WORKERS ,,16(;0I1R' 25¢ -~.... ~-, ... No. 245 .. •J:l.... '~y X·523 7 December 1979 Desnite Khomeini'sDeath Wish for Iran 010 It ;;an't go on much longer without a ready to die for the "imam" and the head-on crash between the world's most Americans who have made a fashion of dangerous imperialist power and the "Nuke the Ayatollah" T-shirts. world's most powerful medievalist The U.S. media counts off the days religious fanatic. Not for much longer for a frustrated. angry and humiliated can Khomeini threaten to hold trials population. while a group of congress­ and execute the hostages at the U.S. men have organized a campaign to "set embassy in Teheran while he calls forth the date" for military retaliation. ABC­ Islamic wrath against the "American TV runs a near-nightly news special Satan." and taunts Carter for having entitled. "America Held Hostage." and "no guts." It cannot go on indefinitely. Tillli' magazine's tlag-and-eagle cover thiS gathering of U.S. warships and demands to know: "Has America Lost aircraft off the coast of the Arabian Its Clout')" peninsula and these storm clouds of war No. it can't go on much longer. sentiment on the streets of America and Despite the efforts to "play it cool." Iran. Carter's war threats are real. and the In the bizarre events of the last month conscLJuences terriblc~tor the masses there IS a tearful S) mmetr) in the lunatiC of Iran and the international proletanat. pronouncements of the 79-year-old nut For the ultimate target in the \\'1'1" with state powcr in Qum who says that room of U.S. impnialism is not Iran but ali Iranians would welcome martyrdom. Russia. It is because the shah was part of Kitty Hawk: Carter's "other remedy." and the coldly genocidal calculations of American imperialism's global anti­ the Dr. Strangeloves in the war/crisis Soviet strategy that U.S. embassies have condition its every move in this danger­ rule. But without gIVIng the slightest room buried decp below the Pentagon. now become the targets of enraged ous contest of nerves. diplomacy and amount of political support to the There is indeed a dreadful correspon­ mobs from the halls of Islamabad to the perhaps war. Surely the ayatollah is reactionary mullah regime of Iran. in a dence between the Iranians who display shores of Tripoli. And it is this same prepared to sacrifice a few million military connict between the most themselves in their funeral 'shrouds anti-Soviet strategy which continues to Iranians to the cause of popular mullah continued on page 2 Embassies Ablaze, Shootout in Mecca's Mosque ...What Next? , Behind Mullah Madness f' American embassies ablaze from On November 20. 200 to 300 well­ Tripoli to Islamabad. marine guards armed Bedouin tribesmen led by their dead in the fiery ruins. diplomats in 22-year-old Mahdi. or self-proclaimed Teheran still hostage to huge crowds of Messiah. seized Mecca's Grand Islamic students burn U.S. embassy in Pakistan on November 21. fervent Khomeiniites. gunbattles Il1 MosLJue. holiest shnne of Islam. during Mecca's Grand MosLJue. a tide of the height of Islamic New Year religious assaults on Amencan embassies. consu­ the U.S. embassy unhindered. while blamic religious frenzy reaching an pilgrimages. Though it was the work of lates and businesses throughout the Qaddafi sent apologies to Washington. orgiastic crescendo of bloody self­ a small Islamic sect. Khomeini instantly East. in Kuwait. Lebanon. Bangladesh. Meanwhile the Shi'ite holy month of tlagellation~has the Sword of Islam called on the faithful to rise up and India. Turkey. Pakistan and Libya. Muharram was reaching its climax in been raised to crush the "infidel" once de:end Islam against supposed Ameri­ In Islamahad. capital of Pakistan. the holy day of Ashura when huge and for al!,! can complicity. letting loose a storm of 20.000 demonstrators chanting "Down processions oftlagellants whipping their with the Dog Carter" and "Down with backs bloody. some even cracking their --'-'- Imperialism" stormed and burned the skulls with scimitars. poured through J2-acre American embassy complex. In the streets while women in black a country where troops are swift and chadors wailed and shrieked from ruthless in suppressing any opposition rooftops and doorways. Ashura com­ to General Zia"s military dictatorship. it memorates the martyrdom oj Mo­ took them over two hours to reach the hammad's grandson Hussein by the smoldering ruins where two marines lay Caliphate of Yazid. and it was out of last dead. In Libya. where Islamic colonel year's Ashura processions that the Qaddafi rules with an iron hand. 2.000 mullahs emerged victorious over the iiiiiiiiii_iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii ......_ ....."'