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04/20/2006
Iran...Differing Views
Following are various thoughts on how to handle Iran from the
Spring 2006 edition of The National Interest. I will continue to
offer my own sentiments in my “Week in Review” column.
Former national security advisor Brent Scowcroft:
“To deter Tehran, it is essential that there be a united front
between the United States, the European Union, Russia and
China to prevent Iran from exploiting any differences or finding
any sort of wiggle room that would allow it to continue with its
program.
“The issue, of course, is that under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty (NPT), Iran – as well as any other signatory of the NPT –
is entitled to a fuel cycle as part of its right to peacefully utilize
nuclear energy for civilian use. The problem is that the process
and equipment for enriching uranium and reprocessing spent fuel
for peaceful purposes is identical to that for producing weapons-
grade material.
“What we need to do, therefore, is find a mechanism that will
allow all NPT countries to enjoy all of the benefits of a civilian
nuclear energy program while preventing the production of
weapons-grade nuclear material under close supervision.
“The permanent five members of the Security Council [U.S.,
Britain, France, China and Russia] should be prepared to make
the following offer to Iran. Acknowledging that Tehran has
every right to exploit nuclear energy for civilian use, Iran should
be guaranteed an adequate supply of nuclear fuel for its reactors
(under a use-and-return system such as that proposed by Russia)
in return for abiding by all IAEA regulations. This, in turn,
should serve as the basis for a new international fuel-cycle
regime that applies to all countries. Any approach to stemming
nuclear proliferation that singles out specific countries – such as
the Bush Administration is doing with Iran – is not likely to
succeed.”
[Scowcroft is against the U.S.-India nuclear deal because in
assessing the character of regimes and governments, the U.S.
opens up divisions among the world’s nuclear powers, “with
each making a list of ‘friends’ who can be trusted with nuclear
technology and ‘foes’ who are dangerous risks.]
“Iran’s strategy remains predicated on the assumption that no
‘united front’ is possible, that even if the United States, the
European Union, Russia and China all agree that a nuclear-
capable Iran is undesirable, disagreement over tactics will
preclude any effective action. The Bush Administration needs to
be prepared to find common ground with the other permanent
members of the Security Council. This includes being prepared
to talk to the Iranians and to put the question of security
guarantees on the table. Indeed, something that might develop as
a result of this process would be a move toward giving all non-
nuclear states firm security guarantees about safeguarding their
independence and territorial integrity as a way to further provide
incentives for current non-nuclear states not to pursue a nuclear
program .
“(We) also need to recognize that, in the case of Iran, we need to
be prepared to strike deals with the other major powers to take
their interests into account. In particular, China is caught
between its stated desire not to see Iran become a nuclear
weapons state and its growing energy dependence on Iran. The
United States and other countries should be prepared to
guarantee to China that if, as a result of pressure placed on Iran
to give up its nuclear weapons program, oil and gas supplies to
China are affected, all efforts will be undertaken to minimize the
disruption to the Chinese economy, and at a minimum that China
would suffer no more than anyone else .We should never take
the stance that ‘virtue is its own reward’ when dealing with a
serious issue like nuclear non-proliferation.”
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Ray Takeyh, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations:
“After 27 years, the complexion of the Iranian regime is
changing. An ascetic ‘war generation’ is assuming power with a
determination to rekindle revolutionary fires long extinguished.
“For (Iranian President Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad and his allies,
the 1980-88 war with Iraq defined their experiences, and it
conditions their political assumptions. The Iran-Iraq War was
unusual in many respects, as it was not merely an interstate
conflict designed to achieve specific territorial or even political
objectives. This was a war waged for the triumph of ideas, with
Ba’athi secular pan-Arabism contesting Iran’s Islamic
fundamentalism. As such, for those who went to the front, the
war came to embody their revolutionary identity. Themes of
solidarity, sacrifice, self-reliance and commitment not only
allowed the regime to consolidate its power, they also made the
defeat of Saddam the ultimate test of theocratic legitimacy .
“(But while) many Iranians wanted to forget the war (after
Ayatollah Khomeini suddenly declared it to be over), for people
like Ahmadinejad the war, its struggles and its lessons are far
from being a faded memory: They are constantly invoked. In
his much-discussed speech in front of the UN General Assembly
in September, Iran’s new president used the platform offered to
him to pointedly admonish the gathering heads of state for their
shortcomings:
‘For eight years, Saddam’s regime imposed a massive war of
aggression against my people. It employed the most heinous
weapons of mass destruction, including chemical weapons,
against Iranians and Iraqis alike. Who, in fact, armed Saddam
with those weapons? What was the reaction of those who claim
to fight against WMDs regarding the use of chemical weapons
then?’
