From: ebrahim@ee.umanitoba.ca (Mohamad Ebrahimi)
Subject: Re: To Agha Javad , PART I
Organization: Elect & Comp Engineering, U of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba,Canada
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 00:59:36 GMT


                  
In article: <1992Nov16.200448.5791@hplabsz.hpl.hp.com> javad@hplabsz.hpl.hp.com 
(Agha Javad) writes:

                                                                               
>In article <BxqK7p.EIp@ccu.umanitoba.ca> ebrahim@ee.umanitoba.ca (Mohamad Ebrahi
>mi) writes:
>>                                                                               
>>In article: <1992Nov14.020002.27006@hplabsz.hpl.hp.com> javad@hplabsz.hpl.hp.co
>> (Agha Javad)  writes:                                                         
>>                                                                               
>>>In article <BxoFp0.Jwn@ccu.umanitoba.ca> ebrahim@ee.umanitoba.ca (Mohamad Ebra
>>>mi) writes:
>>>>                                                                             
>>>>In article: <1992Nov13.184956.18043@hplabsz.hpl.hp.com>javad@hplabsz.hpl.hp.c
>>>> (Agha Javad) writes:             
>---------------------------------------------------------------------------     
>Before I go on, I would like to thank Mr. Ebrahi for maintaining a decent       
>discussion so all interested readers can think and form opinions rather         
>than hit the 'n' button in disgust and shake their head in disbelief. Thank     
>you.                                                                            

  I thank you for devotnig your time to talk about one of the most important
  periods of our nation's life and trying to distinguish true from false in
  it.

>This is a long article, although most of the material is from                   
>previous postings. 

  For the same reason, I'll divide this article to several parts and add my
  comments or answers, if any.
                           
>----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>                                                      
>>                                                               
>>                                                     
>>>> 1- You attributed the story of " Enhelal-e Artesh" ( Dissolving the army)   
>>>> after the revolution to IRI! while everybody remembers that it was one of   
>>>> the main objectives of those spy groups, which later became an integral     
>>>> part of Iraqi army against Iranian people, and if it was not because of     
>>>> the strong standing of Late Imam Khomeini to support the army, nobody knows 
>>>> what would have happened when Iraqi army started its aggression against Iran
>>>                                                                              
>>>Excuse me, but whoever was in the revolution vividly remembers that one of the
>>>main criticisms of the shah's regime was that he was "nokar-e-Amrika" and kept
>>>buying "AhanpAreh F16s" and throwing away our oil money. Of course, we all    
>>>know that there were people working for foreigners trying to weaken the       
>>>country, etc., and I never said there wasn't. But the IRI certainly did not   
>>>do much to keep the military intact.  In the days of Bazargan, there were     
>>>numerous speeches about how we don't need an army, at least the one created   
>>>by the shah, and replacing the army with Pasdaran and Baseej and Artesh-e-    
>>>Beest-millionee.  Nonetheless, you cannot deny that the revolution leaders    
>>>were criticizing the shah for buying all those weapons, and now would love    
>>>to do the same if they had the chance.  Also, can you be more specific as to  
>>>which "spy groups" it was the work of to call for enhelal-e-artesh?           
>>>Tell me something, do you really think that if there was no war with Iraq,    
>>>the regular armed forces would have been left alone, or even allowed to       
>>>exist?  I doubt it.                                         
>>                                                             
>>                                                             
>> -You are mixing two different matters, in order to avoid accepting reality.   
>> The criticism toward Shah for trying to be the "Gendarm of Region" and        
>> involvement in stories like Zofar is something, and trying to dissolve the    
>> army, which you attributed to IRI, is something else. I didn't talk about     
>> the first one, rather I chalenged you about your allegations.                 
>                                                 
>Reality, did you say?  The shah was criticized for trying to become gendarm     
>of the region, whereas the IRI is now an a massive rearmament program.  This    
>in spite of the absence of the U.S.S.R., the annihilation of Iraq,              
>and the removal of so amny threats that existed in the Shah's time, as well     
>as an economic situation which you yourself agree is very weak.  Why            
>are they buying bombers and submarines?  I'm not saying it's bad, I'm just      
>saying that how come it is bad when shah does it, but it is good when IRI       
>does it?                         

