Apocalyptic Iranian 'messiah' theory 'proves the country CANNOT be allowed nuclear weapons': PETER VAN ONSELEN on the deranged belief system of Iran's ayatollahs

Daily Mail​

4 days ago

It is concerning when any country has nuclear weapons - but it's a threat the world has learned to manage.
There's a basic assumption that most nuclear-armed countries refrain from using atomic bombs out of self-preservation.
That is, if they fired nuclear warheads, their country would be destroyed. Defence experts call this 'Mutually Assured Destruction'.
But what if a state doesn't fear destruction? What if it welcomes it, viewing it as a gateway to divine salvation?
That's long been the concern with Iran. And it's not an exaggerated risk.
Iran's nuclear ambitions don't exist in a vacuum. They sit within a broader ideological framework that includes what's known as millenarianism: the belief that the world is heading for a final, transformative clash between good and evil.
Years ago, as a university academic, I supervised an honours student whose thesis examined millenarianism. It opened my eyes to its impact on politics in the Middle East.
In Shia Islam, millenarianism is tied to the return of the Mahdi, or the Hidden Imam. He is a messianic figure who will emerge in an era of chaos to establish a just Islamic order.
This isn't just background noise, by the way. Former Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad openly embraced this worldview.
During his presidency, he not only referred to the Mahdi in speeches, including at the United Nations no less, but his government poured funds into religious preparations for the Mahdi's return.
Ahmadinejad believed the apocalypse wasn't to be avoided but welcomed - even hastened.
Road upgrades to Jamkaran, home of the mosque linked to the Mahdi's reappearance, were budgeted as national infrastructure.
The line between religion and state planning was deliberately blurred.
While not every Iranian leader is a millenarian, enough are, and the political system gives them real influence.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), which would almost certainly be in control of any Iranian nuclear arsenal were that to eventuate, has leaders who parrot similarly apocalyptic language.
General Hossein Salami, the head of the IRGC - before he was recently killed by Israeli strikes - had repeatedly threatened to wipe Israel off the map.
He described Israel as a 'cancerous tumour' that must be 'destroyed'.
There's not a lot of room to move with such rhetoric. It can't be treated as a metaphorical flourish.
It is a statement of intent, rooted in a belief that conflict with Israel is religiously sacred.
This is why Israel acts the way it does - from targeted assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists to cyber sabotage and the recent airstrikes in Iran.
The moves by the US and Israel this past fortnight aren't just about national defence.
They're about preventing the unimaginable: a nuclear-armed state run by people who don't fear a true Armageddon.
The US under Trump hit three separate nuclear-linked sites, facilities buried deep underground, because no other country has the capability to strike those types of bunkers effectively.
The message was clear: diplomacy has its limits when dealing with a state like Iran, which in many ways is a much more dangerous actor than somewhere like North Korea precisely because of its millenarian tendencies.
While Iran has always claimed its nuclear program is civilian, about energy not weapons, that claim doesn't pass the sniff test.
Places like Fordow, the nuclear fortress buried under mountains, were deliberately shielded from airstrikes precisely because it's not an energy enrichment site.
It's designed for survivability in the event of war, which only makes sense if the goal is to build a weapon, not a civilian reactor.
The US has now apparently taken care of that.
Iran getting the bomb poses other risks. If it was armed with nuclear weapons, we would see nuclear proliferation across the Middle East.
If Iran got the bomb, Saudi Arabia would want one (it has said as much), and potentially, so would Turkey. Egypt might seek to build one too.
Some in the West forget, or wilfully ignore, that Iran is not the underdog in the Middle East. It is the regional bully.
Far from being a besieged victim of aggression Iran is the primary source of destabilisation right across the region.
As a Shia theocracy in a predominantly Sunni region Iran's rise is deeply feared by Sunni Arab states.
Its nuclear ambitions are seen as part of its ideological mission to reshape the Middle East in its image.
It's a revolutionary regime, where parts of the leadership believe global chaos isn't to be avoided, it's to be embraced, because it brings the end times closer.
If that doesn't justify aggressive containment measures, what does?