Fourth Reich Archaeology - #079 - Contra Iran, Side B

Episode Date: January 19, 2026

In Side A (listen if you haven't already!), we went all the way back to the country’s entree into modernity and its role as a nominally independent nation amidst and between competing empires in The Great Game. We also go a bit deeper into the political forces that gave rise to the first Shah of Iran, which is a real Fourth Reich fairytale involving Nazis, Brits, and of course that black gold, oil. You know we dug into the rise and fall of the great lost hope for democracy, Mohammed Mossadegh. All he wanted was for Iran to get half the profits from his country’s oil, and instead he got ousted and replaced by a 26-year long dictatorship, replaced by the Islamic Republic in 1979.Basically we cover about 250 years of Iranian history and tell a story that we just have not been hearing in the news these days. In Side B, we take it to the present day and give our analysis on the current protests and the factional formations popping up to prepare a hostile takeover of the roiling nation. It is a time for clear thinking, for historical understanding, for only through consciousness of our role in reality can we act in history. And act we must.

The death toll in Iran reportedly topping 3,000 since protest started three weeks ago, as the Ayatollah blames President Trump threatening him from the bunker where he's reportedly been in hiding since the U.S. strikes last June. We consider the U.S. president a criminal for the casualties, damages, and the slander he inflicted on the Iranian nation. President Trump, saying enough is enough, quote, it's time to look for new leadership. in Iran. What he is guilty of as a leader of a country is the complete destruction of the country and the use of violence at levels never seen before. The leadership should focus on running his country properly like I do with the United States and not killing people by the thousands of order to keep control. A lot of headlines out there that are not the inaccurate President Trump's resolve. It's not the question.

The question is when we do an operation like this, Should it be bigger or smaller? I'm in the camp of bigger, time or till. I'm hopeful and optimistic that the regime of days were not. The West is called, it's not something that's just confined to England or France or the United States. Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. It's one huge complex or combine. Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists.

And this international power structure is used to suppress the masses of dark-skinned people all over the world and exploit them of their natural resources. We found no evidence of a conspiracy, foreign or domestic, the Warren Commission of science. apologize for the United States of America. Ever. I don't care what the facts are. In 1945, we began to require information which showed that there were two wars going. His job, he said, was to protect the Western way of life. The primitive simplicity of their minds vendors the more easy victims of a big lie than a small law. For example, we're to CIA. No, he has a mob.

He knows so long this is to die. Freedom can never be secure. It usually takes a national crisis. Freedom can never be secure. Pearl Harbor. A lot of killers. We've got a lot of killers. Why you think our country's so innocent?

This is a war. This is Fourth Reich archaeology. I'm Don. Dick is on assignment at an undisclosed location. We are getting you this episode, which is, of course, side B to our contra-Iran episode, the first part of which dropped earlier last week. And we wanted to get this out to you all as soon as possible, because, as you're probably aware, events on the ground are unfolding quite rapidly. and at the risk of those events overtaking our narrative here and our initial reactions to the massive protests underway in Iran

and the imperialist response there to, well, we thought we didn't want to make you wait an entire week before getting you the rest of this episode. Of course, to our patrons, you will have already heard this entire episode, and indeed if you'd like to hear the whole thing is one piece, you can sign up at patreon.com slash forthrightic archaeology. Before we dig into it, thank you again for tuning in.

And if you are unable or unwilling to sponsor our little project via patronage at this time, that is no problem at all from our point of view. we just ask that you kindly spread the word, that you like, rate, review, and share the podcast. And if you're so inclined, let us know what you think, your thoughts, your tips, either on Twitter or Instagram at Fourth Reichpod, or via email at forthrightepod at gmail.com. Now, of course, you must listen to Side A before proceeding. if you've not done so, please join the thousands of listeners out there who already have and catch up on the deep, deep history of modern Iran that we provided inside A, largely drawing upon my co-host Dix's very personal connection to Iran being Iranian-American

and having spent a significant amount of time in the country. And when we left off at the end of Side A, we were discussing the Iranian governments, successive governments, dating all the way back to the Qajar dynasty in the 18th century and had worked our way up into the contemporary post-war, Cold War era. And we're starting to make the transition to talking about the contemporary situation, what's going on there, what our take is on the protests, on the regime change efforts underway, and just to provide a little bit of an update. So the last recording that we did on this was on Monday of last week, Monday, January 13th. Here I am dropping this on Sunday,

January 18th, and since our last session, well, things kind of cooled off kind of rapidly, at least in the rhetoric of the United States. But as we heard in that cold open, the cool off is really more of a pause for Trump to kind of regroup to talk to the absolute demonic gremlin, Lindsay Graham, who is there visiting his Mossad handling. in Jerusalem as we speak, and to take instructions from the geopolitical ghouls that pull the old puppet strings behind the Amerisraeli Empire. And I'm going to let the rest of the episode speak for itself, but just to add that, I think in the intervening week, the fundamental ambiguity on the ground remains.

in place. There have been some reports in mainstream outlets since we last recorded, especially referring to this article in the Financial Times, the London Paper of Record there, that reported that, quote, there were groups of men in black clothes, agile and quick, said one demonstrator in Tehran. They would set one dustbin on fire and then quickly move to the next target, end quote. Another witness in Western Tehran told the F.T. He saw about a dozen fit men, quote, looking like commandos, end quote, dressed in similar black clothing, running through the area and calling on people to leave their homes and join the protests. They were definitely organized, but I don't know who was behind them, he said.

