Time To Revisit `A People's History of Iran' Again: Part 12

(All the 2012 GOP and Democratic presidential candidates in the USA—except for Ron Paul—apparently support the U.S. government’s current policy of waging economic warfare and covert war against people in Iran and threatening people in Iran with an overt US/Israeli military attack in 2012. Yet most people in the United States know little about the history of people in Iran since foreign imperialist powers began undemocratically and illegally intervening in its internal political and economic affairs in the late 19th century. But here's part 12 of "A People's History of Iran," from a few years ago--bf).

Although U.S. troops first temporarily appeared on Iranian soil during World War II, it was only in 1946 that the U.S. government began to actively support the build-up of the Shah of Iran’s central government security forces and his Iranian Army. A now de-classified September 11, 1946 dispatch of the Military Attache’ at the British Embassy in Iran, for instance, noted that “The new transport specialist of the United States Advisory Mission to the Persian Army has under consideration a plan for the re-equipment of the army with mechanical transport.”

Despite this U.S. military aid to the Shah of Iran’s regime, however, by 1948 Tudeh Party influence among Iranian university students was also beginning to increase. Around 50 percent of all politically active Iranian students during the 1948-49 academic year, for example, were pro-Tudeh Party in their politics.

In response to the growth of pro-Tudeh Party political activism on campus, Iranian university administrators then issued a decree that banned on-campus political activity by Iranian university students. To protest this decree, Iranian students then went on strike on November 12, 1948 and formed an Anti-Dictatorship Front.

In 1948 and early 1949, the increase in support for the Tudeh Party and for the nationalization of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company continued. A rally at the grave of the Iranian left intellectual Donya magazine founder, Dr. Taghi Erani (who, after being jailed in 1937, had died in prison in 1940 because of prison authority negligence), was scheduled for February 4, 1949.

On February 4, 1949, 30,000 Tudeh Party members and supporters showed up for the rally at Dr. Erani’s grave and peacefully protested in favor of democratization of Iranian society. Elsewhere in Iran at the same time, however, a lone individual who was allegedly a “member” of the Iranian printer’s union attempted to assassinate the Shah of Iran.

This February 4, 1949 attempt on the Shah of Iran’s life was then used as a pretext by the Shah’s regime to proclaim martial law, officially outlaw the Tudeh Party, close leftist newspapers and make mass arrests. Most Tudeh Party and Iranian labor union leaders were imprisoned and tried by the Shah of Iran’s military tribunals. Tudeh Party activists who escaped in the spring of 1949, however, continued to organize underground in support of the political and economic democratization of Iranian society. (end of part 12)

Time To Revisit `A People's History of Iran' Again: Part 11

(All the 2012 GOP and Democratic presidential candidates in the USA—except for Ron Paul—apparently support the U.S. government’s current policy of waging economic warfare and covert war against people in Iran and threatening people in Iran with an overt US/Israeli military attack in 2012. Yet most people in the United States know little about the history of people in Iran since foreign imperialist powers began undemocratically and illegally intervening in its internal political and economic affairs in the late 19th century. But here's part 11 of "A People's History of Iran," from a few years ago--bf).

After being suppressed throughout Iran in late 1946, the Tudeh Party then adopted a policy of boycotting the July 1947 Iranian parliamentary elections. So as a result of the July 1947 elections, 90 percent of the Iranian parliament’s members were now right-wing and anti-communist in their politics and it now declared as “void” the previous Iranian central government’s agreement to form an Iranian-Soviet gas company in exchange for the Soviet government’s May 1946 troop withdrawal from northern Iran.

Despite being suppressed and having no representation in the Iranian parliament, the Majlis, the Tudeh Party still had a mass base among Iranian working-class people, because of the Iranian left’s historical role in organizing Iran’s earliest labor unions. Between 1928 and 1941 under Reza Shah Pahlavi’s regime, however, there had been no growth of membership in Iranian unions, because of that regime’s policy of repressing Iranian labor unions.

But after several former Iranian communist labor union activists were released from prison in 1941, following the forced abdication of Reza Shah Pahlavi, four major independent union centers in Tehran, with 10,000 members, were established by 1944. On May 1, 1944, labor organizers who were also Tudeh Party members consolidated their four union centers into a United Council. By the end of 1946, after adding unions of Iranian artisans, the United Council’s membership had increased to over 40,000 Iranian workers.

