The Insignificance of Iran's Election Results

On December 10, 1979, Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini told a meeting with the Islamic Republic Television and Radio Committee: "In the revolution that was achieved in Iran, people were screaming that they wanted Islam; these people did not rise up so their country could have democracy".

Despite extensive, generally positive media reporting on the results of Iran's recent elections to the Iranian Majlis (parliament), these results, in fact, mean nothing. Every stage of the elections was tightly controlled and orchestrated by the real rulers of the Islamic Republic: the all-powerful and unchallenged senior officers of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp - the IRGC, together with the undemocratic "Deep State" institutions explained below.

According to Dr. Laurence A. Franklin*, it's important to note that Iranians who oppose to the current regime "have been broken physically and psychologically by a combination of regime cruelty and lack of support from the world's democracies. The people, though sullen, appear resigned to their fate. The dispirited state of the populace has proven advantageous for the ruling clique of the regime's Praetorian Guard, the IRGC, the politically reactionary mullahs, and the economy's kleptocratic-bureaucrats who rule with virtual impunity".

As for the recent elections in Iran, hundreds of moderate and reformist candidates were disqualified from running on grounds of:

1. Being ideologically opposed to the current strict Islamic regime
2. Having "moral turpitude"
3. Other vague reasons irrelevant in any real democratic process. 

So faced with a thoroughly vetted slate of pro-regime, pro-Islamic rule candidates, the voters cast ballots for cleverly marketed, regime-acceptable "moderates". 

As Dr. Franklin wrote last week in an article for the Gatestone Institute: "The political superstructure of Iran's government is much like that of the former Soviet Union. The offices of the President, the Majlis and the Civil/Criminal Court System have little real decision-making power. They are more for show, for the people to let off steam, and for foreign observers who might imagine that from there, the seeds of democracy might take root".

But contrary to what these foreign observers may fantasize, the Rouhani era will not usher in an Iran which will conduct itself like a normal member of the nation-state system. The three supposedly "democratic" branches of government: executive, legislative and judiciary will always remain subordinate to the real power in the Islamic Republic of Iran: the so-called "Deep State" institutions.

These institutions: The Council of Guardians, the Assembly of Experts, the Ministry of Information and Security (MOIS), the IRGC's Intelligence Bureau, the Special Courts, and the Office of the Supreme Leader stay largely insulated from external pressure and domestic calls for change.

The non-elected leaders of Iran's "deep state" institutions are even more powerful today. No election has resulted in reducing their power. In short, the regime remains much more an Islamic theocracy than a democratic republic. Its most officially hated sworn enemies are the United States and Israel. The current leadership of Saudi Arabia is also a mortal enemy of the Iranian regime, but in a different category. 

According to Dr. Franklin, "Western governments need to accept the harsh reality that the Islamic Republic of Iran remains a revolutionary regime. 

The West also needs to internalize that all decisions over ballistic missiles and associated delivery systems, the pursuit of a nuclear weapons capability, export of the revolution, aggressive support of the Shi'a ascendancy in the Gulf and militant acts of inhumanity towards their own people are made by the "deep state" institutions."

Whatever the balance in the Majlis between hardliners and members who may be a bit more flexible, there will always be a significant number of deputies who are former IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps), and who will harass cabinet members and political allies regarding decisions which run against the interests of the "Deep State" institutions.

And we should remember that current president, Hassan Rouhani, with all his smiles and seemingly moderate statements, is a charter member of the "Deep State" as a cleric (rank: Hojatoleslam), current member of the Assembly of Experts, close ally of the Supreme leader, and former Commander in Chief of the Air Defense Force (1985-1991).

Rouhani is not, as some naive Western leaders suggest, a part of the solution...he's a major part of the problem.

As you can see, the results of the recent elections in Iran mean absolutely nothing as far as changing that country's ideology or behavior are concerned.