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US and Iran play it cool
By Ehsan Ahrari
It is not very often we hear
that the United States is having a change of heart,
particularly where Iran is concerned. But such talk is
currently making the rounds in Washington, and there are
some helpful signs supporting these whisperings, to be
sure, although no one should become Pollyannaish about
them just yet.
In an era when the US has been
concerned about the link between political extremism and
nuclear proliferation, Iran stands out like a sore thumb
in terms of its resolve to develop its nuclear program.
The neo-conservative-pro-Israeli nexus in Washington has
been quite adamant that Tehran's declared peaceful use
of nuclear energy is a facade; and that it really wants
to develop nuclear weapons.
The US tried to
apply pressure on Russia to suspend its nuclear ties
with Iran. But President Vladimir Putin would hear
nothing of it. Then the Bush administration wisely
decided to take the route of multilateral pressure on
Iran from the Europeans and the International Atomic
Energy Agency (IAEA). Lo and behold, it worked. Iran
accepted limits on its nuclear activities, and agreed to
make it transparent and available for intrusive
inspections. It is the willingness of Iran that has to
be examined from both the Iranian and the US sides.
As Iran surveys its immediate neighborhood, it
sees US forces on its eastern (Afghanistan)and western
(Iraq) borders. An equally troubling aspect of that
presence is that Afghanistan and Iraq are in a worst
state of political instability, especially the latter.
Al-Qaeda has a visible, if not a strong, presence in
both those countries. In fact, Iraq has become a fertile
ground for the jihadi forces that are bent on ousting
the US from Iraq.
Iran does not really seem know
whether to hope for the best or worst for the US in
Afghanistan and Iraq. It finds itself in a "no-win"
situation for the following reasons: If the US is
successful in stabilizing the two neighboring states,
Iran is afraid that the American hubris related to such
victories will be unlimited. Washington would then
attempt to apply the Bush doctrine of preemption and
regime change to Syria, and even to Iran. If, on the
contrary, the US was ousted (or decided to pull out)
from those countries, the resultant chaos would reach
Iran within no time.
Even as the security
situation in Iraq worsens for Washington, Iran has no
intention of providing President George W Bush with any
reason to consider the option of neutralizing its
nuclear power plants. Iran knows that the US possesses
enormous military capabilities to put those plants out
of service. Besides, it does not appear that Iran's
indigenous capabilities, or the availability of highly
enriched uranium stocks, are at such a point that it
could produce one or more nuclear weapons.
Under
these circumstances, there is no need to ratchet up the
conflict with the US on the nuclear issue. So, a
decision is made by Iran to comply with the demands of
the IAEA to open its facilities for intrusive
inspections.
It is also worth noting that Iran's
decision to open up its nuclear facilities for
inspection has the imprimatur of the hardliners. The
Iranian official who negotiated the deal with the
Europeans and the IAEA, Hasan Rouhani, is a cleric and
the head of Iran's Supreme National Security Council.
That agency is responsible for Iran's strategic
policies, security and intelligence. Rouhani reports
directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Sayed Ali
Khamenei. Khamenei's approval of the deal reminds one of
a similar choice made by the late Ayatollah Ruhollah
Khomeini in August 1988, when, under heavy domestic and
international pressure, he accepted a ceasefire in the
wake of continued setbacks encountered by Iranian forces
in the Iran-Iraq War. Presently, Iran is under similar
pressures from the United Nations, the Europeans and the
US.
Viewing the situation from Washington's
side, the Bush administration does not really want to
adopt a confrontational posture toward Iran at a time
when Iraq and Afghanistan are going through a phase of
growing internal turbulence. Washington needs a
breathing spell to concentrate on defeating the forces
of chaos, terror and disorder in those countries.
Besides, US domestic support for Iraq is eroding, with
daily attacks from the Democratic presidential
contenders on Bush's policies. Even though the US
economy has recently shown signs of progress, job losses
are becoming a contentious issue at a time when Bush
wants to spend billions on the reconstruction of Iraq.
Public opinion polls related to Iraq are also
slipping. A Gallop poll analysis on October 29 notes:
"When asked whether they approve or disapprove of the
way the United States has handled the situation with
Iraq since the major fighting ended, 47 percent of
Americans approve and 50 percent disapprove ... A
majority of the public, 57 percent, now favors a
reduction in the number of US troops in Iraq, including
18 percent who favor a complete withdrawal."
Under these circumstances, the Bush
administration sees little reason to confront Iran.
Besides, it was able to achieve Iran's willingness to
cooperate with the IAEA through diplomatic channels, a
reality that provides a considerable breathing spell to
hardliners on the US side as well in Iran.
If
there was any doubt left about the thinking of the Bush
administration, it was clarified during the recent
testimony of Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage,
when he assured that the current administration does not
favor a regime change in Iran.
These
developments notwithstanding, Iran and the US have a
long way to travel on the road of mutual cooperation
before one can be certain that rapprochement is indeed
in the making. The nuclear issue will be watched closely
by Washington as a litmus test of Iran's willingness to
cooperate with the international community. The issue of
the presence of al-Qaeda in Iran also seems murky.
Washington would want Iran to hand over al-Qaeda
suspects that are in its jails. Tehran has shown no
inclination toward that potential.
In addition,
ample clarifications are sought about purported
cooperation between al-Qaeda and al-Ansar operatives in
Iran and Iranian hardliners. Iran's rejection of the
peace process in the occupied territories is also a
contentious issue with Washington. However, since the
peace process is very much dead for now, no Iranian
support for its resuscitation is being sought from the
US side.
The US and Iran have been confronting
each other for so long that any semblance of
rapprochement sounds more important than its reality.
There is a lot of ambivalence on both sides. Armitage
was probably signaling that realty on the part of
Washington when he said that the US government "must
keep all available options on the table". He did not
elaborate, but a general understanding is that those
options include the use of force if necessary. Iran also
understands it. Now the question is, how long would it
forego adopting its own option of nuclear deterrence to
its very fragile bargaining position vis-a-vis
Washington?
Iran is watching how North Korea
would fare in its nuclear bargain with Washington after
supposedly acquiring nuclear weapons. In fact, it has
already made a public response to Armitage's apparent
conciliatory gesture when one government official in
Tehran told reporters, "You cannot threaten from one
side and freeze assets from the other side; level
accusations from one side and then request dialogue from
the other side; we need to see America's practical
steps."
No one is suggesting that Iran and the
US will kiss and make up any time soon; however, one
hopes that these positive public exchanges will lead to
quiet diplomacy. Talking is always better than fighting,
even when the nature of that "fight" is limited to
exchanging insults.
Ehsan
Ahrari, PhD, is an Alexandria, Virginia,
US-based independent strategic analyst.
(Copyright 2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd.
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