One reason Tudeh Party members were so successful in recruiting Iranian workers into Iranian labor unions in the early 1940s was that between 1941 and 1946 the cost of living in Iran had jumped by 700 percent. To defend their members against this steep decline in real wages, Iranian workers, led by Reza Rusta, struck often between 1941 and 1946. In late 1942 and early 1943, for example, unionized construction workers employed on Iranian government public works projects held a strike.

Iranian textile workers also went on strike in late 1943 and early 1944, with 20,000 Iranian textile workers going out on strike in Tehran, for example, Then, in 1945, Iranian oil workers struck in Kermanshab; and the following year, there were two strikes of Iranian oil workers in Abadan. (end of part 11)

Time To Revisit: `A People's History of Iran' Again: Part 10

(All the 2012 GOP and Democratic presidential candidates in the USA—except for Ron Paul—apparently support the U.S. government’s current policy of waging economic warfare and covert war against people in Iran and threatening people in Iran with an overt US/Israeli military attack in 2012. Yet most people in the United States know little about the history of people in Iran since foreign imperialist powers began undemocratically and illegally intervening in its internal political and economic affairs in the late 19th century. But here's part 10 of "A People's History of Iran," from a few years ago--bf).

In December 1946 the Shah of Iran’s central government troops marched back into Iran’s northwestern Azerbaijan region, entered Tabriz on December 12, 1946 and overthrew the pro-Soviet, revolutionary left-oriented Azerbaijan autonomous government that Turkish-speaking Iranian people there had established in 1945, prior to the May 1946 foreign Soviet troop withdrawal from Iran. But between December 9 and 12, 1946, some people in Azerbaijan had resisted the Shah’s Iranian Army troops, and 1,500 Azerbaijani Iranians, including 800 Tudeh Party members, were killed by the Shah’s central government troops. Twenty-six former Iranian army officers who had helped defend the Azerbaijan autonomous government were also killed by Iranian Army firing squads after the Iranian Army occupied Iran’s Azerbaijan region.

One reason the autonomous leftist regime in Iran’s Azerbaijan region collapsed so quickly in December 1946 was that it had lost the support of the still extremely religious Azerbaijan peasantry--when the local clergy in the Azerbaijan region turned against the Azerbaijan regime after it gave Azerbaijan women in Iran the right to vote. Another reason for the quick collapse of the Azerbaijan republic in Iran was that Iranian leftists felt that continued resistance to the Shah of Iran’s central government troops there would have provoked UK government and U.S. government military intervention in that region of Iran and a bloody civil war in Iran, which they wanted to avoid. Other reasons for the quick collapse of the leftist Azerbaijan regional government in December 1946 were the unfavorable objective conditions and the abandonment by the Soviet Union of its previous policy of supporting the leftist Azerbaijan government in Iran. (end of part 10)

Time To Revisit `A People's History of Iran' Again: Part 9

(All the 2012 GOP and Democratic presidential candidates in the USA—except for Ron Paul—apparently support the U.S. government’s current policy of waging economic warfare and covert war against people in Iran and threatening people in Iran with an overt US/Israeli military attack in 2012. Yet most people in the United States know little about the history of people in Iran since foreign imperialist powers began undemocratically and illegally intervening in its internal political and economic affairs in the late 19th century. But here's part 9 of "A People's History of Iran," from a few years ago--bf).

In exchange for the promise by the Shah of Iran’s central government on April 4, 1946 that the Soviet Union would be given an oil concession in the North of Iran, Soviet troops were withdrawn from the northern regions of Iran in May 1946. And on May 1, 1946, 500,000 demonstrators—mainly Tudeh Party members, Iranian trade union members or Tudeh Party sympathizers—also celebrated May Day in Iran and demanded more favorable labor laws, pay raises for Iranian workers and redistribution of Iranian land to Iran’s peasantry.

To block a plot by the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company to destroy the Iranian oil workers union, a general strike was subsequently called in the Khuzistan region of Iran on July 14, 1946, which was suppressed by the Iranian central government, with heavy casualties for the striking Iranian workers. But on August 1, 1946, the Shah of Iran’s regime allowed a new government coalition cabinet to be formed by a Prime Minister named Ghavam, which included 3 Tudeh Party members. It was estimated at this time that the Tudeh Party now had about 50,000 supporters in Tehran and about 50,000 supporters in the rest of the country.

