meet this criteria because they work as lone wolves. Though some may believe themselves to be affiliated with a larger organization, that organization is either nonexistent, or too amorphous.

To further help define who is – and is not – a terrorist, we must look to motive. Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s radical Islamic ideology, and the rhetoric that helps explain his motive, is sufficient to categorize him as a terrorist. There may be separate questions as to "Why him?" (He was a loser, felt isolated from American culture, was disaffected, or mental illness), but those questions go to the heart of why he was a good candidate to become a terrorist. The act itself, connected with the motive and rhetoric, makes it a terrorist act.

Why it Matters

The terrorist label is important because it permits law enforcement to devote resources to investigating and preventing incidents that are tied to similar motives. That's probably the biggest differentiator between Tamerlan's behavior and that of Adam Lanza. Lanza's shooting spree was more an act of randomness tied to mental illness and access to deadly weapons, whereas, the Boston bombings seem less like a random act.

In addition, people linked to terrorist networks are, in a sense, more dangerous, because even after they perpetrate their act, the organization will continue to exist. When lone wolves go on a rampage, their capture or death generally means the end of that incident. Their acts are not connected to a larger head. For example, if we look to the 1999 Columbine shootings, it would not be good to suggest that the “trench coat mafia” was an organization, because it died along with the two shooters.

Finally, in coming back to the Tsarnaev brothers, the organizational link is radical Islam. Radical Islam is undoubtedly a fairly expansive, loosely interconnected organization, with multiple heads. But there is an overarching vitriolic message, and the actors do feel linked to something larger than themselves. It also provides a framework for disaffected Muslim youth to channel their fear, anger, and frustration. A young kid who is otherwise not connected to a “cell” may find what he [always a he] needs through websites, chat-rooms, and videos of sermons. He then often seeks out and reinforces those beliefs. It appears that this was exactly the path that Tamerlan Tsarnaev followed.

Thus, while the mainstream media likely didn’t consider these factors when it labeled the Tsarnaev brothers terrorists, it arrived at the right conclusion. If these two kids got their message to do harm from some form of Islam – which it increasingly looks like they did – then they are rightly branded terrorists, and we should be supportive of the government’s efforts to identify future actors.

Celebrating Columbus Day

Mon, 8 Oct 2012 20:10:50 -0400

Like so many once bland and unobjectionable topics in America, Columbus Day has tragically morphed into a battleground for ideological warfare. Adoration or scorn for Columbus is loaded with underlying symbolism. Some see him as a symbol of America’s spirit of exploration, a hero who journeyed to the far corners of the known world, challenged contemporaneous misconceptions, and radically altered the course of history. To others, he embodies the archtypical oppressor, a man who set in place a chain of events that culminated with end of Native American history and the emergence of Euro-American history. They see Columbus as an early forefather to America, imposing his will on the weak and rewriting history in the name of the victor.

It's hard to sit on the sidelines without comment. The two opposing points on the spectrum both seem rather ridiculous. But while I understand the reason for simplifying a person for the purpose of creating a parable, I find it rather sanctimonious and unfair when people attribute modern values onto historical figures. Those who see Columbus as anything more than a man of his time fundamentally misunderstand Columbus' role in helping conceive the philosophical worldview that now damns him.

To explain this point, we must first understand the historical context in 1492. When Columbus sailed the Atlantic in search of spices and riches from the Indian subcontinent, he did so under the auspices of the Spanish flag and in tribute to the Catholic Church. His obligation to the Church was simple: find heathens and civilize them. His obligation to the Spanish monarchs (who were busy running a minor domestic operation lopping off Muslim and Jewish heads) was to bring back wealth and glory. And so Columbus set course due west with the dual obligation of converting uncivilized men and helping fund Spain’s bloody Inquisition.

It is intuitively obvious that Columbus did not 'discover' the Americas, but it should also be obvious that Columbus assumed in good faith that he was carrying out "God's work" in trying to 'civilize' those whom he thought he discovered. Enlightenment ideas of liberalism, fraternity, and equality of man would not exist in the popular consciousness for another several centuries. More notably, the moral compass of the time – the Catholic Church – espoused a violent and dehumanizing view of non-Catholics. A long-running theological debate centered on the question of whether killing a non-Catholic was even killing a man.