So this notion that there are sort of super soldier potential mass. agents or other armed insurgents infiltrating and involving themselves in the protests does seem to be bearing out even in the mainstream media. Meanwhile, so too do reports of the Iranian security forces using force against protesters, although for the reasons that we'll get into even more in this side B, it's unclear exactly who. who's doing what, who's instigating violence, what the scale of the violence is, and so many other open questions that remain on the minds, not only of the people outside of Iran,

but I'm sure on the minds of the people in the country as well. And, of course, our position here on Fourth Reich Archaeology is one of love and solidarity. We want the liberation of mankind, the liberation of the work. class and the end, the final and definitive end to all imperialist oppression of the proletariat worldwide. And with that, let's get digging. Last week we talked about Venezuela and like the Jack Ryan bit about how the media and the sort of the media and Hollywood has vilified Venezuela in the last 10 or so years. But with Iran, it's been since the 80s, like you say, it's been even beyond the 80s in the early 2000s. You know, you have shows like Homeland like 24 where they're vilifying the Iranians.

You have movies like Argo, you have movies like Siriana, where they're vilifying the Iranians. And then it even for sure goes back to the 80s. You have, like I said, the movie Not Without My Daughter. I invite everybody to go out and watch it if you haven't seen it already. Things like True Lies with Arnold Schwarzenegger, it's everywhere. Like as an Iranian American, growing up in America as an Iranian, it's very difficult to ignore the fact that everywhere you look, everywhere you see your heritage, your people, they're the bad guys. They're the villains.

It's everywhere. And neither that spectacular violence wrought upon the humanity and the image of the Iranian people, nor the physical and literal violence meted out through this eight-year war of attrition succeeded in actually ousting the Islamic Republican government. And, you know, obviously they are still. in power today. And ever since 88, you know, there's just been this periodic churning up every so often of another sort of color revolution, you know, the most obvious being the green revolution around the elections of, was it 2009? Yes, 2009. And it's important, you mentioned 88, it's important to

note that so the Ayatollah the supreme leader he died in 89 I think or 90 so it was right around then and the guy who took over at Ali Khomeini is the same guy that's the supreme leader today so when you're thinking about you know what happened at the time it's like that there was that shift in power and this guy Khomeini there's televised I think televised sessions of the meaning of the clerks where he's like I don't want this power and he's being all coy and humble about it. But this guy has survived and, you know, at times has come off as a more of a reformist, but it's still the same old, same old. And ever since he sort of took off in power, the country has been buzzing and even really buzzing since 2008 about revolution.

Yeah, and another pendulum, you know, besides the sort of pendulum that swings between playing balls, versus taking a more militant stance, there's also the pendulum between American geopolitical rivalry with Sunnis versus with Shia. And so, you know, you think about the 80s is characterized by what, by Operation Cyclone, up till then, the most expensive CIA operation in history, the arming of the Mujahideen in Afghanistan, which, was a Shia military, I'm sorry, a Sunni military operation with bin Laden, with all of these, what they call the Afghan Arabs, right? Bringing militias from all over the Arab world and forming what would later become the

core of Al-Qaeda. and so when you are focused on propping up the Sunnis, you know, you can take your aim against the Shia, but then in the 90s, when that starts to blow back against U.S. interests and all of the, you know, whether by design, more likely or by accident, these militias and, you know, you know, terrorists that the U.S. had armed and trained and set up, start to set their sights against American interests and against the Israelis. Then you want to play ball with their religious sectarian enemies and vice versa. So that's another sort of swinging back and forth.

And even in the Iraq War, too, right? Like in the Iraq war, a lot of the fighting that just perpetuated these utterly senseless cycles of violence. And it's augmented the American invasion into a brutal, brutal civil war that lasted for many, many years. At different times, the U.S. was friends with and enemies with the Iranians with the Iraq. Iranian-backed proxy forces in Iraq, you know, most notably it was the Al-Sadr brigades, right? So, in other words, you know, just to underscore the absolute amorality and viciousness of imperialist methodology in the Middle East, in this region, there's no. no real moral lines that the Americans won't cross in the same way, you know, history

repeating itself that the Brits did all those years ago, that the Germans, of course, and the, you know, even the Iranian leadership or monarchical leadership, they were willing to go along with whoever is able to provide the protection that they need to get that bag. It's real simple, and I hope the listener at this point has picked up on it for the last hundred plus years. In this region, it's just been about oil for these imperialist scumbags. Yeah, exactly. And no matter what alternative explanations are given, they're just window dressing. All right, two hours in time for us to do a little scene and talk about what the heck is going on today.

