What evil lurks within Ahmadinejad’s heart?

In 1941, a maternal great-great uncle, Alexis Ninaud, 61, having lived decades in the Russian Far East (RFE), was arrested and interrogated by KGB authorities. Almost 70 years later, his fate was revealed during a visit made by family members to the RFE where they gained access to old KGB records. Alexis had been caught up in a purge. Stalin’s wrath made it clear guilt was not a mandate for conviction—finding the right pre-ordained number of “spies” to be executed was. Although the KGB file lacked supporting evidence, Alexis was “found” to be a spy—and executed. Included in his file was a “mug shot,” revealing a man who seemingly knew his fate was sealed. His case was closed with the signature of a KGB officer whose own fate turned on finding a sufficient number of spies.

In 1945, a paternal grandfather—a U.S. Army medical doctor—was among the first U.S. forces to reach the Dachau concentration camp in Germany. Horrified by the presence of so many dead and dying, his attention immediately turned to saving what frail survivors he could. Among them was an extremely emaciated 6-year-old Jewish boy. For five days, the boy would make his way to pick up food rations before returning to a bunk in the camp that had been home for most his life. On the sixth day, he failed to show up, prompting a search. His lifeless body was found in his bunk—underneath which was a box containing most the food rations given to him by his liberators. Having learned to horde food his entire life—not knowing what tomorrow would bring—the boy proved unable to break the cycle, choosing to save rather than consume the nourishment upon which his survival depended. General Eisenhower ordered these atrocious camp conditions be documented “because somewhere down the road of history some fool will get up and say that this never happened.”

It is against the backdrop of the brutal acts of these two 20th-century madmen that those of a 21st-century fanatic must be measured.

The purges to which Stalin subjected his people are now visited upon the Iranian people by Ahmadinejad to “find” spies to support his allegations that post-presidential election domestic opposition stems from foreign influence. Additionally, with Ahmadinejad’s continuous claims the Holocaust never occurred, we see Eisenhower’s “fool” has arrived. A religious zealot blind to the cause of violence he has wrought at home as well as to the brutal acts wrought by past dictators, Ahmadinejad is incapable of comprehending the death and devastation to be wrought from using the nuclear weapons he seeks to develop.

A 1930s radio program made popular the exploits of a crime-fighting vigilante known as “The Shadow.” Each program ended with the foreboding observation, “Who knows what evil lurks within the hearts of men. The Shadow knows!”—followed by an ominous laugh. Ahmadinejad knows the evil lurking within his heart. He knows too the leader of the Western world remains blind to it as Obama holds out hope for a non-existent goodness genome.

If one listens closely, one can hear Ahmadinejad’s ominous laugh in the background.

Lt. Col. James Zumwalt is a retired Marine infantry officer who served in the Vietnam war, the 1989 intervention into Panama and Desert Storm. An author, speaker and business executive, he also currently heads a security consulting firm named after his father—Admiral Zumwalt & Consultants, Inc. His first book, “Bare Feet, Iron Will–Stories from the Other Side of Vietnam’s Battlefields,” based on his interviews with hundreds of North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong veterans will be released in April. (For details, please visit: www.jgzumwalt.com.)