But let’s briefly return to this all-important concept of modern liberal values. The political philosophy that articulates man’s duty to man evolved as a consequence of centuries of colonization and of Europeans traversing continents. It was the consequence of accumulated knowledge about foreign lands and foreign cultures (correlated with rapid economic and scientific expansion) and of Europeans thinking deeply about the moral consciousness of humanity. But in order for this moral consciousness to develop, Europeans first had to [philisophically] evolve beyond the growing pains of history. It is thus fairly presumptuous and insincere to impose post-Enlightenment liberal values on a man who operated under a completely different value system.

To articulate this point, we go back to the Americas of the 1500s. It is often forgotten that the principle allies of the Spanish Conquistadors – men like Cortés and Velásquez – were Native Americans once colonized by the Inca. These natives allied with the Conquistadors so as to exact revenge on their previous exploiters. I raise this fact not to suggest that Europeans were somehow more enlightened, or compare brutal acts against brutal acts. Rather, the point helps illustrate that enlightenment ideals didn't exist. People everywhere tended to be barbarous to each other. That was the name of the game.

In returning to Columbus, we must ask ourselves, why do we celebrate this man? Assuming for the moment that Columbus could not live up to our modern moral standard, we still celebrate him as an explorer who pushed the outer bounds of the known world. The myth of Christopher Columbus glorifies an essential American credo, and his spirit of exploration has inspired Americans to explore the unknown. A linear case can be made that the Mars rover of today takes its inspiration from stories of Columbus.

Most of history's heroes were flawed men (as far as I can tell, the only exception is Jesus). Winston Churchill was an avowed colonialist. Franklin Roosevelt interned Japanese. George Washington executed deserters. Thomas Jefferson was a slave owner who fathered bastard children with his slave. Abraham Lincoln did untold things to save the union. But in the balance of history, these men are seen as Great men. Yes, some of that is mythmaking, but what is so wrong with a few superheroes?

Poor Columbus died destitute and impoverished in prison on the island of Hispaniola. After making a name for himself, Europe didn't even honor him as the explorer who 'discovered' the Americas. That honor somehow went to Americo Vespucci, who usurped Columbus and got his [first] name tagged onto not one, but two continents. It wasn't until the early 1800s that post-colonial South Americans honored Columbus' spirit by giving him an eponym of his own, a beautiful country that we would all do well to explore.

In the United States we honor him too. We utter his name every time we mention the nation's capital. To honor his spirit, and maybe to help indoctrinate our youth about the glory of exploration, we gave him a holiday. He deserves it.

The Insanity Behind Inadequate Gun Control

Wed, 8 Aug 2012 12:08:49 -0400

In the span of two weeks Americans have been hit with two devastating public policy tragedies, both of which are the consequence of madmen wielding guns. Yesterday, the perpetrator of last year’s schizophrenic tragedy, Jared Loughner, was deemed coherent enough to plead guilty to 19 of 49 charges, including the attempted assassination of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and the incidental killing of a nine-year-old girl who happened to be in his way. But we Americans are well aware that these recent incidents are hardly the beginning of a trend. In fact, in the last two decades we have experienced so many such incidents that they now inspire a routine reaction, farcically articulated by The Onion after the Aurora, Colorado shooting.

These tragedies, and the many others that came before them, always seem to spark genuine sounding public policy debate over issues of mental health. In the case of last Sunday’s Milwaukee shooting, the focus shifted to the gunman’s alleged ties to white supremacist groups and the source of his anger. It is presumed that he was after Muslims, and instead, found himself in a Sikh temple. We fear these agents of chaos because they hit us in our schools, temples, and movie theatres. They are the embodiment of terror because they attack the most vulnerable. And so, we debate endlessly about extremism, racism, our frantic, stress filled lifestyles, and the merits of mental health.

It would be an act of willful negligence to ignore the common thread that underlies these killings: in virtually every case, the perpetrator was a disaffected young man with mental health issues. But maybe it is an act of collective political convenience that motivates politicians to ignore the elephant in the room: these disaffected young men with mental health issues had access to multiple guns, purchased them easily, purchased ammunition discreetly, and often planned their attacks methodically. It is an inconvenient truth that in every single case innocent people were targeted and killed.