And the way to do that is to acknowledge that Iran is a country where they are not, they're very familiar with the idea of Western meddling, very familiar with the idea of subterfuge, of agent provocateurs coming in and creating hostility, creating chaos. So this is a problem for anyone who's trying to get some news out of the country. And whenever Iran is in the news, everyone listening. Everyone should be very suspicious about what they're seeing because the propaganda machine is so strong. The American government is so quick, the American news media is so quick to jump on anything to effectuate a regime change. Now, that's not to say that this time it's not different because

I do feel like this time it is different because the issue is such a universal issue. Because the things that I'm hearing at least is that people are, first of all, totally disillusioned by the government and a lot of the young people are disillusioned by religion. A lot of the young people are unemployed. There's a lot of food insecurity. The economic sanctions have really hit the people very hard, but there's also this issue, this 100-year issue of the people on the inside selling Iranians out. So Iranians selling Iranians out. Specifically, the cleric class, the folks that Iranians look up to for guys. guidance, for spiritual guidance, they've been in the pocketbooks of the West for so long that it's like a joke in Iran.

Iranians want nothing to do with the monarchy. They want nothing to do with the Mullahs because they've been wronged time and again. And it is the situation where I do think it's different. And the reason it's different is if you just look at what was going on in the Green Revolution, 2008, 2009, 2010, the issue there was free and fair, elections. It was a situation where Ahmadinejad had supposedly seized power. And so many people were very upset. But there was definitely a contingent on the other side of that that were perfectly happy with Ahmadinejad as the president. So that was a political, more than anything, I think, a political struggle that blew up into these protests. Then we move on to the 2018, 2019,

2020 protest leading up to the killing of Massa. and the woman life freedom movement, which very much was a social movement to add to the women's liberation and to get rid of the hijab and to empower women, which is all amazing to see and amazing to witness from the outside. And I'm very proud of all my Iranian brothers and sisters out there that were able to achieve so much time and again. But then again, that is also different because it is a social issue. It's not this issue that is hitting everybody. the pocketbooks at the same time in such a real way. And I think that's why for me,

it seems like it could be different this time. Of course, there's just so much chaos. There's so much misinformation. And unfortunately, it's hard to say what is right, what is wrong, what is true, what is false. But if you take just the historical context and the foundational truths, you can see that, that this time around, it may be a little different.

Don. Even the current president of Iran, President Pezzychkian, am I pronouncing that? Yes. Yeah, Pizchikian, yeah. That even he has conceded in public statements that the government has some accountability

for mismanagement of the fisc, and that even according to him, you know, whereas it would be easy to just point the finger at sanctions, and certainly, you know, sanctions reduce the size of the pie, to use the old facile economics metaphor, right? sanctions reduce the size of the pie, the size of the economy and what is available to the people, but then the question of distribution remains a political question in the government's hands in large part. And I was actually surprised to read his statements that really stopped short of placing the blame squarely on the Americans, even though, you know, as an American left-wing white guy with, you know, other than my my bro dick, no real personal connections to

Iran and not a special knowledge beyond, you know, trying to educate myself on the issue, I'm always keen to put the blame on the imperialists, right? I dig your instincts and I think that's why we're good friends, right? When the imperialists are on one side and everyone else is on the other, I think it's a good bet to blame the imperialists. But your other point, man, that's such a good point. It's so true. You got to look at the inside. Look at what the government of Iran is saying when it's making these admissions, when it's acknowledging the wrongs that it's done. And so I think you could say that that's probably something that's genuine, right? Because what does Pizchekian have to lose when he

says, maybe we've been mismanaging the money? That is a great point. But to the broader point of the propaganda machine. There is so much chaos going out of Iran. Like we've said many times, the Western meddling is so strong. The culture of acknowledging the Western meddling is so strong. There's so much misinformation coming out. Gosh, you'll see death toll counts of like 12,000 from one news source, 10,000 from another, 2,000 from one, 500 from, it's so impossible to sort of find the signal through all of this mess. And unfortunately, in those situations, you know who wins? The person with the largest propaganda machine. And who is that? You guessed it, the United States of America. Hey, the deep state cut off our phone connection. Continue, though. Sorry, you were saying.

That's very spooky. So, listener, this, whenever we get onto some juicy stuff, for some reason, the call drops. But what I was saying is that this propaganda machine and the number one propagandists in the world, the United States of America, it is easy pickings for them. And so they can take social media posts and videos where they see maybe a mosque is on fire or maybe there's a certain morgue that has body bags lined up and they will just blast us with those images because you cannot forget that the United States wants nothing more than the Iranian market to open. up think of all the business interests think of all of the money to be made so this is why it scares me with the Trump administration because he is such a fucking wild card because the people who are

surrounding him are such fucking ghouls it does not would not shock me if they are consistently going up to him and saying hey you know today it's looking pretty bad and actually we've got this guy palavi resa palavi the third who is ready to step up and we've we basically have the bases set up and we have the ship set up and all you really got to do is give the order and by this time tomorrow the Islamic Republic will be liberated and so I want everyone to be keenly aware of the propaganda machine that is going on before our very eyes yeah and and to go back to the sort of social versus economic protest issue you know we were talking before we recorded this a little bit about kind of the aftermath of the anti-Hijab, anti-vailing protests that really

popped off in 2022. And you were sharing some pretty interesting insights on the ways in which the government responded to those protests, which I don't think filters into the mainstream or even the non-mainstream discourse in the United States. I think that, you know, we kind of, see it as, you either categorize it as a color revolution that's simply a proxy for Western security and intelligence forces, or you categorize it as a totally authentic uprising of the people against a totally and completely unaccountable government. But I think perhaps there's a little bit more new. There's much more nuance, right, exactly. There is much more nuance because that issue is still ongoing in the country, right? It's not like that, you know, fight was fought and one side won and one side lost. There were concessions made. The climate has changed. The sort of social climate has sort of progressed in a way where now you will go into the streets of the major cities and folks will, women will be, you know, wearing their hair loose and they won't be covered and there won't be much prosecuting.