....._....,.,-·~"'__.._,,_'"" .. demonstrators hailing Khomeini sacked ('olltilllied 011 page II ,. See No Evil dP-eak No Truth SWP Bows Ever Lower to Khomeini The Socialist Workers Party (SWP) womcn back into \cils. strikebrcaking a "Iren/ied campaign to discredit him" liberal pacifism and bourgeois ddeat­ has been the "best builder" in the U.S. 01 and blnndv supprcssion nl thc Kurds. upon his recent return from leheran. Ism to get t he masses into the streets. Khomeini's reactionary Islamic mO\c­ Ihe symptoms of a grnwing and though "Hansen has so far rclused to "WIl\ dic lor the shah"" the SWP asks. ment. In the mullahs' moment 01 dangerous patriotic \\ar re\er in thc retreat." Hansen. however. is already but what It really means is "Why die lor triumph ovcr the shah last year. the 23 U.S. arc all around us. Hut if you had to discredited. A convicted tax evader and anything"" February tfititalll trumpeted: "Iranian rely on the\/ililillll. you'd ne\er kno\\ on the e,\treme right \\ing of Capitol It may come as a shock to the SWP. Masses ShO\\ the Way." Today. at a it. Ihe SWP has a problem-t he Hill. Hansen has championed causes hut the American population is not time when much 01 thc left has become American public has de\elo["led a deep Irom the fight vs. abortion to opposing inherently pacilist. Carter's imperialist increasingly 4ueasy about their lormer hat red for ayatollahs. So these \\ ollld-be the "gi\ea\\ay" of the Panama Canal. \\ar drive against Iran must be fought enthusiastic support to the Islamic spnkl'smen lor the "\ast majnrity His last diplomatic mission took him t.o hard. and genuine socialists know ho\\ mullah regime, the oh-so-respectable simplv lie. "Protests say: '\0 War the bunker of Gennal Somo/a where hc to do It. Hig Oil's ripoll's. the torture­ reformists of the SWP arc wildly Agalll"! Iran·..· reads thc ,\lililalll's encouraged the shah of \icaragua to chic shah. Rockdeller's and Kissinger's cheering the Khomeiniite sei/llre of the hCldline. \\ hIle the article goes on to hang on. sinister plots. the "nest of spies" in the U.S. embassy. pronf positive that elaim: What IS thc SWP up to \\ith this U.S. embassy-the American \\orking Khomeini is the "progressi\e" they "Defying the wishes of the vast majority cloud-cuckoo-I,1l1d fantasy. of mass class can be mobili/ed against these alwa\s said he was. "Iranian workcrs in of the American people. Carter is taking new steps toward war against Iran.... protests against Carter's war threats? imperialist machinations, but not in lead of deepening re\olution."· the fhe American people arc not buying it.·· Quite simply. these reformists arc solidarity with the ayatollahs and their .Hililalll (30 i\:n\embn) insists. exhnrt­ \ot hUylng ie' A recent Associated seeking ,I' way to make their consistent program for "liberation": no whiskey. ing thc American public to "dra\\ Press; \ HC \ews poll re\ealed that pro-Khomeini position palatable at a no rock and roll. and no unveiled inspiration from the heroic example of some 00 percent of Americans would time when the ayatollah's effigy is heing \\omen. the Iranian masses ... who arc no\\ support a mIlitary strike against Iran it hurned from coast to coast. And while Ihe \\ay to win the American prok­ mobili/ing by the millions tn detend the hostages were harmed or even put on they may he the most craven. the SWP tanat to the light against imperialism is their re\olution.'· triaI. \10st bourgeois commentators arc by no means the only left apologists not the SWp's way, the way of cringing You'd ne\er know from the .tlititalll have remarked in ama/ement at Carter's for the "imam." At a December I Ne\\ pacifism .in America. nothing but a that the Ayatollah Khomellli-whose restraint thus I'll' III the face 01 massive York "anti-shah" [read pro-KhomeiniJ eo\er for political support to th.. 4uotations arc carefully selected and sentiment to ":\uke the Ayatollah." demo attended by much of the left. a religious fanatic of Qum. We arc sanltl/ed for SWP publicatinn--is using Another .\Iililalll article (7 Spartaclst leafleting team \\as excluded absolutely opposed to any American the crisis to divert the Iranian Illasses' December). began under the absurd lor being "antl-Khomeini.'· imperiali~t military adventures in Iran. attention from the shattered condition front-page headline "Carter steps up Sometimes it's hard to be a reformist. We raised the demand "Down with the of the Iranian economy and state. :\or \\ar threats. Defies growing anti\\ar Ha\ing decided to stand by their man. shah!" along with Iranian militants. would you know that his theocratic re­ sentiment." (Douhtless the run on Khomeini, the SWP has got to comince when the SWP was saying this was an gime had been exposed as an enemy 01 Iranian flags-which Americans al"l' at least its own membership that it's "ultra-left" call.