The legitimate public policy debate about gun control is almost never a topic of serious conversation by policy makers. Those who secretly wish for it cower from the oversized influence of the NRA. Even Bill Clinton, who after years of wrangling with House Republicans over the passage of the Brady bill and the assault weapons ban (which expired in 2004), understood that supporters of limitless gun rights were single issue voters who viciously penalized politicians who did not acquiesce to their radical demands.

Guns are a way of life in the Appalachian, and anyone who dares question the sacrosanctity of that statement be damned. There exists a whole arena of paid political operatives whose purpose is to convince the general public of this viewpoint. In 2005, John Lott Jr. of the American Enterprise Institute – a right leaning think-tank in Washington D.C. – pointed to the declining gun violence that followed the expiration of the assault weapons ban the previous year. His argument was, in no unclear terms, that more guns means less gun violence. Naturally, Mr. Lott forgot to mention that gun violence of the “normal” kind (robbery, drug violence, etc.) is economic in nature. People usually kill other people for money. But the people who go on mass shooting sprees in schools and public places are not killing for money. They are killing because they can.

Others argue that regulation on the sale of arms is a “slippery slope.” It is a paranoid argument peddled by those who fear that one day they will have to take up arms against the tyranny of their government. These people likely see themselves as the last gasp hope between the “people” and the fascist government that intends to enslave them. On its face, there is some theoretical merit to this argument, after all, our nation was founded by those who rebelled against the tyranny of their government. The founders were so fearful of tyrannical government that they enshrined the right to bear arms (by state militias) directly into the Constitution. But surely, a bit of cost-benefit must be done as to where theory ends and practical matter of dead civilians begins. In fact, measuring the common good to society is a running theme for government. The Constitution also guarantees free speech, but not in all cases. We are not allowed to run into a theatre and scream “fire,” for though we would be practicing free speech, we would be creating a public hazard. Ironically, we are still permitted to bring several automatic weapons into a theatre – ostensibly to defend ourselves against our government. The Constitution is a finely crafted document, but its authors anticipated evolution where needed. Where is the evolution to the second amendment?

Then there are those who argue against gun control based on the premise that “guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” (Ah, the tyranny of clichés.) The argument is simple: guns are just as dangerous as many other objects of modern life. Cars, airplanes, even food can be used as deadly weapons. In fact, all of those things have been used as deadly weapons. And so, the argument goes, we should not fear guns, for we do not fear cars, airplanes, and food. Rather, we should fear those who wield such weapons without skill or caution, for they are the real problem.

This argument is specious at best. It is a thinly veiled effort to confuse and distort. Those other objects – the cars, the planes, the food – each serve a utilitarian purpose that extends beyond killing. Further, virtually all objects of modern convenience are in fact highly regulated. We regulate who can and cannot drive a car. We regulate the speed at which people can drive. We regulate who can and cannot get into an airplane. We overregulate what people can bring inside a plane. We regulate our food (So much so that if a few people get sick we are prepared to destroy an entire crop of cantaloupes.). Regulation is part-and-parcel to living in modern society. It is a necessary evil, and though not perfect, we regulate so as to protect the common good.

Gun control is good public policy. No measure of cognitive dissonance or data mining will convince you otherwise. Gun control does not mean the complete elimination of guns. That is simply untenable. But there is no reasonable need to permit the availability of the most lethal semi-automatic and automatic weapons. There is no need for cop-killer bullets, or for magazines that hold so many bullets. All of these things serve a singular purpose, killing many lives with precision and efficiency. That is their sole utilitarian purpose. Limiting the sale of heavy artillery does not interfere with hunters. It does not interfere with a person’s right to protect her home from intruders. It will likely not even limit gun violence very much. What it will do is make it harder for the mentally deranged and the extremist hate mongers to apply their chaos.

Gun control is good public policy. So why can’t the majority of Americans face the NRA?

Here are but a few of the gun inspired incidents since 1990:

Aug. 5, 2012: A white supremacist enters a Sikh temple in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and begins firing with a 9mm semi-automatic handgun. Seven people are killed before the gunman is shot dead by police.

July 20, 2012: A gunman begins shooting inside a movie theatre in Aurora, Colorado, killing 14 and wounding 59 others. He carried an assault rifle, a shotgun, and a handgun. He had also booby-trapped his home with multiple homemade explosives.

