Alwaght-Death to America despite its appearance is not a negative or passive slogan. It also is not a tactic or temporal status but an active long-term approach which has positive aspects. How? Death to America was chanted to change a bad situation and indeed has an invasive nature. A system based on dominating other countries, laws, nation's costumes and traditions. Death to America came to existence to disrupt such a hegemonic system; so one can say that not only isn't "death to America" a passive slogan but is also an active one.
Death to America is the most expressive slogan in the literature of far-reaching nations who don’t surrender to west domination and came to the field to put an end to it. Because of this, USA and its European and non-European allies evaluate this slogan as the biggest cultural and political obstacle against their domination. Please pay attention to these statistics: leftist and Marxist anti-America slogans during 1920s and 1970s such as "negation of capitalism" and "negation of imperialism" produced 25 percent of hatred against America.
The American Pew research center released that Iran and its allies and supporters from early 1980s to 2010s produced an average of 80 percent of hatred against America and its international and regional allies and this rate reaches 88 percent among Muslim countries. The leftist anti-imperialism slogans' nature was only economical and political, but the death to America slogan in addition to economical and political aspects also entails aspects of culture and security. Indeed, leftists were no danger for the existence of hegemonic western system and only confronted with them in some restricted issues.
Today the death to America slogan created a great international front which Iran is in the heart of this front. This slogan made a strategic tie between Iran's nation and other nations of the world and its regional and international consequences and worked to the benefit of Iran's security and interests. In a trip to Muslim countries one can understand that death to America slogan has made Iran the most popular country in the region and at the same time made USA, Israel, Saudi Arabia and so on the most hated countries in the region. Their animosity towards Iran is obvious for all. So it is obvious that the death to America slogan has great international value for Iran and imposes cost, risk and damage on Iran's enemies.
West chose "Iran-phobia", "Shiite-Phobia" and "Islamophobia" in retaliation for death to America slogan and propagates them through media and diplomatic, political intelligence and security networks. Today west uses all facilities in order to shed the blood of Islamist, Shiites and Iran's supporters all over the world. Attacking the holy shrine of Imams, desecrating tombs of companions of the messenger in Syria, Jordan, Egypt, attacking mourning rituals in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq, destroying mosques in Bahrain and Azerbaijan, martyring clergymen and so on, all of them are in accordance with west's policy, However these hostile policies road to nowhere. Although Islamism and adherence to Shiite costs too much for their devotees, but their innocence and impact of their martyrdom nullify their plots to spread Iran-phobia and Islamophobia across the world and today everybody knows that all of these violations and assassinations are backed by western security and intelligence agencies.
While death to America approach has annoyed USA and on the other hand Iran-phobia plot is operated in the region, some politicians ask Iran's nation to put aside the death to America slogan, and in order to convince people to do that they fabricate stories about Imam Khomeini's view on this strategic slogan. They are memoir writers who think if Iran put aside the death to America slogan USA will change its hostile policy towards Iran; so they attribute their false and baseless analysis to Imam Khomeini; but Imam has always done his best to add force to the anti-America sentiment among Iran's nation. He described conquering America's nest of spies as "revolution greater than the first one" and also allocated an extensive part of his divine-political testament to the necessity of confronting USA and its agents. Imam in his last words said "stand firm, for America and its agents are seeking to destroy your independence and dignity for which the blood of thousand of noble people is shed." Imam in 1988 said "be aware, 10 years later some so called benefactors may blame sons of revolution who suffered a lot of pain and ask them why you chanted death to America slogan, why you fight for 8 years and why you occupied the corruption nest of America!"
Imam Khomeini didn't chant death to America slogan because of hatred, although he hated USA deeply. He never acted passively and he never caught in the trap of enemy. He made golden opportunities out of tough circumstances to achieve his goals and turned enemy's ruse to themselves. By means of death to America slogan, Imam blocked America's way to dominate Islamic countries and barricaded their way with obstacles, thorn and fire and made the ground unstable under the feet of Americans.
Death to America is not a cruel slogan but it can be explained and justified rationally. Although nation of America are culpable for tolerating oppressors such as Bush, Obama, companies and security and intelligence agencies who are ruling them; death to America doesn't mean death to a nation or country. Iranians, however, has never demanded death of the nation of America or their humiliation and has never programmed to do such violations. Reviewing history one can say that no American is killed by Iran's government or nation but thousands of Iranians directly or indirectly are killed by America; innocent people killed in Airbus plane, 17000 martyrs of terrorism and martyrdom of nuclear scientists and mujtahids of Hawzeh are examples of the hostility of USA against Iran.
If Iran's nation abandons death to America slogan, their regional and international influence will be diminished and they will also lose their authority and power. The recent New York and Geneva negotiations between Iran and west can prove this claim. Iran government accepted commencing a new round of negotiation in order to decrease its current economical problems but the only outcome of these negotiations is a long list of demands proposed by USA and Israel which is increasing from day to day. The cruel west which its hand is stained with blood of people of Iran calls Iran unreliable and argues that Iran should take long steps to build confidence without any expectation. Doubtless, our influence and security is tied with loud shout of death to America. This slogan isn't negative, passive or tactical motto but it is an international approach and will lead to increase in Iran's authority and influence at international level.
Sadollah Zarei
