After
Iraq invaded in September 1980, it had
quickly become clear that Iran's forces
were no match for Saddam Hussein's
professional, well-armed military. To compensate for their
disadvantage, Khomeini sent Iranian children, some as
young as twelve years old, to the front lines. There, they
marched in formation across minefields toward the enemy,
clearing a path with their bodies. Before every mission, one
of the Taiwanese keys would be hung around each child's
neck. It was supposed to open the gates to paradise for them....
"Before entering the minefields, the children [now] wrap
themselves in blankets and they roll on the ground, so that
their body parts stay together after the explosion of the
mines and one can carry them to the graves."...
Ahmadinejad revels in his alliance with the Basiji. He
regularly appears in public wearing a black-and-white Basij
scarf, and, in his speeches, he routinely praises "Basij culture"
and "Basij power," with which he says "Iran today
makes its presence felt on the international and diplomatic
stage."...
The chief combat tactic employed by the Basiji was the
human wave attack, whereby barely armed children and
teenagers would move continuously toward the enemy in
perfectly straight rows. It did not matter whether they fell to
enemy fire or detonated the mines with their bodies: The
important thing was that the Basiji continue to move forward
over the torn and mutilated remains of their fallen
comrades, going to their deaths in wave after wave. Once a
path to the Iraqi forces had been opened up, Iranian commanders
would send in their more valuable and skilled
Revolutionary Guard troops....
This attitude had a fatal implication for the Basiji:
Whether they survived or not was irrelevant. Not even the
tactical utility of their sacrifice mattered. Military victories
are secondary, Khomeini explained in September 1980.The
Basiji must "understand that he is a 'soldier of God' for
whom it is not so much the outcome of the conflict as the
mere participation in it that provides fulfillment and gratification."
...
At the end of July 2005, the Basij movement announced
plans to increase its membership from ten million to 15 million
by 2010. The elite special units are supposed to comprise
some 150,000 people by then. Accordingly, the Basiji
have received new powers in their function as an unofficial
division of the police. What this means in practice became
clear in February 2006, when the Basiji attacked the leader
of the bus-drivers' union, Massoud Osanlou. They held Osanlou
prisoner in his apartment, and they cut off the tip of
his tongue in order to convince him to keep quiet. No Basiji
needs to fear prosecution for such terrorists tactics before a
court of law.
...
As Basij ideology and influence enjoy a renaissance under
Ahmadinejad, the movement's belief in the virtues of
violent self-sacrifice remains intact. There is no "truth commission"
in Iran to investigate the state-planned collective
suicide that took place from 1980 to 1988. Instead, every
Iranian is taught the virtues of martyrdom from childhood.
Obviously, many of them reject the Basij teachings. Still,
everyone knows the name of Hossein Fahmideh, who, as a
13-year-old boy during the war, blew himself up in front of
an Iraqi tank. His image follows Iranians throughout their
day: whether on postage stamps or the currency. If you
hold up a 500 Rial bill to the light, it is his face you will see
in the watermark. The self-destruction of Fahmideh is depicted
as a model of profound faith by the Iranian press.
...
What exactly does that mean? Consider that, in December
2001, former Iranian President Hashemi Rafsanjani explained
that "the use of even one nuclear bomb inside Israel
will destroy everything." On the other hand, if Israel responded
with its own nuclear weapons, it "will only harm
the Islamic world. It is not irrational to contemplate such an
eventuality." Rafsanjani thus spelled out a macabre cost-benefit
analysis. It might not be possible to destroy Israel
without suffering retaliation. But, for Islam, the level of
damage Israel could inflict is bearable--only 100,000 or so
additional martyrs for Islam.
And Rafsanjani is a member of the moderate, pragmatic
wing of the Iranian Revolution; he believes that any conflict
ought to have a "worthwhile" outcome. Ahmadinejad, by
contrast, is predisposed toward apocalyptic thinking.
...
A politics pursued in alliance with a supernatural force
is necessarily unpredictable. Why should an Iranian president
engage in pragmatic politics when his assumption is
that, in three or four years, the savior will appear?
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