In September 1946, however, the Shah of Iran regime’s Prime Minister Ghavam encouraged a tribal revolt in the southern Iranian province of Fars which demanded both autonomy and the expulsion of Tudeh Party representatives from the Iranian central government’s cabinet. A new cabinet was then formed by Ghavam that excluded Iranian leftists and, in October 1946 an Iranian right-wing offensive against Iranian leftist activists was launched. In November 1946, for example, a strike by Tudeh Party-sponsored unions was again suppressed and hundreds of Tudeh Party members and Iranian labor union members in the southern part of Iran were arrested. To discourage such independent labor militancy in the future, the Shah of Iran’s regime then also set up its own government-sponsored labor unions, established a Ministry of Labor and finally passed a labor code for Iranian workers. (end of part 9)

U.S. Anti-War Activist Cindy Sheehan Speaks Out Against U.S. Government War Threats Against People In Iran

Time To Revisit `A People's History of Iran' Again: Part 8

(All the 2012 GOP and Democratic presidential candidates in the USA—except for Ron Paul—apparently support the U.S. government’s current policy of waging economic warfare and covert war against people in Iran and threatening people in Iran with an overt US/Israeli military attack in 2012. Yet most people in the United States know little about the history of people in Iran since foreign imperialist powers began undemocratically and illegally intervening in its internal political and economic affairs in the late 1800s. But here's part 8 of "A People's History of Iran," from a few years ago--bf).

Between 1942 and 1945, the number of Tudeh Party members in Iran continued to increase along with the Tudeh Party’s political influence. In the 1943-44 Iranian elections, for example, around 20% of all the Iranian votes went to either Tudeh Party candidates or Iranian left-oriented candidates who were part of the left-of-center bloc that the Tudeh Party supported. Of the 120 elected members of the Iranian parliament, the Majlis, 8 were members of the Tudeh Party in 1944. In addition, three elected members were pro-Tudeh Party but not formal Tudeh Party members; and 30 elected members of the Iranian parliament were politically left-of-center. Despite the death of the first Tudeh Party Chairman Eskandari in February 1944, by the time of the Tudeh Party Congress in 1944, the number of Iranians who were Tudeh Party members had jumped to 25,000; and 75% of the Tudeh Party members were recruited from the Iranian working-class.

The majority of the members of the Iranian Parliament in 1945, however, were still right-wing and anti-communist in their political orientation. But fearful of the Tudeh Party’s increasing political influence in Iranian society, the troops of the Shah of Iran’s government were ordered to occupy the Tudeh Party’s headquarters in August 1945 and publication of the Tudeh Party’s newspaper was then prohibited by the Shah’s regime. The Tudeh Party was ordered to also disband its branches in areas of Iran that were outside of Tehran.

When Tudeh Party members in Tehran attempted to protest the regime’s outlawing of their political group by marching in Tehran, the Shah of Iran’s security forces blocked the march. A street fight then broke out between Tudeh Party members and the Iranian police in which a leading Tudeh Party activist, Dr. Freydoun Keshavarz, was beaten up. In response, militant pro-Tudeh Party groups of Iranian workers then occupied towns, factories and railroad junctions in the northern part of Iran that was still occupied by foreign Soviet government troops.

An insurrection then broke out in the Turkish-speaking Azerbaijan region of Iran in September 1945; and, protected by the Soviet troops there, an autonomous Azerbaijan government was set up in November 1945 by leftist Azerbaijan activists that demanded national autonomy within a unified Iran for Azerbaijan and land reform. A regular army was also then formed by the new Azerbaijan government. With the support and protection of the Soviet troops that were occupying the north of Iran, a Kurdistan People’s Republic was also established within Iran in February 1946. (end of part 8)

`Not Seasonally Adjusted' U.S. Unemployment Rate Increases To 8.8 Percent in January 2012 Under Obama & GOP House of Representatives

The official “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for all workers in the United States increased from 8.3 to 8.8 percent between December 2011 and January 2012 under the Democratic Obama Administration and the Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data; while the “not seasonally adjusted” unemployment rate for all U.S. male workers over 16 years-of-age increased from 8.8 to 9.3 percent during the same period. The “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for all U.S. male workers over 20 years-of-age also increased from 8.2 to 8.7 percent between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” youth unemployment rate for all U.S. workers between 16 and 19 years-of-age increased from 21.5 to 24.2 percent during the same period.

The “not seasonally adjusted” number of officially unemployed workers in the United States increased by 549,000 (from 12,692,000 to 13,541,000) between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of U.S. workers who had jobs dropped by 737,000 (from 140,681,000 to 139,944,000) during the same period. The “not seasonally adjusted” number of U.S. workers who are no longer in the U.S. labor force also increased by 1,572,000 (from 87,212,000 to 88,784,000) between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of officially unemployed male workers over 16 years-of-age increased by 345,000 (from 7,181,000 to 7,526,000) during the same period.

