A Potemkin village refers to something that is created to give a false impression of an entity being better than it actually is, often masking a negative or undesirable reality. The term originates from a historical anecdote about Prince Grigory Potemkin, who allegedly built fake settlements to impress Empress Catherine II during her visit to Crimea in 1787. The purpose was to hide the poverty and dilapidated conditions of the region from the Empress. While the historical accuracy of the story is debated, the term "Potemkin village" is widely used metaphorically to describe deceptive appearances and superficial improvements
In essence, a Potemkin village is a deceptive creation, a facade intended to mislead observers about the true state of affairs. And so it has been through many years since 1979 and six American Presidents with Iran. All convinced that Iran was greater and more dangerous than it was, until President Trump. Of all of them, it was Obama that sent $170 billion to build Iran up as a major Islamic power and nuclear power in the Middle East. That was his plan. Biden also opened up the financial flood gates to assist Iran. American cannot afford Democrat Presidents again for a very long time.
Three things about Iran’s strategy were extremely dangerous and existential. Their unrelentless drive towards nuclear weapons, their development of long range ballistic missiles and drones, and their ring of fire to surround Israel with terrorist enemies and potential attacks from all sides. For good measure, add their religious ambition to take over the Middle East and the world.
Iran planned to triple the rate of its ballistic missile production and to increase its stockpile from some 2,500 to 8,800 within two years and these could be armed with nuclear warheads. If Iran were to have this many ballistic missiles, it would pose an existential threat to Israel. Such a quantity of missiles would be able to cause massive existential and widespread damage in Israel and anywhere else.
In this strategy, Iran’s army was essentially less important, excepting the IRGC and Basij thugs and bullies used to suppress their own population, but also having a military purpose. Iran was prepared to fight Israel to the last Arab life, and the stupid Arabs were easily fooled as Iran played and pandered to their macho desires and agendas. I don’t think Iran had any plans to use its army in any invasion. They wanted to overwhelm Israel with missiles and drones and let the Arabs do the dying. Israel was the main target and used to whip up the Arab frenzy, but the Shi’ite takeover of Islam and the Middle East was also on the agenda. And that was just for starters.
In addition to all of this, let us give Iran credit for its propaganda and its image projection of being more than they actually were, this aided by a weak West, Europe and America with insubstantial foolish leaders who swallowed Iran’s propaganda and bluff. As with Qatar, Iran wielded its financial power as a weapon and bought support all the way up the American political ladder.
In between the Ayatollah coup and the present, America had a President Obama determined to build and support Iran followed by a now proven brain dead Biden who was essentially Obama’s third term. Do not underestimate these two Presidents’ influence on the rest of the world.
Europe’s greed played a major part in supporting Iran as well. Ever duplicitous and perfidious France was not only supportive, and housed and protected the Ayatollah Khomeini for many years, but before flying him into Iran on Air France, was ever ready for trade. Let’s face it, France has been a problem for a very long time and still is.
Of course we must not forget an ignorant, misguided and clueless Jimmy Carter who threw his ally, the Shah, under the bus in the name of promoting democracy. We know the gratitude he received for doing so with the hostage taking of the American Embassy staff for 444 days until Ronald Reagan came in. Consider the “great” contribution to creating Iran as it is today by the Democrat Presidents Carter, Obama and Biden.
People tend to forget it was Kennedy and Johnson, also Democrats, that got America into Vietnam. George W Bush opened the way for Iran by removing Saddam Hussein and leaving a vacuum in Iraq that Iran rushed in to fill. Not that Saddam was in the slightest a good man, but he was a counter weight to the Ayatollahs, and Bush should have gone on to remove the Ayatollah regime whilst he was there. Invading Iraq at the time was only half the job. In retrospect, it was a truly stupid invasion. What did it achieve? We all know the answer: nothing except strengthening Iran and chaos in the Middle East.
Where to now?
