FG

So far as I can recall this is the first time Khamenei has warned his generals to “stay out of politics.” Previously he showed no reservations, going so far as to give away virtually the whole economy in exchange for saving the Holy One’s butt.

It’s funny to come across the following small item at Enduring America only one day after I wrote that the temporary alliance between the SL and the IRCG cannot survive once the pair has crushed all rivals (see subpost under my recent Mojtaba blog).

From Enduring America: “Looks like the Supreme Leader's camp are trying to pull the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps back into line after last week's intervention by the IRGC commander, General Mohammad Ali Jafari, claiming its authority to arrest members of the "deviant current" around President Ahmadinejad and to define "acceptable" and "unacceptable" reformists....

Mojtaba Zolnour, the former representative of the Supreme Leader to the IRGC, declared Jafari and the IRGC have no say over political participation, with the Guardian Council deciding who can enter. Zolnour said Jafari's remarks were his ‘private" views.’

IS AUGUSTUS COMING TO IRAN? (FG analysis):

For now--if told to “shut up,” the generals will do so. Once all other opponents have been liquidated, I’d expect the generals will respond to such complaints as flippantly as Stalin did after a papal rebuke: “How many divisions has the Pope?”

The generals will eventually have a monopoly of real power as compared to Khamenei’s increasingly theoretical power. Even now anyone can see their arrogant tendency to flex political muscles in direct proportion to the power surrendered by the supreme leader.

According to Khamenei, “Iran can’t have two chiefs” (correct but check out the story of Croesus and his oracle) and “the SL has final say on all matters” (not for long). He is about to learn that powers traded away can’t easily be recovered. No matter how much he talks about “being loved and respected by the people” after all his crimes Khamenei knows better or he’d never have surrendered so much.

In sum, absolute power was never an option, regardless of theory. The only real choice was with whom to share power and Khamenei made a fatal one.

His perception that giving in to reformers would turn his successors into ceremonial monarchs eventually was correct. But is that so bad compared to the only alternative—a reactionary alliance with security forces? Roman emperors made similar claims to divinity and absolutism yet how many died under the swords of the Praetorian Guard or later generals? Emperors who did survive lasted because they knew their place, kept their mouth shuts and appeared docile. Even such men often died when ambitious generals got an itch for the throne. I’d take the first alternative in a heartbeat!

The first Iranian Augustus is waiting in the wings. Iran’s “republic” has gone the way of the Roman Republic. Its elections and institutions are maintained solely for appearance sake.