Recently there has been several comparisons between the 1989 Revolution in Poland where Lech Welesa led the Solidarity movement into power overthrowing the communist regime installed by Soviet Russia and the 2009 election protests occurring today in Iran (most recently in Newsweek). While there are some similarities, this are two separate events occurring in two completely different atmospheres.
First of all, the Polish Revolution took almost an entire decade to finally be successful. There were numerous protest and marches against the government throughout the 1980s, but victory was only obtained when all the people of the country united aganist the communist regime. The Iran protest movement has just begun, and while I pray and hope that the protesters will be successful, I believe that this movement too will also take several years to be successful. History has given Iran a leader of this movement, a man familiar with revolution and who can be sucessful, but large parts of the population are true believers in the theocratic dictatorship that is in powe now. Until more of the other segment of the population become disatisfied with the government the facist leader of Iran will cling to power and use his gestopo like forces illegally arrest and kill dissenters.
It appears that in the near future there will be fundametal change in the way Iran is governed, but until then, the reformers will have to keep the movement alive to bring about this change.
No comments:
Post a Comment