“A pronounced suspicion of the United States and the
international community would come to characterize
Ahmadinejad’s perspective. After all, neither America’s human
rights commitments nor the many treaties prohibiting the use of
weapons of mass destruction saved Iran’s civilians and
combatants from Saddam’s wrath. The lesson that the veterans
drew from the war was that Iran’s independence and territorial
integrity could only be safeguarded by its own initiatives and not
by international legal compacts and Western benevolence .
“(So) while much of Iran had moved on in the 1990s, the austere
veterans nursed their grievances and, more ominously, assumed
important positions in the security services and the
Revolutionary Guards. The move to political office was natural,
even inevitable.
“ ‘We must return to the roots of the revolution,’ proclaimed
Ahmadinejad during his many campaign stops.”
[But instead of empty campaign promises and slogans, there was
something different about Ahmadinejad. He really meant what
he said, as Takeyh wrote, that the problems could be resolved if
Iran went back to its revolutionary roots.]
Iran had grown soft, Ahmadinejad felt, but for “Iran to be
revitalized and reawakened, its leaders had to capture the moral
cohesion and the stern discipline of those who bravely
confronted Saddam’s war machine. The instrument of Iran’s
redemption had to be Islam – not the passive, indifferent,
establishment Islam, but the revolutionary, politicized and
uncompromising devotion that launched the initial Islamic
Republic under the leadership of Grand Ayatollah Khomeini.”
Takeyh writes of the perceptions of America.
“For the aging mullahs such as Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei
and the more pragmatic head of the Expediency Council,
Hashemi Rafsanjani, America remained the dominant actor in
Iran’s melodrama. For the hardliners, the United States was the
source of all of Iran’s problems, while for the older generation of
more pragmatist conservatives it was the solution to the
theocracy’s mounting dilemmas. In either depiction, America
was central to Iran’s affairs .
“In terms of their international perspective, Ahmadinejad’s
generation of conservatives does not share its elders’
preoccupation with America. Their insularity and their ideology-
laden assumptions about America as a pernicious, imperial
power lessen their enthusiasm for coming to terms with a country
long depicted as the ‘Great Satan.’”
For the younger hardliners, power is flowing eastward. The head
of the Supreme National Security Council, Ali Larijani, speaks of
Russia, China and India as playing “a balancing role in today’s
world,” while the mayor of Tehran, Muhammad Qalibaf,
declared, “In the current international arena we see the
emergence of South Asia. And if we do not take advantage of
that, we will lose.”
The war generation is indifferent to the United States.
Ahmadinejad said “Our nation is continuing (its) path of progress
and on this path has no significant need for the United States.”
Then there is Israel. Ahmadinejad:
“Anybody who takes a step toward Israel will burn in the fire of
the Islamic nations’ fury.”
Ray Takeyh:
“In essence, Iran’s president was suggesting that the Islamic
Republic, on behalf of the entire Islamic community, would no
longer be prepared to accept a peace treaty that was endorsed by
the Palestinian officials and the Arab states. Indeed, Iran would
not just continue its assistance to radical Palestinian groups
determined to scuttle any peace treaty, but would potentially
renew its earlier policy of seeking to subvert Arab regimes that
normalized ties with the Jewish state.”
Takeyh’s conclusion:
“As Iran plots its nuclear strategy, the American demands that it
relinquish its fuel-cycle rights granted to it by the NPT have
aroused an intense nationalistic uproar. Larijani emphasized this
point, stressing, ‘Access to nuclear technology is our right and
[we] will insist on it.’ As a country that has historically been the
subject of foreign intervention and the imposition of various
capitulation treaties, Iran is inordinately sensitive of its national
prerogatives and sovereign rights. The new rulers of Iran believe
they are being challenged not because of their provocations and
previous treaty violations, but because of superpower bullying.
In a peculiar manner, the nuclear program and Iran’s national
identity have become fused in the imagination of the hardliners.
To stand against an impudent America is to validate one’s
revolutionary ardor and sense of nationalism. Thus, the notion of
compromise and acquiescence has limited utility to Iran’s
aggrieved nationalists.
“It is still too early to suggest that Iran is re-entering the dark
ages of the early revolutionary period. The Islamic Republic is a
government ruled by factions and competing power centers. The
intriguing aspect of Iran that tends to persistently puzzle Western
observers is that these political factions never completely lose
their influence despite poor electoral performance. The fact
remains that they all represent important constituencies and have
a presence in the complicated web of informal and formal
institutions that govern the Islamic Republic .
