The staff of the Leader's office, members of Sepah-e Vali-e Amr (a military unit responsible for protecting the Leader of the Islamic Republic), and their families called on the Leader of the Islamic Revolution. The following is the full text of the speech delivered at the meeting on August 12, 2009 by Ayatollah Khamenei.
In the Name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful
First of all, I would like to congratulate you on these successive Eids - that is, birth anniversaries of Imam Hussein (a.s.), Imam Sajjad (a.s.), and Abolfazl al-Abbas (a.s.) - each of which is indeed a source of light for the hearts of Shia Muslims, a bedazzling beam of light. May God make these Eids auspicious for all of you. Being auspicious means happiness, spiritual peace, and reliance on Allah the Exalted. If you attain these things, all Eids will be auspicious for you. We must try to attain these things. We must try to make ourselves happy, fill our souls with divine peace, and increase our reliance on God on a daily basis.
We tend to trust the people, in the usual sense of the word, whom we have not observed doing anything bad. We borrow money from them. We trust them when they promise to do something for us. We usually trust them and make preparations, while we know that they are just human beings. They may change their mind, someone may dissuade them, they may simply forget their promise, or they may lose what they counted on to help us. A range of factors will probably prevent them from keeping their promise. Yet we trust them. Allah the Exalted has made many promises to believers: Guidance, protection, assistance in worldly affairs, and divine teaching "And keep your duty to Allah. And Allah teaches you." [The Holy Quran, 2: 282]. Allah the Exalted has made so many promises to us. Of course these promises are not absolute. There are some requirements, which are not very difficult to fulfill. We can meet these requirements. The reason is that Allah the Exalted has helped us whenever we fulfilled the requirements. The imposed war is a case in point. The youth who do not remember the imposed war should know that the day the imposed war broke out, all experts, analysts, and elites were positive that Saddam would win the war and that Iran would definitely be defeated. Only a limited number of people were, more or less, hopeful - those who believed in the Islamic view of things and in the Imam's perspective. Some people thought there was only a glimmer of hope. But others were more optimistic.
I have told this memory many times before. On the third or fourth day of the war, we had all gathered in a room at the military headquarters. Me, government officials, the president, the prime minister, a number of MPs, and some other people had all gathered there. At that time, Bani Sadr was the president and the late Rajai was the prime minister. We were discussing things and consulting each other. Some members of the army were there too. Then one of the army members came to me and said, "Some people are waiting in one of the rooms to talk to you privately." I got up and went to them. As far as I remember, there were the late Mr. Fakouri, and Mr. Fallahi as well as some other people in that room. I sat down and asked what the matter was. They took out a piece of paper and said, "Take a look at this."
I still have that piece of paper which was written by those esteemed brothers. It was a list of different military transport aircraft and warplanes we had - for example, F5, F4, C-130 and so on. They had listed 7-10 different types of aircraft. They had also written how many planes of each type were functional or how long it would take to prepare them for flight. They had listed the aircraft that required some spare parts - there are some parts that have to be changed after one or two flights. They told me it was not possible to replace some of those parts immediately and that some types of the planes would fall into disuse in, say, 5 or 10 days. They explained that some other types of the planes would fall into disuse in 12-15 days. C-130 was the best among them in that regard: It could fly for 30 or 31 days. That meant after 31 days the Islamic Republic would not have a single military aircraft - neither any warplanes nor any military transport aircraft. They said, "This is our military situation. Please, go and tell Imam about it." I would admit I felt a little disheartened. I thought to myself, what are we going to do without airplanes? The enemy was repeatedly attacking us with Russian aircraft. Of course their pilots were not as competent as our pilots, but their planes far outnumbered ours. Their planes were attacking our country one after the other. They were attacking us with different types of MIG aircraft.
I agreed to do what they said. I took the piece of paper to the Imam in Jamkaran. I told him, "These gentlemen are our commanders, and they are in charge of all our troops. They said our military planes will fly for 30-33 days at most. After that, we will not have a single aircraft. That is what they told me." I am just telling you the meaning of what the Imam told me, and I do not remember what he said word for word. Probably, I have noted down his exact words somewhere. The Imam had a look at the paper and said, "Why are you saying these things? You just tell them to go ahead and fight. God will set things right. Nothing bad will happen." From a logical point of view, the Imam's statements did not appear convincing to me. After all, he was not an expert on aircraft. But I had faith in his righteousness and insight and in God's support for him. I knew that Allah the Exalted had entrusted the Imam with a great task and that He would not abandon him. I had faith in all of this, so my heart was purged of uncertainty. I went back and told them, "The Imam said you should repair as many planes as you can and take action."