on that, but you'll have certain lines drawn, right? Where maybe you don't walk into a bank and have your hair out, right? You don't walk into a government building and have your hair out. But otherwise, if you're out in the streets, if you're in a cafe,

don't start, nothing won't be nothing kind of vibe, right? And so this nuance, I think, is very much lost, but it's very much a fight that's still going on today in the country. So when we say there were social issues, and I'm sorry if it wasn't like super clear, but those social issues are still there and they're still sort of percolating. But it's right now what's taken front and center is this economic condition. Yeah.

And with the social issues, it's not like the protests were crushed and the government moved forward with its totally draconian anti-woman agenda. Like there's a little bit of give and take. Right. And of course, you know, the, hypocrisy that's often commented upon that, obviously, Saudi Arabia, a neighboring country and enemy of Iran that would love to see regime change in Iran and is a close ally of the United States has equally, if not more draconian anti-women laws and policies on their books. and yet, of course, Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton, for that matter,

or anybody else in the American ruling class and their cronies and puppets in the government are not going to raise a peep about that, you know, much less like the Israeli government's femicide against the Palestinians and mass sexual assault and rape against Palestinian women in Israeli detention, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, only to hammer home the point, which our listeners should pretty much have as a staple in their ideological landscape that the imperialist powers, the Americans,

they don't give a fuck about the demands of the people. They don't give a fuck about the people. What they want is what they want. and that is in no way tethered. I mean, when you hear somebody like Donald Trump saying that, oh, the security forces, they're behaving very badly. They're very violent. And if they keep doing it, we're going to hit him where it hurts.

We're going to hit him hard. Like, as though he is a protector of the Iranian people when his own fucking ICE Gestapo murdered a mother in broad daylight on film not 48 hours ago. It's, I mean. Yeah, it's the hypocrisy, man. It's the thing we were talking about last week. It's the utter hypocrisy is what's so annoying to me. Yeah, and the same goes for this economic crisis too.

And this is kind of the tragedy of the whole situation that, you know, the actual legitimate grievances of the Iranian people don't get a fair outlet. And, you know, at the same time, the Iranian government under the conditions of sanctions and in the geopolitical position that it's in, right, one of the demands that you hear a lot from the sort of spokespeople for the protesters as they go and do English language interviews is that the regime is, that the regime is, mismanaging the tax revenue in the country, albeit, you know, limited by sanctions, by spending an outsized portion of that on military spending, which, you know, obviously as subjects of the American Empire, we can certainly relate to outsized military spending.

But yet for Iran, you know, as anti-imperialists and as pro-Palestinians, it's also like who else is going to fund the resistance. And, you know, Iran has at least postured itself as the central hub in the axis of resistance to Israeli aggression and genocidal oppression. So in that respect, you know, you, as a supporter of Palestinian humanity and is an opposer of Israeli genocide, you know, you do want and hope that somebody out there is going to pose at least a deterrent of some kind to Israel. You know, obviously we try to get the U.S. government to stop sending so many billions to Israel, but that is falling on deaf ears, both in the executive branch and in the Congress.

And so, you know, it falls on the likes of Iran, the likes of Yemen, who is, again, backed and supported by the Iranian government. And so it is really a rock and a hard place for this government. but at the same time, that leaves the Iranian people certainly much more so than what appears to be a very enthusiastic and much poorer Yemeni population that, you know, you see them out in their thousands supporting the attacks and the defense operations. against shipping of Israeli weapons on the Red Sea. But, you know, the Iranian people are left kind of starving as a result of this squeeze, this imperial squeeze that is being put on them. And has been put on them since the turn of the 20th century, right, since the early 1900s, they've been yearning for a democracy, a republic, a representative

system of government that will help them go about their lives in a meaningful way, right, to be able to prosper, to be able to play on the world's stage as a sovereign state. And every 30 or 40 years ago, there's this situation where they're really close to it. They get really close to it. But the top 1%, 2%, they make all sorts of side deals. They're corrupt. They take over whatever sort of mission is that of the empires in charge, whether that's the Brits and the Russians back in the 19th, 20th century, whether that's the French, the Brits, the Soviets, the United States, and the 20th century. And, you know, the Iranian people are left waiting.

