15 January 2006
American Help to Iran
Farouz Farzami, in her opinion piece in the 12 January 2006 Wall Street Journal, calls for “strong international pressures” on the Islamist regime in Iran in order to foment “the formation of independent and secular political parties.” She apparently believes that economic and diplomatic sanctions alone without military threats or (heaven forbid) strikes can achieve results similar to those she praises in Libya and Afghanistan.
First of all, it is difficult to believe that she and her impatient allies in Iran would be happy under the continued despotic rule of a dictator like Qaddafi. Nor would they be satisfied to be subject to the autonomous and unruly domination of regional Afghan warlords.
Clearly, she advocates some form of intervention in the internal affairs of her country short of the use of military force. And, if we learn s lesson from Neil MacFarquhar’s report in the 15 January 2006 New York Times, free speech, particularly over the Internet, alone is not enough to overthrow an authoritative regime in the Middle East. But there must be a limit on what a government, even the government of the world’s only superpower, is encouraged to do. The appropriate role for a government is to order its own society and protect the security of its population, not to impose its own form on other nations.
If the leaders of one nation don’t like the way the people of another nation are treated by their leaders, they are not authorized to intervene in that nation’s affairs -- not if they have been elected by democratic procedures; not even if their actions reflect the collective will of their own people. On the other hand, no nation can legitimately reduce its individual members to subjects without independent thought and freedom to act harmlessly – even as a result of democratic decision-making. The only resolution of this dilemma is for individuals in each nation to take matters into their own hands.
Of course, there is a risk to individual interveners – the same risk that their collaborators in the target country run. It is essential, moreover, that members of the target nation willingly assume the risks that overthrowing their government entails. Ms. Farzami cannot rely on America’s help, in the form of “smart sanctions,” to achieve the political order that she and like-minded members of Iranian society wish. They must take the first steps themselves; but to do so effectively they may wish to rely on collaboration with private non-violent interventionists who have provided similar advice and assistance to local movements in Poland, Ukraine, Romania, and elsewhere in Eastern Europe.
Neither the local nor the foreign individual interventionists are protected under international law or by the United Nations – those are arms of national governments whose existence private interventionists threaten. There is indeed a useful role for these arms to play – fighting other private enemies of states, like Al Qaeda. However, resisters of oppressive governments need to act with at least as much courage as fundamentalist opponents of all national order. There are no easy ways left.
Farouz Farzami, in her opinion piece in the 12 January 2006 Wall Street Journal, calls for “strong international pressures” on the Islamist regime in Iran in order to foment “the formation of independent and secular political parties.” She apparently believes that economic and diplomatic sanctions alone without military threats or (heaven forbid) strikes can achieve results similar to those she praises in Libya and Afghanistan.
First of all, it is difficult to believe that she and her impatient allies in Iran would be happy under the continued despotic rule of a dictator like Qaddafi. Nor would they be satisfied to be subject to the autonomous and unruly domination of regional Afghan warlords.
Clearly, she advocates some form of intervention in the internal affairs of her country short of the use of military force. And, if we learn s lesson from Neil MacFarquhar’s report in the 15 January 2006 New York Times, free speech, particularly over the Internet, alone is not enough to overthrow an authoritative regime in the Middle East. But there must be a limit on what a government, even the government of the world’s only superpower, is encouraged to do. The appropriate role for a government is to order its own society and protect the security of its population, not to impose its own form on other nations.
If the leaders of one nation don’t like the way the people of another nation are treated by their leaders, they are not authorized to intervene in that nation’s affairs -- not if they have been elected by democratic procedures; not even if their actions reflect the collective will of their own people. On the other hand, no nation can legitimately reduce its individual members to subjects without independent thought and freedom to act harmlessly – even as a result of democratic decision-making. The only resolution of this dilemma is for individuals in each nation to take matters into their own hands.
Of course, there is a risk to individual interveners – the same risk that their collaborators in the target country run. It is essential, moreover, that members of the target nation willingly assume the risks that overthrowing their government entails. Ms. Farzami cannot rely on America’s help, in the form of “smart sanctions,” to achieve the political order that she and like-minded members of Iranian society wish. They must take the first steps themselves; but to do so effectively they may wish to rely on collaboration with private non-violent interventionists who have provided similar advice and assistance to local movements in Poland, Ukraine, Romania, and elsewhere in Eastern Europe.
Neither the local nor the foreign individual interventionists are protected under international law or by the United Nations – those are arms of national governments whose existence private interventionists threaten. There is indeed a useful role for these arms to play – fighting other private enemies of states, like Al Qaeda. However, resisters of oppressive governments need to act with at least as much courage as fundamentalist opponents of all national order. There are no easy ways left.
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