Iran's master puppeteer

Sanam Vakil, Asia Times:

Just as Iran has been duplicitous and underhanded in the ongoing nuclear negotiations, so too has the leadership elite under the guise of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. In effect, Khamenei, after 16 years in power, has learned the delicate and tactical process of manipulating the complicated political system and its flamboyant actors.

While Khamenei is indeed the final arbiter and puppeteer of the Iranian political system, he has been using President Mahmud Ahmadinejad and his ideological international approach to moderate his own public image since Ahmadinejad was elected last summer. READ MORE

In this recent taqieh or dramatic passion play, Khamenei is the one character who will emerge from behind the political scenes having captured not only his domestic audience but also an international one.

Indeed, 26 years after the Iranian revolution, the mystery behind the swinging political pendulum of the theocratic Iranian republic has continued to confound policymakers and Iran watchers alike. Dissecting the opaque Iranian political system is a challenge that must be met especially in light of the nuclear standoff between the Iranian regime and the West. This show of audacity has been deemed the "greatest source of political risk in 2006", as further Iranian intransigence could trigger eventual military responses from either the US or Israeli military.

Khamenei was elevated to the position of the velayat-e-faqih or Guardian of the Jurist upon the death of the charismatic ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1989. Khamenei was hand-picked by Khomeini. However, he had neither the overwhelming support of the public nor that of the clerical establishment, which looked upon Khamenei's appointment with disdain. As a cleric, Khamenei had only limited clerical education, having never obtained the necessary clerical credentials to ascend to the position of the faqih. Having served as the first clerical president of the Islamic Republic and having received Khomeini's the blessing, Khamenei was guaranteed to inherit the theocratic throne, but not without considerable factional challenges.

Ironically, factionalism is enshrined in the Iranian political system. These factions have competed in the parliament, often reinventing themselves, creating not only a level of competition but also a clear sense of patrimony. With parliamentary elections every four years, factional shifts in the system occurred in 1992 in the aftermath of the Iran-Iraq War and in 2000 when reformist politicians brought wind of a "Tehran spring". Indeed, the reformist challengers to the Iranian state were marginalized in the 2004 parliamentary elections due to the much-maligned, behind-the-scenes direction of the supreme leader.

Equally important to the Iranian political structure is the institutional system. Modeled after the French political system with a parliament, president and judiciary, the government maintains clerical oversight bodies that are appointed by the supreme leader. The former institutions have been dominated by factional competition as evidenced by the reformist emergence. Indeed, president Mohammad Khatami's 1997 and 2001 electoral victories posed political challenges for the clerical conservatives.

After 16 years at the helm, though, Khamenei has learned to use this factionalism and institutional control to his advantage, pitting those who support him against those who do not. Using unelected institutions such as the Guardian Council to vet candidates prior to elections and to negate legislation passed by the reformist parliament, Khamenei enabled the final consolidation of conservative power evidenced in the recent round of elections when only clerically approved candidates were permitted to run for political office.

Khamenei has remained mostly behind the scenes, relying on the public face of the president to play his part in this political drama. However, the supreme leader is embarking on a new era. For eight years, Khatami provided the ever-hopeful West the facade of an evolutionary Iran. Traveling abroad with promises of a "dialogue among civilizations and cultures", Khatami was successful in restoring Iran's public face and international image. Out of sight, however, lay a veneer of a revolutionary Iran, for he too had unleashed a domestic challenge to the clerical elite. For Khamenei, this could not be tolerated. Not only was Khatami disturbing the domestic status quo but his presence upstaged that of the already unpopular supreme leader.

With Khamenei neither as popular or charismatic as his predecessor Khomeini, nor Western-educated to attract the youth as was Khatami, he tactically fomented support through a new factional grouping: the ideological underclass of the revolution. Finding allies in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and other ideological supporters of the revolution, Khamenei consolidated his power by surrounding himself with a cadre of loyalists willing to adhere to the revolutionary creed that would protect and preserve the umbilical cord of the Islamic Republic. From the rank and file of this devoted group came the son of a blacksmith, Ahmadinejad, the ever-devoted son of the revolution.

Indeed, the successful election of Ahmadinejad is the culmination of Khamenei's masterful engineering. With Western expectation for continued nuclear negotiation, Khamenei permitted Ahmadinejad's aggressive nuclear posturing, commencing with his rejection of the EU-3 (Germany, Britain and France) proposals in August and continuing with the recent resumption of nuclear "research" this past Monday. Ahmadinejad has inflamed constituencies right and left with his anti-Zionist rhetoric, even garnering censure from his own conservative parliament. The supreme leader recently elevated former presidential candidate and head of the powerful Expediency Council, Hashemi Rafsanjani, giving him supervisory power over the elected branches of government. In effect, Ahmadinejad has created much dissension among the clerical rank and file.

Such antagonistic policy has been a political coup for Khamenei as he has mobilized popular support behind the nuclear program as well as demonstrated to the international community that the Iranian president is indeed fanatical in his orientation and objectives. For the supreme leader, who has spent 16 years isolated in power, Ahmadinejad's unleashing is being manipulated to his benefit. By taking Iran to the brink, Khamenei, the ultimate arbiter, will be the moderate one who can take Iran back.

In this vein, he will emerge having successfully consolidated his power, with a motivated Iranian public supporting a restrained role for the overzealous Ahmadinejad and room to maneuver again at the nuclear negotiating table. His tactics will finally win him his long-awaited support both from domestic parties, which seek to contain the fanatical Ahmadinejad, and from the international community, which hopes Iran will tone down its rhetoric and cooperate with an ever-impatient international community. Perhaps now, Khamenei can feature as producer, director and lead actor in the unfolding Iranian drama, finally winning the hearts and minds of the public.

Sanam Vakil is an assistant professor of Middle East studies at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.