DBWI: Khomeini Accepts the Ceasefire

By mid 1988, the Iran-Iraq War had decisively turned against the Iranians. A growing faction in the Iranian government and military, led by parliament chairman Rafsanjani, attempted to sway Grand Ayatollah Khomenei into accepting the UN ceasefire proposal. Khomenei, however, insisted on continuing the fight, believing that an eventual defeat of Iraq was still possible.

What might have happened had Khomenei accepted the ceasefire? Certainly, if the Iran-Iraq War had ended earlier the Tehran Chemical Attack and the black stain that it continues to leave on the Iranian psyche would have been averted. In the same vein, Iraq might not have become so politically isolated - the US and the USSR were both heavily backing Saddam against Iran, but the mass public outcry after Tehran got gassed led them to cut ties.

However, I think the Iranian Civil War would likely still have occurred. The Islamic Republic was never entirely stable to begin with, with numerous factions competing for power within the government. Khomenei was already on his last legs (I've seen a few estimates that even if he hadn't died in the chemical strike, his heart was so bad that he'd have been lucky to last until 1990) and with the USSR and Iraq right next door arming leftist militants like Tudeh and the MEK, the Civil War, the rise of the People's Republic, the Russian intervention, and the ensuing Soviet domination of the Persian Gulf seems to have been near inevitable.

What do you think?
 
I think the Iranian Civil War happens regardless. Khomeini couldn’t keep his boot on the people’s throats forever; the man couldn’t even control the military, for crying out loud. The revolt may be more of a popular one that could go in any number of directions, though, rather than a secular military dictatorship that shuns theocracy.

Of course, having a neighbor that’s a total theocratic crazy fuck helps out in Iran’s vigilance - after the Iraq schism, the Islamic Kingdom of Arabia (IKA) makes North Korea look downright sane by comparison with every threat to the Republic of Iraq and even to Iran. But hey, at least the Kurds got some autonomy.
 
Well all the good that dominating the Gulf did the Soviets, though without the added expenses of a second intervention in a Islamic nation, perhaps they don't implode quite so soon, or as definitely.
 
I beg to differ about the whole "civil war was inevitable" line of thought. Khomeini was pretty ill by the time the ceasefire was proposed, so had he accepted it and died immediately after maybe people like Rasfanjani would have taken over and continued the Islamic Republic but under more competent leadership.

On a side note, maybe the Pakistani intervention in Iranian Balochistan would have never happened. India took advantage of it and declared war on Pakistan, and while the war ended in status quo ante bellem the opportunity arose from generals to overthrow the democratic government, so Pakistan is impacted by this as well. Iranian Balochistan got their independence in the end (the US couldn't bear to see the USSR dominating the entire Persian gulf), but seeing as how Baloch separatists in Iran were Muslim Fundamentalists you can see how great of a country the Islamic Emirate of Balochistan now is.
 

samcster94

Banned
I beg to differ about the whole "civil war was inevitable" line of thought. Khomeini was pretty ill by the time the ceasefire was proposed, so had he accepted it and died immediately after maybe people like Rasfanjani would have taken over and continued the Islamic Republic but under more competent leadership.

On a side note, maybe the Pakistani intervention in Iranian Balochistan would have never happened. India took advantage of it and declared war on Pakistan, and while the war ended in status quo ante bellem the opportunity arose from generals to overthrow the democratic government, so Pakistan is impacted by this as well. Iranian Balochistan got their independence in the end (the US couldn't bear to see the USSR dominating the entire Persian gulf), but seeing as how Baloch separatists in Iran were Muslim Fundamentalists you can see how great of a country the Islamic Emirate of Balochistan now is.
I once read a timeline where Khameini was the Supreme Leader and Rasfanjani was the President in the 90's and they were rather calm but VERY oppressive. There also was no USSR and Yeltsin, an alcoholic who almost died many times, was somehow running a non-Communist Russia badly.
 
I once read a timeline where Khameini was the Supreme Leader and Rasfanjani was the President in the 90's and they were rather calm but VERY oppressive. There also was no USSR and Yeltsin, an alcoholic who almost died many times, was somehow running a non-Communist Russia badly.

Didn't it also have some KGB agent becoming Russia's leader and "exporting" his "right wing populist revolution" to other european countries and to a lesser extent, the US?
 

samcster94

Banned
Didn't it also have some KGB agent becoming Russia's leader and "exporting" his "right wing populist revolution" to other european countries and to a lesser extent, the US?
Yes, it got kind of crazy later on. Somehow, Venezuela, a stable democracy, elected a populist idiot who is pro-Iran, pro-Russia, ONLY has relations with Palestine, and hates the U.S. His successor caused the economy to collapse at one point.
 
That would be a laugh of a timeline. A USSR that falls apart. Come on.

They practically looted Iraq after the attack on Tehran. Due to the outrage of the chemical attack we turned a blind eye.

Talking about chemical attacks, does anybody remember the story of Syria funneling the chemicals into Iraq that were later used in Uran?
 
Then again, the USSR and USA have been improving relations for a while now, especially since some of the more insane fighters caused serious trouble in the Muslim majority aprts of China (how the hell did they smuggle the chemical weapons, one was freaking white phosphorus?!) which led to the rise of Nationalists in China once more. Granted, they weren't near as bad as we or the USSR feared it to be.

As for Venezulea, I figured that it was probably because with Arabia having gotten to the brink, Venezulean oil became much more valuable which led to greater amounts of infrastructure building and such. Lord knows that drought caused a fair bit of issues for them.

Oman and Yemen both srvived thanks to outside help. Yemen is pretty much married to Ethiopia, especially when those Yemen refugees fleeing to Djibouti led to the mass riots and Ethiopia eventually having to more or less annex it after the leaders flew the coup. Hell, according to current rating, 2/3 of the population of Djibouti would prefer to remain in Ethiopia. Oman meanwhile got closer to India as a result.
 
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