WASHINGTON - The world has over the past months witnessed one of the periodic
upsurges of speculation in the ongoing drama over whether the United States
will attack Iran over its alleged nuclear weapons program.
Tehran test-fired some of its long-range ballistic missiles last week to signal
that it is taking the threat of an attack by Israel or the US seriously.
Subsequently, John Bolton, former US ambassador to the United Nations, wrote an
op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, saying, "We should be intensively considering
what cooperation the US will extend to Israel before, during and after a strike
on Iran. We will be blamed for the strike anyway, and certainly feel whatever
negative consequences result, so
there is compelling logic to make it as successful as possible."
Yet, ironically, the George W Bush administration, is, at least for the moment,
ignoring the calls of the neo-conservatives, and is pushing forward with some
of the highest-level diplomacy with Iran since the 1979 Iranian revolution.
Bush is sending Under Secretary of State William Burns, third in line at the
State Department, to talks this weekend aimed at curbing Iran's nuclear
ambitions. He is traveling to Geneva with the European Union's foreign policy
chief, Javier Solana, to talk to Iran's main nuclear negotiator, Saeed Jalili.
The move is reportedly fully supported by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
The initiative includes plans by the US to post diplomats in Tehran for the
first time since the revolution in the form of a US Interests Section - a move
halfway to setting up an embassy, subject to approval by Iranian President
Mahmud Ahmadinejad. Iran already has such a section based in Washington.
For those hardliners who want to overthrow the Iranian government, not
cooperate with it, these are unsettling moves. And a new monograph by the RAND
Corporation, a prominent US think-tank which has long produced reports on
various national security issues for the US Air Force, will likely only worsen
their mood.
The monograph, titled "Iran's Political, Demographic, and Economic
Vulnerabilities", finds that despite the theocratic basis of its state, Iran is
one of the more democratic countries in the Middle East. And despite these
authoritarian characteristics, most Iranians perceive the regime as legitimate.
Although many Iranians are dissatisfied with the authoritarianism of the
regime, few have been willing or prepared to act outside the electoral process.
It notes, "The regime appears to be under no imminent danger of collapse or
coup."
Given the July 7 New Yorker article by investigative reporter Seymour Hersh
that late last year the US Congress agreed to a request from Bush to fund a
major escalation of covert operations against Iran, to destabilize its
leadership, including support of the minority Ahwazi Arab and Balochi groups
and other dissident organizations, this will come as bad news.
Indeed, the report states, "Ethnic cleavages persist in Iran but do not provide
an easy means of swaying Iran's leadership. Although Persians, the dominant
group, account for only half the population, Iranian governments have been
relatively successful in inculcating an Iranian identity into citizens from
most other ethnic groups by emphasizing Shi'ism as a unifying force and
fostering Iranian nationalism."
This kind of reality-based truth telling is a refreshing, if rare, change from
what one normally sees in reports by government contractors. In a phone
conversation, Gary Sick, who was on the staff of the National Security Council
under presidents Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan, and was the
principal White House aide for Persian Gulf affairs from 1976 to 1981, and is
now the executive director of the Gulf/2000 Project at Columbia University,
said, "I was surprised also; it doesn't strike me as the kind of thing they
normally tell the AF [air force]. Basically, the underlying theory of what they
are proposing is that Iran needs to be brought into the international
community."
Sick added, "Dissident elements are not a threat to Iran. It is not an
effective strategy to try and overthrow the regime. It would require massive
resources and a long, long time. This is a 2,500-year-old entity. Most tribes
identify themselves as Iranian first; they are looking for more respect, not to
overthrow the government."
This is not to say Iran doesn't have vulnerabilities. A more pressing problem
for the Iranian government is how to satisfy expectations for higher quality
government services and lower-cost housing for Iranians living in urban areas.
Iranians endure some of the highest urban housing costs relative to incomes in
the world, making housing one of Iran's most pressing social problems.
The Iranian government also faces great pressure to generate employment for the
children of the 1980s population boom. The number of young people entering the
labor market has risen by four-fifths over the past two decades and is at an
all-time high.
But for neo-conservatives, the most alarming section of the RAND report is that
discussing the likely domestic consequences of US military actions against Iran
if Iran's facilities were to be bombed - public support for any retaliation its
government took would likely be widespread.
And at current oil prices, an attack would be unlikely to stop the Iranian
nuclear program. The government would be able to finance the reconstruction of
the facility and continue the current program without major budgetary
consequences.
The RAND report takes issue with the conservative position that an attack would
lead to Ahmadinejad's comeuppance. It says, "In our view, a more likely
response would be a strong push to retaliate. Critics of such a policy would
likely choose to keep silent."
According to Justin Logan, associate director of foreign policy studies at the
libertarian CATO Institute in Washington, DC, "What it highlights is that it
indicates the problem with US pressure, it is counterproductive."
According to Logan, the longer-term concerns Iran faces - economic, political
and demographic - are serious. "The one thing that will increase their
[rulers'] legitimacy is that if they are seen as the vanguard of resistance to
the great Satan."
The report also found that with respect to blockading Iranian oil exports, this
would probably do more to solidify public support for the regime than weaken
it. It noted that during the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s, living standards
plummeted. Yet opposition to the war was muted because most Iranians rallied
around the flag.
A sharp rise in the price of oil on the world market because of a massive
disruption of oil exports from the Persian Gulf would probably push the world
economy into recession.
All told, the RAND monograph and the trip by Burns confirm what Sick wrote this
week: "In other words, Bolton, as someone whose policies (in my view) are
certifiably insane, recognizes real pragmatism and moderation in Washington
when he sees it. And he does not like what he sees in this lame-duck
administration."
David Isenberg is an analyst in national and international security
affairs, sento@earthlink.net. He is also a member of the Coalition for a
Realistic Foreign Policy, an adjunct scholar with the Cato Institute,
contributor to the Straus Military Reform Project, a research fellow at the
Independent Institute, and a US Navy veteran. The views expressed are his own.
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