But they are, I think we talked about, very, very political and very eager to go out there and, you know, the Iranian people are. sort of work for what they what they are yearning for for over a century. And so that brings me to like why I think this time it's different despite what's, you know, being reported on the mainstream media about why this time it's different and it's going to be there's going to be a revolution. And I want to talk maybe at this point about how we're getting the news and the mainstream media, sort of the drip that's coming out. from Iran and the American base. This is something that you put down, but like these

non-profit groups based in the USA, human rights activists in Iran, also known as human rights activist news agency based in Northern Virginia and the Center for Human Rights in Iran based in New York, neither of which are based in Iran, and coincidentally both received funding from CIA adjacent National Endowment for Democracy or Ned NED. And I think it's a good point to point out that like, all right, first of all, any Iranians in America, I would say odds are they were part of that pro-Shah regime, the very wealthy class. And that's how they got themselves out of there in here. So there are, forged to be sure, sort of Iranians that made it here and they're, you know, started with nothing. there's a saying among Iranians,

like as far as you were able to get from the Islamic Republic when that revolution happened, that's sort of a measure of how wealthy you were. So the wealthiest Iranians, they ended up in California and then move your way back east, right? And so, of course, the poorest Iranians stayed in Iran.

So what I'm getting at is, like, the news you're getting from these sort of groups, it's going to have that bend. a pro-shaw bend. Yeah. And I mean, the Northern Virginia-based NGO that's getting a bunch of money from the NED, you got to think that they are right next door, literally, to McLean, to Langley, they are in the CIA's backyard.

and there is no shortage of interest by the part of the deep state and the intelligence agencies to push their own propaganda line. And so it's easy to see how these so-called human rights organizations, which perhaps have, you know, legitimate ends, although I would really call that into question. I did a little digging myself on this human rights activist in Iran, aka human rights activist news agency, which is really the, seems to be the number one cited source of death tolls. And that's not just for the latest round of protests, but also really dating back to at least, and, you know, probably further beyond, but at least to this Israeli so-called 12-day war with Iran back in last summer, in July of 2025.

And at that time was when some very, very few news agencies, including DropSight, started to report that, hey, these guys are not just an independent human rights organization as the mainstream outlets that are citing their estimates were reporting them as. These guys are U.S. government funded. These guys are funded by the NED. And it's really a red flag that the likes of the New York Times all the way to the likes of Amy Goodman and Democracy Now, which also relies on the same figures, fails to point out the sources of funding behind this organization. And, you know, DropSite reported on it.

I think the gray zone has reported on it. And, you know, I have dug into them, like I said, and saw that not only are they a recipient of U.S. government funding, of U.S. sort of covert government funding, they are also listed as a donor, a donor, to that amazing supporter of human rights worldwide, known as the Atlantic Council. That's how much money they have.

It's like, fuck up in the Iranian people. Let's give some money to, let's give some money to the Atlantic Council. Literally listed on like the, you know, one of these annual reports that lists everybody that gives more than a thousand dollars. And there as one of the donors is human rights activists in Iran. So that really, in my mind. resolved any doubt as to the political orientation of this group, which is almost solely responsible for reporting on death tolls. It's the one that's reporting, you know, I think now in excess of 500 protesters killed. Yeah, something like 500 killed over 10,000 jailed. The numbers I'm

not sure about, I can't confirm. What I can say is, I know for a fact, there have been many people killed, let's say over 500, perhaps, maybe more. I don't know the exact number, but it's not going to be something insane, like tens of thousands of people killed. I don't believe that. And I know for a fact that the blackouts, they're real. It is very hard to get word in and out of Iran right now. So there's really just two truths that I can say I believe in is that It's hard to communicate with anyone in the country, and there have been a number of deaths, scores and scores of deaths, not sure what the number is, and things are pretty bad right now. But again, it's hard to say, right? It could well be that there's 2,000, 3,000 people that have been killed. It could well be that. But there's so much misinformation going around. And I think this brings us to the next and last segment of the show, which is what has. happens next and I think a good place to start that discussion is with the CVS interview that happened earlier today. Oh, amazing. Yeah. With Reza Palavi the third, the so-called crown prince

of Iran who's been living in northern Virginia for the last 50 plus years. And God, if you have any historical context, any education at all about the country, you were last. laughing out loud during this entire thing. And not only that, but it's like he posits that he's merely a servant of the Iranian people, this guy who has lived as, I don't know if he's a billionaire, but at least like a many tens of millionaire, right? Like you can Google Maps his estate. I don't know, I think he might have moved actually in the last decade or so.

But the family estate where he spent all this time, it's like one of these just horrific looking McMansions that, you know, is the size of like a small town. Yeah, it's insane. It's this like social dissonance, this psychosis is in full throttle, right? It's this guy, Brazzapalavi the 3rd, the so-called Crown Prince of Iran. He's saying, the people of Iran want me to lead them. And it is so fucking funny because it's like this guy is like, this guy is like. living effectively the same kind of lifestyle that his dad was living high on the hog in a mansion in mclean virginia he has all the trappings of a prince and you know for example in april of

2025 he had this lavish wedding for his daughter in paris france it's like how many millions untold millions of dollars did you spend on that one and he's thinking like yeah the iranian people are calling for me to do what bro to go back to iran and put on your jeweled crown and to sit in the in the palace and to be the the shah of iran 3.0 i think not it's it's so delusional and yet you know career serious journalist nora o'donnell on bovine berry weiss's cbs news is out there interviewing this guy as though he is some legitimate political personality and you said he's spent the last 50 years. To be clear, he left Iran when he was 17 years old

and hasn't stepped foot since. And he left, and I had to look this up because I thought I misstated it to you off air, but he left to train as like a U.S. fighter pilot. Like a U.S. trained fighter pilot. And, yeah, I mean, I think the reality is, is like if this thing does turn into a regime change a revolution or whatever you want to call it, which, you know, I could see it happening.