“However, it is undeniable that a new, harsh political tendency
led by a severe war generation has infiltrated the corridors of
power. Ahmadinejad and his allied faction (with their powerful
appeals to Khomeini’s legacy and open contempt for their elders’
corruption) cannot be discounted or dismissed. Although it may
be difficult for a Western audience to appreciate, Ahmadinejad’s
message of economic populism and nationalistic self-assertion
does enjoy a level of public support, particularly among the
lower classes struggling with Iran’s inequalities. A strident new
voice has now enshrined itself within the landscape of the
Islamic Republic, pressing Iran toward confrontation abroad and
reaction at home.”
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W. Patrick Laing, former head of Middle East Intelligence at the
Defense Intelligence Agency, and Larry C. Johnson, formerly of
the CIA and State Department:
“Contemplating the Ifs”
“In (an) atmosphere of building tension, Iran is not going to sit
idly by and wait for America to crush it. Tehran has nearly
achieved the installation of a friendly government on its western
border. While U.S. Bases in Iraq could potentially be used to
infiltrate Iran with spies and commandos and, more importantly,
to support and launch air strikes, those bases are vulnerable
politically, not to mention logistically. The supply lines of food,
water, fuel and bullets to U.S. bases run from Kuwait to the north
and through the Iraqi Shi’a heartland. Iranian intelligence
agencies have given Iraqi Shi’a massive support since the U.S.
invasion. The Shi’a are well organized and control the country
through which U.S. supplies are moved. Islamic militants loyal
to the likes of Ali al-Sistani and Moqtada al-Sadr could easily cut
vital supply lines.
“Iran can also play the oil card. If Iran were attacked, Iran could
halt its oil exports and thereby immediately impact the global
price. It would be unwise to hope that Iran, as part of its national
security plan, is not willing to shut down Persian Gulf oil
exports. Iran is well equipped to shower Persian Gulf states and
oil fields with missiles, or to shut down exports with a variety of
other military, terrorist or political methods. At a minimum, a
U.S. military air campaign, even if successful in wrecking the
Iranian nuclear program, would severely disrupt oil markets for
at least six months .In addition, there are countries sympathetic
to Iran, such as Venezuela, that have indicated they are more
than willing to cut off their oil supply to the United States. The
U.S. could find itself facing a 20-30 percent shortfall in oil
imports (and that estimate assumes that the Saudi fields are
untouched and that oil imports continue to flow unimpeded).
“Finally, Iran can play the global terror card. Unlike Al-Qaeda,
groups tied directly to Iran continue to have robust capabilities
and could cause a lot of trouble over the short term. Hizbullah in
particular has a significant presence in South America. U.S.
commercial and transportation assets there would certainly be
targeted, further inflicting damage to the U.S. economy .
“(And) what would the Chinese do? They hold a substantial
amount of U.S. debt. What happens if they decide to find some
other currency to hold instead of the dollar? This could add an
entirely new and dangerous dimension to an attack on Iran. Put
simply, the United States spends too much and saves too little,
and Asia saves too much and spends too little. The Chinese
would view a disruption in the flow of oil out of the Persian Gulf
as a damaging blow to the U.S. economy. Although the dollar
traditionally has been the currency people seek during a crisis,
the growing imbalance with China creates new dynamics that
could convince the Chinese that holding dollars no longer made
economic sense. Under such a scenario, dumping dollars on the
international market would trigger an inflationary spiral in the
United States .
“The point for U.S. planners and policymakers, though, is to
recognize that war brings unintended consequences that go well
beyond the tactical realities on the ground where the fighting
occurs. At a minimum, we should contemplate how a pre-
emptive military strike in Iran could harm other U.S. foreign
policy interests. A crisis in Iran would not occur in a vacuum .
“What would be the posture of the United States if the Iranians
gain nuclear weapons? Would we maintain forces in the Persian
Gulf and in Iraq? How safe would Europe feel, given the ranges
of ballistic missiles Iran is developing, plus those that the
Chinese have previously sold to Middle Eastern countries (Saudi
Arabia, for example)? In the end, it may become necessary to
confront Iran militarily over its emergent nuclear power status,
but the costs would be so high that all diplomatic resources
should be exhausted before such measures are adopted.”
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I am headed overseas for a spell ending up in the Far East.
Hott Spotts will return on May 11. In the meantime, peruse the
archives!
Brian Trumbore
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