   The basis of your comparison is wrong. Iran is not 'a massive rearmament 
   program' if you consider our neighbors like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan,
   Turkey, etc. During 1991 our neighbors have bought $40 billion just from the
   US and this amount was $35 billion for the first 9 months of 1992. Also noone
   of these countries' armies had a war to sustain massive damages. By the cuurent 
   trend of buying arms, Iran would be able to DEFEND itself against it's immediate
   neighbors after a few years, provided our neighbours stop buying arms tomorrow
   morning! I don't see how the threats during Shah could have been more than today. 
   Preparing Iran's armed forces to DEFEND Iran is a duty for any government, and
   failure to do that is nothing but treason and making conditions ready for
   the likes of Saddam Hussein to come again and ask for their 'Arabestan', and
   'Mohamareh'and 'Khafajieh' and 'Tonb-e bozorg va kochak', etc.

                
>> -Yes Bazargan and Co. talked about being needless to even F14's and exchanging
>> them with tractors, but I don't consider them as true representative of Revolu
>> and IRI, do you?                                                                
>                                                                                     
>He was the prime minister of IRI approved by Khomeini himself, and in those     
>days, if you remember, the military service was even reduced to 1 year.  I just 
>remember that the overall mood was towards severely downsizing the armed forces,
>if not ending it altogether, as well as it being ok to have summary trials      
>and executions of generals and officers, and I don't remember many voices       
>calling for the salvaging or maintaining of the armed forces.  These voices     
>became many once the war started. 


   You are not getting the point again. I remember the reduction of army service
   to one year when Madani was the minister of defence, too. I also remember his
   plan to send each soldier to his region for the service, which at that time was
   certainly equal to dissintegration of the whole country. But I maintain that
   those weaknesses, some of which was certainly intentional, can not be atttibuted
   to the authorities after "Interim Govenment". In fact these were just the reasons
   for IRI to relize that Bazargan and Co. were not able to understand world's
   conditions and the necessities of such a revolution, thinking in the most
   optimistic way, and therefore took back their support from them.

             
>> -As for the replacing army with pasdaran and basij, you have forgotten that   
>> Late Imam Khomeini anounced the 29 of Farvardin 1358 as the day of army, and  
>> ordered people to go to streets and celebrate that day with their brothers in 
>> army, but he ordered for basij to be established more than 8 months later     
>> in responce to western hostilities. IRI never intended to replace army with an
>> other force, and I chalenge you to show evidence contrary to this mater.      
>>                                                                               
>                                                                                
>This was in celebration or recognition of the army surrendering to the people.  
>As this was happenning, pilots and homafars were being arrested and imprisoned  
>in the hundreds, and billions of dollars of equipment was rusting away being    
>unmaintained, some becoming beyond repair.  During the first few days of the    
>war, several hundred pilots and flight officers were released from prison       
>and were let loose, and they were able to carry out a massive airstrike of      
>140 fighters against Iraq, seriously hampering the Iraqis effort.  Many of      
>these pilots' families were held as ransom for their return, and in fact,       
>throughout the war, some did escape because of their opposition to the          
>regime.  But the majority fought braveley under unfair conditions without       
>enough spare parts and ammunition, against an enemy wiht much more resources.   
>I seriously doubt that had the war not started, these pilots would be spared    
>in the IRI prisons.  I might add that US Air Force instructors gave very        
>high marks to the Iranian student pilots during their training, and millions    
>of dollars were well spent in creating what many thought of as some of the      
>best pilots in the world.                                                       

   Well, this one is pure interpretation and in such a case reasoning won't
   solve anything. But just a few points, anyways:

   The body of army was never against revolution and therefore there was no
   surrender and no celebration for that matter. In fact the participation
   of parts of army, like air force officers in Hamedan (Shahrokhi) air base
   or hawanirouz officers in Isfahan, was amongst the most efective efforts
   toward the breakdown of Shah's regime.

