Iran Conducts Missle Tests During "War Games"

Via FOX and the AP comes the latest from the Slow Motion Train Wreck.

According to the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei the newly revealed second nuclear plant with soon become operational "and will make the enemies blind".

Now there's a redundancy. Maybe this will open a few eyes:

Report: Iran Tests 2 Short-Range Missiles in War Games
Sunday, September 27, 2009

Iran tested two short-range missiles Sunday as its elite Revolutionary Guards began several days of war games, state television reported. Press TV reported that the missiles tested were the Fateh-110 and Tondar-69, but did not give specifics on the range or other details. The report said the tests also included a multiple missile launcher.

"Iran tests two short-range missiles," Press TV said in a scrolling headline. Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps announced Saturday it would begin war games which would include surface-to-surface missile launches.

Reuters reported state radio as also saying Sunday that Tehran would test-fire a missile Monday capable of hitting Israel and U.S. bases in the Gulf region. The missile maneuvers coincide with tension over Iran's nuclear program following the disclosure of a second uranium-enrichment plant in the country.

The U.S. and its five partners trying to stop Iran's suspected nuclear weapons program plan to tell Tehran in a key meeting on Thursday that it must provide "unfettered access" to its previously secret Qom enrichment facility within weeks, an official said.

The six countries will demand that Iran prove to the increasingly skeptical group that its intentions with its various sites are peaceful and energy-related, as Iran claims, and not for weapons development, as the West believes, the official said Saturday.

Reuters reported Iran's ambassador to the U.N.'s nuclear agency watchdog, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, as saying Sunday that "fabricated Western clamor" over the facility would negatively affect its talks with world powers.

Iran's nuclear chief had said Saturday his country will allow the U.N. nuclear agency to inspect its newly revealed facility.

An aide to Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was also quoted as saying that the facility will soon become operational.

"This new plant, God willing, will soon become operational and will make the enemies blind," Mohammad Mohammadi-Golpayegani, who heads Khamenei's office, said, according to the semi-official Fars News Agency.

Is There A Split In The Iranian Revolutionary Guard?

From Allah at Hot Air:

No verification on this, but it’s potentially so huge that I’m tossing it out there anyway.

According to unconfirmed reports in Balatarin [Farsi] , Gen. Ali Fazli, the head of revolutionary guards in Tehran, has been arrested after refusing to execute Khamenei’s order of using force against demonstrators in Tehran. He is a war veteran who lost an eye during the Iran-Iraq war.

Update: The regime counters Mousavi’s call for a strike by reportedly announcing that anyone who doesn’t come to work tomorrow is fired.

Revolutionary Guard Threatens Crackdown - Opposition Threatens Strike

Apparently, there is an eery calm in the streets of Iran today. The Revolutionary Guard, seeing that the police and the Basijs have not been able to put down the protests, have decided to take matters into their own hands. 

They believed they could do what the Basijs and the cops could not do. But, the opposition is playing a good hand; a general strike.

What are the Revolutionary Guard can do about that? Go door to door and force people to work?

From Hot Air:

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard is threatening to crush any further opposition protests over the disputed presidential election and warns demonstrators to prepare for a “revolutionary confrontation” if they take to the streets again.

The country’s most powerful military force ordered demonstrators to “end the sabotage and rioting activities” and said their resistance is a “conspiracy” against Iran.

A statement posted Monday on the Guard’s website warned protesters to “be prepared for a resolution and revolutionary confrontation with the Guards, Basij and other security forces and disciplinary forces.”

The mullahs have given up on the police and Basijis alone. The police and Basijis have failed to put Iranians back in their place as subjects, and the only option left is a military operation to clear the streets.

If the Revolutionary Guard makes good on its threat, the transition to military dictatorship will be complete.  The mullahs will have no credibility with the people and will remain completely reliant on its army to maintain power internally.  The Revolutionary Guard will understand this well, and will quickly turn Khamenei and his elders into nothing more than puppets for the Guard’s purposes.  The question then will be whether the Guard can maintain control over 70 million Iranians who have already lost faith in their theocrats and never assented to rule by military force.

That assumes the Revolutionary Guard will remain cohesive.  Their senior leadership will see this as a way to grab power, but the rank and file may find it difficult to go to war with their own people, especially against Iranians protesting an election that the Revolutionary Guard considers stolen from one of their own.  Will the Revolutionary Guard maintain cohesion as they march into Iran’s cities and kill women and children?  The fact that the mullahs have to play this card makes the question all the more critical.

Update: Unconfirmed reports have the opposition calling for a general strike of indeterminate length starting tomorrow.  That will be difficult for a military operation to counter, and will further undermine the mullahs, if successful.

Update II: Allahpundit retweets a report from Tehran that claims the streets have gone quiet today, with Basiji and police patrolling in large numbers.  The strike may be the next phase, if it’s true and it’s successful.

IRG Threatens Next Protests Will Mean "Revolutionary Confrontation"

At FOX news:

Iran Revolutionary Guard Threatens Protestors
Monday June 22, 2009
Associated Press

TEHRAN — Iran's Revolutionary Guard is threatening to crush any further opposition protests over the disputed presidential election and warns demonstrators to prepare for a "revolutionary confrontation" if they take to the streets again.

The country's most powerful military force ordered demonstrators to "end the sabotage and rioting activities" and said their resistance is a "conspiracy" against Iran.

A statement posted Monday on the Guard's Web site warned protesters to "be prepared for a resolution and revolutionary confrontation with the Guards, Basij and other security forces and disciplinary forces."

Iranian opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi and a popular reformist former president are boldly defying the country's supreme leader by supporting continued protests of a disputed presidential election, but it was unclear Monday whether protesters would dare to continue massive demonstrations after a bloody crackdown.

According to FOX the opposition is trying to find a way to continue the protests without putting its supporters in further peril.

Mousavi's Web site on Monday called for supporters to turn on their car lights in the late afternoon as a sign of protest — a somewhat muted response compared with the recent enormous gatherings.

Also Monday, the Guardian Council, which agreed last week to investigate some voting complaints, said irregularities were found in 50 constituencies, but that this has no effect on Ahmadinejad's win.

Council spokesman Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei was quoted on the state TV Web site as saying that its probe showed more votes were cast in these constituencies than there were registered voters, but this "has no effect on the result of the elections."

The acknowledgment of the irregularities was unlikely to mollify the opposition, who allege massive and systematic fraud.

Khatami said "taking complaints to bodies that are required to protect people's rights, but are themselves subject to criticism, is not a solution" — effectively accusing the Council of collusion in vote fraud.