April 2, 2012: A gunman enters the campus of Oikos University, a Korean Christian college in Oakland, California, and begins shooting at students and staff. Seven people are killed, and three others injured.

Jan. 8, 2011: Tucson, Arizona. Jared Loughner attempts to kill Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and shoots her through the head at point-blank range. Afterward, he begins shooting at others in the crowd, killing six others.

Nov. 5, 2009: The Army says 13 people were killed and 30 wounded in a shooting rampage at its Fort Hood base in Texas.

April 3, 2009: A 41-year-old man opened fire at an immigrant community center in Binghamton, N.Y., killing 11 immigrants and two workers. Jiverly Wong, a Vietnamese immigrant and a former student at the center, killed himself as police rushed to the scene.

Feb. 14, 2008: Former student Steven Kazmierczak, 27, opened fire in a lecture hall at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, fatally shooting five students and wounding 18 others before committing suicide.

Dec. 5, 2007: 19-year-old Robert A. Hawkins opened fire with a rifle in Omaha, Neb., at a Von Maur store in the Westroads Mall, killing eight people before taking his own life. Five more people were wounded, two critically.

April 16, 2007: Cho Seung-Hui, 23, fatally shot 32 people in a dorm and a classroom at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, then killed himself in the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

Feb. 12, 2007: 18-year-old Sulejman Talovic killed five and wounded four at the Trolley Square mall in Salt Lake City, Utah. He was then shot and killed by police.

Oct. 2, 2006: Charles Carl Roberts IV, 32, shot to death five girls at West Nickel Mines Amish School in Pennsylvania, then killed himself.

March 21, 2005: 16-year-old student Jeffrey Weise killed nine people, including his grandfather and his grandfather's companion at home, and then five fellow students, a teacher and a security guard at Red Lake High School in Red Lake, Minnesota, before killing himself. Seven students were wounded.

March 12, 2005: Terry Ratzmann, 44, gunned down members of his congregation as they worshipped at the Brookfield Sheraton in Brookfield, Wisconsin, slaying seven and wounding four before killing himself.

July 29, 1999: Former day trader Mark Barton, 44, killed nine people in shootings at two Atlanta, Georgia, brokerage offices, then committed suicide.

April 20, 1999: Students Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, opened fire at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, killing 12 classmates and a teacher and wounding 26 others before committing suicide in the school's library.

May 28, 1998: Kip Kinkel, a 15-year-old high school student from Springfield, Oregon kills his parents and returns to his high school. Two students are killed and 22 others wounded. Kinel was carrying 3 guns and 1,127 rounds of ammunition.

March 24, 1998: Andrew Golden, 11, and Mitchell Johnson, 13, killed four girls and a teacher at a Jonesboro, Arkansas, middle school. 10 others were wounded in the shooting.

October 16, 1991: George Hennard, 35, smashed his pickup truck through a Luby's Cafeteria window in Killeen, Texas, and fired on the lunchtime crowd with a high-powered pistol, killing 22 people. At least 20 others were wounded.

The GOP’s Tea Party Problem

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 22:02:05 -0500

A few months ago Republican pundits were gleefully predicting a resurgent GOP that would dominate the 2012 election season. While some busied themselves with measuring new drapes for the Oval Office, others brazenly discussed the possibility of regaining both houses of Congress.

And then the Republican Primary season, with its sickly frontrunner and circus show of misfits and weirdos, began to perform its act for the American people. This primary season is as shocking as anyone inside of the Republican establishment can remember. For months now, virtually everyone inside the GOP political machine has assumed that Romney will eventually seal the nomination and begin to prepare his campaign for a showdown with the president.

So why is it that one day before the Michigan and Arizona primaries, and a week before Super Tuesday, Mitt Romney is neck and neck with his [latest] challenger, Rick Santorum? More importantly, why is it that in the last two weeks the GOP’s message, which was all about reducing the federal deficit and growing the economy, has suddenly and radically shifted back to Rick Santorum’s favorite talking points, abortion and gay rights?

On the surface, the answers are obvious. Santorum believes that culture wars help secure the conservative Republican base. He feels that by making statements like “I don’t believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute,” he looks tall in front of social conservatives (and by contrast, reminds everyone that Romney isn’t really conservative).

