QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong, you stated that Iran is the merger of Marxism and Islam. I consider you additionally stated that the Shah didn’t notice that sending the youth to high school within the UK and the US was a mistake, and that they returned to Iran, indoctrinated with Marxism. Was this the backdrop to Dying to America?
Frank
REPLY: Completely. The Shah made the error of sending individuals to review within the West through the late ’70s when universities have been taken over by the LEFT and indoctrinated college students into this harmful concept that has been behind the only most devastating upheaval in human historical past. No different concept has induced a lot demise because the LEFTISTS.
This merger of Marxism and Islam was distinctive to Iran. It concerned revolutionary Shia clerics adopting Marxist language, leftist intellectuals reinterpreting Islam, and a tactical alliance in opposition to a typical enemy. This collaboration was a key issue within the revolution’s success, although it proved to be short-lived. It has typically been missed and simply seen as an Islamic Revolution, which is NOT appropriate. That is a part of the issue in negotiating with Iran at the moment. If we DO NOT perceive that it is a merger of Islam reinterpreted by Marxists, good luck in attempting to barter.
The widespread language of Anti-Imperialism and Social Justice was merged. The principle bridge between these two seemingly opposed worldviews was their shared dedication to anti-imperialism and social justice. For a lot of in Iran, the Shah’s regime was offered as a logo of Western imperialism and gross financial inequality. That’s the place Marxism got here in, the place everybody ought to have the identical. Marxism offered a pointy critique of capitalism and imperialism, whereas a newly radicalized model of Shi’a Islam, typically referred to as “Liberation Theology,” framed the battle in opposition to the Shah as a combat for the oppressed (mostaz’afin). This overlap in targets created the preliminary widespread floor for an alliance.
Ali Shariati was the Mental Architect. He’s considered some of the influential Iranian intellectuals of the twentieth century. He has been known as the “ideologue of the Islamic Revolution,” and was crucial determine in forging this ideological mix of Marxism & Islam. Ali Shariati, after all, was a French-educated sociologist who was transformed to Communism by Marx himself. Shariati was not a Marxist per se, however he was deeply influenced by Marxist ideas of sophistication battle, which he artfully built-in into his reinterpretation of Shi’ism. He argued that the unique, revolutionary Shi’ism was a faith of the oppressed, which he referred to as “Purple Shi’ism,” in distinction to the passive, established “Safavid Shi’ism” of the spiritual institution. By presenting Islam as a contemporary, revolutionary ideology, he supplied a robust native various to Marxism, making the anti-Shah motion each religiously genuine and socially radical.
Past Shariati’s mental synthesis, the revolution in opposition to the Shah was pushed by a free however efficient alliance of comfort between numerous political teams. The Clergy & Khomeini: Though Ayatollah Khomeini was deeply anti-communist, he and his clerical followers have been expert politicians. They adopted in style Marxist slogans like “financial equality” and “battle in opposition to imperialism” to faucet into widespread anti-Shah sentiment, efficiently channeling this vitality into their very own imaginative and prescient of an Islamic state.
Islamic-Marxist Guerrillas (MEK) grew to become probably the most literal fusion of the 2 ideologies that occurred inside the Mojahedin-e-Khalq (MEK). Based in 1965, the MEK explicitly described its ideology as a “mixture of Islam and Marxism.” The group argued {that a} “true Muslim” was naturally aligned with socialist and anti-imperialist targets. They fought alongside Khomeini’s forces through the revolution however have been purged quickly after.
Secular Marxists (Tudeh Celebration), was Iran’s largest communist social gathering, and was initially cautious of Khomeini’s spiritual motion. Nevertheless, their fervent anti-Shah place finally led them to assist the revolutionary coalition, hoping to affect its consequence from inside.
The alliance was purely pragmatic. As soon as the Shah was overthrown in 1979, the basic incompatibility between Marxism (which is atheist) and an Islamic state (which is theocratic) grew to become instantly clear. Khomeini’s regime rapidly moved to eradicate its leftist allies in what has been referred to as a “counter-revolutionary” purge. Marxist and Islamic-Marxist teams, together with the Tudeh social gathering and the MEK, have been ruthlessly suppressed, with hundreds of members executed or pressured into exile.
