The Persian Mirror

Mirrors are used as decor in Iran, such as in Tehran's Niavaran Palace. Let's have a look at how Iran's modern history is like the reversed reflection in a mirror. To understand the Middle East today it would be very helpful to understand this mirror.

THE FRENCH REVOLUTIONARY MIRROR

It was the French Revolution of 1789 that opened the modern political era. So many other revolutions across the world are reflections of it, as we saw in the compound posting "America And The Modern World Explained By Way Of Paris". One of these reflections was the Iranian Revolution of 1979 but, as we might expect, it was a mirror image reflection.

The French Revolution, like the October Revolution that was also a reflection of it, was very hostile to both the monarchy and the national church. The goals of these revolutions was not only abolition of the monarchy but also secularism or atheism.

All three revolutions overthrew a monarchy by violent popular revolt. All three had the storming of a prominent building as their signature event. The French Revolution had the Storming of the Bastille. The October Revolution had the Storming of the Winter Palace. The Iranian Revolution had the Storming of the U.S. Embassy.

(Note-Donald Trump's would-have-been revolution also fit this pattern as it had the Storming of the Capitol).

The Iranian Revolution, in contrast, was about religion. While it overthrew the monarchy it was done in the name of religion. This was the mirror image reversal of the French and October (Russian) Revolutions. We saw in the posting "The Great Revolution Of Our Time" how the Iranian Revolution has had an impact on the world of turning the tide away from secularism and back to religion. This has been true of religion in general, and not just Islam.

THE CROMWELL TO KHOMEINI MIRROR 

The religious revolution in Iran that took place in 1979 is very much a reflection of the revolution of Oliver Cromwell in England, except that it is a mirror image reversal.

Oliver Cromwell came along during the religious turmoil in England after the Reformation. The Anglican Church had been founded by Elizabeth I as a compromise between the Puritans and the remaining Catholics. But after the death of Elizabeth the country fell into civil war between the Puritans, supported by Parliament, and the Anglicans, supported by the monarchy.

The Puritans emerged victorious and Oliver Cromwell felt that it was his divine mission to abolish the monarchy. He had the Crown Jewels destroyed and King Charles I was executed. The king's son famously escaped by hiding in an oak tree. England was to be essentially a theocracy.

After Oliver Cromwell died, his son took over the movement but didn't inspire the same kind of devotion. The Puritans fell out of favor and the monarchy was restored. The king's son that had escaped was crowned as Charles II. Some of the Puritans decided to leave England altogether, and this is where America's Pilgrims and Puritans came from.

The Iranian Revolution was very similar, with Ayatollah Khomeini in the role of Oliver Cromwell, but it was a mirror image reversal. Like Oliver Cromwell Khomeini overthrew and abolished the monarchy, considering this as his divine objective.

But, unlike Cromwell's revolution, Khomeini's revolution did not fall out of favor after his death. The family of the king that had been overthrown, the Shah, did not regain control. Instead of the religious supporters leaving, like the Pilgrims and Puritans, it was many of the Shah's supporters, the monarchists, that left for countries like America.

THE ISRAEL MIRROR

As anyone who has read the Bible knows, it was the Persians who liberated the Jews from Babylonian captivity when they conquered Babylon. Persia, then a vassal of the Medes, had earlier been allied with Babylon against Assyria. But conflict later began between Babylon and Persia, after Babylon had destroyed the Temple and taken the Jews captive as described in the Bible.

While a drunken royal party was going on inside the walled city of Babylon the Persians managed to partially dam the Euphrates River, which flowed through the city, and get inside the walls on the riverbed. Babylon fell, the Jews were released from captivity and the Persians supported their return to Israel and the rebuilding of the Temple.

But a mirror image reversal has taken place in Iran, which is the modern name of Persia. That reversal was the Islamic Revolution of 1979. History was reenacted when Iranian revolutionaries got inside the walled U.S. Embassy compound, and took the staff hostage. This was a perfect reenactment of the conquest of Babylon in ancient times, except that now it was reversed. 

