Ali Rahnema

Call to Arms: Iran's Marxist Revolutionaries

Formation and Evolution of the Fada'is, 1964-1976

• Gebundenes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

A groundbreaking study of the Iranian Peopleâ s Fadaâ i Guerrillas, their ideology, actions and impact on the 1979 revolution

Produktdetails

• Radical Histories of the Middle East
• Verlag: Oneworld Publications
• Seitenzahl: 528
• Erscheinungstermin: 7. Januar 2021
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 241mm x 161mm x 48mm
• Gewicht: 780g
• ISBN-13: 9781786079855
• ISBN-10: 1786079852
• Artikelnr.: 59937542

Autorenporträt

Ali Rahnema is Professor of Economics at the American University of Paris. He is the author of An Islamic Utopian: A Political Biography of Ali Shari'ati, Behind the 1953 Coup in Iran and Superstition as Ideology in Iranian Politics.

Inhaltsangabe

Preface and Acknowledgements Introduction   1  Violence as a political option? * Demonizing the armed opposition * Why resort to political violence? * The four Iranian Marxist theoreticians of armed struggle 2  Hasan Zia-Zarifi
s account of why armed struggle * The culprit: Absolutist despotic monarchism * Reflections from prison 3  Amir-Parviz Pouyan
s account of why armed struggle * Literature in the service of politics * Armed struggle: Rational or irrational? A necessary theoretical digression * Pouyan on the necessity of armed struggle as a rational choice * Refutation of the theory of survival * Pouyan
s incisive impact 4  Mas
oud Ahmadzadeh
s accounts of why armed struggle * Demystifying classical notions of how and when to take up arms * The fruitful retreat * The Debray factor: From Havana to Tehran via Mashhad * Learning from the past * Breaking with the old sacred cows * Armed struggle by the revolutionary vanguard 5  Bijan Jazani
s accounts of why armed struggle * Mysteries around What a Revolutionary Should Know * To confront a monarchical military dictatorship * Revolutionary intellectuals: The dynamite of the revolutionary movement * Jazani
s paradoxical hints * Revolutionary agents and the question of leadership in a despotic or democratic Iran 6  The Tudeh Party
s awkward tango with armed struggle * Ideological rift over revolution-making * Iranian students take sides * The Tudeh Party
s reluctant approval of armed struggle * The Tudeh Party pushes back against armed struggle * Revolution means employing peaceful methods of struggle * The Tudeh Party denounces armed struggle * What did the revolutionary Marxists think of the Tudeh Party? 7  Monarchists, Maoists, and the Tudeh Party in unison: armed struggle is counterrevolutionary adventurism * For Nikkhah the red revolution turned white * Kourosh Lashäi
s rejection of romanticism and embrace of realism * The Tudeh Party: We told you so 8  Armed struggle and Marxist canonists * Historical determinism or revolutionary voluntarism? * Marx and Engels: Wavering over the role of violence? * Lenin on violence, unequivocal? * Trotsky: Dissonance between intellectual revolutionary consciousness and backward economic conditions invites violence 9  Armed struggle and Marxist revolutionaries * Mao Tse-tung
s revolutionary authority * Che Guevaräs revolution-making to overthrow dictators * Carlos Marighella: Unleashing violence to end dictatorial violence * Marighella in Iran via Baghdad 10  Formative years of the Jazani group * Jazani the entrepreneur * Whence it came * Student political activities * First phase of the Jazani Group * Jazani and The Message of University Students * Second phase of the Jazani Group * The political and propaganda branch * The operational and military branch * The military operation that should have happened but did not * Ghafour Hasanpour
s networks: Recruiting behind the scenes 11 Jazani Group compromised * First raids * The remnants of the Jazani Group under siege * Bank robberies * The decision to leave the country * The final nabs 12  The new Hasanpour, Ashraf, and Safäi-Farahani Group: Preparations and operations * Picking up the broken pieces * Organizing armed struggle: Three teams * The first urban operations of the H-A-S Group 13 The Pouyan, Ahmadzadeh, and Meftahi Group * The dissimilar but inseparable Pouyan and Ahmadzadeh * Enter
Abbas Meftahi * Pouyan
s circles at Mashhad and Tabriz * Ahmadzadeh
s membership in Hirmanpour