It grew to become a Revolutionary Synthesis, reasonably than a merger of Marxism and Islamic fundamentalism, which was a revolutionary synthesis, not a everlasting fusion. For a short interval, their shared opposition to the Shah united them in a robust coalition to attain the revolution. Nevertheless, their elementary variations proved irreconcilable, resulting in a violent and decisive break within the revolution’s aftermath.
Faith apart, what I discover curious is that Marxism is expressly forbidden within the Ten Commandments, confirming that this has been an inherent drawback inside human civilization for hundreds of years. Simply counting Russia and China, the demise toll due to Marxism and the LEFT is estimated at Deaths below regimes that recognized with Marxism–Leninism (e.g., the Soviet Union below Joseph Stalin, China below Mao Zedong, Cambodia below Pol Pot, and so forth.) is estimated between 50 and 90 million deaths, and that’s simply China and Russia. It has been the deadliest concept ever promoted by formal training.
Some argue that Sparta didn’t wage battle in opposition to Athens due to communism vs. capitalism. They fought for energy, worry, and safety—as Thucydides documented—inside the very totally different political and financial realities of the fifth century BC. Nevertheless, the economics tells a distinct story. Sparta was a communist state. It by no means issued cash to discourage particular person wealth.
Sparta by no means issued cash. All they’d have been iron “oboloi”, which have been supposed to be impractical to stop the buildup of wealth. Sparta didn’t concern coinage for hundreds of years attributable to a deliberate set of ideological legal guidelines, often known as the Lycurgan Reforms, designed to create a superbly disciplined, militaristic, and egalitarian society. The state actively used its financial system to implement these values.
In response to historic historians like Plutarch, the legendary lawgiver Lycurgus banned using gold and silver cash, changing them with heavy, cumbersome iron bars to stifle corruption, greed, and the pursuit of luxurious.
The Spartan forex, referred to as Pelanor (additionally known as ‘obeloi’ or spits), was intentionally made impractical. A single piece weighed round 1.5 kilos (0.68 kg) however had little or no worth, so even a small sum would require a cart to maneuver.
The iron was intentionally made brittle by quenching it in vinegar whereas red-hot, rendering it ineffective for making instruments or weapons. This ensured the forex had no objective aside from commerce. This was an early communist state with “Anti-Cash” by design.
This cumbersome system suppressed overseas affect, lowered theft (due to the issue of concealing the massive bars), and curbed corruption by making bribery practically unimaginable. Extra importantly, it discouraged the buildup of personal wealth and helped implement the “equal” life-style of the Spartiate citizen class, which was important for army self-discipline.
Whereas the iron forex labored for inside commerce amongst residents, Sparta was not a closed financial system. The Perioikoi (a subordinate class of free inhabitants) managed commerce and used overseas forex, and the Spartan state itself famously used Persian gold cash to construct its navy and finally defeat Athens within the Peloponnesian Warfare.
Whereas Athens was the facility that defeated the Persians and rose to kind its personal empire, certainly, Sparta was jealous of that energy. However on the root was additionally this distinction in social concept. Athens was capitalist and free, with artwork, expression, and philosophy. These have been traits that have been at odds with the philosophy of Sparta.
The lesson right here is that when coping with Iran, we should perceive that on the very primary core, they continue to be anti-capitalist/imperialist. That is how they see the USA and Israel. There’s a primary elementary distinction in philosophy, and till we cease judging Iran by what we might do, we are going to by no means perceive the adversary.
You may by no means obtain social justice the place everybody earns the identical, nonetheless have private liberty and freedom even to talk, and financial effectivity all concurrently. It has NEVER labored from historic instances to China and Russia, and it’s suppressing Europe into an financial melancholy. It tore Iran aside on the seams. This Marxist interpretation of Islam destroyed Iran, which ranks within the high three vitality reserves on the earth for oil and fuel, although it’s undeniably a worldwide vitality superpower.
The Islamic Revolution was answerable for finishing and solidifying the nationalization of Iran’s vitality sector. The important thing to understanding this lies within the early Nineteen Fifties. In 1951, the democratically elected Prime Minister, Mohammad Mossadegh, nationalized Iran’s British-controlled oil business. Nevertheless, this daring transfer led to a CIA and MI6-backed coup in 1953, which ousted Mossadegh and reinstated the Shah. After the coup, management of Iran’s oil business successfully returned to Western firms