Israel was now an enemy and the embassy seizure was against America, which has the same role in supporting Israel today as Persia did in ancient times. 

THE FORTY YEAR MIRROR

Does anybody remember the Strait of Hormuz from forty years ago? In the following image, from Google Earth, it is the narrow choke point with Iran to the north and the Arabian peninsula to the south.

Iran and Iraq were at war. Both were oil producing countries and both began attacking ships that were doing business with the other. Iran threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz and Ronald Reagan sent ships to make sure that the Persian Gulf stayed open to shipping.

I know that the name of the Persian Gulf has been changed but I went to school when Iran was an ally of the west, and before the name was changed.

Forty years later we are in a mirror image situation, with the narrow choke point on the other side of the Arabian peninsula. This time the Houthis, an ally of Iran in Yemen, are attacking ships doing business with Israel and, once again, the U.S. and allies sent ships to keep the waterway open. Yemen is on the right and Africa is on the left. Image from Google Earth.

During the 1980s the Iran-Iraq War began with border clashes between the two countries. New Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was clearly nervous about Iran's Islamic Revolution spilling over into his own majority Shiite population, and also saw the chance to seize oil-rich and Arab-majority Khuzestan province now that Iran was in revolutionary turmoil and cut off from it's former main ally, the U.S. 

Forty years later, like a mirror image, there were border clashes between Iran and Pakistan, which is on the opposite side of Iran. Each country fired missiles into the other, claiming to be targeting only militant groups.

THE HOUTHI MIRROR

The Houthis, effectively in control of Yemen, are allies of Iran. The area that is now known as Yemen was once part of a pre-Islamic Persian empire.

The Houthi Mirror is amazing and is a reversed reflection from the 1960s to today. In the 1960s the Yemeni Royal Dynasty was overthrown by military officers seeking to form a republic, imitating what had happened in Egypt. Outside powers got involved. The Saudis, ruled by a monarchy themselves, supported the royalists, which were also supported by the forerunners of what are now the Houthis. Egypt supported the republicans who had overthrown the monarchy, as that was a reflection of what happened in Egypt the decade before.

Israel was involved in that it had earlier fought a war against Egypt and another war was on the horizon. Israel supported the forerunners of the Houthis because their skilled mountain warriors were tying down a significant portion of the Egyptian military. When the Six Day War of 1967 came this was an important factor in bringing about an Israeli victory. The war began when Egypt decided to block the strait between the Sinai and Arabian Peninsulas to ships going to and from Israel.

Today we have a Persian Mirror reversal of the above situation in the 1960s.

Now it is the Houthis that are attacking ships with any connection to Israel, instead of their former enemy Egypt. The Saudis were against the Houthis, instead of allied with them as they had been in the 1960s, conducting a mirror image reflection of the unsuccessful Egyptian military attempt to defeat them in the 1960s. 

So it is actually the forerunners of the Houthis who helped to secure Israel's future by tying down a significant portion of the Egyptian military, so that it could not be deployed against Israel in the Six Day War of 1967. But now the Persian Mirror requires a mirror image reversal. 

THE INDIAN REFLECTION

We saw in the posting "The Great Revolution Of Our Time" how the effect of the Iranian Revolution was to turn the world back toward religion. This goes for all religions and not only Islam.

In India we see a Hindu reflection of the Iranian Revolution, but reversed so that it is against Islam rather than for it.

The Hindu party has been in power since 2014 in India which was long run by the secular Congress Party. Narendra Modi is much like a Hindu reverse reflection of Ayatollah Khomeini. Ironically, Khomeini's grandfather lived for a long time in India. Just as the signature event of Khomeini's revolution was the storming of the U.S. Embassy, the signature event of Modi coming to power was the storming of the mosque in Ayodhya that supposedly had replaced a sacred Hindu temple.