If it does happen, there is no way that this guy is able to step back into that country. Like, he steps into the airport and they'll just disappear him. They'll literally pick him clean off his bones, piranastah. Like, you'll just see the guy get off the plane and get overtaken by a crowd, and the last thing you see is maybe his skull pop up. because there's just no way that this guy is going to come back. Metatarsals flying through the air. And I think he knows that, but despite all that, because I think the real plays, he wants some Cush position

as a board member or a subsidiary or some new business venture that goes out there, so he doesn't even actually have to step foot in the country. And I think he knows that. But despite all of that, he straight up is just like, you know, you saw the same report that I. saw, like, is just answering questions about, like, what message do you have for President Trump? It's literally just communicating to Trump through CBS. Yeah, because probably Trump stopped answering his fucking phone calls because just like

Trump dissed Maria Corina Machado, the Nobel Peace Prize winner from Venezuela, who's another one of these utterly astroturfed creatures of dieticians. Asporic invention that has no claim whatsoever to any legitimate authority in her home country. I mean, this guy goes on CBS and unchallenged by the fucking stool pigeon of a quote-unquote journalist that he says, they're calling my name in the street. And like, yeah. Oh, I have it. I have it.

He goes. I didn't ask them. They asked me to help. As you said, they risk a call. And then he's talking about, and Mr. Trump, he's different. They have streets they name after him in Iran. He's not like Mr. Biden or Obama.

He literally said that. And he goes, he goes, he goes, I want to be an honest broker. I have called on key sectors of the oil and transportation industries. And they are ready to bring back. And he's literally saying this through CBS. It's nuts. And worst of all, you know for a fucking fact that he is paying six figures to some Paul Manafort-esque motherfucker that's like there in his decked-out living room with like a glass of $300 Japanese whiskey.

It's like, if you want to get to Trump, you can. You got to stroke his ego. You got to make up shit. Tell him they name streets after him. He's going to love that. He'll eat it right out. Dude, dude, this guy has fucking Mossad agents as his handlers. Like the CIA Mossad contingent is giving him his script.

They're just showing him the card and he's just reading from it. But my favorite one, my favorite one of the things he said is, I am trying to neutralize the propaganda coming out of the regime. I guess so. I guess so. Yeah, if you've got, you know, put a big old fat thumb on the scale. That's the problem. But that's the problem, right? I mean, there's literally nothing that you can trust that is coming out on this issue, on this conflict, on this revolution, whatever it is. I mean, those videos of the morgues and all that stuff. Like, I think this day and age, as we sit in 2020, it's impossible to tell what's AI, what's real, like where shit comes from. I mean, we massive, massive engagement posts have circulated saying they're from Iran and they've proven to be from other cities at different times that have nothing to do with Iran of like burning cars in the streets and throwing smoke bombs and fire bombs and grenades and shit.

It's like, how the first? fuck is a spectator supposed to verify shit and of course any reader of guillaubour knows the spectator cannot verify shit the spectator is prone is prone and just subject to whatever the spectacle throws at you and really unable to make heads or tails of anything and it's kind of a good reason to avoid, you know, a knee-jerk reaction to the moment. You know, the only knee-jerk reaction. And maybe I'm jumping the gun, maybe there's a little bit more to talk about

of what we do know or of what we're being told. But I think it bears mentioning now, and it certainly bears repeating. The only, the only political position that is morally and politically and coherent, you know, as a matter of coherence, justifiable to take is unrepentant, unwavering opposition to a mere Israeli imperialism of any kind, any invasion, any bombardment, any covert involvement, which, you know, another thing that's really different about this round, of course, is that both the U.S.

and Israel have openly conceded and acknowledged that Mossad agents are marching alongside the protesters. I mean, fucking Mike Pompeo tweeted about that. And not only that, they're like maybe not acknowledged, but there's, it's well known that, like, there are agents for all of these multinational corporations ready to go in the country. they're just waiting for the moment for it to happen. And I have no doubt this is what Pahlavi is trying to insinuate with this comment of like, I have major connections in the oil and transportation agency because there's people in the country right now that are just waiting their turn, right?

And, you know, I think my, what we're sort of getting into is this idea like what happens next. And it's like, what scares me is because I have gotten word from people that are in the country who are saying, yes, they're. you know, protests are happening is getting bad. It's kind of dangerous. They've closed down the airports. This blackout, the internet blackout is a little different than the previous blackouts.