s circle * Meftahi
s Sari and Tehran circles * The P-A-M Group
s military operations before Siyahkal * An ethical digression: To press or not to press the trigger 14 Armed struggle in Iran: Rural or urban * Theoretical positioning * Ahmadzadeh gently parts with the Cuban model * Jazani: Rural Iran not the ideal revolutionary base * Jazani
s change of heart: Emphasis on rural/mountainous warfare 15  Merger discussions for
Iran
s revolutionary armed movement
* The painful and slow process of negotiation * Last hurdle: Convincing the P-A-M rank and file * The mountain group
s five-month reconnaissance mission * Postponements 16  The H-A-S Group hounded * The beans are spilled * The arrests begin * The mountain team compromised 17  The Siyahkal operation * Assault on the Siyahkal Gendarmerie Station on 19 Bahman * The aftermath of the assault * The nineteen-day odyssey of the retreating guerrillas 18 Assessing the Siyahkal strike * Objectives of the Siyahkal strike: Ahmadzadeh, Ashraf, Safäi-Farahani * Siyahkal as a military operation: Fumbles and blunders * The regime
s first public response to the Siyahkal strike * The Ranking Security Official
s spectacle 19  The Hamid Ashraf factor * Schooling * Ashraf in the eyes of fellow combatants * Three years of guerrilla struggle in perspective * Ashraf violent and authoritarian? 20 Hemming the guerrillas or cultivating a guerrilla culture? * The Shah declares the end of terrorist activities in Iran * The Golesorkhi affair * Revolutionaries of the Film School of the Iranian National Television * Slaying heroes: Fuel on fire 21 Jazani
s questioning of armed struggle * Challenging the theory and practice of the Fadäis * Looking for new forms of struggle * Underlining the role of legal methods of struggle * A matter of trade-off 22  Softly disarming armed struggle to regain the trust of the masses * Step one: The correct stage in the movement * Step two: Walking on two legs * Step three: Iran
s paradoxical political condition, democratic and despotic * Step four: The guerrillas
conflicting remits, or unity of opposites * Step five: Armed propaganda and the combined method of struggle * Two interpretations of armed struggle * The issue of objective conditions of revolution * How long would it take the masses to join the movement? * Saving the armed movement from the unhealthy leftist tendency 23  Jazani
s ideological offensive in prison * Spreading the good word * Open schism in prison * Where did the original members of the Jazani Group stand? * The secretive delinking of armed struggle from the movement * The misunderstood or conflicted theoretician 24  The Fadäi interface, inside, outside prison * Indirect interactions between Ashraf and Jazani in 1973 * On the correct method of struggle: The Fadäis and the Star Group * Summer 1974: Armed struggle as strategy and tactic has the upper hand * Reading about the correct method of struggle in People
s Combat * Familiarity with and reaction to Jazani
s works outside prisons 25 Fadäi leadership debating correct methods of struggle * A discreet Jazani special issue of People
s Combat * Growing a second leg? * Political activities in 1976 discussions with the Marxist Mojahedin * Does Ashraf take sides in May/June 1976? 26  Bird
s-eye view of armed struggle (1971
1976) * The guerrillas
persistent presence * Guerrillas highlighted: Partial transparency * The news blackout and the Fadäis
rising success * Changing tides: Expansion, exposure, and beleaguered * The Fadäis
relations with Libya, Palestinian groups, and the Soviet Union * The shock of state terrorism * Fadäis under attack * The Fadäis without Ashraf 27  Guerrillas conducting the regime
s requiem * Students at home beat on the drums of war * University turmoil and campus guards * Policy of zero tolerance * The student backlash to the Golesorkhi affair * Winds of change 28  The regime
s requiem: The players abroad * Iranian students abroad rallying against the regime * Iranian students abroad take their cue from the guerrillas * Radical methods to put the Shah
s regime on the spot 29  Prelude to the Shah
s free fall * The Western press reveals secrets * Disdain for torture * The grand anti-Shah conspiracy * A last-ditch effort against the guerrilläCISNU coalition * Beating a fatal retreat   Conclusion Chronology Bibliography Index