The “not seasonally adjusted” number of U.S. male workers over 16 years-of age who had jobs decreased by 1,065,000 (from 74,837,000 to 73,772,000) between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of male workers over 16 years-of-age who are no longer in the U.S. labor force increased by 697,000 (from 34,813,000 to 35,510,000) during the same period. In addition, the “not seasonally adjusted” number of officially jobless U.S. male workers over 20 years-of-age increased by 341,000 (from 6,477,000 to 6,818,000) between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012.

The official “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for all U.S. female workers over 16 years-of-age increased from 7.7 to 8.3 percent between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of unemployed female workers over 16 years-of-age increased by 504,000 (from 5,511,000 to 6,015,000) during the same period. The “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for all U.S. female workers over 20 years-of-age also increased from 7.4 to 7.8 percent between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of unemployed female workers over 20 years-of-age increased by 381,000 (from 5,070,000 to 5,451,000) during the same period.

The official “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for all white workers in the United States increased from 7.2 to 8 percent between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of unemployed white workers increased by 876,000 (from 8,998,000 to 9,874,000) during the same period. The “not seasonally adjusted” number of U.S. white workers with jobs also dropped by 2,241,000 (from 115,117,000 to 112,876,000) between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of white workers who are no longer in the U.S. labor force increased by 283,000 (from 69,567,000 to 69,850,000) during the same period.

The official “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for white male workers over 20 years-of-age in the United States increased from 7.3 to 8 percent between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of unemployed white male workers over 20 years-of-age increased by 351,000 (from 4,764,000 to 5,115,000) during the same period. In addition, the “not seasonally adjusted” number of white male workers over 20 years-of-age who had jobs dropped by 1,518,000 (from 60,484,000 to 58,966,000) between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012.

The official “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for white female workers over 20 years-of-age in the United States also increased from 6.3 to 7 percent between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of unemployed white female workers over 20 years-of-age increased by 385,000 (from 3,435,000 to 3,820,000) during the same period. The official “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for white youths in the United States between 16 and 19 years-of-age also increased from 18.3 to 22.1 percent between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of unemployed white youths increased by 140,000 (from 798,000 to 938,000) during the same period.

The official “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for all Black workers in the United States in January 2012 was still 14.2 percent; and 2,561,000 Black workers were still unemployed in January 2012, according to the “not seasonally adjusted” data. The “not seasonally adjusted” official jobless rate for Black male workers over 20 years-of-age was still 14 percent in January 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for Black women over 20 years-of was still 12.6 percent in that same month. And between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012, the official “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for Black youths in the United States between 16 and 19 years-of-age increased from 39.2 to 40.3 percent; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of unemployed Asian-American workers increased by 35,000 (from 514,000 to 549,000) during the same period.

The official “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for all Hispanic or Latino workers increased from 11.1 to 11.5 percent between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of unemployed Hispanic or Latino workers increased by 183,000 (from 2,579,000 to 2,762,000) during the same period. The “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for Hispanic or Latino male workers over 20 years-of-age increased from 10.5 to 10.7 percent between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of unemployed Hispanic or Latino male workers over 20 years-of-age increased by 34,000 (from 1,387,000 to 1,421,000) during the same period. The “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for Hispanic or Latina female workers over 20 years-of-age also increased from 10.3 to 11.3 percent between Dec. 2011 and Jan. 2012; while the “not seasonally adjusted” number of unemployed Hispanic or Latina female workers over 20 years-of-age increased by 158,000 (from 936,000 to 1,094,000) during the same period. And the “not seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for Hispanic or Latino youths in the United States between 16 and 19 years-of-age was still 24.9 percent in January 2012.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ February 3, 2012 press release:

“…The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) was little changed at 5.5 million and accounted for 42.9 percent of the unemployed…The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons, at 8.2 million, changed little in January. These individuals were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job…

“In January, 2.8 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force, essentially unchanged from a year earlier…These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey…

“Among the marginally attached, there were 1.1 million discouraged workers in January, little different from a year earlier. Discouraged workers are persons not currently looking for work because they believe no jobs are available for them…

“…Job gains in department stores (+19,000), health and personal care stores (+7,000), and automobile dealers (+7,000) were partially offset by losses in clothing and clothing accessory stores (-14,000)…In January, employment in information declined by 13,000, including a loss of 8,000 jobs in the motion picture and sound recording industry…

“Government employment changed little in January. Over the past 12 months, the sector has lost 276,000 jobs, with declines in local government; state government, excluding education; and the U.S. Postal Service…”