history. Many regimes based on religion ended up making a Faustian pact with their military for protection against the people. And in every case the military, once in power, eliminated its masters. Islamic history knows such military rulers as the “mamelukes” — literally, “the owned ones,” individuals who were supposed to serve the caliph but ended up chopping off his head and seizing power for themselves.
There is no doubt that Mr. Ahamadinejad, and beyond him the military elite of the regime, owe their victory to Ayatollah Khamenei, who broke with his fellow mullahs to help the military win the struggle within the regime. Theoretically, Ayatollah Khamenei now controls all the levers of power in the establishment. In reality, however, he is a lone mullah who will be increasingly opposed by the clergy for different reasons. At the same time, because he lacks a popular base of his own, he will in time become a hostage to the new “mamelukes” symbolized by Mr. Ahamadinejad. […]
Political mullahs like Messrs. Khatami and Rafsanjani tried to deceive Europeans, and often succeeded, by pretending to be Davos-style liberals abroad while telling women at home to cover their hair because it emanates a dangerous ray that makes men wild. With Mr. Ahamadinejad, however, you’ll get what you see. Unlike Mr. Khatami, who claimed that Islam was the same thing as democracy, Mr. Ahamadinejad has no qualms about saying that the two are incompatible. He is also open about his belief that women are not the equal of men and that non-Muslims cannot have equal rights with Muslims.
Messrs. Khatami and Rafsanjani tried to present to the Western world an “other” that was really the same bar the beard and the turban. Mr. Ahamadinejad, however, is proud of acting as the “other” that can never abandon its otherness.
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