Labour pledged to proscribe IRGC – why hasn't it?
4 min read
When the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, the only debate was how we were going to spend the ‘peace dividend’. It was assumed around Whitehall that the era of a serious military threat to Britain was at an end. Which just goes to show how wrong you can be
We now face a world more unstable than at any time since the 1930s and a Whitehall structure that largely has failed to adjust to the threats from Russia, China and, most homicidal of all, Iran.
The latter country has been ruled by clerical fascists since 1979 who, if anything, have grown increasingly vicious and murderous. The fundamentalist regime is particularly keen on torturing and murdering women. Last month marked the anniversary of the nationwide uprising which followed the brutal murder of Mahsa Amini in 2022. The uprising, which was led and organised largely by women, was crushed with immense brutality by the Iranian National Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). More recently, the death penalty has been used in a more and more systematic way.
The IRGC is a huge organisation with well over 100,000 personnel. It operates across the globe and uses proxies, the most infamous of which are Hezbollah and Hamas. It certainly operates in Britain and uses proxies here including criminal gangs. Iranian cash often finds its way into all sorts of dodgy organisations bent on undermining the state and democracy. Resources are also creeping into antisemitic campus activities, which partly explains the sharp rise in anti-Jewish racism in many universities.
Iranian claims that they knew nothing of the attack on Israel on 7 October 2023, the single largest slaughter of Jewish people since 1945, are risible. Hamas receives funds and weapons from Tehran as well as directions. The present government has introduced criminal sanctions against those with undeclared links to Tehran, and that is to be welcomed. However, generally the response of the British state to the deranged murderers of Tehran has been inadequate to say the least. There has been a steadfast refusal, for instance, to proscribe the IRGC.
When the Conservatives were in power, Labour policy was to ban the IRGC outright. I can remember, in my time as an MP, hearing that policy enunciated very clearly again and again by Labour shadow ministers. Now that we are in government, Labour ministers are repeating exactly what their Tory counterparts said while they were in government, and the plan to proscribe the corps has been quietly dropped. Funny old world, isn’t it?
The culture at the Foreign Office (FCDO) is to engage with murderous psychopaths. That has been the case for many years and shows no sign of changing. Minister after minister, from both parties, will have been briefed that this should all be left to the clever chaps at the FCDO who really know what they are doing, unlike us oiks who might actually have an interest in opposing fascists.
To be clear, the government is moving in the right direction, introducing the sanctions mentioned above and increasing defence spending. We now have to rebuild our defence manufacturing capacity sharpish, which was largely and thoughtlessly abandoned in the early 90s without planning for any future contingencies and instabilities. To paraphrase Winston Churchill, the best way of avoiding war is by preparing for it. The government has announced hefty increases in defence spending and this is already being opposed by some on the left. This is to be expected. The previous Labour leader’s reference to Hamas and Hezbollah as his “friends” is notorious.
The greatest British foreign secretary ever, in my view, was Ernie Bevin. If he were around today, he would undoubtedly recognise the Tehran regime and its evil vanguard, the IRGC, for what they are. He would be aghast to learn that its members are operating on British soil. When faced with maniacs who are bent on slaughtering Jews and anyone else they don’t like, and returning women to the Stone Age, it is obvious that a deeply robust and confrontational response is needed.
