Democracy, made in Iran

[frandroid]

My long Iran entry yesterday was thwarted by frequent Firefox crashes and LJ, so I think I'll just post quick entries instead.

By reviving memories of an ousted leader, Iran's protesters are signalling they want to win reform without US intervention [The Guardian]

Above the twinned pictures of Mossadeq and Mousavi on this protest poster are the words "We won't let history repeat itself." Centuries of intervention, humiliation and subjugation at the hand of foreign powers have decisively shaped Iran's collective psyche. The most famous victim of this intervention – and also the most vivid symbol of Iran's long struggle for democracy – is Mossadeq. Whenever Iranians assert their desire to shape their own fate, his image appears.
[...]
Iranians began their painful and bloody march toward democracy with the constitutional revolution of 1906. Only after the second world war did they finally manage to consolidate a freely elected government. Mossadeq was prime minister, and became hugely popular for taking up the great cause of the day, nationalisation of Iran's oil industry. That outraged the British, who had "bought" the exclusive right to exploit Iranian oil from a corrupt Shah, and the Americans, who feared that allowing nationalization in Iran would encourage leftists around the world.

In the summer of 1953 the CIA sent the intrepid agent Kermit Roosevelt – grandson of President Theodore Roosevelt, who believed Americans should "walk softly and carry a big stick" – to Tehran with orders to overthrow Mossadeq. He accomplished it in just three weeks. It was a vivid example of how easy it is for a rich and powerful country to throw a poor and weak one into chaos.
[...]
Carrying a picture of Mossadeq today means two things: "We want democracy" and "No foreign intervention". These demands fit together in the minds of most Iranians. Desperate as they are for the political freedom their parents and grandparents enjoyed in the early 1950s, they have no illusion that foreigners can bring it to them. In fact, foreign intervention has brought them nothing but misery.