The same F4, F5, and F14 airplanes and other aircraft, which were supposed to fall into disuse after 5-6 days, are still being used by our Air Force. 29 years have passed now since that time, but the airplanes are still functional. Of course some of them were damaged or shot down during the war, and some of them were replaced by better models. But that attrition was accompanied by growth. Our engineers working in the related organizations managed to produce the aircraft parts we needed. They managed to plug the gaps, and much to the enemy's disappointment, they somehow managed to import some of the parts in spite of the sanctions. They managed to keep the aircraft functional. In addition, they learnt to manufacture two types of planes. As you know, our Air Force is currently manufacturing two types of airplanes: Military trainers and combat aircraft. Of course they are not identical to the original aircraft, but our engineers used the original models to design the new models. After all, that is what engineers do. They observe, gain experience, and design new models. In addition to what we have manufactured, we still have some of the original airplanes.
That was an instance of reliance on God and shows the truth of God's promises. When Allah the Exalted emphatically says that "surely Allah will help him who helps Him" [The Holy Quran, 22: 40], He will undoubtedly support those who help Him - that is, those who promote His religion. When God says this and you and I know that we are promoting God's religion, you must be assured that God will help us.
After the imposed war broke out, we witnessed divine support on many occasions. One of these occasions was when our POWs came back. About fifty thousand of our people were held captive. Of course we also held almost as many Iraqis captive. The difference was that the Iraqi captives were all members of the Iraqi military. But a large number of the people they held captive were ordinary Iranian citizens. They simply collected people from the streets and held them captive. After the war ended, I personally thought it would probably take 30 years to exchange all the POWs with Saddam. That was because we had seen prisoner exchange programs before. In the case of the world war, some countries claimed that there were some prisoners who were being held captive even 30 years after the world war had ended. Their claims were then rejected by other countries, and after engaging in numerous negotiations, they would occasionally achieve some positive results. There had to be hundreds of meetings and negotiations in order to prove that a small number of captives were still being kept in a particular country. This was a laborious process. That was the way Saddam behaved. He was a very moody, bad-tempered, evil, and cunning person. Whenever he felt he had some power, he used to show it somehow. That was what Saddam was. His nature was truly mean. Whenever mean people feel they are powerful, they will become so arrogant that they become absolutely uncompromising, making it impossible to make any deal with them. But whenever such people feel weak or whenever they are faced with more powerful people, they become extremely humble. As you saw, Saddam was begging Americans. Before Americans last attacked Iraq, Saddam was begging them to join hands with him against the Islamic Republic. But this time he was not lucky enough.
I thought the process of prisoner exchange would take around 30 years. Allah the Exalted set up a new occasion, and this idiot [Saddam] decided to attack Kuwait. He thought he needed to make sure Iran would not attack him before he went into war with Kuwait - of course the war he was planning to wage had been designed to fully occupy Kuwait. That was not possible while he was holding Iranians captive. He first wrote a letter addressing the then president as well as me. Because he did not receive an appropriate response from our country, he decided to unilaterally release Iranian POWs. All of a sudden, we were informed that the POWs were crossing the border into our country. They came back in groups one after the other. That was another instance of divine assistance. Such things have constantly happened until today.
You are my dear brothers and sisters. Those of you who are serving here to protect this place and those of you who handle bureaucratic responsibilities here as well as your family members are rendering truly valuable services. You are serving at a sensitive place. One piece of advice that I would like to offer you is that you should increase your insight. In many cases, the disasters that nations face are the result of lack of insight. The mistakes that some people make are the result of lack of insight - as you can see, in our own society ordinary citizens, and mostly elites, make some mistakes. Our elites are expected to make fewer mistakes, but sometimes their mistakes qualitatively, if not quantitatively, outnumber those of ordinary citizens. I would not claim that all of these mistakes are the result of lack of insight, but in the majority of cases the mistakes are due to lack of insight.
You must increase your insight and knowledge. I have constantly repeated the following sentence quoted from the Commander of the Faithful: "This flag [of religion] cannot be carried except by those who resist and have insight." [Nahjul Balaghah, Sermon 173] As you know, carrying Imam Ali's (a.s.) flag was more difficult in some respects than carrying the Prophet's (s.w.a.) flag. That is because, at the time of the Holy Prophet (s.w.a.), there was a clear line between enemies and friends. But under the flag of the Commander of the Faithful enemies were not clearly distinguished from friends: Enemies were saying the same things as friends, and they used to pray together at Imam Ali's camp. In the battles of Jamal, Siffin, and Nahrawan, the people in the opposing camp prayed as well. Now what would you do in such a situation? They tell you that the opposing camp is evil. But you may say, "Evil? But they are praying and worshiping God." Some of them, like Khawarij, used to perform highly elaborate prayers.