But the pivot away from discussions of the economy reflects a reality that Republicans fear. The GOP spent Obama’s first term repudiating every proposed policy and characterizing each as a failure. Unfortunately for them, it’s beginning to seem like despite everything, Obama’s policies actually worked. The auto industry bailout worked. The economy is slowly healing. Polls show that most Americans believe that the rich don’t pay their fair share in taxes.

So on the central issues of this campaign season, Republican candidates are left without a leg to stand on. The natural tendency for social conservatives like Santorum is to return to tried and true talking points. What is most fascinating however - and most revealing - are the levels of extremism that the already extreme conversation is taking.

A decade ago social conservatives battled liberals on issues of abortion, but today that conversation has taken a bizarre turn toward debating contraception. A decade ago there were occasional debates regarding the role of religion in civic life, particularly on government property. Now Santorum openly states that he doesn’t believe in the absolute separation of church and state. Yesterday he denounced a President who wants every American to have the opportunity to attain a college education. Are these fights that Santorum thinks he can win?

The GOP has always been proud to declare itself the party of small government and fiscal responsibility. Unfortunately, that sliver has increasingly lost out to the other factions of the party, social conservatives and libertarian extremists. And while moderate Republicans do still exist, they are becoming an endangered species. Today’s GOP is extreme and getting extremer. They are no longer satisfied with debating Roe v. Wade, they wish to pass legislation defining life at contraception. Libertarians, always (and rightfully) fearful of government encroachment into the daily life of Americans, now absurdly demand the abolishment of the Federal Reserve.

Even when debating the economy, the GOP made a tactical decision to pivot toward ideological purity (i.e. extremism). There is no longer any room for compromise. It is free market principles or die! Even during the single largest recession since the Great Depression, when credit markets were frozen and unemployment rates were near 10 percent, the party position was to cut government spending and cut government jobs. It is as if John Maynard Keynes, arguably the most influential economist of the 20^th century, never existed.

But just in case all that isn't caustic enough, the GOP has almost deliberately taken a dogmatic immigration position hostile to Latinos, a gay rights position hostile to homosexuals, a religious position hostile to American Muslims, welfare and tax positions hostile to the lower class, and most recently, a contraception position hostile to women. At least they're securing the reactionary evangelical white male vote.

This is how far the Republican Party has come. But we should not be surprised. Many saw this coming. Though the party establishment may not have expected this, they courted these malcontents and clowns. The election of George W. Bush, who ballooned the national debt, increased the size of government, encroached on our privacy and personal freedoms, and sloppily mired us into two wars, was a beautiful exercise in Orwellian doublespeak. Say one thing, and do another.

As the current crop of Republican candidates lean ever more heavily to the extreme, the GOP establishment move to distance themselves as quickly as possible. That may be the reason that most of the 29 governors have not yet endorsed a candidate. Hopes of some Republican white knight appearing at the last minute to challenge Obama are foolish, as most sensible people know that the atmosphere in the Republican base is too poisoned, and they have nothing to gain by fighting a strong Obama. Real candidates know that they must wait until 2016 before they can fight again.

When this election is over and the dust has settled, let us hope that the GOP figures out a solution to its extremism problem. If they wish to challenge Democrats on real issues like government regulation, Obama’s extension of Bush’s spy programs on Americans, and real compromises on deficit reduction, then we will be a better country for it. Until then, let’s wave as the circus road show travels through town.

Iranian Ineptitude Revealed

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 16:02:55 -0500

Conventional wisdom out of Washington is that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard is a professional and sophisticated intelligence corps capable of proxy-war making capabilities and coldly eliminating enemies. But if this week’s clumsy and ineffective attempts on Israeli diplomats are to be taken at face value (and not, as The Guardian’s Arshin Adib-Moghaddam believes, a Machiavellian attempt by the Israelis to entrap Iran), Iran is actually telling us that once again, Washington’s conventional wisdom is dead wrong.

The botched and seemingly coordinated attempts that culminated with the almost slapstick absurdity of an Iranian blowing off his own legs in Thailand, scream of something, but whatever it is, it’s not professional or sophisticated. All signs point to the leadership's mismanagement in organization, planning, and recruiting the right people. This is a major indicator of demise from within. More than anything, Iran is beginning to look much like a troubled youth on the verge of doing something rash. The Islamic Republic should be on suicide watch.

