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Conversations with Bill Kristol

Ray Takeyh on Iran: Are We Witnessing a Revolution?

Conversations with Bill Kristol

Conversations with Bill Kristol

News, Society & Culture, Government, Politics

4.71.7K Ratings

🗓️ 14 October 2022

⏱️ 59 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Iran today is in some kind of revolutionary stage…. All social classes are united behind the idea that they want the extinction of the regime, and all social classes seem to be united on the proposition that reform is not possible. So argues Ray Takeyh, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and one of the leading historians and analysts of Iran. In this Conversation, Takeyh analyzes the momentous events in Iran following the killing of the 22-year-old woman Mahsa Amini at the hands of the morality police last month. As Takeyh argues, the regime faces the greatest threat to its rule since the Islamic Revolution of 1979. Takeyh shares his perspective on the complex political, social, and security dynamics in Iran and what to look for over the next weeks and months. Kristol and Takeyh also discuss what the US and the West should do to give the protest movement the best chances to succeed.

Transcript

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0:00.0

Hi, I'm Bill Crystal. Welcome back to Conversations. I'm very pleased to be joined today by Ray

0:19.6

Takay, Senior Fellow at the Council of Foreign Relations. One of the really leading experts on Iran,

0:26.4

here in the United States, historian with a doctorate from Oxford, the author several important

0:32.7

books, and I would say for a layman like me and most of our viewers and listeners are very

0:38.8

accessible books. Those serious scholarly books on modern Iran. The most recent one is the last

0:47.2

Shah, America, Iran, and the fall of the Palavi dynasty, which includes very interesting

0:52.9

reconsideration of the 1953 coup in Iran. I think Ray did a lot of archival research for that,

0:59.0

and I'm proud of the way we published one of the articles, an article by Ray that was kind of

1:03.1

an early glimpse at some of that. He's the co-author with Eric Edelman, who's been on this kind of

1:09.1

these conversations several times of a book in just three, four years ago, Revolution at Aftermath,

1:15.9

forging a new strategy toward Iran. So, Ray, thanks for joining us today. Thanks very much for having

1:22.5

now. It's great to have you, and of course, Iran. So, I mean, let's just dive right in. I mean,

1:28.4

what's happening there? Obviously, very dramatic, very moving scenes from Iran. How should we

1:35.0

understand what's happening? How serious it is? Is it different? Is it from previous failed,

1:39.6

unfortunately, efforts to shake the, the, the, the, the Ayatollah's regime there?

1:46.3

Well, these protests are more serious than the previous ones, because they tend to encapsulate

1:54.9

all the previous grievances within the catalytic event that sparked all of this was the death of

2:02.4

Miss Amini in custody in early mid-September by the morality police for her headscarf.

2:10.8

But these are not female emancipation protests, although they are that. They tend to be

2:16.4

political grievances, economic grievances, cultural grievances, religious mist. And they have essentially

2:23.0

the the female emancipation issue has essentially become

2:29.2

a umbrella under which all other forms of grievances are inexperienced.

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