   Even if there was a surrender, it was nearly 2.5 months before the day
   of army ( 29 faravardin 1358) and I suppose you are not implying that
   people and IRI were sleeping during that period!

   And, you are still repeating your allegations about the number of arrested officers
   without any evidence. I mantain that no officer or even general was arrested
   or procecuted, unless he has been involved in one or some of these activities:

   -maintaining 25 years of dictatorship,

   -suppressing people via SAVAK or Zed-e Etelaat,

   -killing people during the months of revolution and martial law,

   -stealing peoples money through their relationships with the regime.

>As far as baseej, yes, this was formed when hostages were taken, and IRI        
>feared military action from the US, the regular army being in a state of        
>disarray.  The sepAh and komiteh, however, were formed immediately after        
>the revolution to safeguard protect the revolution, i.e. a revolutionary        
>police.  The sepAh's duties grew as the war started, and their role expanded    
>to defence against the revolution's external enemies as well.  I would like     
>to add that whenever the IRI bought new weapons, it would give preference to    
>the sepAh, and only for equipment that the sepAh could not operate would        
>they give these weapons to the army.  The sepAh would get first cut at          
>light arms, and later they started to expand into artillery pieces, and even    
>form the "sepAh air force" and the "sepAh navy", entering direct competition    
>with the regular armed forces.  This enough is evidence that the IRI wanted     
>to slowly phase out the regular armed forces, why else would the sepAh have     
>to have an air force and a navy?  Why did we need two armies to handle our      
>artillery and rockets?  I remember Mohsen Rezaee the IRGC commander treating    
>Sayyad Shirazi the regular army commander almost like a subordinate even        
>on TV.                        

   With all due respect, I think this has become too childish. "They gave the good
   ones to Sepah and the bad ones to army", etc. 

   I don't call the friendly and close relationship between Rezaee and Sayyad Shirazi
   as such. I remember Shirazi calling Rezaee as Mohsen and Rezaee calling Sayyad
   as Ali in the TV. In fact, the superb agreement and coordination between these two
   guys was very effective in making the cooperation between army and sepah work
   during the years 1360 and 1361, and also during the last days of war, when MKO
   under the support of Iraqi air force and artiliary atacked Iran.

   By the way, Sayyad was the commander of army's ground force, while Rezaee was
   and is the chief commander of whole sepah, and therefore technicaly in a higher
   rank.

>> -It was my impression that you have enough information from the first years af
>> revolution, so you can find out which spy groups. Besides, there wasn't too mu
>> groups who later became integral part of Iraqi army.                          
>                                            
>If you are referring to MKO, I never liked them either.  But I hope you will    
>remember that they played a key role in the success of the revolution,          
>and they were in fact part of the IRI in those early days.  It was later        
>that they split, and in fact, many MKO memebers took part in the war effort     
>in the early days.  And I don't think Bazargan and those guys were MKO,         
>unless you would like to call them foreign spies too.                           
            
   Yes I remeber that, but I never exagerate it. When Late Immam Khomeini started
   his strugle against Shah in 1340, MKO even didn't exist. Later, the strategy
   of armed strugle was never endorced by the majority of the nation and helped
   Shah's regime to make the suppression more sever.
   MKO was never ever a part of IRI ( ask it from themselves :-) ). They never 
   had official responsibilities in IRI, they didn't accept IRI's constitution
   ( while the majority of the nation approved it), and they even didn't succeed
   to atract the vote of people to send a single one of them to the first parliament.

>> -Yes. Army would have been left alone regardless of the war, and in fact, if i
>> wasn't the necessity of war, pasdaran and basij would have never grown that   
>> much and the whole defence budget, or its majority would have been spent for a
>>                                                                               
>>                                                                               
>                                                                                
>Please see above.                                                               
>                                                                                
>                                                                                
>>Mohammad                                                                       
>                                                                                
>Thank you once again,                                                           

   Thank you.
                                                      
>Agha Javad                                                                   
                                                                                

Mohammad
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