BOOK
REVIEW Iran nuclear diplomacy: An
insider's take National
Security and Nuclear Diplomacy, by Hassan
Rowhani
Reviewed by Farideh Farhi
National Security and Nuclear Diplomacy
was published in Iran during the autumn of
2011, but most people only learned about it
recently after it was made available during
Tehran's International Book Fair in May. It is
significant because the author is Hassan Rowhani,
the country's nuclear negotiator for 22 months
during the presidency of Sayyid Mohammad Khatami
(August 1997 - August 2005) - just one of the many
positions he has held since the inception of the
Islamic Republic of Iran. The book - a
publication of the Center for
Strategic Studies (CSR), which Rowhani directs -
is now in its third printing. CSR is affiliated
with the Expediency Council in which Rowhani
continues to be a member.
Going beyond the
nuclear issue, I recommend this book to anyone who
is interested in understanding Iran's
post-revolutionary politics and how the
fundamental changes in its structure of power have
transformed the decision-making process in the
country from one-man rule to a collective
enterprise.
The details revealed in
Rowhani's book about how decisions were made in
restarting Iran's nuclear program in the late
1980s, as well as in negotiations with the EU 3
(Britain, Germany and France) are very
interesting. The section explaining why
negotiations failed with the EU 3, titled "Why
Europe Could not Capitalize on the Opportunity?",
should be read by anyone who believes that Iranian
negotiators had no reason to be suspicious of the
EU 3's intent and mode of operation.
Those
interested in learning about the dynamics of
Iran's national security calculus will also find
ample information about the changes that occurred
in the Supreme National Security Council after
9/11 and Rowhani's take on why these changes are
not sufficient to overcome some basic flaws in
Iran's decision-making process. Rowhani's opinions
about wrong policy choices made by subsequent
nuclear teams are also included.
But the
value of this book really lies first in the fact
that it was written with a domestic audience in
mind and second in the frank defense - and by
implication promotion - of that approach to the
same domestic audience.
But let me be
clear that by "domestic audience" I do not
necessarily mean the Iranian population at large
whose views about national security are, like in
every other country, shaped more by the national
security establishment than the other way around.
More than anything else, this is a book generated
from debates and disagreements within Iran's
political establishment that is intended to
influence the continuing mutation of that debate.
After all, today, the Khatami era nuclear
negotiators are routinely accused of passivity,
even treason, by Iran's hard-line security
establishment.
Less than two weeks ago,
during a meeting with Iranian officials, Supreme
Leader Ali Khamenei stated that the EU 3 would not
even agree to the Iranian offer of "only three
centrifuges running" and that had he not
intervened in the nuclear file, the Iranian
"retreat" would have continued.
But unlike
Rowhani's other detractors, Khamenei does
acknowledge that the failed negotiation with the
EU 3 was a needed experience. And, by using direct
quotes from Khamenei, this is a point that Rowhani
keeps highlighting: every decision made on the
nuclear dossier was made by consensus and had
Khamenei's endorsement.
Moreover,
preventing the referral of Iran's nuclear dossier
to the UN Security Council at a time when the US
was at the height of its military adventurism was
a major achievement that assured Iran's security
and also provided the country with time to prepare
for future challenges.
However, the
defense of his nuclear team's performance is not
the only aspect of Rowhani's book. He not only
sheds light on the nature of domestic opposition
to the 2003-05 nuclear negotiations (political as
well as based on ignorance about Iran's posture in
the negotiations), he also criticizes the mistakes
made by subsequent negotiating teams.
Rowhani chastises, for example, the team
lead by Ali Larijani - who in August 2005 replaced
Rowani as Secretary of the Supreme National
Security Council - for thinking that there was no
need to continue negotiations with Europe despite
his warning that reliance only on the "East" -
read Russia and China - was a mistake. He also
suggests that the new nuclear team did not take
seriously enough the "very dangerous" September
2005 resolution of the International Atomic Energy
Association's (IAEA) board of governors. Rowhani
states flatly, "it was after September 2005 that
the new nuclear team realized the [limited] weight
of the East! And then they went looking for the
West, which was of course already too late."
As to Iran's current predicament, Rowhani
acknowledges Iran's technological progress: "We
can say that 20% enrichment has in some ways
created increased deterrence". But he adds that
given the "heavy cost paid", Iran's technology
"should have progressed more." More significant is
Iran's undesirable political and legal struggle
given the referral of Iran's file to the Security
Council. Rowhani concludes National Security
and Nuclear Diplomacy by stating:
... now taking [Iran's file] out of
the Security Council is a complex and costly
affair. In effect, we have endured the biggest
harm in the areas of development and national
power. We may have not benefited much on the
whole in terms of national security either. The
foundation of security is not feeling
apprehensive. In the past 6 years, the feeling
of apprehension has not been
reduced.
Rowhani does not challenge
Iran's nuclear posture. He is a committed member
of the Islamic Republic and supporter of its
nuclear program in the face of what he considers
to be recalcitrant hostility. His criticism is
quite different than the criticism of those -
mostly among the Iranian Diaspora - who have
challenged the utility of Iran's nuclear program
or the objectives of Iran's rulers.
His
charge is much more ordinary and damning: the
subsequent nuclear teams made key mistakes,
miscalculated, and politicized the nuclear dossier
in order to enhance their domestic standing and
harmed the interests of the Islamic Republic
during the process.
Given the fact that,
according to Rowhani, none of the nuclear
decisions made in Iran could be made without
Khamenei's endorsement, this book is also a
devastating critique of the latter's endorsement
of the clumsy way Iran has negotiated with West.
Rowhani may be right or wrong in arguing
that Iran's condition would have been different
with better Iranian negotiators, a better
understanding of Iran's predicament and
limitations in finding allies, and better
diplomacy. After all, the American and European
posture of no enrichment in Iran has persisted
with or without Rowhani.
What I do not
doubt, however, is the fact that no one could have
published a book like this before the revolution.
Used with permission of lobelog.com ,
Jim Lobe's blog on US foreign policy.
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