In the darkness of the night, one day the Commander of the Faithful approached the camp of Khawarij. He heard someone beautifully and impressively reciting a verse of the Quran in the middle of the night: "Is he who is obedient during hours of the night ..." [The Holy Quran 39: 9]. Another man, who was accompanying the Commander of the Faithful, said, "Good for the man who is reciting this verse so beautifully. I wish I were a hair on his body because he will undoubtedly go to Heaven and I will enter Heaven with him." Then the Battle of Nahrawan took place. After the enemies had been defeated and killed, the Commander of the Faithful went to bodies of the enemies. Passing by the bodies, he ordered his soldiers to roll the bodies onto their backs. Imam Ali talked to them. They were dead, but he wanted his companions to listen to what he was saying to the bodies. He ordered his companions to turn another person onto his back. Then he told the man who had accompanied him to the camp of Khawarij, "Do you know this man?" The man replied that he could not recognize the body. Imam Ali (a.s.) said, "This is the same body on which you wanted to be a hair, the body of the same man who was reciting the Quran in an impressive voice." They rose up against Imam Ali (a.s.), the talking Quran, in the Battle of Nahrawan and charged at him with their swords drawn. That was because of lack of insight. Lack of insight made them unable to understand the situation.
I constantly liken political arenas to a battlefield. When involved in a battle, if you do not have a map of the battlefield, there will be a chance that you will make great mistakes. That is why reconnaissance missions are carried out before a war. Reconnaissance is one of the most important phases of a military operation. Reconnaissance is carried out to closely inspect the position of the enemy and the organization of the troops in order to determine what should be done as the next move. If someone does not have this knowledge and does not know the battlefield or the enemy's position, he may suddenly realize that he is directing his mortar or artillery fire onto the friendly side. That is what happens if a soldier does not know the battlefield. Political arenas are exactly like this. If you do not have insight, if you cannot distinguish friends from enemies, you may suddenly realize that your propaganda artillery, your arguments, and your actions are directed at the side where friendly troops are positioned, not enemy troops. One must know the enemy. We must not make a mistake in distinguishing enemies from friends. Therefore, there is a need for insight and clarification.
Clarifying the realities is one of the most important things that our elites should do. They must clarify the realities without any bias and without taking partisan and personal considerations into account. These considerations are harmful. You must put partisan tendencies aside. You must try to understand the truth. During the Battle of Siffin, clarifying the realities was one of the most important duties of Ammar Yasir. That was because the opposing camp - that is, Muawiyah's camp - was making use of different forms of propaganda. Psychological warfare in the modern world is not something new. In the modern world, only new methods of spreading propaganda have been developed, but propaganda itself has been there for a long time. In fact, they were very skillful at psychological warfare in the past. When we look at what they did in the past, we can see how skillful they were. Generally, it is easier to ruin a thought than to build one. When you hear something and become somewhat doubtful, it will be easy for suspicion to enter your thoughts, but it will be hard to purge your mind of this suspicion. Therefore, they used to create doubts and suspicion. That was easy for them. Ammar Yasir was the one in Imam Ali's camp who considered himself responsible for neutralizing this psychological warfare. During the Battle of Siffin, Ammar Yasir rode on his horse to different parts of Imam Ali's camp and when he met different groups of the troops - which can be thought of as modern brigades and battalions isolated from one another - he stopped to talk to them for some time. He clarified the realties for them and tried to influence their thoughts. Sometimes he observed that there was conflict somewhere in the camp and that a group of the troops were doubtful. He quickly went there, talked to them, and clarified the realities. He resolved the problems.
Therefore, insight is important. It is the duty of the elites to create this insight not only for themselves but also for other people. Unfortunately, one can observe in some cases that some of the elites are suffering from lack of insight. They do not understand. They are unaware. Suddenly they thoughtlessly say something that will benefit the enemy whose camp has focused all its efforts on annihilating the Islamic Republic in one way or another. They are elites. They are not bad people. They do not have any evil intentions. But that is the way they behave. That is all due to lack of insight. This lack of insight can be compensated for, especially in the case of you dear youth, through reading good works, reflection, and consulting trustworthy and experienced people. Of course consulting that always leads to blind imitation - that is, accepting whatever you hear - is not advisable. Some people can convince you through reasoning. Even Imam Hussein (a.s.) used this method from the beginning of his movement. As these days are associated with Imam Hussein (a.s.), I would like to say a couple of things about him.
We must not just associate Imam Hussein (a.s.) with his battle on the day of Ashura. That was only one part of Imam Hussein's jihad. We must base our knowledge of him on his efforts to counsel people to do good, his advising people against evil, and his clarification of different issues to ulama and elites in Mina, Arafat, Karbala, and on his way to Karbala. Imam Hussein (a.s.) made extraordinary speeches that have been recorded in books. Even in Karbala Imam Hussein (a.s.) did not abandon clarification. He talked to different people. They were on a battlefield, waiting to kill one another. Yet Imam Hussein (a.s.) used every opportunity to talk to them in the hope that he would manage to awaken them to the realities. Of course some people who were unaware did wake up to the realities. But some others who were pretending to be unaware did not wake up in the end. Those who feign sleep are very difficult to awake, and sometimes it is even impossible to awake them.
By Allah's favor, these Eids will be auspicious for all of you. And I hope Allah the Exalted will bestow on all of you happiness, hope, peace, confidence, and dynamism to achieve your goals.
Greetings be upon you and Allah's mercy and blessings