13 January

The protests in Iran predictably being described as a popular uprising, ‘the people’ trying to take back control of the country etc. We love these fantasies. This all happened before in Iran, in 1978. They had a ‘people’-led revolution, because Western powers had replaced their democratic government, which wanted to nationalise the oil industry, with their previously repressive monarchy. A puppet kingdom friendly to the West and our love of oil. There is no such thing as the people. All of these types of events are rival elites fighting for control of a country, co-opting an unhappy wider population to that fight. The last populist revolution led to the current regime in Iran. The French revolution led to Napoleon, the Russian revolution lead to the Soviets. There will be a rival elite or multiple rival groups inside and outside Iran right now driving these protests, it’s not ‘the people’. Like last time it would not be surprising if the West, particularly the US and Israel, are mobilising this action behind the scenes to undermine the current Iranian regime.