Sarajevo became a byword for assassination
as casus belli, and Syria's apparent
involvement in the February 14 murder of former
Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri might be
misread as a signal for the US going to war in the
Middle East, be it against Syria or Iran.
The murder of Austria's crown prince in
July 1914 precipitated World War 1, but in this
case, the only thing likely to precipitate is the
ruling Assad family of Syria.
In Iran, a
noteworthy set of statements from the Iranian
leadership during the past several days makes it
clear that the Islamic republic believes it can
obtain its objective without confrontation. As
matters stand, Tehran is likely to succeed.
I do not believe any formal understanding
is in place, but the
probable outcome is that
Washington will refrain from military action to
forestall Iranian nuclear arms developments, while
Tehran will refrain from disrupting Washington's
constitutional Potemkin Village in Iraq. Iran has
the initiative, and the proof of the pudding is
that Iran's press agency IRNA provides better
guidance about the course of events than the
Western media.
The Syrian affair is a
diversion. Less than any other political entity
from the Mediterranean to the Indus does Syria
resemble a nation, and its ruling clique has no
friends, only customers. If the United Nations
investigation of the Hariri killing leads to the
downfall of the Assad family, strategic
implications will be small, and mourners few. Iran
is a different matter.
Compare two
reports, the first from the Iranian service on
October 20:
Director General of International
Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) [and Nobel Peace
Prize laureate] Mohamed ElBaradei said on
Thursday that he was optimistic about the future
of Iran's nuclear dossier and settlement of
relevant issues. In a meeting with Iran's
ambassador to Vienna and Iran's permanent envoy
to the Vienna-based international bodies,
Mohammad-Mehdi Akhoundzadeh, ElBaradei said that
resolving the crisis is moving on the right
track and hoped that all the concerned parties
would do their best to this effect.
And the second, from Supreme Leader
Ali Khamenei at his October 21 sermon:
Ayatollah Khamenei said holding the
referendum on the constitution was "a great and
blessed job." He said the Iraqi nation is making
its first constitutional law in its history and
this is not absolutely what the Americans want.
"In spite of what the Americans pretend, they
are pursuing other things in Iraq," said the
ayatollah. He went on to say, "The next
important step in Iraq after the referendum is
the general elections on which the occupiers are
planning right now." The Supreme Leader
expressed his concern over the disputes
currently observed in Iraq between the Shi'ites
and the Sunnis, adding some extremists who know
nothing about Islam are trying to add fuel to
the fire. "These elements [extremists] are
neither Sunni nor Shi'ite but are the enemies of
both and Islam," Ayatollah Khamenei reiterated.
The "extremists" to which Khamenei
refers include Muqtada al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army.
That is of special significance for Washington,
for the American side blames Khamenei for turning
Muqtada loose in the first place.
William
Kristol's The Daily Standard wrote on October 5,
"As early as September 2002, Ali Khamenei placed
General Suleimani [commander of the
extraterritorial Qods force] in charge of
organizing various Iraqi groups as part of an
Iranian plan to dominate the country following
Saddam's removal ... Yet it was not until April
2004 and the beginning of Muqtada al-Sadr's failed
uprising that the Qods Force would truly make its
presence in Iraq felt." If Washington believes
that Muqtada is Khamenei's dog, then Khamenei can
credibly promise to muzzle him.
As I wrote
on October 12 (The blood is the life, Mr
Rumsfeld!), not so much Sunni as
radical Shi'ite opposition to the proposed Iraqi
constitution made its approval in the October 15
referendum questionable. But I did not anticipate
that the Iranian leadership would pull chits to
help pass the American-designed constitution, and
lavishly praise it afterwards.
Khamenei
and Iran's President Mahmud Ahmadinejad remind us
that the Persians invented chess. By providing
resources not only to Shi'ite "extremists" but to
the Sunni resistance as well, they set the stage
to withdraw such support, making a concession for
which they would be rewarded in turn.
Tehran thinks strategically, as befits a
country with a government newly elected by an
overwhelming majority (The living fossils'
vengeance, June 28), while Washington
thinks politically. President George W Bush is
struggling to persuade the American public of the
wisdom of his nation-building scheme in Iraq, and
badly wants the Iranians to keep their hands in
their pockets. Iran is prepared to do so as long
as America keeps its opposition to its nuclear
program within the confines of the diplomatic
cul-de-sac defined by the International Atomic
Energy Agency.
In this exchange, Iran
gives up nothing of importance, for the rage of
the Iraqi Shi'ites will only wax over time. Tehran
retains the option to stir things up in Iraq
whenever it chooses to do so. Its capacity to do
so will increase with time as Iraq grows less
stable. Time is on the side of Tehran. Only with
great difficulty could the US employ military
means to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear
weapons; once Iran has acquired them, the military
balance will shift decisively in favor of the
Iranians.
The analogy to draw between
today's Middle East and the preparations for World
War I is not Sarajevo, but rather the First
Morocco Crisis of 1905. A timid Kaiser Wilhelm II
avoided confrontation with France at a moment when
the German army might have trounced the French
without English intervention. The diplomats gave
the armies of Europe another nine years to even
out the balance of power, ensuring that when war
came, as it inevitably must, the outcome would be
a sanguineous stalemate (In praise of premature
war, October 19, 2004).
Over
the next generation, Iran faces a devastating
demographic crisis, coincident with the peak in
its capacity to export oil. Tehran's
aggressiveness is a strategic response to the dual
crisis (Demographics and Iran's imperial
design, September 13). But Tehran's
leaders single-mindedly pursue a strategic
objective, namely nuclear power status, while the
Bush administration frets about exit strategies
and opinion polls. What will happen next in Iraq?
The best answer would be, "Whatever Tehran wants
to happen." If Tehran can buy American diffidence
with respect to its nuclear program in return for
reducing instability on the ground, we well may
see a period of relative calm in Iraq. But the
calm will be deceptive; it will be the calm of
1905, and the clock will continue to tick.
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