[Mb-civic] In Search of an Iranian Policy

[Michael Butler]

This item is available on the Benador Associates website, at
http://www.benadorassociates.com/article/6397

IN SEARCH OF AN IRAN POLICY

by Amir Taheri
New York Post 
August 6, 2004

 August 6, 2004 -- AS if trying to add a last- minute item to a banquet
menu, the Bush adminis tration is busy concocting an "Iran policy" for this
month's Republican Party convention.

 In recent weeks, the administration has solicited input from many experts
and Iranian-Americans. There are no signs, however, that the end product
will amount to a blueprint for dealing with a problem set to dominate
America's Middle East policy for years.

 To some, it may be news that the first Bush administration is drawing to a
close without having worked out a policy outline on Iran. Many will be
surprised that National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice and her team have
produced National Security Directives (the standard guidelines on policy) on
more than 70 countries, but none on Iran.

 The reason for this paralysis is the Bush administration's divisions over
an analysis of the problem, not to mention possible solutions.

 Early in his presidency, Bush included Iran in an "Axis of Evil," and came
close to committing himself to regime change there.

 The Pentagon supported that position. The State Department, however,
retained the analysis made in the final year of the Clinton administration,
which saw Iran as "something of a democracy" with which the United States
must seek "positive engagement." The National Security Council avoided
taking sides by refusing even to commission a paper on Iran.

 The policy vacuum has encouraged some Republicans to try to commit the
United States to regime change in Iran through legislation, as happened with
Iraq during the Clinton administration. Meanwhile, some Democrats have tried
to exploit the Bush administration's lack of policy by promoting
rapprochement with Tehran.

This is in sync with Sen. John Kerry's long-held views. In a conversation on
the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, almost two
years ago, Kerry spoke of his desire to "engage Iran in a constructive
dialogue." Last December, in an address to the Council on Foreign Relations
(CFR) in New York, Kerry promised to adopt "a realistic, non-confrontational
policy with Iran," ultimately leading to normalization "just as I was
prepared to normalize relations with Vietnam, a decade ago."

 Last month, the CFR endorsed Kerry's position in a report on Iran produced
by a Task Force led by President Jimmy Carter's National Security Adviser
Zbigniew Bzrezinski and former CIA Director Robert Gates. The report amounts
to an attempt at reopening Iran to U.S. oil, aircraft, and construction
companies.

 Yet both sets of advocates ‹ of regime change and of détente ‹ base their
different strategies on a fundamental misunderstanding of the situation in
Iran.

 Advocates of "regime change" claim that the Islamic Republic is on the
verge of collapse and that what is needed is an extra push from America..
The promoters of détente insist that the Khomeinist regime is "solidly
entrenched" and that Iran is "not on the brink of revolutionary upheaval."

 Both are mistaken because they see Iran as a frame-freeze, ignoring the
realities of a dynamic political life. The "overthrow" party underestimates
the resilience of a regime that is prepared to kill in large numbers while
buying support thanks to rising oil revenues. The détente party, on the
other hand, underestimates the growing power of the movement for change in
Iran.

 Both camps also ignore the dialectics of the Irano-American relations. The
"overthrow" party ignores the fact that improving relations with Washington
could help the regime solve many of its economic and diplomatic problems,
thus strengthening its position. The détente camp fails to acknowledge that
a U.S. commitment to help the pro-reform movement win power in Iran could
alter "the solidly entrenched" position of the Khomeinists and encourage
"revolutionary upheaval."

 In other words, any U.S. action, or inaction, could help alter the picture
in Iran.

 Both the "overthrow" and the détente camps in Washington see Iran through
the prism that was used for determining policy on Iraq under Saddam Hussein.
But the Iranian system is not dependent on an individual and his clan. There
are internal mechanisms for change ‹ mechanisms which, if helped to function
properly, could produce the changes desired both by the people of Iran and
the major democracies led by the United States.

 Iraq was a tete-à-tete between Saddam and Washington. Iran is a triangle in
which the Iranian people, the Khomeinist regime and the United States have
different, at time complementary and at others contradictory, interests and
aspirations.

 Whatever the outcome of the coming U.S. presidential election, Washington
cannot equivocate on Iran much longer.

 Anyone with knowledge of Iran would know that a majority of the Iranian
people are unhappy with the status quo. America shares that discontented,
albeit for different reasons. The reasons for U.S. discontent cannot be
eliminated by endorsing the status quo in the name of détente: Instead, that
would help consolidate the regime, and policies, that caused the discontent
in the first place.

 The Iranian people and the United States share an interest in promoting
change in Tehran. But that shared interest does not mean that the people of
Iran would give Washington carte blanche for regime change.

 Iran is passing through a phase experienced by virtually all nations that
have emerged from a major political revolution. In such a phase, the
divergent interests of the state and the revolution come into conflict.

 Any student of Iranian politics would know that today there are two Irans.
One embodies the Khomeinist revolution that controls the instruments of
power; the other represents the Iranian nation-state as shaped over the past
400 years.

 In some cases the interests of the two coincide; in many more they diverge.

 Today, Iran is one of only two countries in the Middle East (the other is
Israel) where the United States enjoys popular support. The reason is that
the U.S. is seen as the only major power not yet prepared to appease the
Khomeinist regime.

 Those who preach détente are, unwittingly perhaps, trying to appease the
Khomeinists ‹ an ultimately self-defeating task. If implemented, their
policy could turn the people of Iran against the United States, thus,
paradoxically, underpinning the regime's anti-American message.

 Yet the "overthrow" scenario could also alienate the Iranian people by
confirming the Khomeinist claim that the U.S. "imperialism" is out to impose
its will, regardless of domestic popular movements.

 Rather than hastily endorsing half-baked ideas to fill the vacuum on Iran,
President Bush and Sen. Kerry should use the campaign for debating the issue
at some depth, thus allowing a more realistic understanding of Iran to
emerge as the basis of a serious policy. E-mail:

amirtaheri at benadorassociates.com

This item is available on the Benador Associates website, at
http://www.benadorassociates.com/article/6397