By John J. MetzlerDarkness at Noon has shrouded Iran for nearly half a century.
The Islamic Republic of Iran has tried, and somewhat successfully, to turn back the clock in the once secular and prosperous nation. It has since ruined the economy, disenfranchised women, supported terrorist proxies, and turned the once proud Iranian nation into an international pariah state.
Now following epic military attacks on the regime by President Donald Trump, Iran is on the path to a hopeful new Dawn unleashed by Operation Epic Fury. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, its longtime clerical autocrat, was killed early in the attacks along with many military commanders.
Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) responded to the U.S. and Israeli strikes by launching waves of drones and ballistic missiles against Israel. Explosions were also reported in Bahrain, Abu Dhabi, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia, just hours after the U.S. launched operation Epic Fury.
Just think of this for a moment. The Islamic Republic of Iran was established in 1979.
- Its revolutionary students soon seized the American Embassy in Teheran and took diplomats hostage and held them for a year;
- Then Iran became the patron saint of international terror;
- Later Iranian agents flooded Iraq with IED’s which killed or horribly maimed thousands of American troops;
- Years later Iran used the shadow of nuclear blackmail to intimidate neighbors.
Iran heir to ancient Persia, remains a nexus of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Security; not only holding massive petroleum resources but controlling the strategic Straits of Hormuz, the narrow maritime choke point through which 20 percent of the world’s oil flows.
This country of 93 million, twice the size of Texas, remains a geopolitical force but now temporarily faces a dangerous political power vacuum.
Regime Impunity
During massive pro-democracy demonstrations in mid-January, the Islamic regime killed 38,000 of its own citizens and arrested thousands more.
The world looked on with horror but did nothing. It appeared the Islamic Republic would once again get away with bloody murder as it did in September 2022 during the momentous “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement, sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in morality police custody over not having worn her hijab properly.
While the clerical regime has weathered rhetorical rebukes, tightened economic sanctions and hostility from the U.S. and Western countries; this time after the January bloodbath, Teheran went too far.
President Trump drew the proverbial red line in the sand. He stated; “To the great, proud people of Iran… the hour of your freedom is at hand…when we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take.”
For nearly fifty years, since the Iranian Revolution in 1979, the truly wicked theocratic regime of the Ayatollahs has threatened the Middle East, abused and politicized Islam as a tool of government, become a patron of state sponsored terrorism and a sworn enemy of the United States and Israel.
Yet most of all it’s been a curse upon the Iranian people.
Diplomacy
The U.S. /Iranian diplomacy focused on three key areas; the nuclear program, ballistic missile stockpiles, and support to proxy forces such as Hizbullah, Hamas and the Houthis.
During the desultory diplomatic talks as recently as last week, the Iranians were promising to stop Uranian enrichment, nuclear weapons research as well as opening secret sites to International inspection through the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Such a “deal” would usher in an endless shell game charade which would hardly settle the murky nature of Iran’s proscribed nuclear ambitions.
The Iranian Diaspora
Nearly a million Iranians living overseas, the diaspora, has rallied against the Islamic regime from London, Paris, Berlin and Munich to L.A. and Toronto. For weeks huge peaceful demonstrations have called for the downfall of the Islamic Republic and the revival of a secular Iran through Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, son of Iran’s last Shah.
The diaspora forms a pool of wealth, talent and patriotism which can help revive the country through the Iran Prosperity Project.
Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi stated, “Moments of destiny lie ahead of us… This is a humanitarian intervention; and its target is the Islamic Republic, its repressive apparatus, and its machinery of slaughter, not the country and great nation of Iran.” He calls for a “Strong, Stable Transition.”
When the dust settlers and a durable freedom comes to long-suffering Iran, we will have witnessed the largest tectonic geopolitical shift since 1989 and the liberation of Central Europe and the subsequent Soviet collapse.
Donald Trump has unleashed history, up-close and live.
Light will then triumph over darkness in a Free Iran.
John J. Metzler is a United Nations correspondent covering diplomatic and defense issues. He is the author of Divided Dynamism the Diplomacy of Separated Nations: Germany, Korea, China (2014).
Free Press International
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