Despite its various posturing and bellicose language, in the three decades since 1979 the Islamic Republic has behaved as a rational actor on the world stage. It has never fought a war of aggression, and has effectively deflected criticism of its support of Hezbollah and other proxies through plausible deniability. It has courted valuable allies in Russia and China (and less valuable allies in Cuba and Venezuela), and maintained a mildly defensible position with regard to its nuclear ambitions. Virtually all of its foreign policy was directed at redirecting global aggression while beating its chest for the Iranian faithful (that small, and ever shrinking minority of Iranians that still believes in the glory of the Revolution).

Unfortunately for the Islamic Republic, the poorly managed 2009 presidential elections and consequent Green Revolution began to unravel that coveted image of domestic unity and staunch defense of the homeland. The Obama administration made some mistakes in this early test of the administration’s foreign policy strategy, but its fundamental success was that it avoided becoming the scapegoat that the Ayatollahs desperately needed to diffuse the homegrown anger. What happened next is still unfolding, but in the past two years, Farsi language readers have watched with growing unease as domestic fissures began to grow wider. In recent months, as Iran grows more isolated, the populist Ahmadinejad administration has begun to openly question the role of the Ayatollahs in running Iran. For his part, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, the undisputed leader of the Islamic Republic, has come to regard Ahmadinejad as an unmanageable thorn who is undermining his rule. The war of words is playing out during Friday sermons, and is not exclusive to these two petulant characters. The various other factions – often ridiculously caricatured as “moderates” by Western media – represented by Rafsanjani, Mousavi, and Karrabi are stirring the pot and increasing domestic unrest. Add to this the increasing pressure of foreign sanctions, spiraling hyper-inflation of the Iranian Rial, and the various outward signs of nontraditional war waged by Mossad and the CIA, and Iran becomes the highly combustible situation the West has long feared.

The regime is on the verge of collapse, but the infighting and instability has dangerous foreign policy implications. First and foremost, the “rational actor” argument seems to be flying out the window. As the various factions fight one another, they are liable to take extreme positions. The lack of a coordinated foreign policy strategy can lead to the undermining of the chain of command and a breakdown in authority inside the Revolutionary Guard. Again, the consequence is rash acts and poor judgment. Finally, in a last gasp hope to stave off a resurgent Green movement or other revolution, the regime is liable to walk the path of no return, all out war as a means of self preservation. In the face of homegrown revolution, these are men with absolutely nothing to lose.

All the while, the Islamic Republic has ratcheted up nuclear development. The belief is that a nuclear Iran can solidify the regime and must be an actor that is taken seriously at the negotiating table. The regime has surely gambled that if they are able to obtain a nuclear warhead before they are overthrown, they will breathe new life into the decomposing rot that is the Guardian Council. Based on the bits of information reported by the press, and the very real desire of the Israelis to try and delay the process, the regime must be close. It is an all-out sprint to the finish line.

Iran’s current erratic behavior indicates that domestically, it is on the verge of something very real, and very dangerous. The talking heads want us to believe that Iran is a militarized Islamic nation hell-bent on destroying its sworn enemies, the Big and Little Satan. They have beat the war drum on Iran for several years, though I always believed it to be a regurgitated version of the same narrative used on Iraq. Unfortunately, for the first time the talking heads may be right about Iran, but not for the reasons they believe. The domestic problems of the regime have created a dangerous and highly destabilizing tension that can no longer be ignored. We are no longer dealing with a rational actor with a cadre of professional assassins at their disposal. The cloak has been lifted, and what is revealed is a group of pathetic amateurs who have outlasted their welcome in their own country. They have nowhere to run, and a caged animal’s instinct for survival. They are a dangerous lot.

Regimes on the verge of implosion look to their enemies to help them unite behind the flag. This regime is no different. An outside war may help them avert collapse long enough to plot their next move. Though the sabre-rattlers in the U.S. and Israel are right to fear an Iranian bomb (for fear that it will prop up a domestically unstable regime), war with the Islamic Republic will only play into the Iranian leadership's hands. Any kind of hot war will ultimately require full-scale regime change and nation building efforts. War is not the answer. Patience, and effective détente by cooler heads will win this cold war.

Let us play this game right. The Islamic Republic is dying its slow and wretched death. Let us be careful not to inadvertently give it new life.