In my opinion, although it is claimed that regime change was not an Israeli objective in this war, Israel had started to attack various regime installations and if allowed to continue for another two weeks, most likely could have created a good opening for ordinary Iranians against the Ayatollah regime to rise and throw the Ayatollahs out. That would have done Iran, Israel, the Middle East and Europe a great favour.
France’s Macron, increasingly looking like a man way out of his depth, claimed the removal of the Ayatollahs would have resulted in chaos. Any revolution is chaotic, but so what! Instead we have no final conclusion and Iran is carrying on in its usual arrogance and obviously determined to rebuild and continue. It is ridiculous to try and apply Western thinking, logic and common sense onto these medieval religious fanatics.
Talking of religious fanaticism, we have to look at what drives and motivates these people and what is really behind them. Religion can be uplifting, or it can be an opiate, and actually it can be abused as a means to attain human aims and ambitions. Human ones, not G-d’s. It is as old as human beings have been on earth and a great coverall. Islam lends itself so easily to controlling and whipping up its people. All in the name of Allah.
During WWII a concept called Operations Research was developed and has been used ever since. It took experts from various disciplines to tackle a problem. The classic story is that after WWII, an Operations Research team was called in to tackle the problem that people complained about the speed of the lifts/elevators in the Empire State Building. There were physical limits as to speeding up the machinery as too fast was a problem going up and down. So who in the team solved the problem? The psychologist. He suggested installing mirrors in the lifts/elevators. This was done and suddenly the lifts went faster. Why? Because people’s minds were occupied whilst in the lift.
I use this story to advocate doing the same in our approach to Iran. I am sure all sides have propaganda and media teams fully at work. During the war such tricks were used to herd the Iranian generals into a meeting where they could all be wiped out simultaneously and were. I am not saying Israel is not already and logically applying itself to this issue. What I am advocating is turning Iran’s Islamic madness against itself. It is already hugely insecure and paranoid and is seeing spies and collaborators under every bed and behind every bush.
This war is not over. There has to be a proper complete defeat or unconditional surrender. We can readily see anything less will not do. All Iran’s surrogates have to be totally destroyed. Not just weakened. Hamas has to be totally eradicated and its leaders hiding in Qatar, Turkey and elsewhere have to be eliminated whatever it takes. Think of going after the Munich Massacre murderers. Do the same now.
Hezbollah and the Houthis have to also be fully destroyed. Nothing, like cancer, can be left to regrow and rebuild. If Europe doesn’t like it, too bad. Let France, Belgium, Germany, Britain, Sweden et al live with now their own developing self-created problem that Israel has had to cope with for a hundred or more years. Let Israel and surroundings once and for all be terrorist free. It’s enough of putting up and pandering to Islamic and Palestinian terrorism. It is time for a New Middle East and for Islam to move into modernity.
Iran cannot be allowed to continue as before. There is no logical argument to justify this. Iran can be a usual part of humanity and the world, but not with the medieval Ayatollah regime in charge.
President Trump is a man of peace, but not someone who can be messed with or challenged and not get a response. I understand clearly he is the President of the USA and not of Israel.
The American system is extremely difficult as there are Congressional Elections every two years, which means although Trump has only been President for six months, he has to start planning for the next midterms in eighteen months and has a year to get things working and successful so that he does not lose his majority in the Congress. If he does lose it, he becomes a lame duck and the ever vicious and discombobulated Democrats will once again try to impeach him. It is in everyone’s interests, the USA, Israel and the world that President Trump remain fully in control for the full term of his office.
There other world powers, Russia and China have shown they are clearly disinterested in getting involved with defending Iran. Russia, due to Putin’s ego, has its hands full with Ukraine. China has its own problems and even threatened Iran not to mine the Straits of Hormus.
Iran under the Ayatollahs cannot stand and it would be very foolish and naïve to let them survive. Putting Iran back a year or two is simply not enough.
David Hersch is Chairman of SAIPAC, the South African Israel Public Affairs Committee. Former chairman of the South African Zionist Federation (Cape Council) as well as a former national vice-chairman of the South African Zionist Federation (SAZF). He is also former member of the South Jewish Board of Deputies (Cape Council). Retired businessman and