|
|
|
|
The National Interest
Iranian Beliefs and Realities
by Clifford Kupchan
The spines of Western leaders shivered following the election of Tehran's mayor, hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, as Iran's next president. And for good reason. Ahmadinejad's resume and rhetoric are not pretty. He was a member of the ideological Revolutionary Guards and of the paramilitary Basij. He is a leader of the Abadgaran (Developers) movement, comprised of younger hardliners who feel that their elders have lost their revolutionary fervor. In keeping with someone who looks back to the early 1980s as the golden age of the Islamic revolution, the new president celebrates the revolutionary ideals of the Khomeini era and ardently criticizes the United States.
Full Text (PDF, 5 pages, 89.8 KB)