It's not in the past these VPN companies have been able to sort of work around. And it doesn't seem like it's working so great this time. But again, like a lot of this is also you have to be wary of like what you're getting from the news. my point being that even if it is true that a revolution is coming it's not going to be under the palavi dynasty right it's not that's not going to be it it will be in trump's reality though right it will be whatever mr trump decides because he's proven his willingness to do that with venezuela so i have what scares me is that maybe this is close to actually happening or maybe there is a chance that the Iranian people get that finally get

that shot at self-determination and you know the reality being that they're faced with this this real true tyrant in the form of Donald Trump who's willing to do whatever it takes just for his ego yeah I mean as far as like the geopolitical situation I see less of a risk that Trump will come in as a tyrant because, I mean, he doesn't like to lose, right? And I think of a major Goats on the Ground style engagement in Iran, any moderately objective analyst will tell you that that is doomed from the start. There's no way that U.S. troops will be. met as liberators in Iran, regardless of whatever Pahlavi is saying. And in fact, it would be a big,

old-fashioned quagmire, much like what ICE is meeting in Minnesota. Right. I think my point is more like, this is the right guy, the right audience in Mr. Trump, to get sort of gassed up by this 30-minute talk, to be like, all right, yeah, let's do it. If they're close, let's push it over the edge. And then just see what happens, you know? Yeah. And one thing that I've seen is talk about Khomeini's son being like a potential proxy. You know, they're kind of auditioning and sickeningly using the prediction markets as... Nice.

as like a proving ground of floating different potential successors to the current regime on there. And one of them is like, yeah, let's get like a religious guy, but he's a little bit more modern and maybe a younger guy. And, you know, that way, again, kind of following the Venezuela model, it's a decapitation, but not necessarily over the, the line to regime change per se. So it's like they're, I think, considering these different options. But of course, at bottom of all of the options that are on the table to the U.S. is this imperial hubris that blinds the reason of the guys with the fingers on the triggers and invites really disastrous types of scenarios that you could imagine, right?

Like, it's not hard to conceive that a decapitation op or a bombing campaign targeting government buildings or just a total destabilization, which clearly is not beyond the page. for the Americans and their Israeli allies. And remember, right, they are in lockstep on this shit, right? Like, it's not really clear who is in the driver's seat between the U.S. and Israel. But, like, to the extent that the U.S. is mulling its options, Israel's in the fucking room on that shit. And even, you know, even you see in a lot of these dias,

protest in the U.S. or I don't know if you call it a protest, but like gatherings of Iranians in solidarity with the protesters and really in support of the Shah and the monarchical restoration, like Israeli flags are as prominent at those gatherings as are Iranian flags or as monarchical Persian flags, right? They wave the flag that like now Twitter is going to change. I think I saw the flag. It's an important emoji. It's an important point to make at this juncture that that large Iranian diaspora, there's like four million Iranians outside of Iran right now. A large number is in Israel, right? Because there are Persian Jews. And yeah, there's certainly that connection, right? For sure.

And, you know, there's also a pretty solid representation of Persian Jews in the New York City real estate game, which is Donald Trump's bread and butter. So, like, the people that he's talking to are not necessarily limited to people that you see on TV. You know, I have come across in my life some extremely wealthy Persian Jews from New York city real estate dynasties, and you know that those people are into some nasty, nasty business. And, you know, underscoring that all of this shit is taking place sub rosa among psychotic perverts with no ability to actually realistically assess the consequences of their actions. And that is the true danger of the situation that the world is in as a result of this sort of perfect storm of forces.

And, you know, the tragedy is that the desires of the Iranian people are in no way, like, illegitimate in seeking a more representative form. form of government and greater freedom. Like, while it is certainly exaggerated and overstated the degree of everyday repression, notwithstanding like the current round of crackdowns on protests, right? But like the day to day, I think there's a big disconnect between the average Americans conception of what it means to live in Iran, versus the reality, right? Like they consider it to be like a hellscape

where if you like show your face as a Christian, like you'll be beheaded or some shit, you know? Totally. And it is it is a very diverse country, very young country, but very sort of with the Shia Muslim bend. There's one other way I could see this play out and I wish there was a polymarket or a Kalshi on it. But it would be that the new prospective regime,

sort of represents the based Iranian answer to like a Nick Flentes type, the young Christian fundamentalist type. But in Iran, it's going to be the young sort of Shia fundamentalist type, but it's all of the same stuff. It's all of the Burger Reich stuff, but with the flavor of Shia Islam instead of Christianity. And I'm saying this because the Iranian people in Iran,

they love tech, they love technology, and they love fast food. some of the best fast food you'll ever have. And it's crazy how sick they've gotten. If you want a fun time, go to your TikTok, your Instagram, your Twitter, and find the Iranian fast food scene page. And it's just nuts what they're doing out there with fast food. Amazing.

And, you know, it would be great if we could all pay a visit someday to our brothers and sisters out there in Iran. And meanwhile, you know, I think it is incumbent upon all of us to clock the true objectives of these fickle and evil imperialist warlords that are moving money, that are making propaganda and that are spreading lies in order to really bring about. national socialism, right? Like all of this, you know, when you're talking about the oil industry too, like, remember, we've commented on the expense required to actually extract and refine Venezuelan oil. And so 100%. The U.S. doesn't control Venezuela's oil, notwithstanding Trump's claims that it does. But even if it did, right, you've even seen in the last week the oil companies coming in and being like, eh, not so sure if it's going to be cost effective to go in there

because it's going to require such a degree of investment that, you know, what's the opportunity cost of really putting all of the eggs into that basket when there's all this other oil elsewhere? And Iran's oil infrastructure is high. highly developed to the point where, you know, like you said, it's got a history of over a hundred years at this point. It's churning and chugging. Like, if that oil infrastructure were opened up full throttle to the Western cartel, like they would come flocking. And Venezuela would be a nothing burger. But meanwhile, if the sort of doomsday scenario occurs and Iran turns into a civil war hellscape, then obviously

the oil assets are kind of frozen to corporate interests and you need to make that investment in Venezuela. So it's all about hedging the portfolio, hedging the bets, hedging the geopolitics. And I think at this point, I would like to kind of recap what I view as, let's say, three maybe not exclusively, but like major geopolitical goals that the incoherent but at least a directionally cognizable thrust of the imperial gambit in Iran are. And the first one of those goals, I think, is to prevent any oppositional alliance, whether it's in South America, as we discussed in the Venezuela episodes, or whether it's in the so-called axis of resistance to Israel,

to Israeli genocide, to the overall apartheid regime, and, you know, its allies in like the Abraham Accords, right, the Gulf states, we want to prevent any oppositional alliance that would challenge their bag, their dominance from taking shape anywhere in the world. And the reason for that is that such an alliance could, as Gaddafi threatened to do way back before he was bayoneted and tortured to death to the glee of Hillary Clinton, create a alternative economy for the exchange of major commodities that is not denominated in U.S. dollars, right?

It is dollar dominance that facilitates untrammeled corporate access to these global reserves, whether it's oil or precious metals or whatever you want to list, right? Rare earths, lithium, what have you. If there's a trade in any of that shit, that cuts out the U.S. entirely, you know, the paper tiger of the American Empire will crumble

like a house of cars. And so these are desperate, desperate measures to ensure that that doesn't happen. And really, the gloves are off. You know, there's no niceties about the way that they're going about this. The second goal is to show off and battle test. these expensive-ass weapons and weapons technologies that the bulk of our tax dollars go to pay for. We have a legitimate grievance against our government, dating back generations at this point, that all of our fucking money is going to military spending and none of it is going to social spending, and therefore we have no safety net to support our brothers and sisters who are suffering from hunger, from sickness, from lack of housing, from the cold.

You know, all of that money that would go to help them is instead going to enriching these sicko weapons manufacturers and produce these toys for their psychics. psychotic rulers that have access to their use. And, you know, all of those toys on the shelf don't do much good if you can't take them out and play with them every now and again. And, you know, both the weapons industry and the puppets in government whom they sponsor have this need to actually... you know, engage in what they might characterize as creative destruction. And it is truly,

truly a sad state of affairs that we let them get away with that and that we keep on paying them to do that shit. We better think about ways to stop them from doing it because it's depraved, but it is nevertheless a major, major objective of our government's activities. And the third is, of course, another theme that we've talked about many, many times. And it kind of rhymes with the first goal that I discussed, which is to shield the Amerisraeli imperial evil doers, right? All of these governmental leaders, all of these corporate thugs and stooges, all of these mouthpieces in the propaganda industry to shield all of these absolute sick, perverted fuchs from any kind of accountability. Right? We've talked about it in connection with the

genocide, we've talked about it in many contexts, right, but as soon as one domino falls, as soon as, let's say, if Netanyahu were to be arrested and thrown into the dock, right, it's impossible to scapegoat him without punishing and holding accountable all of his many enablers in the United States. They act together and they must be held accountable together and the best defense, as they say, is often a good offense. And so this unrestrained assault on humanity that we are living through is itself a way to stave off and prevent. In fact, prevent even by just flooding the stream to use that phrase again, of wrongdoing, of war crimes, of international, contumly against all. This is a mechanism to prevent any kind of a rules-based international order that is not a facade to protect the principle that might make

right, you know, this principle that now these mask off fucking Nazis like Stephen Miller are expressing with no sense of shame. So their goals are all rotten to the core. And, you know, this is why, you know, thinking about these goals and really understanding what they are after when they make false and empty statements about democracy and freedom and protecting civilians, it's fucking bullshit. And anyone who can't see through that, you know, you just have got to wake the fuck up and wake up your loved ones and wake up your friends and wake up your comrades and, you know, snap out of it.

Engage in discourse. don't engage in knee-jerk campism, you know, use your fucking brain and think creatively. Because we have to. We have to think creatively or else we are all fucked. All right, folks, that does it for this week's program. We are so glad to have had you here with us today. Before I sign off, I do want to say to my people in. Iran we are with you whatever happens we are always on the side of the people down with

the fascists down with the collaborators down with the oppressors a better world is possible if we can just get these motherfuckers out of power please do join us again next week where we will no doubt cover another wild and crazy topic about this and crazy world. But until next time, I am Dick. I'm done. Saying farewell. And keep on digging.

No, no, no, No, nocemen Barra, Farrdie by Farrd Bafas not, but for horse,

no, havas, noahs In the Aphra in the Ape in the abra

on the Gengal and Doo. One, You know what time it is. It's that time where we give our thanks to all of our doctoral candidate and research assistant Patreon members. Thank you so much to Stephen, Sergeant Grumbles, Cornelia, Bick, Dave, Raven, McGee, Al,

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